Keeping Up....

When I picked Callie up from preschool, I think it was last Friday, she had a loose tooth and was so excited. We couldn't pull it so it just kept wiggling in there. Last night we had tuna noodle casserole and she lost her tooth while eating it - that shows you how loose it was. The one next to it will soon follow. The tooth fairy brought a dollar last night :-) For some reason this has really hit me hard - what a big girl thing to lose a tooth - wow!

Chase is a full fledged walker - going everywhere now. He walks all around the house, wherever he wants to go. Unless he is in a hurry then he tries to run but he isn't that good yet so his body gets ahead of his feet and he falls.... and crawls from there! He must not have gotten completely over his ear infection cause it flared back up this week, so a sleepless night Monday and another round of antibiotics. He also has some rash on his leg but the Dr thought it was just irritated, so just cortisol ointment.

Mom and I took the kids with us to Joplin to get a few Christmas gifts on Saturday. It was busy but we had a good outing. Callie made a reindeer at the build a bear type place in the mall. She loves doing this and especially dressing it. She made a reindeer with a red nose dressed in a beautiful Christmas dress and named her Claire.

Then on Sunday evening Mom and I went back to Joplin to a SIDS memorial candle lighting service. It was the first one that they had tried in Joplin. Kansas has one in Wichita but this time of year it is hard to get to. The service was so nice but the turn out was very small. I hope she does it again next year to try to build it up cause it was such a nice service.

photo update

Dancing to music...




Hanging out with Grandpa.....


Doing a little Christmas shopping????


Watch week at dance class...


Aren't they cute???

Lighting the Advent Candles

Or maybe just the morning entertainment?
We were to light the advent candles last Sunday but we were running late, as is normal these days. So they had just put up the slide that said we were lighting the advent candles and my mother in law said that were hadn't made it there yet but we were actually walking thru the doors behind her. So everyone enjoyed the timing, we thru our stuff down and headed up there, Shannon starts reading (we had remembered that sheet at least) and I can't find anything to light the first candle, someone kindly gets me a lighter and we are set, Callie is holding the candle and waving to Grandma and Grandpa, Chase sees her waving and gets in on the action too, well he can't wave without clapping for himself when he is done, then Shannon hands me the paper and microphone to read the second part and I hand him Chase, Chase immediately starts screaming to come back to me, so we switch back (thanks Chase I was nervous to read it anyway)........I doubt anyone heard a thing that was read with all that going on.

Also, we have a walker, kinda

I forgot that on Wednesday Chase got up while Callie and I were still decorating. He was playing and Callie and I both saw him take about 4 steps! He has continued to take 2-6 steps all the time. It is so cute and Callie was so excited.
Then on Thursday I noticed that both the top side teeth were completely thru - 6 teeth now!

Thanksgiving

I haven't been good at taking pictures lately and don't have my camera cord right now to connect but since it has been so long, I am going to go ahead and update without photos. We went to Dadeville, MO on the Saturday before Thanksgiving to Shannon's uncle's house (dad's brother) to have Thanksgiving with that side of the family. We hadn't seen most of them since last year at this time so they had never met Chase. It was a good day - Callie drew her great aunts several pictures.
On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, Callie waited not so patiently, until Chase went down for his morning nap and we put up the tree and Christmas decorations. She was so excited and said that she remembered how fun it was last year. Then when we were getting the tree up and stuff out she said that it wasn't as much fun as she remembered. Once we got going though she was happy :-) And so far Chase hasn't really bothered the tree much at all.
On Thanksgiving we went to my parents with my younger brothers family and my grandparents. It was a nice relaxing day. At bedtime, Shannon and the kids headed home and I stayed so that mom and i could get up at 3:30 to go to Olathe for some Black Friday shopping. We have always gone, not always that early, but it is just a fun time for us. We didn't get anything big. Some good bargains on toys, etc. and a lot of fun. We shopped, and ate, all day.
Saturday we went to Shannon's grandmas (mom's mom) and had Thanksgiving with them. Callie and Daddy went on a "safari hunt" after lunch down to the bridge and around. Callie thought that was great and has wanted to go out again this week. I went to the cemetery to decorate and when I got back Chase had just fallen asleep and got woken up. He was so cranky. We came home and he continued to be very upset. He started running a fever. He ran it all Sunday but we for better or worse we held out to take him to the doctor until Monday. Monday he was very uncomfortable in addition to the fever. Linda watched him while Callie was at preschool and I worked in the AM. The I took him to the doctor - double ear infection. Once we switched to motrin and got the ear drops in him he started feeling better. 10 days of antibiotics to fight with him to take! Linda stayed with him on Tuesday also but by Wednesday he went back to daycare.
We have been watching all kinds of Christmas cartoon specials and counting down the days. We went to the mall to eat after dance on Thursday but Callie wasn't sure about sitting on Santa's lap.........Chase just wanted to tear down all the fencing around him:-)

Thanksgiving

Chase is so close to walking. He stands alone and even picks up things off the floor while standing unassisted. He has no desire to walk without having a hold of something though. He hasn't been sleeping too great so I am hopeful another couple teeth will pop through and we can go back to the one week we slept all night! We did start night before last leaving his door pushed shut but not lached. It is hard for me cause I can't see the monitor from bed now but it is still on so probably a good step in the weining process for me. Anyway he did do better that first night, not so much last night. The night light in the hall is neccessary for Callie to use the bathroom but since he has become more mobil, he wakes up at night, stands up, holds on to the rail and bounces for all he is worth. He loves it and yells for us to come visit with him - cute but not a couple times a night. And I end up feeding him one of those times, even thought I am sure he doesn't actually need it, it is a quick way to put him back to bed.

Callie ran a fever last week from Wed evening to Sat morning so I stayed home and took her to the doctor on Thursday. She ran flu and strep tests and both were negative so she thought it was just something she had to wear out and we left with no meds. I was skeptical as she was complaining about her throat and her fevers were high. She didn't even seem sick when you could keep her fever down though and was quite disappointed to miss preschool Friday (having Grandma Linda come over to stay did help though). On the way home from the doctor I was on the phone and said that the doctor thought it was just a bug. From the back I hear Callie say "I DON'T have a BUG on me!"

We have so much to thank God for each day and so often we get too caught up in all the hectic trivial everyday things. I am trying to keep what is important in focus. As the busy holiday season starts with our first family thanksgiving in Stockton with Shannon's Dad's side of the family I hope I can keep that up! I am excited for the time off to be with the kids and to see family (and of corse some good shopping on Friday :-)

Halloween & Birthday!

We had a busy week last week. Shannon had P/T conferences on Tues and Thurs evenings and Thursday was watch week at dance class. I took Chase and he did great! At one point the teacher even said to the class to hop on the left foot to Callie's little brother and then switch to the right foot. I never had to take him out - too much to watch!
Wednesday night we carved a pumpkin. Callie drew herself on the pumpkin-whole body and very detailed and was so disappointed that I couldn't carve it out. We wiped that off and Shannon drew an example that he then wiped off for her to try again. She said she couldn't do triangles so she chose circles. The one thing she insisted on was that it had eyelashes...after I did the first big one she said that wasn't what she was imagining....I did better after that:-)

Friday Callie had her birthday and halloween parties at preschool. They dressed in their costumes for the whole time at preschool and we came to pick them up a little early to see them parade. They had songs to do too but the cold wind shorted the process! Hattie and Callie were both going to be witches - they are dressed a lot alike for us not knowing what the other was wearing!


Saturday we had Callie's birthday party at lunch time and then trick-or-treated in the evening. Callie was really into going door to door again this year. Chase slept in the car :-)

The party was care bears. Callie and I made the cake...the first cake mix exploded, luckily I had a second white cake mix. I ordered the top sheet off the internet from yummy edibles and I thought it turned out great. Callie had to add the red and green sprinkles but I figured it was her birthday so whatever!!!!


Callie did this with her costume and care bear while I was cooking for the party.


We had an incredibly had to break witch pinata - not any too good of pics of it. I was worried that each kid wouldn't get a turn before it broke.....hahaha....they had to have help finally getting it broke.


The witch and the giraffe.


Playing with new toys.....together?

Max

Nothing to write, just a picture of Max. He is such a good dog and sooooo good with the kids.

Pumpkin Patch

After the birthday party, Callie and I went home to get Daddy and Chase and headed to the pumpkin patch. She had a great day (I didn't get good pics but here is what I have).

Party

Callie went to her best friend from preschool's birthday party on Saturday - it was at Kiddie Land and she had a blast. We will definitely have to go there again!

On the MOVE!

Chase crawls everywhere....
Pulls up to Anything....
And I don't have a great picture but Cruises around the house as long as he can keep one hand on something....

Basement

The carpet was laid on Wednesday. Shannon is planning to get the doors hung and some of the trim up yet this week. After that I think we are taking a break to replenish funds before we do much else. The one area needs the drop ceiling put in and the bathroom has not even been started. But it will be to where we can move stuff in and start using the family room area and get the storage part cleaned back up! Just a big toy/play room!




















For those of you from college - does this look familiar???

Crawling

On Friday the 9th Chase had his 9 month doctor's appointment. He remained in, or slightly above, the 75th percentile in height and weight and kept his head's 90-95th percentile status :-) Afterwards we had the pictures posted below taken. Shannon went to the football game and I went home to give the kids a bath. Chase had been kinda close to crawling for awhile but was much more interested in walking - I really thought he would walk before he crawled because he really didn't like to try to crawl. So I took Chase out of the tub first and sat him on a blanket across the hall in his room and then went back to get Callie out. I told her to go get her jammies on in Chases room so he would quit fussing (doesn't appreciate being alone :-). I quickly let the water out and cleaned out the tub.....walked out the bathroom door and about stepped on a naked Chase man in the hallway. My first thought was how did he get here - surely Callie didn't drag him out here!!! Callie was putting on her PJs in the living room and I asked her if she moved Chase. We quickly discovered he had learned to crawl. He proceeded to crawl all over. Callie was so excited. She would take passy and give it a toss so he would crawl to get it....she did this over and over. She also had to call Grandma to tell her.
He is crawling everywhere now. I just can't believe how he went from moving a little backwards to proficent crawling in one night. He explores a lot now. He is more content and really likes to get into Callie's stuff. She usually handles this very well. She is great at watching him and letting me know if he is getting into something he shouldn't or going toward the stairs - Shannon is supposed to install the gate tonight. She is such a good big sister and such a big helper for mom and dad!!!!
In the last two weeks Chase has also gotten his two front top teeth in to go with his two bottom teeth. Started waving hi and bye (he usually claps for himself after he waves). AND we have started trying to feed him some table foods.....it is a slow process. He loves to feed himself but very little actually goes in the mouth and stays there....what a mess.

Pictures Preview

We went to Penney's in Joplin to have these take on 10/9/09 - Chase is 9 months and Callie is less than a month away from being 5 years old!!! I can't wait to get them back - they are supposed to be in on Tuesday the 20th!!!!!!

Click here and enter your Customer Name (JULIE UNDERWOOD):
https://www.smilesbywire.com/home.asp?AC=LTPP0721103455JCP

Halloween here we come!

One of two outfits they have :-) Not spoiled at all!

Kincaid Fair

We went up to Mom and Dad's to the fair on Saturday. Both of my brother's families came up too so it was a lot of fun. Parade, turtle race, rides!!!!

Best of Friends

Callie has always loved Chase but lately she has been so into watching him. It is so cute and also very helpful! He prefers standing right now and she is always watching to make sure he doesn't fall. He is so spoiled that all he has to do is grunt/scream a little and she comes running. When she runs to do something and leaves him she always says don't worry I"ll be right back and she runs as fast as she can to get whatever done and back to him. If he has to ride in the car without her he fusses the whole time!!! I have to admit that I love it!!!!!!

Party

Callie has so much fun playing these days. She had this all set up!!!

Almost Fall

I have never liked the back to school time and now even less. We made it thru the first couple weeks of craziness trying to get back into a routine. Made it thru the week of the 28th and the days that followed on past Labor Day - had plenty of hard moments but also got to spend some time remembering a precious boy. Thought that things should slow down but.... Chase was sick or maybe just teething, still not sure. When we got home with Chase one day I thought Callie seemed sick- one look in her throat and we off to the doctor for her. Got thru that week only to get the stomach flu myself early last week. I am low on sick days and so busy at work anyway - ahhhhhh!
So this week has been uneventful so far and the weather is so fall like! It has been a nice change. I am ready to get the fall decorations out! Looking at the adorable pictures below - I guess the last few weeks haven't been too bad, huh :-)