Severely Overdo Update

I know my diligence in maintaining this blog has been worse than pathetic. However, I think I have some pretty darn good excuses for being a slacker - sometimes I feel about how Evan looks in this picture. To say the least, a lot has happened in the last year. Here’s the good, the bad and the ugly:
· Economy takes a grueling dive into the asphalt from outer space.
· Aaron laid off with the masses at LifeScan, but has to stay working there until March 2009.
· Julie gets eye laser surgery in February (yay!)
· Evan has his first trip to Hawaii in March (pictures/blog in previous post).
· Slight panic occurs at the realization that the best job prospects are NOT in the Bay Area. An opportunity for Aaron arises in Salt Lake City, Utah instilling further hysteria as our sole research on the area (i.e. HBO’s Big Love) reveals that Utah would not be the place for us.
· Evan starts becoming extremely mobile – lots of crawling around and rolling everywhere.
· We are saved from Utah when Aaron is offered a job in beautiful San Diego with Covidien. Julie is extremely lucky because EDAW has an office in San Diego and they were very enthusiastic to have me transfer down there.
· We put our house on the market at the absolute worst possible time to do so.
· Aaron starts at Covidien in June 2009 while Julie and Evan stay in the Bay Area.
· While Aaron was gone, Julie had possibly the worst month of her life (yes, worse than law school). Here’s why:

o Evan was sick for 3 weeks straight with a fever that hit 103.5 at one point. We made 3 trips to the hospital. He refused to drink any fluids at one point.
o I had to keep the house sparkling for showings, which is nearly impossible with a baby. We had at least 6+ people coming every day to see it.
o I almost killed my cat Bear because she was under the sofabed when I put it back together (mom was staying with me to help out and was sleeping on the sofabed since our guest bed was packed in the garage for showings). More than $800 later for xrays, blood work and emergency vet visits, she ended up being okay with only severe bruising and puffiness (however, this was her 9th life apparently – more below).
o Aaron got sick when he was home for one of the weekends.
o Mom got sick shortly after.
o All of this while I was still working full time and deadlines were naturally crazy during that time. I ended up using all my vacation so that I had to take a leave of absence when we
finally had to move down to San Diego.

· We sell the house and take it off the market.
· We take a desperately needed family trip to Seattle. Pictures are on the picasa site.
· Julie and Evan move to San Diego and we all live in corporate housing for about a week. Evan starts to pull himself up and stand.
· After contingencies are removed, the buyers back out and a fight ensues over the deposit and panic creeps up that it will be nearly impossible to sell an empty house.
· The house is back on the market.
· Luckily we sell again almost immediately and no issues happen with this one.
· We move to an apartment in San Marcos while we look for a house in San Diego.
· Evan has his first birthday! Pictures on Picasa.
· Evan starts walking and saying more words.
· Bear does not return after going outside one evening. Poor Bear-Bear. I made regular visits to animal shelters and we put up signs, but she was never found.

Okay, so now you say to yourself – it has to get better, right?
· Julie gets promoted.
· We find an amazing house in Carlsbad: 10 minutes from the beach and town, minutes from shopping and freeways, across the street from a preserve with hiking and biking trails, large and cozy, and on a cul-de-sac.
· The weather is absolutely perfect here.
· Our friends Amy, Rich and Drew visit over Thanksgiving to help us move.
· The whole family comes to visit for Christmas and we have a wonderful time.
· Aaron and Julie take their 1st vacation together sans family in 3 years to the Yucatan in Mexico.
· Evan is absolutely amazing (‘nuf said).

So now that I have gotten all that out of the way, I will try to be better about posting little stories of Evan (because that’s what we really care about right!) He is currently almost 21 months. He has taken to running everywhere instead of walking. He is stringing together words, like "mama shoe" or "mama juice" when he wants something. We are getting a peak at the terrible twos - he is starting to perfect the Julie-patented stomp and stare. He can read the numbers 1 through 10. He is a pro at eating (but he always was.) And there is lots more to report, but in the meantime, please enjoy the recent photos of him posted on Picasa.

I love kites!

Let's go fly a kite...up to the highest height...up in the atmosphere...up where the air is clear...Let's go fly a kite! It was a beautiful, breezy day this past Sunday. So we strolled to the park and we were happily lounging about, letting Evan roll around and play with his toys. Then the man with the kite arrived! Suddenly, Evan was completely enthralled and super excited. The kite flier was pretty talented - whipping the kite all over the sky, sending it into twirls and spins, and darting it up and down. This is a video of Evan's reaction - you can see his eyes follow the kite all over the sky.

Here is a picture of his total excitement and joy. It's also a great shot of his two teeth!

Family Pics in Hawaii

Evan in Hawaii

Chillin with the mom-ster.
I am not so sure about this sand and water stuff. What are you subjecting me to?

Oh OK, maybe it isn't so bad after all.


















A hard days work deserves a nice long nap for Evan and Tutu.

Bink Control Acheived!

Evan now has full binky control, which means that he can find the binky and put it back in his mouth. He can even do this while sleeping! This is a life changing event as we can now sleep through the night on most nights. Also, instead of having to find his mouth with the binky (which is a difficult maneuver while trying to drive with him in the backseat facing backwards), we can just hand it to him and let him do the rest.

It's a tooth!

Or at least it is if you really blow up the pic. You can certainly feel the future grinders when he bites the fingers. He also drools like a leaky faucet. He seems to be none the worse for wear because of it, other than a slight fever, which doesn't seem to stop the arm waving, leg kicking, and frantic breathing.

He has developed a cold, which has caused a lot of mouth breathing and consternation while feeding....when one cannot breathe out of the nose, one must prioritize....eating or breathing. Both very important.

Oh yes, and he started day care this week, part time. He is easing into the schedule this week and goes full time next week! Mommy left the first day in tears, but he seems unfazed by it all (except for not wanting to nap).

Evan Soon to Be Six Months!

The following photos are a smattering of recent adventures that Evan is into lately. The first photo represents Superman time during which Evan loves to be propelled up in the air above our heads and flown around while we are lying on our backs. He also loves to drool all over us during this activity.


This second photo represents an endearing time period. Evan wakes up incredibly early - between 6 and 7 am, so on weekends, we would be so exhausted that we would just bring him in bed with us after he awakened. He would usually play for a while and eventually fall asleep between us. for a little nap There are some really cute photos of this activity on our picasa web album site. This photo was taken during the 1st part of Evan's 5th month and is no longer an approved activity because it messes up his napping and sleeping schedule for the rest of the day. But we sure loved taking naps with him while it lasted.
This third photo presents Evan's reaction to solids. As you can see he didn't quite know what to make of the experience. He would frown and move his mouth as if he was trying to eat the cereal, but pretty much every spoonful would dribble down his chin and end up on the bib instead of in his mouth. We also made a video of the event which I will eventually post on Picasa. He now eats solids like a pro and giggles incessantly between every spoonful.
This last photo catches Evan in the act of rolling over. He does roll over from his tummy to back when he feels so inclined. But he actually prefers to works really hard on skooching and the beginnings of a crawl that he forgets to roll over before he gets too frustrated. As soon as he starts crawling, we are in trouble!

Evan will be turning 6 months this week! Check out the Picasa site for more Evan fun.