Talk About Timing

Just four days after moving into our new house, we get several inches of snow! Thank you GOD for sparing us this weather until we were moved in! The "For Sale" sign wasn't even down yet! It was lots of fun for the boys and I to bundle up for the first snowfall of the season! Colin reminded me so much of the little boy from A Christmas Story... "I can't get up!"

Mary Had a Little Lamb!

Cannon's preschool did an adorable Christmas production where each class represented the different animals, angels, etc in the manger. He and his classmates were all dressed as sheep. Here's a little video clip. Cannon is on the top row, far left. His best friend Dominic is on the top right dressed as the "black sheep"! hee hee

After their part of the production, the kids filed off the stage... all except for Cannon! He stood there, waiting for specific instructions from his teacher to get off the stage. Too cute!

Preparing for Our New Home

Next weekend, in between Thanksgiving and Christmas, we are moving out of our current home and into a new home. We'll be creating an apartment in the basement and Rob's parents will be coming to live with us. In addition, we have to clean up, paint and shampoo carpets in our current home as we plan to rent this out for a few years before selling it. It's crazy how much we have to do, but so far, it's all going very smoothly. One hour after putting our "For Rent" sign up, we got a call. So we're hoping for a signed lease from that family so we can breath easier knowing this house is getting paid for. We have a lot of things to do in the new home to get ready to move in, mostly with making it safe for the boys. We need door alarms, locks, gates etc for Chance. We have a walk through on Monday, settlement Friday and moving Saturday. Oh, and I'm hosting a baby shower Saturday morning for a friend at church! AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

Here are a few pics of the new house I took with my phone.

Cannon's All Grown Up

I don't know about you, but I just can't believe how quickly my kids seem to be growing up... literally before my eyes. Colin went from being a baby to being a toddler overnight it seemed! Now Cannon, he is so much older than 3! He's so much fun and so SMART! He just wants to understand and be a part of everything. It really is fun to experience things all over again through his eyes.

Falling for Halloween Time

Fall and Halloween have been so much fun this year. Between pumpkin patch trips and trick or treating, the kids were kept busy for weeks!

Cannon's preschool had a field trip to Old McDonald's Farm. And Chance's kindergarten class had a field trip to Ridgefield Farm. Mommy went on Cannon's field trip and Daddy went on Chance's! Both trips included corn mazes, lessons on pumpkins, petting zoos, play time, a hay ride, and of course, picking out a pumpkin.

Now Trick or Treating was a TOTAL blast! In my day, there was one day a year to trick or treat. Now it seems like everyone has their own plan. There's trick or treating at the mall, at the outlets, at the senior center, in the neighborhood the weekend before, on the day of Halloween.... it never ended! We decided to do trick or treating at Somerford Assisted Living the week before and then in our neighborhood on the Saturday before Halloween. It was so much fun! Chance and Cannon walked up to the doors and were so polite. Colin went along for the ride! And Cannon's preschool had a costume parade. Here he is with his best bud Dominic and his little girlfriend Annabella.

Colin's First Year in Review - video

Here is a video montage I put together of Colin's entire first year. He's 17 months old already and I can hardly believe it. My baby is not a baby anymore. I have thoroughly enjoyed each and every moment!

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Our Future Worship Leader!

Cannon has definitely inherited his Mommy's musical nature. He loves to play any instrument he can get his hands on, and he REALLY loves to sing. Since all I ever have on the radio is Christian music, he's learning the songs and singing along. Nothing like hearing your three year old singing his little heart out about Jesus. Anyways - recently I was asked to learn a song called Ocean's Will Part to sing as an offering for church and to sing with the band I sing with. So I played it a lot to practice and Cannon came to affectionately call it "Mommy's song". Today I put my CD on and went into my room to do some work while he played with his matchbox cars in the living room. Next thing I know I hear the joyful sounds of him singing along to the song. I knew he knew some of the words, but this time he knew them all! And not only that but he was lifting his hand in praise. It was so cute I had to capture it on video. Take a look!


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Colin's Sucker!

My little man is just that, a little man. Hard to believe he's going on 17 months already. I remember bringing him home like it was yesterday. It's simply sad how fast the time goes by when they are this little. I just ADORE all three of my boys, but since Colin is my last baby, I can't help but think he's just the cutest EVER! I love this little clip of him slurping on his lollipop and wandering around the house. He makes even walking look cute!


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Chance's Communication Practice

Typically each night, or at least several times a week, we sit down with Chance and work on his communication. We just recently updated his communication board, so we spent some time helping him get familiar with where everything was on the board. Clearly you can see in these two videos that Chance knows his stuff! He loves to work for lotion! Crazy what motivates our angels!


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Angelman Syndrome Information

This video is Susan, her husband and Ryan sharing information on Angelman Syndrome. I hope you find it informative.

Jumpin Jeepers!!!

Cannon and Dominic are the best of buds and they sure did have a great time driving the jeeps around yesterday. I don't know, perhaps we should drop the legal driving age to 3?!!

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Sprinkler Time!

One our favorite things to do in the summer is play in the sprinkler. We seriously have quite a water bill each month, but it's worth it for the fun we have!

Angelman Syndrome Conference

Rob and I had an absolutely AWESOME time at the Angelman Syndrome Conference in St.Louis. Thank you to my mom, Aunt Dar, and Aunt Deb for the enormous task of watching the boys for us while we were gone. Thank you to our church families at IBC, HPCC and Wildwood for your financial support, prayer support, and meals! And thank you to all our friends for your support and prayers. We learned so much about ourselves as parents/caregivers, and we learned a TON about Chance. We believe he is so much more capable than we initially thought and we're excited to see how his life unfolds. We were encouraged by the hundreds of families and angels we met there. It was really emotional for us to meet other angels. Rob and I also enjoyed some LONG overdue alone time. We hope to make the trip to the conference every two years to continue to learn, but more importantly to see our new extended family!



During on of our lunch breaks, Rob did this crazy trampoline thing in the mall. He was a bit scared at first, but he settled in and was jumping REALLY high!
The next picture is our hotel. It's the old historic St.Louis Union Station, completely renovated into the Hyatt Regency and a mall. Very cool!

Okay- so I'm a dorky tourist!

This is the keynote speaker Dr. Elizabeth Thiele sharing her research on seizures. She was very very good!

Summer Time and Icecream

It simply doesn't get any sweeter than this! It's just a lot of fun to make icecream cones and let the boys make a huge mess of themselves outside. It's one of the few times that they actually sit quietly for a few minutes together!

Chance's First Day of Kindergarten

Watching for the bus to come!
I know, I know... it's summer, so how can it be his first day of Kindergarten? Well, Chance is part of the Extended School Year program for special needs and it just so happened that his first day of Kindergarten falls in July. He did GREAT! So much better than I expected. I guess I was just a nervous ninny, but his new teacher, Ms.Ginnie said he did better than she expected. Chance was so excited to see the bus coming, so that was a relief. And Ms.Ginnie was at the door when the bus pulled up to school, so he recognized her and was instantly at ease. I think we're going to have a good year!


He was so excited to get on the bus, he was pulling on my arm!