A little of this and a little of that!

I gave Megan a teenis lesson one evening and then when we got home she started teaching Andrew! One day they will get to play against one another.


Andrew trying to hold the tennis raquet like sissy showed him!

My grandma on the left turned 90 two weeks ago and we of course had a party for her. This is a picture of me with both my grandmas. I have been priviledged to have both of them in my life.

Megan had a field trip last week to the zoo! Andrew got to go with us and yeah we got to use our zoo passes again! The funniest thing happened that morning though. Andrew and I was standing outside of Megan's classroom. The bell rang, and all the kids from Megans class were making over Andrew. We showed the kids in her class a few of Andrew's signs that he uses and they couldn't get enough. Suddenly the teacher comes out the room wandering what happened to her entire class, because no one was coming into the class room. The teacher just laughed and asked the kids to come into the classroom. All I can say is Andrew knows how to draw a crowd. He cracks me up!!!

Megan and one of her friends walking with Andrew at the zoo!

Megan got to touch the sting rays at the zoo!

Our neighbor friends had a party and invited everyone on our culdesac! One of our friends has his own band and they played and sang all evening! Andrew couldn't get enough and he was in his all and glory when he got to touch the mic. Andrew loved to dance and at one point all the neighbors were chanting "go Andrew"! He had everyone cracking up! Once again he knows how to draw a crowd. I have a feeling Andrew may be the class clown one day when he starts school. When we were leaving the party, everyone kept telling us that Andrew really knows how to party!

Andrew has found a little girl friend who lives across the street with cheeks as big as his! Its a match made in heaven!

Our neighbor John singing to Andrew!

By the end of the evening the kids ended up inside our friends house and were watching a movie. What a great time we all had!

We have been putting this stuffed animal in Andrew's crib since he has been home. My brother in law Ryan gave it to him as a coming home present. Andrew has been scared of stuffed animals since he has been home, and he just usually throws them. Recently Andrew has been becoming use to this little doggie being in his bed, and just today he cuddled up with it at nap time. It may not seem like a big deal to most, but for me it is just one more thing that Andrew has overcome. Now, if we could just overcome his fear of real dogs will be okay!

This just cracked me up. We had this chair sitting in our kitchen and
Andrew was standing on it. The next thing I knew he fell in it and couldn't get out! So me being the great mom that I am, I grabbed the camera rather then helping him out! Oh Well! One day Andrew will laugh at his own video!

An Andrew Brag Session!

Well I guess I'm Andrew's mom and this is my blog, so I guess I have the right to brag about my son. All I can say is what a smart little guy he is becoming. Setting aside his speech delays which he is coming a long way with, he blows my mind every day what he understands and what he learns. I have continued working with teaching him signs, along with the speech therapist, and he knows up to 25 to 30 of them now. I had to start writing them down because I was forgetting ones that he knows, and he would do some that I haven't done with him in a long time. In fact when someone watches him, I forget to tell them some of the basic signs and Andrew gets frustrated not understanding why they don't know what he wants. It is wonderful to be able to communicate with him. Andrew is also coming along with his talking. He says about 10 words now, but not consistently. Sometimes he just rambles on and on, and other times he is so quite. One thing I can say for him, is that he is constantly on the go, and he never sits down. He does pretty good sitting in the car seat, and stroller when I need him to, but any other time, the kid just runs everywhere. He actually hasn't gained any weight in the last few months, and he is getting taller, so I'm sure that is due to his activity level. Andrew still has a ton of personality. This kids draws a crowd anywhere we go. I think part of that is due to him just having a look all his own, and those cheeks are just irresistible! Here is a few cute moments I had with Andrew this week. He is always making me laugh, so I have to remember to grab my camera and capture everything I can.

Andrew has been screaming a lot at dinner and pointing to the table. Up till now we haven't been able to figure out what he has wanted. We discovered that he just wants to feed himself his food. Unfortunately, Andrew has been picky about some of the things that he eats so we still give him some of the older stage baby food, just to give him some variety. Well the baby food is very runny, but we have let Andrew start trying to feed himself. We are shocked how well he can do it. This video is the first time he used a spoon on his own. You go Andrew!!!

This is what happens when you leave the bathroom door open!

We start our kids doing chores early. It wont be long and Andrew will be doing all the laundry!

Our Memories of Summer 2008!

I put together a slideshow of our summer memories. I tried not to put to many repeat pictures from our blog in it, but some were just classics. It was however, wonderful having the summer for our family to continue to bond. When Andrew came home in January, school for the girls was in full swing. Having the summer for us all to just spend quality time together, made us feel like a complete family. Andrew sometimes cries now when we have to drop the girls off at school. He loves having his sisters around the house.

A Blessing From Above!

Some of you may know, but others may not, so I will share this blessing anyways. My brother has been in the ministry for years. He has served as a youth pastor for awhile in Ohio, then he moved to Georgia to help with a youth ministry of around 500 kids. Then my brother felt called to bring his wife and child back to Ohio, and he wanted to complete his masters degree, and eventually start a church. My brother came to me and my husband last winter and shared his vision. He wanted to start a church in Macedonia, Ohio, and was going to need as many people to help as possible. We prayed about it and felt that we needed to be there to help get this new church started. We spent a lot of time over the summer with events in the community to get the word out. The church participated in hanging many door hangers on doors in the community, we did 3 parades over the summer, and we also handed out free glow bracelets with info on the church at some different fireworks. In August we had a movie in the park night (The Bee Movie) that the rec center in the area helped sponsor, and we got around 700 people to come to that. Chick Fillet donated 1,000 chicken sandwiches for the movie event. Then we had a back to school festival in mid August and we got 350 people to come to that, and only 25% of the people went to the movie night, so we had a lot of new faces to that. Well I have shared all that to say that my brother has prayed for 200 people for his kick off Sunday which was this last week. When the counting was done, by God's funny since of humor we had exactly 200 people who came to his first service. My brother is renting out the auditorium and a few class rooms in the high school in Macedonia, and below is the picture of the auditorium which is absolutely beautiful and seats up to 750 people. Please pray that God will continue to bless Stone Creek Community Church, and that we will see people come to know Jesus! That is the true meaning of this new church. Feel free to visit us on line at:
http://www.stonecreekcommunity.com
or too see my brothers vision more visit:
http://www.visionmacedonia.com
I'll give updates in the future but this whole experience has made such an impact on my family and I can't wait to see what is to come! God is good!!!!!

Main Auditorium at the high school that is being used for Stone Creek Community Church!

The End of Summer!

Well labor day has come and passed, and that means summer is on its way out. We are in full swing volleyball season for Alisha now, and that means games 3 days a week. We will have our lives back in two months. I'll have to post some pictures of volleyball later on. In the mean time we did spend our last summer day with the kids at the beach. We live somewhat near Lake Erie, so we needed to make sure Andrew experienced a beach at least once this summer, and I have to say he is a little beach bum! He loved it!!! I didn't hear him cry once the entire time we were at the beach. I do apologize for all the photos, I am a little crazy with taking pictures at the beach, and I only put in a few of the many that I took. I also love beach pictures in black and white! They make for great photos!

Andrew's first time in the water!

Megan gets burried in the sand!

Andrews turn to get burried in the sand!

Andrew's bib sums it up, "Major Trouble"!

I think we got a climber on our hands!

This is Alisha's version of fun at the beach!