Cute Easter Photos

Last month, our neighbor passed away. Ed Letcher, you may have met
him, has been our friend since he moved here. He died suddenly of a
heart attack while hiking. Ed was a great guy and he took to Joanna
like she was his own grandchild. He left behind his wife and his
14-year-old adopted son (grandson). His son is doing o.k. but is
really heartbroken. It's my understanding that Ed didn't even know he
was dying, he thought he was out of breath and was going to sit down
and rest. He died as he was sitting down of a massive heart attack.

Ed was Joanna's "pappy." She saw him nearly every day and he loved
her. She has finally realized he is not coming back. It has been tough
explaining to her, but I decided to keep it really simple. I tell her
"When you go to Nana and Pappy's house, Pappy won't be there. He is in
heaven." Sometimes, she says, "No. Pappy is at work." (just
matter-of-factly). A week ago, Sheryl had Joanna in the car and Jacob
got in the car and mentioned Pappy's name. Joanna said, "Pappy is in
heaven." and they were stunned. Sheryl told me that Jacob asked her
"what did you say?" so that she'd repeat that because he couldn't
believe she said that. A few days ago, she asked for Pappy and Sheryl
overheard her. Sheryl asked if she could give Joanna a photo of Pappy
later. When she gave the picture to Joanna, Joanna threw it down and
said "No" (but not mean). She asked for him again today after I said
something about being "happy". I just said, "Yep. I want to see Pappy
too. He's in heaven. I know you miss him. I miss him too." She said, "Yep"
back and "Oh, I'm sorry." I know she doesn't fully understand, but I'm just approaching
the situation like I want her to learn about death. Death is a natural
part of our lives. It is unexpected, but it is not the end.

I'm still sad about him being gone and my heart breaks for
his wife and having lost her partner of 40 years. Wow! She's doing
o.k. though. Ed loved the Lord Jesus, though so it helps knowing we
will all see him again. It also helps knowing that he died doing
exactly what he loved, hiking. Ed's funeral was awesome. It was one
that I had never seen the likes of before. I will have to write about that!

My children are my joy

My children are my joy, and of course, my husband is too. I can think
of many blessings in my life, and my husband is at the top of this
list.

Joanna is now two and a half. She is so delightful to be with. She is
two, and with that comes the boundary testing and temper tantrums, but
those begin to subside as she learns our boundaries and her own. It
helps if we are consistent as well, I have realized.

Thomas is really showing his personality now. He can sit up for a
little while on his own and he grabs at toys and holds them in both
hands. He's sticking things in his mouth and is happy to bounce and
swing and jump and be tossed around in the air. He is truly a happy
baby. He will be six months old soon.

Joanna talks in whole sentences, paragraphs, chapters, even! She can
tell a story, relaying details and opinions, if you can catch it all.
Sometimes, it takes a trained ear to catch those context clue words to
figure out what she's saying, but she is genuinely clear in most of
her words. We have caught her counting into her teens! Today, I
noticed she bounced her monkey on the couch and sang the alphabet song
like Daddy does with her. She also put the monkey in her shirt so that
his head stuck out the neck of the shirt and she walked around with
him like that for a while. She is so sweet.

I found her in her cave (Uncle Andrew built this for her) laying down
and sucking on a toy today. I sure hope that was a one-time thing.

Thomas is really watching Joanna and you can tell he really likes her
and is interested in all she does. This morning I gave him a bath and
she walked around in conversation back and forth so that she was going
in and out of his line-of-sight, though she didn't take notice of him
paying attention to her. He watched her this whole time and I could
see his expression change on his face from delight--an open mouth
smile with his eyes twinkling. to disappointment or not-so-excited
face. That was neat to see. He also peed on me as I was bathing him.
What is it about that warm water!

Joanna got a bath too. She is really getting better about letting me
wash her hair. I run a bath about 3 inches or so and she lays belly
down for some soapy suds. I got her a pink pouf a while back with some
special kids bath soap. It was for Valentine's day. Anyway, she lets
me put this soap all over her and even on her head. Then, we get out
some bath toys. I put in some "slippy bath" or baby oil so that her
legs don't turn into "alligators." I've started pointing out the hands
on the clock too and telling her that bathtime will be over soon. That
doesn't help much, though. The princess towel seems to help!

Calling Thomas Michael

Jason suggested yesterday that we start calling "Thomas" "Michael"
instead to throw off telemarketers. Jason likes this about his name.
I'll occasionally call him his first and middle name, then. I don't
think it will be too easy to change what I call him.

Thomas is standing up from a seated position on my lap if I'm holding his hands.

Joanna is talking in paragraphs and relating stories, with some
embellishment. This morning, I was taking her across the street and we saw
a robin. It was a plump little bird. I stopped and pointed out the bird,
that it was called a Robin and to look at it's fat red belly. I inched us
closer to the bird explaining to be quite and we could see how close we'd
get. It pooped! I pointed that out and it flew into the yard and then on
the house. She pointed out the bird's activities and when we got to the
neighbors, she told Ed all about the bird and what it did. She would add
"and now" between each thing.

We had our photo made yesterday. She was really good!
Last night, I told her if she went back to sleep when she woke up during
the night, I'd give her a prize in the morning. She liked the idea. When
she woke up in the early AM, she remembered when I reminded her about the
prize and went back to sleep, a later wakening was a little less
successful, but she drifted off eventually, with my help. She woke happy
in the AM and I gave her the prize. I wanted her to know that I did not
forget, even if she had. It was a bath sponge and her own shower gel. She
asked to take a bath just before this and what wonderful timing. She liked
sudsing up the bath poof and getting all sudzy. She even hung the poof up
on the bath spout.

She's getting better somewhat about crying when we put lotion on.

-Amy

2009 Year in Review part 2

April 2009

On April 4th it was Jason versus the tree and the tree won. On Sunday,
I took him to the ER.
The doctor at his follow-up appointment was very surprised at how
swollen his ankle was!

May 2009

The ultrasound! We learned that we were having a boy and it occured to me that I wanted to name him Thomas as soon as I found out. (I actually thought of "Tommy" but I'm not big on nickname-sounding names.) I spent the next several months saying we were still thinking of names, and I may have changed my mind, but I didn't.

My great aunt Jo passed away and I attended her funeral on the 6th.
On the 15th, Brenda told me she had a dream I would name my baby
something that meant "genuine jewel."
I looked up the names that meant this and they were pretty silly.
Joanna stood up on the dining room table after she climbed up into the
chair. I was pretty convincing that she shouldn't do that again!
On the 16th, Dad, Brenda, and Caronna watched Joanna while Jason and I
went to see "Taken" and went shopping.
On the 17th, Joanna and I went to visit mom after church while Jason
did the grocery shopping.

On the 23rd, we left for vacation to Hilton Head.

June 2009

Attended Ashley's shower.
We refinanced our home mortgage.
Sheryl took Joanna to the movies.

July 2009

Started looking into new phone plans. I got tired of paying over 80
bucks every month! The phone company lowered the cost to $72 (after
allt axes and fees) and I put up with the phone bill a few more months
until I found something new.
Started doing the fetal movement chart to keep track of the baby's activity.
Ashley watched Joanna for a week and both seemed to have fun.
Brenda watched Joanna for several days later in the month.
Our sunday school friends had their baby.
I went to a meeting in Chattanooga.
I finished up a web site redesign at work and had some friends from
the non-profit organization review it for me.
We went to see Harry Potter!
Ashley's baby was born!
My obgyn changed practices and we had to deal a little bit with
refunds and payments.

August 2009

We watched "The Hurt Locker" and ate out at a Japanese buffet.
I had plans to tour the hospital but totally forgot!
I got my hair cut! It was soooo long.

September 2009

Jason, Jon, and Dewayne went to the UTvs W KY game.
Attended Stephens Family Reunion.
September 9, I thought surely I would go into labor, but not. It was Labor Day!
On the 15th, Thomas Michael was born!

October 2009

Joanna turned two!
Joanna and Thomas had checkups.
Joanna got Swine Flu.

November 2009

Jon left for boot camp.

I had a birthday.

2009 Year in Review

I may have done a lousy job of writing this past year, so to make up
for it, I am going to do a "year in review" the best that I can using
my old planner pad calendar before I tuck it away and begin using the
new one. I should probably go back through my pictures, too. But this is what I have time for!
This is by no means meant to be complete...

January 2009

We bought a nice Broyhill couch for Mom and took it to her on the
Saturday after her birthday (next day) in the rain. We met some nice
folks, Betty, Jim's sister. The couch was a fantastic buy. It was 200
bucks, plus an end table that we kept for Joanna. Tub was at mom's and
helped Jason bring in the couch. Mom was in her P.J's and Sally and
Duane came by. I returned the tarp to Betty later in the week one day
on my way home from work. That day I had to drive by their house
because a tree was down on the main traffic vein in to work. Several
of us caravaned home from work because we had never gone this other
way before.

The non-profit group's web hosting account expired at the awful web
host, so I bought a new hosting account through another vendor (who 10
months later was attacked by hackers and destroyed the business while
I was on maternity leave). I set up Joomla! and TikiWiki as a test and
liked TikiWiki best. It took about 5 days to completely redo the
website with a Wiki. Not bad for the first time.

We went to Texas for a wedding. We had a really nice time! Joanna
danced on the dance floor and was the biggest fan of the band. She won
the hearts of many! Oh how cute! We visited a cave and saw a fish in
the pond at the end of the cave. A bat was covered with condensation
and looked icy. I loved the baby sling on this trip.
We ate Mexican downtown and were serenaded by an authentic Mexican
guitarist. We flew on a plane with Joanna in our laps. She did pretty
well. Most folks commented that they had no idea a child was on the
plane, but I know the folks immediately in front of us surely knew,
but they were good sports.

I was working out pretty consistently by going to 6 am workout classes
at the gym. Jason helped me out by taking care of Joanna in the
morning after I left. Sometimes she'd get up right after I left,
sometimes she slept on. On average, this was pretty good. It didn't
last though, because I found out I was pregnant and started to get
super tired. I couldn't even drag myself out of bed. I needed my rest,
so I took it! I took a pregnancy test on Jan 26 and was in to my obgyn
on the 29th. I even had the confirmation ultrasound that day.

Andrew had his birthday and we went out to dinner at Texas Roadhouse.
The service was so SLOW! Jason and I took turns walking around the
place with Joanna, who said "Hi" to nearly everyone and was excited
about seeing some other kids.

February 2009

I started back to work full time the second week of this month. I
helped plan a meeting for the non-profit that took place this month.
Joanna "flapped" her arms like a bird when we were playing and I told
her to "flap her arms." We were watching Dora the Explorer and singing
a song about what the animals do.

We met Rachel, Jason, and Chris and Tracy at Olive Garden for Rachel's birthday.

March 2009

Found a replacement web master for the non-profit's web site. Whew!
She didn't start till July/August, though.
On March 6, I got to hear Thomas' heart beat for the first time.
We thought of the name Jina or Gina for a girl, it means "Queen."
March 10th, Joanna said "more water" while we were brushing our teeth.
The next day, I took her with me to an appointment and she had a nice
time playing with a toy house there. On the way home, she sang "Ba ba
black sheep" (sort of) from her car seat singing to herself. So sweet.
"The future is no place to place your better days" - Dave Matthews.

Winter Collage

We are having a fantastic winter. Here is my first collage I created using Picasa3. Quick, easy. Hopefully, I can make a few more of these!