PLEASE MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A CARBON MONOXIDE DETECTOR

I don't have a lot of time to write but I have been meaning to update this on a few things that have happened to us the last few weeks.

A couple of weeks ago we had quite a scary Saturday! We were in a car accident...we are ok...but it was kind of scary. We were traveling at about 35-40mph and a car pulled out from a side street right in front of us and we t-boned him. We are so thankful that the accident happened the way it did! I know that might sound strange, but after it was all said and done, we realized that if we had to be in the accident that it turned out just right. A foot more in one direction and the driver in the other car would have been Seriously injured!!! And if we had swerved in the other direction we would have crashed into someone who was very far along in her pregnancy and she would have hit about 5-6 kids who were all standing on the corner! So we are thanking God for His provision of safety!! (Maria has a sore neck and low back and Josh's low back is sore...but over all safe!)(Mateo was in the truck with us but strapped securely in his car seat.) The pregnant lady ended up calling the police and a fire truck and emt came and checked on all of us.

THEN...Later that night after resting in the evening we went to bed only to be awoken by our Carbon Monoxide Detectors at around 12:30am. I woke up nauseous and Josh and Mateo were both pale and "tired". We called the fire department and they told us to leave the house immediately! So we put our coats on and stood outside (in the very very cold clear night) with Mateo and Oliver waiting for the fire truck to show up. When they did arrive they turned out to be the same firemen that were at our car accident earlier in the day..."You are not having a very good day...Are you?" "No". They put Mateo and I in their fire truck to stay warm and they went in the house with Josh to check it out. About 5 min. later they came out and said we could not stay there tonight because the Carbon Monoxide levels were too high. They though it was our furnace and said we would need to call a heater specialist to come in and check it out and fix it. (Our furnace is only 4 years old) They also said "GOOD THING YOU HAD CARBON MONOXIDE ALARMS..." We might not have made it through the night! How scary!! I capitalized what they said to us for a dramatic effect. I am trying to tell everyone I know....PLEASE GET ONE..TWO!!! It has been law here for around 3 or4 years (I think) and I remember thinking ..."oh just one more thing for us to have to buy and keep batteries in" and know I know they saved my families life!!! Please get one...you just never know.

We ended up staying at Josh's parents house (they had just left town that day) and we all tried to sleep on a futon together. :P We did not get a lot of sleep! It was 3:00am before we were trying to sleep and Mateo is not used to sleeping with us and he is a bed hog!! :) The next day we called a heater specialist and he met us at the house and after checking our house and heater he found nothing wrong...he believes that when Josh backed his truck into the garage (he did it right before we went to bed that night) it stalled half way up and ended up flooded that the heater must have turned on at the exact time and sucked all the fumes into the house. Then the house was all closed up (as would any house be in the middle of a cold winter) and the fumes just circulated. So we were exposed to the fumes for over an hour and a half before our alarms went off. Which explains my stomach symptoms and Josh's reluctance to get up. Scary!

Sooo...we are very glad to be alive!! And have a lot to be thankful for! We are still a bit jumpy when we drive around...but hopefully that will fade. Then later in the week we took a impromptu weekend trip to see Josh's Grandparents in Idaho (His grandpa is full of cancer). It was a wonderful trip and I will post next about that.

OCTOBER 20th Anniversary Day

It is (was...this post is overdue) our 6 year wedding anniversary and this is a picture we tried to take of ourselves before we went to dinner! Also on this day, it has been one year since our first meeting of Mateo. (I added a couple of pics of our visit trip with him so you can join me in the astonishment of how much he has grown)

He was 3.75 months during the week that he stayed with us at the hotel in Guatemala !

These are some from the last month...a few of his little cute "quirks" he has picked up!

When he smiles he likes to wrinkle his nose and the outcome is that his eyes end up closed.
And here he is split seconds after his slightly demanding declaration/request of "fivbe" or "hi fivbe". (I do realize it is not spelled correctly...it is spelled the way he pronounces it) It is a subtlety but if you have heard him and then you look at this picture you can "hear" him saying "five" because he keeps his mouth in the position of half "v" and half "b"until he has gotten his five. :) We think it is cute!

Mateo's First Real Snow!

Well it has snowed a lot today! And it is the first big snow for our city this year! We dressed Mateo up which was funny all in itself...and then we went out and showed him how to play in snow!! We had another friend give us her son's hand-me downs (what a blessing! Thank you Candy!) and the coat and snow pants are a 1-2 sizes too big for Mateo but they are very warm, are good quality, and they work!! :) His boots are also 2 sizes too big but he manages! (kind-of :) ) We figure since winter lasts so long in Alaska that he will have plenty of time to grow into his winter clothes! We have video of this that I will try to learn how to post soon. (If anyone has any pointers please let me know!) But here are our pictures from today (11/11/2007)

Here is my first SNOW ANGEL ever!!!!
(the snow is not really blue...just the lighting out side...it was still snowing pretty hard)

Here I am trying to push the snow around.

Here I am trying to walk in the snow with my very large boots! : ) I only really took a few steps then my parents carried me everywhere else!

Here I am trying to make a snow ball like my Daddy was doing. He was throwing them for Oliver to chase...then my Mommy was trowing them at me!

Please don't mind my mom she has been sick the last week but she just could resist experiencing my first snow with me. I hope she doesn't get more sick but I am glad we were all out as a family! Most of the time she was under a huge black and white umbrella taking video of me, my daddy and Oliver. It was snowing hard and she had to find a way not to ruin the videocamera. Oliver did not like the umbrella . He barked a lot after that!

Here I am with a lot of snow in my face...I am ready to go in!

Thanks Daddy for helping me brush snow off of me!

Here I am inside ...turns out all except for my cheeks and nose I stayed warm! (Don't I look like such a big boy these days??? That is what my Mommy and Daddy keep telling me...I am "growing up too fast"!)
P.S. Please don't judge me for the outfit! After church they changed me into the quickest (most comfortable) thing they could find so I would take a long nap...then I just stayed in it all day! Don't they know that stripes and patterns do not go together????!!

PJ Fashion Show!! Summer and Fall Collection

We have been taking pictures for this post for the last 3 months...and we finally decided that we needed to just post it in "parts" otherwise it could take years before you see him in all of his adorable pajamas! So here is an assortment of his pjs...some cute...some scary...some he was very upset about. (We have decided he already has a great sense of fashion and a taste for the expensive stuff! Some friends have given us a few hand-me down shoes for him. And out of all of the shoes he has he is always in the entryway trying to put on his shiny black dress shoes!! :)

These next two are from our friend Mandy! They are definitely Mommy's favorites! She loves to cuddle me in them! Thank you Mandy!!!

These are my first footed-pjs. They are still lightweight for our fall! (taken a month+ ago)

Here I am in the same pjs just different times. The first pic is with my mono (monkey in Spanish) I love my Mono!!

Here as you can see I am very upset with my mommy!!! I do not understand why I have 3 layers of pjs on! Later I realized that she was right...you do need to be bundled if you are camping in Alaska in the fall time!!! I woke up at 4:00am with very cold hands!

As you can see by this picture the next night we were smarter and I wore my mittens to bed!

Here I am after my mommy dressed me up like this person she keeps calling "Urkel"...? I have no idea who "Urkel" is but he must be funny because my mommy always laughs when I look like this!

Here are another pair of cool pjs! If you look really closely there are moose on my pjs! Daddy says all these are missing is the butt flap!

This picture is less about my pjs and more about my fun Saturday mornings!!! Here I am with my family all pilled on the bed ...My mommy jumped up to take the picture but she was here too! And, yes, Oliver loves to be right in the middle!

This picture also is less about my pjs and mostly all about my HAIR!!!

Look for the upcomming Winter PJ Collection !!!

Dona Luisa's Banana Bread!!! Hmmmmm...

Ok...so not all of you who read this will know what I am talking about...but for those of you who have lived (or visited) in Antigua this is for you.... OK I have been missing Guat. right now a lot! So I decided to reminisce and I made a batch of Banana Bread from my Dona Luisa's Cookbook. Wow...do I have to say more? For those of you who haven't been to Antigua...this bread was soooo good! Anyways, let me know if my friends from Antigua would like the recipe....very easy and simple but oh so moist! :) I know I am a little Loco...but I thought maybe you all would know and could relate!

HE IS WALKING!!!

What fun!! J and I decided yesterday...that we could now and would officially declare Little M "walking". He is now letting go of things with a determined look on his face and stepping out... He also is just standing up in the middle of the room and walking. So far the farthest we have seen him walk is across our living room (the long way) this morning. He is so proud of himself and looks like he is thinking to himself " wow...this is so fun...why haven't I been traveling like this all along". J and I want little M to stay this age for another year!! We are having so much fun with him! He is so precious...though some of you might not agree... we have decided that we have the best baby in the entire world!!! How could it get any better than this! Thank God for our little blessing! (who is not sleeping (nap) right now like he should be :{...our little stinker! I hear him talking right now)

I aged my son...

OK with in 20 minutes I aged my son from a baby to a little boy....I have always wanted to be able to spike my sons hair. So I took him to get a haircut and this is what he looks like with a lot LESS hair. It is not the best picture but you will get an idea...It took me a few days to get used to it...and I was bemoaning the fact that it made it him look so much older :) But...now two weeks later half of it has grown back already...his hair grows really fast. Here it is:


Well...I am winding up my posting for the day...more quick info...Little M is still not walking about yet. He has taken on average 6 steps little walks but you have to stand him up and encourage him to walk to you. But...in the last 2 days he has been standing himself up in the middle of the floor...well just anywhere really. So I think it will be soon! He is so proud of himself when he does this. He is very talkative... He is a happy boy (most of the time :) He loves music (and he is mommy's biggest fan...he is probably the only little kid that is not scared of my opera singing) He loves his daddy sooooo much!!! He gets very sad when he leaves in the morning and very excited when j comes home. "HI DADDY HI HI DADDY DADDY"...at the tops of his lungs!

I have started watching a 3 year old 2 days a week and Little M loves him. He is learning and picking up a lot from him :)

That is all I can think of now...feel free to ask about anything I might have forgotten to share!

Uncle Marty and Aunt Erin...

Then the day after my sisters and brother-in-law left, J's family had a outdoor bbq get together because his aunt and uncle were here visiting from Colorado. Here are a couple of cute pics of Little M with J's sister Erin and Brother-in-law Marty!

This is me with my Aunt Erin...:) I am having so much fun!

And here I am with my Uncle Marty...don't I look so cool in his sunglasses! For some reason I couldn't persuade him to let me leave with them!

Aunt Mindy, Aunt Missy and Uncle John come to visit...

We were so excited to have M's family come up and visit for almost two whole weeks!! (all the way from Minnesota and Seattle) Aunt Mindy had never met Little M and Aunt Missy missed him like crazy since the time in Guatemala when she escorted me down and helped me get settled with Little M. (Uncle John had not met him yet either) We started the time off, by going camping the first weekend near my Grandparents house. (2.5 hours from our city) It was a lot of fun (or at least some of us enjoyed it ;) ) We have some "city folk" in our family that still had to drive to town to have their daily dose of Starbucks! :) It was a great time...my grandparents and uncles and aunt and best family friend (you know who you are ;) came and had dinner with us around the campfire! It was a good time to have family catch up with each other. Then after the camping trip we just came home and enjoyed a week of relaxing... at the end of the week (right before they had to leave) we went to the State Fair. Little M got to see a lot of farm animals for the first time and we all enjoyed the hot weather (yes it was hot for alaska...in the 70s) and good food and entertainment. Here are only a few pictures from this time...more will be coming soon.

This was us packing for our camping trip...

This is sitting around the campfire...

This is me right after I was dropped by my mommy...er...I mean canoing with my mom and dad

This is me with my Uncle John...he is funny ...

This is me playing with my aunt Mindy....you can't see her but she is a blast to play with and she takes tons of great pictures of me ( I am quite a ham) I am also quite blind after a week with her :) he he he (all the flashes going off :)

And this is me being very inquisitive of my Aunt Missy...she has something in her hand that I really want...if I smile just right she maybe she will give it to me...

Don't worry there are more pics to come...ones that actually include the family we are alluding to :) I know it isn't allllll about Little M.

OK...OK... I know we just dropped off the face of the earth...

Actually, in the last month, we have had family visiting! Well only 2 weeks of it (the rest of the time was me being a slacker...:)) I have some pictures for now and we are collecting more from our family. Hopefully by next month we will have a new computer and it will be easier for J and I to upload our pictures on a more regular basis. But I have some cute ones now...and more coming!
Here are the pictures we promised from Grandpa Cross from our arrival night at the airport (Time -line -wise they belong down at the bottom of this blog....but I am afraid no one would see them):

This is Grandpa and Grandma Cross (J's parents)

And these are Papaw and Granny Casey (M's parents)