Playing Catch Up!

Where oh, where do I begin?? Feeling like it's been forever since I've blogged, probably can't even recall half of the things that have taken place but I have a few things to speak on.
I do believe, I can say that we are all finally healthy! A few runny noses around but I think that has to do with the high pollen count. I am so thankful that baby Will is better. We had to give him breathing treatments for a week because he had bronchialitis. Will is still growing so quickly. He is nearly 7 months old and our last weigh in a few weeks back he was nearly 19lbs. and he is about 29" long. He is eating some solid foods now which he seems to thoroughly enjoy. Seems to prefer this to his breastmilk feedings. He isn't sitting up completely on his own yet...he's a little top heavy so kinda falls over after a few seconds of sitting there.
Since I last blogged we've had some visitors come join us here in FL too. We had a surprise visit from my Dad back in February (he was sick while he was here:( ) and then just last week my Grandparents from Indiana were in town for a week. It was wonderful to see them interact with the kids and get to meet Will for the first time.
Eddie, continues to be Eddie....full of life and happy things! I was putting him in his carseat yesterday and he randomly just smiles very big and say's "Momma, I'm HAPPY" What a great thing to hear as a parent! He is soooo funny and I want to share some of the recent things he's said and done that have ammused me. Perhaps I'll dedicate a blog next time to this topic.
Something else that I'm excited about is the fact that we have a little garden that John started in our backyard that is really thriving right now. We have collards, butter lettuce, eggplant, broccoli, romaine, spring mix, & kale. It's been so neat to see things sprouting up and actually getting to eat them too! It's a hydroponic garden which seems to be working well, the photo I included here was a few weeks ago so now the veggies are much bigger!
Here are a few recent pictures of our life lately.

My Love, My Valentine

I can remember the time when Valentine's Day always felt like such a bummer, wishing and hoping that Prince Charming would come and sweep me off my feet on the "most romantic" day of the year. Getting all dolled up to go out...usually with friends only to come home feeling no different at all and feeling like I would never meet the man of my dreams. I breathe a huge sigh of relief these days knowing that I will have a perfect Valentine to snuggle up to not only on Valentine's Day but everyday for the rest of my life! I actually look forward to tomorrow more than this day because it is our wedding anniversary! This year we celebrate 7 years! In the bible 7 represents completeness or perfection. I'm SO blessed and I would marry the same man a million times over. I remain amazed at how God orchestrated our lives to meet up how and when we did as only He could! I'm a perfect testimony for the sermon that preachers always preach about not letting your own agenda get in God's way. I prayed and prayed for years for different scenarios to unfold in this way or that, little did I know that God's plan was way bigger and better than I ever dreamt. I'm forever THANKFUL!
Wanted to share a couple cute pics of my boys that I played around with on photoshop. Eddie gave them out to his family and friends as his personalized Valentine's Day cards. The picture of Will, I stole the idea from my creative friend, Becky, thanks Becky for the cute idea. :)

GO COLTS!

Officially not a huge Pro-football fan but being that my roots are Indiana we have to say we're rooting for the Colts tonight for the BIG game. Here's our little guy showing his support.

Sigh...

sigh (sī)
1.to take in and let out a long, deep, audible breath, especially in expressing sorrow, relief, fatigue, longing, etc.
This word seems so approriate to describe how I'm feeling at this moment. Kids are quietly sleeping and John and I have a few hours to ourselves. It's been such a difficult month with kids awaking at all hours of the night with fevers, whines, cries, etc. Not to mention dealing with long days of sickness amongst the entire family. In my last post I mentioned that Will & myself had escaped the illness but a day later we were also sick. I breathed a sigh of relief when we all seemed to be over it, but 1 week later Eddie was had the bug again!
Although the entire month of January was quite the challenge we had a few days of fun & a few laughs to go along with it.
Will's latest stunt...rolling over! He turned 5 months old already in January, can't believe how quickly he's changing

Make a Smilebox slideshow

HAPPY YEAR!

2010 has been a crazy one already for us. We've all been whipped out by a flu bug and are just now able to get out and about to do something. It did however, spare Will, which I'm so thankful! Eddie has only been sick 1 other time in his 2 years of life so it was a real learning experience and trying time for us. John and I were pretty knocked out too but thankfully not the worst at the same time. So I'm singing praises for good health and look forward to moving on with our New Year!
Along with the sickness, we've been dealing with, what I hate to admit to be the "terrible twos" with Eddie. Daily, I feel I'm left to wonder who came and hijacked my sweet baby boy. It's so sad and I hate dealing with it but I know I'm not the first or the last. I pray I can have patience and deal with this effectively for Eddie's sake.
I hate it that bad behavior takes the attention away from our sweet little Will. I want to just say how absolutely sweet Will is. I can see big personality difference between he and Eddie already at a young age. I remember knowing that as soon as Eddie could he would be off and running...I was right and then some. Will on the other hand is sooooo layed back and not much bothers him. He's so happy and about as easy as babies come. A much needed balance at this time.
I have so much love for my boys, appreciate their differences and just need prayer that I can bless Eddie & Will with good parenting and guide them to be Godly boys. Eddie, John, Aunt Kerstin & Karis
Will & Daddy

Merry Christmas!

Happy Birthday Jesus!! At our bible study Christmas party this year we dedicated it to the kids and it really reminded me again of what the season is all about. "And you will have joy and gladness, and many will rejoice at his birth" - Luke 1:14 It was a birthday party for Jesus. We had a birthday cake that read "Happy Birthday Jesus" and we sang happy birthday, played games, etc. It's so easy to get caught up in the "to-do's" this time of year so it was great to see the kids celebrating the true reason for the season.
Last week I asked Eddie what he would like for Christmas...his answer, Candy! I asked him again a day or two later, his answer, an apple juice drink. I think I can handle both of those!
So, I wanted to get some cute Christmas photos taken of the boys. My plan, go to the beach, build a snowman in the sand and snap some pics of the kids next to him. Well....that was much harder than I thought and didn't work out at all! So anyways, in few moments we had with Eddie clean we took a few shots of him. By the time we got to Will the memory card was full, I had grabbed a smaller card than I intended in the rush of trying to get out of the house!! I only got one shot of him and the photos aren't too "Christmasy" but here they are anyway.


Now May the Lord of peace himself give you peace at all times in every way. The Lord be with you all. 2 Thessalonians 3:16

Imagination

There is alot I never knew about raising kids and one unexpected thing I've discovered lately is that I never knew that a 2 year old could have such a big vocabulary and imagination to go along with it. I attribute alot of this to Eddie's best buddy being our next door neighbor girl who happens to be 8! We are so blessed to have such wonderful neighbors. Eddie wakes up and goes to bed talking about Saryn and they get to play together nearly everyday. It's almost as if he has a big sister.
I wanted to share a few of the cute things that Eddie has said/done over the past week.
1. We see a trail of ants in our garage which lead to a rather large, dead grasshopper. Eddie proceeds to crouch down, gasping for air and in the next breath saying "OH NO MOMMY, careful, it's dangerous"! I can't capture just how cute this was by putting words on paper (or the computer) or reiterating the story, just one of those times I wished I had my camera.
2. Driving over to Eddie's grandma's house Eddie talks the entire way, narrating everything he sees. On this particular day he starts saying "we've got a nodder", a favorite quote from his favorite movie, Cars. I proceeded to ask Eddie if he could tell me what that meant and he proceeded to say, Mac is sleeping. I was totally shocked that he knew what this meant since no one had ever explained it to him.
3. Since the time change, by the time John arrives home from work it's nearly dark which means Eddie gets to play outside with Daddy after dark...a new phenomenon to him. Tonight he spotted a star and was very excited and began saying how he wanted to reach the star. He took off running to the garage and wanted his Daddy to hand him the rope. John gave him a short rope and Eddie ran back to the spot where he spotted the star and began trying to throw the rope up to the sky. A twist on trying to rope the moon.

I just love being Eddie & Will's Mommy and what that brings day to day. Even on the particular challenging days I'm forever grateful and love my job.

A report on Will, he's doing great, sleeping great, growing great. He's a real flirt. I remember Eddie doing the same thing Will's doing as far as just waiting on someone to look his way so he can smile, laugh and coo at them. He's very happy when he's eating, having his diaper changed and about 45 minutes after eating and then he's ready to sleep again! I am blessed that I get to catch a few zzzz's nearly everyday while Eddie & Will nap in the afternoon.

The pictures I'll share this time include a sign the neighbors made for us this past summer. We woke up to this in our side yard waiting for us...so sweet!
If you can't read it, it reads "you gise are the bestes nabers we cold ever have in the world. have a grate summer eddie's family".