The Christmas post...finally

Okay, I just have to sit down and do this.

Well, for starters, poor Bethany had a cold at Christmas. She was all stuffy and had a runny nose. But she was still tons of fun!

Christmas Eve, Santa left a fun Christmas-y ball and little stuffed reindeer in her crib. Nathan and I woke about an hour before she did. I think we were more excited about Christmas than she was! But, of course, she was only 17 months old. When Bethany finally woke up we heard, with this pathetic, stuffy-nosed, hoarse voice, "oh boy, ball!" and, "oh boy, reindeer!". We went and got her up and she was clearly excited about the reindeer, she just couldn't express herself!

She got up and unwrapped the rest of the presents that Santa left, a couple of puzzles, a coloring tablet, and a snowman cup. Then it was time for Mommy and Daddy's present. I helped her pull away the wrapping paper and there it was...a Wagon!!!! She wanted to get in it right away. And, of course, Daddy took her for a ride.

After we all got dressed (and stopped for cold medicine) we were off to Nahna and Papa's house. We slowly unwrapped presents there so it wasn't a complete maylay (sp?) with ALL of the kids there unwrapping at the same time. All of them got a little spotlight as they opened presents. Later, Nathan took Bethany and Hope for a ride in the new wagon (do you think we would have gotten away with leaving it at home?) and we had lunch. Yum, lunch was SOOOOO good. Before we left for Grandma and Grandpa's house, Bethany let Uncle Michael HOLD HER!!! I was so excited! You see, ever since Hope's 2nd birthday party (in August), Bethany has been completely freaked out by my brother. So this was a huge step!

Next we headed to Nathan's parents for round 3. More good food (I must have gained 5 pounds that day) and on to the presents. Bethany by this time was a pro at unwrapping gifts. She even started helping other people unwrap their gifts! Before we started opening, Bethany went up to one bag, bent over and said, "toys?" She's no dummy! She knew what was going to happen again!

Christmas was a great day. Bethany was so into the presents and unwrapping stuff. It was so much fun to watch her experience that. Next year she'll be a little more into Santa, I think. This year she knew "Santa", but not really what it was about. This year she also got very into snowmen. It was sad the day after I took the "Frosty the Snowman" book back to the library. She just stared at the bookshelf saying, "Frosty Book?".

Well, you've probably seen the Christmas pics on the website, but if not, here are a few of my favorites. Click on the first one to see all of the Christmas Day pictures.

copycat

I know it's been awhile. Bear with me. I promise I will do a big Christmas and house update VERY SOON. But for now, I wanted to give you a couple of small updates.

Remember that really annoying game we played in middle school where we would copy EVERYTHING someone said? That's pretty much our life right now with Bethany. We'll be talking in the car (or I'll have Sean or something on the radio) and she will repeat practically every other word that is said. It's gotten to the point where we'll say something just to see if she can repeat it (don't worry, nothing bad!). And full words don't always come out. For instance, I said "delicious" one day and she said "licious". We were in the doctor's office Tuesday and I said, "Can you say 'HI, Doctor Bell?'" and she said, "Hi...doctor...bell".

Yesterday, after her nap, we were hanging out in her room and she said, "mama, carry you" (that's what she says when she wants YOU to carry HER), so I picked her up and she gave me a big hug. We sat down in the rocker and I rocked her and sang to her. Every time I finished a song she said, "next?". After a few minutes she got down and ran out toward the kitchen. She stopped, turned around and came right back and stood just outside her bedroom door, looked at me and said, "O'mon, mama", with the arm gesture and everything. It was so cute, she'd never done that before on her own. We've told her to say "come on" to different people and she'll repeat it, but never on her own like that. It was so cute! So I chase her and she laughed.

So at the doctor for her 18 month checkup she weighed in at a whopping 21 pounds and 2.5 oz! (I was being sarcastic if you couldn't tell) And she is 32.5 inches tall. But Dr. Bell said she's just fine. We scheduled a renal ultrasound for her for Monday. Just to make sure that her kidney has become normal.

Most of you know that Bethany is not very into meat or veggies. Yesterday I made Potato Broccoli Chesse soup for lunch and she ate it! I was so happy. And last night she ate a whole hot dog. I had to peel the skin off of it, though. Otherwise, she spits out half the hot dog trying to eat around it. And she loves to eat "orangens" from our tree. Nathan picks them, Bethany puts them in her wagon, and they bring them inside and cut them up. It's so cute.

So the Christmas update is coming soon, I PROMISE!

time flies

I can't believe I haven't posted in this long. I don't know where the time goes.

Well, we're gearing up for Christmas here. Bethany loves the tree. She loves to let us know what everything on the tree is. And now she has started saying "whassat?" or "whosat?" (what's that, or who's that) when she doesn't know something or someone. When I turn the lights on in the evening she says,"Lights!". Nathan's grandmother gave us some of her animated Christmas things. Her favorite is the Santa that sings "Jingle Bells". She says, "Santa! Push it! Button!", then moves her arms up and down and her hips side to side. She also likes the reindeer from Nathan's mom that sings "Jingle Bell Rock". "Reindeer! Push it!"

This morning when I was making her breakfast I caught Bethany at the back window. She would gather up the curtain and hold it up to her face and say, "Bessyah! Wharyou?" Then pull the curtain down and say, "Boo!" and giggle. She's hysterical.

She loves giving hugs and kisses and asks for them often. Of course, you can't resist that sweet little face when she asks. She also kisses like every one of her stuffed animals or dolls. And she loves to rock them in her cradle and sing, "Rock, rock baby" (her version of "Rock a-bye baby").

Bethany still loves books and can "read" half of every one of them. I leave words out and she fills them in. I think her favorite book right now is "Frosty the Snowman". She also loves "Snuggle Puppy" by Sandra Boynton. I checked that out from the library but might put it on her wish list. It's cute.

Still no more teeth. She has her fingers in her mouth ALL the time, but nothing!

Well we started kindof potty training. I don't think I'm up for the rigid potty training yet. She has started wearing pull-ups during the day (which she LOVES) and I'll ask her every once in a while if she needs to go. She's gone a few times. But I think mostly right now she's "asking" to go right after she's gone in her pull-up. That's okay, though. She's recognizing that. We'll get there slowly but surely. She went today for Nathan so I'm glad that she will for someone other than me.

I just can't wait for Christmas. She is going to be so much more fun this year. Last year we had to stop opening presents for her to take a nap! She was so cranky the whole time! Plus, of course, we were all by ourselves. This year, everyone will get to see her open her gifts. I can't wait!

leaks and things

So as if the tree thing weren't bad enough, a few days later we discovered we had a leak in our bathroom. How did we discover this? Well, the first clue was the water squirting out from underneath the kitchen floor (there was laminate flooring in the kitchen). The first plumber we had out told us there was no pipe leak. Well, when the problem was getting worse, Nathan's dad came out and found it (we also ripped up the floor). We called a different plumber to fix it.

After the insurance adjuster came out, we took down the rest of the wall around the shower (on the kitchen side) to let it air out. This week, we've been replacing the drywall and finishing the removal of the wallpaper on that side. Due to all of this, we've decided to go ahead and replace all of the floors in the house. Even though we will be in debt up to our necks, it will be worth it, I think. We are about to add a ton of value to our house, anyway. Merry Christmas to us.

Our Thanksgiving was so great. We had a really good time at my aunt's. It was good to see everyone. For a lot of them it had been since Bethany was born that we've been together. And, we got to come home with peanut butter pie! :) My mom decided to have Thanksgiving on the following Saturday. That was nice, too. It was calmer. And, when my mom couldn't find her flour, we were able to get some!

Friday we put up the tree. It looks really nice. I love having it in our front window. It looks so cozy.

I can't believe that after Thanksgiving I actually lost weight. Ok, it was .2 pound. But I didn't gain! I'm down 25 pounds and almost 3 dress sizes.

Ok, so here are some updated house pics starting with our lovely floor. Click on it to see the rest:

"Jesus!"

Bethany LOVES to say, "JESUS!!" The other morning, she even put her hands above her head and said, "Yeah! Jesus!!" So precious.

Bethany had an AWESOME Thanksgiving. We drove to Michael and Lisa's first to hang out. Bethany got her first hair cut (Thanks, Aunt Bevee!) which looks soooooooo cute and she and Hope played so great together. When we were about 45 minutes away Bethany was saying "Hope!" non-stop. She was still a little petrified of Michael, but she's still pretty leery of men in general. We tried to get Bethany to say "Bevee" while we were there, but wouldn't. Of course about 5 minutes down the road after we left, she must have said it 50 times! Her timing is horrible.

We then went to my Aunt Sandi's (my mom's sister) for linner. Just about everyone was there. My grandma and grandpa, my uncle Tim, aunt Kristy and their daughter, Alexis, my uncle Curtis, aunt Erinn and their daughter, Jennifer and her boyfriend, Mario, my aunt Sandi and uncle Jim and my cousin, Crystal and her husband, Wes and my other cousin John and his wife, Nancy and daughter, Alex. I think that's everyone. :) Bethany had a blast playing with Alexis and Alex and my cousin Jennifer. She was also pretty good with Wes. She was on the swing in the backyard most of the time. And falling out of it didn't even stop her. She wanted right back on. Of course, she crashed in the car about 10 minutes after we left. She did so awesome.

So, Friday we put up the Christmas tree. Bethany helped. She helped me put up all of the ornaments and I held her up to put the angel on the top. She loves looking at the colored balls because she can see her reflection in them and says, "Bessyah!" (that's how she says her name). She also likes the deer and the soldier (which, when she says it, sounds a lot like "shoulder") and the heart, and the mouse, and every angel on the tree. I have a Minnie Mouse ornament and she's playing a flute. So Bethany learned to say "flute". When she looked at an angel ornament playing a trumpet she said, "Angel! Flute!". I told her that was a trumpet and she said, "Trumpet!". I can't believe how she copies.

At my mom's house on Saturday, she was playing with a nativity set on the fireplace and picked up the baby Jesus and walked him all over the house. "Jesus! Jesus!!"

Wow, this is long. She's just been doing so much lately. She is just crazy about books. She'll bring one to you and say, "Readit!" Then when you're done, "Done! Next!", and hop down to get another one. She can practically read certain books to you. Some of the "unimportant" words are left out, but she understands.

Oh, by the way, Uncle Ricky, when we got home Sunday night she kept walking around the house saying, "High Five! Ricky!"

She truly amazes me.

Yeah, Jesus!

a tree falls in deland

So, remember Hurricane Wilma? Remember how we didn't get much damage? Well, after the whole storm had past, our neighbors rotted tree about took off the corner of our house! Luckily, it missed. All we lost was the tree their tree landed on, our microwave, our dishwasher, the pump for our bed (Select Comfort), the baby monitor, and the alarm clock. I think that's it. When the tree fell, it pulled the neutral out of the house causing 240V to go through the house. That explained all the popping we heard before the tree landed. Lucky for us, Nathan's dad and Lonny were able to come up and fix everything for us. It's good to know people.

Well, we planned on slowly replacing the appliances in the kitchen anyway so we went ahead and got a microwave to go over the range (thank you, Gram). It looks really nice. We got a donated dishwasher that Nathan's dad had, and are using a pump for a blow up mattress to keep our bed inflated (we are NOT paying $200-400 to replace our pump!). On Sunday, Nathan's parents came over to help install the stuff and help me start removing the wallpaper in the kitchen. Ed was also going to replace an element in our water heater except he couldn't get to it past the 6 inches of sediment in the bottom! Drain your water heaters, people! So, what else could we do? Buy a new one, of course! Geez. Why do these things always happen at one time?

So we've decided to save up and replace the stove next. I think we're going to get a glasstop with convection oven. Our kitchen is going to look soooooo cool. So, click the picture below to see EVERYTHING.

pictures!

Ok, here are some pics for you. As usual, click on one to see the rest of the album.



Little Hula Girl


First candy! Really, she only took about 8 licks, she didn't eat the whole thing!

not a baby

Many, many things that Bethany does makes me think how in certain ways, she's not a baby anymore. Like, temper tantrums for one! Haha, you thought I was going to get all sentimental, didn't you? Just kidding. But yes, temper tantrums. And coloring. She LOVES to color! She goes nuts when she sees crayons or markers. She also is learning things so quickly. The other day (she has these blocks with letters on them and pictures of things that start with that letter) we were playing with the blocks and I showed her "house". She said it back once and that was it. The next day I was stacking them up for her and she found the "H" block, pointed to the picture and said, "house!" I couldn't believe it. I only showed her the day before. And only one time!

Potty training - I know I'm going to have to do it sometime. She's been showing signs for several months. She loved sitting on the potty when I was trying to get her pee for a culture (I don't think I'll go into detail about it on here!). Then today, I went into the bathroom at the mall and as I was sitting there she said, "pee-pee". Oh, man. This was one thing I did not want to do when I had kids. A friend of mine suggested the "Potty training in less than a day" method. It's one long day of teaching it, but then it's pretty much done. Except for the overnight part. I know I'm going to just have to bite the bullet and do it.

I got some GREAT pictures of her at the park the other day. Check the next post for them. She got on the playground equipment all by herself! And went down the slide! She already loves the swings, but the slide!!

I'm running out of creative titles

So, we just got back from Chicago. What a fun trip! Bethany did great! She pretty much skipped every nap (except what she could catch in the car or in the stroller) but was "happy, happy" the whole time. (That's a new thing - if you ask, "Bethany, are you happy?" she'll move her shoulders back and forth and say, "Happy, happy". Too cute.)

She loved Lincoln Park Zoo. As do I. It's a free zoo (but for the parking) and there is so much to see. She loved the otters. No, wait, she LOVED the otters. And, who couldn't? They are sooooo cute. And she said Zebra for the first time. That was a shock. No prompting. We just walked up to them and she said, "Zehba". What??? Ok!

Aunt Susie taught her to say, "Okie, Dokie". Only when she says it, it sounds like, "Otee, Dotee". What a cutie!

We went to Ikea and I bought her these finger puppets. They are all animals - Parrot, Duck, Moose (Deer?), Frog, Bear, Panda, Giraffe, Elephant, Monkey and Lion. She loves them. She likes to put them on her fingers and tell us what they are.

She LOVED LOVED LOVED the train! Now every time you ask, "What does a train do?" she very enthusiastically says, "Woo-woo!". And I think she loves planes even more now. She wouldn't let us take her away from the window at the airport. She kept saying, "Airplane! Bye-Bye!" and frantically waving her arm. I bought her a little Southwest plane that lights up and makes the sound of a plane taking off and landing. And when you pull it back, it taxis for a second and then takes off (really, it just lifts the nose).

She was very confused by the pants and long sleeve shirts. By the time we were on the plane back home, she didn't want me to put the pants back on her. She had had enough.

She also thinks that Keifer Sutherland is cute. She was flipping through a magazine in the car one day and everytime she got to the page with his face on it (an ad for 24) she said, "Cute!" I love her.

She says that now, too. Only it sounds like, "I lellow". But she says it after someone else does. So we know she's trying to repeat it.

Bethany freaked out at the Shedd Aquarium. She was running all over the place. "FISH!!!" And we saw a shark. "Shart! Whoa!!!" And turtles. Aunt Susie bought her a turtle. I bought her an otter.

Ok, how about some pictures?

also

I forgot to mention how the rest of the afternoon went after B's doctor's appointment. I had to go to Walgreens to pick up a prescription and after waiting for 30 minutes, I finally got it. She was exhausted, but it was past lunch and we both needed to eat. But, instead of going home, I thought, "she deserves a treat (and so do I)". So we went across the street to Friendly's and we had a nice lunch there. I had a chicken wrap and Bethany had Mac-N-Cheese. They're pretty cheap there, though, because it was just Kraft (made with a LOT of butter!) but we had a good time. She talked to everyone, of course. After lunch we went home and she slept for a few hours. She was pooped. Me too.

sorry

I know, I know, it's been too long. Sorry. But, I have a bunch to update!

First of all, at her doctor's appointment last week, Bethany was 31" tall and 19 pounds! I know, only 19 pounds! The doctor said that it was okay since she is so active. She was all over that office. There was a jungle wallpaper on the bottom of the wall and she kept walking up to it..."Lie! roar...Bish!...Ooh Ooh Ooh! (monkey)...Bird! teet teet!..." She was so cute. So that's about it. No, wait. She got three shots. One in each arm and one in her left leg. She screamed and screamed. I finally got her to calm down by saying, "Look, you got a sticker (the round snoopy band-aid on her leg)!" She calmed down immediately. Then all day long she was pointing at her leg saying, "ticker, ticker!" It was traumatic that evening when it fell off in the shower.

Bethany's new favorite show is JoJo's Circus. It is such a cute show and whenever she picks up the remote she says, "JoJo!" She dances to the music and follows along with most of what JoJo does. It's so cute!

Well, the naps haven't been as great as that one a couple of weeks ago. Only 2 hours max. She keeps waking up poopy. Even if she's already pooped that day. She'll get used to the new schedule though, right? Even her poops?

She also is really starting to love all kinds of food. I'd have to say, though, that her favorites are cheese and pickles. Just like her mom! She freaks out whenever she sees a pickle and she'll eat anything with cheese. I'm trying to find good ways for her to have the food she likes. Instead of buying regular mac-n-cheese I bought this brand called Annie's. It's organic. Wheat shell pasta and cheddar. The ingredients say, "Whole wheat pasta and white cheddar cheese". Isn't that awesome! No preservatives or funky chemicals. No, I'm not turning into a freaky liberal wacko, don't worry. I'm just trying to give her good food. And I found it at Target!

Well, that's all I can think of right now. More later!

new fun

Well, we are really getting settled in here in DeLand. Bethany loves her new room. Now we just have to decide what color to paint it. Last week everything was "lellow". This week everything is purple. Make up your mind, silly girl! Last week, my friend Sharla invited us to go with her and her son, Michael Jr., to the story time at the library. Michael J. is 10-months old. The story time we went to was for children under 1. It was really cute. We sang a couple of songs, said some nursery rhymes and read a book. Then the four of us went to the park and the kids enjoyed the swings. Bethany did great this time. Her first experience with swings was not great. We tried swinging her at the park at Hope's birthday party and she wanted nothing to do with it. This time, I think she saw how much fun Michael J was having and realized it really was fun! This week, I took Bethany to the 1-3 story time and I think it was a little more her style. There was more singing and movement and they even had a puppet! It just seemed a little more "put together" than the other one. We hung out at the library for almost an hour after the story time was over looking at books and reading. Even though it's DeLand, the library is way better than the Manoa branch of the Hawaii Public Library. And the staff is much more helpful and more friendly. We checked out some books and went home.

Bethany has been taking only one nap this past week. It didn't start out as a plan, it just kind of happened with the move and things being kind of wacky last week. So, today she took a 3 1/2-hour nap. It really is kind of nice. I can get a lot done in those 3 hours.

Well, Bethany has her 12 month check up on Thursday. I know, almost 3 months late. Yet another reason while health insurance sucks. We didn't have any from the time we left Hawaii until September 1st. And even then, her old Ped. was already booked until the end of October and we didn't move over here until last week.

So I'm sure I'll have a lot to update after Thursday. We haven't had any new stats in awhile. I'm very excited!!

second opinion

Well, I went to my regular doctor today (actually it was a doctor filling in for my doctor who is out this week due to having surgery) and he thinks I just have bronchitis and possibly a seasonal asthma. So I have another cough medicine (in pill form-woohoo!) and advair. So, we'll see how that goes. I'm supposed to go back in a week to follow up.

Our movers called today to tell me that they had a cancellation for tomorrow (Thursday) so we'll be moving in 2 days early! This is good. Now I don't have to worry about a potential conflict with going bridesmaid dress shopping on Saturday for Kristy's wedding. Whew!

whoop...there it is

Yep. I have been diagnosed as having Whooping Cough (Pertussis). Apparantly, in about 10% of adults, the vaccine we recevied as children wears off. It starts off with the same symptoms as the common cold, which makes it hard to diagnose. I went to the doctor a couple of weeks ago and she said it looked like maybe bronchitis. When it didn't get any better (and my whole body started to hurt from all the coughing) I went back and she said it's very possible that it's Pertussis. So she gave me a breathing treatment in the office and I'm taking an antibiotic, a cough medicine and an inhaler. I still cough occasionally, but not as hard or deep. So it's a lot better. But Pertussis can persist for several months. Ugh. So, that's my life right now! Lucky me!!

our house

Well, there are some developments since my last post. We bought a house! We are so excited! We have a few pictures, but just of the outside. When we move in, I'll take more pictures and some of the inside and post them. Then, as we make improvements, I'll post pictures of our progress!

Bethany is almost 14 months old. She is amazing. But you can read about her in her blog!

I've now lost 19 pounds in 14 weeks. I have passed my 10% goal and will now make a new goal. It will probably be 10% again, since that's about how much more I want to lose. You should see me. I look fabulous!!! :)

Okay click on the picture below to see the house!

Pictures!!!!!!!

Yay!!!!!

Click the first picture and go to the At Home album.
Click the second picture and go to the Out & About album.

blah blah blah

She is just talking up a storm. I can't believe it. Most of the time (amazingly) I understand what she is saying! I guess that's a mom thing.

We bought a new camera so new pictures will be coming soon, yay!

Today something really funny happened. Bethany knows what a bus is and whenever we pass one on the road she yells out, "bus!!" Today we were walking out of Linens N Things and a Ford Expedition drove by and she pointed at it and yelled, "BUS!" Haha! I just said, "Yeah, I know, it looks like a bus, doesn't it?" How cute. Also, for some reason she has a Pavlov reaction to the word "color". Whenever she hears the word she says, "yellow" (lellow). She knows many colors. She can look through her color book and recognize red, yellow, blue, green, purple, white, black and brown. So you can point to an object and she'll tell you the color. But whenever you say, "what color?" she says, "yellow" (lellow). Oh, well.

And...we will finally be in our home next week! YAY!!!! Next Tuesday we will be residents of DeLand. We are sooooooooooo excited!

a fun weekend

Last weekend was really great. Bethany did a lot of new things and handled it all amazingly well. My niece's birthday party was last Saturday. My brother and his family recently moved to St. Pete for a new job, so the party was over there. They are currently living in my great-grandmother's house, so that means nobody else has a place to stay when we go over there anymore. Nathan, Susan, Ricardo, Bethany and I all stayed at a Days Inn about 15 minutes from where the party was going to be. Bethany was great the whole car ride over. She just talked and read books and ate some snacks. Then, when we got to the hotel, we put her down for a nap (we requested adjoining rooms so we could put her down and hang out next door). She just talked for about an hour and then finally fell asleep about 5:00. We had to wake her up to go to dinner. There was a Cracker Barrel (YUM!) across the street and my brother and his clan came to meet all of us (mom was with us, too). She was pretty good and kept pointing at Hope across the table and saying, "Ho!" (she's not very good at those ending consonants yet). So, then she went to bed pretty easily, too, and we just hung out watching "What Not to Wear" in Susan and Ricardo's room until we got tired. Our only problem was that I had been sick (on the verge of bronchitis) and woke up about 6am with a horrible coughing fit. I went into the bathroom but Bethany heard me and woke up. We decided to just get up and go to breakfast then see if B would take a nap before we went to the party at 10am. She did, and we actually had to wake her up to go! She had a lot of fun at the party. They had the party at a park. It was the first time she actually walked around in the grass and went on a playground. We tried putting her in those toddler swings, but she didn't care for it too much. I thought that she would love it, but maybe she'll just have to get used to it. But she had fun just walking around everywhere. And they had bubbles and hula hoops and pinwheels (which she calls "Fi"-sounds like eye). I think she thinks it looks like a butterfly, which she calls the same thing. Anyway, we had a great time and it only took 20 minutes for her to crash in the car. She slept almost all the way back to Orlando. She was really good the whole weekend. Too bad mommy was too sick to go to church on Sunday. She hasn't seen her church friends in awhile. While mommy was in Tucson, B stayed at Grandma's house while Daddy went to church. He was working sound that week so he had to be there REALLY early! Hopefully we'll all make it there this Sunday.

I'm sorry to say that we may not be posting any new pictures for awhile. Our camera broke this weekend. We don't know what happened. It just stopped working. We'll have to figure out a way to get the pictures up from this weekend, because there were some really cute ones.

March of the Penguins

Today, Bethany went to her first movie. We went to see March of the Penguins. She did pretty well. We had to get up and let her walk around a couple of times. There was a walkway that went behind the seats and she just walked back and forth and then we we would go back and sit down again. She seemed to like it when she paid attention. A few times, she pointed at the screen and said either, "bird!", "baby!", or "oooooh!". It was cute. She really was pretty good. So, it was her first time at the movies, and there will certainly be a page in her scrapbook about it (if I ever actually start one!). :)

growing up so fast

I know, I know. It's been awhile since I've blogged. We have just been busy, busy since we've been back. With church, SAI, work, and having friends and family to hang out with, blogging has taken a back seat. I guess the first thing to tell is that we are buying a house! It was totally unplanned, but the rental market in DeLand really stinks and it just made more sense to go ahead and buy even though we didn't really have much saved to do so. You know, moving to and from Hawaii can really screw up your savings. Anyway, we were able to buy in DeLand really close to campus and we will be closing at the end of the month. Pictures are forthcoming.

Bethany has been growing up like crazy. She tries to copy just about anything we say. You've seen the list of words. I could continue adding. Well, okay, I'll do it now! She can now say wash, bite, box, eyes, nose, mouth, toe, hair, bear, blue, boo, water, hello.

She can also pant like a dog, shush (puts her finger to her mouth and goes "sssss"), say "hello" and laugh with her phone up to her ear, and dance on command. When she knocks down a stack of blocks she raises her hands above her head and says, "ooooooooh!". She is running around this place like crazy. And she crawls up on everything. She loves to sit on the couch like a grown-up.

She's been eating more grown-up foods lately. She loves spaghetti! She also loves apples, grapes, cherries, bananas, nectarines, strawberries, cheese, yogurt, animal crackers, pb & j, bagels, egg, chicken, potatoes, and other things I can't remember right now.

Well, that's a lot for now. Hopefully I can write more soon!