Memorial Day Weekend

This weekend was very exciting. WE HAD GUESTS! Ana, Chad and Alesandra came to visit us for the weekend. It's important to get together since we have plans of Alesandra and Liam marrying. We still have to work on Liam, though. He was having trouble sharing so I'm not sure how he'll feel that we've already established an arranged marriage. He did have a few tender moments though...

We kept things pretty low key as I have to feed Eli every 3 hours. It was still fun though to see the kids together and catch up with friends. I think Ana & Chad must be the most helpful guests ever - cleaning up after themselves, helping in the kitchen, entertaining the kids. Now that the standard has been set, feel free to come visit. :)

On Monday, after the Belongea's left, we tried to have a restful remainder of the day to save up our energy for the big Memorial Day fiesta at the Horns. As usual, there was lots of eating good food and playing the Wii. There was also an incident with a locked door...we're not sure how it happened. Price wasn't very happy.

Oh, maybe that's how...

Some final pics of the days events...

Some days almost feel like normal...

This week was yet another hectic week. I feel like most days I accomplish nothing and for me, who can't stand to stop for one moment, that's difficult. But then, there are those days that almost feel like normal. Jon worked from home on Friday and it was a real blessing for two reasons - the first was that he was super busy this week and when you consider how much I sleep, it seemed like I didn't see him at all. The second is that I was able to get out of the house with Liam. B/c Eli is so low maintenance, I could feed him and split. Liam & I got the grocery shopping done, picked up some stuff at Babies R Us and then I went alone to the post office to mail a few packages. Liam and I also went for a walk which I think he enjoyed immensely as he was able to actually walk. Although, he might have felt like he had a monkey on his back, well, b/c he did. His little monkey backpack leash so he doesn't stray too far.

I felt like my old self. I also felt so well rested and for whatever reason I had to abuse myself and stay up late to watch a movie with Jon...August Rush. We really liked it, a lot. Very heart warming. Saturday morning the Horns came over for brunch. It was yummy and fun. There is nothing like good friends (and by good friend, I mean the kind you don't have to get out of your pj's or shower for, b/c I didn't) and good food. We had my dad's famous waffles, breakfast casserole, and fruit salad. Liam had great fun playing with Stephen. The adults had great fun having some adult conversation. We're planning a vacation together. Who knows if it will happen, but it would be a blast if it did.

Moms & Kids

Shannon & Eli

How Dads watch the kids...

Saturday evening and Sunday morning, Jon played a drunk in the drama at church. Apparently it was good but I missed it. You can catch it here under the message title Deal with the Dirt. We had a meeting after church and so our good friend Abby was kind enough to keep an eye on Liam for us and the rest of the day was filled with entertaining the kids, mowing the lawn and all the other not so fun stuff that comes with home ownership. But, hey, that's life. Here are a few other pictures from the week that I thought were blog worthy. Enjoy and have a great week!

Liam "helping" me do the laundry.	Training to become a master chef.
Having a snack at the table like a big boy.	1st time eating corn on the cob.

What is Gramma's number?

Oh yeah and did I mention, my kid has a mullet!

Eli - One Month Old

Time sure flies when you aren't getting any sleep and have to chase a toddler around all day. Can you believe Eli is already a month old? I can't. Here's his one month picture.

What can we say about Eli? He's certainly displayed some Super Baby characteristics, Gramma thinks he's gifted. I guess we'll know soon enough but just for fun, I'll list some of the amazing things he's done already. Rolled over! Yep, that happened shortly after we got home from the hospital...maybe a week or so. Granted, it hasn't been repeated, still it's incredible to think he was capable... which brings me to #2 of his amazing gifts. He's very strong. This isn't just my opinion either, the ENT Doc told me so as well as the pediatrician. My favorite special talent is the smiling, Eli is constantly smiling. I didn't think babies were supposed to be smiling this early, but he does. We attribute all this talent to the extra week in the womb...and maybe the extra omega 3's I was getting.

I guess I'm keeping this one short. I can't think of much to say right now and aside from that, I need to feed Eli. I thought I'd include a picture of Liam when he was a month old in case you wanted to compare how they look next to each other. There are some similarities...the chin, I think it stops there. Eli's face is narrower, he has a heck of a lot more hair, his eyebrows are less prominent and he isn't struggling with baby acne quite as bad as Liam.

How We're Doing...

You're probably wondering how we're doing or maybe you're not but I'm going to tell you anyway. This week began the second week on my own without help. What I'm wondering is when some help will arrive? Seriously, is someone coming to visit soon? No, things aren't really that bad. I'm just looking forward to the day that Eli gets his schedule down to something we can, for the most part, count on. It's frustrating to know he is tired and to watch him fight sleep or not sleep at all unless someone is holding him. All that talk of inactivity in the womb being an indicator that he'd be a good sleeper was a joke. What makes me feel worse is that I feel like Liam is getting the short end of the stick having to entertain himself all the time. Besides, I miss our time together. Oh well, it was our choice and I guess the good news is that neither one will remember that we neglected them to take care of the other...except that it's documented here. Well, by the time they can read, blogs will probably be out. Aside from that, I'm just tired. No surprise there. Thankfully, not as tired as last time. I'm trying to figure out if it's God giving me the strength or the fact that I knew what to expect and since Liam arrived on the scene I've gotten used to less sleep. Probably both! I'm also missing the quality time with Jon. Basically, if I'm not sleeping, I'm feeding Eli. I know, it's just a season and it will pass. When it does, I'll probably be sad but until then I'll keep looking forward to it. At any rate, here are some pictures as I know many of you are wanting to see how Eli has changed.

1st Bath!	Peek a Boo
Crazy Hair!	Me & my little guy.

Some family pictures...

Liam keeping Eli company during tummy time.	Liam in his new duds.
Story time	Frodo taking over Liam's chair.

Liam has been enthralled with the camera. He loves to look at the pictures after they are taken. About half the time, he wants you to take his picture and half the time he runs away. Here are a few moments he didn't run away and I'd like to call this series Li-Ham.

Get that camera out of my face.	Pucker up.
You said cheese, right!?	This is Liam's Angry Eyebrows face.

Watching Out For Us

If you've been watching the news lately, you've probably seen that we had a bout of nasty weather. Nasty being an understatement. I know that God is continually keeping his eye on us, but some days it is so much more obvious, like today for example. The forecast yesterday called for severe thunderstorms and possible tornados. I scoffed at the weatherman and went out anyway...and got stuck at Target while poor Jon was stuck at home while the sirens were going off with two screaming kids. Fortunately, it passed quickly and I made it home. At 1 am this morning, I woke up to feed Eli not realizing that Jon had never come to bed. Well, after I got, he did go to bed and I flipped on the tv to pass the time. There was another line of storms heading our way, currently about an hour's drive away and a tornado warning was issued with these storms. Fearful that we wouldn't hear the sirens while sleeping, I stayed up even after Eli had finished eating. About 1:45, the thunder & lightening started up and then a few minutes later, sheets of rain were coming down and the wind was so strong, it was unbelievable...yet no sirens. Well, the power went out and I woke Jon up and had him get Liam so we could all go to the basement. In the midst of this running around, of course, we can't find the flashlight, we have no battery powered radio...basically, we're unprepared. Finally we get it together and get down to the basement to wait out the storm. Fortunately, it passed quickly and we went to bed. I had a hard time falling asleep, I've never been in a storm like that and I kept worrying it would come back.

This morning we were woken up to Jon's cell phone ringing. It was Annie my boss asking if we were ok. My response was,"yeah why, is something wrong?" She asked if I was watching the news but our power had been out since 2 am, so I wasn't watching anything except the back of my eyelids. Apparently, one neighborhood over from ours, a tornado touched down. The same tornado also hit the next town over. I was thankful then that we were all ok. Later, I ended up taking the boys and going into work b/c the power was still out. I'm amazed by what I saw and it wasn't even the worst of it. Street by street as you headed out the neighborhood, things gradually got worse. It started with our neighbor's fence being down, then shingles missing, more fences, swing sets knocked over. As I turned onto the main street out of our area, there were houses with parts of the roofs missing, windows boarded up, a house with a hole punched out of it. All the way to work I was thanking God that we were safe. It's incredible to see the tornado seemed so specific and how it "targeted" certain areas. Literally, streets over from us, houses were ripped off foundations and flattened. Thankfully, there were no major injuries in our area. If you'd like to watch some video, you can click here. Thanks to everyone who called to check on us and thanks God for watching out for us!

Below is a map of how close some of the houses were that got completely obliterated.