Andrew Words

At dinner the other night, Chris and I were discussing what the doctor said at Jonathan's 2 year well visit. By the way, he is doing well. He is average weight and average height but he head is slightly big, but nowhere near the size of Andrew's noggin. I told Chris that he is officially no longer considered speech delayed. He is just fine and talks none stop. This is the rest of the conversation:
Me: He also said that we shouldn't be feeding him peanut butter and choking foods.
Chris: Really, no peanut butter? Why?
Me: I guess it has something to do with getting or developing peanut allergies.
Chris: Peanut allergies?
Andrew: Yeah, and then we would have to give him a Zyrtec everyday.

I think we might reconsider the amount of time our child is watching TV.

What Did We Do....

We just got back from Nicaragua on Saturday. It was an amazing trip and what everyone asks me is, "What did you do down there?"
We went down to Nicaragua with a ministry called, Because We Care Ministries, led by Donald and Pam Gillette. They have been doing this for 9 years and are loved in their town of Somotillo, and the surrounding villages. Their main goal is to met their physical needs and share the gospel and disciple the pastors of the villages. On this trip, Chris and Rob Stephens, taught at a pastor's conference and I did a make shift VBS. I didn't know until I was sitting in the chairs at the conference that I was going to be doing a VBS. It was a lot of fun. Here are some of the things we did as well:

Shared the gospel in the villages.

Make shift VBS during the pastor's conference.
Played with the kids in the villages.

Handed out medicine to the babies and the mommies.
Handed out rice and beans to the families.

Faces from Nicaragua

Here are some of the beautiful faces from Nicaragua. Donald G., the man in charge of Because We Care Ministries, tells us that that we help them take off their "Nica" look for just a moment. It is true. I loved to just takes pictures of their faces, besides being gorgeous, their eyes told so many stories. Plus, they loved to see their pictures on the digital camera.
Enjoying some sandia. The juice is running down his tummy.

I think she likes it.
This is Henry. His home life is a sad story so he likes to hang out at the Casa as much as possible. He understands lots of English but doesn't say much in English. He is super smart.
This was the last village we went to and by far the saddest. I truly can't explain why because my words fail me. I just knew that this village needed God and all His wisdom.
Her face was just so sweet I had to take a picture.
She and her sister (not pictured) had such a unique look. Simply gorgeous.

Random Pics

Life has been so crazy and then Chris and I just got back from a mission trip to Nicaragua. Here are a few things that have happened around the house.

Andrew and Jonathan helping me clean out the kitchen before the kitchen makeover.
Jonathan enjoying some zzzzzzzs on the way to Florida.
Andrew enjoying the trip with no zzzzzzzzzs. He's not big on sleeping in the car. He did on the way home because he was so tired.
One of the great parks withing walking distance to my parents house. Jonathan walked all the way there and pooped out on the way home. He slept really well during his nap.
"Where's brother?"

Preschool

Here are a few pics of the boys during preschool. This is before we started fixing our kitchen. I love these pictures because it shows how he is starting to work on school work by himself. Jonathan is just there to encourage him and distract him.
This is when he was really sick. Typically, he is trying to sit in Andrew's chair or play with his preschool blocks.

We are in FL

We made the 2 day trip to FL!! It has been nice for the boys to hang our with my parents. I have some photos but they are in my camera which is in the car and right now I'm too lazy to go and get them (maybe the heat is a little overwhelming right now). They will been seen soon.

Some of our activities:

Going to numerous parks.

Andrew and I racing up rock walls at the park (and me getting beat bad by him).

Making a gianormous meal for my Mom's friends. There are too many funny stories in that one day. I honestly don't know where to begin.

Watching Andrew beat Pa Pa at the game of Operation (Pa Pa may have given up some of his competitive nature to allow this).

Numerous baths (maybe crocs weren't the best choice).

Trips to all our favorite sites and food places.

All that in just a couple of days.
Meanwhile on the home front, one of our Christmas gifts from Chris' parents is upgrading our kitchen. It is really small and hard to work in and it will only get worse as the kids get older. It is an amazing gift from them. So Chris is at home making sure everything is going as it should. He'll send me pictures of the days work and I am amazed at home much they have done. I made sure to take lots of pictures of the before kitchen and I will show the after when it is complete. I can't wait.

Get Together

Last night we all jumped in the car and headed off to my brother's house for an early Christmas dinner and present exchange. It is nice to live near family so you can spend some time together (and not have to ship every present). My sister-in-law made and amazing homemade lasagna and I made an amazing bagged salad (I forgot the actual salad in our hurry to get on the road and had to stop at a local store for a bagged one). We had to leave early because Andrew just did not look good. At one point his face had no color in it. His little cold is causing him to get little sleep (and he broke the humidifier in his room, which doesn't help) because of all his coughing. But before we jumped back in the car we let the kids open their presents:
Andrew jumped right in and started opening his first.
Andrew got a Webkin police dog and a sheriff's badge. He named is dog, Duke, because that is Uncle Travis' dog's name and he thinks his uncle is so cool because he has a police dog. Duke slept with him last night to protect him.
I was going to help Jonathan but he said he can do it, and he did. It was fun to watch him tear into the paper. This makes me extra excited about Christmas this year.
A Big Truck. Perfect. Jonathan played with that and cried when I didn't put it in the crib with him. Mean mommy.
Andrew's cousin Kirsten opening her present. We got her a really cute necklace and a candle. I think she really liked it.
Jonathan was done and he wanted to play.
Sorry guys we had to leave early (I forgot the presents for the FL family). We had a blast.

Update...

Jonathan has an ear infection in his left ear. She gave us medicine and tips to ease the pain while the medicine gets to work.

Yeah nothing serious!

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He woke up from his nap yesterday with no fever but in serious pain. He cried for a good 45 mins. solid. About a 30 mins into the cry feast we got the bright idea to use the ear drops the doctor gave to us for the pain. Once they settled into the ear he ran around like nothing was wrong.

Andrew has been the healthy one but now he has a cold. All he wants is medicine because "Boo Boos gets medicine." They make he laugh with the 'if he gets something I get something too' mindset.

Last night as they were jumping on their beds, Jonathan would do whatever Andrew would do. If Andrew got up at the end of the bed, then he would call for me to help him. Andrew started to roll around on the floor and Jonathan started to roll around too. But my favorite, when they make each other giggle over silly things. It makes my heart happy. They also 'fighted' in the bathtub because Jonathan was holding Andrew's legs down and he didn't like that.

104.5

I was wrong to say he had the rotavirus, he does not. Monday and Tuesday he ran a fever of 100-102, nothing too serious. Wednesday, he woke up from him nap and he was on fire. I took his temperature (under his arm) and it read 103.5. It scared me to see that number, knowing that it was actually a little higher than that. We called the Dr. on call and he was not worried. He thought it might be a cold related temperature and told us to keep an eye on him. Yesterday, he woke up fine and acted fine all morning. He took his nap and woke up on fire again. I took his temperature and again it read 103.5 (under his arm). I gave him some medicine and then later that night he looked so bad and felt hotter and I took his temperature again and it read 104.5 (under his arm). That scared me and the Dr. calls and says he isn't too concerned because he doesn't have any other symptoms with the fever. He said if I didn't feel comfortable with those numbers (is anyone comfortable with them) I could bring him in tomorrow. That's where we are now. He had a horrible night last night waking up and wanting something to drink. I plan on taking him in today so I'll keep you up to date. Here's a picture of his sick face not wanting to eat his snack. He looks so said.

Rotavirus...

So when deciding whether or not to vaccinate Jonathan from the rotavirus I opted out. It is still so new and I thought, "What are the chances he'll get it?" I think he has it. I'm about to go to WebMD and figure out what it is and how do we get rid of it. I can't afford the diapers he's going through.