Funny Fish Face

Hudson's newest trick is to make a "fish face". We just caught him making it randomly a few days ago & now he'll copy us if we do it first.



We caught it on camera


I don't want to make fish face anymore

Physical Therapy & New Job

Trent & Hudson both have some great news & I'll share it with you youngest to oldest. :)

Hudson had his last physical therapy appointment yesterday! I took him for a check-up & our PT said he's doing so well that she doesn't need to see him anymore. She said he still needs to strengthen the muscles in the left side of his neck/shoulder region, but that it's just a detail now. He is trying his hardest to crawl now! He roles all around, ends up on his tummy normally, pushes up and kicks his legs and moves his arms. We think he still has a ways to go before crawling, but it's a start. I can't believe it!





Trent got a new job as a public speaker for Making It Count. This organization has several presentations they offer to high school students, college students, & parents of high schoolers. Trent will travel to high schools and talk to parents of high school students on financial planning for college. Here's the link for his talk. He's already scheduled to give a couple talks.

Look Who's the big 50...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JERRY!
Trent's Dad, Jerry, is the father in the middle of the picture :)

his birthday is actually Monday (9/22)

A Tribute

It's so hard for me to believe that my mother passed away 5 years ago today. She was a silent fighter during her cancer, hardly ever complaining. Rather she tried to keep things as "normal" as possible for the sake of her family, especially my younger sister who was only 12 years old when she passed away. I admired my mom for her great courage during lots of scary and unknown times during her 3 year battle with Ovarian cancer.

So many things have happened in the last 5 years that my mother would've enjoyed being a part of so much. She died before Trent & I got married (but after we got engaged) and didn't get to meet my sister's twins or Hudson. While she was on Earth, here are some of the things she enjoyed, from the perspective of her middle daughter:

*a good novel
*sitting on our back deck looking at the lake
*going out to eat
*walking & hiking
*traveling
*hanging out with her kids
*a good glass of wine
*cheese & crackers
*book club
*talking to her sister on the phone
*cribbage
*broadway shows
*a good cup of coffee
*seeing her grandson!
*folk music (Peter, Paul & Mary)
*getting together with her work friends
*blue cheese dressing
*walking on the beach

Anyone who reads this blog & knew my mom (family, friends) & wants to add to the list (in the comments), I'd love to read what you remember. :)

My mother & my nephew, Brandon September 2002

Our last professional family photo (my parents, older sister & brother-in-law & my younger sister) Summer 2001

Memphis, Here We Come!

Here are some pics we took of Hudson last night before we got professional family pictures taken. I'm a sucker for little boys in sweater vests. :)




Also, here's a link to a video someone took just before we started the half-marathon on Sunday. Also, Trent & I both registered for the St. Jude Marathon that takes place December 6th in Memphis. I'm not sure how I feel about training for another full marathon, it takes so much time, but I decided to go for it again!

Disappointment

I ran the Lewis & Clark Half Marathon this morning with my friend, Elisa. I envisioned something very different than what happened. Here's a play-by-play of my morning...

4:00am feed Hudson
4:20am can't go back to sleep b/c I know I have to get-up soon
5:00am get up
5:20am leave my house & pick-up Elisa
5:45am arrive at half-marathon, but can't get out of the car because of Hurricane Ike
picture through the windshield (couldn't open the door to take a pic)


6:30am get out of car to go to the starting line, immediately step in over ankle deep water (it is unavoidable)
6:45am stand at start line shivering and getting pelted continuously with painful rain, race is supposed to start now
7:05am race finally starts (we can't hear any gun signifying the start, people just start running)...don't know why the race was delayed
7:45am my skin is not numb as I was wishing, but rather still stinging from the monsoon like weather we are running in
7:52am the highlight of the race...we ran under an overpass and had 7 seconds where are bodies weren't being smited
8:10am realize that despite the horrible conditions we are actually making pretty good time and I will probably get a PR (personal record) today, getting excited about this
8:27am we run across the finish line...we are only at mile 10 though instead of 13.1...we were very confused, but realized they had to stop the race early because the rest of the course was flooded
8:28am someone hands me my "finishers medal"
8:40am leave because all of the post-race tents are flooded and it was a muddy, confusing madhouse at the finish

I left feeling very disappointed because we didn't get to finish. So basically I paid money (which I doubt will be refunded) to run in atrocious conditions this morning staring at the ground the whole time (it hurt too much to look up) and didn't even get to finish. The last half-marathon I attempted was 1 year ago when I could only run a couple miles and then had to stop because I was sick (I was 10 weeks pregnant with Hudson and at the height of my morning-sickness).

There were photographers along the course and at the finish. When the pictures are posted online, I will post a link to them.

Covenant Children

Hudson had his first play date today. He played with his friend, Caleb. It was so fun for Caleb's mom, Rachel, and I to watch our sons play and have fun! One of the most fun things to do with Hudson right now is to feed him cereal. He gets so happy and excited when he sees the bowl and spoon coming now. He opens his mouth really wide before I can even get the cereal on the spoon. Here's a video of his first time eating cereal. We're hoping to get another video soon of how excited he gets when he just sees the cereal coming:)


Our other update is that we've decided that we're going to go to Covenant Presbyterian church (check it out here). I started going to a women's bible study yesterday on 1, 2, 3 John. I'm excited that I have the opportunity to study these rich books of the Bible while Hudson gets wonderful childcare (thanks Lisa!!).

Hudson's Newest Feats

Over the last few days, Hudson has started sitting up by himself. He could fall backwards at any moment though, so we have to be nearby. His other new first is that we fed him rice cereal for the first time last night! He would open his mouth up really wide after he started getting the hang of it, but by then end he was all done. He smiled and kicked his arms and legs a lot. Overall, I would say cereal was a hit!

It's Game Day!

Let's go Mountaineers!

these are from game day last week

from today...

The privileges of being 5 months old

Although today's a rainy day in St. Louis, yesterday we enjoyed some nice weather by going down to the swings by our house. Hudson was only mildly impressed with the swings. Although he did crack a few smiles, his excitement was nothing compared to playing airplane, singing ABCs or hanging out in his exersaucer. He's definitely on the small side for the swings as he seems to get swallowed up when we put him in the swing.

Bank of America

Hudson's helping Dave out with a customer

hanging out behind the teller line with Terry & Damini

Most of you know that I work for Bank of America as a Sales & Service Specialist. After almost 3 years at the same branch, I transferred to the branch right next to my house this week. There's a huge difference in my commute- from 35 minutes to 5 minutes. It's great to work so close to home. It's sad to leave a place where I had friends, knew most of the customers & they were flexible with my schedule (as long as I worked every Saturday!). I still have to work every Saturday at my new branch and I'm waiting to get my new schedule. I turned in my request of times to work, but I haven't heard back yet. We have had such a hard time working out babysitting that I hope they honor the time requests I made. I simply gave them Trent's school schedule and asked them to work around that so he could babysit Hudson while I work. We'll see...