Texas and Luke's Baptism

What a great weekend!!  This weekend we left OKC and headed down to Texas to visit with friends and have Luke baptized.  Friday we visited with our previous neighbors and  then spent the night with our friends that were the kids surrogate grandparents when we lived in England and Spain.  It was a night of laughs and good conversation.  Saturday we had lunch with Reagan's godparents, who have a pond for fishing, chickens for chasing, dogs and cats to play with and horses feed and try to pet.  For dinner we met up with Luke's godparents and the kids had friends to play with!  Sunday was church and Luke's baptism.  Luke's baptism was a wonderful ceremony.  We were blessed to have friends in attendance as we welcomed Luke into our church family.  After the service friends gathered back at our friend's home for snacks and drinks.  The kids were able to run and play outside while adults talked and caught up.  Thank you to everyone that came to help us celebrate and a HUGE thank you to Thumper for putting so much work into getting things ready!!! 

The Many Faces of Luke

Happy Halloween

This year for Halloween we had a ninja, leopard, witch, Rapunzel, ladybug, and dinosaur.  We walked around the neighborhood and the kids made out like bandits!   They were give a couple of full size candy bars and a gallon zip lock bag of candy each.  That is 5 gallons of candy!!  Plus they were give a lot of the small lunch size bags of chips.  I think those will last the rest of the year.  The kids had a good time and the weather was nice it was not too cold and no rain! 

 

Out and About, Again

Today was another beautiful day and we went for hike.  It was a 3 mile hike (up and down).  We had a good time and pushed the kids pretty hard.  Reagan walked the entire way with no complaining.  At the end she did comment her legs were hurting and she was slowing down, but kept on trucking.  I am impressed at how she keeps up on these hikes without complaining.  We reached the mountain top had a snack and came back down.  Coming down is a lot faster tan going up. 

Out and About

We went for a hike this morning.  The weather is still beautiful and we are going to try to take advantage of it before winter sets in.  This was about 10 minutes from the house and part of the East Coast Trail.  Nathan found some moose tracks and the girls built rock statues, there were 2 already started and the girls just added to them.  The Ocean Bay Sciences Center (part of the college) was right there, it is not open right now, but they have 3 harp seals they are researching and you can watch them from the observation deck.  The kids enjoyed watching them swim back and forth.  We even found a few blueberries left to pick and eat. 

2 Months Old

Luke is 2 months old!!  During his check-up he weighed 14 pounds 5 ounces (86th percentile) and was 24 inches long (81th percentile).  He has gotten so big that Madeline has trouble holding him.  Emily can still hold him but not for very long.  Luke is smiling more and more every day, mornings are his best time.  When he is in a good mood he will smile and coo, it is the sweetest sound and I enjoy every minute of it.  He does NOT like his car seat.  As long as the car is moving he is happy, but as soon as the car stops moving for more than a minute he will start to cry.  When he was 6 weeks old he was spitting up all of the time and would get so upset after he ate.  At his 6 week check-up the doctor gave us a prescription for Zantac to help with his reflux, it has worked really well and Luke is a much happier baby.  Luke will still get an upset belly and spit-up, but is not as fussy.  Luke enjoys being held and most of the time will only sleep if he is being held.  At night time he will sleep in his crib for the first 3 hours then he wakes up to eat and Paul or I will fall asleep with him on the sofa or recliner just to get him back to sleep.  Luke is still trying to sort out night and day, but I think it will not be too much longer (I hope).   

 

 

my life

This is a snapshot of what my life revolves around.  Luke, changing diapers, feeding, cleaning and trying to stay awake!!  That being said I love this life!

1 Month Old!!

Luke is one month old and he is getting chunky.  His fingers and toes are no longer skinny, his thighs are getting thicker, he is loosing his newborn skinniness.  Luke is staying awake longer and his vision is getting better, he can see you at a close distance and will actual look at you for a few seconds.  His eyes will go cross eyed occasionally as he tries to focus on things.  The kids still enjoy holding Luke. Luke, however is getting less tolerant of the constant passing around and the flopping about they put him through.  Luke is getting too big for Maddie to hold and walk him around, which is sad as she LOVES her little brother and wants to hold him the most!  I have noticed her struggling to hold him as he slips out of her arms, he has not been dropped, but it is getting more difficult for her. 

Luke LOVES to "look" at his lions

Picking Blueberries

Today we went on a hike to pick wild blueberries.  It was a lot of picking for not lot of blueberries, plus a couple buckets tipped over and dumped out on the ground which slowed the picking process.  The kids enjoyed eating the berries and I think more were eaten than were put in the buckets. 

Puffins!!!

Today we took a boat tour to see puffins and hopefully whales, but we saw no whales as they have moved on.  It was about a 15-20 minute (rough) boat ride out to the island that the puffins have made their dens in.  The island is uninhabited by people.  The only people that are allowed to go on the island are the biologists that study them.  There were thousands of puffins on the island along with sea gulls, the Common Murre, and the Black-Backed gull (a predator of the puffin).  The Common Murre is a cousin to the puffin and looks similar to a penguin.  The Puffins live at sea about 8 months of the year and only come to land to breed.  Once the chick is big enough, the parents will leave the nest and the chick will stay in it's den until runs out of food and then it will fly from the den to the ocean.  Puffin chicks will follow the moon to head out to sea, and are often confused by lights from the cities around the island and will end up in the city and the puffin patrol will go looking for lost puffin chicks and return them to the ocean.  A young puffin will stay at sea for the first 4 years of it's life before returning to land to find it's mate and breed, puffins will mate for life.  There were 2 puffin chicks on the boat that had been rescued the night before and they were being returned to the ocean.  The boat crew took them out of their crate and placed them on the floor of the boat with the idea that they would go to the water.  One had to be helped into the water and the other one found it's way to the water after a slight hesitation.  It was a good experience and none of us got sick.  There were people around us that had plastic bags, but we took our Dramamine and managed to keep our cookies untossed! 

LOTS of puffins

LOTS of Common Murre

Common Murre

Puffin Chick

puffin chick