Here are some pictures of Kaiya taken recently. The first are from our garage sale adventures. Clearly, she is pleased with the stroller. :) She has been into babies quite a bit lately and we were at the mall and saw a mom with a toddler and the toddler was following the mom around pushing a little stroller like this one with a doll in it. I saw Kaiya's eyes get as big as saucers -- she never knew there was such a thing! :) Later that week we were at a sale and she spotted this one. We had to get it. It came as a deal with the little lawnmower -- both for $1. I've never spent 50 cents so well in my life. My carpet has little wheel marks in it from her racing all over the house with her Bear.

She really wanted to try the lemon. We warned her.... :)
Wearing Mama's hat and breaking into Daddy's tool box.
The shirt says it all. She's been wearing this hat all around the house lately. Love it with the curls...

Tony's Graduation

I'm finally getting around to posting these pictures from graduation a month ago. :) Can't believe it's been that long. It was a beautiful day and we were able to start it out great with a nice breakfast with Austin & Kristina who had driven over from Indy to celebrate with us. After breakfast we went to the school and waited for graduation to start. We had great seats and a perfect view of everything. Tony walked right past me during the processional so I was able to snap this great picture.

This is Dr. Montgomery -- he helped immensely during my pregnancy with Kaiya. I visited him regularly for adjustments from beginning to end and he was great. He is smarter than my OB.

After graduation ceremony with Maurine & Hannah

Dr. Free & Dr. Hyser

After graduation we all went over to UNO's Chicago Grill our favorite restaurant and had lunch. Here are some pictures of everyone who joined us for the lunch. After that we all had to face the music and go load the truck, finish packing and clean!

Rachel w/ Brian & Julie Katerberg (friends from church)Jackie Thies and Jake Wyllie - small group friends minus their spouses.

Tony's mom & cousin Becca

My parents

My sisters who sweetly babysat Kaiya during graduation so I wouldn't miss a thing.

Tony & his dad

Scorpion on my ARM!!!

Okay... I seriously am going nuts from these bugs. Today while sitting in the sun with Kaiya by the pool I felt a little creepy crawly on my upper arm. Look down and see a SCORPION!!! This is my second scorpion sighting in a week. I can't take it. :)

I flicked it off -- Kaiya is meanwhile yelling from the pool: BUG! BUG! BUG! and stomped it with my flip flop. Dirty little bug.

Anyway... it's gross. We have sugar ants in the kitchen that I can't get rid of. I have the most spick & span kitchen I've ever had in my life and they still keep coming. I sweep every other night, I soap out my sink and put all dishes away and still they come. So... we are bringing out the big guns this weekend. Ruthie and I are on the hunt for BUG KILLER. We think they are coming in from the garage so that is where we are going to first launch our attack. I'll let you know how it goes.

Onto the more exciting things in Florida...

Hilarious story from today. So Tony was up late watching football and up early checking his fantasy football online and was running late to work. He comes home for lunch and I notice that he is sporting kind of a different look with his hairstyle. It's all kind of spikey this way and that. So about halfway through lunch I ask -- "Are you trying something different with your hair?" He looks at me strange and then touches the top of his head. "Nope," he says. "Just put gel in this morning and forgot to comb it out." We start cracking up - Kaiya too, but only because at this point in life she is a follower. :) He gets up to go look in the mirror and he's laughing. He fixed it before going back for lunch. We decided the new look doesn't help him out in looking old enough to be a doctor. :) I wish I had gotten a picture.

Water fun pictures... Thanks Uncle Austin & Aunt Kristina for the wonderful beach kit! Kaiya loves playing with all of the buckets and shovels and wagon outside in the water. :) Ruthie bought a pool that we set up on the back patio and we've enjoyed it every day this week for a little bit in the afternoon. Can't stay out long though -- this sun tans you quick! Twenty minutes and we all have lines from our swim suits. K's getting a cute little criss cross on her back from her suit and it makes her seem so much older to me for some reason. She will tan well, I think. Anyway... here's the pics.

New Guest/Smart Girl

Tony here.....I haven't posted in a long time so I thought I would give Rachel a break and tell you a couple of stories that happened recently. Most of you know but we moved to St. Cloud, Florida for a year so I could take part in a training program. From there, we are planning to move to Charlotte. I joke with rachel that in our first 6 years of marriage we will have lived in 4 different states! On top of that, most of our kids will be born in different states! Below is the picture of our 26 ft moving truck. When you add in the cab and Ruthie's car that we were towing it was almost as long as a semi. I drove the truck with Roger and Rachel, Ruthie, Kaiya and lu-lu and moneybags all followed in rachel's car. The trip down wasn't as bad as I thought it would be. The only exception might have been when we were trying to keep costs down we had stopped at a hotel that only cost 39 dollars per night. Well the old adage "you get what you pay for" came into play. You could barely breathe b/c it was so musty, there was a big spider in the bath tub, the bathroom lights didn't work and no one was looking forward to taking their shoes off or sleeping on the beds. After about 2 seconds of deliberation we decided that this wasn't the place for us and we asked for our money back. The rest of the trip was uneventful.

Anyways, on to the stories. First: We typically think of ourselves as welcoming people. We enjoy having people over as guests to our home. As the story continues, keep in mind the key word in the previous sentence is "people". The other night we had put kaiya to bed and rachel went to take a bath while I was checking my email. After about 5 minutes I hear rachel yelling my name. With kaiya being asleep I'm high tailing it to rachel so that kaiya isn't woken up. I come into the bathroom to see rachel (from the bath) throwing a used diaper at our cat money bags. Moneybags had picked up on our welcoming demeanor and was entertaining a new guest. Below is a picture of our new guest; needless to say, I wouldn't categorize it in the "people" category.

I figured since money bags could be welcoming... so could I. From there I made the formal introductions between Mr. Scorpio and Mr. Snee Kerr and Old John Crapper as pictured below:)

Okay, I know... a little corny. It was an interesting experience to say the least. We have kept our eyes open in case their were others but thankfully our search has been uneventful!

The second story happened today. Kaiya woke up early so we decided to bring her into our bed and try and snuggle her in between us. Of course she wanted "up". Still being a little groggy, we decided to let her roam around a little while we laid in bed. She was gone no longer than 10 seconds when we hear this noise. Nothing menacing but enough to make us think "what is she getting into now?" Another 15 seconds go by and kaiya comes strolling back into our bedroom with some dried banana chips. The funny part is that they were on middle of the table. She had to move the chair, climb onto the chair and probably the table to reach them, somehow get them down to the floor without spilling them (the box isn't easy for her to manage" and then carry them into our bedroom. On top of that, she was only gone long enough for her to actually accomplish this. It wasn't like she was out roaming and just saw them; she can't even see them from the floor. We just got a kick out of the fact that she actually had to have the idea while in our bedroom and head directly out there on a mission. Below is the picture of her when she came back into our bedroom with her newfound treasure!

These pictures are from the afternoon we spent with Connie and her kids. I didn't take as many as I should have (this always happens to me), but I did get a few. We had fun playing outside
in the sprinkler and playing inside. And I enjoyed the little bits of conversation that Connie and I managed to get in during all the activity around us.

I'm back!

Sorry for the long absence. We have settled into a bit of a routine here in our new home and think I have found my blogging window. For now anyway... I have a lot of catching up to do. And thought I would stretch it out over a couple days.

These pictures were taken about 2 months ago during a diaper change. For some reason -- I can't remember why -- I got Kaiya up to change her diaper after she had fallen asleep for the night. Probably realized that I hadn't changed her diaper before she fell asleep. Anyway. She is laying on the changing table. I take the diaper off and as I reach for the wipes, she rolls over onto her belly and is out of it. I had time to grab the camera and get a picture and she didn't move a bit. We finished the diaper change and then I layed her back into her crib. She rolled immediately again and continued sleeping in her favorite sleeping position. On her belly, with her knees tucked up and her little toushy in the air.

That's it for today. I'll blog more pictures tomorrow... I have a ton to post so it will be fun to get all caught up.

Quick Update

I just wanted to post a quick update. I am in my last week of training my replacement here at work. As a result, I haven't had hours on end to surf the Internet. :) I'm sure that will resume once we are settled in Florida. Here's our timeline:

August 9th: Rachel's last day at work (Hallelujah)
August 9th/11th: Tony will leave for Florida, Rachel will go to Ind. to finalize things at house we own and see a couple friends.
August 13th: Doctor's appt to hopefully determine sex of baby for sure! :)
August 15th: Pick up Tony at Airport
August 16th-17th: Get seriously packed
August 18th: Tony's graduation, Load the Truck
August 19th: Pull out in the morning.
August 21st: Arrive in Florida

Whew! Can't think about the next two weeks too hard or I start bawling. This is a bit stressful -- completely exciting -- but stressful.

Ruthie is now living with us. Poor thing is sleeping on her mattress on the floor of our office -- which is a room that is not closed off to the rest of the house. She is graciously sharing her space with us. Most of her belongings are in boxes in our basement currently.

We are still trying to nail things down w/ a place to live in Florida. We found a wonderful house, but are waiting to be approved, etc. Please pray no one snatches this house out from under us -- we have to wait on the Post Office to get our checks down there, so I'm paranoid.

You may hear from me only in small spurts over the next few weeks. I'll be back eventually.

Recent pics

Here are just a few pictures that I took over the past week. We babysat AJ last week and they were both up until 9:30 playing. We tried to get Kaiya to bed before he came over, but she must have heard us playing. I went in her room about 30 minutes after he was over and she was wide awake sitting up in her crib. Oh well... :) They had a lot of fun -- and big muscles Kaiya wanted to push AJ all over the living room.

The other pictures are this morning. I put all of Kaiya's hair in piggy tails and she looked so darn cute. The first picture is a chipmunk picture of her w/ a mouth full of O's. :)

POLL -- Would you do it?

I was browsing the news online this morning at work and came across this article on http://www.foxnews.com/.

My sister has a German short-hair and her husband has a labrador. Rebekah -- this is what the spawn of Ziggy & Katie could turn out like!! AHHHH!!!

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MENOMONIE, Wis. — Debbie Hulleman's dog Pepper has been known to gnaw on lipstick, munch on shampoo bottles and chew on toothpaste. But Pepper got Hulleman into a real mess after gobbling nearly $750.

"This is probably the worst," Hulleman said Thursday, recalling how she poked through vomit and dog piles left in the yard to recover the cash.

Hulleman had asked her mother in Oakdale, Minn., to take care of Pepper and Zach, the family's other dog last month while she and husband went on vacation. Pepper, an 8-year-old black Labrador-German shorthair, got into a purse belonging to her mother's friend and chewed the cash from an envelope. Hulleman's mother recovered some of the money that Pepper spit out, thinking she had it all. But when Hulleman returned from the trip and went to clean up her dogs' mess outside, she noticed a $50 bill hanging from one pile.

The chore of sorting through dog feces netted about $400, the 50-year-old dog lover said. Between that and other bills that Pepper had either vomited or simply chewed on, the family recovered $647.

"We have a $100 bill that can't be recovered because you need three-fourths of a bill and it is only half of a bill," Hulleman said.

The family swapped the soiled money for fresh currency at a bank.

"It wasn't that bad. I soaked it and strained it and rinsed it. I just kept rinsing it and rinsing it. I had rubber gloves on of course," Hulleman said.

"Everyone said, 'I can't believe you did that.' Well, for $400, yeah, I would do that," she said.

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It gave me a little giggle and I thought to myself.... Yep... I'd do it too. :)

So... now the question is: WOULD YOU DO THAT? Comment please! :0)

It's a BOY! (maybe)

We had a doctor's visit on Tuesday and he told me last month that we could find out what we are having if I come with a full bladder. The ultrasound reflects off the bladder so it would help him get a clear picture. Apparently I overshot the full bladder bit. I was so paranoid about not having enough water, that I drank a lot. I was in pain walking up to my appt because I had such a full bladder. :) Silly me... Anyway... when he went to do the ultrasound the baby was sitting Indian style. Yep -- legs completely crossed. AHHHH! My full bladder was taking up so much room that the baby couldn't stretch his legs out. The doctor got one decent shot and said he had a guess if we wanted to hear it. He said that if he had to make a guess he thinks that he saw boy parts. He followed that with -- don't go painting the nursery, if you buy clothes - save all the receipts, etc. So our next visit is the big ultrasound and we should be able to get a more concise answer then. Below are ultrasound pics (you can click on the picture to make it much bigger) -- the arrow on the first one is pointing to possible boy parts. The baby's bottom is on the bottom, with a thigh bone pointing up.

The second ultrasound is the 3D. With great ultrasound reading skills you can make out a face with eye sockets and a chin. There is a little V down at the bottom and that is the elbow joint. Looks quite alien-ish, but still fun to see the little baby growing and changing each visit.

So stay tuned for a confirmation of the baby's sex. We should know in a month or so.

Where have we been?

I can't believe that it has been so long since we posted. I have some great 4th of July pics to post someday. Whenever Ruthie sends them to me. We took pictures with her camera and so they will be coming soon. In the meantime here are a few pictures that I borrowed from Connie.

We went to visit Tony's mom in Elkhart last weekend and our friends came up to see us and play in the pool. My parents came up for a couple hours too. Here are the pics:

Kaiya w/ Max & Mitch (Connie's 2 yr. twins)

Kaiya & Papa

Big Girl

Over the past month, Kaiya has taken up an interest in our shoes. She constantly parades around the house pulling shoes by their laces, or trying to figure out how Mama's strange different types of shoes all work. She figured these sandals perfectly on her own. Fortunately the camera was close by so I could snap a couple pics.

It was very hard to push the Dora car with high heels on... :)

Corn on the Cob

Kaiya's first taste of corn on the cob. She LOVED it. I ate most of the corn off my cob and then she climbed on Papa's lap to finish it off. She got the hang of it right away, and immediately started just cheesing these huge grins. She giggled the whole time she was eating it. Adorable.

Cardinals

One of Tony's patients works for the Cardinals and sweetly gave us excellent seats to Tuesday night's game. We scrambled for a babysitter (Thanks Nate & Maurine!) and had a great date. We did the typical - "I thought you had cash" - and so we didn't have enough money to park anywhere remotely close to the stadium. (Oops) But we parked by the Arch and walked over to the stadium. As you can see, we had a great view of the game and the Cardinals won!

I sure will miss this view. The arch is such a pretty city landmark. And it didn't come out in the picture, but the sky was really pink/blue w/ the sun going down behind us. A beautiful night!

My little parrot

We took these precious pictures after our trip to the zoo. Aunt Ruthie joined up with us for dinner after we got back from the zoo and these pictures are the perfect example of cute Miss Kaiya mimicking EVERYTHING. She watches her Aunt Ruthie very closely and we catch her "copying" Ruthie all the time. In fact, the other night Ruthie was being really dramatic about something and put both hands on her face. About 2 seconds later we look over and Kaiya is walking towards us with both hands on her face and a big grin because she knows she is just like Aunt Ruthie. :)