More Summer things

First we are going to have a guessing game.  We want you to identify whose eyes these are (they are either Amanda’s, Glenn’s or Paul’s)

Now Here are some pictures that were taken during the summer.  First off, we bought a little kiddy pool so we could take Glenn out and let him have some water time.  He learned to splash very well by the end of the summer.

Glenn had become much more mobile during this summer.  At the beginning he was just beginning to roll, but by the first of September he was getting up on all fours and beginning to scoot and role around a lot.  Because of this new mobility, he found himself in tight corners he has not been before.

We also had fun one day and took Glenn to the Park and let him try the “big” kid things.

Glenn on his first swing!

Glenn found these little drum sets just to his liking

Amanda took Glenn one day to listen to the Ohio State Marching Band.

This past weekend We had some of Amanda’s family here to visit for the weekend.  We enjoyed seeing everyone again before we all part ways from the east.  We got pictures of each family and of all of the grandkids together.

This is what happens when you have all kids 4 years and younger!

Here are some pics of the families and with the grown-ups.

We tried to get pictures of everyone, but I didn’t figure out how to auto shoot my camera in time, so this is what we got.

We also have a little birthday shin-dig for family while here.

And a couple more pictures of Glenn, just for good measure.

Updates at beginning of summer

 

To begin with we enjoyed some visits of family over Memorial Day Weekend.  Amanda’s sister and family came and visited.  They also have a young baby boy almost the same age as Glenn, it was fun seeing them together.  Amanda got a taste of being a mother of multiple kids when she watched their kids while they got their eye exams at the College of Optometry.

 

Glenn has been growing and doing little new things every so often.  He has begun to roll over and over and now is able to get around a little bit.  He has started to pick up cheerios and feed them to himself, although only about 10% make it into his mouth.  Here are some pics of him recently.

We also have taken a couple of trips in the last month with my week break between classes in early June.  We visited the Dayton Air Force Museum.  Really cool, but HUGE!  We thought we would be there for only about 2-3 hours, and when we were about 1/2 way through it we looked at our phones and it we had already been there 3+ hours.  Glenn had been getting a little restless…no wonder!  Then we visited one of the American Indian burial mounds (not the one the Joseph Smith visited).  It was interesting seeing all of mounds and the museum about the artifacts they found, and the rituals they performed previous to making them.  It’s pretty similar to the Egyptians, they would do burial ceremonies and then build these mounds over the graves of the deceased.

More of May

Hi again,

I forgot to put a fun picture that Amanda took.  I think it is kind of fun.

May Information

Hi Again,

This month has had a lot of changes for us as a family and especially for Glenn.  First… Glenn broke in his first tooth a couple of weeks ago.  We had been expecting this for a while because he had been slobbering and getting cranky at times.  Now when he sucks on our fingers, it has a little bit, quite literally.

Glenn also started his first solids this last couple of weeks.  His pediatrician said to start him on the rice cereal about a week before his 6 week checkup to make sure he was starting OK.  It was a hoot watching him, and he has had some good moments and bad moments since he started.

Glenn eating first meal

Also, Glenn rolled over for the first time.  It’s kind of funny because he probably could have done this sooner, and he kind if “fell” over rather than rolling over.

Glenn rolling over

Spring Break

This year we went to visit Amana’s sister and family in eastern Pennsylvania.  While we were there we had fun visiting and also got to go to Philadelphia and see some of the historic sites there.  We also visited my brother and family in Connecticut.  We really enjoyed the time with family, even though it was pretty cold.  Glenn got his picture taken with his first pair of sunglasses (they didn’t really stay on his face though).  We were able to see some of the cool New England sites and fancy parts of Connecticut and Hartford.

Here are more pictures of us in Philadelphia and some of the things that we got to do while in Pennsylvania.  Glenn did pretty well most of the time with all the traveling and with with his schedule being all messed up.  We would carry him around a lot in the carrying backpack we had, which also doubled as a crib when he got tires.  We had a good system in the car of him sleeping for a few hours, then needing fed and changed, and then repeating this a time or two.  He only really had a screaming fit on the train coming back home for part of the ride.

We also visited Chinatown in search of a new purse for Amanda at the place she bought her last one 3-4 years ago, no luck though.  We also stopped and were able to visit Valley Forge for a little bit.  There is a picture of Glenn reenacting one of the soldiers sleeping in the cold winter nights during the revolutionary war.

 

WASHINGON DC AOA-PAC

I (Paul) had the opportunity to go to Washington DC in early April as part of the American Optometric Association’s political activism week.  Basically what the point of the whole thing is to go talk to you state senators and representatives about bills that the profession of Optometry would like to have passed or vote against bills that would they wouldn’t want to pass.  I spent two days in DC.  The first day was an intensive day of learning about the different bills that have pertinence to optometry, and also time discussing the point and techniques of going to talk to legislators.  The second day I was able to visit with senators and representatives from both Wyoming and Ohio.  It was a real treat to visit with them and they were all gracious, welcoming and interested in our positions.  Here are some photos of the trip.  For those of you who may recognize him, the photo with the senator is senator Jon Barrasso, of Wyoming.

Also, a couple more fun things.  We haven’t forgotten about Glenn, though Amanda was beginning to think so.  He has had some fun things happen this last month or so.  First off, he finally got to the point that he likes the “jonny jumper'” and he really goes to town on it.  With that strength in his legs, he also has begun to kick over his little jungle gym, or whatever they call it.

Jonny jumper thing

kicking over the jungle gym

We also had a challenging choir repertoire for the Easter program today.  The hardest piece that we sang was a canon from Bach.  Here is a link to the song that we sang if you are interested, although we didn’t have the trumpets, just the organ.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lnrHhYSGzd4

Happy May everyone!