Evan's 1st Day of School

Front of bag, notice above the yellow school bus, the outline of my iron, sweet

Back of bag where I need to let Evan color or paint all over it

Rocking Chair Picture

Hamming it up

My first day of school

On Tuesday, Evan went to school for the first time. He is going on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 9:15am-12:15pm. He is in the 2 1/2 year old class with seven other kids, five of which are his closest friends. I think that school is going to be really good for him and so far, so good. Last week we met his teacher at school and he really seemed to like his teachers and his classroom, but he kept telling me that he did not want me to drop him off at school. So, as you can imagine, I was pretty worried about the first day. Joe and I took him there and gave him a hug and he went right into the classroom without tears, but then he saw his friends and there and started to cry. His teacher picked him up and he was lunging for me, so of course I started to cry. But, we walked away and within a few minutes, all kids stopped crying! Yeah. The second day was much better, he told me that he wasn't going to cry and he ran right into his classroom. He saw more friends crying, so he did a little too, but it couldn't have lasted longer than 30 seconds. He seems to really like school and loves all the activities that they do and I really think school will be great for him!

They all got these bags for school, which the parents and kids are supposed to decorate. As you can see, Evan has yet to decorate it, I should let go a bit and let him go to town with some paint. I thought his turned out so cute, until I burned the top front of the bag while ironing on a patch. I was "this close" to being Martha Stewart, oh well!!

Daddy's Little Helper

Evan loves to do everything and I mean everything on his daddy does. So, the other day when Joe was mowing the lawn, he had to join in on the fun. I know Joe will be excited when he's actually able to do this all on his own!! Mowing the lawn around here is definitely a weekly event all year long.

California

Joe, Danielle, Joe & Evan in La Jolla looking at the seals

Lauren, Jenna, Evan, me, Uncle John, Megan

Evan and his godmother, Jenna

California sunset

At the park by our old house in PB

Megan, Evan, Jenna & Lauren

Joe being a good sport as Lauren painted his nails

The Crystal Pier, Pacific Beach

My boys

When we left Arizona, we headed for our favorite place in the U.S.-San Diego! We stayed with our friends, Joe, Marylou and Danielle and visited some of our favorite spots. We took Evan by our old apartment in PB, and the beach that we used to hang out at. There's a playground there at the beach, that he played at and it was just funny to me to see him there playing. Who would have thought about that 7 years ago when we met. We went to go see the seals in La Jolla, went to the beach in Del Mar, played in the Zamorano's pool, jumped on their trampoline, ate some carne asada burritos and had some fabulous seafood meals. Evan loved playing with Danielle, who is 8 and she was very patient playing with him.

After our days in San Diego, we headed up the 5 to go see the Wesseln's in Newport Beach. They were staying at their beach house right on the beach. It was wonderfully relaxing to stay there with them and spend so much quality time visiting on the beach. Evan loved playing with all the kids (who are really like teenagers/adults)-Lauren, Megan & Jenna and loved being with Aunt Debbie and Uncle Curtis as well. We also got to see some other family while we were up there which was really nice. One of the best things was that it was actually kind of cold, especially at night. I got to wear pants and sweatshirts. Now that may not sound exciting to most, but when it's been hotter than you know what since APRIL, it feels darn good to be cold and not from the AC :).

All in all, it was a fantastic vacation. We didn't want to leave, but after being gone for almost 2 weeks, it was time to return home. Evan, a very seasoned traveler (this was probably his 16th RT flight), was perfect on all flights and just a great traveler. Thanks to everyone for having us, we loved it!!

Visiting Grandma & Baba in Arizona

After many weeks of traveling, we are home. I am finally finished unpacking and cleaning up, now to the blog updates!!

In the end of July, we went to visit my parents for a few days in Arizona. We figured that AZ was the only place warmer than Florida, so we should definitely go! We had a great time with them and they kept us very busy. We went to the Zoo and Aquariam, to Chuck E Cheese, to my cousin Laura's house, and Evan's favorite, the Diamondbacks v. Phillies baseball game. My dad got us great seats, just a few rows back from the field. As you can see, Evan held his glove out most of the game, in hopes of catching a fly ball.  We also spent a lot of time in their pool, blowing bubbles and drawing with chalk. Evan also introduced Grandma and Baba to his new favorite show, Word World and showed them how much he is in love with pirates. It was a great visit and we were sad to leave, but we hope that we get to see them again really soon.

Captiva Island

Jonathan

Evan, Jonathan, Evan & Wilson

Jen, Catherine, Abby, me, Brian & Paul (don't we look like we are headed to prom?)

Little Evan

Wilson

Evan

Wilson & Ellie

Jonathan & Evan

Evan & Wilson

Last week we went on vacation to Captiva Island, which is just off the coast of Ft. Myers beach.It was beautiful and we got to see so much wildlife including giant manatees. We stayed with three other families in a giant house and two other families were nearby. We had a great time. All the boys are about the same age and they all played so well together. Evan loved having his friends staying in the same house as him. The adults all played well together too :). I didn't take too many pictures, but thankfully my friends did!! We are off to AZ & CA next week, so hopefully I'll be better at picture taking then.

Our First Trip to the Hospital

We had quite the adventurous week as we made our first trip to the ER with Evan. On Tuesday night, while I was talking on the phone and sitting on the couch, Evan slipped while running on a place mat he had thrown onto the tile floor during dinner and fell backwards on his head. He screamed really loudly and cried hysterically, but was able to calm down after a few minutes. He kept telling me his head hurt, but he passed all my "tests"-pupils the same size, answered all of my questions, could follow my finger with his eyes. But then he threw up twice and I knew we had to go to the ER. Of course, Joe was in Texas, so I calmly took Evan by myself. I was actually impressed how calm I was. Thankfully I called Jen and told her what I was doing and she insisted on meeting me at the Children's Hospital. It was wonderful having a friend there with me through that!  After a cat scan and many x-rays the ER doctor told me "I'm just going to break it down for you-he fractured his skull. But, thankfully there is no bleeding in the brain". I could have vomited right there, I'm surprised I didn't. Thankfully his fracture is very small and will heal very quickly. Evan actually doesn't have any side effects at all and is his normal self, THANK GOD. We had to spend the night in the hospital so that they could observe him and then we were released at 1pm the next day. It was quite the adventure and Evan was wonderful. The staff was amazing there as well. Evan was sure to charm all the nurses and doctors with his lion roars and his recitation of EVERY disney character known to man. The ICU doctor who did rounds at the very end of our stay, and who gave the discharge orders said to the other doctors he was doing rounds with "are these the scans of the kid in that room roaring? If so, we are done here, he is clearly doing just fine!"  Hard to believe, but Evan seemed to love all the attention he got and when we left the hospital, he said to me "Mom, that hospital with the doctors and nurses, that was fun." Let's hope we don't have that kind of fun again for a long time!

Hard to believe, but my camera wasn't exactly on my 'sprinting out the door to the ER' list. But Aunt Shannon took a picture on her phone when she came to visit us. Although it's not great quality, at least we have a little picture to remember our visit!

Happy Father's Day!

Evan looks so serious in these pictures! He still looks cute though :). Happy Father's Day Joe!! Evan is the luckiest kid in the world!