Random Updates/Pictures

Thought I'd write about a few random happenings in the last week and a half....

Parker has been doing much better. After about five days on Prevacid, her screaming fits during and after feeding time seemed much improved. We even made a road trip to Lufkin on Saturday, and she didn't cry much at all! That day was a huge turning point for her. I still would say she's a pretty fussy baby...a different kind of experience than we had with our first baby, for sure! But she's coming around. The crying is getting less and less, and once the medicine started taking effect, she began to smile a bunch. I'm starting to have hope for her temperament! =)


The road trip mentioned was for my cousin Cory's little girls, Kate and Reese, who turned 6 and 2 this week. The kids, my parents, and I made the trip while Joel stayed home to play golf with some friends for his Father's Day gift. Jonah had a blast, jumping in inflatable bounce house things that they rented for the party. I could barely keep up with him. Thankfully, I didn't have to because since I had taken my parents with me for back-up! I'm a girl who always loves spending time with my family - just wish we saw those guys more often!

Jonah and Parker with all their cousins there:

The birthday girls with their adorable personalized birthday shirts:
Kate holding Parker:
Jonah was given the Better Batter baseball toy for his birthday, and we've been pleasantly surprised by his skills. This child had yet to show us any signs of athletic ability, which would be just fine. But he really picked up this baseball thing...he has a great swing, and he even naturally turn his hips just right when swinging. Who knew?! Of course, as of now, there's not a competitive bone in his body, so we'll see.






He'd been playing in the sprinklers, one of his all-time favorite activities, although it looks a little like we don't feed him:
My brother's family is coming for a visit next week, and we are just so excited. They'll be here Tuesday through Saturday, so we'll be spending as much time at my parents' with them as we can. Everyone except for me and Amy and the two little babies are going camping for one night. They'll have a great time. But I am not jealous, no I am not. Not one bit. Amy and I have plans to hire a baby-sitter one afternoon so we can go to the pool and lay out...alone! How wonderful. I am blessed with a great sister-in-law, and as much as I love having all our kids together, it will be nice to just spend some time without them. That probably has never happened before! I will be a sad girl if the weather doesn't cooperate with our plans. (But don't worry, Amy, I have back-up plans!)

There is a man from Lowe's here right now, working on assembling a birthday present Jonah received from Joel's mom: a swingset/fort for the backyard. It will take a few days, but we are really excited! While we have a great big shady backyard, we have pretty much had nothing for kids to play with. So we're working on making it more kid-friendly.

Our family vacation (with Joel's side of the family) had been planned for two years and was supposed to take place in a few weeks, but it recently got canceled. Not everyone is details-oriented; therefore, misunderstandings happen. And a big one did this time. We all had different dates scheduled, and now things can't be rescheduled. So no Sea World this summer. I'm mostly sad for Jonah. We had been talking a lot about feeding the dolphins. I was extremely disappointed about this turn of events when I found out, but I've just had to choose trust. It's obviously not supposed to happen at this time. I think instead, the four of us are going to spend a four-day weekend in the Dallas Metroplex and do some fun things like the Aquarium, maybe a baseball game if the Rangers are in town, and spend some time hanging out with close friends there. This woman needs some kind of vacation-like thing to do this summer! Oh yes, and I have some serious shopping goals for while we are there. I need some new clothes!

Jonah has been really sweet. We had one rough week...the one when Parker was the most high-maintenance with the reflux. He certainly was demanding much more attention than was physically possible for me to give him. To say I felt stretched is quite an understatement. But the only way to deal with that was to turn to the Lord for some supernatural help! And He's been showing me a lot of things about my parenting. I'll write about that soon.

My girlfriend Kelli is coming this Friday to meet Miss Parker, and I can hardly wait. We have lots of catching up to do, so hopefully the playset will be finished so we can throw our older kids outside to allow for better conversation between us. =)

Another of Jonah's birthday presents was a goldfish. After thinking through lots of potential names for his new pet, mostly from the Nemo movie, like Swordfish, Starfish, etc., he finally settled on the perfect fish name: Selfish. Yes, SELFISH. Can you tell what we've been talking about a lot at our house lately??? This boy is so hilarious. He just doesn't really know it.