Blogs

July 18, 2008 ARCHIVE =) This is now the archived Blog site. Click on the link to the new Blog for updated information. July 18, 2008 Check Johnny's Page for Exciting Information That is all. Go ahead. I will wait. May 29, 2008 It's About Time 6 short months. If nothing else we are consistent....in not updating :) Katy is almost done with Kindergarten. All of our fears were apparently for nothing because though she is still quite the *leader* her teacher thinks it’s a good thing. She definitely has daddy's knack for public speaking. She decided that although ballet was fun for being princessy and girly she would rather do gymnastics so that is how we have been spending our Saturday mornings for the last few months. Matt has now earned his orange belt in Hapkido and doing great. We are dreading that he has one more year until school starts but at the same time I am glad I get to keep him all to myself for the next year. Johnny is an honest to goodness walker and runner now. He is talking up a storm and quite opinionated (future *leader*?). Constantly fascinated with all things electronic and if it looks like in any way shape or form could be a ball, balloon, bubble... he needs it right NOW! We are still getting all those sweet baby cuddles but they are coming less frequently now :( Besides his great weight gain and language explosion I think his biggest accomplishment would probably be his freakish talent for dribbling a soccer ball. Definitely takes after his mommy. Speaking of Soccer - Katy and Matt are super excited to start in the fall. Mommy is going to coach BOTH (yes, I am a sucker) teams. I think it is payback for all the hours my parents had to spend at the field. We are all just plugging around right now. Kids growing more and more every day and Michael and I are trying to stay sane ;) January 6, 2008 Happy New Year Welcome to 2008, everyone. The new year has found us happy and healthy amungst a plethora of family. I must say living out of state with only a couple family members nearby made it easier to choose where to celebrate... But if that is the worst of our Christmas woes, I will take it. October 23, 2007 What Day Is It? What do you mean I haven’t updated in 4 months…I’m sure it couldn’t have been that long…ok fine…so it has been. I fess up, I’m lazy. Well I’m sure not much could have changed…. Just about everything Our house sold the first week in September. It was such an awesome day when we could actually say we are no longer home owners, but then we had no excuse but to reregister the car in California. I am missing Colorado a little right now as it is supposed to be in the 90’s today and there are raging fires all over southern California, Denver is nice and chilly and it snowed yesterday. Oh well I’ll take the trade off. We found a PERFECT apartment in Seal Beach. It is way more perfect than we ever expected to find. The kids are sharing one room with plenty of room to spare in there and that leaves the third bed room as a toy room and office. Katy started Kindergarten and is doing so well. I was very nervous about her being the ‘leader’ but she seems to be doing great. She has made great friends and is amazing us daily with how much she has learned. She is also doing ballet one day a week. She might have mommy’s grace, but it is pretty darn cute watching her dance. Matt is a Senior White Belt at Hapkido. My pessimistic views say they made up these make believe in-between “Senior” belts for more $$ so that stupid parents would pay to have their kid tested…well call me stupid because he had an awesome test. He did a great job and even learned his phone number, falls, and basic motion #1. Johnny is 14 months and a crawling fool and cruising like crazy; he has no desire to let go and walk. Luckily for my arms he is only 14.5 pounds since he obviously still gets carried everywhere. Gaining weight well (or at least better than he was). He says HI all the time in that super cute little baby voice. Just like my other kids he won’t perform so we will tell people that he has one word that he never stops saying and instead of playing along he will look at us like we have 2 heads. I guess the biggest news from him since our last update is that he was cleared by the allergist to eat anything and everything he could possibly want. They looked for allergies from all sides and there were no signs anywhere. He drinks milk, eats junk with corn syrup and all with out any problem. He still refuses to eat anything that resembles healthy but if I mask it with enough peanut butter he will eat anything. Peanut butter is by far his favorite food E.V.E.R. As for Michael and Me…we are pretty boring. He loves being back working here and getting around town on his new motorcycle (or as Katy calls it his murdercycle). I am keeping myself busy between the kids and the activities involved with having kids. I am never terribly interesting and this just kind of proves it :P June 23, 2007 Time for a change Thanks for waiting so patiently for the first CA update. It probably should have been sooner, but this here have been busy, as Karl Malone would say. My supervisor Teri says we love being back here with family and friends. She says we couldn’t be happier to have the kids back at their honorary mother… Now that that is over, on to the real update. We are indeed happy to be back among family and friends. Of course, the blistering pre-summer heat was not exactly the welcome we were hoping for. Luckily Nana has a pool and my work is air-conditioned 24/7. Johnny is up over 11 pounds now, which is fabulous. We of course forgot his official scale back in CO so don’t know his exact weight at the moment, but he is eating really well and has his first New Doctor’s appointment all scheduled. Matt and Katy can’t stop talking about school for next year. Matt doesn’t seem to understand that he is not old enough for kindergarten since Katy gets to go, but we told him he could choose either preschool or some other social activity since he has two years before kindergarten and he did so well this last year in preschool. Not much to tell about Lisa and me. I started work right away and am signed off of training now. No hits on the house yet, which is a bit annoying but not a whole lot we can do about that. Still no pictures for you today in here, but check out the Photos area of the website - we will put up some new ones there instead. See you all soon. June 6, 2007 At last the wait is over! Ok, so maybe you weren't all waiting for it, but it has been in the making for us for some time. At last out little monsters have their own personal niche of the net. And best of all, we don't have to write an essay with a bunch of "dots" and "slashes" just to give out the website address anymore. Things are moving right along out here for the move back. We are slowly but surely packing up the house and getting things in order. This consists mostly of throwing things away or packing them for Goodwill, but it works. We changed our cell numbers to new So Cal 562 lines, in case you missed the e-mail and don't know why we cancelled our phone service. And if you didn't get the e-mail, well we must not like you. Not really, of course... We probably just don't have a good e-mail for you. You can e-mail us from the link on the left and correct that if you would like. The house still isn't sold, which really stinks but what can you do? We tried to hire our neighbor to mow the lawn until it was sold and she told us she would do it because she likes the work out and calorie burning offered by mowing. Valerie, if you are reading this YOU ARE CRAZY! but thank you! Now you are probably expecting pictures, but that is really Lisa's thing. I am posting this from work and don't have access to the plethora of shots the photogenic trio have. I will let her post the next entry and wow you with pictures of the newest CA residents, probably next week I would assume. May 24, 2007 We will be Californians again in about 2 weeks.   We are in California and enjoying our trip and here are some pictures to tide y'all over until I decide to post an actual update :P Before leaving CO At the airport At Granddaddy Van's house Playing the Piano at Grandma and Grandpa Berry's house Katy dancing at the wedding Johnny and his new friend Huntington (only one month apart) Matty just too tired to make it up the stairs Katy and Tess walking to the park Playing at the park Matt showing off his tantrum skills ...and happily doing a handstand to show off (about 2.3 seconds post tantrum) April 24, 2007 Check me out...Updating more than one time this month. Family News- Our house is on the market and we are moving to California Katy News- She gets to start Kindergarten next year.  Probably Los Alamitos Elementary just like mommy and daddy Matt news- no news is good news Johnny news- Feeding therapy has started and yesterday he actually ate pudding.  That is HUGE for him.  He's now using the feeding pump through the tube 5 times a day guaranteeing more calories   Still small but fiesty Lisa news- I am loving my new camera and have even ventured out of Auto mode a few times and gotten good results.  That thrills me.  My goal is to make it to full manual soon Michael news- The red tape is not yet crossed but should be accepted back at his old job. (Yeah for good health insurance again ) April 1, 2007 HE DID IT!!! So I said he'd be 10 pounds by his 6 month check up... I lied.  It took him until 7.5 months but he is finally 10 pounds.  this formula seems to be working atleast somewhat. March 23, 2007 Nothing fun to update.  But I do have some pictures.  Johnny is still small and though we have yet to find out why we have moved him on to a new formula that will hopefully help.  It's only been 4 days so a little too early to tell if it is going to work, though there hasn't yet been an upward trend in his scale. Matt is loving preschool.  He goes 4 days a week and surprised his teacher when she found out that he is only 3.  At his first parent teacher confrence I was informed that he is their favorite and will definately be ready for Kindergarden in the fall... too bad he misses the cutoff by 2 years Katy too is loving school.  All the educational concepts they are teaching in preschool our little miss has mastered and appears to have done so before the older kids in her class.  She too misses the Kindergarden cutoff here in Colorado so unless some kind of miracle happens (read: we move out of Colorado) she will be in Preschool for another year.  Katy and Matt have discovered the fun that is the internet so we are having to referee fights about who's turn it is to go to Playhousedisney.com or Pbskids.org but I am amazed watching them and seeing how fast they have figured out how to use the computer and navigate their way to what they want to play with.  They are definatley too smart for my own good. ok on to pictures   matt's first day of school   Johnny: the newest sitter my attempt at making grass green...and Matt posing for the camera all three Johnny's newest toy Katy trying to catch a pretend butterfly...with a fish tank net   And our photoshop fun. first is the original and then the "updated" version         January 28, 2007 We have had a great month.  Johnny has been so happy since his surgery it is like having a different baby in the house.  He's very slowly gaining weight but is gaining so doing better in that department too.  He will be 10 pounds by his 6 month check up...even if I have to line his diaper with lead Matt turned 3 on Friday.  It is amazing how fast the last 3 years have passed.  I look at him and remember those anxious days waiting for him to be born and cant believe they weren't just last week.  As a great surprise for both us and him in the middle of the day Friday right after I got done explaining to him that just because he's now 3 doesn't mean he will be starting school right now.  The phone rang and it was the preschool offering him a spot in the 4 day a week afternoon class for FREE.  There is no way we could pass that up so Katy is jealous that he gets to go more than she does but also very excited for him.  I think it might take me a little time to adjust because I haven't been preparing myself for Matt growing up. Katy is doing very well in school.  She is going to end up in Preschool again next year :(  we were told we could petition to get her in early (she misses the Kindergarden cut off by less than a month) but now we have learned the Sept. 15 cut off very strictly enforced no exceptions.  Next year she should get to be in the same class as her little brother.  She will love bossing him arround in front of other people and it will make my schedule much easier :) Birthday Boy   Katy and Daddy Smiley Boy