Vernon Volumes text

Vernon Volumes text

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Groundhog Run

Today, Andrea ran in her first official race!

She's been running for a long time and runs 10Ks all the time, but this was her first actual factual race. The Groundhog run is an underground 5k or 10k run, and Andrea decided to do the 10k (6.2 miles). It was really neat to see the underground caves, and they are a consistent 65-70 degrees year round, so the cold weather today wasn't a factor at all.

We arrived a little early and watched all the 5k people finish. We got to see Andrea's cousin Kelly and her boyfriend Dennis as they crossed the finish line.

Andrea and Kelly.

After the last of the 5k runners finished, all the 10k participants lined up. Andrea took a quick picture with the kids and we wished her luck.

There were a bunch of people, but it didn't really matter where you started because the chip attached to Andrea's number didn't start her time until she crossed the starting line.


Getting ready to go!


Andrea started the race in the middle of the pack and ran a well paced race. Her miles were consistently under a 10 minute pace. The 10k course followed the same course as the 5k course, but the runners did 2 laps. This was pretty neat because we got to see Mommy go by twice and were able to cheer her on.

Andrea coming in for the first lap.


While Mommy was running, Daddy and the kids explored the caves. They were pretty immense and Connor enjoyed running around racing Daddy and Paige.

Some big columns holding the place up!


Connor was a very good boy and was very patient. Paige fell asleep and napped almost the entire time.



Andrea pulling away from all the losers at the finish line! Go Momma!! She ended up finishing right around 57 minutes, 40 seconds.


Daddy with the kids.

Paige is 9 months old today!



Paige turned 9 months old today! She has been such an amazing baby and it's hard to believe she's getting so big and so old so fast! She has such a laid back personality and is almost always content. Recently, she's been pulling up on everything and getting in to everything.

She hardly ever cries, except when something bonks her on the head. She is very sensitive about that and she will melt down and act pathetic until someone consoles her and takes her hurt feelings very seriously.

We love you Paigie Pie!

Connor the artist

Connor likes to play "teacher" with his whiteboard. Typically, Mommy will be the teacher and will draw letters or numbers and Daddy will compete with Connor to see who can name them first. Yesterday Connor decided he would be the teacher and we practiced writing and eventually he decided to do some drawings. It was the first time he ever drew anything freehand that was recognizable, so Daddy got a few pictures of his amazing artwork.

Connor posing with his "puppy dog"


A snake! (Daddy labeled it)

Connor's sticker chart



Connor's been doing an awesome job with potty training for a long time. The only time he wears a pull up diaper is at night time and he hardly ever gets it wet any more. To encourage and reward him, Andrea put together a sticker chart for him. When he gets five dry nights in a row he gets a treat! He's gotten a lot of good nights, and he really doesn't even care about the treat, he just likes to pick out the stickers.

Grandmom Velma Anders

This past week, Andrea's Grandmom, Velma Anders passed away. She had been in hospice care for a few weeks, so it wasn't a surprise, but it was still sad to see her go. We will miss her greatly, and we're so glad we were able to have her over to the house for Christmas this last year.

Here are some pictures of Granddad and Grandmom Anders from the past several years:





Monday, January 24, 2011

Paige standing and climbing



Paige is still not quite crawling yet, but she is getting very fast at army crawling around and is very mobile. She also has gotten very good at pulling up to a standing position. She will pull up on anything within reach and you really have to watch her now. We'll put her exersaucer in the middle of the living room and she will walk all the way around it while holding on, and will even let go and grab on to other things nearby. She's definitely not very stable yet and falls quite a bit, but she's learning fast.

Today after her nap Mommy came in and saw her standing up and took a picture with her phone and sent it to Daddy at work. We couldn't believe how big she already looks in her crib and how tall she is when she stands up. It seems like just yesterday we lowered the mattress, and we're going to have to lower it again so she doesn't fall out of it.

The same day, she managed to pull herself up on a step and climbed up a few while we supervised. We couldn't believe she is so strong and coordinated. We got a few pictures, and after this we're discouraging any stair adventures.



We'd put up the baby gate for the downstairs a while ago and now we're going to have to keep a close eye on her to make sure she doesn't go up!

Eating Adventures



Paige got to try ice cream for the first time this past week. She's been eating from a spoon for a while now and when she saw Momma and brother eating ice cream she got agitated and demanded to try some. The first bite she made the funniest face, so Daddy ran and grabbed the camera. We got the rest of the tasting session on camera, which is cute, but that first face was the funniest and unfortunately not on camera.



OM NOM NOM NOM!!


Paige also ate some puffs for the first time. They are great because they keep her busy for a long time and she gets great practice with coordination trying to get them in her mouth.

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Bonkers with Zonkers and Allison

On Saturday we went to Zonkers and had Allison along to play with us. It was a great plan so Alli could ride the rides with Connor and we always love having her over.

Eating at McAlister's beforehand.


At Zonkers we got unlimited ride armbands for Alli and Connor, which was probably not worth the money since Connor only grudgingly rode most of the rides. He was much more interested in some of the car games and other token-operated games. We laughed watching him scowl on the rides while all the other kids were smiling and screaming. He was mostly a good sport about putting up with the rides and sat through them somewhat patiently.

Riding the train.



The Yak Attack. Thankfully neither of the kids yakked after this ride.



The flying banana.


The rollercoaster was pretty neat. Mommy even rode it once with Alli.



Paige just sat in her stroller most of the time. She loved watching all the kids playing and was very patient. The perfect baby! She did ride a little car ride with Alli.






It was great having Allison overnight. She is a big help and is a lot of fun. The air in our house is apparently pretty dry and her hair got a little staticy (not really a word I know) this morning. We had to take a quick pic of that.


Allison feeding an uncooperative Paigie Pie Saturday night.

Tough guy



Connor likes to be tough and rough lately. He likes to play fighting games with Daddy and loves to test his strength. Recently, we've been telling him that if he eats all his food it will help him grow big and strong. It definitely helps him to cooperate. Sometimes, right after he's done eating a meal, he'll run over to Daddy to compare himself to see if he's grown bigger and if he's as big as Daddy yet.

Here he is, measuring himself against his old man.


Here's a real tough picture where he's making some big muscles. WOAH! So real big!


Mammy just thinks he's funny.


Getting big Connor boy!

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Paige's sense of humor



Some things are just hilarious to Paige. Recently she's been laughing at lots of things and we caught a few of her favorite things on video.

She LOVED when these block toys fell over. I remember Connor loved this kind of thing too.


Pulling out her Nuk? Hilarity!

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Bathtime



Connor's been talking his way into the bath lately. He told us: "It's a pattern: Bath, Shower, Bath, Shower", so we've relented and he gets to take a lot of baths lately. He really loves goofing in the tub and playing with his bath toys. He even has a pretend shaving kit with foaming shaving cream. He's very cute about it, I missed my opportunity to take a picture of him shaving.



All clean!

Bubba's Bridge Books

Connor's back into his books lately due to a loophole at bedtime. After Daddy's done with stories at the train table, and done with games on the phone, and done with more stories with the stuffed animals in bed, he leaves Connor alone in his room. Typically Connor will get up and play for a while quietly until he's tired enough to fall asleep. Lately, he's been getting some books out and will take them out to the catwalk to read them where it's lighter. He had quite a few out the other morning and Andrea snapped a quick pic.

Mammy and Alli



We have a slideshow running in our living room now with all of our pictures we've ever taken. From time to time a picture will pop up and we will glance at it and think "I don't remember Paige having that outfit... or sitting in that bouncy chair" and then we'll realize it's actually Allison (Paige's cousin).

I tracked down the picture, it was from March 17th of 2001. When you really look at it, Allison's eyes are a lot bluer and she's got a hint of red in her hair and eyebrows, but they do look pretty similar.

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Our so real great guy



We've done a lot of posts recently talking about all the things Paige is up to and decided to do a post with some updates about our little man.

Connor has been learning all kinds of things from school and from some of his favorite shows. From school, he's gotten very good at counting and also is really in to patterns. Every day when Daddy drops him off at Ms Rachel's house we discuss whose turn it is to get out of the car first, Connor or Paige. He always tells me that it's a pattern. Just tonight he was telling us that he should get to take a bath since he had a shower earlier in the weekend. He said it should be a pattern: Shower, bath, shower, bath.

He's always interested in whether there's going to be school the next day and will say "No school for day?" (meaning tomorrow). He used to be pretty whiny about getting dressed for school, but recently Daddy's made it in to a race and Connor is always eager to be the winner. He takes off his pajamas, goes to the bathroom and gets dressed completely by himself now.

He's really been in to watching cartoons on Youtube lately. He likes the old Mickey Mouse cartoons from the 30's and 40's, Bugs Bunny cartoons and also some newer Mickey Mouse cartoons from the late 90's. We have a variety of playlists and he watches them on the computers. He also learns some funny phrases from his shows, he will usually say "Aw phooey" like Donald Duck and "Hey, what's the big idea". Another phrase we hear a lot is "so real", we're not sure where he picked that up, but he uses it a lot. Usually as in: "This game is so real fun" or "That guy is so real bad". We've found ourselves using it lately too, it's so real easy to get in to the habit of saying it.

He plays with all kinds of toys now. He still plays with some cars, including his criss-cross-crash and slot car race track, but has been very interested in action figures lately. He got a number of them for Christmas and likes to tell all kinds of stories with them. We typically name the action figures after people he knows including Mommy, Daddy, Paige, Connor and kids from school like Logan, Brady, Miles, and Chase. His favorite story involves all of them playing football together.

He likes video games, however he tends to struggle with most of the controls. It's got to be hard because of all the different ways you can control games these days. He does pretty well playing a "Muscle Truck" car game on Daddy's phone and just this last week Ms Rachel sent us a picture of him driving Mario Kart for the first time. Driving games are definitely his favorite.



We love our little guy and we're so real lucky to have such a sweet son!