Pictures (all resized)

October



















November






















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January
























February












































"It's a Snipe!"






March




































April

It’s Been SUCH a Long Time!

I know it's been way too long, and there's no excuse. So I'll try to cover as much as possible from the past several months I haven't been writing (or at least post pictures from those months).

We've been busy working on our yard around here for the past several months. It's actually more like Justin's been busy working outside while Jack helps him move rocks and dig in the dirt, and Abbigaile and I keep ourselves busy around the house. Justin dug trenches and places irrigation all around our house and we're so excited that we'll have some grass around here and eventually we'll be able to start a garden! The front yard is almost done, right now we're just waiting for the last of the weeds to come up so we can kill them and get planting and mulching. After we get the grass and mulch in we're going to build a sandbox and possibly a small swing set for the kids. We think they'll love it, and I'll love that they'll have a safe place to play outside at home.

Now for the kids—Abbigaile turned 1 on February 18 and it's just amazing to me how quickly that first year goes! Abbigaile took her first step on January 14 and didn't stop after that; she was walking pretty well even before her birthday. She definitely wanted to keep up with Jack and she's doing very well with that now; Abbi's all over the place now and she is FAST! We went in for Abbigaile's one-year appointment and the doctor was concerned because she hadn't gained any weight and had only grown ¼ inch since October. So the doctor gave us a month to fatten Abbi up: we put butter on and in everything, fed her lots of high-calorie foods, and switched her onto bulked-up baby formula. Luckily, when we went back we found she'd gained 1 lb. 2 oz. and grew another ¼ inch in a month! Now we're just trying to keep the same sort of diet for her so she keeps gaining. Abbi says a few words now: mama, dada, hi (it almost sounds like ha), more (ma), ball (ba), and sometimes it sounds like she says "this." She loves her babies, TownHouse Crackers, Gerber puffs, her sippy cup, and playing with her brother.

Jack is SO SMART! He amazes me every day. He knows almost all of his letter sounds and knows how to spell quite a few words. Some of the words he spells are: Jack (of course), sun, train, stop, hat, log, car, and dog . . . just to name a few. He's so into reading, spelling, letters, and, oh yes, running. He's as busy as he ever was before and even though he got a trampoline for Christmas he still insists upon jumping on the couch and his bed. Jack is finally potty-trained (yay)! It's not to say that he doesn't have any accidents, but he's doing a lot better. Jack is too funny; he loves the show "Super Why," which is a reading super-hero show. Jack quotes the show and walks around and strikes super hero poses; if I don't already have a picture, I'll take one tomorrow. My current wallpaper on my computer is a picture of Justin and I and Jack is running through it. The other day Jack was looking at the picture and says to me, "It's mommy, and daddy, and super-hero Jack." He's super-hero Jack quite often, then other times he's "Jack, just Jack." I love it! Oh, Jack went to his very first Primary activity on Tuesday and he had sooo much fun! He got to do an Easter egg hunt and play outside; it was the perfect day.

Justin is starting to work like crazy because it's the beginning of wedding season. However, he just got back from a three-day backpacking trip with his scouts in the San Gabriel Mountains. He had a blast! He just got back on Wednesday and I'm so excited to see the pictures. We're going to the same area in June to do a day-hike with another couple and we're so excited for that! Who wants to babysit? ;) We just went out last night and celebrated Justin's birthday a little early (he'll be 28 on the 18^th). We went to the Brigantine for dinner then went bowling. It was so nice to get out and do something as adults. We're trying to be better about going out and doing something without the kids once a month so we can have some time together. Hopefully we'll be able to keep that goal :D

Currently, I'm interning at Jodee's Bakery in Temecula and I absolutely love it! I think I could bake for a living and be completely happy. The internship was my Christmas gift from Justin; he's the best husband ever! Oh, if you're on Facebook, I think you should go check out their page and become a fan. I get to work with a bunch of amazing women and make yummy things, how cool is that? I may be coaching cheer again (I'll know for sure in a few weeks), but I'll be coaching JV this time around. I'm so excited for tryouts and the prospect of working with some of my girls again. I just got my new pressure canner in the mail and I'm so excited to start canning soups, veggies, broths, chili, etc. Now I'm really going to be reading and checking out lots of canning books from the library. On a not so fun note, I'm going in for a consult for my wisdom teeth on the 19^th because they're killing
me! I'm not excited about the surgery, but I am excited about being pain free (because it's hard to even swallow right now).

I guess that's a pretty brief general overview of what's going on in the Lowell house right now. I guess just let me know if there's anything else I should fill you all in on. We love you all, thanks for putting up with my non-posting over the past months.

Just Pictures

I was looking at our blog after adding pictures to the last major post and realized that I really haven't posted any pictures since July! So now I'm going to do a post of just pictures. And our camera just kinda died so I don't know when I'll have new ones.

July

Pictures of Abbigaile's Room if you haven't seen it finished :)

August

Justin after our vacation; he didn't shave at all!

September

A "J!"

October

It's an "Apple Phone," Jack was waling around the house saying, "Hello!"

EXCITING NEWS FLASH!

I just wanted to make a quick post. Jack went poo poo in the potty this morning! I was unloading the dishwasher this morning and heard him go and shut his door, so I ran to his room and opened the door. However, I didn't realize he was right behind it and smacked him with the door (I think it was the knob). I grabbed him and made him sit on the little potty. When he stood up there was a little bit in the potty (I think he'd already started to go when he was in his room and it just fell in the potty when he sat down). Regardless, we gave him a new toy car to reward him. A couple hours later, while I'm sitting on the floor playing with Abbigaile, I hear him shut the door to his room again (a tell-tale sign!) so I start yelling "Don't go poo poo in your pants!" and run and grab him to place him on the potty, yet again. He scowled at me, but ended up making a giant poo poo in the potty! We were all so excited! We gave hugs and kisses, "I'm so proud of you's," and lots and lots of high-fives; so he got to pick out another new car this morning. I just hope that because he's done it once (and because he wants more cars) we can make it a habit. Jack, we are so proud of you!

LOTS to Catch Up On

It's been a little over a whole month since my last post and it seems like ages ago; I don't know how I used to go without writing for months at a time! I just looked at our last post to figure out where I should start—so, here it goes. Last time I wrote Abbigaile was suffering from a cold and it really started to improve, then it got really bad again and when we woke up that Tuesday morning her eyeball was completely crusted shut (ewww) so I took her to the doctor again. I'm so glas I took her in when I did because she had pinkeye and was starting to get an ear infection. We had her on Amoxicillin to help with the ear and kill everything and an eye ointment for the eye (obviously); our poor little girl was so miserable. Luckily she really started to improve after that. However, that following Monday I called her doctor's office to ask them a quick question about little Peanut and found that our pediatrician passed away that morning (we were shocked).

Abbigaile rolled over from her back to her stomach for the first time on August 6, and I missed it because I was out in the garage (but Justin watched her do it so it's okay). Justin was watching her the other day and she was rolling over like crazy, but he said she was getting frustrated trying to crawl/move herself . . . who knows, she may start crawling sooner than later. Her first two teeth popped through together on the 9^th; However, I'm happy to say that she really hasn't tried to bite me any more than she tried biting me before the teeth came in (if that sentence makes any sense at all). I don't see any teeth coming through for a little while, but we've just now started giving her solid food (rice cereal, yum!) and she seems to like it a lot. When I took Abbi to the Dr. they told me we'll want to be a little more cautious about when introducing new foods because her skin is quite sensitive, she gets rashes easily, etc. (apparently that could be an indicator of food allergies). Our little Peanut is now 26 ½ inches long (75 %) and 15 lbs. 12 oz.

Okay, sorry this is going to kind of jump now . . . I started this post on August 26^th and haven't had time to finish it. So I guess it's now been almost 3 whole months since my last post.

We went on vacation mid-August, but Justin said he'll write about that so I'll wait for him for that portion of our summer. After we got home from our trip we got Abbigaile to start sleeping in her own bed. It was so hard listening to her cry, but she does sleep a lot better now that she's in her crib for most of the night. Some nights are better than others and she does still end up in our bed in the middle of the night. She and Jack have both had their flu-shots and Abbigaile didn't even cry (she was about 16 ½ lbs. at that appointment). Abbigaile is now eating tons of solid foods (rice cereal, oatmeal, applesauce, pears, peaches, peas, carrots, squash, sweet potatoes, green beans—I think that's it), she loves them all, and I'm thinking we'll probably introduce finger foods very soon (we just have to introduce wheat). Since I last started writing Abbi has had several bouts of pink eye and her nose just started running this morning (such a bummer). She's been scooting herself all over the living room for a bit now and as of Sunday/Monday (October 11^th or 12^th) she can now sit herself up 100% of the time. Also, this Wednesday she actually started crawling on her hands and knees. Everything's just gone so quickly with her, it's amazing.

Jack has also grown up so much, even since August. He's speaking soooo much more clearly than he was (we think it's mainly due to the fact that he no longer used a sippy cup). He's now putting whole sentences together and he cracks us up with the things he says. Justin and I were sitting together on the couch the other day and Jack comes in and asks, "Hey guys! What 'cha doin'?" and we told him we were watching a show. He then said, "A show? O goodness!" He does this quite often and he always responds "_____, O goodness!" I just think it's so hilariously cute. Jack is also ridiculously smart; he's now learning the phonetics of the alphabet. It's been a few weeks now, but Jack came in to Justin and put 3 letter blocks on the bed and said "Log!" Justin looked at the blocks and Jack had brought L-G-O with him. He now puts the letters in order and tends to take "LOG" everywhere—he even sleeps with it most nights. Then the other day Jack was playing in the living room and he put T-A-H on the table and said, "H-A-T, HAT!" He points out letters, shapes, and numbers wherever we go and is always so excited that he is able to recognize things in the world around him.

When we went on our trip we would drive at night while the kids were sleeping. However, the first night we were driving Jack woke up about an hour into the drive and remained up until about 2:45 AM. Jack especially loved all the lights in Las Vegas and was even begging to see another castle. Fast forward our trip several days . . . we went to IHOP for breakfast the first morning we were in San Francisco. Jack got a pancake and it had some saucy strawberries on top. Before we were able to cut up his breakfast for him he had popped a whole strawberry into his mouth and began to choke. Luckily, Justin yanked him out of the high chair and was able to get it out; it was so scary.

Back to the present, we are now trying (again) to potty train Jack. We've even started resorting to bribery—he gets an M&M if he goes pee pee and he'll get a new toy car if he goes poo-poo in the potty. So far we've had no luck in the poo-poo department but we're not giving up. He does rather well at keeping his diaper dry as long as I remind him to go potty and he voluntarily put on a pull-up this afternoon . . . now we just have to put the pull-up on all the time and then get into the real "big boy underwear." I think that's all that's really going on with the kids right now, but I know things are ever-changing with children and we'll have new things to report soon.

I'm back in school part-time (two days a week) and I'm taking Intro to Literature and a swimming class. I wasn't so excited about starting back up to school, but now that the semester's halfway over I'm actually enjoying myself. This weekend I'll be starting to study for my midterm on Wednesday and I just hope I can remember all of the material. I think that's all that's happening with me right now, just school and being a mommy.

Justin is still working full-time and things are in full-swing for him because it's wedding season. He's staying home with the kids on the days I'm in school and is still completing projects around our house. Just this past week he finished staining and putting new hardware on half of our kitchen cupboards!

I promise I'll post new pictures sometime this weekend for everyone to see. And I'll be better at keeping everyone updated (like I was before) now that I'm getting used to my new schedule. We love you all!