Alivia's Birthday

Well I'm almost a month late with this post but better late than never. Alivia turned 2 on October 19. I can't believe she's two! It's amazing how when your youngest turns a certain age it just seems so shocking to think where the time went. She is a special little person - funny and loving but that girl can throw a temper tantrum like no one else. She's definitely not afraid to tell you if she isn't happy about something. Alivia has turned into a huge daddy's girl, that seemed to happen almost overnight here recently. The day before her birthday she woke up at 4 in the morning throwing up and continued to vomit all day long. At about 5:00 that night after a call to the nurse we were advised to bring her into the ER for treatment of dehydration. She had her first IV and some medicine to help with the vomiting (which she threw up...go figure). Luckily she recovered pretty quickly and although on her actual birthday she was not quite 100% she was feeling much better. She's such a character, the terrible twos should be something.

We have a teenager!

Austin turned 13 yesterday, I'm still shaking my head at the thought of having a teenager, seems like just yesterday when he was born. He decided to have some friends celebrate with him by bowling and playing lazer tag. Of course Paul was right in there with his buddies. So far no teenager attitude yet, although I believe we (the parents) are becoming increasingly uncool, Paul's pretty much in denial that he could possibly be uncool.

Here are pictures from the party and some other randoms, enjoy!

Pictures!

Kid Stuff

Well we find ourselves about halfway through the summer and we're at the end of what has been a month of no practices, games. It's been a nice break, we've spent several weekends at the lake. Austin, as always is quite the swimmer, doing flips off the dock, I was pulling him on the tube behind the boat one weekend and as he was trying to stand up I noticed that the rope for the anchor was rapidly going into the water and I quickly let up on the gas and Austin took a dump off of the tube...oops. No harm done, he did manage to stand up on a later try, a feat he hadn't been able to accomplish before.


Kale is becoming quite a little fish, he took swim lessons about a month ago and you put his life jacket on and that kid is in the water from sun up to sun down. He's even jumped off the boat into the water a few times. One weekend we had the kids out in the boat pulling them in the tubes and after all of his cousins were done he said "my turn". We were shocked but thought well, let's go with it. So Kale and his cousin Michael went for a turn in the tube together. They were both all teeth smiling from ear to ear.


Alivia has gone from eating the sand on our beach last year to actually playing in it this year. She's even starting to enjoy going in the water for longer periods of time. Doesn't really care for being in the boat for very long but each weekend she seems to enjoy herself a little more.


The 4th of July brought really crappy weather this year but it managed to clear off in time for the fireworks. I was so excited for Kale and Alivia to see them, and they didn't disappoint. They oohhhed and aaaahhhhed through the whole thing it was a lot of fun.


Other happenings in our little world:

• Austin is going to play fall baseball this year for the first time and I've managed to talk Paul into coaching. He's such a good sport. It's a short season, only 5 weeks, so looks like we'll be dusting off the ball equipment here soon.


• Kale is so close to being potty trained...talk about a long road with this one. I don't know why I'm surprised, he's a strong-willed kid and he'll do it on his time. Unfortunately that generally clashes with our plans.


• Alivia is Kale's little shadow. Whatever he does, she has to do too. They've always gotten along pretty well but they're starting to fight a lot more often. Of course Kale usually has the upper hand being bigger, but she definitely holds her own and she's not afraid to take a stand if she really wants something.

We're all pretty excited that Grandma and Grandpa Jackson are coming to visit us later this week. We're going to take them to the lake for the weekend so we're all praying for nice weather.

Pictures coming soon.

A Star is Born

Sorry to always put posts just about Kale but this kid gives us such great material on a daily basis that we couldn't pass up the opportunity to pass it on. Paul calls him the next Billy Joel. Enjoy.

Kale's Googles

Austin received an Easter package the other day from his step-grandparents and in the package were a pair of swimming goggles. As with every other two year old, he thought they were his. So being the good sport Austin is, he let him play with them. Kale calls them "googles". He wears them all around the house telling us to call him Superman. He gets so wound up and sweaty that the "googles" start to fog over and he has to pull them down to see (kind of like a person wearing bifocals). He even decided he had to take them to school to show his friends. We got to school Tuesday morning and he gets his coat off and tells me to help him put them on and away Superman went!!! He was so proud of himself. Priceless!

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Hair Today...Gone Tomorrow

Well Austin decided it was time for a change. The school has been cracking down on the hair policy and since his cousin Cody got his all hacked off Austin announced that it was time.

He looked like he had turned back time and was 8 years old again!!

He said it turned out shorter than he wanted and he said he's never cutting it again. And pretty much wore a hat for the better part of a week. However, he's getting used to it and I think he's going to let it get a little longer but still keep it short...we'll see.