End of Summer 2011

Link to photo album; click.

End of Summer - 2011

Noah, Evan, Josh, Brian, and I have all been super busy lately!  We've all been having so much fun getting used to having Josh in our family.  Noah and Evan love him very much.  They will help us out when we ask them to (like getting diapers, wipes, etc, for us), but they don't try to help when we don't ask for it...which is probably a good thing. 

Since our last post, we've had tons of family fun!  On July 23rd, we went to Smithville again for Brian's cousin Katy's birthday party.  The boys are always the life of those parties!  The love to play with the old Hot Wheels that Brian's Uncle Mark keeps in his basement.  On July 31st, we took them to the Midwest Kids' Fest, but that turned out to be a dud.  The only thing worth the money we spent was the bounce house, but Noah and Evan were much too afraid to climb it and go down the huge slide.  There were too many kids jumping around on it, so we think they were just scared. 

During the weekend of August 4th-6th, we moved out of our first house and into a temporary apartment about 10 minutes away.  We got used to the small living space fairly quickly, and are looking forward to our new house (more on that later).  That same weekend, Evan got a fever and what we think we determined as a type of summer flu.  Noah, Josh and I went to our friend Ben's birthday party.  Brian and Evan stayed home.  The next day, we thought Evan was better, so we went swimming at the apartment pool.  However, then Noah got a fever that night.  They both had the flu for about 3 days and Brian got it after they were both over it.  Thankfully, Joshua and I did not get it. 

On August 20th, our realty company held a customer appreciation luau at Longview lake.  They had awesome food, pony rides, a bounce house, door prizes, and much more.  We had so much fun!  That evening, we went to some friends' house for another bbq.  Noah and Evan had a lot of fun playing with another little boy's trains and playground balls.  Here are some pictures of Noah and Evan on the pony at the luau.

We've been to the zoo two more times since our last post.  Josh likes to ride in the back of the double stroller and snooze.  On August 27th, we went with their Uncle John, Aunt Theresa, cousin Michael, Aunt Sarah, and Uncle Mark.  We had so much fun, but it was super hot!  Noah and Evan even got to meet Thor (the super hero). 





 

That night, we went to the same friends' house again that we went to the week before.  Noah and Evan are still talking about it and refer to it as "the blue house." 

We took Josh to his 4th wedding on September 2nd. Noah and Evan stayed at home and their Grandma Cathy watched them.  It was an outdoor wedding and very hot, but Josh handled it like a champ!  The ride home, however, was not so great.  Josh does NOT like the car, and on long rides, he cries most of the time.

On Saturday, September 3rd, we got to celebrate the boys' Grandpa Mike's birthday with an awesome dinner at Grandpa and Grandma's house.  Grandma Mary cooked an amazing Mexican feast.  It was a lot of fun!

On Sunday, September 4th, we went to church in the morning, a family picnic in the afternoon, and a bbq in the evening.  It was a busy but very fun day!  Noah, Evan, and Josh did pretty well considering how exhausted they were.  Here are a few pictures from that day: 

 

Noah and Evan are doing fantastic lately.  They sleep very well almost every night now.  They love to sing songs.  Their favorites are still Twinkle Twinkle Little Star and Humpty Dumpty.  The song they love to listen to right now is "Life is a Highway" by Rascal Flatts because it is in the movie CARS.  They call it "the Mack song."  Josh usually likes when they sing.  They like to count and sing their ABC's.  They love riding their tricycles in our driveway at the apartment, although they still don't know how to peddle.  They push themselves by walking along the ground.  On a behavior note, they are still definitely in their terrible twos.  They bicker over the littlest things, and we've started to have biting issues again.  I'm hoping their 3's are better!  They are still not ready to potty train yet, so that's the next big thing we are waiting on.

Josh is also doing fantastic!  He has been "talking" so much since our last post.  He loves to coo and talk to all of us.  He gets very excited and gasps when he is having fun.  We took him to do his 3 month pictures on August 17th (he was 3.5 months old), and he did amazing!  We got some awesome pictures of him.  On September 2nd, he turned 4 months old and he also had his 4 month checkup that day.  He was 15lbs, 5oz (75-80th percentile), and was 25 inches long (70th percentile).

Our house is coming along very well.  We are supposed to move in on November 4th.  The outside is not completely finished, but it looks pretty good.  The inside was being painted and we're guessing the floors might be next.  The kitchen cabinets are in and are being stained.  We took a trip over there last week to check out the backyard.  The boys are going to have a lot of fun in it.  We're just so anxious to move in!  We're definitely ready to be out of this apartment.

Click the picture on the very top post above this blog entry to see a new album of pictures.

Summer - July 2011

We've been pretty busy since the last blog on June 7th.  Joshua is now 11.5 weeks old and is getting so big!

Here is Josh's one month old picture and his two month old picture.

Joshua was baptized on Father's Day, June 19th, 2011 at the 8:30 am mass at St. Regis.  We were lucky to have Father Tom Holder baptize Josh, because he has been reassigned to another parish and is now no longer our pastor.  We were very sad to learn he was leaving.  He married Brian and me, and baptized all three of our children.  After mass, we had a brunch at our house for Josh.  So many family and friends were there; it was a lot of fun!  Josh fell asleep right in the middle of it...he was beat!  He got a lot of neat gifts, including crosses for his room, clothes, books, and much more.  Below is a picture of us with Josh's Godparents, Mark and Sarah, and Father Tom.

That night, we celebrated Father's Day at my mom and dad's house.  We celebrated Brian, my dad, John, and Mark.  It was great.

We took a trip to the zoo on June 12th and another on June 24th.  We have now been to the zoo three times with Josh, and each time has gotten a little bit easier.  Noah and Evan enjoy all of the animals.

We went to our cousin Charlie's first birthday party on June 25th, where Noah, Evan, and MJ got to play in a really fun swimming pool/sprinkler.  They loved it! 

Josh had his two month checkup on Friday, July1st.  He weighed 12lbs, 10 oz, and was 24 inches long.  His weight is in the 85th percentile, and his height is in the 90th percentile.  He is bigger at 8 weeks than Noah and Evan were at 11 weeks!  He is still eating so well and sleeps well too.  He still wakes up at least once at night to nurse, but I don't mind it at all.  As soon as he wakes up and I stand over his bed to get him, he smiles so big! 

He LOVES to smile at us!

 

He loves his Bumbo seat!

 He also loves to coo and talk to us, mainly to Brian and his Grandpa Mike.  They can always get him to talk and "laugh" (he hasn't really laughed yet, but we can tell when he wants to).  He still loves watching his big brothers play around him too.  Although, sometimes they get a little too loud and upset him a little.  Josh had another doctors appointment July 18th to check out his eye that has had a clogged tear-duct since he was born.  His eye is fine; we just have to massage the tear duct as much as we can to get it to unclog.  The best part of that appointment was when the doctor told me that Josh is clearly an "overachiever" because he is already smiling at people other than his parents and can bring his hands together to hold them (things that they don't look for until a baby is 4 months old).  Noah and Evan must be teaching him right!

Noah and Evan have gotten to play with their swimming pool several times out in our backyard this year.  One time, Michael Jude came over and played with them.  They all had a blast! 

On the 4th of July, we all just hung out together at our house all day.  Noah and Evan swam, we had a picnic dinner on our patio, and then we watched fireworks in our front yard.  After all of the boys went to bed, Brian and I sat on our back deck and watched a skyline full of fireworks for about an hour and a half.  It was beautiful!

Noah and Evan are both doing great.  They got to switch from cribs to a "big boy bed" with Woody and Buzz sheets, pillow cases and comforter on July 8.  They love it.  They are doing really well sleeping in it, although Evan still likes to come in to our bed once in a while.  Evan likes to snuggle with Noah in their bed too, which kind of gets on Noah's nerves sometimes.  We love to go in to check on them before we go to bed to see what kind of positions they are in.  It's almost always hilarious!

Unfortunately, my maternity leave is up and I returned to work on Monday, July 11th.  Josh is already right at home with Noah, Evan, and MJ with Grandma Mary!  We're so blessed to have her watch our children, and I know she loves watching her grandkids.

Well, our current house was only on the market for one month before it sold!  We are still in negotiations with the inspection on our house (the buyer is being a little ridiculous, and that's not just us talking, but our agent too), but hopefully everything will work out with this buyer.  Our new house is still in the early stages of building, and is currently being framed.  It is so neat to drive by and watch the progress!  The photo below was taken today, July 20th.

Since it won't be ready until early November, we are being forced to move to a temporary location for three months.  We found a very nice apartment complex that does short-term leases where we will have a two bedroom, two bathroom apartment with an attached two-car garage.  We will store most of our boxes and things in one of the two garage spaces.  It kind of stinks that we are having to move twice, but we definitely wanted our current house to sell!  I think we'll enjoy the apartment complex for the three months we will be there.  They have a beautiful swimming pool and a movie room/theater that I think the boys will just love!

I hope to keep everyone updated throughout the moving process!

For more pictures, you can look at the following link (copy and paste it into your browser):

https://picasaweb.google.com/lauraquirk29/JoshuaSBaptismAndSummer2011?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCNrq75vnq-28Cw&feat=directlink

Enjoy!
Brian, Laura, Noah, Evan, and Joshua

June 7, 2011

Joshua is now 5 weeks and one day old!  The time is flying, and we are all having a blast.  Joshua smiles more and more every day and is "talking" or cooing all the time now as well.

He LOVES his big brothers Noah and Evan.  Whenever they are around, he listens to them and is always looking for them.  They love him too.

Josh and I still have a little under five weeks left of maternity leave together...it is going way too fast!  Noah and Evan still enjoy going to Grandma Mary and Grandpa Mike's house most of the weekdays.
 
Josh had his first trip to the zoo on Memorial Day, May 31st.  It was pretty hot, but he slept most of the time in a carrier that I wore.  Noah and Evan always like going to the zoo, but got pretty hot, tired, and hungry towards the end of the trip.

Well, we have officially started building a new house!  Our current house went on the market 5 days ago and has already been shown twice.  Our new house will be just about 3 minutes away from our current one, and will be ready by early November.  Brian and I have had several meetings to select and pick things out for the new house, which has been a ton of fun!  We are so thrilled that the boys are going to be able to grow up in the new house we are building, which is bigger and in my opinion, more kid friendly.

Yesterday, Noah and Evan played in the sprinkler for the first time.  Clare (one of their Godmothers) bought them a "wigglin' waterpillar" that attaches to the hose and sprays water everywhere.  They absolutely loved it!  They stayed outside playing with it for over an hour.  We were afraid they might not like it too much, and were pleasantly surprised!

Please look at the link below to view some new photos of all of us.

https://picasaweb.google.com/lauraquirk29/LateSpringAndSummer2011?authkey=Gv1sRgCJjBz9jJ3IGzbA&feat=directlink


Love,
Brian, Laura, Noah, Evan, and Josh

May, 2011: Baby Joshua is here!

Hello everyone!

I have finally been able to sit down for a few minutes and try and figure out this blogger website since the webs.com website was no longer working for us.

Well, Joshua Robert was born on May 2, 2011 (his due date) at 4:37am.  He weighed 7lbs, 10 oz, and was 20 inches long.  Both he and I got through the labor and delivery just fine and are still feeling fine today, two and a half weeks later.  We've been enjoying our time together very much!  Daddy, Big Brother Noah, and Big Brother Evan are also loving having Josh in our house.  Noah and Evan love him so much already.  Noah loves to point out his "little feet" and "little legs," and Evan likes to stroke his hair and say, "It's okay, baby" (even when Joshua isn't crying).  They are adjusting more and more each day to having a new baby brother.  At Joshua's two week check-up, he weighed 8lbs, 8 oz, and was 21 inches long.  He is in the 85th percentile for height, and the 60th percentile for weight.

Joshua has done so many things already!  He went to his first wedding rehearsal dinner and wedding at 4 and 5 days old.  Congratulations, Damien and Shannon!  Joshua also attended the graduation and graduation parties of some of our cousins and a close family friend.  He did this at 12 and 13 days old. He even went to the eye doctor with me today, at two weeks and 3 days old.  He loves to nap, smiles frequently, and likes listening to his big brothers talk (and sometimes yell).  He hasn't quite taken much of a liking to "tummy time," but we still do it anyway :)

Please click on the link below to see the whole album of pictures we've taken so far with Joshua in our lives.  You may have to copy and paste the link into your browser to make it open.

https://picasaweb.google.com/lauraquirk29/BabyJoshua?feat=directlink

As I learn more about this website, hopefully the blogs will come across better.  I'll keep you all posted on our new lives with baby Joshua!  After reading this post, please click "subscribe by email" so I can keep you updated when I post blogs.

Love,
Laura, Brian, Noah, Evan, and Joshua