Toes in the Sand

The Osbornes are back into the swing of our daily routines after a wonderful beach vacation to Ocean Isle. It was L's first beach vacation, and of course our first vacation with a baby. I do believe we packed the entire house into our trailblazer and used some storage on the boat because we had NO IDEA what to take for booger...I don't think she even touched half of the stuff we lugged around!

We definitely enjoyed watching her face as she saw the ocean for the first time, kicking her feet and hands in excitement. She concentrated on the water when we stood her up in the crashing waves, but no unhappiness there either. She loved it! Her favorite part was the sand...as could be seen by her constant rolling around in it, and the fist fulls she shoved in her mouth! We did try to keep her from eating bucket fulls of sand, but eventually, she did it anyway. Thankfully, there were no problems later :)

Since the last post, a lot of new and exciting things have happened with our sweet, chunky nugget. She started crawling when I was in Atlanta (first part of July) but since then she has mastered that and travels faster than a speeding bullet. It's about impossible to keep up with her, so we are looking into getting a "cage" haha. She is also very determined that she is going to stand up and walk around. She pulls up on everything and if you hold her hands while she is standing, she takes off walking...although she looks like a little drunk...all over the place, legs wobbling with every step. Its an interesting milestone for Steve and I as parents because for one, we are able to get more stuff done since we aren't holding her all the time, but at the same time, she is into EVERYTHING so we are constantly redirecting her, pointing her towards the items she can actually play with.

As for Steve and I, things are still the same. Work, Baby, Working out, and sleep!

Enjoy our favorite beach pics...

Mr. Crabby with his "Laser Crab Eyes!"

First watermelon slice. Yummy!

The sun setting over the canal.

After eating a few hand fulls of sand.

Knocked out! Shortly after, an old man walked by yelling "she looks peaceful"
which startled her and woke her up. We think he forgot to put his hearing aid in. Covered in sand.

Complete concentration.

Happy 1st Birthday Caleb!!! & Ready for Momma to Get Back...

(Aplogies for the picture quality, they were all taken on my phone)

This past Sunday London and I went to my Parent's after my baseball game to celebrate Caleb's first birthday. My Mom has been keeping foster children since I was 9 years old, and moved to therapeutic DSS foster care a few years back. She currently has two kids in her care, Scotty (aka. Mini-Coop) a 4 year old, and Caleb, a 1 year old with Cornelia Delange syndrome (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cornelia_de_Lange_Syndrome).

Little Caleb is an Angel! In his one year on earth he has already experienced much more that most of us will in a lifetime. Countless surgeries, trips to the ER and many doctors telling us that he wouldn't make it. Caleb has been very healthy in the past few months, however. The longer he stays strong, the better his chances are for continuing to grow and develop.

He still eats through a feeding tube, and probably won't be able to walk until he is 5 years old (if ever) and will likely never talk, but the kid has a heart of gold. He loves to laugh and play and make all sorts of noises. He especially loves my brother Chris who can always get him to laugh, and my parent's dogs, Kohle, Pepper and Emma.

Here are some pictures from his first party yesterday:











In other news; This is my 6th day of getting to feel what it would be like to be a single parent. This past Wednesday morning, Crystal left with her Mom for a tradeshow in Atlanta, and will return late tommorow night. Here's a nod to all of the single parents out there, especially those with mutliple children. I honestly don't know how they do it. Just keeping up with the limited amount of laundry and dishes that L and I make is tough.

Probably the most difficult thing is London being "out of her groove." She definitely misses her Momma, as evident of her unwillingness to let me leave a room without taking her with me. She has done fine at My Mom and her Aunt Joyce's while I am at work, but once I pick her up, she is very needy. I understand though, as I am all out of whack too with "Mom" gone. She has started to adjust, but has fought sleep ALOT more than usual. I have had to sleep with her in the bed with me at least 3 nights so far to keep her from crying. She has just learned to climb and stand at the crib rail, and even after I think she's asleep, I'll walk by her room and see her standing there cooing "MuMaMaMaMa..." It's so sweet that I can't help but cart her around half asleep until I am ready for bed.

Once again, HAPPY BIRTHDAY CALEB, hat's off to single parents, and COME HOME SOON MOMMA!!!

Here's my little mechanic helping Me, Chris and Russ work on the Bronco on Saturday. My sister keeps telling me that London is going to one day resent all of these redneck pictures I keep taking of her.



Here she is after a long night of waking up, crying for Momma and getting transported to Dad's bed. We both look like this in the morning's lately



Here is the little playpad that I set up for her while we worked outside Saturday.

Happy 4th and Happy 8 months!

London has grown up quite a bit since our last post. She turned 8 months old today (the 5th) and she is one busy little nugget. Not only is she talking, she has recently learned to go from her belly to sitting up on her own, pull to standing (we had to drop her mattress before bed), and is soooo close to crawling we think it will be only a matter of days. Don't get me wrong, if there is something she wants to get, she'll roll and pull herself all over the place until she gets it. I guess we need to get busy baby proofing the house! We can't wait to take her to the beach in a few weeks...there is no telling how much trouble she is going to get in.

Little drool monster...trying to crawl.

Playing with her toys.

On Friday, Steve and I both had the day off so we took Boogie to the lake. We bought her a little infant float so she could feel like a "big" girl, and she loved it! You can tell by the big smile on her face. From our recent trips to Nana's pool and the lake, we think we've got us a little water bug. During our first trip to the pool, Steve dunked her under and she was nothing but smiles...even trying to dunk her own head under quite a few times.

On Saturday, our little family traveled to Burlington to hang out with Dave, Mollie, Bradshaw and Charlie at their 4th of July gathering. It was the first time that we got to meet Charlie and Bryce (Candice & Jonathan's little boy) and London got to meet everyone! London was fascinated by Bradshaw as she was pretty much the first little girl London has ever played with. But her favorite part of the evening was when Dave shot off a few fireworks. We have never seen London so excited. Our little nugget was quite the life of the party after that as everyone kept watching her reaction to the fireworks...she was so excited kicking her feet and swinging her arms that it was about impossible to hold on to her. Crazy baby!

Playing with her toys and Bradshaw.

Family photo...L refused to look at the camera!