Our little bulldozer

Scarlett’s personality is really starting to emerge. She’s persistent, won’t take no for an answer, and is very head strong. I think we’re going to have our hands very full with her!!! She’s walking EVERYWHERE and into EVERYTHING. It is a full time job keeping up with her.

Here is a prime example of how things are either going to go her way or no other way at all…. As you’ve probably seen in past pictures, we bought this fantastic little play yard for her. It has been great at keeping her confined to one space so that we are not chasing her around the house all day. Well, she decided that she didn’t like it anymore. Instead of crying about it, she just bulldozed it down. Seriously. She pushed on the walls until it all just fell apart. We were hoping this was just a fluke and kept putting it back together, but after her knocking it down about 4 times in a row, we just put it away. So now she has free reign of the house

She’s also loving the doggie door. She doesn’t crawl out of the house to outside, but from outside in. I think she’s over the back porch and this blistering summer heat.

Troy’s doing really good. Unlike Scarlett, he likes to be held A LOT and coddled. He’s actually pretty laid back. I think he may end up being a little mama’s boy! LOL!

We are somehow managing to keep up with the two of them…..

Growing like Weeds

The past two and a half weeks have been BUSY! It’s hard to believe that this Friday will be Troy’s 3 week birthday. The time is flying by, and he is growing so fast. When we brought him home he was a skinny little thing, but that is changing….. QUICKLY! I took him in for his 2 week check up yesterday. He’s gained 1 lb. 1 oz. and grown 2 whole inches!!!!!

Scarlett is still doing great as far as adjusting to the new addition to our family. She too is growing up so fast! She’s walking more and more. Her main problem is that she isn’t trying to walk, but trying to run. She’s into everything! She’s also turned into a little climber. She loves to climb the stairs, does her best to climb up on the couch, and even tried to climb out of the bathtub last night. During the tree fiasco last week our neighbor borrowed Joe’s chainsaw to cut up part of one of his trees that had fallen. In return, he bought Joe some beer. Here she is climbing the box:

She's not only climbing a Coors Light box, but she's also sucking on Troy's pacifier! :)

Speaking of the tree, it had to go. I had thought we could leave part of the trunk for a table base, but that wasn’t possible. When I came up with this idea I didn’t see the back side of the tree. We think it might have been a little diseased on top of being weak.

So, the tree is no more. For those of you wondering, it was a Bradford Pear. This is one tree that I will NEVER plant. I had heard that their life span was 20-25 years, but I never dreamed ours would crap out on us while we were living here. Of all the trees in our neighborhood that I have seen blown down by wind, they have all been Bradford Pears. The only positive thing about the tree’s departure is Joe’s pool maintenance. The thing about that tree is it has green leaves during late Spring through most of the Fall, and those leaves fall off (mostly into our pool) in the Winter. In the Spring the tree has these beautiful white blooms that last for about 2-3 weeks. Then they fall into the pool. Then the green leaves grow back, and we start all over again. Here is a picture of Joe holding Scarlett that I got this Spring with the white blooms:

The fence guys came yesterday and replaced the section that had fallen. Now we are just waiting for them to return today and stain it. As soon as we figure out what all we are going to do with our new open/empty space, I will post some pictures.

We also had a little extra excitement while the tree was being cut down. My cousin Blake along with his wife Karla and their 4 month old twins, and my Aunt Jo came for a visit. Blake and Karla live in Washington State, and I hadn’t seen them in FOREVER!!! Since our last visit, we’ve had 4 kids between us!

JoJo, Blake, Addison, Annesley (not sure which is which), Scarlett (not really cooperating), and Troy

Blake with his girls and Troy

We’ve got a lot planned for the next few days starting with tonight. My uncle is coming to town to meet Troy, and he’s taking me out for dinner. I’m really looking forward to getting out for the night and for a break even if it’s only for a couple of hours. Then Joe’s parents are coming this weekend to meet Troy. And Sunday is Father’s Day! This will be Joe’s 2nd… I wonder if the kids got him anything?? :)

Every Man Needs a Chainsaw

DEPRESSED. That is how I feel this morning. Last night we were hit with a HUGE storm that had extremely powerful winds. I knew that it was getting bad outside as the flap on our doggie door started blowing inside the house. As Joe stood and watched out the backdoor, he let me know that our fence had just been knocked over. I ran to look and noticed that part of our tree was gone. He immediately ran upstairs, got Scarlett out of bed, and we all got into the hall bathroom.

Once the storm kind of subsided, Joe went out to assess the damage. He originally thought that the tree had landed on his truck. Thank God that it didn't! We were mostly expecting hail damage, so he had put a tarp over it. Now those tarps are covering up the big section of fence that was knocked out. The fence company is supposed to be out later today to put up the orange safety netting to keep people out. We've got to be very careful about this open access to our backyard since we have a pool.

We are very fortunate to have out neighbor Randy. He and Joe were both out with their chainsaws cutting up the tree and moving it to the front. It had to be done last night as the tree was obstructing the back alley. They worked for about 3 hours getting this done.

Luckily, we do have our child safety fence between the house and the pool. This way our dogs can still go in and out of the their dog door without running into the street.

Now we have to cut the rest of the tree down. It's very lopsided and has the potential to fall over again. This happened to our neighbors across the street a year or so ago. We'd rather be safe than sorry.

I'm sick about the fence, but I'm way more upset about the tree. You can replace a fence, but it takes about 20-25 years to get a tree the size of the one we had. We've also spent the past 4 years trying to make our backyard an oasis.... a beautiful place to relax. When we moved in here all that was back there was the pool, concrete, dirt (where grass should have been) and 2 trees. At least one tree made it! We've also worked hard to block the view of the houses behind us. We love our neighbors, but we really don't want their house to be a part of our view.

I'm very thankful that nothing else was damaged (like our house!!!) and that no one was injured. Things could have been a lot worse!

Last night's pics of the damage:

Pics from this morning:

I think we've decided to cut the tree down, but leave the base of it at table height and start looking for a round table top to mount on top of it. At least this way we'll have a part of our beloved tree left and a sitting area out back. Also, notice in the picture above of how nothing else was damaged. The only other "damage" we had was part of the chaise lounger bent forward.

So far so good!

Scarlett is adjusting to Troy very well. She wasn’t very excited at the hospital or even the past few days. She’s mostly just ignored him but looks every once in a while and has smiled a couple of times. She has pushed him in the swing and has started showing more interest when he is being fed or if one of us are tending to him.

One “funny” thing that happened the other day was when Scarlett was eating her very first grilled cheese (thanks for that tip, Natalie!!) when Troy started to cry in the swing. I went to check on him and then heard her start crying. Joe was at the table with her and I asked him what was wrong. His only guess was that when one cries, they both cry. HUMMM…. Hopefully no one will be crying at all!

Troy is a really good baby. He likes to be held a lot and mostly just eats, sleeps, and poops. Our main handful is Scarlett. Since I had a C-section, I cannot pick her up for a few weeks. This makes me sad especially when she puts her arms out to be held or grasps onto my legs and won’t let go. Joe has had to make Scarlett his first priority since doing most anything with her requires her to be picked up….. picked up to be put in the high chair or taken out, picked up for a diaper change, picked up to be put in or out of bed, etc. We’re making it work for now, and I know it’s not forever. My mom is back for a couple of days to help us which is great! Joe had appointments this morning, so I really needed someone here to watch Scarlett and do all the things that I can’t.

Punkin and Peanut are adjusting well too. Punkin doesn’t care about any of them. He’s old and just wants to eat, sleep, and be left alone. Peanut has been dying for the past year for Scarlett to pay some sort of attention to him. He loves it when she pets him (which isn’t often) or just grabs his tags and shakes them. Scarlett and Peanut now play fetch together. Joe throws the ball, Peanut goes to get it, Scarlett then takes it away from Peanut and gives the ball back to Joe, and it starts all over again. If Peanut won’t go get the ball, Scarlett goes after it herself! This is fun to watch as Scarlett laughs so loud watching Peanut run after the ball.

Before I forget, I wanted to let you all know that Scarlett’s test came back from the Urologist free and clear of any infection!! Hopefully everything will stay this way. She will have to have her major testing done again in September. We’re praying that she has grown out of the kidney reflux or that it has greatly improved.

Troy Michael Farner

Troy Michael Farner was born on May 29, 2009 at 8:00am weighing 7 lbs 5oz and 19 ½”. So far everything has gone great! Scarlett has been at my mom's since Saturday and is coming home today. We miss her so much and can't wait for her to get back to us!!! I think things will get very interesting upon her arrival. I'm sure I'll have lots to say in the weeks to come....

My family

Scarlett kissing Troy :)

GranJan with her grandbabies -- I just love this picture!

Troy in the outfit he wore home

Getting ready to leave the hospital

Joe and Troy

Home at last!