New Pictures

Luke enjoying his first biscuit
Mommy and Claire building a gingerbread house
Luke is crawling!!!
Happy Claire

Thanksgiving and Birthday parties!

I haven't posted in a while. It seems like I haven't had a spare minute to write anything. Well, we had a great time in Colorado. The trip didn't turn out like we thought it would, but we still had fun. When we got up to my parents house we found out that there was a huge recall on my SUV. GM ended up buying my car back from us, and we got to buy a brand new Torrent! It was a little stressful, but it was a relief to drive home in something safe! The week after we got home I spent every second of it cleaning... yuck. We had two parties at our house on Saturday. The first party was Claire's Second birthday party. I still can't believe she is two! It was very small, with just a few friends, and Claire had sooo much fun! The second party was our life group Christmas party. I am so thankful to have such good friends. Now that the parties are over I can start getting ready for Christmas. Both sets of our parents will be coming for Christmas, we are very excited. I haven't even started my Christmas shopping yet.
Luke update: Luke is almost crawling! Actually, you could probably say he IS crawling, he is just lacking some coordination! He gets were he wants to go, that's all that matters! He is also eating solids now, and the boy LOVES his food!!
Claire update: It seems like she is a big girls now... she is talking in small sentences, and you can actually understand most of her words! She loves to help with everything, especially of it involves Luke!
And last but not least... Congratulations Kevin, Angie and Natalie, on a new baby girl! We are so happy for y'all. We can't wait to meet her!
Here is a quick slide show with pictures from Thanksgiving and Claire's party...

We made it.

Well, for those of you that wondered... we made it to Colorado. It was a lonnnng trip with the two munchkins, but we did it. Imagine this: Jeff driving, me in the passenger seat, Luke SCREAMING and Claire watching Diego for the 50th time. Oh, and The Killers playing really loud to drown out the screaming and Diego. Your jealous that you were not in the car right? Well, just thought I would leave a quick update! More soon...

Thankful...

Hi all... I'm sure that some of you received this link in an email, or if you frequent youtube you might have seen this too. I usually don't put things like this on my blog, but this one really got to me. If you have kids, or you want kids, you really should watch this. It's about car seats, i know... not that interesting right? Well, take the time to watch this. I learned a lot from this video. I am very quick to use the seat belt to latch Claire's car seat in to the car instead of using the latch system. Anyway, on a lighter note, we are off to Colorado for Thanksgiving! Should be sooo much fun! Here are a few things that I am Thankful for...

1. Jesus
2. Jeff
3. Claire and Luke
4. Our families
5. Our friends
6. Jeff's job
7. Naps

I hope that you and your families have a very blessed Thanksgiving!

What do you think?

"Do not kiss your children so they will kiss you back, but so they will kiss their children."
-Noah Benshea

How do you feel about this quote? I really like it.

hello there...

I haven't blogged in a while. I will catch you up. Last weekend we had some friends over for dinner. Fun was had by all...even the kids. In all, there were three 5 1/2 month olds, and Claire. Claire had a great time playing with Korben and Eliana, Luke is old news. Let's see... there was more medical drama in our house. I feel like a live in an episode of "ER". Luke had a reaction to an antibiotic. Jeff took him to urgent care, and I took him to his doctor the next day. He's fine, but while we were in the office the doctor noticed Claire's constant wheezing. She decided that her current meds are not working well enough, so now we have to do breathing treatments a few times a day. How do you get a 2 year old to sit still for thirty minutes you ask? Diego. Go, Diego, Go!!! Claire is SO over the Wiggles, she has moved on to Diego. Well, that pretty much gives you a snapshot of my previous week... here are some pictures for your enjoyment!


Claire enjoying some pre-dinner "dip"!

Korben and Luke (BFF)
Claire, Korben, Eliana and Luke Korben, Eliana and Luke
Luke and his pretty rash!
I'm sooo tired...

Naked again, and again...

Does anyone know how to keep a almost two year old from stripping? Claire will NOT leave her clothes on. Every time I turn around she has taken her clothes off. That is fine and all, except, it is getting a little too cold to be in the nude! This will be a short post... however I wanted to share two videos with you all. The first video is of Luke and his friend Natalie. As you will see, Luke LOVES Natalie! The second video is of Claire, Grant and Natalie jumping on our bed (Claire's second favorite past time. Her first is getting naked!) I hope you all have a great weekend.

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Happy Halloween...

Our little Peyton Manning

Daddy, Claire (the Colt's cheerleader) and Natalie (the OU cheerleader!)

Daddy and Claire

Claire and Luke are Colts fans for Halloween this year. They look so cute in there costumes, and they made Daddy very proud!

New videos

This is a recent video of Claire reading her "tweet book". She still calls most animals by there sounds and not by there actual names. We are working on that!
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Here is a video of Luke laughing. It is a little hard to hear, so turn the volume up! Luke hasn't been doing much laughing in the last few days... he is pretty sick. He has a double ear infection and a stomach bug. I feel so sorry for him. Hopefully it will be gone soon.

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Pumpkin fun

This weekend we had so much fun! We went to the pumpkin patch with the Mullins family. Claire and Hudson had such a good time running around and climbing on pumpkins! We also got to carve pumpkins at life group on Saturday night! How fun! Claire and her friend Selah sported the "diaper only" look while playing in pumpkin goo! Here are some fun pictures for you to enjoy! (There are also a few of Claire playing in the playhouse that I made her.)

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Abilene

This weekend we went to Abilene for our five year reunion as ACU. We had so much fun seeing old friends! Here are a few pictures from the weekend.

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Naked day

Today Claire decided that she would not wear clothes. After her morning bath I attempted to put her clothes on her and she screamed "NO, STOP MOMMY!" After several attempts she won, and I let her run around the house naked. This went on for 3 hours. Every once in a while I would mention the "big girl potty", but she said she was fine. Finally, she came to me and asked for a 'di-di' (diaper). I asked her if she needed to go potty, and she said no. I asked her if she did go potty, and she said yes. Oops. She showed me 2 little puddles... oh what fun. Once I got her dressed I went to start cleaning up the mess, that's when I saw it. Oh, my goodness, I wanted to scream!!! She had peed right next to my special diaper bag. Now, when I mean special, I mean... My amazing friends chipped in and bought me the Louis Vuitton of all diaper bags. The Petunia Pickle Bottom. So anyway, there it was, soaking up pee. I spent two minutes cleaning up the floor, and then an hour cleaning the bag. Don't worry, it is not ruined, and Claire finally did get clothes on. I think this will be one of those stories will be repeated when she is 20!

Just a few cute things...

Have you seen the website "Cute overload"? If not, you should check it out. It is similar to the Daily Kitten website, but with all kinds of animals. Jeff has a softball game tonight. I love taking Claire to his games because she likes to stand at the fence and yell "GO DADDY!" So cute. While we are on the subject of cute things... This is my favorite commercial. It would not let me embed the video on my blog so click here, and see for yourself. I laugh every time I see it, because I do the same thing in the grocery store. What funny things do you find yourself doing for your kids (if you have some!)? One thing that I have found myself doing is singing to Claire, IN PUBLIC! I would have never done that before I had her!

Luke

Here are some new pictures of Luke. He is getting to be SO fun. He is smiling and laughing more, and he loves being around Claire. Yesterday we had a little bit of drama in our house. Claire had been asleep for a few hours, a little longer than usual, so I went up to check on her. When I walked into her room she was balanced on the railing of her crib looking out the window. When she saw me she slid back down and started rattling off all of the things that she had seen outside. Kitty, mommy's car, airplane... I guess we need to start thinking about a big girl bed! Well, I don't really have anymore kid stories for you, so I guess I will say goodbye. We are going to ACU homecoming this weekend... I hope to see a lot of you there!


Enough kisses already! 

Random things.

I should be in bed. We have this really bad habit of staying up late and watching all of our DVR'd shows. These are a few things I am thinking about...
1. Ugly Betty. Have you seen it? It is pretty good. Kind of a spin off of 'The Devil Wears Prada' in a round about way. You should watch it next week.
2. The Office. SOO funny. I Ab Lounged it while watching it tonight. It is really hard to do crunches while you are laughing... maybe I burned more calories though?
3. The Ab Lounger. Yup, the one from the infomercial. I got one, and I LOVE it! It is so easy to do, yet it burns! Skinny, here I come (hopefully).
4. Chocolate chip "Smell'ems". Anyone want to guess what this is? Well, you probably didn't guess bubbles did you? Bubbles, you know, the bottle with the stick with the holes on the end. Tons of fun for kids. Claire LOVES "bubs". We ran out, and I have been searching for more at every store I can think of. Whoever decided that "bubs" were a "seasonal item" is not kid friendly. Well, after a week of searching I found some at Walmart in a tiny bin under the off brand toys. They are not any old "bubs", they are chocolate chip "bubs". Can you imagine a little kid trying to sniff "bubs" that are floating in the air? I am laughing just thinking of it. I'll let you know how that turns out tomorrow!
5. Project Runway. I was a little disappointed this week. I just don't get into re-cap shows.
6. Lost. Good... but our DVR cut out the last 5-10 minutes. I wanted to cuss... but I didn't.
7. The Bachelor. Yes, it's that time again ladies. My FAVORITE show. Although, this season I think it is truly about status and not just about getting the cute guy. He is a prince, from Italy. I don't think the girls care what he looks like. The season premier was worth quite a few laughs. I can't wait for next week. (Mel- do you want a reminder call? I would hate for next week to result in another tragedy!)
Well, that should do it for tonight. Now that I have cleared my head I think I will be able to sleep.

Wednesday

I switched my blog to beta mode. It is a lot easier to publish that way... if you haven't switched yet, you should check it out. This morning I put training pants on Claire. Not successful. I kept asking her all morning if she needed to go potty. She kept telling me no. She held it all the way until after lunch. I asked her again. This time she got really excited and said "YES, POTTY!" We ran into the bathroom (i was all excited too!), pulled down the training pants and YIKES... she had made me a present. I really thought it wouldn't gross me out, but it did. She felt really bad, she almost cried. This gives me hope though. I really think that after a few days of this she will be ready. You wanted to know all that right?! Here are a few pictures from our recent trip to Colorado. There aren't any of Luke... oops. Claire had so much fun with her Opa and Oma (German for Grandpa and Grandma). I thought I would also give you a Luke update: In two short days he has learned to rollover front to back and back to front. This morning he was up on his hands and knees. I hope it takes a while for him to learn to crawl... I'm not ready for that yet!




Claire playing in Opa's bird bath





Claire and Opa filling the bird bath














Claire smelling Nana's flowers













Claire playing with bubbles

I'm Back...

Well, it has been a long two weeks. My Last post was September 11th. If it wasn't a sad enough day to start with, it got even worse. My Grandpa Don had a massive heart attack that afternoon. He was taken to the hospital, put on life support and we all waited. I flew up to Colorado by myself, with both kids. It was hard to see my Grandpa just lay there. Claire and I sang to him, and he turned to look at us... it was very sweet. Anyway, one week after the heart attack he passed away. He was a great man, and a strong Christian. Please pray for my family as we mourn my Grandpa Don. On a happier note... It seems like ALL of my friends are prego!!! Makes me want another one... JUST KIDDING!!!! Two kids under two is plenty for the moment. Speaking of kiddos- Luke had his 4 month check up on Monday. He is a linebacker! He weighs in at 16 1/2 pounds! He is rolling over and even pulling himself across the floor to get to Claires toys! Have any of you seen the commercial for the Bill Parcels training camp video? It is a training video for Dads to help them teach there sons how to become NFL stars. Well, I think Jeff ordered it and is secretly taking Luke out back and starting him on the basics early! HA, HA! Claire is good. She is stringing words together now. Very cute. My favorite thing that she says is "Hello." It sounds like "Hewo"! Well, that's all for now. I will post pictures soon.

A tribute to Lisa Marie Terry

I have the great privilege of taking part in the The 2,996 Project. Each participant is to make a tribute to a victim of 9/11. As I posted earlier, I was assigned Lisa Marie Terry. I Googled her and I wondered if she would be happy with the tribute articles that people had written about her? I wondered if they did her justice? Probably not. Here is my attempt at a tribute to a woman that I will never meet, and that so many people are missing terribly. Lisa Marie Terry was a 42 year old Vice President for Marsh & McLennan. She was a mother of two year old twins, and she had a love for horses. I did not know Lisa, I have only read her tributes on various websites. She seemed like a beautiful person. On September 11, 2001 she was in the World Trade Center along with 295 of her colleagues. Although I do not know much about her, I am still sad for her family. She was a child of God, just as I am. Jesus died for her sins, and cared about every hair on her head. No one knows why the terrorist attacks happened, but I do know that the Lord takes care of his people. I know that God is taking care of Lisa's family too. I hope that they have felt comfort and peace in the last five years. I hope that people have surrounded them and showed them compassion. I hope that her children will grow up to remember her through pictures and stories. I pray that on September 11, 2006 Lisa's family will feel the warm and comforting hand of God holding them in His arms. When September 11, 2006 ends and the sun sets I know that the Lord will watch over them as they go to sleep... He will not forget them, He is always there.
For a complet list of all tributes for the 2,996 project please click here.

We love Jeff

I don't always take the time to tell Jeff what a wonderful Dad he is...

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Our trip to Indiana

We got home this afternoon. We were only gone for a few days, but it seems like we were gone for a long time. Traveling with 2 kids is hard, but overall, they did great! On Friday we flew to St. Louis for a family reunion. After the reunion on Saturday we drove back to Indianapolis with Jeff's parents. Sunday night we went to Symphony on the Prairie. The concert ended with a great fireworks show. Claire loved it. She kept saying "twinkle, twinkle!" , it was so cute! On Monday we met our friends Frank and Andrea and their three boys at the Indianapolis Children's Museum. It was amazing... I wish we had one here too! We rode the carousel, played in a sandbox, dug for dinosaur bones and even saw glass fireworks (see pictures!). All of the kids had a great time. That night we went back to Frank and Andrea's for dinner. Claire got to ride a horse for the first time. She seemed to like it! I haven't mentioned Luke yet... yup, he was there too! It will be fun when he can enjoy all of these things too! In the slide show above there are a few pictures of Luke in his sling. I "wear" him most places, and he really likes it! Well, i'm off to bed for some much needed sleep... it has been a long 4 days!

Big sister, Little brother

Claire LOVES Luke. She wants to hold him constantly. Luckily for me, he seems to like it too! She holds her hands out and say's "baby uke, baby uke!" When she is holding him she will kiss his head, and pat his tummy. He just lays there and coos at her. It is the sweetest thing. I know that when they get a little older they will probably not be so sweet to each other, so I am enjoying it for the moment. Labor day weekend we are going up to Indianapolis to visit Jeff's family. It should be very fun, once we are done with the plane trip. I am hoping for a tear free flight... we will see!

Friends

This weekend I got to see all of my good friends from high school! I went to a Shower for my friend Andrea! It was so much fun to see everyone... I am so glad that we are all still friends. Also on Saturday we went to Grant's 2nd birthday party. Claire had so much fun, and Jeff and I had a great time talking with friends. This weekend was great... I was a good reminder of how blessed we are to have such good friends!

The weekend and fun with makeup.

This past weekend Jeff's roommates from ACU came in to town to visit. We had a lot of fun! On Saturday we went to the zoo. Claire got to see the elephants and her favorite part was the reptiles. We were all a little surprised that she wasn't scared of them! On Sunday we went to the pool. Claire loves to jump off of the side and go under water! Luke still doesn't know what to think, but he sure looks cute in his swim trunks! So, Here is the part about makeup: today while I had my back turned, Claire got into my makeup...again. Posted is a picture of the end result. The face she is making is her new creation. She is imitating me. I don't think I really look like that, but who knows! When she gets in trouble I give here the "intense stare down" look. Obviously she thinks it is funny... I guess I need to come up with a new one! Oh, by the way... Happy 2nd Birthday Grant!

Luke

Here is my new favorite picture of Luke. Isn't he adorable? Yes, I am biased, but seriosly he is pretty cute. I am having a horrible time taking pictures of Claire... she is just to busy to stay still long enough for me to take her picture!

Newness.

I have a new look! Girls like change. I like to rearrange furniture, in college I liked to change my hair color, and now I will be so bold as to change my blog! My very good friend Lisa went with me and the munchkins today to the pediatritian (I learned from our last visit that I need help!). Claire had an eczema check up, and Luke had his 2 month shots. First of all, if you have not seen Luke lately, he is HUGE. He weighed 14.5 pounds today. He was over the 100th percentile for weight, and 95th percentile for length. NFL, here we come! Claire on the other hand now has asthma... so 4 new medications later, we are hoping for some relief. Please pray that Claire will be healed. Jeff's roommates from college are coming in to town tomorrow, so we should have a fun weekend. I hope yours is great too! Oh, by the way... is anyone else having problems uploading pictures to blogger? I have some cute ones to show you, maybe it will work soon! One more thing- THANK YOU LISA!!!!

Opportunity...

Yesterday Jeff ran across a blog that had a link to a 911 tribute website. I think it is a really great thing to do... and I thought some of you might enjoy participating too. Please Join Me And Be A Part Of 2,996. Join the blogosphere community tribute to honor one of the 2,996 who died in the terror attacks on 9/11. The idea is simple, but powerful: A tribute for each victim of 9/11 will be created by 2,996 different bloggers. Please sign-up to make a tribute on your own blog. The 2,996 coordinators will randomly assign a 9/11 victim to you. As of today not quite half of the 2,996 have been assigned. If you go here and sign-up we'll be one more person closer to 2,996. On Monday September 11, I'll be honoring Lisa Marie Terry, a 42 year old New Yorker who died in the World Trade Center.

Parade

Last night we went downtown for the Barnum and Bailey Circus parade. It wasn't really a parade, but there were clowns, elephants and a horse! Claire loved it, even though it was so hot. The "parade" started with several clowns doing tricks, then a man riding a horse and doing lasso tricks came out. The main attraction was the elephant portion of the "parade". I think there were 8-10 of them! They were right in front of us eating off of tables! The kids LOVED it! Here are some pictures from last night... (PETA was even there! There is a picture of one of the protest signs.)

funny girl

Claire is starting to put several words together, and the things that she comes up with are very funny. We were playing in her playroom today and Finding Nemo was on in the background. Out of the blue she says "No more fish mama, no more fish." all while shaking her head No. It's hard not to laugh when she says these things! A few hours later we were singing her favorite song "If your happy and you know it", after I had sung it to her 20 times I tried switching to "The ABC song". She would have NONE of that. "STOP, STOP, NO more song Mama!!!" Oh, my goodness, I laughed so hard that time! And to top the day off Jeff and I and the two kids went out to dinner tonight. On the way out we stopped at the pharmacy to pick up a prescription. We went through the drive through, and right as we pulled up Claire started screaming "DINK, DINK!" That translates to "DRINK, DRINK!" So, does that mean we go through the drive through too much? :) Well, to say the least Claire is very spirited. I can't wait to see what Luke is like...

more...

Oops, i meant to post this picture too. Is it not the cutest? This picture was taken on Fathers day. Jeff is a FABULOUS father... even though he refuses to change poopy diapers. I'm sure Jeff would love to hear your comments on the matter!

pool time

This weekend we went to a pool party with some friends that also live in Fort Worth. Claire had a lot of fun playing in the pool. Luke still is not sure if he likes it, plus it makes him really sleepy! Here are some pics from the weekend.

Video and picture

Hi friends! I haven't blogged in a while. Trying to unpack a house, take care of two kids and stay calm is hard. Needless to say, i haven't had much time to sit at the computer! Luckily both kids went down for a nap at the same time today! Claire is doing good. She is saying so many new words. She needs me as a translator though! Luke is growing. He is putting on weight and finally looking a little more healthy- he was pretty skinny! Jeff is loving is short drive to work! As for me, I am trying to adjust. Fort Worth is ALOT different than Dallas. I have had lots of friends come over and help me unpack the house... thank you guys! You don't know how helpful that was! Well, I will leave you with a new video of Claire, and a cute picture of Luke!


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Uh Oh!

Just a few minutes ago I was sending out a quick email to my family with a few new pics of the kids attatched. As I was typing a quickly as I could (because Claire was playing in the other room by herself) I was thinking to myself "I really should wait to do this at nap time". Yup, I should have listened to myself. Just as I finished the email she came around the corner saying "mommy, mommy!" I looked up and she was carrying my giant cup of coffee and it was sloshing everywere. Don't worry, it had cooled off! So, after I calmly took it from her I went and mopped the whole entire living roon and hallway! My house smells like Starbucks now! What a fun morning! Yesterday we went to the doctor. Claire has Eczema... poor thing. She walks around saying "itch, itch!" Hopefully it will go away with her new medicine. As for everything else, we are just packing up and getting ready to move over to Fort Worth! Here are a few new pictures of the kids!

Long time

Well, I'm back! I haven't posted in a while, because having two kids takes up all of my free time. Even with extra help. I had no idea how all consuming two babies could be... wow. Luke is a very sweet little guy. He loves to be held and cuddled. He is waking up about two to three times a night to eat, so I haven't been getting a lot of sleep. Claire LOVES her little brother. She love to help me take care of him. She brings me his diapers, blankets and passy's. She even likes to hold him (supervised of course!) In other exciting news- We sold our house!!! We have also bought another one in Fort Worth. The big move day will be July 13! Yeah!!! Well, I'm off to get some sleep! Here are some new pics of Luke... i will try to be better about updating.