Wyatt's Construction Birthday Party

Our sweet friends had a Construction Birthday Party last weekend and we had so much fun!! Wyatt turned 3 years old and Caryn and Stacey threw a perfect party including sand to dig in, a paper house to paint, golf tees to nail into styrofoam, incredible "themed" food, and every last detail covered.

Every child had their own "worker's hat" and a "job".  Caleb was a part of the Work Crew.

I think these two punkins were trying to see who could get the most paint on themselves and sweet Brylie won!  It looks like Caleb is being chivalerous and doing all the painting himself.

Wrecking Balls (clementines), Boulders (cake balls), Gravel (popcorn), Traffic Cones (bugels), Sack Lunches (paper bags with goldfish), and other touches of orange and yellow.

The birthday boy

Pinata Time!! I guess Caleb thinks he can help the birthday boy with his foam hammer.

Precious Cade loved the sand and Chapman has his eye on his worker's belt.

Thanks Smith's for a fun birthday!!

Easter Weekend

This Year's Bunny Picture:(this is what took so long-we were trying to wait patiently for it to arrive in the mail.)

Last Year's Bunny Picture:

We had a wonderfully relaxing three-day weekend around the house being productive, lazy, and enjoying a ton of family time.  On Friday, we started the weekend with Caleb's 18 month appointment. Then we took about 80 Easter baskets for boys and girls who live at a homeless shelter in downtown Dallas.  We have some great friends at church that organized over 500 Easter baskets to be donated, stuffed, and delivered.  What a joy it was to serve with our little guy on this special occasion.  (Sorry we didn't take any pictures.)

Friday afternoon we dyed Easter eggs.  I think Daddy had the most fun and he is very creative with his egg dying skills.  Caleb even enjoyed it and made the most beautiful green egg.  We did a lot of yard work and Craig continued to work on the playscape (pictures to follow once it is complete) plus we took a few trips to the hardware store, which is Caleb's new favorite play ground.  On Saturday evening we went to our church's Easter service.  It was a great experience to go on Saturday evening along with 3,000 of our closest friends.  There were over 200 kids in the nursery ages 4 and under.  It was packed to the rim.  

 

Pure delight as Caleb is looking at his filled Easter basket!

On Sunday we were able to have a lazy morning making Resurrection Rolls, an Easter egg hunt, and seeing the treats in Caleb's Easter basket.  Since, this was Caleb's third Easter Egg Hunt in 3 weeks, he is starting to learn to go for the plastic eggs, open them, pour them out and eat whatever he liked (the teddy grams were his choice).

Caleb threw the hard boiled egg with basketball plastic sleeve on it.  He realized that he could then peel the shell off! Great Fun at our Easter Egg Hunt!

Hope you all had a wonderful Easter celebrating our risen King!!!

18 Month Updates

On Friday we went to the doctor for his 18 month check up.  Caleb is 34 1/4 inches tall (95%) and 27 pounds 11 ounces (75 %). Since his last appointment 3 months ago grew 2 inches and gained 2 pounds. He's a growing boy!! He did great with his one shot but it did give him a fever and fussiness for a few days.  This is the first noticable side effect we have seen.  Thankfully he won't have any more shots for at least a year and a half!!!!

Thank you to all of you who continually ask about Caleb's kidneys. We just recently went to see the urologist (6 months since his last procedure). Both kidneys are still enlarged (right kidney is 10 cm and the left one is 8 cm). The urologist didn't seemed too worried since they have been through so much the last year of his life. It sounds like his body will eventually grow into his kidneys. We will go back in 6 months for another round of tests (Caleb will have to go under anesthesia in order to run these tests.) In the meantime, we continue to give him antibotics to reduce infection and a laxative to keep things flowing down there. Thanks for all your continued prayers and support.

Month 18 - March 25

We can't believe we have a little boy that is a year and a half!! 6 more months and we will have a full-fledged toddler!! Where does the time go...chasing our little man everywhere. He is so much fun and enjoys having a good time (especially dancing to music with his Dadda)! The words for the month are stairs, cheese, and vacations.  From Puerto Rico at the beginning of the month to our trip to Austin, there wasn't much time in between.  Here are a few random pictures from the month:

A beautiful day at the Arboretum.  Out of all the gorgeous places to run and play Caleb loves the stairs!

The Petting Zoo at the Arboretum.  Caleb loves animals!

Our church had an Easter Egg Hunt.  We didn't know if Caleb would just stop and be mesmerized with just one egg, sit down and investigate the "ba-ball" but to our surprise he understood the concept of picking up the eggs and putting them in his basket.  He loved it!  More pictures to come after the Easter Weekend.

We know a whole new level of love.  We love our son more deeply and our love meter is truly overflowing every moment we get to spend him our little blessing. 

Austin Spring Break Trip

Spring was in the air, so Caleb and Mommy packed up and headed to Austin for a Spring Break extended weekend.  We arrived on a Thursday afternoon and left on a Tuesday afternoon.  It was great to see so many friends and family.  It is never long enough but we are grateful to be able to have the flexibility to take such a long vacation.  Below are a ton of pictures and a few sentences about what we were doing during our time in Austin (while it was snowing in Dallas).

We first stopped in Georgetown to meet Caleb's 10th cousin, Faith Isabelle, who was born on March 12th.  She was born at 2:09 am weighing 7 pounds 13 ounces and 19 1/2 inches long.  At her two week appointment she weighed 8 pounds 6 ounces and is an inch longer.  She is a beautiful addition to the family and she is dearly loved. 

Julie discovered that Caleb LOVES the sand and did not want to leave it.

Not sure how these two toddlers managed to switch without any tears but they are already learning to share with each other!!

Christalyn and TJ are riding their bikes so well!!

We then rushed to Mimi and Papa's to unpack and get Caleb down for the night.  Julie then ran off to have dinner with a high school friend, Molly.  She is the owner of Vanilla Orchid, an online cafe and catering service in Austin.  Molly has so much wisdom and has been a dear friend of Julie's for years.   

Friday morning, started with a fun walk around the Arboretum with Katherine, a sweet friend from our Newly Married group in Dallas.  Katherine is a soon-to-be momma of a little boy.  We are excited to meet the little guy the next trip to Austin.  Caleb was up and down the many stairs, enjoying the fountain, making new friends, and keeping the pregnant Ms. Katherine very busy.

We then had a play date with Vicki and her two little kids (Samantha almost 3 years and Chase 11 months).  Vicki is a friend of Julie's from Craig's business school days in California.  Caleb again enjoyed the stairs, new toys, and even waking Chase up so that he could play with him.

After a nice nap we met at an amazingly HUGE Sandbox with Kristen and Landon.  Kristen is a friend of Julie's from middle school and high school drill team.  Landon is such a cutie (the precious one actually looking at the camera) and could teach Caleb a thing or two about his colors and new words he speaks daily.

Saturday morning Caleb played with Mimi while Mommy was at dance practice.  Julie's dance studio where she learned the foundation of her dance is having their alumni come back and dance at their Troupe Show in a few weeks.  It was SO much fun to get the group together again to laugh, attempt to dance, and reminiscence on old times.

The proud Great-Mimi holding her 5th great grandchild.  Isn't she stunning at 89 years old!

An afternoon at the Garcia's house and dinner with Craig's parents, Julie's parents, Grandmother, and Uncle Willie.  Caleb had so much fun at Gloria's with both of his grandparents.

Sunday we went to church at Mimi and Papa's church, a relaxing day at home, and then dinner with Megan and Lori, Julie's best friends from high school.  Caleb was quite the handful at Aunt Lou's house with all her "no touch" things, therefore no pictures were taken.

Monday morning we went to visit Julie's childhood best friend, Amy, and her beautiful baby girl, Anabelle, who was born on March 2nd.  She looked so peaceful, like a little doll.  Just love the newborn stage, how quickly they grow up!

Then Julie, her mom, and Caleb went to see all the changes of Julie's second home in college, the Alpha Delta Pi house.  It brought back so many wonderful memories and the changes all looked wonderful.  Caleb loved the 2 sets of stairs and hated leaving them plus the pretty girls he ran into along the way.

During Caleb's nap on Monday afternoon, Julie ran over to Craig's parent's new home.  It is so beautiful and they are so happy to have their dream home in Austin!

After nap we had a play date with the Ezell's, one of Craig's 9th grade guys family that moved to Austin last summer.  They are such generous hosts to let Caleb play with all their toys and sending a toys and clothes home with him.  Luke (6 1/2 years old) is a great playmate for Caleb and was reading him a story.  Madeline is so good with Caleb and we were sad to have missed Jake.  What a sweet family that has blessed our family with their prayers, encouraging words, and love. 

Caleb loved the horsey and Mrs. Ezell!  He also remembered the basketball hoop from his last play date at the Ezell's House.

A group of Julie's friends from middle school/high school Sundancers and their mom's got together for a dinner.  The mom's get together once a month and they were kind enough to plan this month around when Julie was in town.  It was so fun to see old friends and to see the bond of friendship that the mom's have continued to form!

Tuesday morning, we had one more stop... to kiss Aunt Jen and Baby Faith bye before heading home to see our greatly missed Dadda!

This is a sweet new thing that Caleb has been doing.  It is so sweet to have a wet, open-mouth kiss!!!

We had a wonderful time and wished it could have been longer.  Thank you Mimi and Papa for hosting us and being flexible with our whirlwind of 6 days!

Craig's 35!

Craig turned 35 last weekend and it was a nice relaxing weekend after a fun vacation.  Caleb picked out a book for Dadda.  Craig has a many nicknames for our son, one of which is "Pookie." (Let's hope this nickname doesn't stick).  Caleb and Julie were at the store and saw a book called, Let's Dance, Little Pookie.  We had to get it for our Dadda!  Caleb wanted to wrap it in a special bag with balloons on it or as he calls it "ba-balls."

Not only did we have a relaxing weekend but Julie's parents came in town to help us celebrate.  They gave us a night out and watched Caleb for us.  Asl always thanks for your help Mimi and Papa! 

To the Love of My Life,

I am excited to celebrate your 35th year of life! 

Thanks for being such a wonderful husband and excellent Dadda to our son!  We love you!