Children's Museum

If you can believe it, the day after the beautiful 65 degree weather, we got snow!! So, we decided to use our membership and take a trip to the Children's Museum. Here is Abbey steering the ship!

Ben having fun on the dock next to the ship.

Look, it's an Aunt Teesa Pizza!!

Abbey making pizza.

Spring!

We have been having some good weather lately, so we decided to get outside and enjoy it! we bundled everyone up and went on the first bike ride of 2010 to the park! Juliette enjoyed being outside and taking a nice leisurely stroller ride.

Ben and Abbey on their bikes.

Ben riding his big boy bike that he got for his birthday (it's a Lightning McQueen bike)!

Juliette enjoyed the swings.

Abbey did too!

We are really looking forward to spring/summer!!

Juliette's eating

Juliette has been doing really well at eating lately. She has tried most of the baby foods in stages 1 and 2 and we are thinking of trying her on 3's pretty soon. She seems to enjoy most food - especially bananas and prunes. She does pretty well with the meats too, which is surprising because they seem pretty gross to me and neither Ben nor Abbey ever really took those very well. But whenever I get up while feeding her, Abbey climbs into my seat and takes on the duty of feeding. I think it is the sweetest thing to come into the room and see Abbey trying to feed Juliette - what a big helper!

She gets excited when we put her in her chair to get ready to eat.

Feed me Mommy!!

God's Will

Sometimes it is so difficult to understand God' will. I truly believe that God has a master plan for all of us and that everything happens for a reason, but sometimes that plan or reason are just mistifying - why good people have to fight such tremendous battles just to stay alive and how they sometimes lose those battles being called Home by God. There is comfort in knowing that the suffering has ended and those loved ones are comfortable and happy with God. But knowing that does not necessarily ease the pain of those who loved and lost them. As evident by two very different, yet similar instances that occurred this weekend.

Debbie Russo Williams was a girl Paul and I both knew in high school. She ran cross country and track with us and was a very vibrant and happy girl. Two years ago, while pregnant with her third child, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She underwent immediate chemotherapy treatments and miraculously, her baby was born only 6 weeks premature and perfectly healthy. Since then, she has been waging a tough battle against the disease, including several rounds of chemotherapy, alternative medicines, and participated in several medical trials. Unfortunately, that battled ended on Saturday when God called her Home. She left behind 3 little boys (ages 6, 4 and 2), a husband, and countless family members and friends whose lives were affected by her. Her story has reached so many people - people who didn't even know her were continuously praying for her and her family. It is amazing how people can unite in prayer for an important cause.

Joshua Roy Kurby was a strong and happy little baby who we loved and cherished. He was born 4 days before Abbey, but had medical struggles from the start of his life until the very short end when he was only 8 months old. He left behind his courageous and strong Mommy and Daddy and his twin brother Joey. It was a year ago today that he went to be with God. It is amazing to me that a whole year passed already because I can still picture him so clearly and the pain of his passing is still very fresh in our hearts. He is definitely looking out for his family from above though - he sent them a beautiful baby girl who was born in December. I cannot imagine the continual pain they must go through on a daily basis and we continue to pray for his family - our dear friends.

The two stories are vastly different, yet both include someone being taken too young and in a seemingly unfair way. I trust that God has a plan for everything and that both Debbie and Josh are looking down on all of us and watching out for their families. All I can do is pray for their families during these most difficult times and let them know that we, as friends, will always be there for them. God bless them and bring them comfort.

Juliette is 6 months!

Well time is flying by and Juliette is already 6 months old! She went to the doctor on Friday and weighed in at 15 lbs, 0.5 oz and was 25 inches long, which put her in the 30th and 25th percentile, respectively. She did great at the doctor, but we found out she had an ear infection, which I suspected given her building cold over the previous few days. So she is on an antibiotic now and seems to be doing much better. She is doing well with her baby food and we have now entered the fruit food group. So far her favorite foods are sweet potatoes and bananas (not too surprising). She also loves her cereal - either oatmeal, rice or barley. She is working on sitting up and does pretty well, but still leans and can't be left alone sitting quite yet. Her biggest problem lately (and our biggest obstacle) is that she cannot seem to stay dry through the night. She wakes up wet every morning and we have been changing the sheets and washing them every day! Luckily after 3 kids we have a lot of crib sheets we can alternate. I'm not sure what is going on. We tried the next size diaper, but that didn't work. So, last night I tried something new in a desperate effort to not change sheets everyday...I put 2 diapers on her (a size 2 covered by a size 3) and this morning I did not have the change the sheets! The outer diaper was wet though. So I might do this for a while until whatever is going on stops and the outer diaper stays dry. Maybe she is just at an in-between stage of changing diapers.

Since Ben turned 4 and Juliette was 6 months, we decided it was time to take some pictures. I also thought it would be a good time to take some family pictures too. Unfortunately, my favorite picture place, Kiddie Kandids, went out of business rather unexpectedly so we were forced to try someplace new. We went to JC Penneys and I was NOT happy with it. We were rushed the entire time and the lady did not really work with the kids to get them to smile. She took 4 pictures of Juliette before deciding she "got it" and then moved on - Juliette had not even smiled yet so I am not sure what she thinks she "got". The pictures of Ben turned out great, but he was pretty easy to photo as he is old enough to just smile when you ask him to. Abbey needs some warming up before she smiles at a stranger and the lady just didn't really take the time to try to work with her or get her to smile. She just told me that Abbey wasn't into it and we weren't going to get one of her smiling. We got a few cute ones and did order a bunch, but I won't be going back there and hope to find a place that caters more to child photography. The only good thing about it was it was pretty cheap given the coupon we had. Any recommendations for other child photo places would be greatly appreciated. But, you can view our pictures by going to this link and putting Katherine Sheldon as the customer name. https://www.smilesbywire.com/home.asp?AC=LTPP0060117005JCP

Given that debacle, I decided to take my own pictures of Juliette to show what a beautiful smile she has - and the kicker is she smiles pretty easily if you just take a few minutes to play with her!

And here is just a picture of Ben enjoying a movie night (well earned after some recent good behavior) with one of his birthday presents - a very cool snack holder! Thanks Uncle Phil and Aunt Sandy!