Soooo Big!

Happy Birthday, William! 

Birthday Boy

 Wow, a year goes by so quickly when you are watching an infant grow and change in their first year of life!  It is a bitter sweet day when my boys have birthdays.  I love experiencing each new stage they enter with each year of life, but every birthday is a reminder that they grow up so quickly.  

Will has been such a joyful addition to our family.  He is small in stature, but huge in sweetness.  AND, he is the pride and joy of his dad, mom, and two big brothers!

William, we all love you so much, and each and every day, you make us all smile with your precious personality.  You seem to hold your own with two older brothers, and, as a matter of fact, you have us all wrapped around your little finger!  

A YEAR IN REVIEW

July 27th, 2009 10:58pm
7lbs 13oz

1 month

2 months

3 months

4 months

5 months

6 months

7 months

8 months

9 months

10 months

11 months

Washington2

While on the East side of the state, the weather was unusually chilly and rainy which put a bit of a damper on some of our outdoor time.  We did get outside as much as the weather permitted, and here are some of our outside moments...
Papa's tree swing:

S'mores at Papa's

Boating at the lake                       

Henry and Sean watching the turtles race at our friends house

a picnic in the woods on our last day

the babies

When we drove to the East side of the state, the weather was unusually sunny and beautiful!

We didn't spend too much time in Seattle this visit.  We were only able to do a quick walk-through of Pike Place Market, and we were able to meet up with some friends from dental school for an early dinner on the ocean.  The rest of our time on the East side, was spent with family (south of Seattle).

Will and my grandmother at the park

Marc teaching Henry how to feed the seagulls 

Henry mastering the monkey bars

Trip to Washington

After closing on our house, we headed to Iowa to celebrate the marriage of our good friends, Nick and Megan.  Then, we drove back to Omaha for a day before flying to Washington to visit some of my family and friends.  It was soooo good to be back in the Northwest again!  We had a wonderful time, and are so grateful to all who hosted, as well as those who came to us!  
Within 15 minutes of our arrival at my brother Tim's house, Henry's cousin Catherine had taught him to ride a bike without training wheels!  We were so impressed, and he was so proud.  It was not long after that, that he was doing figure 8's and riding up and down the curb, and then he upgraded to a bigger bike.  Here is our impressive little dude in action

Unfortunately, the day before we left, Henry had a collision accident on the bike, which landed him in the E.R. with a broken arm. 

We flew back to Omaha the next day with Henry in a splint, and he got his cast the following day in 

Omaha.

He is the proud owner of a green cast.  Initially, he was eager to explain what happened-

"I was riding Catherine's teeny-tiny bike, and I crashed into Luke's bike and I fell and broke my arm.  I had to go to the hospital, but I didn't have to get a shot," he proudly declared.

The novelty has worn off, and now he asks me to answer the question, "what did you do to your arm?"

Josh and I have been so impressed with Henry through all of this.  He has been so brave, and he hasn't complained...not once!  He quickly adapted to using his left hand, legs, mouth or whatever to continue on being the independent & active child that he is.  As parents, it has been a bit heartbreaking at times limiting his activities and knowing that he is patiently waiting to partake.  Every hotel we were at had a pool, and he just can't wait to dig in the sand and run into the ocean...

More on our trip to Washington to come...

Moving On...

Saying goodbye to our home on Port Royal was a bitter sweet one.  We were really looking forward to our new adventure, yet sad to leave the comfort of our home, family and friends in Nebraska.  Here is our last family picture in front of our house

We have had so many wonderful memories in this home.  It is hard to believe that Henry was three weeks old when we moved in- how we have grown since then!

The boys LOVED moving day...what is better than a big truck in front of your house?

Josh's Big Night

On May 14th the Dental School held a hooding ceremony for the 2010 dental class at Joslyn Art Museum. This is when Josh and his classmates officially became DOCTORS!  WOO-HOO!  The ceremony was intimate, and it was a really special time for the students and their families to celebrate the accomplishment of the graduates.  Here is Josh processing in (and doesn't he look great in LILAC?!)

Josh chose to have my brother, Tim, be his escort for his hooding.  Tim is a Creighton dental school graduate, and also may have had a bit of influence on Josh's decision to pursue dentistry.  

Following the ceremony, we TRIED to get some good family photos, but children who are sleep-deprived and hungry do not cooperate too well.  This is as good as we could do

The Conway Family (Josh's parents, sister Molly, brother-in-law Brian, and nieces Penelope & Lucy)

The Casey Family (my brothers Tim & Kelly, and niece Catherine)

After pictures, we rushed over to the dental school for a reception.  During the reception, one of Josh's professors, a retired Air-Force Colonel, commissioned Josh and two of his classmates to Captains.  Here is their swearing in

and their first salute (to Josh's dad!)

After all of the ceremonies and receptions, we headed to Kobe Steakhouse for a late dinner...a great night of celebrating Josh's hard work!  

The next day was Josh's actual graduation ceremony at the Quest center.  Probably the best thing about that, was the fact that they were selling concessions, and Molly was kind enough to share her popcorn with me!  That afternoon, we had a graduation party at our house for some of our local family and friends.  It was so nice to have one more get-together at our house before the craziness of moving set in.  Thank you to all who were able to attend, and help in honoring Josh.  I was super excited about the cake we ordered, it was AWESOME...(and huge)  

Congratulations, Honey, I love you, and I am so very proud of you!

Home Sweet Home

We have arrived!

We actually arrived in Florida at the end of June (I can't even remember what day we got here), and moved into our house on July 12th.  It has been quite the "adventure" since we closed on our home in Papillion on June 4th.  In that short time frame, we changed locations SIXTEEN times!  The kids have done a great job during all of this transition, but it really started to wear on us all.  The positive side to all of our travel time was that we got to visit and spend time with many family and friends before we headed to our new location.  Thank you to those of you who so generously hosted us during our crazy time!  

Here is a picture of us in front of our new home:

It took us awhile to find our house, but we are super excited about this one.  It is located in a great neighborhood (at the end of a cul-de-sac!!), and we have a great yard.  Needless to say, we will be spending a lot of time outside and taking advantage of the Florida weather.  Already the boys are experts at sighting various species of birds, turtles, lizards (one lives in our mailbox), and Josh even spotted an alligator!  Oh, and I love the vegetation here- there are tons of pine trees, and tropical plants/trees, and it is beautiful!  AND, we have two of these in our yard:

Unfortunately, our moving company is backed up on delivering, so our stuff won't be arriving until July 28th.  Thank goodness we brought sleeping bags and pillows!  We were able to borrow some kitchen basics and a baby gate from the base "loan closet" which has helped a ton!  I am so excited for our stuff to arrive to make life a bit more simple, and to get us all back into a normal routine.  I also can not wait to unpack...call me crazy, but I L.O.V.E. to organize, and I am ready for this challenge!  

We have a lot to learn about Florida living, including the hurricane.  Just when I was getting used to Nebraska tornados, I am challenged with a different natural disaster!  We found these in our garage:

 Apparently, these are custom fit window coverings that we will be putting up when a hurricane is approaching!  I hope we can figure this out...!

Now that we have a working computer, I will be catching up on posts- a lot has happened since early May!  Thank you for keeping us in your prayers, we are healthy, safe and have enjoyed the journey!

Henry's End of Year Program

Here are a few pictures from Henry's last day of preschool waaaaaay back in May!  It is amazing how quickly the year flew by, and it was a joy seeing the growth Henry made during the year.  The students put on a little program for the parents, and it was adorable!  The children sang a few songs for us, recited The Pledge of Allegiance, and they played a slideshow of pictures taken during the school year.  It was a wonderful year at Little Lights Preschool, we will miss all of our friends there so much. 

 Here is Henry with his teachers:  Mrs. Marshall and Mrs. A

Henry was quite the performer on stage!  Too cute!

Henry (and little bro, Sean) and two of his favorite classmates: Haley and Delainey