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We can’t believe that 10 months ago today we met our little boy for the first time! He’s growing up so fast and is looking more and more like a little boy every day, instead of a baby. He’s really close to walking; he actually took 2 steps the other day toward the cat. He’ll do 1 step and then fall forward going from person to person as well. He’s also really into doing “so big,” waving, saying “bye bye” clapping his hands, and playing with his toys. Santa was really wonderful to him this year, he got some awesome toys and very cute clothes

Sean is having a great time with his Oma, Opa and Aunt Cate here in New York. It’s funny, he slept really horribly the first few nights that we were here, and my Dad and Colleen offered to take him in his room for the night to let us get some sleep. He ended up sleeping perfectly. He slept in their room again last night and slept perfectly again. I guess he’s just tired of his mommy and daddy and wants to be with Oma and Opa! They just love it

Here are some pictures of Sean from our vacation so far, along with Christmas pictures. Notice his Christmas outfit with his name embroidered on it from Stephen and Ally (Thank you!). What a cute gift. We got it for a baby shower gift and it fit him absolutly perfectly on Christmas morning. He wore it all day

Here are some more pictures of our time here, mostly of the birds and snow. We havae about 3 feet right now, although it’s packed down on itself some over the past few days. Still…a lot more than we get in KY and it made for a wonderful white Christmas.

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Grams passed away in her sleep last night. It was very peaceful. Services are going to be on Sunday. Thanks, everyone, for your thoughts and prayers over the past few weeks.

Em & Paul

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Sparing all the details and events from the past week, my mom and her 4 siblings decided, with Gram’s agreement, to take her off all medication for the c-diff infection, as well as the dialysis. They have set her up with good pain medication that keeps her comfortable, and only have IV fluids to keep her hydrated. She was moved out of the ICU and into the oncology unit 2 days ago. She doesn’t have cancer, but they are better suited for end of life patients; nicely set up, quiet rooms, less interruptions from staff, and just an all around better place to spend her final days. Family continues to stay by her side around the clock. They say that she’s content and comfortable. She’s even allowed to have coffee and coke by way of one of those sponge thingies.

Please pray for peace and comfort for all of us (family and friends) as we let her go, and for Grams, for safe passage when it’s time.

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Sean and I were playing a new game today. I got laughing so hard with him, that I had to get the video camera and record some of it. Unfortunately he’s been sick lately, and he got laughing so hard playing our game that he got himself into several coughing fits. Still….if this video doesn’t make you fall over laughing like it did him (literally), then you’ve got something wrong with you!

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Check out some pictures of Sean’s first Halloween, wearing his Aunt Megan’s tiger costume from 1982:

And senior night for Philip:

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We had a really fun weekend. My mom came down from St. Louis on Saturday and stayed until Monday. On Sunday, we went to the Conservatory and the Art Museum. The conservatory was really pretty – alot of cool plants. I would have taken more photos, but our main lens for the Nikon D80 is on the fritz so I was using my backup Olympus 750UZ. We didn’t get much time in the Art Museum, but we were able to visit a number of the wings and exhibits. Will have to go back there soon. Sunday night we had dinner at Teak for Emily’s birthday. Its a thai place. Brian tried to order his food with a spice level of 10 (on a scale of 1 to 10), but luckily he let us talk him out of it and ordered a 5
Monday, mom got to spend the day with Sean while we were at work. We are going to visit her this weekend too, so that will be nice quiet weekend away from Cinci.

Sean likes bath time!

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Apparently our house is a Sears and Roebuck kit house which were very popular from 1906 to 1940. These houses are a great part of history and luckily Sears has archived their history for us:

http://www.searsarchives.com/homes/

We are going through the floor plans and have a few that we think are the plans for this house. Our kitchen was remodled by the previous owners and I’m sure some of the previous owners have had their share of work into it.
It is pretty cool to lear a bit of the history of your house though. When Brian and Ash bought their house down the street, they went to the courthouse and library to do research on it. I may have to do that myself! These PDFs are priceless though. Depending on what model house we have, Sears priced them from $1600-$2500. Wow.

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Paul got on me because I haven’t written about my new job yet; so here goes.
I started my new job at Campbell County High School on 8/7/08. The position is a Transition Coordinator. It’s a grant position under Title 1 Part D. I’m working with students that are currently in Campbell Lodge or Holly Hill (residential facilities) or those that are transitioning back to the high school from the alternative school. Typically, these kids would come to the school, get enrolled, be handed a schedule and basically told “good luck!” There wasn’t anyone to make sure that the kids didn’t fall through the cracks…they had guidance counselors, but they are really busy and don’t have the time or resources to monitor these kids as closely as they need to be monitored. Thus, my position was created.
My overall goal for the program is to make sure that these kids graduate. This grant was created to reduce recidivism and dropout rates. I have spent the past 1.5 weeks developing the position from scratch. It’s been difficult because A) no one knows exactly what I’m suppose to be doing B) I don’t have a direct supervisor or team to ask questions to in my building C) I have a HUGE learning curve with learning the school system, the programs that these kids are coming from, and all of the in-school supports / programs / testing that is available for them.
Basically it looks like I’ll be spending my time helping the pre-transition process like getting their transcripts put into the computer, making a schedule for them, notifying the teachers of the child’s situation, and getting to know the kids before they even come to the high school. Once they are ready to transition, I”ll be showing them around and monitoring them weekly (via face to face visits, emails updates from teachers, phone calls home or to their residential facility) to ensure that they are holding up ok, fitting in, and being successful. There’s a TON more stuff that I have to do including holding ARC meetings, making a graduation plan, career planning, teaching organizational skills, social skills, self-esteem, etc etc etc. I already have about 40 kids on my caseload, and it will just go up from there. I assume that I’ll keep the kids until they graduate so my list will eventually be really huge.
It looks like it’s going to be an exciting job; all the teachers and staff at the high school and alternative schools are really excited for the prospect of the program and what it can do for the kids. I’ll update more in about a month to let you know how it’s going!

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So, some new stuff has def. happened recently.
My brothers company, CarDomain.com has downsized once again, ex-ing the staff from its long standing SoundDomain division, amongst others. SoundDomain.com is one – if not THE – largest online community for audio enthusiast. Their forums and members are very dedicated. They have users on there from beginners to shop owners, to those guys that seem to have nothing better to do then make their car as loud as humanly possible!.
Emily and I got a new phone system today. We’ve been using vonage for a while now – and previously another online group that went WAY under. Vonage has worked well for us, unless I had some huge download going Previously we were using a two phone 5.8ghz system that worked pretty well for the last 2 or 3 years. One of the phones recently started acting up so we have now upgraded to the new Dect phone system.
Dect? what is dect?? Dect is a new frequency used by home cordless phones. Its a lower frequency, but right now, its only for cordless digital phones – this means it should be a really clear, strong signal. Previously, the 2.4ghz and 5.8ghz range were shared with wireless computer networks, absorbed microwave and other electronic interference, etc. So this should be a nice upgrade.
I went with a Panasonic 4 extension system (it can take up to 6 handsets). Should be a nice upgrade to our 2 phone system – esp for those who want to get a hold of us . We looked at vtech, uniden, AT&T and other phone systems, but this panasonic one was the most comfortable unit, and to be honest … panasonic really has cornered the market on cordless phones.

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