Just some pictures from my phone...

Before Colin went to go mow, he told Jack that they would go swimming when he got home. He immediately went to get his swim trunks and had me put them on him. He doesn't understand the concept of waiting. He was ready when he heard the word 'swimming'. Here he is sitting on the window sill in his room waiting for Colin to come home. (He had just left.)

I'm getting a little carried away with bows. Love them!!! At one point, she was on the floor trying to roll over and I heard Colin say to her in a very pitiful voice, "You have to try to roll over while you are wearing bows and jewelry, you poor thing!" hahaha

They love each other <3

Happy Girl

It's sort of a ritual that Grace joins Jack in his crib after nap now. Usually he wants to do a puzzle or read books in there, but only as long as she is in there with him! She gladly obliges.

Go Cubs! Jack loves hats, but his Cubs and Purdue hats are way too small for his head. Grace will grow into them though!

Both kids are doing great. Like I've mentioned before, Jack's language is developing very quickly. He has new words on a daily basis. He is just learning and changing SO much that it is crazy. He got to play with DenDen (Devin) today which made him very happy. Kelly walked in and left Devin on the front porch to see what Jack would do. Sure enough, he just looked at her and said, "DenDen?". He LOVES her! Today we were watching Baby Einstein and there is a part where someone is doing a board puzzle. He really likes that part and wanted me to just keep replaying it and not watch the rest. Well, one time I didn't do it right when he said, "puzzle", so he jammed the remote in my hand and said, "come on!". He makes us laugh a lot!

Gracie loves to be in standing position. Her little legs must be getting so strong. She also rolls over pretty much every time I lay her on her back. Just now, I went to check on her, and she had fallen asleep on her belly. I laid her down on her back. I lay her down awake and turn on her glow sea horse. She falls asleep on her own with minimal to no fussing. She is such an easy going baby and so happy! She will smile at the drop of a hat. She loves to watch Jack play and interact with him. He is so good with his little sister. I think I've mentioned this before as well, but she used to SCREAM every time we got in the car. She absolutely hated it. This girl has the quietest cry ever, and we rarely really hear her get worked up (unless we were on the road). Well, we bought her the same car seat that Jack has now. The only difference is that her car seat has to be rear facing. She barely makes a peep! The doctor said the other one was probably uncomfortable on her belly. That was an easy fix! She is doing better with the bottle. The past two days she has taken about 4 oz. out of a bottle. We're getting closer! She definitely knows how to do it, but she is just being stubborn. She knows what she wants.

I want to make sure I keep everything well documented in here. If you notice things I'm forgetting to post about, leave it in the comments and I'll answer them next time.

I don't think I've mentioned how INCREDIBLY thankful I am that I got to spend 5 months at home with my babies. It is going to be heartbreaking for me to return to work, but our bank account tells me that it is time! :) I'm sure we will get into a good routine and adjust, but it will definitely be a huge transition for all of us. The 24 hour a day job of a stay at home mom is the hardest job I've ever had (by far!), but I love love love it! I remember with Jack, I didn't have much of a hard time leaving him when Colin was off. But there were a few days where I showed up to work in tears from leaving him at day care. I just have to keep telling myself that it is only 1-2 days a week which is good compared to what some people do! Plus I know Gracie is in good hands in the infant room. I know those teachers well since that's where Jack was for the first year of his life. Until then, I'm going to enjoy the last weeks of summer.

DMB in Tampa

I know I still haven't blogged about our vacation, and that is hopefully coming at some point in the not so distant future. Today I just wanted to post some videos from last night. Colin and I got to go see DMB for the first time since Jack has been born. So amazing!!! We loved it. We are both two of his biggest fans, and it was sosososososoooooo wonderful! During the entire opening band performance, we stood at the gate by the backstage area to see if we could catch a glimpse of Dave or any band members. We ended up seeing Dave two times, Carter, Tim, and Warren Haynes. If you aren't a fan of Dave, these videos will probably be boring, but we were literally shaking from being so excited! And my heart was racing. Now if he only would've came over to get a picture with us... And now we want to know HOW we can get an "all access" pass. There were a handful of people who were allowed to go through the gates where we were standing. They didn't even act like big fan. Tim walked right by them and they had no clue who he was!

Blogger won't let me upload the video of Carter because it is over a minute long...darn!

Thanks to Mike and Kiya for being our trusty babysitters and taking such great care of our babies!!!!! We really appreciate it!

Gracie - 4 Month Stats

Gracie and I headed to to West Orlando Pediatrics today for her 4 month well visit. She was on great behavior. The NP that we saw had an intern with her. She asked if she could get some practice by checking her out a second time since Grace was so relaxed and easy to examine. She weighed 13 pounds, which is in the 50% percentile. She was 25 inches long, which is in the 75th percentile. She got 2 shots plus one oral vaccine. She cried for less than 5 seconds and hasn't had any side effects so far. She's hit all over the appropriate developmental milestones and looks very healthy. My only question was the bottle issue. She said to continue to have Colin try to offer her a bottle in 15 minute increments for an hour before I give in and breastfeed her. We should be doing this at least once a day. She said most likely she will realize that when I'm gone, she is going to have to take a bottle. Let's hope!! -- 2 more weeks and I'm back to school. She's also ready to start cereal. I'm not sure when I will introduce that - don't really want to rush it, but definitely by the time she hits 6 months.

Grace Elizabeth on her 4 month birthday - 7/23/10

Here is a blog of Jack's 4 month appointment.

Stay tuned, hopefully later tonight, for a blog about our awesome vacation!

Engineer McCormick

I won't be blogging for a few days, so I wanted to jump on and post some pictures from tonight's promotion ceremony first. I know people will be checking for them!! :):):)

Celebratory Dinner

Nice behavior, Jack - standing on the high chair

Chief talking about Colin

Mike pinning Colin

We came up for a picture after he got pinned

And another

Last one

Colin and Mike

Colin and Jimmy (friend from standards who just got hired with Ocoee)

Jack and Mike playing afterwards

Parking lot fun

Gracie all smiles on the way home. Proud of her daddy.

Colin

Before I start, I just want to say that Gracie Girl rolled over multiple times from back to belly today for the first time. She is very pleased with her new trick! She's getting so big and strong!

Here are some pictures from Colin's 30th birthday celebration. We went to CityWalk at Universal Studios. He thought it would just be the two of us having dinner, but was surprised when some of his friends were waiting on us. First we went to Bubba Gumps to eat dinner, then went out to a few places at CityWalk. We had such a great time!

They sang to him and made him dance. He was a good sport about it!

Below there's an article from today's paper about his promotion. More on that coming Tuesday.

Ocoee welcomes new firefighters
By Sara Drumm

The Ocoee Fire Department will be welcoming Colin McCormick as the new fire engineer, as well as three new firefighter paramedics at Ocoee’s July 20 commission meeting.

As a result of promotions that occurred in December, there have been promotions down the line at OFD, and vacancies have opened up.

McCormick, who was promoted to replace 10-year Engineer Paramedic Carl Curtis, has been a member of OFD for five years. While the promotional ceremony will take place July 20, his new rank went into effect July 12.

Jaime Escobar, Ryan Sandberg and Roxanne Trager will be introduced and given their firefighter badges at the meeting. They are all new hires who will fill vacant positions.

Escobar has had five years of experience as a firefighter paramedic with the Leesburg Fire Department, and Sandberg worked as a paramedic for Medics Ambulance Service in Broward County. Trager recently graduated from Seminole State College, where she earned a degree in emergency medical services while completing her paramedic and firefighter certifications.

“As the fire chief, I feel very fortunate to work for a city that has managed the budget so well that it allows me to fill our three vacant positions,” Fire Chief Pete McNeil said. “This is especially true when you look at other countries and municipalities that are facing extremely tight budgets next year.

“The addition of these firefighter paramedics will allow the Ocoee Fire Department to continue providing the high-quality level of advanced life support and emergency medical service that the citizens and visitors of Ocoee have become accustomed to.”

Click here to see the article on the newspaper's website

Backyard Fun

We got the swing hung up in our backyard, and Jack still loves it.

My goal is to find time to blog tomorrow. I need to post pictures from our visitors plus blog about Colin's THIRTIETH birthday celebration. We have many fun things coming up (Colin's promotion ceremony, the Annual Friends Trip, etc.), so I can't get too behind on blog posts. Hope everyone had an enjoyable weekend.

Grace Gets Baptized

I'm very short on time today, but wanted to share a picture from Gracie's big day. She was baptized during mass this Sunday, and it was such a special day filled with love for her. We were so thankful to have our family here to help celebrate.

More coming soon!

Climbing UP

In recent days, our little Budgie has become quite the climber. We had to remove our bar stools from the living room area because he started climbing up onto the barstools and then up onto the kitchen counter.

The morning after I took the barstools out of the area, this is what I found:

Apparently the guy already knows how to improvise!

Then tonight I left to run a very quick errand. I walked into the front door to find Colin and Gracie getting ready to webcam with Aunt Shannon. I asked where Jack was, and Colin told me that Jack was sitting in the living room watching Little Einsteins. Well...watch the video to see what I found.

Notes about the video:

1. I said he was holding a "screw of some sort". Colin corrected me - It's a drill bit...whatever!?

2. I love that when I talk about the soap that he got into, he shouts, "bubbles!".

3. We have our hands full with this one! :):):)

Here are some pictures of the kiddos in their sweet little 4th of July outfits made by Grandma Moller. They were very festive!

Also, here's a picture of the gang out dinner.

And some misc. cute ones!