Updated pictures

These pics are from today when we went across the street to play at the playground. Honor was really excited about using chalk but Mikey decided it was more fun to throw them down the storm drain!

Hooray!....It's Spring!!

So let's see....there's lots to catch up on (yet again) :) The house that we put a bid on way back on the day after Christmas is about 99.9% ours. The banks have finally approved the offer and hopefully we'll be closing at the end of the month. Even though it took a long time I think it worked out for the best since it'll be less time that we have to pay on the apartment if we can't get anyone in before September. Also I think more people are looking for new places now that it's Spring.
Things are going well with the baby. The ultrasound showed that it's a perfect, healthy baby and even though we don't know what it is yet I'm still pretty sure it's a girl. I say girl and Darren says boy but seriously, I'm all hips and butt so it has to be a girl. Also I eat anything bad for me and I gain a pound.
It's so nice that it's finally getting warmer out...I think we've hit every playground in the area. It's great to see Honor and Mikey be able to tackle parts of the jungle gyms that they couldn't before (even though Mikey almost always gives me a heart attack!!). We're anxiously awaiting the opening of Davis Farmland, I think it's going to be so much more fun this year now that Mikey will be able to interact more and Honor understands more about the animals.

Honor's 3!

It's a little late but Happy #3 to Honor!! We went to Chuck E. Cheese's to celebrate and Honor's friends Kaitlyn and Alison joined us there. There were lots and lots of other kids there so it was good that we were a small group and everyone had a great time.
Honor's happy to finally be 3, now instead of saying she's almost 3 for the past 4 or 5 months she can say "I'm Feree" :) as she holds up her pinky, ring and middle finger (her thumb is holding down the index finger)
Also now that she's 3 it's time for preschool!! Honor is going to the Early Learning Center in Grafton and seems to enjoy it. She does have a hard time in the morning when I drop her off but the teachers are really great at getting her involved with something while I sneak out. She usually gets to feed the fish or paint which she loves!
I've been trying to get her a bit prepared for the new baby since she was too young to really remember anything about when Mikey was a newborn. I keep asking her if she wants to be a big sister again and she says "Sure" which usually her answer for everything. Then when anyone asks her if she wants a brother or a sister she always says a brother. Even though we don't officially know what this one is I'm sure it's a girl. Hopefully she won't keep calling the baby her brother if it's really her sister. :) I think she thinks of herself as the sister and she can only have brothers since that's what she's used to and always hears. The other day I told her to be careful around my stomach (like not elbowing me or trying to sit on my stomach) because there's a baby in there and she could squish it. She asked me if she could sit and watch the baby hatch! I told her she'd be there a while since the baby won't hatch until July so now she keeps telling me that she has babies in her tummy (a boy and a girl) and they're going to hatch really soon. Too cute sometimes! :)

Scan of the new peanut

It's not a great picture but it's the first of the new addition. For those who have no clue what your looking at, the blob in the middle of the black circle is the baby. It's sleeping there face down with the head on the left, it slept during most of the ultrasound which is why there weren't any good pics. Hopefully after the "big" ultrasound March 3rd there will be some better pics to show off. :)
I had an appointment yesterday and was surprised I lost 6 pounds!! Aren't pregnant women supposed to gain weight? But it's good, my Dr. and I were pretty happy. She only wants me to gain about 10 pounds at the most instead of the gazillion pounds I gained with Honor but I did good with Mikey only gaining about 12 pounds, hopefully I can do it again!!
Everyone here has been sick for what seems like forever! It started with a cold that went from Honor to Mikey to me and now Darren and once it seemed like Honor was over her cold she got a tummy bug that then went to Mikey and now I think I've got a touch of it. It's hard though to tell between my all day nausea that I get when pregnant or an actual stomach bug. It would be nice if finally no one was coughing, sneezing or having to run into the bathroom for one thing or another. Plus Mikey's finally teething again, he hasn't gotten any teeth since he was about 7 months old so it's about time! Anyway, enough of the misery here....Mikey's learned a few more words! He's been saying Dada for a long time but now he's got Mama, Nonah (Honor), Mimi (Grammy), Pipi (Pippin), Gum (come), Go, Dis (this), Dat (that), baby and goobah (goodbye)...very cute. :)

Pic Overload!!

I haven't posted any new pictures so here they are!.....

This is the kids today, Honor was being a good big sis and making sure Mikey was ok while I vacuumed. It was very sweet.



This was at Higgins Armory Museum Jan. 5th 2007



Mystic Aquarium




Mikey playing with Foster



Mikey's first Horse-back ride, Honor's an old pro already



Mikey's first birthday party at Tiny Toes

Baby Update

So I finally got an appointment with the OB on Monday. Everything looked good, I got a quick ultrasound to check how far along I am....I was guessing about 9-10 weeks and the baby measured 11 weeks 1 day! (That was a little different than when we went for our ultrasound for Mikey thinking I was about 8 weeks and find out I was only 6 weeks.) We got 1 picture, the baby wasn't cooperating much for good pics, it was sleeping with it's back to us. The next big ultrasound is March 3rd but it won't be that exciting since we're not finding out if it's a boy or girl but it's always fun to see the baby! She did put me on an aggressive dose of antibiotics just to be safe since I did drink some of the milk affected by the Whittier farm recall but hopefully it's only a precaution and I didn't actually drink any milk with listeria in it! It's nice to know that I'm almost out of the 1st trimester so my "All day sickness" will be tapering off soon. And the new due date is July 31st!

The Cat's out of the Bag! ;)

Cat, Baby, either way most of you know already that Baby Slocum #3 is on the way! We think s/he is due early August but not exactly sure yet....hopefully we'll have a better idea after the first OB appointment on Monday 1/7/08. It would be really neat if the birthday was 8/8/08 especially since Darren's birthday is Aug. 8th but since these 2 came early (3 weeks early) I doubt this one will make it into August. We kept it a secret from most up until the Family Christmas party last Saturday where Mikey wore a shirt I made for him saying "Big Bro 2008" Not everyone got it at first but as the day went on a few caught on to it and then it snowballed from there. :) It was fun to see everyone's reactions! We'll keep posting as we find out more although we're pretty sure we're not going to find out boy or girl this time until the big day.....how many times in you life do you really get such an incredible surprise??

Christmas 2007

What a great Christmas this year! It was so fun to see the kids get excited about Santa for weeks and then get up on Christmas and see all the things that he brought for them. Honor had asked for Baby Born which most of you would know if you talked to her between Thanksgiving and Christmas! :) Santa brought her Dora's Magical Castle and Mikey a neat wooden workbench. Of course the magic wands that came with Dora's castle are more fun to play with than the actual castle (Honor like to point them at someone and say "Shazam!") and the tools that go with the workbench are more fun to play with but that's ok. Santa did bring Baby Born and Honor's actually playing with her right now, sitting on the couch asking Baby if she's cold or hungry and telling her not to cry....very cute. :) And Santa also brought Mikey a Big Tonka dump truck, big enough to sit in and go for a spin in the bed of the truck. Santa had left these at Mimi's house so she could bring them later in the morning which was a good idea, that way there wasn't too much chaos in the morning.

We had a great dinner of roast beef, orange glazed carrots, spinach, green beans and sweet potato casserole by Mimi. Overall it was a great, fun, quiet day for all....probably the last time I can say that about a Christmas!

Happy Birthday Mikey!!

It's a few weeks late but oh well! Everyone had a great time at the party! So much so that I'm even thinking about booking it for Honor's party too. The good thing about Tiny Toes is that it's one big room so you don't lose track of anyone and all the toys are geared towards 5 and under. It was great that they had the bouncy house out too because the girls had so much fun jumping in there, even Mikey got a chance at it! :)
The cake was a big hit and it tasted good too! It was so easy to decorate, maybe I'll make all their birthday cakes (or maybe not....) There was plenty of cake for everyone and even extra for some drop-ins. Some guy came in with his daughter thinking the place was open for regular play and I told him it was a private party. I let him stay anyway since his daughter was going to get really upset since I turned them away and I even offered them some cake....the more the merrier right?? I'll post pictures once I figure out what the heck Darren did with them....

Can you believe it?

I'm the worse person to remember to update!!! So much for the updating on Fridays huh? Well, let me see if I can remember what we've done between Halloween and now.....

Halloween was alot of fun! Honor was Dora and Mikey was Boots. We went trick or treating in the center of town which is what most people do here in Grafton. The street everyone goes down is called South St. and it's full of old historic colonial houses. The people who live there decorate the houses very festively and there's always something for the parents (like warm cider or wine) at one of the houses.

So I guess the next thing that happened was Iggy's emergency surgery. I had noticed he was trying to pee one night and nothing came out. I knew this was an emergency but was in denial probably so I waited until the next morning to go to the local animal hospital and when they couldn't get a catheter through I had to bring Iggy to Tufts. there they got the catheter in but found that he had a tear in his urethra that needed to be fixed. Long story short I ended taking him back to the local animal hospital where he had surgery to repair the tear and essentially was made into a female cat since they rerouted the urethra to go through the pelvis and that makes it shorter and less likely to collect the crystals that caused the problem in the first place. So we can say now that Iggy's had a sex change! :)

Thanksgiving was nice, we went to Aunt Jackie and Uncle Skip's condo in Norton. There was lots and lots of good food as usual and Honor and Mikey loved playing with their cousin Matt. The day before Thanksgiving was pretty eventful though....Chris proposed to his girlfriend Megan! We knew this was coming but it's exciting that now Honor and Mikey can call her Aunt Megan. :) Honor and I are also excited about being in the wedding and hopefully this time Honor will actually drop the flower petals instead of running up the isle and them dumping them out later!

Last weekend we went to Sutton Chain of Lights and Grafton Celebrates the Holidays. Both events consist of businesses in the area opening their doors and having some sort of family friendly thing going on such as pony rides, face painting, visits with Santa, cookie decorating, etc. So in Sutton we went to Whittier Farms (this is where our milk comes from) and we went on a hay ride around the farm and saw all the nice cows that give us their milk. :) Then in Grafton, Honor went to see Santa (who she wasn't afraid of this time!!) and got her face painted. We all went for a hay ride around the Community Barn and then went to the center of town for the tree lighting.

Now we're gearing up for Mikey's birthday....I still can't believe it's been a year already!! When we were doing the "Frosty Stops" during Grafton Celebrates the Holidays I was thinking how I was sooo very pregnant with Mikey last year when we did this. It's going to be great to see all the kids having fun playing at Tiny Toes. I'm also excited to make Mikey's cake, it's going to be so cute! I'll post a picture when it's done.

Pumpkins anyone?

Today we went to Honey Pot Hill Orchard in Stow, Ma. to get some pumpkins and apples and cider. The kids had a lot of fun playing with the pumpkins and sampling the apples. They have a new pony named Lucky and not as many goats as before but it's always fun to go visit. Here's picture overload from our day with the pumpkins. :)

Last trip to Davis Farmland for 2007

Sunday October 28th was the last day of the season at Davis. It was a good way to test out the costumes (even though Honor was Sleeping Beauty, not Dora) and bid farewell to our animals friends until April.

See? I knew I'd forget to post on Friday

Geez! This week flew right by and I haven't even finished Mikey's costume yet! I don't even know where October went, it's a total blur to me but anyways....
Last Saturday we went to Salem, MA to partake in the Halloween festivities....no, we didn't go to any museums and no, we didn't take any tours. We did want to take a tour but by the time we were ready to they had stopped for the day (figures right?) So we watched the street performers, and also watched the interesting people who visit Salem at this time of year and the kids played on the Common in the center of Salem. I think it would've been more fun if the kids were older so maybe we'll try again in a few years.
Sunday we went to our favorite place......you guessed it, Davis Farmland! Their last day is the 28th so we decided to get some more time in there before the end of the season. Honor didn't even want to go see any of the animals, she played in the playgrounds, went for a pony ride and painted a pumpkin. She did a great job on the pumpkin by the way. It was her first time painting one by herself and with a paint brush instead of her fingers. Maybe next weekend we can get another day of fun in there, there's going to be a costume parade led by MooMoo Saturday and Sunday so hopefully we can get in on that.
On Monday Honor, Mikey and I met our friends Amy and Kaitlyn at the West Boylston Rail Trail which was so beautiful this time of year with the leaves changing. It's so cute to see Honor and Kaitlyn having fun playing together and I think it's even cuter that Kaitlyn calls Honor "Nonie"!
So I finally had an interview at Tufts! Things went well and I'm scheduled for another one next Tuesday. I'm excited to finally get back into the Veterinary world and the working world! It's great though because I'll be working nights Friday, Saturday and Sunday so the kids won't miss me much and they can get some Daddy time on the weekends.
Yesterday we checked out a different park in Millbury, it was really cool because there was one of those Merry-Go-Rounds that you don't see anymore because they're deemed unsafe by most people. We played on it for almost 1/2 hour having so much fun pushing each other around until we were dizzy!

Recap of the last 2 weeks

So I'm going to try and recap things and happenings of the past week every Friday. Don't hold me to it because I'm sure I'll miss here and there.
Let's see....we'll begin with last Monday being Mikey's first trip to the Emergency Room. I took the kids up to Mimi's house (that's what the kids call my mom) in Albany to pick up the rest of the stuff I'd left there and was planning on taking a one day round trip. Anyway, Mikey being the climbing maniac, part monkey, part mountain lion (he likes to growl) that he is he decided to tackle the stairs. Needless to say he climbed up a few but came down much faster than he intended and got a little banged up and to be sure he was ok we ended up taking him to the ER. The doctor saw him and sent him home with a clean bill of health besides a few bumps.
Also other things Mikey's been up to is learning how to walk! I know...a 10 month old walking? Yup, he's been trying the past few weeks with a step here and a step there but he finally took more and more steps yesterday and today. It's really adorable to see Honor holding his hand to help him walk, she's such a good big sister!
Honor's done a lot of growing up it seems lately. She named a stuffed animal all on her own last week, she got a pony from "Build-A-Bear" and decided to name her Tillie. I don't know why I'm so excited about this but it just seems like she's more aware of individuals and their names not just what they are but who they are. She's also discovered how much fun it is to jump on Mommy and Daddy's bed and to hid in our closet. One day last week it was awful quiet for a while and I called Honor to see where she was and heard a muffled voice yelling "In here, I'm in here Mommy knock on the door." So thinking she's in her room I go in there and no Honor. Then I hear some noise coming from the closet and there she is peeking out waiting for me to find her and she got so excited when I found her. She also now knows how to spell her name, I think it's because when people ask what her name is they also ask how to spell it. She knows the -N-O-R part but last night she told me it's spelled Rachel N-O-R. I thought about it and figured H-O does sound a lot like Rachel!
I'm finally looking at going back to work. Tufts Veterinary School is right around the corner from us and I figure it'll be a good place for me to finish my Vet Tech certification. I'm pretty excited about getting back into the veterinary field and it'll be nice to get away from the kids for a few days a week. We went to their open-house a few weeks ago where they open their doors and let people from the community see all there is to see there. I was amazed at their facilities and started talking to a few people who said they're always looking for experienced help and I thought it would be so incredible to work there. So I'm finally going in for an interview next week and I'll keep you posted when things start moving along!

Videos of the kids

Darren's set up a website so all of you can view videos we've taken of the kids. Enjoy!!

http://sarama.homelinux.org/cgi-bin/videx.cgi?DIR=/vids/web

Trip to Martha's Vineyard

For Grandma Slocum's birthday we went to Martha's Vineyard on Sept. 22nd. It was fun for all of us since we'd never been before and it's nice to at least say we've been there. I think Honor thought the best part was the ferry ride, she still talks about it. Once we got over there Darren went to pick up the car we rented (much easier to see the island in a car with 2 kids than a bike!) so while he was doing that Honor, Mikey Grandma Slocum and I went to the Flying Horses Carousel that was built in 1876. Honor and I had so much fun on the ride and she even caught a brass ring and got a free ride!! We drove around the island and stopped at a few interesting places such as the Black Dog Tavern and the Island Alpaca Company. We just can't resist seeing some Alpacas or Llamas, probably not until we have our own....nah, we'd probably still stop to see other ones even then. We spent a good deal of time in Aquinnah even though we couldn't see much past the fog. We did have the unfortunate opportunity to view a sun bather who thought he was in a secluded cove, or maybe he didn't, who knows, but it made for an interesting trip to Aquinnah. We finally stopped for some dinner in Vineyard Haven before we had to catch the ferry back. We stopped at a restaurant that seemed like a nice, normal place but come to find out it was a very formal, very expensive place and dinner ended up costing more than the car was to rent but oh well! it was very good and a nice end to the day in Martha's Vineyard. We were hoping Honor would start to fall asleep on the ferry ride back but I think she was just way too excited to be on the big boat again, at least Mikey fell asleep and made it all the way home with out making a peep. :)