New Address

I think most of you know that we moved this year. Please email me if you need our new address.

$$$ Money, Money, Money $$$

Okay, so there are some definite advantages to having 4 1/2 year gaps between your children. Jerica and Jaren are only 2 years apart and it looks like they will be going to the orthodontist at the same time. I have an evaluation appointment scheduled for Jaren because he has a tooth that appears to be coming in very crooked and may need to have the tooth below it extracted. For the most part, his teeth do appear to be fairly straight, although crowded. We'll see how much money his beautiful smile is going to cost us.

Jayden is already gearing up for braces. His first permanent tooth decided to grow in perpendicular to the rest of his teeth.

Oi vay!



Jaren's incoming tooth/teeth


Jaren's handsome smile


Jayden's first permanent tooth has a mind of it's own

Toothless

Last night, I heard quite a bit of commotion and crying from the upstairs bathroom and went up to investigate. I found a distraught 6 year old sitting on the counter with a rather horizontal tooth hanging from his upper gums while his older brother was coaxing him into letting him have another try at pulling it out. Jayden wanted nothing to do with that since his gums were bleeding a bit and he thinks that anything that provokes that kind of a reaction out of your body cannot be good. Unfortunately, the tooth was in no condition to be left in, so I convinced him to let me have one try at pulling it out. I managed to get a good grip on it and yanked... hard. (Thank goodness it came out... I vividly recollect my upper front tooth hanging by a quite thin, but tenacious thread which required a pair of pliers to tear it out.)

I really am not ready for my little boy to lose his baby teeth and would have liked to see this particular tooth stay in for another week or so like it would have if his brother had not been so helpful.

*Sigh*

C'est la vie.


Jayden showing off the brand new gaping hole in his mouth.

Chad and Sage Nicholls Family

Last Saturday, Rich's brother, Chad, brought his family in town for a visit from Utah. When they started planning the trip, we reserved good weather especially for them, and were not disappointed. It was absolutely gorgeous while they were here! (And promptly returned to our typical cloudy, drizzly Oregon weather when they left.)

On Saturday night, Chad & Sage and Rich & I left the kids at home and went on a hot date in downtown Portland. We went to my favorite Thai food place, Typhoon. Then we went Powell's Bookstore. Powell's takes up a whole city block in downtown Portland and Rich and I love to go there, give each other a peck on the cheek, and have a wonderful date night perusing the aisles of the store separately.

On Sunday, we went to church and then the kids took their cousins over to explore Pirate Park. Sage and I spent the evening planning photos for her wall and baptism invitations for Kayla's baptism in February. The boys had some fun playing computer games.

Monday was absolutely exceptional! The kids had the day off of school and the weather was phenomenal, so we headed off for Cape Lookout. The beach was so scenic and serene... and, we had the whole place to ourselves. The temperature was probably in the low 60's and it wasn't even windy - quite rare for the beaches here in Oregon. We roasted hot dogs for dinner and marshmallows for dessert and watched the sun set at exactly 5:00p.m. (That's one advantage to going to the beach in the fall/winter... you can actually enjoy the sunset and make it home at a decent hour!)

Sage and I had planned to take some photos of her family at the beach. We hit Old Navy before we left and grabbed a few shirts for matching outfits. Chad was a sport and endured the cheesy shots. Here are some from our little beach session and other candids of their family. We had such a lovely time with them. They are a truly wonderful family and we were very sad to see them go.

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Cape Lookout - Candids of our family

We had so much fun. Here are some of my favorite candids of my family from the day.

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Alexa's Well-Baby Checkup

So, I took Alexa in for her well-baby appointment, yesterday. She's a little behind on her immunizations and ended up getting four shots: a flu shot and three other immunizations. She's 25 lbs. 13 oz and 2'10" tall, now. Her head is measuring just above the 95th percentile, she's about 92nd percentile in height and 65th percentile in weight.

The doctor is referring her for hearing tests and an appointment with a speech therapist since she's not talking very much, yet. I really don't think there is anything wrong with her... I just think she's a bit coddled and taking her time. But, still... it does make me worry a little bit.

As I've thought about it over the past day, I don't think anything is wrong with her hearing. When we're outside, she hears birds, airplanes, and dogs barking and looks around to find them. She responds to directions and will go do things you ask her to do like putting a diaper in the garbage. I did tell the doctor that, but I think he's just making sure he's covering all the bases... and, truthfully, if something was wrong, it would be better to find it sooner than later.

I have her audiology appointment set up for next Wednesday and am waiting to hear back from the speech therapist. Perhaps, they'll want to wait for the results of the audiology appointment.

In the meantime, I'll try not to worry about my baby.

Trick or Treat!

Here's our lovely crew on Halloween. Alexa was supposed to be a flying monkey, but I didn't end up making her wings, so she's a regular wingless monkey (pre-wicked witch curse). Jerica is Elphaba from, "Wicked". Jaren wanted to be a Jedi, and Jayden was so excited to be Spiderman.

It was a gorgeous, mild fall evening... the best weather we've ever had on Halloween here in Oregon. We sent Jerica, Jaren, and Jayden off to play (along with a cell phone in case they got lost or had any problems) and intended to keep Alexa home with us while we took care of the trick-or-treaters. However, it was such a lovely evening and Alexa would literally fling herself to the ground and bawl every time we closed the door after the trick-or-treaters left, so I took her around for a little trick-or-treating of her own. She loved walking around the neighborhood and checking out all of the halloween decorations. Then, we met up with the other kids and took a few more photos to complete the evening.

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Free at last! At first she could care less about the candy.... she was just thrilled to be out and about.


Oblivious to the scary monster above her.


Alexa loved all the Jack O' Lanterns


By the end of the evening, Alexa was a pro at knocking on the doors and begging for candy to put in her bag.


The boys brought in quite a haul!


"I have flying monkeys, don't make me use them." (Bag given to Jerica by her piano teacher)