Friday, May 20, 2011

What's happening these days....

I've been a terrible blogger.  For the most part I've stopped even attempting to write any posts because I get halfway done and go "ugh this is not how it sounded in my head..."   So let's see if I can at least write an update post that I'll be satisfied with!

Our Hunter is almost 17.5 months old- how time flies.  He is into everything, running, becoming very independent and is just the love of our lives even though some days he just exhausts me.  Here is a recent picture of our little piranha monkey... (He's a biter- makes me crazy! And I've tried pretty much everything... but he's still doing it especially when in a confrontation, so if anyone has any thoughts on it- please feel free to comment and let me know!)
   
Hunter helping Grandma at her greenhouse.
 Today is 2.5 years since we met and said goodbye to Morgan.  Honestly I can't believe how long ago it was.  On the other hand it's not even been 5 months since Gage was born and spent his 10 days with us but it seems like so long ago.  How does that make any sense???  We are doing okay.  We miss them.  We walked the March for Babies again this year and between all our team members and a spaghetti dinner fundraiser we were able to raise over $6000.00 to go to the March of Dimes.  I'm so happy we could do so much in there memory.    Here are a couple family pictures from the day of the walk.




 April 1st was the 2 year anniversary of Morgan's due date and April 8th was Gage's due date so we just did one balloon release on Gage's due date.  We went to a beach on Lake Michigan and I even wrote their names in the sand.


Let's see, what else is going on....  I have a part time job now.  I had been occasionally looking online for something part time because even though we were making it work, it's been really tight for us- especially after emptying our savings (which wasn't very big to begin with) because of Chris being off for a couple of unpaid weeks and paying for Gage's service.  Then we started applying the principles from our Financial Peace Class and it really highlighted how tight it was.  So even though I would look and then cry because I didn't want to go back to work and leave Hunter, two days before my birthday I found an ad for a M-F job, 10-3 that came with a few benefits like vacation.  I sent in a resume and got contacted right away, interviewed the Monday after Easter and was offered the position on Tuesday.  And so far I love it! I'm a Marketing Clerk which basically means I do a lot of odds and ends stuff but I'm never bored and the people are great.  Hunter for the summer is home with Chris (he adjusted his work schedule) and in fall when Chris starts taking some college courses we will have to find childcare for about 10-15 hours a week and so far I think we have two - three possibilities from church. 


I was able to go to a women's retreat last weekend with my sister in law's church.  It was awesome.  It was my first women's retreat and it was amazing.  It was exciting to spend a whole day (plus a few hours- it was only one night) all about Jesus!  I can't wait for my church's retreat next year!

Well that is pretty much all the new stuff for us right now.  And I think I have a little boy who might be waking up from his nap so we can go grocery shopping....

2 comments:

  1. hi anna,

    my daughter went through the biting phase around that same age as hunter. we got lots of advice, but the thing that worked best for us was what our pediatrician told us to do: don't react, just put the baby down and firmly say "no biting" (or something else simple, like "we don't bite" or "biting hurts, ouch! please don't bite.") and turn your back briefly for a few moments. i guess this approach is based on the idea that they're just doing it for attention/reaction from you.

    another thing that helped was once naomi was able to use words to explain what was wrong, that helped with less biting at daycare. she would attempt to bite another child if they took a toy from her. now they've taught her to say, "no, my turn" and being able to communicate helped a lot too.

    i'm sure april was such a hard month, but it's so great that your family did the walk for babies and raised so much money for mod.

    reba (from miss)

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  2. Hunter is getting so big! He's so cute.

    I'm sure April was so hard. I thought about you a lot. I love the pictures of Hunter next to Morgan and Hunter's names. And thank you again for doing Owen's name too.

    Hannah Mae bites too but I'm not sure it's out of anger or frustration (yet). We tell her no biting and do the other putting her down away from us and trying to ignore it for a minute or so. I have no idea what else to do!
    I hope Hunter stops soon! I know that must be super frustrating!

    I love you, Anna.
    ebe

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