Welcome 2010!

We had an excellent Christmas and now we’re excited to see what 2010 will hold for our family! 2009 was certainly full of blessings…Carson’s arrival, good health, a warm house, good jobs etc. I’m certain the year ahead will be as busy as usual! Kenneth & Anissa will be here for a visit in late January and then Paul’s birthday is in February and we’ll also have a weekend in Nashville for a wedding. The following weekend we’ll celebrate Carson’s first birthday and also have him dedicated at church the first Sunday in March. My sister Amy is planning to be here so I’m so excited about seeing her. We’re going to Idaho in May for my nephew Gavin’s high school graduation…so you see we've already got a full schedule! :-)

This Christmas was by far the best! Jack was so excited about Santa visiting! He got everything he asked for (a sword, dinosaurs and transformers) among other things. Carson got a ball pit from Santa and we get a lot of laughs watching him dive in & out of it.

Carson is ALL over the place these days. He’s finally mastered turning his car walker so when he gets stuck he can turn it around…big relief. He loves to hold on to fingers and walk. He’s started climbing too. He discovered the stairs and loves to climb on the dishwasher door and anything else he can get up on.

Here are some photos from the last few weeks:

Snapfish Photo Album

Conga Line, one more time

A few people said they weren’t able to view the “Conga Line” video from my earlier post. I’m posting again via You Tube.

Rock Star

Here’s Jack’s rendition of “Rock Star”

Conga Line

We have one of those car/walker things for Carson but I’ll be honest, I put it to the side because it was causing more frustration for Carson…and back pain for us. Today I got a note from Carson’s teacher saying he was doing really good with the walker (they have the same one at school) and that it doesn’t get away from him too much any more, but he still gets frustrated when he gets stuck. So tonight I pulled it out of the corner and sent Carson down the hall to Daddy. He LOVED all the attention. I grabbed the camera and told Paul to send him my way…this is what we got.





We laughed soooo hard at Jack's response...completely on his own he decided to jump in line!

Jack is 100% into the Christmas Season! He loved getting all the christmas decorations out and decorating the tree. Our magic elf "Doc" has returned and as if Jack didn't already wake up early, he's in our room at the crack of dawn every morning asking where we think Doc is hiding. It's precious. He is obsessed with singing "Rock Star" from the Shrek movie. I just can't even tell you how many times a day we hear..."she was lookin' kinda dumb with her finger and her thumb in the shape of an L on her forehead". The rest of the words are a jumble but it's so cute.

Carson is so sweet these days. We took him for his 9 month check up yesterday and he's doing great. It's funny because we've said all along that we feel like he is bigger than Jack, but when I compared their height & weight at 9 months, Carson is only a few ounces heavier than Jack and is actually a quarter of an inch shorter than Jack at 9 mos! And of course as you've seen...he's everywhere! He's babbling a lot and loves to get in the cabinets and drawers. He is finally on a regular routine sleeping from 7 to 6am. It's been a LONG time getting to this point and we are so thankful!

6th Anniversary

PS...I still haven't figured out the best way to display pictures which is why they're always jumbled at the bottome!

A mid-week update…

I took Carson back to the ENT doctor on Tuesday. Murphy’s law…after waiting 2 hours and having the audiologist, Nurse Practitioner AND doctor see him, all three said his tubes look great! Praise the Lord!  He was wonderful given it was nearing lunch time and even slept on me for 30 minutes or so. I thoroughly enjoy the snibbits of snuggle time he gives me! Both the ENT and my good friend who is a pediatrician said the fever Carson had on Monday screamed flu…which is probably how Jack ended up with it just a few days later. Regardless we’re all feeling pretty good. I hope I’m on the tail end of my cold, which I do not think was the flu.

During lunch today a few Mom’s from school went to visit Joshua’s parents David & Amanda. They removed his breathing tube today and were slowly waking him from sedation. They are still awaiting several test results but they are surrounded by their family and great friends daily. PLEASE remember them in your thoughts and prayers. All of the classrooms are taking up donations for the family.

Jack had his weekly gymnastics class tonight. On the way there he said “Mommy! I just saw a chair like on Nemo!”  After he described the scene where the fish jumped out and the guy is getting his teeth cleaned (not in such a clear order) I finally realized we had passed a dentist’s office and since it was dark, he could see the dental chair through the window in the lighted office. What a clever kid!

Carson got a new tooth this week! Sunday night I heard a strange grinding sound as he was in the highchair. I couldn’t see/feel anything until Monday morning, but there it is…a top tooth popping through!

Hope everyone had a good hump day!

So Blessed ~
Jill

Prayer Request

I’ve shared this with a few of you, but I wanted to take a moment to ask you to pray for Joshua Vincent. Joshua is a baby in Carson’s class. He’s only 9 months old and was diagnosed with neuroblastoma one week ago.  Joshua’s big sister Julia is Jack’s age and has been one of his classmates for a while.

I cannot even begin to imagine what they are walking through right now. Fortunately they are surrounded by a wonderful church and Sunday school class. So I want to extend that prayer as much as I can…it’s all we can do right now. You can follow Joshua’s progress at:

http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/joshuagvincent

-Jill

Too long since my last update!

I knew when I started this blog that I would have to be diligent in my updates! If you don't stay updated, people will stop checking the blog!

Let me see if I can sum things up since my last post:

Friday- 10/30 we surprised our friend and babysitter Alyssa with a surprise going away party. Alyssa was Jack's teacher when he turned one and she's been our babysitter and good friend since then! We are sad that she left B'ham to move home and work on her Master's Degree, but we wish her lots of luck...and we know we'll be seeing her soon!

She thought she was coming to babysit!

Marci, Alyssa & I

10/31-Halloween. We got together with the Carney’s once again! The boys had a great time!

Our Woody & Buzz

The following weekend Paul and I enjoyed a weekend away for my friend Beth’s wedding. She lives in Wisconsin so we got to visit 3 new airports and a new city. We had a wonderful time!

Paul and I in front of the State Capitol Mary Kate, me, Beth, Debra & Tami

And that kind of gets us to now…

Last Saturday night Carson started running a fever. By the time we returned Sunday evening he still had fever so Laura and I took him to the doctor on Monday. We were told he had yet another ear infection so we started him on antibiotics <again>! Tuesday was a rough day. I took Carson to the sick care facility at work, which I hated to do, but work is really busy right now for me and Paul both. By Wednesday I thought for sure he was on the mend. Unfortunately JACK was the one with fever! Luckily Paul was able to take him to the doctor since I had two meetings I couldn’t reschedule (I have been working furiously on a website that was to go live this weekend!). He called me an hour after the appointment to tell me Jack had H1N1. My company has a policy that if we are directly exposed, we have to be out for 72 hours. BAM- I had to go home! The pediatrician started Jack on Tamiflu and gave us a Rx for Carson in case he spiked a fever. By the time Paul picked him up that afternoon, his fever was 99.9 so we went ahead and started him on the Tamiflu as well. So…it’s now Saturday evening and I’m pretty sure the boys are on the mend and I’m feeling just a little puny…but no fever!

I’ll admit these last few weeks/months have been a little rough for us. We’ve been very sleep deprived because it seems once we get Carson sleeping, Jack starts waking for some reason and then vise versa. And poor Carson…as soon as we get his ears cleared up his reflux acts up, or he’s got a tooth coming in or he gets a cold. We both feel like he’s had a rough month and Paul and I are both praying that we can start backing him off of his reflux meds as he is growing and eating more table food. I’d like to ask all of you prayer warriors to please keep our little Carson in prayer. Pray that his ears would be healed, that his reflux would go away completely. He’s such a sweet baby but I feel like he can’t catch a break! We decided to take him back tot he ENT on Tuesday.

So I think that catches you all up…for now anyway. I have another update I’ll post tomorrow, but I’ll give your eyes a break for now! :-)

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