Life as a Family of 4!

3Day Follow-up

2011-08-16T18:15:00.000-07:00

The first weekend in August, my sister and I completed the Susan G. Komen 3 Day for the Cure. We were able to complete all 60 miles! We were so excited to be able to finish everything. It was a blast and we highly recommend it to anyone. It was a hard road, but knowing that we were doing something to help others felt great. There were about 2000 walkers in Chicago. The first day we walked around the Northwest suburbs. We walked about 22.6 miles. The next day we walked more around the West suburbs and walked about 19.5 miles. The final day, the bused us from camp to Lincolnwood and then we walked to Soldier Field. The weather cooperated overall. It rained a little bit, but compared to the heat we were having a few weeks earlier, it was beautiful weather!

I posted quite a few pictures on facebook, so feel free to check them out!

Just another day in....

2011-07-21T18:19:00.000-07:00

The Extreme heat! It has been so hot here that in some ways I feel like we might as well have snow on the ground. I know, I know, I shouldn't say that, but honestly, the parks are empty, it's too hot to be outside (even at 8am) and we have cabin fever! I'm hoping that it cools off in the next few days so we can get back to enjoying summer.

Alex has been taking a summer camp at a local park district. He is doing such a good job. He comes home every day and tells us about what he's doing and then his friends he played with. I'm pretty proud of him. Every other Friday he gets to go to the splash pad. He has been having so much fun. I can't wait to see him in preschool this fall.

Paige is toddling around like nobody's business. She is trying more and more to talk and repeat everything we say. Of course her favorite word right now is "mine." Alex gets quite upset whenever Paige says it. He doesn't understand why "she says that everything is her's." They are starting to play together more which is fun to see.

My 3 Day Walk for the Cure is coming up in just 2 weeks. My sister and I are looking forward to it. We're excited to be able to spend time together and talk without kids interrupting one another. We are praying that it isn't so hot like it has been this last week. If you want to come out and support us we'd love to see some familiar faces along the way. Here's the information: http://www.the3day.org/site/PageServer?pagename=CH_Spectator

I'll post again after the walk to let you know how it went. Thank you for everyone who has supported us.

A 4 yr old and a 1 yr old!!!!

2011-07-04T17:59:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it, but we have a 4 year old and a 1 year old now! It's crazy how fast time goes by. Paige turned one at the end of March. She is starting to toddle around. She's still not walking 100% of the time as she's too much of a princess and doesn't want to get hurt. There are times that she will just turn and toddle across the whole room. She is walking more and more. Every day it seems like she starts saying more and more words. She will try to repeat anything we say and even more entertaining is when she signs the word and says it. She is too funny! She still thinks that her brother is the funniest person ever. She will repeat the silly sounds he makes and laugh and laugh and laugh.

Alex turned 4 at the beginning of April! I am still trying to wrap my mind around him being four years old! He is getting bigger and bigger every day. The more time that goes by, the more that we see him mature and be able to control his energy. He loves trains still and would ride the CTA all day if we'd let him. He is full of joy and of course energy! He finished his first year of preschool and had a blast with his friends and teachers. He talks all the time about riding the school bus and going to Kindergarten. I continue to tell him to slow down and eventually he will go to school. No matter what, he will always be my little boy.

Finishing up and Starting Anew

2011-05-05T17:39:00.001-07:00

This weekend is our half marathon in Indianapolis. I have spent the last 5-6 months training and running at least 3 times a week. I feel ready for this race and I'm looking forward to completing it in a time that I'm happy with. Hopefully the weather cooperates and I feel good on Saturday morning. Kent and I are dropping off the kids at my parent's house tomorrow and then heading to Indy. Honestly, I'm also desperately in need of a break, time away with just Kent, adult time. I love my kids, but I need my time away too. It refreshes me. Plus, I know that Alex (and I'm sure Paige) love being with my parents.

So when the half marathon is over after Saturday, I will officially begin my training for the 3 day walk for the cure. I'm looking forward to the walks, but I will also continue to run as well. Right now I have about $660 left to raise before I can walk, but I'm feeling fairly confident that I can do it. I'm asking for your prayers as I officially start my training and as I finish up my fundraising. I believe this is an important event and I'm looking forward walking for those who have and who will fight breast cancer.

If you'd like to support me in my walk you can donate at: www.the3day.org Search for my name. :)

More updates after the half is finished!

Birthdays Galore!

2011-04-11T19:08:00.000-07:00

The end of March and beginning of April are going to be busy for us every year as we celebrate. This year we decided to celebrate each birthday separately since it is Paige's first birthday. We decided on an Owl theme. Afterall, the first year with Paige has been a real "hoot!" She continues to make us smile and laugh every day. She loves to try to imitate her brother. She'll climb over to the trampoline, make her way up and start trying to jump. At her first year appointment she weighed just over 20 pounds and was 29 1/4 inches long. She's still our little peanut.

Alex on the otherhand has grown 4 inches from December til April! Crazy!!! He is still in the 80-90% for height and weight. He continues to keep us on our toes. The things that he is able to remember never cease to amaze us. He loves being active. Kent even made a swing under his bed so during those long winter months he could still be active. For his birthday he got a scooter from my parents and a new bike from us so he will be busy this summer learning how to use each of them.

3 Day Walk

2011-03-17T11:18:00.001-07:00

Most of you probably already know this, but in August, my sister and I will be participating in the Susan G. Komen 3 Day Walk for the Cure. Over the course of 3 days we will be walking 60 miles. You may be asking "why in the world would we do something like that?" Well, for me, I have been working in the hospital for the last 3 1/2 years where I've seen so many women fight day after day for their lives. Some of those women have fought the fight and won, others have not been so lucky. One thing is the same about anyone I've come across that has to fight this fight. They all have an incredible amount of bravery as they lie in that hospital bed.

There isn't much I can do about fighting breast cancer, but I can walk. I am choosing to walk to raise awareness about the importance of early detection as well as to help raise money to bring about new treatments and hopefully even a cure.

In order to walk, we need to raise a minimum of $2300 each. So, I'm asking you to please support me on this journey that I'm taking. You can go to my personal page to donate: http://www.the3day.org/site/TRC/2011/ChicagoEvent2011?pg=peditor&fr_id=1611&px=5609324

I'll be doing my best to use our blog to also update you on my fundraising and training.

Life Goes On...

2011-03-17T11:05:00.000-07:00

I really do have every intention of trying to keep this blog up to date, however it seems like life just keeps going on. Things have been going well for us. I can't believe that Paige is almost one and Alex is almost four! How is that possible?

Alex these days loves to be on the go, just like always. He is enjoying preschool and seems to be doing better with following directions there. He loves his teachers and is having more and more friends. He loves playing with his baby sister and making her laugh. One of his favorite things lately is to swing in his room. Yes, that's right, in his room! Kent put up a swing under his bed since he has a loft. He loves it! It is the perfect thing for him.

Paige is growing like a weed! She is crawling all over the place and pulling up on anything she can. She of course, loves to laugh at her older brother and we think she's even attempting to say "brother." She is our easy-going little girl. That is, as long as you don't try to take her toys away. She is a cuddly, smiley, and adorable if I do say so. :)

Kent and I are still keeping busy with work, kids and with the worship team.

I'll be doing my best to keep this blog more updated.

Time passes by...

2011-01-10T18:31:00.000-08:00

Wow! I can not believe that it has been 4 months since I last posted on our blog. We have had a busy few months. As I mentioned in the last post, Alex has started preschool. He is doing pretty well for the most part. His energy level still gets the best of him, but he is enjoying going and talks about his teachers all the time. I often find him suggesting that we play "school."

October brought lovely fall days, a trip to the pumpkin patch and trick-or-treating. We picked probably the warmest day in October to take a trip to the pumpkin patch. Alex loved it!!! He played so hard and asked so many questions as we rode the John Deere tractor out to the patch. Alex also agreed to trick-or-treating this year. Last year he acted all excited about it and then was scared to go to other people's houses. This year, he eagerly ran from house to house, looking for the porch light that was shining brightly. He did great for the first few houses at only taking a few pieces of candy, until about the 4th house when the owner told him to take more than one. From then on, he reached his hand in the bowl and grabbed a handful. I had to tell him, respectfully, to only take 2 pieces. He had a blast!

November brought many trips for us. First, we headed to Disney World with my family. It was a time that was filled with memories for us. We spent 3 days on land, staying at Kidani Village. Over the course of 3 days, 5 out of the 10 of us came down with the stomach flu. By the time it was time for us to leave for the cruise, we were afraid that we would not even be allowed to get on the boat. After those who were sick talked with the nurse, we boarded the boat. It was our first time on a cruise and we loved it! The first night, the waters were a little rough and as dinner progressed, one by one, we dropped like flies, leaving only Kent at the table to finish the meal. He ate it up, no pun intended, and tasted each of our dinners and each dessert that our wonderful waiters brought out to him. After the first night, the waters calmed and we enjoyed our days by the Mickey Pool and our nights going to the shows for the kids. We saw many different characters on the boat. I think my favorite part was Castaway Cay (Disney's Private Island). It was fabulous! We are grateful for the memories that we made as a family. Four days after returning from Disney World, we again packed our bags and boarded the plane to Tennessee to spend Thanksgiving with some of Kent's family. It was great to see family and watch Alex play with his cousins. Paige and Timothy are only 6 weeks apart and it was fun to watch their similarities as well as their differences. Alex played and ran and jumped and laughed the whole time we were there.

December is always a busy month and as we did our best to keep our schedule as free as possible, it was still filled with family time and other obligations. The biggest thing in December was Alex's surgery. Three days before Christmas, Alex had surgery both to take his tonsils & adenoids out as well as to correct his teeth. The tonsilectomy was the easy part as far as the surgery went. It only took about 45 minutes total, but the recovery was harder. Alex took probably a good 10 days to fully recover. It was hard to watch him in pain and barely eat anything, but he is back to himself and no longer in pain now. The longer part of the surgery was the procedure for his teeth. It took about 5 hours, but the recovery was only about 3 days of just tender gums. The dentist did a fabulous job on his teeth putting crowns and caps on almost all of his teeth. They also completed x-rays to see what we are dealing with as far as his adult teeth. We found out that they are also cone-shaped, so we will decide what is best when get to that point. We are so thankful for his dentist. She is wonderful and we can't say enough good about her! Because of Alex's surgery, we took it easy for Christmas. We spent Christmas eve and Christmas day with my family, trying to keep Alex as comfortable and as calm as we could. It was a good Christmas celebrating our Savior's birth.

As the new year as come, we are looking forward to what this year will bring. Paige is now 9 1/2 months old and changing every day. She is crawling on all fours now and trying to pull up on whatever she can get to. Alex continues to enjoy preschool and we can see him turning into a 4 year old as each month passes. I continue to work 3 days at the hospital and love my job. Kent continues to work from home and is always busy.

PRESCHOOL!!!!!

2010-09-14T11:18:00.000-07:00

That's right, we have a preschooler in the house. Alex started preschool last Tuesday. He is going two days a week for 3 hours at a time. While that time is great for me to get a lot done, I'm sure the teachers have their hands full with Alex in class. :) He has always been an active boy (even for boy standards) and has always had a difficult time focusing on one task at a time. That being said, he is super smart and so sweet. He seems to be having fun, although it is hard to get information out of him as to what they did each day. I checked in with his teacher today after class and she said what I was expecting her to say, "Well, he's having some trouble focusing on one task. He likes to go from thing to thing to thing." *Sigh* So now at home we are working on this even more. Setting the timer, no getting up until the timer goes off, etc. Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated! Here are some pictures from his first day of school. :)

Ready to go!!!!

Putting together a little puzzle

In his cubby

His special treat for his first day.

5 Months

2010-09-14T11:15:00.001-07:00

Weighing in at 14.2 pounds and 24 1/2 inches long.

Paige is rolling over like crazy, eating her toes all the time, laughs at everything, but especially her big brother and is the most laid back baby I've seen. She is a joy to be around.

What We've been Up To!

2010-08-23T18:00:00.000-07:00

(I apologize for the smaller size of the pictures. I uploaded them differently. I'll do it normal next time!)

I have realized that I have been a horrible blogger and have resigned to being okay with updating this blog once a month. Hopefully I'll back into a schedule of updating it more often, but for now, just be prepared for LONG posts with lots of pictures and little explanation. (That's all anyone wants to see anyway, right?)

I have the best friends! I took a trip to Ft. Wayne to hang out with my girls from Taylor for a (much to short) weekend. It was great to see how much all of them loved on Paige! I miss those girls!

I love the look on Paige's face in this picture. She adores her big brother!

We took Claire and Eli to the zoo recently. They wanted ice cream and since Alex doesn't like ice cream (yes, I know that's unheard of) he wanted a pretzel!

Happy Girl!

Such a sweet little boy. A kiss from the birthday boy!

So I'm a little late on this one, but happy 4 months old!!! Weighing about 13.5 pounds and 24 inches long (still my little peanut)

And one last one with big brother

Showing off his new shoes

Paige trying to talk and laughing at nothing.

Picture post from back in time....

2010-07-20T12:01:00.000-07:00

I was uploading pictures the other day and realized that I haven't posted some on here that I know you'd enjoy seeing. So, this post is dedicated purely to pictures.

ENJOY!

Waiting for the "potty races" (as Alex called them) to begin. We headed home to the Fireball Festival. It was fun to see Alex's reaction to the toilets racing down the street. He had no clue WHY they would do this!

Off they go!

3 Months Old

He was so focused on watering the plants in the Family Zoo area. Kent and I kept saying, "who is this kid?" It was cute.

Little trip to the zoo. They had this bean bag toss game set-up and Alex LOVED it! He played it about 3 or 4 times. He actually did a great job too. We made him scoot back further.

On Daddy's shoulders. Best way to experience the zoo.

Trying out the foot massager at the zoo.

Paige at the zoo! What a good little girl.

I took Alex to see his first movie in the theater. He loved Toy Story 3! It was fun to watch him experience the big screen for the first time.

Alex is taking two classes at the Park District this summer (cooking and art). After his art class he told me that he made "goo" to put his hands in. It turns out that it wasn't GOO but GLUE! Oops. Oh well, he had fun!

Water balloon fight on the 4th of July! We had fun tossing the ballons at one another. Alex wondered why we weren't in our swim suits. By the time we were done, I wondered the same thing.

Little Illini Fan!

One of his paintings from Art Class

Paige Laughing

2010-07-18T18:32:00.000-07:00

3 Month update

2010-07-14T18:14:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm a few weeks late for this post, but better late than never. Paige is now 3 months old and growing like crazy! I can't believe I'm saying this, but I wish she'd slow down! She is definitely my happy little girl. She has just started in the last two weeks laughing outloud! She is not one you have to work at to get her to smile! She loves looking at faces and smiles back at you. She is unofficially around 12.5 pounds. On another note, we do have her in physical therapy at Children's Memorial because of her favoring the right hand side. Her neck is getting stronger and she is really starting to even out her preference. Basically by favoring her right side, she caused her head to be slightly misshapen. He has a flat spot in both the back and the front of her head. We do a lot of tummy time and moving her in different positions during physical therapy. Another aspect of it is that we have to really try our best to keep her off of the back of her head when she is awake during the day. Our goal is 50% of her awake time on her tummy (or similar positions). We're getting there and we're happy with the progress she has made.

3 Month pictures for JCPenny

Not to skip over Alex in this post...He's doing great and always full of energy! He loves to keep us on our toes. We were actually thinking back to one year ago and are so blessed to be able to say that he no longer has any speech delays! In fact he is non-stop talking! One year ago when we took him to fireworks, he was still using his sign language! :) Amazing how one year changes things.

God has truly blessed our family!

Picture Post!

2010-06-09T18:03:00.000-07:00

Life here is good as we continue to adjust to life with 2 kids. I have about another week and a half of maternity leave then it's back to work. Paige had her 2 month check up and was 10pounds 10ounces, 22 inches long! She's looking good!

Playing in the rain.

Getting big!!

Little pool fun on a hot day

Beach trip with Daddy

Smiley Girl

Videos

2010-05-18T11:54:00.000-07:00

Drummer Boy

Making a cake

A New Schedule

2010-05-18T11:45:00.000-07:00

So I've discovered while home on maternity leave that Alex is a child who needs some major structure. Without it, he gets bored and starts to do things that he knows we do not allow. After 7 weeks, I finally figured out that I need to do a schedule like I did with many of my music therapy clients I worked with awhile ago. I created a storyboard and found pictures, laminated them and put them with velcro on a piece of cardstock. We now have everything planned out for the day so there is no time for Alex to get bored. Included in this schedule is a time for chores. I took a few pictures the other day of Alex doing his chores. It made me laugh, but he was LOVING it!!! We also have arts and crafts everyday as well as some time to "play" with Paige. He is doing very well with it.

Family Visits

2010-05-18T11:33:00.000-07:00

My Grandma came from Arizona to meet Paige at the beginning of May. It was great to have her here, even though it was a short visit for the day. We were able to catch up and most importantly she was able to spend some time with our kids. We love that Alex and Paige have two great Grandmas that love them and are a part of their lives.

The whole gang!

Grandma Bev & Paige

We were excited a few weeks ago to have Kent's parents come and meet Paige. They had a quick visit, but Alex was beyond thrilled to have Grandma and Grandpa here to play with. He quickly took them to his room to show them ALL of his toys, read many books, and many silly games.

Bedtime stories

A bedtime prayer

One Month Old

2010-04-27T11:49:00.001-07:00

Bubble Time

2010-04-27T11:40:00.000-07:00

The other day Alex and I headed outside and played with his new bubble wand that I got from the $1 bin at Target. He loved it. He was having a blast. After deciding that blowing the bubbles wasn't enough excitement, he figured that it would be better to rub the bubbles all over himself. He was so dirty by the time we were done playing that we had to go right inside to the bathtub, but it was a blast!

Birthday Boy turns 3!!!

2010-04-27T11:23:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it, but my little boy is 3 years old! A week after Audrey Paige was born, Alex had a birthday and turned 3 years old. He is getting so big. He is definitely in that independent stage, but yet he's always been strong-willed and independent. He loves to run and jump and play outside (or inside for that matter). He is loving his new sister and for the most part does really well with her. He's had his moments, but I can't complain. He has just started to like playing with little cars and trucks as well as Gogos (little plastic creatures). His creativity is growing everyday! I can't believe his attention to detail. He will recognize emblems from cars and other little things like that. He loves to know how things work, which means that I find myself saying, "I'm not sure, ask Daddy!" He is an absolute joy and even though he wears me out everyday, I wouldn't trade him for the world! What a blessing to have him in our lives!

We celebrated at Chuck E. Cheese (easy for me to prepare!)

My Grandma and Audrey Paige

Opening gifts!!!

When I asked Alex what kind of a party he wanted he said "Chocolate" When I asked if he wanted a circle or square cake he said "Triangle!"

Thomas Trainset he got

Drumset from Nana and Papa. Thankfully Paige is sleeping through the noise (for now)

New Addition...

2010-04-03T09:53:00.001-07:00

We are happy to announce the arrival of Audrey "Paige" Thompson, born March 27th, 2010 at 7:05pm. She weighed in at 6lbs12oz and was 19 inches long. She came a few weeks early as she decided to do her own thing and flip around inside. Because of that, we decided to induce labor in order to avoid a c-section should she continue to flip until she came. My labor was longer thing time, but overall it wasn't bad all things considered. She is perfect in every way and we are so excited that she is finally here. She is sleeping pretty well at night which is always a help! We are just busy adjusting to life with 2 kids. Alex seems to like her and is trying to "help out" in any way he can. He also got to spend a few days with Nana and Papa, which he loved!!

What's new here?

2010-02-28T12:40:00.000-08:00

Last weekend we took a trip with my family up to Christmas Mountain at the Wisconsin Dells. It was fun to watch the kids play together as they get older. Claire is the typical girl who always wants to be holding Alex's hand and hugging him. Alex is the typical boy who wants to play with her, but forget the hugs and hand holding. There were a few times that I had him hold her hand as we would walk inside a building. As soon as we'd get inside he'd say, "Claire, I don't have to hold your hand any more now." We went to the pool a few times, which had a water slide. To prove how much Alex loves having Claire around, here's a little story. They both LOVED the water slide. As soon as they were down, they would run (yes, we'd remind them to walk) back around to the top. Well, Alex would stand there and wait at the top until Claire made it back. Then he would jump up and down and let her go down first. He had a little hop in his step the whole time they were playing at the pool. It is fun to watch him get older and be able to do more things.

Look at that face!!!!

Saturday afternoon, the rest of my family went tubing down the mountain while I stayed back and hung out with Eli! Alex has such a funny personality as he loves doing things like tubing, but his facial expressions don't always reveal that. My mom would ask him if he was having fun and he would just say, "yeah." At one point they knew he was having fun going down the mountain when he said, "This sure is fun!" He also did manage to say "Wheee!!!!"on one trip down the mountain. :)

That was our last "trip" before the baby gets here. I've got about 6 weeks left until my due date. Our weekends are pretty full between now and then so I'm hoping that time continues to go quickly. I'm still feeling pretty good. My energy level is starting to go back down, but I'm not sure if that is from being pregnant or from chasing Alex around. We're all pretty excited for this baby to arrive. I think the closer it gets to spring, the more we feel like it will be right around the corner.

We've spent some time this winter playing in the snow and building a snowman. Alex was so proud of "Frosty." That is, until he toppled over as we had a few warmer days.

Playing with his Shaving Kit that he got for Valentine's Day!

Way too Long

2010-02-02T18:56:00.000-08:00

I realize that it has been way too long since I last updated the blog. This will probably be a quick overview of the last month with a few pictures at the end.

Things are going well here. We took a trip to Disney World at the beginning on January with some friends of ours. It was a blast! Alex LOVED Disney! His favorite part was the Barnstormer which was a roller coaster. He also loved the race cars, meeting Mickey Mouse & Friends as well as the penny machines (that smash your penny into a souvenir). We were able to spend 1 day at each of the 4 parks which was great. We have a ton of pictures, so I'll try to chose a few to give you an idea of how much fun we all had. Alex is still talking about Disney World.

We are getting closer to baby #2 being here. We have about 10 weeks left til our due date, so we'll see when she decides to make her arrival. We are excited to meet her and have here here. Alex talks about his baby sister quite often. I think he understands as much as a 2 1/2 year old can understand about getting a baby sister. He has really taken to being a "big boy" and doing things "by himself." We've been working a lot with that lately as well as working more with disciplining. He's responded great to a sticker chart that we made for him. He's so proud when he puts his sticker on at the end of the day! When he fills up the chart he gets some sort of "surprise."

Nothing else really going on here. We've got some busy weekends coming up with being on praise team as well as just a few trips, then in April having baby #2 arrive! Should be an interesting couple of months.

For now, enjoy the pictures from Disney World.

Christmas 2009

2010-01-01T12:53:00.000-08:00

We had a good Christmas season this year. Before we headed home to celebrate, Alex and I took an afternoon and made a gingerbread house together. It was an interesting experience. Alex learned that he likes frosting, but that I'm not that good at getting the house to stay together. It fell apart and we had to wait until Kent got home to fix it. It was fun either way.

What is this white stuff??

Oh, I like it!

Yummy!

It fell apart

But Daddy fixed it....

Christmas Eve morning we opened our stockings. This was the first year that Alex kind of understood what was going on. He had a good time and kept saying, "And I got this, and I got this." It was fun!

After opening our stockings we headed home to my parent's house to celebrate Christmas Eve and Christmas day. We went to church on Christmas eve and then did the traditional pictures, wonderful dinner, dad reading the Christmas story, lighting candles and saying what we're thankful for, singing Silent Night, then mom reading the Santa Christmas story. We had a good time, even though the kids were talkative. :)

Christmas morning Alex actually slept in (which never happens) and then we let him open the presents that we had gotten for Alex. He got some Arch books from us as well as a trampoline! Let's just say the trampoline is a perfect gift for Alex! He jumped all morning!

After nap, the rest of the family came and it was time to open presents. Claire and Alex passed out the gifts this year and then we took turns opening our gifts. The kids did a great job of waiting their turn. They had a good time together and loved their gifts. Alex's favorites were his "own treasure game" (which he plays with his speech therapist) and his Thomas train.

The day after Christmas we packed up the car and headed out early so we could drive to Toledo to spend the rest of the weekend with Kent's family. We were able to see a few of his Aunts and Uncles as well as his sister, brother-in-law and their three girls. It was good to spend time with family and catch up. Alex had a blast playing with the girls and kept calling them "his friends."

Overall it was a wonderful Christmas, spent with family and just enjoying that time that we have together.

In other news, Alex graduated from speech therapy on Tuesday!!!! YAY!!! We're excited that he is officially a "talker!" There are days that he wakes up and starts talking non-stop! It's fun to hear him talk. We were looking through older videos the other day and not even 6 months ago, he was still signing and had very few words! Praise God for the progress he has made. We'll miss Miss Emily, but are thankful for the work that she put in every Tuesday!

Mickey Mouse Parade of Lights

2009-11-30T19:14:00.000-08:00

We took Alex downtown last weekend to see Mickey "light up downtown Chicago." We went down earlier in the day and walked around a lot. We went to the Disney store, the Lego store, Navy Pier, the Beach, Millenium Park, Grant Park, The Bean, and of course the Parade. Alex had a blast walking around. We actually let him walk quite a bit to wear him out. He went on the big ferris wheel at Navy Pier. He was very interested in the parade. He loved seeing Mickey Mouse, Goofy, Donald Duck, Daisy, Minnie, and many more characters. He still talks about "Mickey lighting up the trees." When we drive past houses or buildings with lights on it, he says, "Maybe Mickey light those." Here are just a few pictures from the day.

The Lego Man

The Lego Lady :)

Alex at The Bean

At the Beach

Navy Pier Ferris Wheel

Watching for Mickey to start the Parade

Frosty the Snowman

Santa at the end of the Parade

Trimming the tree

2009-11-30T19:05:00.001-08:00

We put up our Christmas tree a few weeks ago actually. We had a good time with it and only "lost" 2 ornaments. I guess that happens when a 2 1/2 year old is excited about decorating the tree.

In the tree box

Time Away in San Diego

2009-11-30T18:38:00.000-08:00

Kent and I were able to spend 4 days away in San Diego in the middle of November. My parents kept Alex for us. He had a blast while he was there. He rode the combine, played with Claire and Eli, and ran around outside on the farm. I actually had a music therapy training, which is why we were in San Diego. It was beautiful! We will definitely go back some time for another vacation. We took a trolley tour around San Diego and were able to see a lot! It stopped at most of the "tourist places" to see and you could get off of the trolley and walk around for a half hour or more and catch another trolley. We went to Hotel Coronado, Gas Lamp District, Old Town, and were also able to take a Seal tour. The Seal tour was both a land and water tour. We loved it! We of course ate plenty of Mexican food while we were there. :)

The Trolley that took us around

Hotel Coronado

Me in front of the ship used in filming of "Master and Commander of the Sea"

Kent in front of the Mission

A Navy Ship out on the water

The Seal Bus that went on land and water

The Sea Lions

Out on the Water

Our Seal Guide

Trick-Or-Not.....

2009-11-02T17:40:00.000-08:00

About a week ago, we were planning on just using my niece's costume from last year and having Alex dress up as a monkey for Halloween. Well, I was asking him about it and said, "aren't you excited to be a monkey?" He laughed and said, "No, I be a noo-noo and cheese box." I laughed at first and then looked at Kent and said, "I could do that! That would be hilarious!" So, I spent Sunday evening, and Monday painting his macaroni and cheese box. :) He was so excited to wear it and would just laugh whenever he saw himself in it.

Fast forward to Saturday.

We were at my parents to go trick-or-treating with my niece and nephew. Alex didn't take a great nap, which may be where our problems started. We first went to my grandma's house. Alex got out of the car and said, "I'm so excited!" That being said as he was jumping up and down. Well, I go to put his costume on him and he DID not want to wear it! He put it on long enough to walk in the house, but that was it. :(

We left there and he put it on to walk next door (we were just going to trick-or-treat in the neighborhood). Well, I think it scared him to death that we were going to someone else's house. I think he thought we were going to go inside. He kept saying, "Other people houses no fun!" Needless to say, we only went to one other house, then headed back to my parent's house.

He put his costume on for them, and then proceeded to sit on the floor and look at all of his candy. At least he enjoyed that part.

Sunday morning (at home) he sees his costume sitting by the table and wants to put it on. I put it on him and he just starts laughing and says, "I love my noo-noo and cheese box!" Silly boy!!!

I did get some good pictures of him goofing around in his costume tonight. So, the first pictures are from Halloween and the good ones are from tonight at home. :)

Let's just say next year, I probably WON'T be making a homemade costume!

As promised....

2009-10-28T18:50:00.000-07:00

Here are the pictures from our beautiful Fall walk on Sunday!

A fall Walk....

2009-10-27T19:00:00.001-07:00

Sunday we enjoyed the afternoon as a family and took a nice walk in the woods, or forest perserve. It was a blast and Alex was in his element as he was just able to run like crazy. He found a great natural see-saw, made a boat out of tree limbs, and loved following all the "dots" (trail markers) along the way. It was so much fun to watch him outside in the woods. We got some great pictures too of the quickly changing and falling leaves. :) For now you'll just have to enjoy the videos as our pictures aren't uploading for some reason. I'll try again tomorrow night.

Singing the ABCs

See-Saw in Nature

Out of the habit of blogging

2009-10-22T18:11:00.001-07:00

I have been out of the habit of blogging for the last few months. I'm not sure why, but I'm going to try to get back into the habit of keeping this updated with pictures and posts letting you know what is going on. I think I last posted at the end of September, which was awhile ago. We have been busy on the weekends as Kent and I are both on the worship team at our church. We are never on at the same time, so it usually works out that at least 2 out of the 4 weekends one of us is busy Saturday and Sunday. It works out and we both really enjoying serving in that capacity. It does take a lot of our time on the weekends that we serve.

As many of you probably know, Alex was sick last week for about the whole week. I got a call at work on Wednesday that he had a fever of 101. I went to pick him up and we headed home. He continued to have a fever day and night for the most part until the following Monday morning. We headed to the doctor on Friday and then went back to the doctor on Monday. He had no other symptoms while he was sick which was just baffling. His throat was fine, his ears were clear, urine was fine, no rash, etc. His fever on Saturday and Sunday morning was 103 which was just TOO high. Monday when we went to the doctor she ended up taking blood and told me to not give him motrin unless he had a fever (at the time we were at the doctor his fever had gone down). It turns out Monday morning was the last time I had to give him any motrin or tylenol. His lab results were a little off so we're going back in a few weeks just to make sure that everything is back to normal (which they should be). He's back to normal now, which is so good to see. For those six days we didn't do much besides sit on the couch and watch television. I can tell you that I have seen enough Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, Curious George, Calliou, and Little Einsteins to last for awhile! :) His sleeping was also terrible during those six days so Kent and I are just getting back to normal! Most of all though, we were just worried about little Alex as his body just couldn't break this fever!

Things are going well with the pregnancy. I'm 15 weeks and feeling pretty good. I'm still trying to run a few times a week, but obviously my distance has gone way down! My goal right now is to try to run until at least 20 weeks, unless I start uncomfortable during a run or having any cramping. Those are obviously signs to stop and just walk instead. I go to the doctor again tomorrow. We are planning on finding out what we're having this time, but probably won't know until December. Don't worry, we'll let everyone know when we find out!

We took Alex to Chuck E. Cheese a few weeks ago and he loved it!!! It was nice to go to a restaurant and enjoy eating and have Alex entertained to. His eyes were huge the entire time we were there. I think he was a little overstimulated, but he had fun!

One of the projects Alex has made at Daycare!

There was one day Alex and I were playing and he decided that I need to sit in his tent. He then proceeded to empty his ENTIRE toybox into the tent, with me in it. Needless to say, it was a tight squeeze with everything in there!

Fun on the farm

2009-09-27T12:33:00.000-07:00

We've been pretty busy lately on the weekend between one of us being on praise team at church and heading home to see family. Of course having a new nephew motivates us to go home and see how much he's grown! We went home a few weeks ago and were able to see my grandma who was visiting from Arizona as well as celebrate Claire's 3rd birthday! I can't believe she's already 3!!!

On Saturday we headed to the local pumpkin festival. Alex was so excited about the bouncy houses that we told him would be there. We got him his armband and then headed to the bouncy houses. For some odd reason between one side of the park and the other, Alex decided he didn't want to do the bouncy houses and instead wanted to play in the free park. It was a waste of $10, but what are you gonna do? Claire had fun and I think she got at least $20 worth of jumps! :)

The only bouncy house that Alex attempted. When he got to the top he was scared of the slide (he's going through a phase of being scared of heights)!

Claire having a BLAST!!

After taking his nap, Alex wanted to go out and see Papa's tractor. He loves John Deere tractors and can spot one from a mile away! He inspected it from outside for awhile then finally decided he was ready to drive it. He climbed up the stairs and spent a ton of time "driving" the tractor. I think he's a true farm boy! The look on his face when he's at Grandma and Papa's is priceless! He loves just running around the farm.

New addition coming in April 2010!!!

2009-08-30T12:26:00.000-07:00

If you haven't heard our news yet, we are excited to announce that we are expecting a new baby due April 13th, 2010! I don't think Alex quite grasps how his world will change in a few short months, but we're trying to start making some changes now. He is already potty-trained (which is HUGE), sleeping in a big boy bed, and making some improvements with his speech and attention-span. Anyway, I've been feeling pretty good for the most part. I've had a few more 1st trimester symptoms than I had with Alex, but all is good for the most part.

Here are a few other pictures of Alex playing with Papa when we went home just last weekend.

New Nephew- Eli Robert

2009-08-21T11:49:00.000-07:00

When we got back from Williamsburg, I headed immediately home to watch my niece while my sister delivered her second baby! Sunday morning we all headed up to the hospital to meet Eli Robert Francis! He's perfect in my book. :) I'm excited to have another nephew. We got some great pictures of little Eli as well as big sister, Claire.

And a video of Claire meeting her little brother....

Williamsburg Vacation

2009-08-19T18:35:00.000-07:00

We have had a busy month in August. Last week we boarded an airplane and headed down to Williamsburg, VA to spend about 5 days with all of Kent's family! It was good to see all of them since it is very rare that we can get everybody together. God definitely blessed the trip as the only time it rained was either while we were driving to/from the beach or while most people were resting/napping. With 25 people, and over half of those being kids, that was a HUGE blessing! We spent most of the time just hanging out at the timeshare and swimming in the pool. Friday we ventured to Virginia Beach. It ended up being a lot of fun even though the weather didn't seem like it was going to cooperate. The trip back from the beach however was not so much fun. It should have only taken an hour, but it ended up taking most of us at least 2 1/2 hours (or longer). I came to the realization that people from Virginia must not be able to drive in the rain. (Just kidding) but serious, there were more accidents on the way home than I thought possible!

Alex was great on the way there and back home. He did great in his seat on the airplane!

Here are a few videos and pictures from our trip.

A Tree Chair!

These were the biggest popsicles you've ever seen! And they were only $.50

It's hard to get a family pictures on the paddle boats.

We took a morning and everyone headed to a local park. The paddle boats were a lot of fun. Surprisingly, Alex actually sat pretty still and enjoyed the ride. :)

Alex's first time at the ocean! He loved it!

Another video of the ocean fun

Sweet Kezi

Playing in the sand

Building sandcastles

What fun!

Oh the fun of the ocean!

The In-Laws! :)

Kent and his siblings

Our family

All the grandkids, (well, minus 2, but almost all of them)

The Fair and then End of a Small School

2009-08-02T17:47:00.000-07:00

A few weekends ago we headed to the Iroquois County Fair. Alex had so much more fun than last year. So much changes in just one year. Tears were free-flowing a year ago as he rode the merry-go-round with my mom. This year, he LOVED the rides. We went on the Merry-go-round, the elephant/dumbo ride, the big slide, the super fast racecars, the caterpillar roller coaster, and a tilt-a-world kind of ride. :) We weren't sure if he was enjoying the racecars or the roller coaster, but we found out he was saying "No all done" not "all done." We saw some animals, ate some fair food, and of course had to play on the John Deere tractors! Those were definitely the highlight of Alex's day at the fair.

The weekend started with a ride on Claire's glider

Waiting in line for the Merry-Go-Round

The Big Slide with Papa

Racecars with Claire (by the end of the ride, Alex was on top of Claire's lap)

Gotta watch this video to see how fast these racecars went. :)

Caterpillar Rollarcoaster with Nana

Elephants with Mommy

Looking at the animals

Playing on the tractors

Enjoying an Elephant Ear

This past weekend we headed home again for the C-I High celebration since this was the last year it was open. We weren't able to stay as long as we hoped, but we were able to at least do our own tour of the high school (Kent had never been to my high school) We were able to see Rachel and at least take a picture in front of our old lockers. We actually had to sneak into the school. As Rachel said, "Only in a small town can you sneak into a school and not worry about getting in trouble."

Golden Eagles

Our Old Lockers

Playing the Bass Drum

Playing at the park

4th of July fun!!!

2009-07-06T18:55:00.000-07:00

We had a great time this fourth of July. We went to fireworks on Friday night and Alex loved them. First of all, the fireworks were at a golf course so while we waiting for it to get dark, all of the kids were playing in the sand traps. (Jami, this would have been a nightmare for you!) So, Alex joined right in and dug in the sand, threw it in his hair, down his shirt, inbetween his toes, etc. He had a blast!!! He just ran and ran and ran until he literally asked to go in his stroller and "go night-night." We put him in his stroller and walked around until the fireworks started.

As the fireworks began, he signed "flower" because he thought they looked like flowers. He then started naming all the colors he saw; "Blue, yellow, green, purple." He was saying "boom" and just staring at them until we decided to go ahead and head back to the car to beat the rush. Then he said, "More fireworks." It was great to see him enjoy them!

Saturday morning we headed to a local parade. It started with all the police cars, firetrucks, and ambulances. He was mostly looking forward to the candy. When they started throwing candy, he went and picked it up, but then wanted to eat it all right away. Unfortunately, we didn't want him to eat a huge back of candy, so he was a little disappointed. Overall though, he had a great time. He loved the bands that were there too.

Montly Post with more to come....

2009-07-06T18:30:00.000-07:00

I've looked back at the last few months and realized that I've really only posted about once a month. I need to work on that. :) So, here's our post for the month.

We went back "home" to Bloomington a few weeks ago to help a good friend celebrate her 30th birthday! It was good to see some familiar faces and go to church at E-Free again. The party was at a park in the area. It was such a great environment for Alex as he LOVED playing outside and just running. We had a great time!

Popsicle!!

Playing at the park

Being a goofball in the car

Notice the spoon in his toes

A little craft he made at daycare

1st ear of corn. He LOVED it!!!

Can you tell??

Enjoying some brownie batter Yum!!!

And a video for you......

From the mall

First Haircut

2009-06-10T18:41:00.001-07:00

Alex is now 26 months and he finally just had his first haircut tonight! I did the first cut, but then Kent took over with the clippers. At first Alex was a little unsure of the sound, but once we explained that he was just going to have his "hair tickled" he was fine with it. (With Miss Emily for speech, he gets tickles on his face and in his mouth, so he understands this concept.) By the time Kent was finished, he was asking for "more." We couldn't cut any more and didn't want to cut any more. Here are some pictures and a video of the experience.

As promised- videos!

2009-06-09T12:13:00.001-07:00

I mentioned in the last post that videos would be coming, well, here ya go!

Alex acting like a bird:

Monkey Island fun:

Pool Fun:

More swimming:

A month has passed

2009-06-08T18:12:00.000-07:00

I just realized that it has been a whole month since I've blogged. I can't believe that I haven't updated the blog with at least pictures. That is really all I have to update. We haven't really been up to much so far this summer. We have been making so many trips to the zoo. Alex can now say "zoo" so we hear it a lot! :) He loves going to see the zebras, monkeys, elephants and fish. We're glad that at least the zoo wears him out so he takes a good nap, or sleeps well at night after we come home.

He is still doing well with his speech therapy. He's talking more and more. It's still really difficult to understand what he's always saying, but luckily he's still using most if not all of his signs so that helps us understand his words. He's also starting to put 2-3 words together to make small phrases, which is so encouraging. In July we'll have another evaluation as it will have been a year since his last official evaluation. I'm looking forward to seeing the update and reading about his progress.

We have a few trips planned for the summer that we're looking for. This coming weekend we're headed back to Bloomington for a friend's 30th birthday! We're looking forward to seeing our friends from E-Free again and hearing Pastor Ron preach. In August we'll be going to Williamsburg with all of Kent's family. We're excited to see all of his siblings as well as all the nieces and nephews. Hopefully we'll be back in time for my new niece/nephew to be born in late August. :) I'm sure I'll be making some trips home to see that new baby, too.

Kent took this amazing picture outside of our condo

Alex and I were playing at the playground at the zoo. He is a climber!

Merry-Go-Round with Daddy

Swimming in the pool

Stay tuned for videos.......

It's been way too long......

2009-05-19T18:39:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the lack of blog posts lately. It seems like when the evening is over, I don't really feel like sitting down at the computer and blogging. We've been spending a lot of time lately outside, that is when it isn't raining. It seems like it's been raining a lot lately which makes us feel like it's still winter in some ways. To make it worse, they took the pool cover off about a week ago and it is all ready to jump in to. However, it hasn't officially opened. Thankfully Alex only repeated "pool" those first few days. He literally cried at the window (we put a chair up so he could look out) and he just kept saying "Pool, pool, pool, mama, dada, me...." It was cute, but got old so fast. :) We're hoping that it opens this weekend and we can finally see how much Alex will actually like it this summer. I'm hoping we spend most days in the pool as it gets warmer.

We've also started to make our weekly trips to the zoo again. It is a little different this year as Alex is old enough to look more at the animals. He's enjoying that more now.

We spent Mother's day at my parents house and Alex found a new love for Papa's tractor! He LOVED it. I think we may have a farmboy (at least during planting/harvest season).

Alex has been working so hard at his speech lately. He's really making a lot of progress. It is still very difficult to understand him, but he is really trying to talk to us more instead of doing the pointing and closed mouth sounds. He is trying to repeat a lot of what we say. He's added quite a few words to his repertoire. Some of those words include: ball, bird, all done, all gone, milk, please, rocket, blue, yellow, wall, teddy, bunny, and some others......

I asked Alex to smile, and this is what I get.....

This is what I wanted....

And a few videos for your enjoyment. This first one is of Alex being swung by daddy in his pjs. He LOVED it!

Fun with the phone at the zoo.

Videos

2009-04-18T19:01:00.000-07:00

The other night I was reading Alex a book from the library and he just cracked up laughing at it. I think we read it at least 7 times before I finally said that was enough. Enjoy the 3rd or 4th time that I read it to him.

Kent got out the flute to play for Alex as he loves to hear it and in turn, he ran and got his plastic recorder to play a duet. It was so cute. Before he started playing, he was actually singing to match the sounds of the flute.

When he opened his easter basket on Sunday morning he didn't realize the eggs were so great until he "accidentally" opened one and found the chocolates. Then it was a different story.

We have a 2 year old?!?!

2009-04-10T17:46:00.001-07:00

I can't believe that Alex is already 2!!! It's crazy! We celebrated his birthday last weekend and will celebrate again in a few weeks when Grandma and Grandpa Thompson come. Alex is excited to be able to celebrate twice with cake and ice cream! My parents, sister's family and my Grandma came up to go to Brookfield Zoo with us and then have cake and ice cream. It was a fun time. It was actually the first time that my Grandma saw a lot of the animals at the zoo, so it was great watching her experience some of God's creation for the first time. At one point my mom said, "Does this make you realize how creative and BIG God is?" So true! We came back home after a few hours at the zoo and by the time we got home (only 3 miles) Alex had fallen asleep, so we laid him down while the rest of us ate at late lunch. (I had forgotten to put lunch in the oven before we left. Oops!) When Alex woke up he ate a little and then opened gifts. He got some great new toys and bike from Kent and myself. He loved his "dump-truck" theme of a party. The pictures of him with his cake don't really show how much fun he had since he had just woken up, so trust me when I say, he had a great time! :) He was a little confused on Sunday when I told him it was his birthday because Grandma and Grandpa weren't there. We've just been talking about Grandma and Grandpa coming for his birthday. It's tough to explain it to a 2 year old!

In other news, Alex is making progress with his speech therapy. He now consistently says: Mama, Dada, Bye Bye, and More. On the list of not so regular words: Milk, Ball, Down, Done, and a few others. He's really starting to try to repeat what we say consistently, which is great!! It's really slow, but we're starting to see the fruits of all our labor of speech paying off. Keep praying that he'll continue to make progress. The more he is able to communicate with us, the lower the frustration levels of all involved! :) He does still continue to learn more and more signs. He has to know at least 75 or more by now. Such a blessing!

This is Alex saying "TaDah!"

We also dyed Easter eggs the other day. Alex had a lot of fun, but he did come away with a blue hand. Oops! It faded after one bath, so we didn't have to deal with it for too long.

We were playing at the park the other night and he just thought this was hilarious when we would make a sound when he ran into us on the swing. His laugh was contagious!

I think we have a keyboard perform/dancer in our household. What do you think?

If you listen closely you can hear him sing "Row Row Row your Boat" while playing the keyboard. Talented, right?

Other Random Things...

2009-03-28T10:18:00.001-07:00

Here are a few other random pictures and videos from the past month.

Playing at the Park

Trying on Mommy's Shoes

Playing with Claire
Note: We typically don't let them jump all over the couch! :)

Alex's Favorite Picture Book

Let's go Fly a Kite.....

2009-03-28T10:01:00.000-07:00

We have really enjoyed the hints of Spring finally being here. Now granted as I write this, we are expecting snow tomorrow, but still. A few weeks ago we decided to make a little trip to Target and get one of those cheap little kites for Alex to fly. We walked to the field close to our condo and showed him what to do. He loved watching the kite fly in the sky. When we handed it over to him, he just ran and ran and ran. Unfortunately, he ran right into the trees. No worries, he wasn't hurt, just a little muddy. The kite survived too. It was hard to get pictures of both him and the kite as he ran so fast and the kite was very high, but we tried.

Big Boy in the Thompson House

2009-03-08T17:09:00.000-07:00

I was on praise team this weekend at church, so Kent and Alex dropped me off yesterday at church for practice and then they headed to the Children's museum. They came back at 5pm for church so that this morning they could stay home and Alex wouldn't have a long morning at church. So this afternoon I get home around 1pm and it's time to lay Alex down for his nap. Kent opens his door and says, "Show mommy how your a big boy now!" Well, Alex has learned how to climb out of his crib, so Kent changed his crib into a toddler bed. He actually had climbed out once while I was at church and bonked his head on his toybox pretty hard. (He's got a big knot on his head.) So, we're now in the transition of using a toddler bed whether we like it or not. Alex is such a climber that it doesn't surprise us that he's learned to climb out, but we were hoping to keep him in his crib for a little longer. Oh well. At least our crib easily transitions and we don't have to go out and buy another bed for him. Enjoy the videos that Kent took! I think they speak for themselves. :)

I should add that it took about an hour to get him asleep for his nap. That was constant taking him back to his crib, over and over again. Tonight it took about 30 minutes to get him down for bed and just a few more trips returning him to bed. For now, it looks like he's asleep. We'll see how the night goes.

An update

2009-02-27T10:38:00.000-08:00

Okay, so it's a boring title to this post, but my creativity is lacking today. I have some pictures and videos to get to up on the blog.

A few weekends ago, Kent was on a business trip in DC, so Alex and I headed to my parents for a short trip and then spent the rest of the weekend here in Chicago. We had a lot of fun playing, coloring, climbing, and just having fun.

It's hard to believe that Alex is getting close to being 2 years old.

Pictures and Videos

2009-02-12T18:36:00.000-08:00

When the weather hits 60 degrees in February in the midwest, we head outside and play! Yes, we know that it is just a tease and it will shortly (already has) return to the cold frigid temperatures, but at least it was nice for a few days and we got to play outside. We took Alex to the park and just stood back and watched him climb. Okay, so we couldn't really stand back or we might have had a long trip to the ER, but we did watch him climb. He ran right over to the "big kid" playground and started climbing this ladder that turns as it goes up in the air. He loved it and didn't realize that he wasn't quite old enough to really be able to climb it. We definitely have a climber on our hands. It is fun to see just how much he improves at things even over the course of 4-5 months.

He also has been working hard at his speech therapy. He is starting to imitate some animal sounds that we make and also tries to say words. Tonight we were reading his ILLINI book before bed (in preparation for the game). I said, "Say Illini" and he really tried! It didn't come out quite right, but he tried. He's also trying to say car, go, mouse, boat, meow, cock-a-doodle-doo (quite cute), woof, and a few other ones. We're encouraged with the progress and are really working with him intentionally every day.

You'll notice a theme with some of these pictures and videos! :)

Climbing to his booster seat

Climbing on the "big kid" ladder

Playing at the McDonalds playland

Playing at the Park

Overpopulation?

A Special Song

2009-01-28T12:03:00.000-08:00

Here's a special song just for your enjoyment.

In case you can't recognize it, he's singing 'Row, Row, Row, your Boat!'

Nothing really new.

2009-01-25T17:46:00.001-08:00

I don't really have anything important to update as far as information, but we've taken some cute pictures lately, so I thought I'd post a little something so I can get these pictures up on the blog. We've been doing well. We're a little tired of winter already, but are confident it will be over soon. :) We've had enough snow already that we're just ready to send it all to other people, so if you're missing some snow, let us know and we'll send it your way.
Alex loves playing outside, so it makes it tough when we're stuck inside. We've been heading to McDonalds, the mall and the museum a lot lately to play.
He's still doing well with his speech therapy. He has really started to imitate Ms. Emily a lot more when she works with him, which is encouraging. We've been having fun with the few new "tricks" that Alex has learned, too! He loves to pat you on the back and also instead of giving you a high-five, he'll give you knuckles! I love it! :) Anyway, enjoy the pictures!

Reading to Mr. Frog

"I love Guacamole!"

Reading in my crib

My ILLINI book

Playing at the Mall

The snow was so deep, he couldn't move, he could only stand there!

Speech Therapy Progress

2009-01-08T18:24:00.000-08:00

I took a video the other night to show some of the progress Alex is making with his speech therapy. We feel like he's right of the verge of talking, but we'll see. For now we're happy that he's making progress. I showed him the video after I added it online and he continually asks to watch it. It's funny! He sits still through the whole thing and then signs more.

A Good Cause

2009-01-03T10:56:00.000-08:00

Check out this video and website for more information:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lOkvCTJF-lQ

http://ahundredforahome.com/

They're so close to their goal!

Vacation time and 2008 review.

2008-12-30T19:11:00.000-08:00

I've had the last week and a half off, so we'd had fun with family for Christmas and also just hanging around home. We spent the week of Christmas at my family's place since we had Christmas things Saturday, Sunday and of course Wednesday and Thursday. We had a good time and Alex was actually interested (or more interested) in opening gifts. We didn't go overboard on gifts since he already has a lot of toys and clothes. Plus we knew Grandparents would be getting him some things. :) He got a few remote control cars and another fire truck that he loves. He also got a new hopper bike (difficult to explain) from Grandma and Grandpa that he loves, too.

We've had a pretty good year and realize that we are definitely blessed. We're so thankful for family and friends. Alex continues to bring us joy (and headaches at times). His speech is starting to come. He has been babbling more and trying to imitate us more in the last few weeks. I counted his signs the other day and he has over 50 signs that he uses regularly. It has helped with frustrations, but we're learning lately that talking would be so helpful in lessening meltdowns. He continues to amaze us with his physicality and the way that he figures things out. We're convinced that he'll be some sort of mechanical engineer. If there is a way to get things open, he'll figure it out.

Enjoying his Christmas Cookie

The painting I did for my dad

Playing with his firetruck

Family Photo

Christmas Eve, ready to go to church

Lovin' the sunglasses

His new John Deere outfit

Must get down on the ground to play with the farm

Sporting his firetruck outfit

Opening presents from Grandma and Grandpa Thompson

Videos and Pictures Galore!!!

2008-12-19T11:40:00.000-08:00

We've taken a lot of pictures and videos lately, but haven't updated the blog, so here are a bunch for you to enjoy! A lot of them are from the Naperville Children's Museum, which we found to be a great place for Alex to run and play.

Thanksgiving, Weddings and Snow! Oh My!!!

2008-12-03T18:01:00.001-08:00

This past week was the first time that we braved taking Alex on a plane for the first time. We have to thank everyone so much for the prayers because Alex was a perfect angel on the flights!!! We couldn't even have asked him to behave any better than he did. We had a great time with Kent's family in Dallas. It was good to see them again. Oh Saturday morning we woke up at 3:30am to head back to Chicago.

After arriving in Chicago, we got in the car and drove an hour south to drop Alex off to my parents. Then we headed back to up Chicago for a friend's wedding. Surprisingly, even after waking up at 3:30am, Kent and I had a fabulous time at the wedding. Alex was great for Grandma and Grandpa, too.

We got snow over the weekend, too so yesterday I took Alex outside to experience the snow for the first time that he could probably actually enjoy the snow. He just laughed and tried to run in the now. It was a little difficult for him to run as he was bundled up in his snow pants. It was quite funny!

Halloween and Candy

2008-11-07T16:42:00.000-08:00

We went to my parent's house for Halloween weekend. Mainly to get to see family and then my mom, sister, and I took off for Indy on Saturday morning (without the kids). Anyway, I don't know how excited Alex was to get dressed up and the head to stranger's houses, but he went along with it. It was fun to be home and I know Claire loved having us. In fact, I heard from my sister today that she's been asking, "Where's my Aunt Regan? Where's my cousin Alex? Where's my Uncle Kent?" I love it! :)

Alex didn't get a ton of candy since we only went to about four places, but he did get enough, that's for sure! We got home and I decided a few days later to give him his first sucker ever. As I gave it to him, I quickly realized that he needed to be in his highchair or I would be scrubbing down the entire house. He put it in his mouth and quickly made a "mmmmm....." sound. I just laughed. He had fun with it and definitely enjoyed it.

He has also been loving his baths lately, even more than usual. In fact, there have been many nights that the water has drained and he's just sitting in there as if it doesn't really matter if there was water or not. I was able to capture it on the camera tonight.

Fort Fun Trip

2008-10-27T18:57:00.000-07:00

This past weekend Kent and I packed up the car, and of course Alex, and headed to Fort Wayne, Indiana to visit some good friends. It ended up taking us a LOT longer than we expected to get there as we had traffic, not in Chicago, but by just before Valporaiso, Indiana. Who would of thought? Anyway, the trip wasn't all bad as we saw the most beautiful rainbow on our drive! It was an amazing site to see.

Alex had fun with our friends' little girl as she was only about 6 months older than him. We took them to the mall on Saturday to run around at the little playground. They loved it (as you'll see in the video below). It was great to catch up with our friends as well. It was a little rough during lunch on Saturday, but we managed to survive a meltdown and enjoyed the food at home instead.

We had a fun time tonight playing with Alex on the couch. He loves it when we roll him around. It looks a little rough, but he loves it! He was also trying to jump, which is just funny to watch.

He did have his 18 month appointment a few weeks ago. He was 29.4 pounds and 34 inches tall. That puts him in the 75% for weight and 95% for height! No wonder why we always hear people say how tall he is. He is doing well with his speech therapy. We're starting to get more sounds from him, which is the goal right now. He has begun to say Mama and Dada appropriately, which makes my day! He is still signing up a storm and now probably has over 30 signs that he knows and uses consistently. For us, signing has been great in helping lower his frustration level and helping him communicate his needs.

He's had a little bit of fun putting on Kent's shoes as well.

New Pictures

2008-10-11T17:26:00.000-07:00

Not much is new here, but we've been taking quite a few pictures lately, so I thought I would at least post those. We've been enjoying the beautiful fall days by trying to be outside as much as possible.

Out for a ride on a fall day

Trying to get a "corner of the couch" picture isn't so easy anymore.

At the park

Running to throw something away. (He loves to do that!)

Fall Beauty

I think it's time for the booster seat

2008-10-05T18:57:00.000-07:00

Watch the video and you'll see the new "bad" trick Alex learned while I was in Colorado. By the way, he learned this on his own, without our help!

Sight we never thought we'd see

2008-09-29T11:20:00.001-07:00

We never thought we'd see this from Alex. Everyone always has pictures like this and we just laugh at them, but here is Alex from lunch yesterday.

Naptime or Lunchtime?

Rainy day post

2008-09-29T11:09:00.000-07:00

The title of today's post has nothing to do with this post besides the fact that it is a rainy day today and we're staying inside instead of going to the zoo.

We've spent a lot of time these last few weeks going to the zoo. We've discovered that playing and running around there really wears Alex out and helps him take longer naps, which we love! This past Friday, Shannon & Chris stopped on their way to Michigan and went to the zoo with us. It was fun to have Claire with us as we went to all of our typical zoo stops. So, we have a lot of pictures of our zoo days. We've discovered that Alex now loves riding the merry-go-round, which is so much fun!

Looking at the Lizard with Daddy

Alex LOVES the Merry-Go-Round now! (Apparently so do I)

Claire

Playing with the play Kitchen

Merry-Go-Round fun

Practice Time

2008-09-20T11:00:00.001-07:00

We figure he's almost 18 months old. He has to be old enough to start lessons, right??

Chores

2008-09-07T19:15:00.000-07:00

You're never too young to start having chores, right??

Family

2008-09-01T17:15:00.000-07:00

Kent and I travelled to Ohio to visit his family. His brother and sister-in-law were up from Tennessee with their four kids. We haven't seen them in about 2 years, so we wanted to make sure we were able to see them while they were only 4 hours away. We packed Alex up in the car again and made the trek back to Ohio. He actually did great in the car, which is not like him. Unfortunately, he has started to scream at bedtime and naps, which makes for very frustrating travel. We ended up having to sit in the room with him until he fell asleep. Other than that, he had a great time getting to know his cousins and another aunt and uncle.

It was quite entertaining to watch Alex observe the kids as they played. Katherine was jumping rope on the porch outside and he just sat there and really observed what she was doing. He did the same thing with David as he was riding the scooter around. Sure enough, after about 2 hours, Alex came back outside, picked up the jump rope and attempted to jump. It was so funny! He then put that down, walked over the the scooter, grabbed the handle bars and then with my help to balance the scooter, put his one foot on the bottom and his other foot he held up, and we took off. I guess we know he takes in what goes on around him.

Taking a look at the wagon

Slide

Katherine playing at the park

Swinging with Grace

Video of the kids playing outside

Video of "the scooter" and homemade ice cream

The Thompson kids

Playing some baseball together

Kent was trying to beat Jeffrey to home plate

Alex has also really started to use his signs to communicate. He still hasn't said any words, but through sign he says: more, eat, dog, banana, baby, signing, time, water, bird, drink, milk, train, car, and sometimes bike and thank you. He actually starts Speech Therapy tomorrow (9/2), so we'll see if the speech therapist (Emily) can work her magic. He will be meeting with her at our house once a week for an hour. I'm not sure what they'll do with a 17 month old, but I trust they know what they're doing.

In other news, our bathroom is finished and looks great! Alex is loving his new bathtub, and so are we as it is much easier to give him a bath now.

We also took Alex to the beach again today. Probably for the last time of the season. He took off when we arrived and LOVED the sand and water. It's funny how in just a few months, he has really changed in how he reacts to things. Unfortunately due to this bedtime routine of screaming and waking up a lot at night, he was tired and only lasted about an hour before he started to get really crabby. We decided to just pack him up and take a walk on the waterfront. We were walking and realized that Alex has drifted off to sleep. About 2 minutes later, there was an ambulance that was leaving the waterfront area (literally RIGHT NEXT to where we were walking) that put his siren on and woke Alex up. He was terrified!!! We calmed him down and kept walking. He seemed to be fine in just a short time.

At the beach

Video of the beach, playing in the waves

More video of the beach

What does a 1 yr old do in Construction??

2008-08-21T18:48:00.001-07:00

Play of course! We've finally been able to redo our bathroom after our ceiling collapsed in at the end of May. Kent has been working hard to do all the other stuff that wasn't covered by insurance (i.e. the floor, painting, and installing the vanity/sink). So, Alex has had a lot of fun playing with all of the new "toys" that have been all over our house. I think most of the pictures speak for themselves. (Seems like I'm always saying that!)

They had to cut a hole in our hallway wall in order to get the new shower into the bathroom.

Playing in the new vanity

"This is Fun!!!"

I think he likes his new bathtub

Admiring his new bathtub

Playing in his new bathtub!

"This is great, why didn't I have one earlier?"

Believe it or not, he is smiling in this one. He was splashing all over

More Bath fun!

Sunday Morning Photo Shoot

2008-08-15T12:04:00.000-07:00

Alex Loves pasta, Can you tell?

He was so cute on Sunday morning, we had to take some pictures.

Making Grandma proud (playing with Creative Memory stuff)

New Videos

2008-08-15T11:58:00.000-07:00

Here are some new videos from some fun outside and in the pool. Enjoy!

A more Serious Update

2008-07-31T17:15:00.000-07:00

Wednesday we had Early Intervention come and did an evaluation for Alex. We had an Occupational Therapist, Developmental Therapist, and Speech & Language Therapist come. They basically came and played with Alex while asking us a trajillion questions. After watching him interact and play with them for an hour, they decided that he does need Speech Therapy. That didn't come as a surprise to us as he is not babbling a lot (really only started babbling a few weeks ago). He never says "mama" or "dada." He has been starting to do more sign language which is VERY encouraging to us. Mostly he makes grunting noises when he is trying to communicate with us. It's a little frustrating as most people who don't know him very well tend to think that he is whining when he's really just trying to talk. He's also been pointing a lot, which the S&L therapist said was encouraged to see. Anyway, he'll be getting speech therapy 1 time a week for an hour at a time.

In other news, we've also retested Alex for his tooth and nail syndrome. We found out about a month ago that there is testing available for Witkop Tooth & Nail Syndrome, so we went ahead and had blood drawn for the 4th time in Alex short little life. Hopefully we'll hear something soon about that. Basically this will just help us with insurance stuff and we'll also know if it is a dominant or recessive gene.

The Fair & Claire

2008-07-31T16:48:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago we took Alex to the County Fair where I grew up. I don't think Alex was quite old enough to understand the fair. He wasn't a huge fan of the Merry-go-round. He seemed to enjoy looking at the animals, but didn't really want to touch them. He was a little tired from the heat and not a great nap. His most favorite part of the day was definitely running around in the open area by the tractors. He just ran and laughed. He also loved pretending to drive the tractors! He thought it was a blast. Who knows, maybe he'll be a farmer afterall. :)

We've also been spending a few weekends with Claire (my niece) as well. It seems like they've really had fun playing lately. At a wedding rehearsal last weekend, they were chasing each other outside and laughing, or should I say screaming. Here are a few pictures to enjoy.

Goats!!!

Playing in the Water

Driving on the Tractor

What a Smile!

Playing with Claire

From my last work-out with Rachel before she moved. :(

Sisters

Zoo Fun & more

2008-07-15T19:09:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from our last few trips to Brookfield Zoo.

And some pictures from a trip to the Children's Museum in Kankakee

New Videos!

2008-07-07T19:01:00.000-07:00

A few more videos from the park yesterday! Enjoy!!!

New Videos

2008-07-06T19:10:00.000-07:00

This first video shows Alex's love of climbing.....

This is from the 4th of July. We were just playing in the HUGE field of grass by our condo. I think you can tell (if you have the sound on) how much fun Alex was having.

There will be more videos to come tomorrow....

More Summer Fun

2008-07-06T11:25:00.000-07:00

We have been having a blast with Alex this last week. Last weekend he spent time with Grandma and Grandpa while Kent and I headed to Wisconsin for a friend's wedding. It was nice to us to spend a little time by ourselves, but by Sunday we were ready to go and pick Alex up. He has been so happy this last week just laughing at everything and really starting to play games with us. His new favorite game would be to chase us or be chased around the house. We also discovered a huge open field of grass by our place that is perfect for putting Alex down and just telling him to go anywhere. He really can't go anywhere to get in trouble there, so it works out perfectly.

His head is healing and the scab is looking better everyday. It hasn't seemed to bother him too badly, which is great! Every once in awhile he'll touch it, but more than often he just leaves it alone. Hopefully his scar won't be too bad.

At the Zoo with Daddy

No explanation needed...

Again....no explanation needed

4th of July

Fun at the Splash Park

An eventful day!

2008-06-20T11:03:00.000-07:00

This morning has been eventful morning. I was watching Alex this morning and he was playing as he always does, and climbing all over things. Well, he was just playing around the TV table and the next thing I know, he slipped and fell on something that was on the floor and sliced his head open just above his right eye. It was a deep cut, so we immediately got in the car and headed to the emergency room. Not a fun experience, but thankfully Alex is okay, and didn't need stitches. They were able to use the dermabond stuff which should have minimal scarring. I think I'm more scarred than he is. I'm now terrified of everything that he is playing with. I know, I know, accidents happen and all kids fall. I'll post some pictures of his latest battle wound. :(

Time for the Beach

2008-06-14T17:39:00.000-07:00

We got up at our normal time this morning (6:45am) and then headed downtown to take Alex to the beach for the first time. We were at the beach by 9:15am and Alex headed right for the water. He loved the sand and the water! Unfortunately, when we first arrived, he ran right for the water, tripped, and fell face first into the water. Kent ran to pick him up, so I don't think he was too traumatized. We took some pictures and video to capture the memory.

Building a sand castle

Playing in the water

Park Fun!

2008-06-13T13:00:00.000-07:00

Our courtyard!

2008-06-13T12:45:00.001-07:00

Check out what Kent saw in our courtyard a few weeks ago.

The Pool is OPEN!!!

2008-06-13T11:43:00.000-07:00

One last update

2008-06-07T18:09:00.000-07:00

I forgot to tell you all about our stress that we've had this last week. Saturday night I was out with my friends from college. I got home Sunday and Kent told me not to use the bathroom. He then went on to say that our bathroom ceiling collapsed from the leak that we'd noticed a few weeks ago. We found out this week that the toilet from upstairs had been leaking for awhile and the water damaged caused the ceiling to just give way and collapse. So, Monday we had an emergency water damage crew come and cut the rest of the ceiling up and clean things up. The crew left two HUGE dehumidifiers in each of our bathrooms. Let just say that not only do we have a pool, but for a week we also had two saunas! Not the highlight of my week. :) Friday afternoon, they did come to pick up the two dehumidifiers. We also had someone come to write an estimate for us.

So at the end of the week, we've come to realize that the worst is over, or at least it seems like the worst is over. :)

You'll notice in the next few posts that Alex has a huge bump on his head. With all the demolition, we had a ladder out in hallway. He turned too fast, fell, and hit the corner of the ladder with his head. Not a pretty site, but it's getting better.

We'll keep you updated in the next few weeks.

Fair Oaks Farm.....

2008-06-07T17:39:00.001-07:00

We spent today at Fair Oaks Farm in Fair Oaks, IN. It was a lot of fun and not what we expected. What an amazing operation they run on over 19000 acres. Somehow we survived the day with Alex not getting a nap until 2:30pm when we got in the car to head back home. Funny thing was, we weren't even on the entrance ramp before he was asleep. I think he was quite tired from the fun of the day! I think the highlight for Alex was the indoor play area. He loved it!!! I also think my parents finally saw how active he is! (They'll have fun in a few weeks when they get him for the weekend!)

Of course we had to enjoy some ice cream before we left the Dairy Farm!

I think this picture conveys just how tired these two were at the end of the day!

A New Trick!

2008-06-07T17:36:00.000-07:00

Alex has learned a new trick that I'm not so excited about. I think the pictures will speak for themself.

Fun with Claire

2008-06-07T17:26:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago we headed down to Chris and Shannon's for some fun family time. Alex had a blast playing with Claire's outdoor playset. We've decided that he has now fear as he just goes down the slide head first. It is fun to see him start to interact more and play with Claire as he gets older.

Can you see the classic "Alex" look?

Zoo Time

2008-06-07T16:50:00.000-07:00

Kent and I have been entertaining Alex lately by taking him to the zoo. While the weather has been nice quite a bit lately, it seems like the days that we have him, it isn't so nice. That means that we have spent a fair amount of time at the Hamil Family Play area of Brookfield Zoo. It has been a blast to watch Alex as he just tots around and goes from room to room. We've found that his favorite rooms are the "Veterinarian Room" and "The Office." I think it amazes him that he can stand there and play with everything and not get into anything that he isn't supposed to be in. It also makes our job much easier. We're looking forward to spending more time at the zoo this summer as the weather continues to get nicer. These pictures are from a few weeks ago, but as you'll see in my next few posts, things have been busy and crazy around here the last few weeks.

Note: It's also harder to get a good/clear picture of Alex these days! :)

Overdue Update

2008-05-17T16:04:00.000-07:00

I think this blog post is way overdue! I feel like I haven't updated everyone in so long. We have been busy, but not with anything specifically. We've been out of town quite a bit lately, so I guess that takes up some free time, and we'e been spending a lot of time outside as well. Alex loves to be outside, which is fun for us. We love watching him play at the park and just run around outside.

A few weekends ago we headed to Ohio for some family time. Alex was able to meet another one of his aunts and his uncle, and two more cousins! I think he had fun. It is sometimes hard to tell with him, but he did great the whole weekends. Especially considering for three nights in a row he had to fall asleep in the car! Probably not my first choice, but it worked.

Last weekend we went to my parent's house for Mother's day weekend! Saturday afternoon Claire and Alex played together for awhile. We always think that they'll start to be closer together in what they can do and how they can play together, but Claire keeps advancing as well. :) She gets so excited to see Alex! It's cute. She now has learned how to say "Al" (we're working on the Ex part), "Kent" and "Regan." Her vocabulary surprises me everytime!

This summer seems like it is going to be a busy one for us. We have three weddings and a few other trips to take as well. We're looking forward to the trips, but not the gas prices. In Chicago, it is now $4.05!!! YIKES!!!

Here are a few pictures from the last few weeks for you.

My Birthday Gifts from Alex and Kent

Alex LOVES to give hugs to his stuffed animals

"Strawberries on my head? How'd those get there??"

On the farm with Grandma

Bubbles!!!

Fun on the Farm!

Helping Grandma

A bird's nest

Wagon Ride

4 Generations

Storytime!

Lookin' Cool!

Playing outside

Dancing King....

2008-04-29T18:59:00.001-07:00

Here's a video for your enjoyment of Alex dancing to his new fridge toy. He loves it!!!

New pictures

2008-04-27T17:58:00.000-07:00

I don't really have too much of an update. Things are going well for us here. Alex has been growing like crazy, but he has been a lot of fun. As you can tell, we have really been enjoying the park and being outside more. Enjoy the pictures

Videos!!!

2008-04-13T18:25:00.000-07:00

Here are a few videos from today. Enjoy! I think they'll speak for themselves.

Birthday Boy!

2008-04-05T17:34:00.000-07:00

First a few pictures from when Kent was gone to CA. Alex had a fever pretty much all 4 days Kent was gone, so I let him do whatever would keep him happy. He ended up playing in the pantry. Why do we buy toys for kids to play with???

Birthday Fun! Drinking whole milk! YUM!

Last "Corner of the Couch" picture

Birthday cake

Today is Alex's first birthday. It is so hard to believe that a year has already gone by. Our lives have definitely changed throughout the last year. It has been so much fun to see all of the changes that Alex gone through this last year. We have loved watching him see the world through "new eyes." If you're never watched a child explore new things, sit back and watch them. It is very entertaining.

My parents, Shannon & Chris (and Claire) and our friend Erin made it out for his party. We had a good time watching Claire and Alex play. Claire continues to grow and change every time that I see her. I think the new favorite word is "no," but it is still said in her cute and adorable way. She has learned so many new words. Just today she said "Pawpaw" for Grandpa. (Which he loved!)

Besides watching the kids play, we had lunch and of course cake. Alex dug right in. He's never been shy when it comes to food. In fact, I don't think he's ever met a food that he doesn't like, or won't eat. I put the cupcake on his tray, and he took a little bite, realized it was sweet, and then just continued digging in until there was nothing left on his tray. We've had to teach him to "clean his plate." I guess that's why he's such a big boy.

Alex was blessed with many cards and gifts from those who love him. He received some new clothes for spring and summer. (We're thinking that after today, spring MAY be here!) He also got some great books! He loves to turn the pages of his books and look at the pictures. He likes to read them too, but usually doesn't sit still long enough to make it through the whole book. :) We'll get there. He got a few toys too, which of course he loves!

After opening presents, and after a few naps for the kids, we took a short walk on the trail behind our condo! We were so thankful that it was such a beautiful day and we were able to get outside. Last year, it was snowing when Alex was born. :( Crazy how the weather can be in April. It was a great day!

We're so thankful for Alex and all the joy he brings to our lives. We're truly blessed to have him.

Sleepless Easter

2008-03-25T07:46:00.000-07:00

This past weekend we headed to my parent's to celebrate Easter. We were looking forward to getting out of town, since we've been home for awhile now. We really haven't travelled since Christmas. Apparently Alex is now at the age where he knows when he isn't in his own crib and room. Every time we tried to put him down for a nap or his bedtime, he would just stand up and scream! We never deal with this at home. At home, we lay him down and within 15 minutes at the most, he has fallen asleep. Needless to say, it was frustrating to have a screaming child who was just scared to be in a place that he didn't recognize as his own home. We made it through the weekend though and he's back to his normal sleeping habits. After this weekend, we're wondering when we even want to venture out for another weekend trip anyway.
We did have fun with my family though. It was good to see the new things that Claire is doing and how fast she is changing. Friday night, Chris, Shannon, and the two of us left the kids with the grandparents and headed to Kankakee for a movie and dinner. It was fun to have a night out with the kids. Kent and I haven't seen a movie in over a year, so it was long overdue!
I'll leave you with some pictures from easter.

Popsicle Leftovers (I had some of Daddy's)

Crawling around

Easter Frog from Great Grandma Bev

Playing with Mater

Playing in the Crock

This is Fun

In the Crock again

All dressed up for Easter Morning

A Tie? Seriously mom??

With Daddy

With Gma, Gpa, & Claire

Eating Gma G's salad

As Promised

2008-03-14T12:28:00.000-07:00

Toys Galore

My Racetrack

11 Months Photo

Toybox Fun

Attempting to Walk

Fun at the Park

Park, Day 2

Time for an Update

2008-03-14T12:10:00.000-07:00

Things must be crazy around here, so here it is! It is so nice to see the sun out and have a few nicer days. Alex has been able to get outside with us the last few days. We've headed to the park, and he loves it. But first, let me give you an update on what he's been up to. He is now 11 months old and getting ready for his first birthday! We are amazed that he is almost a year old already! Time flies. In the last few weeks he has been making strides at walking. He really is starting to get the confidence to let go. He has been taking about 5-10 steps from one thing to another. Today instead of crawling to where he wanted to go, he just turned and started walking. I think Kent and I just held our breath, like "wow, there he goes!" I'm just in another month he'll be walking everywhere. Another thing he has learned to do is shake his head no. It is quite funny actually! We're not quite sure if he knows what he is saying, but every once in awhile it makes sense when he shakes his head no!

We're trying to get a video off of our video camera for the blog, but for some reason it won't show up, so we'll keep working on it. For now, you'll just have to settle for the pictures! We've taken so many this last month, so I'll try to pick just a few of the best.

I'll post the pictures hopefully later this afternoon.

Video Fun and more

2008-02-27T12:21:00.000-08:00

Alex has been doing this silly thing with his mouth lately. Last night I captured a SHORT clip of it, so enjoy the video. :)

Also, we had our dermatology conference today. Really we did more educating the doctor's than they did answering any of our questions, but hopefully we will gain some information from them after they finish meeting today. After we left, they spent the day talking about different cases they saw and their impressions. I'm guessing that we won't really find anything out, but it was good to talk to our own dermatologist again and see what he was thinking today. Alex was a trooper. He was so good, even as it was during his nap time. He let all of the doctors (about 30 of them) look at his teeth and his nails. He had a great time in the room as well. We were in a little exam room. We walked in and they had a little hospital gown for him, which he didn't end up needing, but it was adorable. It was kind of funny as all of the doctors kept saying how laid back and well behaved Alex was. They didn't see him climbing all over the room before they came in. He managed to find the buttons to move the exam chairs up or down, the drawers with the medical supplies in it, and the stool that they doctors all wheel around on. It was entertaining!

Genetic Update

2008-02-22T12:34:00.000-08:00

On Wednesday we had an appointment with a genetic specialist to talk about Alex and the form of Ectodermal Displasia that he has. After a thorough exam, it was decided that we would test for a specific form of ED. Unfortunately, the kind that we actually think Alex has doesn't have testing available yet, even though though the gene is identified. The doctor thought it was at least worth testing for this other form, which also effects hair besides the nails and teeth. Obviously Alex has really short, fine hair, which can be a symptom, but in his case we really don't think it is at this point. We'll have results in about 4-6 weeks. The downside of this news is the fact that most likely we won't know genetically where this came from, which means we won't know how future children may or may not be effected.

In other news, NEXT Wednesday we are going to be a part of a dermatology conference downtown. We got a call a few weeks ago and were asked if we would be interested in bringing Alex downtown to be examined by about 20-30 dermatologists. THey will then meet together and talk about their impressions. We're excited about gaining so more information and also spreading knowledge about this rare disease.

Still Winter

2008-02-19T12:12:00.000-08:00

I don't know about you, but we can't wait for winter to be over this year. It feels as if winter has lasted forever this year! We are so anxious to get outside again and play in the warm weather. We have been getting creative with playing inside and trying to make errands fun.
Alex is about 10 1/2 months old now. He has made a lot of little changes all the time. He has just started to take the fork from us when feeding him and he'll put it in his mouth by himself. He also has been standing a little bit on his own. He still isn't quite sure of himself, but he's getting there. He is motoring around all the furniture though.
It has been fun to see the changes over the month. It hard to believe that he is almost 1 year old already.
Things are going well for Kent and myself as well. Like I mentioned, we are ready for spring, but we've been making the best of the cold weather. We joined a local gym that is wonderful! (Including a steam room and hot tub!) It has been nice to get in a good work-out even when it is so cold outside.
I'm including some recent pictures of Alex, of course, so enjoy!

Doing Chores Already

With Mom

My 1st Babysitter (that I've met, usually I'm asleep when they come)

Climbing through my Exersaucer

Happy Valentine's (from Alex)

Playing in my room

Life as a Family of 4!

3Day Follow-up

Just another day in....

A 4 yr old and a 1 yr old!!!!

Finishing up and Starting Anew

Birthdays Galore!

3 Day Walk

Life Goes On...

Time passes by...

PRESCHOOL!!!!!

5 Months

What We've been Up To!

Picture post from back in time....

Paige Laughing

3 Month update

Picture Post!

Videos

A New Schedule

Family Visits

One Month Old

Bubble Time

Birthday Boy turns 3!!!

New Addition...

What's new here?

Way too Long

Christmas 2009

Mickey Mouse Parade of Lights

Trimming the tree

Time Away in San Diego

Trick-Or-Not.....

As promised....

A fall Walk....

Out of the habit of blogging

Fun on the farm

New addition coming in April 2010!!!

New Nephew- Eli Robert

Williamsburg Vacation

The Fair and then End of a Small School

More videos.

4th of July fun!!!

Montly Post with more to come....

First Haircut

As promised- videos!

A month has passed

It's been way too long......

Videos

We have a 2 year old?!?!

Other Random Things...

Let's go Fly a Kite.....

Big Boy in the Thompson House

An update

Pictures and Videos

A Special Song

Nothing really new.

Speech Therapy Progress

A Good Cause

Vacation time and 2008 review.

Videos and Pictures Galore!!!

Thanksgiving, Weddings and Snow! Oh My!!!

Halloween and Candy

Fort Fun Trip

New Pictures

I think it's time for the booster seat

Sight we never thought we'd see

Rainy day post

Practice Time

Chores

Family

What does a 1 yr old do in Construction??

Sunday Morning Photo Shoot

New Videos

A more Serious Update

The Fair & Claire

Zoo Fun & more

New Videos!

New Videos

More Summer Fun

An eventful day!

Time for the Beach

Park Fun!