Hear Colby do his speech

Here's a little quick video of Colby during his speech session this week. They were going through the first set of flash cards. You might have to listen closely to hear him, so turn those speakers up! We are so proud of the progress he is making. Who knows, another couple months and he might be talking in sentences!

Speech update

Colby has been doing great at speech. His favorite thing is to do the flashcards. His therapist is really good with him. He has started saying so many more words now. It's great.

This past Monday, he showed her what he likes to do on my iphone. He showed her some of his flashcards that I have on there. Then he showed her how he likes to find pictures on the phone and place them in Disney frames. He's a smart little bugger. He can figure out how to navigate through the different apps.

The downside of having him on my phone, sometimes he makes some calls and I don't realize it.

Gaps can be good!

As most everyone knows, my kids have gaps between their teeth. Except Lexi now. She has beautiful teeth thanks to the braces. Colbys teeth are very similar to what Lexi's were like when she was little.

The dentist checked his teeth out and was very pleased by the amount of gaps. It's a good thing to have gaps to prevent the cavities in between the teeth.

Colby found a use for his front gap. He got a sucker at stride rite. He was sucking on it on the way home. I turned around and he stuck the stick in his gap and didn't have to use his hands. Creative little thinker!

You can barely tell head on that his stick is stuck up there. Gaps can be a good thing!

A split chin

When we were buying our table and chair set, we thought we were getting a great deal. They were at a real furniture store on clearance. The table is pretty good, very sturdy, probably too heavy. The chairs, we have found, were the reason the set was on clearance. They tip over way too easily.

Colby climbed up on the chair by Lexi's computer. He tipped it over backward and split his chin open. It's a tiny little cut. He was bleeding for a little bit, but he's such a trooper, he didn't cry very long.

Sitting on the couch with him tonight, I looked down at him and told him I loved him. He slipped his arm behind my back and leaned in close and said, mmmm, which meant he loved me too.

Our Christmas Tree

I meant to upload a few pictures, but I haven't downloaded them from the camera yet.

Our Christmas tree was decorated by Lexi, she was in charge, and the rest of the kids. We sorted out all of the breakable ones, like the glass bulbs and left them in the boxes.

The tree was nicely, evenly covered in the ornaments. It looked nice! Notice I said "looked".

Colby is our destroyer. He has broke so many ornaments that I didn't think would break. He will snag an ornament off the tree and throw it as hard as he can and as high as he can into the middle of the tree. Most of the bottom branches are bent out of shape and missing ornaments. The strange thing is, I don't know where most of them are. I think he has stashed them somewhere. I walked out to the living room the other day and he was whacking the tree with his blanket.

How did I know the tree wouldn't do well in our house this year. Maybe the idea of hanging it upside down from the ceiling wouldn't have been so bad after all.

I guess we can only hope next year will be better! Maybe I'll post some before and after pictures once I get them on the computer.

Lil bit of trauma, lil bit of drama

Poor Colby. The other night, he decided to try to climb up the oven. Usually it's locked, but this time it wasn't. Thank goodness John had already anchored it down so the whole thing doesn't tip. Anyway, he went to climb up it, the door fell open. He fell flat on his back. My first instinct was to close the oven door to get to him to pick him up.

Well . . . as I was shutting the door, his toes were underneath it in between the bottom drawer and the oven door. John saw that and I immediately stopped. His toes were stuck. If I tried to close it, it pinched them, if I tried to go the other way, it pinched them. After a few minutes of frantically trying to figure out how to get them out, we called 911. While we waited for help to arrive, Sammy was very upset. He kept screaming, " Colby is going to die! I don't want Colby to die! Help him"!

We thought the fire dept was coming but they dispatched the EMT's. Once they arrived, they called in for the fire department. They couldn't see how to get his toes out either. Colby was able to get all of his toes out except his big one (and it is big).

Poor Colby, he was crying. He would point to his toe and say, "Ohh". We gave him his favorite blanket. Eventually, my legs were starting to shake from squatting that long. I was squatting trying to comfort him, while trying to hold the door in place so it didn't move at all. I had John try to hold the door for me so I could sit next to Colby. He was very shaky with the door (doesn't handle crisis very well we learned), so I took over.

The firemen finally showed up, did something to the hinges of the oven door and used a screwdriver to pry up the door. His toe was a tad swollen and red. We'll see in the near future if there is any damage to his nail as it grows.

Even though the firemen were the ones to release his toe, I can tell Colby is very grateful to me (even though I was the one that closed the door). He will come up to me and hug me and make his "uhh" noise (which with a hug means I love you in Colby language).

Do you think he learned his lesson? At times yes, he will come to the oven door say "oh" and point to his toe. But, there have already been times where he tries to climb it AGAIN!

Handsome lil guy

Look at this handsome lil guy. He's getting so big now. He loves to give hugs and kisses. He's our sweet baby. We just love him to pieces . . . and he loves us. He has a special bond with Lexi. He greets her every morning when he wakes up and as soon as she gets home from school. She can even get him to sleep if we need her to.

Future Kindergartener

When we dropped Sam off for school the first day, Colby was just as excited. He loved the little chairs to sit in. He's such a cute boy. He's a smart baby. Poor little guy just can't talk yet. I'm sure when he does start talking, we'll think it's so cute ... But, I'm sure there will be a day when we will look back and think how nice it was when he wasn't talking. You know those days, the ones where the kids are either talking back or talking a mile a minute.

Kindergarten and Tot time begins!

Yea! School has started up for Sammy and Chloe. It was a very exciting day this past Monday. Sam doesn't start school til 8:15 am, but decided to wake up around 6:30 that morning.

We all got ready and took the "first day of school pictures". You know the one I'm talking about, the backpack pose. I got all of the kids together finally and snapped a few real quick. They were all happy and excited, so I got one with them smiling! Sam still wearing that backpack, of course.

He went to Kindergarten with no problems. He was so excited that when he saw Quino across the parking lot, Sam did his happy dance.

Sam will do great in class this year . . . as long as he's not too wild for his teacher. So far this week, I think he's been really good in class. He says he listens and is a good boy. I'm assuming he is since he is super wild after school gets out. All of that contained energy just bursts out once we start leaving school.

Chloe loves tot time and is a little pro at me leaving her this session. There have been no tears. I worried since Sam isn't there with her, but I'm thinking she might like it better that way.

I'm working at getting Colby back on his "school's in session schedule". Trying to get him to nap in between drop offs and pickups. With the kids back in school, they seemed to have shared something with Colbs. He now has a fever. The first of many to come, I'm sure. Such a bummer!

Somersault boy gets new shoes

Colby can do somersaults . . . a forward roll for the gymnasts out there. He does them perfectly. He has figured to tuck his head just the right amount to roll over in a straight line. It's really cute.

Today, I bought Colby some shoes. He is almost 16 months old and wears a size 8xw. This little kid has huge wide feet! He's going to be a beast. He loves his shoes. His toes on one foot turn inward when he is walking so I am hoping by him wearing shoes most of the day it will self correct.

The shoes were on sale buy one get one half off so I picked up another pair in a bigger size. These brown ones. The shoes are cute, but way pricey. He needs them though, so I guess I shouldn't complain. They are supportive but still soft and flexible.

Blog Off Babies

This weeks topic for the blog off for babies is . . . Babies! I decided that I would share our journey of how our babies arrived in our family.

It's only fitting that I start off with pictures of our cute babies.

Lexi, Sammy, Chloe and Colby

Ah, they were so cute!

Of course every mama thinks their own babies are cute, don't they.

Like all babies, my babies were heaven sent. I will admit that I took for granted my first baby. We decided that we wanted to have one shortly after we were married . . . and lo and behold, we had one, with no effort. We were blessed with the prettiest baby girl I had ever layed my eyes on. She was such a fun, smart and lovable baby. She brought us such joy, that we decided we would have another one. When she was 2 1/2, we decided it was time. At least that is what we had planned. To my husbands delight, we started trying . . . and trying . . . and trying . . . and we kept that trying bit up for a couple of years.

Then, we realized something just wasn't right. Turns out, it was me. I went the infertility route. I was diagnosed with PCOS. I tried a few cycles of treatments with no success. It was a devastating blow to hear the doctor tell me that I had a slim chance to get pregnant on my own and even if I did, it would most likely end in a miscarriage. John still had hope and I didn't. There was a part of me that resented him for reassuring me that one day we would have more kids.

Fast forward a little while . . . we decided that we did want to add more babies to our family, so we started up the adoption process. It's a rather long story of ups and downs, more downs than up . . . that will need to be told another day (if I ever decide to). Long story short, we had two adoptions that after months in process fell apart. One was for a newborn baby boy in Guatemala. We were in process for over six months with him only to have it yanked out from underneath us. We were absolutely devastated. We loved this baby boy. We considered him ours even though we never met him. Then months later, we accepted a referral of a newborn baby girl in Guatemala. We were in process just a few months when we found out the case could not go forward. Another devastation.

While we were in the process of adopting, I did end up pregnant, twice. We thought wow, double the blessings! The blessings were cut short. I miscarried both times and both of the adoptions came crashing down.

Miraculously, about the same time we started up a third adoption for a little girl from Guatemala, we found out I was pregnant once again. Of course, with the previous experience, I was thinking, "you've got to be kidding me". I know those around me thought that I wasn't happy to be pregnant. I didn't show much emotion about it on the outside. On the inside, I was very excited, but extremely nervous. Our adoption continued on as did the pregnancy.

It was unreal. After 10 years of secondary infertility, it finally happened! Right on time, Sammy was born. He was such a cute baby. He looked just like an old man in a little baby body.

Months later, our adoption was finalized. Things don't always turn out the way we think they are going to. With out going into details (especially since many don't know this), we later made the decision to place her with another family here in the states. Another devastating situation. Even though it was our decision, it was by far the hardest thing I have ever done in my life. She was ours & we loved her. I still think of her often, still will cry myself to sleep at times when I think of her & will always love her.

Jumping ahead, two years after Sammy was born, we had Chloe. She is our cute little petite, feisty stubborn child. Two years after Chloe, we had Colby. I would have to say he was somewhat of a surprise. My body finally remembered how to keep hold of a baby and apparently doesn't want to stop. Colby is now our final baby. He completes our family.

Our journey to have our babies was a long one, 15 years long. One filled with surprises & too much heartache. Maybe it was all in "the plan" for us to go the adoption route, to get our little girl to the right family for her, to eventually be blessed with the rest of our family after our job was done. Who knows really, but I can't wait to find out. That will be my first question once I die, no wait, my second question will be to find out the whys of it. My first question will probably be, "dude, what just happened"? :)

It's just Chloe

Bethany photographed Chloe for me the other day. She looked too cute in Lexi's old dress. She had the cutest little pig tails, little corkscrews and all.
Last night, I was reading books to the kids in Chloe's room. Colby was in there walking around playing with all of the girlie stuff. I smelled something nasty. So, naturally, being totally disgusted, I asked the kids, did one of you fart? They both say no. Then Sammy says, It's just Chloe, she's a girl so she always stinks. Chloe jumped quickly to her defense saying boys are the stinky ones.

It was Colby. He let off a little stinkbomb.

Chunky Nuts

Sammy came into our room yesterday to tattle on Chloe. Apparently, she double dipped. I asked Chloe what they were eating. She paused a little, then said "chunky nuts".

What's her version of chunky nuts, you might ask? Why, it's peanut butter of course! She double dipped with her spoon. Not to worry, though, we bought new peanut butter last night. We won't keep something that has been double dipped in, that's just gross!

I love when my kids come up with new names for common things. It's always the best when they can't remember what something is called. Sam used to call fruit punch, fun pooch. Chloe has referred to a soft taco as a soft tico. As for Colby, everything is either mmm, aaaa or dun dun dun. We know the dun dun dun is shut the gate. The aaaa is when he is calling someones name. The mmm is just about everything else. Go figure. I'm pretty sure one day he'll really talk.

*Colbys eyes are getting red again, looks like another ear infection in the works,*

He's walking!

Colby is now walking more than he crawls! He's probably faster at crawling, so there are times that he jams that way. He looks like a little penguin when he walks. He's so cute!

He is still such a dancer. He loves the beat and rhythm in things. He has finally figured out how to dance while standing up. It's more of a slow dance. He seems to dance faster when he's sitting down. He loves music. One of his favorite dancing songs is Poker Face. He bobs his head as soon as the music starts. He even puckers his lips out.

One day if I can figure out how to video him and upload it, I'll post it!

Let's play catch

Catch up that is!

School is out for all of the kids.
Sam graduated from tot time.
Lexi is now a Sophomore (and very proud of that fact).
Colby has had another set of ear infections that didn't quite clear up with the first medicine prescribed, so, I got to take him back into the doctors for something different. They are now cleared up and he has just a few doses left to take. Have I ever mentioned that our copays are $50? Well, they are. His ears are costing us just about the same as all of his diapers probably have!
John and I celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary. We went to Reno and stayed at the Peppermill. Our suite had a very nice soaking tub, which was used quite a few times. I would . . . or I will should I say, stay there again!

We've had lots of spiders, some even in the toilets. Good thing the lids are never down, other wise, those big floating spideys would've been big crawling spideys! I did find Colby trying to catch a big spider that was trying to run away from him on a couch pillow that was on the floor. Yuck! That's all I need, him to eat one of those.

No pictures to post just yet. Bummer, huh!

Colby has been one for awhile now.

It's about time I do a posting about Colbs. He turned one last month. I'm just a slacker bloggin mama.

Colby had a good birthday. He wasn't too much into his cake. I eventually had to give him a fork for him to try the cake.

He liked all of his presents . . . as did the other little kids, of course.

He is trying to walk now. He can take 4-5 steps on his own before he drops to crawl. His knees are pretty rough from crawling on the carpet. He crawls around on the floor and pushes the cars around.

He is getting two more teeth on the bottom. As of right now, he has six teeth on the bottom, eight teeth on the top and two extremely swollen gum spots. He's a funny boy. He loves to dance! He loves the music playing in the car, loves Lexi's ipod & her phone. He even loves to dance to ringtones. He doesn't really watch tv, which is nice, especially when all of the other kids are at school. I get a few hours of quiet . . . or enough time to catch up on some recorded shows.

He still takes two naps a day, which I love! He's a good napper. I just give him his blanket and put him in his crib and he lays down and falls asleep. Night times we not the same though. He likes to sit on Johns lap to fall asleep, but I am now in the process of breaking them both of that little bonding time.

I guess that's it for now.

Colby 11 months already!

Our little baby isn't so little anymore. He's a whopping 23 pounds! I don't know how long he is (I'll find out at his One year well check next month), but he's tall. He's a cruiser. He now hangs onto the top of the counters and table to skim them . . . probably looking for scraps of food. He's our mini vacuum. If there is something on the floor, he'll find it and eat it. Doesn't matter to him what it is. I can't tell you how many pieces of string from our couch pillows that we have pulled out of his mouth.

He's still working on getting over those darn ear infections. I took him back in yesterday and the dr. we saw thinks it may be a persistent ear infection on one side. His 10 days of taking Augmentin is tomorrow, but then, we start another 10 days of it up. Thank goodness he seems to like taking it. He's a trooper. He is still happy even when he should be hurting.

Hmmm, what else about our Bubbas . . . we just love him to pieces! He likes to wave hi and bye, give kisses and has just started to pull hair (especially mine and Chloes). This morning he grabbed Sammy by the hair to show him something. For some reason, he will grab mine and pull when he gets mad. Little stinker!

Another one sick & rainbow

Now it's Chloe's turn. She's now the sicky one. She has a cold, I think. Fever, runny nose, sneezing, lounging on the couch and a lot of whining and tears. Poor little feisty thing. She can't stand when anyone looks at her, touches her or talks to her. Makes for a really fun day.

Colby seems to be doing much better. He's in a much better mood. At least I know his medicine is working. He is teething again. Big huge swollen gums where the molars are trying to peek out. Ouch, looks painful!

This pic was taken this morning in the car waiting to drop off Sam at preschool. Chloe stayed home today to relax.

Lexi was over at her friends today. She sent this picture to us on her phone.

I haven't mentioned Lexi lately, but yes, she still exists. I just try to give her more privacy on this blog.

Johns Birthday & Sick Bubbas

Big daddy John had a birthday too. He is now 36. Whoo, that’s getting up there! We gave him his gifts, which he was excited to open.

Even though it was his special day, we had to devote some time to Colby and take him to the doctors. Poor little Bubbas has ear infections in both ears and eye infections. He looked fine the day before. I can always tell when he has an ear infection, his eyes get nasty. Poor baby was miserable. He had a cold for about a week along with a cough, but that was mainly at night.

The night before we took him in, he had a really hard time sleeping. Too many boogies!

Poor Sick Bubbas!

After a few doses of his medicine (Augmentin) this time, he seems to be getting better. This is the third set of ear infections in three months.

While we were gone to the doctors, Lexi made John his cake and cleaned up the house for him. We brought dinner home for the adults (us, Lexi, Bethany, Omar & Gilbert). John chose Olive Garden. Excellent choice! I can’t stand pasta, but I love their five cheese marinara sauce.
Overall, I know John had a good birthday and he loved all of his gifts. I'm hoping to post some pictures of John! Check back tomorrow!

Colby 10 months old

Our cute baby boy is now 10 months! Eeek, he's growing up fast. I say this too often, but - time sure does fly by fast.

Colby is a fun baby. He's a fast crawler. He's a furniture cruiser. He has eight teeth. He has experienced his first buzz cut. He survived five nights in a row without his mama and daddy. He has a super cute giggle. He is a picky eater. He refuses to eat baby food. He likes to eat a banana like big people. He hates getting his diaper changed. He's a little stinker. He's our big baby with the prettiest blue eyes and the cutest smile.

Bethany took some pictures of Colby today for me. He is not very cooperative. For some reason, he doesn't like to just sit there and smile. I'm sure it has to do something with his age, ya think?!

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