Rejoicing in the husband of my youth...

May your fountain be blessed, and may you rejoice in the wife (husband) of your youth.

Proverbs 5:18

When you get married young (22 for me), you have a lot of growing and a lot of changing to do together. It's not always easy, but there is no one I'd rather do it with than my amazing husband whose birthday I celebrate today. Things I love about Fred:

• His sense of humor.
• The crazy good dad he is. I never see smiles on my kids faces like I do when he wrestles with them. It takes talent to wrestle with a 7-month-old.
• The way he takes care of us. He is always looking for ways to serve and do things for me to make my life easier.
• I love that he sees people for their value to God, not for what he can get from them.
• I love that he enjoys the simple things - walks to see the chickens in the evenings, playing in the backyard, riding with the windows down.
• I love that we've lived through different seasons together and can remind each other of God's faithfulness through each one.

I never saw you coming sweetheart, but then that seems to be how God bestows his greatest blessings. I love you!

At 7 and 30-months

John Parker will be 7-months-old this week and Kate is now 2 and 1/2. Time for an update!

Little man is doing great. He got tubes last Friday after a long run of ear infections and he came through the procedure well. He's already sleeping and eating better. He's completely off the reflux meds now and we're getting ready to switch to a less fancy (i.e. less expensive) formula. Things are looking up! Some things about John Parker at 7 months:

• He sleeps generally about 7:30 to 6ish, with a dream feed at 10:30-11 p.m.
• He continues to be one of happiest babies there ever was. His smiles are really contagious.
• He is so, so physical and active. He's crawling and working on pulling up. When he's awake, he never stops moving. No more bouncy chair for us. I looked over yesterday and he was about to flip it over.
• He loves Kate and Alli. If they're in the room, he wants to be wherever they are.
• He's eating more and more baby foods - bananas, apples, mangos, pears, carrots, sweet potatoes, corn, pumpkin and a few others.
• His hair is getting thicker and it's still very red. Everyone who sees him says how much he looks like Fred.

Kate is doing great too. She's sleeping really well in her toddler bed. She sleeps later than she ever did in her crib. She's got potty-training down now. We've had a few minor accidents, but she does great for the most part. We can do so much with her now. It's a lot of fun. Here are some things about our nearly 3 (WHAT?) year old:

• She generally sleeps from about 8 to 7 a.m. She loves to take books with her to bed. Usually we put her to bed with one and when she wakes up she has a different one.
• She loves to be silly. She loves laughing and giggling at everything.
• She loves her school and her teachers. There's a little girl she's been in school with since she was a baby named Isabella. At her old school, they called her "Bella," but at their new school they call her Isabella. Kate somehow heard this as "Buzzabella," so we get daily accounts of what Buzzabella was up to.
• She loves to boss John Parker around already. "John Parker, you can't have any goldfish!" She comes by this honestly on all sides (sorry Fred, it's true :), so we know we'll have to work on being bossy.
• Her hair is still wild and curly. She doesn't like to keep it up, so I took her for a hair cut this weekend. I was worried they'd cut her curls out, but it's curlier than ever. Her hair fits her personality to a T.

So that's what is up with the kiddos. Sorry to be so slack in updating. Thanks for checking in on us!

New Blog Adventure

I'm beginning a new blog adventure. Check it out!

http://lifethroughlyrics.tumblr.com/

John Parker at 6 months

We had John Parker's 6-month checkup on Wednesday and he's doing great. He weighed in at about 18 pounds, so he's growing like a weed. We working on a plan over the next month to ween him from the hypoallergenic formula and reflux medicine. He's getting closer to sleeping all night, but we're still not quite there. He's doing great at daycare and charming all the teachers.

Kate's doing well too. She's doing great with potty-training and recently transitioned to a toddler bed. No more crib! We're wishing we would have made this move earlier as she sleeps better and later now.

Life is crazy, but good!

At 5 months...

John Parker's 5-month birthday was yesterday, so I thought you all might like an update on what he's up to:

EATING: He still has pretty bad reflux. We've switched reflux medications and he seems to be doing a little better with the new one. He still spits up a good bit, but it's not as bad. He's still on the hypoallergenic formula. He's started eating cereal and now eats it three times a day. He does really well with that. We're going to get some fruit baby food this weekend and start trying that a little at a time. He only takes a bottle about every 4-5 hours during the day. This is so different from Kate. She was on a 3-hour schedule, like clockwork.

SLEEPING: This is still a work-in-progress. He's definitely doing better. We usually put him down around 8 p.m. when Kate goes to bed. He'll sleep really well the first part of the evening. He wakes up anywhere from midnight to 3 a.m. ready to eat. He'll eat a full bottle during the night. Sometimes he'll go back to sleep, but lately we've been having to move him to the swing to get him to go back to sleep. He was doing really well on his stomach for a while, but he doesn't seem to want to sleep that way now.

EVERYTHING IN BETWEEN: If you took away eating and sleeping, this child would be the best baby ever born. He is so happy and content. He has the neatest personality. Very laid-back, but very personable and engaged too. He's doing great at daycare - all the teachers love him.

Little man, you are such a blessing to us. We know you'll get the hang of sleeping soon, and before we know it you'll be slinging spaghetti around the kitchen like your sister. But you're sweet little smile will remain. We can't wait to see you grow up into all the plans God has for you. My heart aches with love for you!

I can now post updates from my phone. Should be interesting!

Blog Changes

Hi all! The password protection turned out to be too confusing, so you'll notice the blog is back to open access. You'll continue to see updates on the blog about what's going on with us here in Baton Rouge, but we won't be posting any more pictures of the kids here. This is to protect their safety and privacy. We hope you understand. I will be posting pictures on Facebook, so feel free to friend me if we're not friends on Facebook already. Hope everyone's doing great!