Growing Kids

My smart girl stacked her boxes all by herself from biggest to smallest...almost :)

Just before we took Levi to his one month check-up.  He gained 2 lb 9 oz in 3 weeks!  (Weighing in at 10 lb 9 oz)  To compare...he weighs half of Juliana's current weight, Juliana just barely hit 10 lbs at 3 months of age, and he's 4 inches longer than Juliana was at 1 month.  I think he's taking after his cousin Kylan :)

Christmas Decorating

 We put up our Christmas tree this week!

Juliana "helped" by getting out all the "toys"

And Levi took a nap!

Unfortunately the string of lights on the bottom of the tree is having a problem...it sparked when I plugged it in and then the line got really hot...so until we take the lights off and replace them we can't turn the tree on.

After we decorated the tree Juliana and I made some salt dough ornaments and covered them in glitter.  I learned a big lesson that day...never do a glitter activity with a 2 year old when you have a newborn in the house!  Levi ended up with more glitter on him than Juliana did...and after 3 baths I'm still finding glitter on him :)  I knew that it was too humid here to do salt dough ornaments, but was hoping they might last till Christmas...however I think I might have to take them off tomorrow if they haven't already fallen off tonight...

Juliana and I also been checking out Christmas books from the library (and was embarrassed when Juliana thought the angel on the librarian's desk was a fairy), listened to MANY hours of Christmas music (we buy 1 CD each year that we stay in Honduras for the holidays...this year was Michael Buble), wrapped the gifts, watched 1 Christmas movie (so far), and will make paper snowflakes tomorrow morning!  And each morning when she wakes up, Juliana asks if it's Christmas Day yet and then tries to convince me that it is by showing me the tree (to prove it's Christmas-time) and then showing me the sun outside (to prove its day) :)  MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Happy Due Date Levi!

I realized a couple days ago that I never updated the blog when Levi was born.  And since I also hadn't downloaded all of our pictures off the camera until today, I'll just do all of that today, October 30th, Levi's due date!

If you hadn't already heard, Levi William Webb was born at Honduras Medical Center on October 22nd, at 5:37 pm.  He had been estimated to weigh about 7 1/2 lbs, but the first thing the doctors said after he was born was, "wow, that's a big baby".  He weighed 8 lbs 10 oz at birth, and seemed a lot bigger that first day than he does now (his face was pretty swollen and round).  He is a very good baby, rarely cries, and pretty much just eats, sleeps, and tries not to be crushed by all of Juliana's hugs :)

Juliana loves her little brother A LOT and was very excited when he was born.  We didn't tell her his name before he was born, because we didn't want her to tell everyone.  Most of the time she remembers his name now, but when I asked her today she told me his name was Baby Brother Webb :)  I think the excitement may start to wear off soon though...its very hard for me to get out of the house with the both of them and Kyle's been very busy lately, so pretty much Juliana, Levi, and I are home all of the time.  Before he was born we would at least walk to school a few times a week.  Now, every morning she asks me where we're going today, and when I tell her we're staying home she's pretty disappointed.  She has however gotten to go on a couple play dates and to a Fall party this weekend.  Should've taken a picture before we put the jacket and crocks on, but she went as a ballerina.

And just in case you don't have facebook, here's some of the ones I'm posting there...

Our new house!

A couple weeks ago Kyle, Juliana, and I went up to the school to look at the progress made on our new house.  Kyle had seen it somewhat recently, but this was the first time that I had been up in a couple months.  It actually looks like a house!  

This is the back side of the house; we'd have the right side (the part that's slightly lower).    There will be a patio on the back side (where the pillars are) with patio doors walking into the living room/dining room area.  The lower level also has a kitchen with pantry, 1/2 bathroom, and laundry room.  The 2nd floor with have 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, and an open area at the top of the steps for an office and maybe a smaller living room or play area or something.

This is the front side of the house (ours is the left side).  You can also see the water tower that they built in the background.  They've also dug a sewer system and have started digging the foundation of a 2nd building (that will have 4 apartments with 2 bedrooms each).

It's a little hard (exhausting) for me to get up there with Juliana, so I haven't been back since, but they were supposed to start on the 2nd floor last week.  Before we left for the summer we had been told they would start work immediately and have it done around Christmas.  There were some additional problems with the permits, so work didn't really start till August.  If I heard correctly, the builders are still being told the Christmas deadline, with the actual deadline being Easter.

Almost There

No new baby pictures today, as I think his face is too hard to get a good look at now...that and my doctor had a very packed schedule plus a patient in labor the day I went for my last appointment, so maybe he just didn't want to take the time :)  But everything is fine with the baby, I have now been going for weekly appointments, and my due date is 2 weeks from today.  I go for my 39 week appointment this coming Friday (a few days short of 39 weeks) and I think my doctor isn't expecting me to make it much past that, since Juliana was born at 39 weeks and 1 day.  And according to Kyle, there's only 2 more blackout dates that he can't be born on...this Saturday because of a big athletic fundraiser, and then Monday because he's speaking in chapel...  Personally I hope he's born early because our pediatrician leaves for a conference in the United States on my due date.  I think the only thing we're still unsure about is what our insurance company will cover...and its looking pretty bad.  In August our new insurance company told us that they cover 80% of hospital bills, but only 70% at the hospital where I will deliver.  However we were ecstatic that they would cover 70%.  Then a week and a half ago we found out that we had to get a bunch of papers from the hospital before they would cover anything, and then it would take 7-10 days for them to pre-approve my birth.  We managed to get the papers in 1 afternoon (a big miracle) and because it was so close to my due date they pre-approved it in a couple days (another big miracle).  But after reading the fine print, it looks like they MIGHT cover 50%.  Or if you read it a different way, they might cover more like 30%.  But either way we might not know until we're actually at the hospital.  And it's kind of open so that we're not even sure if we might have to pay all of it outright and then get reimbursed for a some of it later on.  So for now we've notified our credit card company that there might be a large charge made sometime in the next couple weeks from Honduras and are praying for an even bigger miracle in the meantime.

We have been working hard to get the house ready and I think we're nearly there.  The big sister was having a bit of a hard time at first, especially when we took her changing table/dresser and gave her a regular dresser (she likes to climb the changing table) and when I took the pink cover off the infant car seat and put a blue one on instead (when I was done she got into it, cried, and said "I NEEEEED IT!") After that I was kind of dreading taking away her crib, especially since we were moving her to a regular twin size bed.  But this summer we bought her some super cute bedding as a surprise (I had let her pick it out earlier in the spring and then waited till it was on sale this summer to buy it) and for a couple weeks kept talking about how she was going to get a special big sister bed and asking her if she was ready for it.  She was pretty sure she was ready and when a maintenance man from school finally brought it she was so excited.  She looks pretty tiny in it, and thankfully hasn't fallen out of it...though I line the floor with pillows and check on her a few times every night.

She's so proud of her new bed

Posing after she asked me to take a picture of her with her pony :)

Drawing pictures for mommy

Last Tuesday Juliana came home from a friends house feeling fine, but within 2 hours had a fever of 102.  The next morning we took her to this clinic that is a part of our insurance plan, where we pay $5 and it will cover Urgent Care, doctor's visit, lab work, prescriptions from the pharmacy, etc...  After a VERY stressful morning of trying to get Juliana to go potty in a cup in the clinic's bathroom (Kyle's sure she has some weird phobia), we finally went to the grocery store to buy a bowl for her to go in and then took her to McDonald's to bribe her with a hamburger.  We then went back to the clinic and waited for the results from that test and a blood test...then back to the doctor in Urgent Care...to find out she had a throat infection.  They gave us antibiotics, assured us that we couldn't get it from her, and sent us on our way.  Well apparently the doctor was wrong because I've had a sore throat and fever since Saturday.  I've talked to 2 doctors...one who told me to go on antibiotics immediately and get the infection taken care of before the baby is born, the other who said to wait it out and see if it might be a virus first and then if it doesn't go away then start antibiotics.  So at this point I haven't started the antibiotics and feel miserable, but don't really know who's advice to go with.  

There's been so many things going on around here...the biggest of all is that we bought a different car even though our old car is still not working...but I'll see if I can get Kyle to write about that sometime in the next day or 2 :)

Baby pictures plus the other cutie

 Sorry some of these are kind of blurry...I was too lazy to hook up the scanner so I took a picture of them instead.

Reading library books in her "classroom"

"Hello, bippa?  Happy birthday!"

Back to school

Well August is almost over, so I guess that means I'm past due for a blog post.  Soon after I posted last we left for Hawaii and spent the next month visiting Kyle's friends and family and doing a little work.  It seemed like a whirlwind of trying to fit in activities while people were around, while at the same time trying to fit in naps so Juliana didn't throw too many temper tantrums.   I think if you asked Juliana her favorite parts of the trip she'd probably say the pool and waterfalls.  She loved going to the kiddie pool with friends and throwing herself off the side so daddy would catch her :)  Kyle's parents took us to the Big Island for a long weekend and we saw a number of waterfalls.  She cried when it was time to leave a few of them and she still asks to see pictures of Umauma Falls.  She constantly amazes us with how well she remembers names of people, places, and animals!  During the day she'll bring up various family members from both Hawaii and Nebraska and ask to go visit them again.  

In addition to going to the kiddie pool and waterfalls, we also went to the Honolulu Zoo, the beach a couple times, Kyle got to play volleyball a few times, and a few other things.  Today I don't have time to explain everything but maybe in a later post.  

All our stuff, getting ready to load the car to go to the airport

Juliana was GREAT on all of the flights this summer and we all got a little spoiled on the flight from Honolulu to Houston :)  There were tv screens on the back of every seat and you got to choose whatever movies or shows you wanted...needless to say, none of us got as much sleep that night as we could have.

When we got home we were a little surprised at how dirty our house was.  For those of you who don't leave your houses for 2 months at a time, this is what our yard looks like every time we come back...actually that's what it STILL looks like right now!  

But we had left our house closed up, with a dehumidifier running, and a friend changing the water every few days.  Usually the house is a little dusty and smells a bit musty until the windows are opened.    When we opened the door, we discovered that our dehumidifier had stopped working at some point, all of the windows were wide open, random wood chips on the floor in a couple rooms, and disgusting black dirt covering every inch of the house.  We found out the next day that the school had fumigated our house again, so I guess they left the windows open to let all the smoke out.  It took me about a week (and 1 day with a maid helping me) to get everything in the house clean enough to feel livable.  And then I finally got around to opening and unpacking our suitcases!  All 9 of them.  In the last 2 weeks I think I've probably done like 30 loads of laundry (I usually do 3-5 loads a week) but I'm FINALLY caught up.  

Right about the time I got around to working on the suitcases we had to make a weekend trip to San Pedro (about 5 hours north).  Before every tournament Kyle has to go for a meeting with the other Athletic Directors in the Association of Bilingual Schools of Honduras (ABSH).  In addition to that, all of the Athletic Directors have been taking classes together for the last couple years.  (I think 6 classes, each about 4-5 hours long.  Each class given in a single day with a test at the end of the class...all in spanish.)  This weekend was the last class with a brief graduation and dinner the next day, so Juliana and I went along.   It was the first graduating class, with 10 athletic directors graduating.

Wasting a little time in the car before the dinner.

Kyle receiving a plaque from the President of the ABSH

Aside from laundry and weekend trips, school started this week!  Tuesday and Wednesday were half days, with today being the first full day of school.  Kyle is teaching PE for a little bit as the high school boys PE teacher will be arriving late.  He seems to be enjoying it, but it keeps him extra busy, and he's been really tired this week.

Our last bit of news, and big prayer request, is our car.  It was in the shop for the summer getting some things fixed, was back in the shop last week, and is now in the shop for a 3rd time.  The last couple weeks have incurred some bigger expenses than we had hoped and basically we just need it to get it functioning reasonably well and sell it as fast as possible.  Kyle has been going to some used car lots and test driving some cars, but because we're hoping to trade it in, we need the car running before we can actually seriously pursue a different car.  The repairs this time could take as much as 2 weeks, and until its fixed we're without a car of our own.  We're praying that it'll be working well enough to sell without costing us too much, and that as soon as its ready we'll know which one to buy.  We're looking for small SUV's that I will feel comfortable driving but get us down some rough roads as well, and will run well without needing any repairs for awhile.  AND we need it pretty quickly, with a baby on the way and its just plain hard getting to doctor's appointments without a running vehicle!  Not too much to ask for :)

Speaking of the baby, we went to the doctor last Monday...he's still a boy, weighs probably about 3 lbs, and measures right below the 50th percentile.  We got some very cute ultrasound pictures of his face that'll as soon as I can I'll scan and post.  The doctor is convinced that he looks more like Kyle :)

July so far...

So we've spent July traveling around visiting even more friends and family.  A few of the highlights... 

We drove up to Orange City and spent the night with Christa and her family

Stopping in at NWC to see the Brogan's and other professors and friends.    (We also had lunch with my former co-workers at Vogel's, but I forgot to take a picture.)

Gardening with Aunt Ruth

Bubbles with Uncle Randall

Loving on the kitties

Stopping in to see the Birky's

This past Saturday we celebrated my Grandpa's 90th birthday so we drove to Chester for a couple days to visit.  Juliana went out to meet him as he arrived.

Great-Great Uncle Johnny

Just being cute

Great-Uncle Kevin

Some horses live a couple blocks from their house.  This one is 40 something years old (I think).

Petting Candy

Offering to help figure out the new laptop

Petting Regalo