Hurricane Sandy

Hurricane Sandy came through last night...

I figured instead of emailing this out it'd be easier to add the pictures to the blog. 

We had rain and wind all day Monday, I stayed home with the kids.

Kenn came home around 12:30 and we expected the power to go out

Since it does for practically every storm this past year.

I put Lily to bed, and Brandon and I were watching TV in the front living room.

I was just about to put him to bed when Kenn came in from the kitchen

(where he was working on some blue prints for work)

And informed us he heard cracking noises and wanted us into our bedroom immediately.

I looked at him like he was crazy and said ok. 

About a minute after Brandon and I were in my room we heard a crash. 

We looked outside and there was a tree down. We immediately thought it was the front tree.

I had Brandon go downstairs and i checked on lily who was asleep in her crib. 

Kenn went outside and i called our neighbor Shawn across the street.

Turned out it was the tree next to our house.

We thought about leaving but since it was just hitting the most dangerous part of the storm,

and we had power and no leaking we could see we decided to stay put. 

I moved lily downstairs to her pack N play and we slept down there. 

This morning we were able to see what happened. 

 this is the only spot the tree hit on the house.

The window to the left is Lily's, the window to the right is Brandon's

Kenn got up on the Roof 

we were so amazingly lucky. 

This is what Lily did all morning while the men were outside

We quickly had at least 10 men out front of our house in the rain helping to remove the tree

with chain saws this morning. one teen girl was raking leaves, another wife made

hot cocoa and hot cider. it was so heartwarming to see everyone come out to help.

We didn't even know a few of them!

The entire thing was cleared before 11:30am. 

THIS is why we love our street and will never move. 

We need to buy A LOT of beer for them on Halloween evening. 

 I cant believe that's all the damage that tree did. 

We were pray thanks last night. if that tree had moved a few feet over,

it EASILY could have hurt Brandon and I in the living room, 

or Lily asleep in her crib. i was jittery all last night.

God was defiantly watching out for us all. 

some of the tree cut up

the roots/stumps that just couldn't hang on with the water saturation. 

Our poor tree in the front that took 1/2 the brunt. 

we are so thankful to God for watching over us and our AMAZING neighbors.

Lily 3 Months (Sept)

 

Lily and Brandon are the perfect siblings!

He really is taking on being a big brother.

He will talk to her and try to calm her down when she cries

he has "saved her life" when she was wiggling out of her bouncy chair.

He helps get us things for her and is pretty patient overall :)

Lily also has a new habit below... It has to be THOSE two fingers also..

 Lily has discovered her reflection in the swing.

She's also noticing she has feet and moves her hands to bat at things a little now

 Bathtime is still very fun, we have hooked up things to hit on there also

while getting dressed afterwards she still cries...

We didn't have a DRs appt this month so i have no idea how heavy or long she is.

She does roll over both back to belly and belly to back.

(although mostly back to belly)

she likes to do this at night so then her hands get stuck under her stomach and she cries

and i have to go flip her back at 1am...

Otherwise she's still sleeping great, actually goes down earlier now between 7 and 7:30pm.

She is talking more and more, still mostly to Daddy.

She drinks 6- 4oz bottles a day. at 3 months this week she is now completely on formula.

She is just about to move up into 3-6month clothing, and maybe even stage 2 diapers.

She follows you (or an object) really well with her eyes, and has become more animated at daycare.

 

The three of us are completely smitten with this little lady

September 2012

Brandon has been thriving in kindergarten & Sunday school.

He loves all the activities he does and has made a new friend keagen.

Every friday he buys school lunch (pizza)

He gets a prize from the prize box that he picks out for being good all week,

and even though its a little happy meal toy-esc he LOVES it.

He corrects me and tells me gym is PE and that playing outside is recess.

He has also become obsessed with coloring and cutting out papers and creating things with paper.

every night this is what he does instead of playing video games.

It is very rewarding to see what he makes with his imagination.

Brandon began his 3rd season with the Green Hornets Soccer league
He is doing SOOOO well too! He goes after the ball and doesnt get upset when he doesnt score.
He supports his team and is very active with all the games and practices.
 he's come a long way since he started as a 3yr old!

 

Brandon has also officially learned to ride a bike without training wheels.

He could have done this earlier but as bad parents we don't take him out enough to practice.

The other big first that happened in September was the loss of his first tooth!

The dentist said we have a second one that's coming in, but its not very wiggly yet.

Brandon was SO excited to have the tooth fairy come and leave him a letter and 5 gold coins

(dollar coins)

We went on a family outing to Raven's Stadium to watch the Lorax on the big screen

 

 we got to meet a real penguin too!!!

 being goofy for the camera

 we also went to the B&O museum last weekend, we didn't know it closed at 4pm..

so we only got an hour there, brandon didn't remember much from being their before

(besides riding Thomas) and he had a blast.

He's in the window below :)

Brandon took this picture of himself with my camera. i thought it was adorable

our first family portrait Lily is 2 mos old

Lily 2 Months (aug 2012)

 Lily loves to talk to Kenn... not me, just Kenn

He sits there and can have "full conversations" with her.

 Lily finally got to meet her Great Grandmother "Granny"

 and Great Grandmother "MomMom"

 

 there's that Daddy thing again...

 

 Taken on her 2 month Birthday 9/3/2012

At 2 months (9/10) Lily was 23 3/4" tall (90th percentile) and weighed 9lbs 14oz (25th percentile)

her head is 39.5cm (75% percentile)

both weight and head are same percentile as her 1 month appt, and her height increased.

She wears 0-3 month clothing, size 1 diapers an started to drink formula 2x a day at daycare.

The first 2 weeks at daycare she did not sleep very well, after that she's been great!

 (up an hour and sleeps and hour)

Lily loves bathtime now and its my special time with her in the evening before bed.

At 6 weeks she slept through the night for the first time.

At 8 weeks she slept EVERY night through the night from then on

(8pm to 6am)

 

 

August 2012

For those who don't know Brandon is OBSESSED with Baseball this year.

He knows ALL of the players names and positions. (i dont know one)

he watches the games on TV with Kenn and has been

lucky enough to go to several games this year.

We even got to meet JJ Hardy!

Kenn and Aunt Gail waited in line for 2hrs and we just got to stroll up and hop in line.

Brandon was very nervous at first, then after some chocolate courage (M&Ms)

he met him and told him that he drew a picture in school of him.

JJ Hardy asked if it looked like him. Brandon said it did.

He got an autographed hat (one on below) and a picture.

Later Brandon asked us if JJ Hardy worked at AT&T where the signing was.

 

the pictures below are a game when they let the kids run the bases.

When Kenn heard about it he just had to take him to this game.

He was such a good sport waiting in line for an hour.

 

Brandon is the one in the black shirt on the left

 coming home!

 Baseball players are too cool to smile for a picture

 Brandon also got to go to a preseason Ravens game!

 The week before I went back to work we had kenn take a day off and the 4 of us

took our first official outing to the DC Smithsonian Natural History Museum.

The boys doing what they do best

This is what they were taking a picture of

 

This is what Lily did most of the time.

When she did cry it was ok because the museum was loud enough not to mind

 Brandon also started his First day of School!!!

above is brandon at his locker (on back to school night)

He did great! no crying from him (or Mommy)

The week he started school was also the week i went back to work and Lily started daycare.

It was a hard week but we all love being back into the swing of things!