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::Lucas Sleeps::

We are so blessed to have such a great sleeper. Lucas sleeps very well now at night. Goes to bed at 8pm and is up between 7am and 8am. Then goes back down for a nap around 9am or 9:30am. He usually naps for 1 1/2hrs to 2 hrs. Then he takes a nap around 3pm for an hr. I'm sure as he gets older it will be just one 2-3hr nap later in the day. Any chance we could be blessed twice? I guess we'll let God decide on that one.

Lucas is into sharing right now. He decided to share a puff with me when I opened my mouth. I'm sure this won't continue but I really do want to encourage it by saying Thank You in a happy tone. He does really well with the NO thing. Of course he does go back every time to what we tell him NO to in the first place but steps away with a firm NO.

On Saturday Lucas and I plan to leave the house to let Eric work on the basement. Last weekend didn't go well because we were snowed in and Lucas wanted to nap but couldn't because Eric was being loud in the basement. Lucas really needs his naps. So since it looks like its going to be nice on Saturday we'll we leaving Eric so he can work on the basement and get closer to getting us out of this house.

I keep changing my mind on what theme to do for Lucas' 1st birthday. Eric really doesn't care what I do and would rather me be in charge of it. Its between two different ones. I'm pretty excited about it. Even if our baby is growing up. He is so much more fun now ;-)

Well I bet he is going to get up from his nap soon so I should do something productive.

::House Stuff::

Who knew trying to get your house ready to sell could be so stressful. Maybe it doesn't stress others out but it does me. I have been having trouble sleeping at night because I lay awake thinking of everything that needs to be done. Then with what ever house we get, there is a whole other level of stress there. So much is going through my head. It just want little fairies to come and finish our house, sell it for us, and find us an awesome house some where haha. I don't think Eric is really that stressed out, but he's pretty laid back.

Lucas is 9 months old tomorrow. It won't be long until we are planning is FIRST birthday. The time has flown by but he gets cuter every day so its okay. He has such a little personality. I have a feeling he is going to be a tough discipline. He listens pretty well to "NO", but not always. He's better with Eric, must be that deep voice he has. He is such an active little boy. He just wants to go, go, go 24/7. Yesterday he was so hyper. I loved yesterday. He was happy, active, such a good boy. He napped really well, smiled all day, listened to me. Today is another story. I guess you don't get good days every day but I can't wait until he is a little older. We will have so much fun together.

We are so ready to see Spring. This snow has way over stayed its welcome this winter. Today it has been very sunny and I wish it was melting the snow quicker. It has been a long, snowy winter. Where is the global warming now? *eyes rolling* I would love to get out and take Lucas for a walk but not in this weather. I hate how depressing winter can be.

I'm still hoping someone will adopt our dog Dynamo. If not then I'm going to have to put the guilt aside and break Eric's heart and give her back to the shelter. I hate getting so mad at her for barking, biting, running around after me all the time. I had to put them in the basement earlier because I couldn't stop yelling at her and I didn't want to scare Lucas. She sounds like a joy, doesn't she?

::Going to the Beach::

We are supposed to being going to the beach this weekend for the long weekend but since we are going to DE we aren't sure if the travel will be clear of snow of not. I really would like to go and get away but we'll have to see I guess. 


After we get back from the beach we are hoping to buy the rest of the stuff to finish the basement. The rest of the dry wall, the flooring, etc. I don't think we'll be done by the end of this month like we were hoping but maybe March. We won't have everything done upstairs but if we get lucky maybe someone will just buy it but if not then we'll continue the trim, finishing the rest of the floors. We are guessing this will be a first time home for a new couple or for an elderly person because its a smaller house and a ranch. But we have a certain price we want to get out of it so we'll keeping working and doing minor not expensive things around the house to attract more buyers. 


Lucas is now 19lbs. We are hoping he fits in his 12-18m clothing for this summer since we bought most things last summer when they were on clearance. He goes for his 9 month appt at the end of this month. I'm excited for them to see how much he has grown. He loves real food. He doesn't even want anything pureed any more. Last night for dinner we had sloppy joe's at my parent's house and we took some of the mixture and put it over some bread and cut it up and he really liked it and then he had a little apple sauce as well. So I plan to continue with the oatmeal for at least a couple or one meal because it has so many nutrients in it and then give him what we are having for dinner. I think he'll like that. 


Well off to start up the crock pot for dinner tonight. Many exciting things for us to come that I'll be blogging about later. 

::Shh...Sunday::

::Help Needed::

If we are going to get this house on the market the end of February then we need to pack up some junk and possibly the animals. I'm going to have to request some help from my mom during the week days after she gets done with work because its nearly impossible when I'm home alone with Lucas. We need to get some boxes and get packing. All of this makes me nervous for some reason. I've never packed up all of our stuff and moved it before. I'm just ready for some more room.


Lucas has been so active. He never stays in one place for long but he is more interested in toys. We bought him a Jeep walker and he loves it. The expression on his face is priceless and he runs with his hands twirling up in the air, too cute. He is now 18 lbs 6 oz. I can't believe how much he has grown. 


Eric's 28th birthday is next weekend. We are heading over to the beach for the weekend. It will be a quick cold beach trip but it will be nice to get away. Eric is mostly excited to get Lucas in the pool, since there is an indoor one. Don is coming along as well so it should be fun. Hopefully Lucas sleeps well in his pack n play and it doesn't mess up his amazing sleep schedule we have going for us here. 


I'm excited to get our tax return back. I have so many things planned for it. Eric said I could use it to buy furniture for the basement. I hope to not use it all for the basement but to save a little chunk for a king sized bed for our next house. We haven't really bought much of our furniture so it excites me!! I think we bought the couch and then the dining room table and that is it, everything else was given to us. 


Off to clean up the kitchen that is long over due. 

::Busy Busy::

Lucas turned 8 months old on Wednesday. Eric and I are noticing that he looks so much more like a little boy rather than just a baby. In a way its kind of sad to see our baby growing up but we know it will be so much excitement to see him grow. He got his 5th tooth this week and is now sleeping through the night again. He's wearing cloth diapers to bed and not leaking through any of them which makes for a better nights sleep as well. When he was born he had a ton of hair that was pretty much red. Then most of it fell out and he has a full head of hair again but its dirty blonde now, with a little bald spot in the back which is growing in slowly now that he is sleeping on his tummy. He says "Mama" and "Dada" now and looks at us when he says them. He has a little personality that is for sure. We can't believe how much more we can love him every day. He's a little sweetie. 

(http://www.cablecommunicators.org/resources_pm.php)

Well if all goes well with the basement we are thinking about possibly listing our house on the market in the end of February. We aren't in any hurry to sell but hope it doesn't take longer than a year. I guess this all means that we need to clear the junk and tidy up a bit. Start collecting some boxes to put away unnecessary items around the house so its clean for viewers. We decided its not a bad idea to try and take advantage of this tax credit a little since it goes until April some time. The realtor says it has really helped move houses along pretty quickly, especially in our area. I think it will be an exciting and possibly stressful time for us. We are hoping to upgrade for at least a 4 bedroom house, nothing too big but a little more space would be nice. 


Time to get ready for bed so we can enjoy our sleep time until Lucas wakes up in the morning around 7am for a feeding. Hopefully it won't be any sooner than that. 

::It Has Been Crazy Around Here::

Just Emily posting:

Lucas has been having a rough couple of nights. We weren't sure why on Sunday night he didn't sleep well. If I had to guess I think it might have been that he filled his diaper fast and has leaked onto his jammies. We cloth diaper him but since Eric is still getting used to this and he diapers him before bed I've been letting him use disposables for bed time. Well Lucas is becoming a HUGE wetter at night and I'm thinking he needs to be in cloth for that too. I just need to make sure I have diaper Eric can figure out available for him at night like the Bum Genius velco diapers. They are the most similar to the disposable diapers.

Last night we put him in one of these diapers and doubled the inserts and he slept much better and didn't wet through the diaper. It was a better night for us all.

Eric has had an interesting week. He was offered a new job by a different company but with the same contract he had been working on. They were offering a pay raise as well but he decided to turn down the offer and stay with his current company because he has really enjoyed working for them and they have been and were planning to be loyal to him and he wanted to return the favor. Well over the weekend this other company contacted him back and offered an amazing pay raise that was hard to turn down so Eric said yes to them because they wanted a response that evening. So Monday morning Eric went to his boss to let him know the situation and they were shocked that he turned down the first offer and very understanding about the second offer but they wanted him to stay and said they'd match that offer. Eric was shocked and also excited that he was so wanted. ;-) He really does love this current company so he contacted the other company and told them, sorry but he was staying where he was. They told him that they were sad to lose him but if he ever became unhappy with his current job to contact him because they'd be lucky to have him. So he got an awesome pay raise and gets to stay with his current job.

Not much happening with me, just trying to keep up with house work and take car of Lucas who is now crawling all over the place. He's up from his nap now so I have to go get him.

::Transfered Our Blog::

Emily likes the "cute" backgrounds you can get for the blogger so we decided to move it. I'm okay with that because blogger is by google after all.

*********

Eric has been really busy at work. He is working 50hr weeks. He recently got a very nice job offer from another company but we decided it was best he turn it down and stay loyal to his current company which has been so loyal to him and plans to continue to be loyal. This is the first job he's enjoyed in a long time.

Emily booked our vacation house for this summer for the Beezhold vacation. This place will be perfect for the growing family because its big, fenced in, and has the lake in the back yard. We are excited about summer coming.

Lucas has been having a rough week this week. He hasn't been sleeping well. He wants to move all over, but is limited at the moment. Although he did crawl a small amount this morning, so I'm sure he'll continue to figure it out and be crawling all over the house in no time. Should be fun for Mama. He talks all the time too. We are waiting for his first real word to come out.

This weekend Eric will get back to work on the basement and hopefully get things moving so we can get down there with our tv and couch and such.

Enjoy the new blog, be back on another time.

Eric, Emily, & Lucas

Stats on Lucas: 18lbs, size 6-12 month clothing, 12-18 month shoes

::Sleep is Good::

Here we are in 2010. So far it hasn't been super exciting, but we are pretty sure that is good.

Eric has been working in the Fairmont office this week. He has been able to come home for lunch and enjoy some Lucas time. He has been working until 5:30 or 6pm this week so by the time he gets home we have dinner and Lucas is off to bed at 8pm so he doesn't get much time with Lucas. Eric thought that he would be working two projects, the reason he is working extra hours at work but he isn't going to be so he might take Friday off. Lucas and I will be happy to have him home with us.

Emily has been stuck inside for the week except for when we went grocery shopping on Monday. It has snowed every day and the roads are awful so I've been taking the SUV to work leaving her and Lucas with no car to leave in. Monday was a bad day for Lucas. He didn't sleep super great that night and so when he got up at 8am he was still tired. He was very fussy and Emily felt worn out when I got home. That is why we decided to head out for dinner and to Walmart to get some groceries even if it was messy on the roads.

Lucas has a new sleeping patter for night. He used to go down at 10 pm and wake up all through the night and we'd go to him and comfort him and then he'd be up at 6am or 7am for the day. Well when we went to get his booster shot we had a talk with the doctor about this. She suggested putting him down earlier and letting him cry it out. She said the first week we should prepare for no sleep because it would be really tough on Lucas. Turns out it only took a couple of nights of crying before he figured it out. Now he goes down to bed at 8pm and sleeps until 6:30am or 7:30am and get a feeding from Emily and then goes back to sleep until 9am. Then he gets up and nurses here and there all day but he gets a solid at 10am usually oatmeal. He then goes down 2hrs after he woke up for a nap so around 11am and sleeps for an hour. Then he stays up and plays and hangs out with mama and gets another solid, oatmeal, at 2pm. He'll have another nap at 3pm and sleep until 4pm. We won't let him nap past 4pm so that he is nice and tired to head to bed at 8pm. He gets a yummy solid at dinner time (6pm), usually a fruit, veggie, or whatever we are eating pureed. So we are getting lots of sleep, and we are loving it.

This past weekend we bought a new dining/kitchen table, thanks to Dad Beezhold's Christmas present. We love it so much. Before we used to eat in the living room but now we are eating as a family at the table and Lucas actually prefers it. We think he thinks he is eating what we are, which some times he is.

2009 was such a blessing to us. We were so lucky to get such a wonderful little boy. We are excited what 2010 has in store for him and are excited to see him grow and see his personality flourish more.

::2009 is Ending and a Crappy New Year Awaits Us::

We had a nice Christmas and kept ourselves distracted especially with Lucas. Christmas Eve we spent at Claire and Kevin's house and Dad came over and we had a nice dinner and unwrapped presents. We later went to the candle light service at the church which had a great turn out this year and we enjoyed it a lot. Later that night Lucas didn't sleep well at all and was up almost every other hour. So Christmas morning we didn't get up and moving as quickly as we had hoped. We had coffee and unwrapped the few presents we had between the two of us. Eric got a new xbox game and a blue ray player from his wife and Emily got a family necklace, Waterford wine glasses, and wine glass charms from her husband. Lucas got his exersaucer a while back but still enjoyed it that morning. After we had our Christmas we headed down to Joe and Marcia's (Emily's mom and dad) and had Christmas with them. They are always so generous.

Eric got: garage door opener, keyless entry, xbox controller, wireless xbox thing, xbox live, dress coat, and stocking stuffers.

Emily got: new flatware to serve 16, 3 new shirts, bunt pan from William Sonoma, serving platter from Crate and Barrel and stocking stuffers.

Lucas got: a sock monkey in a box (like a Jack n the box) ;), and a couple other toys and a walker which he is too short for.

From Don (Eric's dad) we got a generous amount of money that we are arguing on what to do with haha. Lucas got an awesome play center for crawling and walking that will last him until about 36 months. From Kevin and Claire, Lucas got a really cute farm ABCD toy and some swimming toys for the tub which we are excited to try out tonight. From Brian and Vanessa, Lucas got a fun table game and an activity center.

We must agree that Christmas is a nice time to get the things you need but Emily really enjoys giving more than receiving which can hurt my wallet some times. *haha*

New years Eve we are having a few people over like Joe, Marcia, Brian, Jamie, Micah, Don, and maybe Kevin and Claire. We don't have a ton of room but it will still be fun and we have a big tv to watch the ball drop. It will be nice to be at home instead of away from the home so we can put Lucas to bed if he wants to go down. We aren't totally thrilled about the upcoming year with the new health plan but we know God will provide for us and carry us through.

Before we got pregnant last September Eric had started on the basement. Then after we got pregnant he started on the nursery. Now Eric is back to working on the basement. We have our floor picked out and know how much everything is going to cost. He is working on the electrical work and then once that is down the dry wall can go up and then the floor can be installed. Hopefully it won't take too long so we can enjoy it a little bit before we put our house on the market. The plan is to move the office to the basement as well and have a guest bedroom available for anyone that might want or need to stay with us. We might even use the extra money we have right now for a king sized bed for our room, it would be nice. We'll have to upload pictures of the before basement and after so you get an idea of how much work was put into it. Emily is excited to decorate down there and already found a nice area rug at Marshall's.

Lots of things happening so there should be lots of things to blog about, hopefully we keep it up.

::Could I have that onesie back?::

It is 3 days before Christmas. Even though we've had our tree up and decorated for a month and the packages wrapped under the tree, it hasn't really felt like Christmas at all this year. It could be a part of us wishing it wasn't. There are many unhappy memories around Christmas pushing away the good ones this year. One year ago tomorrow Eric's mom died. Losing a mother is the worst. She is the one who gave birth to you, the one you saw the most every day. We are lucky God gave us Lucas to help cheer us up this Christmas and Jesus to give us all hope. Keep the family in your prayers.

Eric has a lot going on at work. He found out his project he is on isn't going to be funded until 2011 so he isn't sure about what job he'll be put on if they'll even have one for him. So I think he's been a bit stressed out lately. The one good thing is he had an interview with another company last week and he is waiting to hear back from them. It would be best if he could stay with CSC though because he loves his job there. Keep that situation in your prayers as well.

Emily hasn't been up to much. This week has been a little high strung for her as well. Lucas is cutting his 5th tooth so he hasn't been a happy camper. He isn't napping at all and because he isn't getting any naps he is really cranky all day long. Then last night we put him to bed earlier than he normally goes and it really messed him up. He was up just about every two hours. Eric tried to help out by patting him back to sleep so I didn't have to nurse every time but Lucas only wanted momma. So Emily got up and nursed him even though he didn't seem hungry he just wanted the comfort. We were joking that we could use that onesie back that we gave to Vanessa that said, "All mommy wants for Christmas is a Silent Night". Emily has been exhausted lately and isn't handing the dogs barking very well. She would be so much happier if we could find a home for Dynamo. She really needs a loving home. If you all know of any one who would love a small white Jack Russel mix about 6-7 years old, let us know. She came from the pound so she would be great for an older couple with no children. I think she adds some added stress to our lives that we just don't really need right now.

Lucas is 7 months old now. He is growing up so much. Its amazing how some times when we look at him he doesn't even look like a baby any more. He is sitting up, pulling himself up to a stand in his crib, babbling constantly, runs in place in his Exersaucer, giggles, has 4 teeth and working on the 5th. He is in a no nap kind of mood these days. At least he doesn't like to nap away from us. He likes to be comforted and we are guessing its his tooth coming through that is bothering him. He was doing really well with naps until now. He was taking three naps a day for 1-1 1/2 hrs. We both can't wait until this tooth is through and we are hoping for a break. Teeth have been popping through since he was 3 months old so I think we deserve one. Lucas is about 16lbs 6oz. He is considered average for his weight now. We are glad to finally have a good weight on him. Emily has had a rough time feeding him since he was born. I'm proud she has stuck with the breastfeeding though, even though I think most would have given up by now.

Well that seems like a good place to start with our weekly posts. Lots of things to pray about and try to find Dynamo a home ;).

Love,

Eric, Emily, and Lucas