A, B, C...

Here is Nathan's version of the alphabet.

Nathan's Evaluation
The lady came today to see how Nathan is doing with speech and such. She had some puzzles and little toys for him to play with. He loved that. She also asked me some questions and observed Nathan. She thought that Nathan is doing very well with things. She said his speech will come along with time. That is good to know.

I think his frustration issues are a lot better now. My theory is that he got a little touch of the sickness that Jacob had and that made him tired and cranky. That is what I am hoping anyway... I don't want that Nathan to return!

Jacob is mobile!
So Jacob is now officially army crawling! Here is a video of him doing it. It is funny to see him doing this because Nathan never did this. It is so cute.

Nathan Talking
So his speech evaluation is tomorrow after I get off work. That should be very interesting to see what the speech therapist thinks. She is coming to our house for the evaluation, so that will be nice. I'll update to let you know how that goes. On a good note, today he said mommy consistently for the first time. Before this he would either say momma or bobby. Yay!

Visitors!
This past weekend we got to visit with Daryl's sister and her family. They came to visit us. It was good to see them and their 5 kids. It was an adventure trying to get all 7 of our kids checked in and to their correct Sunday School class.

Jacob
He went in yesterday for his 9 month checkup. The doctor thought things were looking good with him. He is still little, weighing 17 pounds and 2 ounces, but she thought that was fine. Nathan at this age weighed 20 pounds, 11 ounces. He was 27.25 inches long. That is just a little shorter than Nathan. Also, measuring a squirmy baby is not an exact science! :) He didn't have to have any shots this appointment and he will return at one year old.

Nathan
Now for Nathan... he has been SUPER fussy and whiney these past few weeks. He is a little better here at the house, but whenever anyone comes over or we go out to someone's house, he turns into crazy child. I don't know what is up with him, but Daryl and I are praying it passes quickly! We think he may have a touch of what Jacob had last week. He got sick one morning last weekend and has been kind of clingy and tired recently and also his appetite has been coming and going. Even the teachers at his class at the YMCA have commented the last two days that he is not himself.

While we were at Jacob's appointment, the doctor asked how Nathan was doing and we got on the subject of his slow talking. She suggested I call and get him a speech evaluation to see if he would benefit from some speech therapy. I called a program in KY called Project First Step. I guess they come to the house and will test him to see. Hopefully some of the behavior issues are the result of him not being able to communicate his needs and desires. We'll see. I'll keep you updated about this.

Training Our Troops!

So, last night I got the coolest opportunity to help train our American soldiers for combat.

Down by Fort Knox, they have a place where civilians can participate. It's called the Zussman Urban Combat Training Center and I got be a terrorist.

Yeah, I know what you're saying... "but DW, you have a red goatee and I'm pretty sure that terrorists don't look like that. You're too white!"

But, see below... are you sure about that? Some of us got guns! At least the guy on the far right (Maxim) looks like a terrorist! Crazy Ukranians :)



We got to participate (about 20 civilians total) on two different training exercises. I've never been to bootcamp, nor seen anything like this. It felt very very real when you see explosions, helicoptors, tanks and hear gunfire and troops yelling "get down get down get down." We had normal paintball guns. The troops had super-mega "military" paintball guns. Instead of the normal round paintballs, they were 9mm "pill size" paintballs. It was pretty cool.

I personally played more of the lookey-loo "random citizen on the street who sometimes gets to close to the troops" both times. I wasn't arrested and was generally left alone. If I got too close the troops, they yelled at me until I figured out what they were saying (I couldn't speak english of course) and ran away.

I look forward to going back.

--DW

Sick Baby :(

So Jacob has been sick for the last few days. It started last Thursday morning when he threw up at the YMCA. We had to leave early. It seems when he gets too much food, it all comes back up. So today I have been feeding him just a few ounces every few hours and that seems to be helping him. He is pretty pitiful though. He is sleeping a lot and gets pretty droopy like the above picture.

Boys Everywhere!
This past weekend Daryl invited two coworkers and their families over for a cookout. With all of the kids it turned out to be 8 boys, the ages were 6, 4, 2, 2, 1, 1, 1, and 0. It was pretty funny to see them running around and that there were no girls. Nathan freaked out a little in the beginning when they started touching HIS stuff, but he was fine after a few minutes.

Counting...
Nathan is doing better with talking. We are really starting to try and make him talk instead of whine for everything. The whining really drives Daryl and me crazy. He can now count to 10. He loves to tell us the time and point out letters on signs and in the store.

Almost There
Jacob is not crawling yet, but he is really wanting to get up on his knees. If I help him he can get up for a little bit. He can rotate around in a circle pretty well. He has 4 teeth now and his hair is getting pretty long. It is so blonde which is pretty interesting. He goes back to the doctor in 2 weeks, so that will be good to see how much he weighs now. He is a skinny-minny.

Just for fun
Nathan with a goatie and Jacob with a mohawk!

My Dad (Dan Hunter)
Some of you may know, my Dad went into the Hospital last Sunday with chest pains and an irregular heartbeat. He's been there ever since getting a lot of tests and procedures done.

Turns out, that he was pretty close to two bad things - stroke and heart attack.

When his heart started freaking out, it was causing blood to not circulate properly through the heart and that could easily lead to stroke. So, they did all sorts of fun complicated medial stuff, and got that working again. During the process, they found out he's diabetic, so now he gets the joys of a new diet and lifestyle.

When his heart got back in rhythm, they had scheduled a heart cath to see if there was anything to be worried about. When they did THAT procedure, they saw he was over 90% blocked in one area of the heart and had to put a stint in. Wow. 90%. So, that was a heart-attack ready to happen. They put in two stints and he had to lay flat on his back last night.

But, the GREAT NEWS is that I just talked with him and he gets to go home tonight. Praise God!

Anyway, please pray for my Dad, Dan. He's doing well, but I know this was a small shake up.

Please pray for my mom, Delores, too as she deals with an aging... no.. old... no... MORE EXPERIENCED Hubby... yeah... that's it. More experienced is a better word.

--DW

Random Stuff
Here is cute photo I took a few days ago of the boys...

A few weekends ago we got to stop in and see our friends, Chris and Angie. They have moved back to Indiana and live between Daryl's parents house and our house. It was great to visit with them and see their son. He is just 2 weeks older than Nathan. They had a good time playing together. Here is a picture of them. Daryl had to be behind them to keep them still for 2 seconds while we took the pictures...

6 YEARS

Another year to create
precious memories together.
Another year to discover new things
to enjoy about each other.
Another year to build a life
rich in love and laughter.
Another year to strengthen a marriage
that defines "forever."

-I love you Daryl!

Long Time No Post
Sorry to not update the blog in so long! In an effort to fix this, I have created some new posts and dated them in the past so that it doesn't get too confusing. You'll have to go through and read some of the older entries to get caught up.

Things are well here. The YMCA job is going very well. I enjoy it and the kids are enjoying playing with others as well. My class has about 12-14 kids right now. I am getting to know them pretty well. When school begins in a month or so we will have 22 kids. I work with another lady and she is the lead teacher for the room.

Our garden is coming along. The tomatoes are going crazy! They are very tall and have tons of tomatoes. The cherry tomatoes are starting to ripen now. It will be a little while longer for the others. I have gotten several cucumbers, zucchini, and yellow squash as well. Here is a picture of some twins we had a little while back...

Nathan vs. The Dentist
We just got back from the dentist for Nathan's first appointment. It went okay overall, but we basically had to hold him down. He didn't think it was a very good idea to look at his teeth. All looked well to the dentist except for the fact that he does have an underbite. We'll see how things go when his adult teeth come in. If it continues at that point, we'll have to go to an orthodontist to see what to do to get that corrected.

Family Visit
I was able to see both of my brothers this past weekend. We hadn't been all together for a few years, so it was great to see them! My oldest brother lives in California with his wife. She was not able to make the trip unfortunately. My other brother lives in Alabama with his wife and almost 2 year old son. He and Nathan got to play together and have a good-old-time in the sprinkler and on the slide. They are starting to get to the age where they are actually starting to play together. Here are some pictures from our time together...

Happy 4th of July!

Hunter Family Reunion '07
Well, we just returned from Southern Illinois to visit with Daryl's side of the family. We had a great time. There were 18 of us total. With 10 grandchildren in the family, Nathan and Jacob have a lot of other kids to play with. We stayed in a cabin with Daryl's parents. It was a nice place and they had a lot of farm animals to look at. We got to eat, swim, play snakes, go to church, see my nephew get baptised, have a bonfire, visit, and eat some more. Jacob went swimming for the first time and we found out he is a fish! We are going to try to do this each year around the 4th of July. Here are some pictures...

Wiiiiiiiii

Our new Wii just arrived and we are enjoying it. There is bowling, pool, golf and many other games. Daryl is much better than me on the games, but it is still fun. It is fun to play with friends and actually requires you to move around unlike most video game systems. It is pretty cool so far.

Quick YMCA Update
I got my TB test done and my background check came back so I am good to go. On Monday I go in to fill out some paperwork and then I start officially next Wednesday.

Jacob Update
Today I took Jacob in for his 7 month weight check. He is doing well and gained 3 ounces since he was 6 months. That's not very much, so the doctor asked me to add a few feedings to his schedule to make sure he is getting what he needs.

Another exciting event in his life is the emergence of a tooth. It is his front bottom left tooth. That should explain the massive drools!

YMCA
I finally heard back from the Y and they offered me the position from 8-10 each day in the 4-5 year old room. I went yesterday to get the first part of my TB test and go back tomorrow for the follow-up. When that gets done and my background check comes back, I can start. I think it will be neat and low stress.

Caffeine Free!

For any of you all that know Daryl, you know that he is a Diet Coke addict. Well, you will be amazed to know that he has now been off caffeine "cold turkey" since last Friday evening! Can you believe it? He had his share of withdrawal symptoms (headaches, tiredness), but he is doing very well with it. I am pretty proud of him for this. We figured it up and he averaged about 3 liters of Diet Coke with caffeine a day before! Here is a link to an article from John Hopkins Medicine about the effects of caffeine withdrawal... pretty interesting.