Marathon, Lasik, Razor, Pictures and more

Where has the time gone! Our last post was from July when we took the girls home for summer vacation. Now they are all back in school. Well more importantly we had 2 girls leave the house and now have two new girls. Nina is still with us and is attending ODU and we now have Shay and Karrie who are both in high school. Ellie is talking a lot more and Benjamin is HUGE. Brandon had lasik eye surgery and Emily is running the roads like crazy. I am posting some new photos and am trying a new way of showing them so let me know if it is annoying!!The new pictures are at the end of this post so click more and check them out. There is a button on the pictures that says FS and that is for full screen mode. Our old pictures are on the pictures page so you can click that link to see them if you haven’t.
We took the kids to the doctor the other day and little Ben weighs in at a whopping 18.7 lbs at 5 months. His ‘big’ sister is still sitting pretty at 24lbs and is trying to become a big potty user. She does ok with peeing and asking to use it but when it comes to the other, man do we have a problem. She doesn’t get the concept of sitting to do her business… we have even tried having her stand on the toilet and no success. But we are getting there and she is growing up so fast. She knows her colors and animals, can count to 10 and is starting to learn her abc’s; she loves to sing (she sang for an hour in bed last night by herself before going to sleep), she is learning to drive her new hummer power wheel, and wants to play with kids (any kids will do) all day long. Between her friends that live next door and the mothers group Emily is in, she has a lot of interactions with kids of all ages which is great for her development and also brought us into a new phase of un-teaching some of the things she is learning from them. Big Benjamin is ‘talking’ a lot more as well. He is starting to self-entertain by checking out his hands and feet, grabbing for things, and loves to sit and watch everyone in the room. He has been eating rice cereal and bananas for a few weeks now and just started eating baby food this week so I am guessing he is not getting any smaller. He is a happy boy, even when his sister is laying on top of him and squishing his face.
I have finally finished off the rest of the insurance money I received back in June. I was in a huge debate over what I wanted to do with the percent we determined as my ‘do something for me’ money. I was stuck between fixing the back yard and buying a 4-wheeler. May not sound like a very hard decision but for those of you who know me, know I really want a big green yard with a patio, grill, fire pit, fish pond, the whole nine yards. I had all but decided that I was going to use the money to start this project but then I came upon something called a Polaris Ranger Rzr. That changed everything. You can see it in the pictures but it is a cross between a 4-wheeler and a go-cart or dune buggy. It has 2 bucket seats and is the same width as a 4 wheeler so you can ride on atv trails and parks. It has a 770cc engine that pushes 52 hp and goes 60+ mph. I have had it out with friends and with the girls and I don’t regret it for a minute. So much better than a 4-wheeler–more comfortable, safer, and less awkward for the girls. I also got Lasik eye surgery done on the 9th and it is awesome. I still am having a problem focusing and my eyes are a little uncomfortable, but after just a few days I can see 20/20 without glasses or contacts. It is amazing to play with the kids, take a shower, wake up in the middle of the night and not have to search for my glass. I can’t wait for my eyes to finish healing and experience my new life without worrying about not seeing. I won’t describe the procedure in detail because it freaks some people out but GET IT DONE. It was worth it completely and did not hurt at all.
Emily has been doing a lot of the heavy lifting these days with the kids and the girls. The two new girls have really connected to her and think I am scary, so I have taken a back seat to most of their running around needs. On top of that she has become one of the organizers for her mother’s group so she has been working on their website, accepting and planning get-togethers and has been hosting a lot more here at the house. She also convinced Autumn, Nina, and I into running a half marathon here in Virginia beach. Sorry to say I was the only one who could not finish the race because of hurting my knee but Emily and Autumn both beat their goal times and Nina finished so it was a great day and fun to have everyone up and doing something together. We have also hopefully found our church and are beginning to get plugged in. We are currently taking a couples bible study class on Wednesday which is great cause we have dinner at the church and the girls have youth while Ellie goes into the nursery with one of her best little buddy Parker.
Well I am tired of typing and you are probably tired of reading so we will call it quits and post something in a month or so.
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