Hello Family and Friends! *note that there are pictures throughout the blog, in between the text*
We have had a busy Fall so far! I can't believe it is almost December and Christmas will be here before we know it! Casey is growing like a weed (still in the 70% for height and about the 20% for weight) and we have had a lot of fun the past few months, starting the holiday season.
In October, we had a whirl-wind of activities such as going trick or treating in San Carlos at all the local businesses, going to the pumpkin patch, going to the Jack O' Lantern Jamboree at Fairyland with our Young Families' Group, riding the local Halloween train with Casey (which he loved!), and then taking him trick or treating around our neighborhood with the little girl, Emilia, that lives next door. He adores Emilia (who is a few months younger than him) and cries if he can't see her or say hi. He always says, "Meel, Hi" for Emilia--it is so cute. So Casey was an Ewok for Halloween, but then he wouldn't wear the headpiece that went along with it, so people thought he was just a bear or dog or something. Haha. So I finally just changed his costume and used my creative side to wisk together a tiger/cat outfit for him, since he apparently LOVES to wear cat ears (or dog ears or firemen hats, or anything like that). He turned out to be a pretty cute tiger (even if his tail was just a long black sock). :) He had a great time trick or treating and loved going up to the doors (he would say "tre...tre"...for trick or treat), even though he was a little scared when a man was wearing a scary were-wolf mask when he answered the door! Kevin and I ended up eating most of the candy though! :)
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| Fairyland with the Young Families' Group! |
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| Petey dressed up as a King! |
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| Waiting for the Halloween train |
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| He found the Halloween box! |
Also, in the beginning of October, I went on a Mommy Getaway Weekend in Carmel with 5 other moms! It was so much fun and amazing...we laughed so hard playing games and just having a relaxing time together. We also bought Coach purses! Yay!
Also, I forgot to mention that in September, after finishing up two big weddings I was working on, I was also able to go visit my brother, sister-in-law, and nieces, for Kaylin's baby shower. It was so great to see them. I love them!
After Halloween, we started preparing for Casey's 2nd birthday, which was on November 17th! We had another whirlwind of activities, all in the midst of some trials that I will mention in a bit. On Casey's actual birthday, we invited our neighbors (who have little Emilia) over, as well as my parents and our other new friends who are from Switzerland (they have a little boy named Noel), over for a dinner party. It was a lot of fun. Casey loved having his two friends there and we had a Toy Story party! Casey LOVES Toy Story...especially Woody. He got a Woody and Bulls-Eye toy for his birthday from one of our friends, and he adores it. He talks to Woody and takes him to restaurants and reads to him and 'so on. It's adorable. Casey also got a tricycle for his birthday for us. It is a bright red one with a bell. He loves to ring the bell. He can't reach the pedals very well, but he loves to try and to be pushed around (a work-out for us too). My parents got him an Easel and he has been an avid artist lately...he loves to draw lines and circles and pretend he is drawing "Pa" (my dad). So cute. He also loves his new drill set, his new slippers, his Car Legos, and new musical instrument set he got...he dances around and plays the tambourine, cymbals, triangle and maracas. He loves music and especially loves to DANCE. He has a sense of rythym too and can stay on beat...maybe he will be a drummer like my cousin Justin! :)
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| Woody and Bulls-Eye! |
We are going to be starting music class again this December, for the holiday season, so that will be fun. I have missed that class! Every time Casey hears music you can see his little body start bobbing up and down, even if he is sitting down...it is adorable. So, we will definitely try to foster that interest in the years to come! We are also doing My Gym classes still, because we stopped Swim Lessons when the summer ended. He loved swim lessons and we will probably start again when he is 2 and a half. But the My Gym classes are great and he loves playing in the balls, climbing on everything, and participating in the class. I still have people comment on how "brave" or "bold" he is or that he has "no fear"...and it is true. We went to Bounce U, where they have HUGE inflatables to jump on and slides and so on and he was the ONLY little kid in our group that would go down the adult-sized slides. He is so brave and it scares me...I seriously have to watch him EVERY second of the day because he always finds something to get himself into trouble with...climbing up the outside of the stair-case or jumping out the doggie door or opening the front door (even though there are baby locks on the doors) or finding ways around the locks on the toilets...yes....he keeps me busy. Haha. VERY BUSY. He is definitely one of the most active little guys out of all his little friends...but he is also really skilled at physical things too...he does great at tumbling and bars at the gym, and he can swing a bat and hit a baseball really well and seems to have pretty good balance. So I guess we have a future athlete on our hands. :) Did I also mention he loves to pretend he is "flying" and puts his arms out behind him to fly? Here is an example:
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| At Bounce U for a Play-date! |
Another love that Casey has is animals...and boy does he loves them. He loves to look at cats and fish and reptiles and hamsters and horses and just about anything at the pet store and at the zoo. He also loves playing with his doggies, Petey and Sidney. Petey (our dachshund) is really more like his brother...they play together many times a day...tug of war, chasing each other around the house, or just yelling and barking at each other. I'm glad they have each other. My other dog, Sidney (our beagle) loves to play too, but unfortunately she has a hurt leg and is going to have to have surgery! She was running outside and ripped a tendon in her knee, so she can't walk on it and hops around on three legs. Poor thing! So we are going to have the surgery soon to fix her leg. For awhile, every time I would mention Sidney's hurt leg, Casey would get this really concerned look on his face, with furrowed eyebrows, and fold his hands together and say, "Pray....Pray...." and look like he was praying for her. He saw me pray out loud for her leg, so he thought he would do it too! He did it multiple times and it reminded me I should pray without ceasing too!
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| Petting a ferret at the Palo Alto Zoo. |
Another thing that has gone wrong the past few months is that after we had our first fire in our fireplace for the season, we had a "smoke fiasco". We thought the fire was completely out after we doused in with water, and I guess it smoked all night long and whenever the heater came on, it would blow smoke into the house. We woke up at 4am and the house was full of smoke...we had to wake Casey up and leave the house to go to my parent's house. Then EVERYTHING in our house smelled like smoke. We had to wash down all the walls downstairs, pay a lot of money to get our air ducts cleaned out, and wash everything downstairs. It was definitely spring cleaning in the fall. All the while, we had to stay at my parent's house (poor things...I think we over-stayed our welcome) because my asthma was acting up with the smoke. We did go home after awhile, but then we had to wait for the guys to come clean the air ducts out, so we had to live without heat for a couple of days...and it was COLD. So we had to sleep mostly in Casey's room with a little space heater and it was hard for all of us to be in the same room, especially since Casey got used to having me near him all the time. On top of all that, we got sick and then our car broke down! I guess when it rains, it pours, right??? Haha. God helped us through it. It has definitely been a challenge the past few weeks, but we are grateful for God's provision and help in all this (and that he provides for us financially even though it has been tight). So I am definitely glad all that is behind us! :)
Oh yeah, back to Casey's 2nd birthday...I forgot to tell about his "second" party. :) He had another party with his friends from church and we had his party at CuriOdyssey, a children's museum and zoo. We had a Curious George party this time, being that that is his favorite show (actually I love that show too...it teaches me a lot!) Kevin and I made cake pops for the party, and let me tell you, it was HARD WORK. We did a trial run and they were pretty ugly...but the the second time around they were way better. I had to end up dipping all of them though, but Kevin did the sprinkles. ;) We also had a Curious George mini-cake made by a friend of a friend, and it was so adorable. You can see pictures below. I got some great ideas for decorating for his party from my friend Becky. Hope you like all the pictures! Casey had a glorious time at the party and loved running around with his little friends.
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| Making cake pops...took until 12:30am! |
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| Favors! |
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| His Friends at the Party! |
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| Getting a Curious George tattoo! |
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| They actually sat down to eat! |
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| Looking at the animals at CuriOdyssey at his b-day party! |
He loves being 2 years old now and can tell you how old he is. He is also talking a lot more now and putting words together. Sometimes it is a mix and match of words,like "shoe....go....me" and so on, but he is learning more and more words all the time. He knows most of his letters and lots of his numbers and shapes too. He loves to play games of counting up to 10 and back again in silly voices. He also loves to read books and especially loves the "Twas the Night Before Christmas" poem...I have to read it almost every night. Haha. And he loves to look through his Bible and ever since I showed him the Adam and Eve picture with the "bad snake" around the tree, tempting them with the fruit, he keeps going back to that page and saying, "bad snake...bad snake" and yet he seems to love that page because of the bad snake! I guess because he can relate to sometimes doing bad things...he sure tries my patience all day long, testing his limits. He is pretty stubborn and it has been a challenge to discipline him and have him truly listen...he loves to do the opposite of what I say and is often defiant. I guess we will continue to learn how to discipline him effectively as the years pass! I just keep praying for him that God will draw near to him and that Casey will come to know Him at a young age...I can definitely see the sin nature strong in him, even when he is so little! But I know God is so much stronger and I see the wonderful little person Casey is too....he is so gentle and loving sometimes and wants to be held and cuddled and hugged and gives kisses when someone is hurt and says "sorry" when he does something wrong. So I know there is hope! :) I love that little guy so much. He is so funny and silly and brings joy to our lives.
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| He's two now, so we turned his car seat around! He loves to tell daddy when the light is green and to "Go!" |
Besides all of this (sorry this has been such a long blog!), we celebrated a quiet Thanksgiving with great food and friends and we are looking forward to the Christmas season! We already went to the Dicken's Christmas Fair and Casey loved it...he loved the dancers and the food and looking at the people dressed up and all the decorations. We also have these things on the agenda this December: Ice skating in downtown Redwood City, a Holiday Tea with other Mom's, going to the Gilroy Gardens light festival, going to Hometown Holidays in Redwood City, going to the Lucasfilm Christmas party (and this year it will be different types of dancing....swing, ballroom, line...etc), having family visit and much more!
By the way, the Bundles 4 Babies Drive was a complete success! We had about 3 carloads full of things (including 4 buckets of mostly new baby items worth about $1000 or so) and the lady from the Shelter Network said that she dosen't normally say it at work, but "God works in mysterious ways" because they had about 22 babies at the shelter from the ages of 0-12 months, so our donations came at just the right time. I am so grateful to all the wonderful friends and moms that helped make it a reality. Thank all of you! I hope the items will be a blessing to the homeless people in Redwood City and that they will see God's love through it. We put notes with Bible verses on the items and we also put devotionals and baby Bibles in the buckets. It was awesome, so thank you!
We hope you are all doing well! Please drop by for a visit with us if you are ever in the Bay Area. We would love to see you!
