Hi-
Why yes, we are still alive and well.
Since the last post we've... performed in the Christmas musical, Back to the Manger, hung out with Aunt Jesse, Uncle Darrell and Temperance, celebrated Jesus Birthday with our annual birthday party with friends, celebrated Jesus Birthday at home on Christmas Day, been to Disney World for a full week and visited with some Clemson friends who now live in Orlando on the way home, spent more time with Aunt Jesse, Uncle Darrell, and Temperance before saying good-bye as they are off to Bahrain for the next couple of years, squeezed in a few days of non-fun-field-trip schoolwork, sent Blaise off to spend a week with the grandparents, had Scott evaluated for allergies and started on shots for tree pollen- especially oak, traveled to MD to pick Blaise up and visited (Cullen's) Grandma at her new swanky apartment- it's really nice, spent a couple of extra days at the grandparents house while Cullen was at a conference in DC and realized how much I love our ranch style home, started letting RoseMarie play with food.
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| RoseMarie hanging with Aunt Jesse |
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| Girl Cousins- Temperance and RoseMarie |
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| Cousins |
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| RoseMarie meets "Granny Annie" and Great Grandma Jill and gets a sweet quilt too. |
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| I just love this picture of Temperance. |
Our February milestones in (much) more detailed news...
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| Scott at the Calvert Marine Museum |
Scott- is turning 7, SEVEN! next weekend. That means he can go to Camp Pattersonville this summer!!!!! (But, sadly, I can't- it's so not fair.) His party is going to be tomorrow. He's requested the same party he had last year. A backyard campfire party, complete with hotdogs and s'mores over the fire. We are all looking forward to it (I should be cleaning...) Our big dude is insanely tall, its' like he grows an inch every time I turn around. It will be nice when it's summer again and he can go back to wearing shorts :) He's also insanely smart, though insanely difficult to teach as he doesn't like anything that has the slight resemblance to work. He will easily read for hours a day and is reading books at about a 4th grade level (per Scholastic)- as well as entertaining himself with simpler books. This past week he found a book at Grandma's house and read it and probably spoiled our plans for introducing him to Star Wars in the *right order... Return of the Jedi. We're considering let him watch A New Hope for his birthday next week sometime, and also planning to get him his own library card for his birthday (and so I can have more than 10 holds at a time.) He still loves to be outside, football and baseball are his current favorites, though he's gotten much more into climbing- the playground, the trees, whatever. Still working on the riding a bike thing, it's hard to find time to practice, since our gravel driveway with a slope isn't the best place... he just needs about an hour dedicated time on a flat, paved surface. He's getting better at playing games and losing without throwing things or having extreme temper tantrums, but he's still got quite a temper in general... gee wonder where he gets that? Guess that's something he and I can work on together. He's a protector like his daddy and takes good care of all of us for the most part. He absolutely loves his baby sister and is often the first to go get her if she's fussy and yes, he picks her up and carries her around some. And yes, he's already talking about another baby sister- but those of us who matter most in that department are NOT. I love that he loves our big family and he still talks about "when I'm a daddy and my kids..." though he has started considering careers in addition to being a daddy- football player, firefighter, or policeman. Sounds pretty typical for a boy. We really love this big dude and so enjoy "watching Scotty grow" as the song my dad picked out goes. Praying daily that he will grow to be a God-fearing man, whom God will use powerfully.
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Scott enjoying being a big brother and letting Daniel use him as a jungle gym.
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| Michael and RoseMarie- with her new hairstyle to keep it out of her eyes. |
RoseMarie- is 6 MONTHS old already! How does this happen? They grow up so quickly. She is usually a happy easy girl. I'm still a little concerned about my own ability to raise a girl, but so far we're managing :) She's still a little baby, but she's strong and interested in everything. She loves her brothers and they all love her, so it's a pretty sweet arrangement. She rolls, can scoot across the floor on her back by pushing with her feet and arching her back- doesn't look comfortable to me, but what do I know? She loves to jump in the Johnny Jumper and in the exersaucer and stand on your lap if you'll hold her steady. She's also into kicking. She lays on her back and throws her legs down and makes all kinds of fun thumping sounds with her feet on the floor... again, doesn't seem comfortable to me.... She's not very steady sitting up on her own yet. She can do it, but she likes to stretch out and push off with her feet. I intend to keep nursing for a long time yet (after what we went through to get started, no point in quitting, um, ever), but she enjoys being with us during meals and likes to reach for things, so the past couple of days we have started finding a few things off our plates that she can play with. Not too much actual eating happening yet, but she's very happy to be involved in dinner and I'm sure it will come too soon for me. I've been reading "Baby-Led Weaning" from the library and finding it pretty interesting- mostly intuitive, but still interesting.
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| Chomping a bit of pork chop... and loving it. |
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| This is the crazy upside-down crawling thing she does... I have a video, but it will take too long to upload. |
