Life. Has. Been. Wild. And Crazy. And Fun. It's been that busy time of year -- springtime, end of school, the fabulous beginning of summer break, and long long days. I personally love it. Know I say that every year. Being outside until dusk in the long days of June is pure heaven. We've been at the pool, at the tennis court, and in the yard.
Anders has been having a great time; and Halle has been her usual summer happy self. She's getting a small break from school this summer, though Aunt Nissa and I are planning some activities and some home school for both kids! She's also been in the stander a lot. Anders had a one-week break and now he's in a half day tennis camp at Furman. That kid loves to talk. One of my favorites is that instead of "more" he says "more-der." It's a conjugation thing that is so cute. "He has moreder than I." I'm sure that will disappear soon but it's pretty sweet.
Anders had no chance in our fam of being anything but a sports nut. Mama C has made that a personal mission and now Anders truly is a huge sports dude. He love baseball, especially the Braves. The other day I even heard him say, "we don't like the Yankees, right mom? Are they mean?" He knows a lot of the Braves players. The other morning when he woke up the first thing he said was "Freddie Freeman hits a lot of homeruns." When we bat in the yard he says something like, "I'm the Braves and you're the Gamehocks (his pronunciation of Gamecocks). I'm Justin Upton. I can transform into Freddie Freeman, Dan Ugglan, and Evan Gattis. Who are you?" This coming Friday our friend Juan is taking Erik, Anders, and Steve O to a Braves game, and he is going to be in heaven. The other night we played front yard baseball at Rob and Jaime's, and had a blast. The boys barely beat the girls. While at Rob and Jaime's, Rob and Anders played some old school Nintendo RBI baseball and at one point Anders hit a home run and looked at Rob and said, "You're my best buddy."
Also on the sports front, Anders watched some of the French Open with me. He's a Novak fan. And he likes Nadal. In the final he pulled for "the guy with his hair sticking up everywhere." (Rafa). He likes to go out in the driveway and hit the tennis ball back and forth. "I'm Novak. Who are you? You be Serena." or "I'm wearing my baseball hat backwards. Which tennis player wears his hat backwards?" "Andy Murray does sometimes." "Ok, I'm Andy Murray with a backwards hat."
He also loves music. Unfortunately I've introduced him to some baaaad country music (I keep telling Erik if he doesn't like the music then he needs to brainwash Anders in a different direction). Anders knows all of the words to "Cruise" by Florida Georgia line. He likes the remixed version with Nelly. He also sings a lot of Jake Owen songs including Barefoot Blue Jean Night" and plays his air guitar.
I mentioned to Anders that I was sad that Roger Federer lost in tennis and that he was getting old. Anders said, "yeah, he's gonna die soon." I told him that no, he isn't that old... he is just old for tennis but younger than I am. And he said "he's not going to heaven soon with Daddy B and Mach," and I said "not yet," and he said: "We miss them. We'll see them again one day."
Anders is just full of life and love and excitement. Every day when he wakes up, it's something new. Today's question was about swimming. Yesterday's about a friend in Tennessee. He wants to know if it's a Nissa day or a Blanca day (meaning who will come play with him!). He likes to take naps only because it means he can stay up late. He LOVES to go to Grandma and Grandpa and Nissa's house and wants to make sure that He-Man sat on the couch and acted sad if he doesn't get to go! Anders also loves biking at Furman with Nissa and He-Man and volleyball on the back porch.
I do love how much he and Halle love each other. She likes when he sits beside her on the couch an just gets this look of contentment on her face. He loves to hug and kiss her. He plays with her and watches Baby Signing time with her.
Here are some photos from late spring and summer:
Pops and Anders at the Greek Festival where lots of rides were ridden and delicious goodies tasted:
Rob, Jaime and Anders at the Jason Aldean Concert. That kids was grinning from ear to ear during Big Green Tractor.
Anders and Grandma snuggling
Halle showing off her standing abilities in PT
Playing with switches (the communicative kind)
Water Day at the Furman CDC! Such a fun day of playing outside.
Anders' first kids run -- a mile at the Take Flight 5K at the downtown airport. They got to run a mile on the runway near the planes. It was very cool.
Anders walking with Sadie and Ellie Dripps to the start line
Pre-Race Pose
Halle stylin' her new suit
We had so much fun at Freedom Weekend Aloft. Anders was brave on the rides and rode the Scrambler with me (I pretended to be brave but almost threw up), so he had to ride the spinning tea cups alone.
The motorcycle ride
Sweet Wyatt's first birthday
Mama B with Halle and Anders. As you can tell it was a sunshine-y day.
Kathryn Mikel and Halle Cathryn Mikel on the boat dock
Two of my favorite fellows canoe-ing
Cousin Becca with Smiling Halle. Becca is graduating from residency next week!
Pure Sweetness
Anders and Lena at Freedom Weekend Aloft
Halle and Mom
At the South Carolina Children's Theatre's production of Rapunzel with Ana Sofia and Addy
Great buddies
Summer wears us out:
Rob's birthday cake from Brick Street
Halle's adorable legs
Halle with Interim OT Heather doing great at therapy
Really good Clemson amigos
Another of our wonderful spring adventures was having Sister Peggy in town. It was an incredibly special time when she came to speak at Furman graduation. Being in her presence is pretty awesome. We got to host a gathering for her at our house and she hung out with the whole family.
Precious princess
Anders and his Dad at lunch in the Furman DH where the kiddos from the CDC made their own pizzas
Anders and his great buddy He-Man
A wonderful gals' night out to celebrate Brook's 40th. At Sip!
The CDC students serenading the Furman students in the DH
Awesome Mama Cia with an Atlanta Brave tipping his hat to her
Mother's Day 2013. My fave kids in the world. Such a great day including a long run and lots of family time.
My favorite husband.
On cold, rainy days Anders loves to ride his scooter around in hundreds of circles. He likes for us to be announcers and call the "monster truck race" and reference exploding engines, wrecks, all the racers, etc.
A pretty good napping photo. Read the box!
One of Halle's new IEP goals is to be more visually attentive to books.
She's definitely showing off here!
Really fun time hanging at the park.
Jason Aldean sings really loudly
Redneck Fellows
Some cute kids riding rides at the Greek Festival
Greek Guitar
Long-legged beauty
Really good buddies.
Watching the Preakness together.
Even longer-legged beauty with Pops
Hanging in the yard on a spring day
Sunshine-y Lady
One of our recent big events was Halle's surgery to place a g-tube on April 10. It was a decision that was not made lightly and we did not want to do it for a long time. Putting Halle through surgery is a stressful thought, but as she began to fight her bad-tasting meds more and more, her swallow got worse (who wants to swallow bad-tasting things) and her 2x/day meds began to take longer and longer. Now that we are two months out from the surgery we are SO relieved that we did it. Meds are easier than ever and Halle can enjoy her good-tasting formula so much more.
Here she is the morning of the surgery.
Pre-Op (yes we were nervous, but she was a cool cucumber)
When she woke up, she had a rough two hours but here she is in her hospital gown and bed.
Being a sweetheart in the hospital room. She even got to go home a day early!
Her first day home! Halle was amazing. The anesthesia definitely made her feel bad but when it was over her vitals were great and she was so sweet about everything.
Thumbs up, playing like crazy with Mama C while Sis is in the hospital
Here's Halle showing us she's hungry post-surgery.
Napping in the hospital
Here is Halle's tubie friend! It's a precious stuffed animal with a tube just like her. There's a nonprofit that sends these for free to kids who get tubes to make the children and siblings feel more comfortable.
Aunt Jaime holding the recovering gal
We also had soccer season. Coach Erik and Player Anders had the best time doing this together. We're already planning to do it again this fall. Anders loved it. Erik got to have a whistle. It was fun.
Anders and Hazel sitting on the sideline cheering on their teammates
And cousin Bo came to play with Eye Candy at the Bohemian!
..... and Anders got a black eye at Furman, hit by a frisbee.
We just adore Halle's new caretaker, Erika. They have already formed a special bond and adore each other.
We couldn't believe another school year at the CDC came to a close. There were many fun activities from water day, to walks to the lake, to Trike-A-Thon. Here are Anders, Harrison and Tom post-trike-a-thon-eating-popsicles. It was such a great year at the CDC. One more to go! Yay.
Showing off her holding skills!
Pops at the piano ---
Anders' imitation.
Driving from TN home.
Our happy little angel in TN where we went for a fun weekend visit while Erik was at LASA in DC
Showing off his "hittin skills" as he calls them. "I gotta practice my hittin' skills."
And our littlest Dr. Ching likes to give Halle her meds through her tube
And to cap off our busy but fun spring, Halle got to try out the multisensory dark room at the Washington Center pre-school. It's a cool, cool place. She loved it. Mesmerized in fact.
She wondered "why has it taken you so long to bring me here?"
Ok, this is super cool.
Finally got Anders to a bowling alley. Rob's idea. These boys had fun.
Loving some Baby Signing Time.
That's all for now folks. Have a fab summertime!
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