The end of swim class

Here is our swim class! Left to right: Tracey and Owen, Missy and Ben, Mary (the instructor) and Little Dude, Rhonda and Nick, and Marlee and Isaac. Today was our last official class, but all of us moms are going to continue to meet at 8:30 am to swim with our little guys and then work out together. It has been such a fun group, we just all couldn't let it end!

Here is a pic of the others doing some swim kicks. Isn't our gym pool nice? There are two more outside and a fun baby pool!

This is my beautiful sister, Lisa. She came to see us Monday and it was SUPER fun hanging out with her. I love her new haircut too....now that Little Dude is pulling my hair, I am tempted to cut mine short too...it looks so cute!

Here is Little Dude with his Easter Bunny from Granny! Isn't it amazing how big he is in his car seat? When we brought him home from the hospital, he was almost to little for it!

Here is a nifty gadget made for shopping carts. It covers the handle, so he can't lick it the whole time you're in the store, and it adds nice soft cushions for him to sit and lean back on, so the ride is all comfy for him. He loves it and it makes shopping easier now that he is sitting up pretty well. Also, I am a germ-a-phobe...so this helps with my paranoia. :)

Little Dude trying his first bit of pizza. It is just crust with tomato sauce, but he LOVED it. I have a feeling pizza nights will be a must for him!

Here is another picture of Little Dude sitting up so well. It was such a cute picture I had to post it.

New pictures and news

Here is a quick update:


Little Dude is now swimming quite well and even going under water for brief periods of time. All in all, the swim class has been amazing and I recommend anyone with kids starting them early in the pool. We have learned all kinds of songs and activities in the water for making it fun and easy. Very Nice!


We went to a rodeo with some friends and it was great fun! One of the Bull riders had his shoulder dislocated too...ouch! They also had pony rides for all the kids too and our friend's little girl LOVE it! Our Little Dude was too little...maybe next year....


We are going to the Zoo on the 31st and I can't wait!


We are having a big BBQ at our house on the 24th around 3pm.


Little Dude is trying to get his knees under himself so he can crawl on all fours...wow.


We are going to a Seder dinner at church on the 26th


I am counting down the minutes until the Discovery Channel (one of my top 4 channels) has "Planet Earth" on. Also, the same night and time (8pm est) the Science Channel (another top 4)has "Mammals vs Dinos" on....its going to be a race of flipping between the two channels...now is the time I wish we had TiVo! haha! I am a dork, I know.


Since some asked, here are my (Michelle) top four channels, in no particular order:

1 Discovery Channel. I have been excited about "Planet Earth" for months
2 Science Channel. "Survivor Man" has me ready to face any natural disaster. "How it's Made" rocks and again, I have been excited for months about "Mammal vs. Dino". Also, I love all the shows about the old and new testaments from a scientific point of view...funny, but those shows make my faith seem even stronger and more clear...they are awesome.
3 Fox News. Of the news channels, they seem the least biased and I love Bill O'Reilly, he is great at making people look like idiots when they try to support some immoral thing they are doing. Also, it is the ONLY news channel that shows a right wing side as well as left wing..it is more right than left, but since all the others are waaaaaaay left, I like Fox News.
4 Food Network. Most awesome channel ever. I have dozens of recipes now and I am a faithful watchers of Rachael Ray, Giada DeLauentiis, Paula Dean and Sara Snow. I always check what they are cooking online and if it sounds good I turn the show on. It is great to watch while folding laundry and cooking dinner. Just ask Bill...he is loving my new cooking skills. He said he would've gotten me to stay home long ago if he'd know it would improve my cooking. :)


O.K., back to updates:


We have multiple friends adopting


We have filled out and submitted our part of the adoption process for two of our friends (reference, essay on character and ect) The process was a little stressful because we knew the adoption agency would carefully consider all we had to say in determining accepting our friends applications to adopt. After many re-writes and edits, I must say we sent in one kick-ass reference! Now they have a few papers to fill out and send off, then the waiting begins until they are matched. How exciting!!! Here is the agency our friends are adopting through. I am so happy for them and all couples who are adopting.


I am also esp. happy for the brave, smart women who loved their child and cherished life enough to give him/her to adoptive parents. There is no greater gift to the child or the adoptive parents or even to the birth parents than to support life and adoption. Simply because a "mistake" was made and you may not personally want to parent a child, it does not mean that you need to abort; there are so many loving people who long for nothing more than to raise and love a child. I feel like everyone should support adoption over abortion when at all possible. There is a new law in the works in South Carolina that will now have women seeking abortion look at their baby through ultra sound before aborting...what a wonderful thing they are doing. For those that want the choice, they still have it, but they get an INFORMED choice...they get to see the tiny fingers, toes and heartbeat. They get the chance to turn the idea of being pregnant into a real image and perhaps that will end in more babies being put up for adoption rather than murdered for mistakes they never made. You can find more info on this bill here. Also, any of my pro-choice friends out there are free to give me their point of view on this law. Since I am and always will be pro-life, I suppose I am biased; it would be fair to peacefully hear the other point of view.



Also on the topic of protecting our children, here is a great letter for senators and governor's voting on the National Sex Offender Registry that we should all send out. You can get the letter (or ideas for your own) from Oprah (yes, she rocks). You can also find your rep's mail addresses at: http://www.usa.gov/Contact/Governors.shtml and your congress' addresses at: http://www.congress.org/congressorg/home/





On a different, happier topic, here are some new pics I have been promising! Also, one of my friend's from swim class had her husband drop by to take some pictures of all of us, so as soon as she sends them to me, I will post them! That solves my whole problem of how to get pictures in the pool without getting my camera wet! Yay!

This is a hat I knitted for Little Dude...he is all ready to cheer on the Wolfpack. The shirt he is wearing has a red crayon on it and says: "My favorite color: Wolfpack Red" Isn't that the most awesome? Yes, I thought you would agree.

This is his St. Patrick's day outfit. It says "Little Good Luck Charm". Isn't his wild, red hair great?I LOVE St. Patrick's day and I cooked a bunch of Irish food and made everything I could green! Yay! You can find more info about Ireland's Saint and his good charities (also the fact he was once a slave in Ireland!) here.

Here are my two wonderful guys after a hard day of playing.

More busy playing with Daddy!

This is after a bath. Isn't his robe the cutest? Or is it him that makes it so cute? Hard to tell, I know...haha!! He normally has his bath in the mornings to clean up whatever poop/pee/spit up/drool happened during the night. Usually a combo of them...However, this day he decided to explode out of his diaper. Yes, I said explode. It was EVERYWHERE...up his back, down his legs...how did so much come out of something so little? So at any rate, this all happened while Will was home, so he decided it was a good time to take a pic of me and Little Dude together, since I am always the one behind the camera! I think we look quite nice too!

We went to a rodeo with some friends and their children as part of our St. Patrick celebration! (I know, not very Irish, but totally fun and American) This was Little Dude's first rodeo! He seems to like it!

Will, Little Dude, Jade and Cindy waiting for the rodeo to start. We got seats behind where the cows waited; it was so fun watching them play! As you can see, Jade loved the cows! Cindy is also expecting her second child soon! Cindy, her husband, Jim, and their daughter Jade are great friends and super fun to hang out with!

Well, that is about all we have been up to so far this month. We are getting ready for some weddings that are coming up; my cousin in Texas is getting married soon and we are super excited to fly down and see everyone! Then we have some friends getting married in Aug and another pair getting married in October! What a fun, busy year we are getting ready to have! I guess I better start looking at Travelocity soon! (I just want to add I LOVE the gnome in the commercials, I want one for my garden!) Bye!

Crawling and band things

OK, our little guy is starting to do the army crawl really well! WOW! Bill and I sat and watched him forever last night as he struggled to get his knees under him and get his body moving...wow. That is the only work that can describe watching him grow up. I can't believe he is the same little guy we brought home from the hospital only 6 months ago...it has gone by to fast! So, I guess my time is up for baby proofing...now that he is almost entirely mobile I better get on the items I had put off baby proofing!

In other news, we might be back in May...yay! It is not official yet, but I will keep my hopes up. The last trip home made me really miss our house, our friends, and our awesome neighbors. In neighbor news, I just have to say our friends, Alan and Amy, have the two most adorable children in the whole world. I miss hanging out and occasionally drinking wine with Alan and Amy...they are super fun and super nice I just want to say I miss them. The neighbors here are nice, but just don't compare to the great ones we have back home.

Anyways, little guy is getting another cold and has been quite cranky about it. He is sleeping right now, which is why I can finally get on here and update for everyone. Sadly, I am lazy and have not taken pics off my camera yet, so I don't have any new ones to update you with....sorry! I will get on it this weekend.

Band is going well, but honestly, right now band is a "hobby" for me. I certainly don't have the time to practice the way it's required to become a truly semi pro musician and play in symphonies or grand orchestras...I honestly barely practice enough to keep up with the local band I am in! However, band is a super fun and relaxing part of my week and I truly love it and all the wonderful memories picking up my instrument brings back to me. Speaking of memories, my long time friend, Michael, is in the Charlotte Orchestra! Check it out: http://www.charlottecivicorchestra.org/ I am super proud of him! He plays the clarinet. We went to high school together and have been good friends for almost 11 years...wow I feel old saying that! haha! Anyhow, everyone should make a trip to go see him play; the Charlotte Orchestra is AMAZING. Now that I know someone playing, Bill and I must get back to Charlotte to hear them!

Well, I guess that is all the update I have for now...I will work on getting pictures for everyone! Bye!

Little Swimmers

Well, the 4th was Little Dude's 6 month birthday...hasn't it gone by very fast? I can not believe how quickly the time has flown! He is getting bigger by the minute! On the 5th we started swimming lessons in a baby swim class at our gym. So far it has been quite a blast and Little Dude is enjoying it! Today, in fact, he went under water for the first time! Awesome! He loved it, even though I was really nervous about it. He came up smiling; so perhaps we have a fish on our hands! The other kids and moms are very fun too, though they are all at least 4 months older, but I am keeping notes on what the instructor does with them so I can remember and do them later this summer. Can I say that swim diapers are the most extraordinary invention ever? They dont come off and hold everything in...trust me...they work amazingly well! And we got some with Winnie the Pooh and Nemo on them...SO CUTE!!!!!! I will try to figure out how to get a picture of baby swim for you guys. I think I will have to get a one time camera for it because I am just to nervous about my camera getting wet! So, keep your eyes out for a pic...I will work on getting one soon!

MOMS club is great; we are loving the play dates! Little Dude is becoming quite social and quite fascinated with the other children! I'm glad he is already confident enough to roll away from me and play with other kids, though a little sad he is already showing independence. I did actually cave to some of the home made baby food recipes...avocado is now a favorite of our Little Dude's...though I love it so much too that I guess that is not a huge surprise. Since I don't have a food processor I have gotten away without to much scrutiny on buying baby food...but one of the mom's made a comment that kinda hit me.....there are not much variety out there in the land of baby food. It's the save 4 veggies, same 4 fruits and variations of those mixed with beef or chicken or turkey. So, on that thought, I have decided to make what I can and so far Little Dude has LOVED it...he has had avocado, cottage cheese, yogurt, cucumber and mashed potatoes. Amazing? And all things I can fix for him with minimal work or clean up.....as Borat would say...VERY NICE!

Also in other big news, we have a crib for Little Dude! Yes, I know, we had one back home but since it was a free used one, it was hard to get together and we did not want to take it apart for anything...so Little Dude has been sleeping in a pack n play since out growing his bassinet. The pack and play has been fine, except now he is getting up on his hands and knees every so often, so we were scared of him pulling up inside the pack n play and falling out. Yes, we know we can take the raised part out and use the big pack n play, but you forget how short I am! Ha ha! I tried a few times having him sleep in the big area and I ended up having to drop him the last few inches, which was a disaster if he was asleep and no so pleasant if he was awake....SOOOOOOOO Bill and I talked and decided it was worth the money to get a good crib, esp since the crib, the bassinet and pack n play (along with a lot of other great things, like an awesome breast pump and tons of clothes) were all given to us. Since we have not had to buy a single expensive item for him yet, we decided to get a good convertible one and let me just say it is AWESOME. It converts into the cutest toddler bed, then day bed, then full size bed. AMAZING. It is so beautiful too and will be a beautiful bed for him when he's older. Also, once we have a second child, one will have the crib, and the other the toddler bed; super exciting! I'm bringing up his crib bedding from home this weekend and really getting his nursery here set up right. I am super excited!

It is amazing how much it is feeling like home here now. I guess that happens after living somewhere for 6 months, but now that our time will be counting down from here til Aug and we have the possibility of going up to Virginia I am a little sad to think of leaving. Esp our church, it is wonderful and very active...compared to our little church back home, we selfishly wish we could take All Saint's back home, or to VA. Well, Little Dude is up from his nap and ready to eat...we are actually having chicken and apples (from a baby jar) so I better get going! Bye!