Happy Halloween ~ Oct 31, 2009

This was a real treat for Kim and I. Yes, I know that was cheesy but it fits the whole trick r treat thing. We joined several people on a Halloween outing. My Sister-in-law, Kim, invited my family to her grandparents house on Halloween. Her Grandparents are really nice and gracious people. Her Grandpa had me laughing several times; great sense of humor. They had food set out for us and everything was really good. LOVE CHILI!!

(This pic is of that night)

So Who was there at this Halloween event?

My parents (Hailey's grandma and grandpa Lloyd)

Mel, Jeff, Mason and Kaila

Jon, Kim, Emily and Aiden

Randy, Kelley and Abby

Emily's grandparents (Kurt and Cindy)

of course Cindy's parents (a wonderful couple)

and obviously us (Chris, Kim and Hailey)

Who dressed up?

Randy was dressed as Jon (my brother); I couldn't tell who was who.

I was dressed up as an abused husband. I had scratches on my face. They were emotional scares that manifested in a physical form because Kim doesn't have fingernails.

Hailey was dressed up as Dorthy from the Wizard of Oz.

Emily, Abby and Aiden dressed up as monkeys. Although some lady that handed out candy called them cute donkeys.

Here some family pictures:

Here are some Tick r Treat pictures:

Videos:

Hailey and Emily playing together

Hailey your mommy wants Skittles!

Kurt and Cindy's clan/ Charles and

Barbara's clan go walk'n

Get'n the Wagon for 15 feet?

Donkeys or Monkeys?

Hailey is really wanting to do her own thing!

A rough day at the office...

Trick r Treat girls!

Fall Festival ~ Hailey's Daycare ~ Oct 30, 2009

We invited Jon and Kim to join us at Hailey's Daycare around 6pm on Friday for some Halloween fun. IT WAS A BLAST! No... seriously... it was fun to watch the kids get their face painted and do little activities for some prizes. The school staff did a great job decorating every room and offering fun games for the kids. Grandma CC and Grandpa Ben were on hand at the festival too.

Here are some pictures of the event

Hailey and Mrs. Delma are smiling for the picture. She is one of Hailey's favorite teachers and one of mine also; she thinks I should win father of the year award and I agree!

Face painting time...

more fun games that Hailey played...

Hailey's first tat! She said "kewl"

Some more games to win prizes on...

Here is some videos of her at the school Fall Festival:

Hailey and Emily move ducks from one area

to another...

Hailey and Emily look on to see what the

Cookie table is all about...

Cookie time!! COOKIE TIME!!

K, this maybe poor quality video but Mrs. Delma

tells everyone in the area how great I am...

and I agree! There were witnesses

Hailey and Emily getting their faces painted

Hailey has fun at the bean bag station.

She sure does listen to her teachers.

Hailey went ahead an invited a new game for this

station. You're suppose to walk around until

the music stops and then you get a book

from the number you landed on.

Hailey had different ideas for it.

ZooBoo ~ October 25, 2009

Kim and I were able to meet up with Jon and Kim for Zoo Boo this past Sunday. We arrived at the zoo around 3:30pm-ish. It was packed like I fully expected it to be. Yay for Zoo Boo! Hailey, Emily and Aiden had fun taking a tour of the zoo. They laughed and played and they even enjoyed the snakes... oh how nice it is to be young.

Here are some pictures of the them.

Here is a video of the girls on the carousel.

When we left the zoo it was a little past 6pm and we decided it was best to feed the kids instead of allowing them to starve. So we headed to the nearest CC PIZZA.

Here two pictures of the girls enjoying their time eating PIZZA!!!

Here is Aiden letting his Dad know that he isnt happy with the crap he has to eat... he WANTS PIZZA!!

A Note from Dad

I wanted to write a little note on here expressing what I have learned and hope to accomplish since becoming a father. By reading this you may see a side of me that most haven't seen with the exception of a few, namely my wife. She is always saying that I need more sensitivity. Bah! Sensitivity gets you a seat at the Obama's foreign policy meetings and I certainly don't want to be there. I don't think we should apologize for the billions of dollars we pour into other countries or for his lack luster performance in trying to get Iran to verbally commit to not going nuclear during his administration. back to what I was saying...

A father isn't something that I planned on becoming until I was done with school. I was very afraid (yes I will admit it) of fatherhood. My wife will acknowledge that my favorite saying through her pregnancy was "Fear the BELLY" done with humor and a splash of truth; she would smile. So many unknowns surrounded the milestone for my wife and me. I knew I had an idea what a great father was because of my dad; Loving, understanding, and a discipline. These were the three areas that I knew I would excel at until I was in the Hospital room with Kim. She was pushing and then looking at the nurse. She asked the nurse for a mirror. When I heard her say that I thought to myself "Oh my GOD! This thing is coming”. Once the mirror was presented for Kim's viewing. I turned to fix some of the balloons and flowers. The room kind of broke out in a little laughter and everyone was perplexed at what I was doing. I was not ready for Hailey... mentally. Sure you're allowed 9months to get ready but I still hadn't grasped the notion of becoming a dad.

Several days go by and we have Hailey at home. Both my wife and I are tired. The whole feeding thing and the much needed crying kept us up. The uncertainty was still there... I thought to myself "get a routine down and everything will go back to normal". The routine came and it was nice. Hailey was a really good infant. She started to sleep through the nights fairly early in her infant stage. She’s been a huge blessing to Kim and I. Every day we get to watch her grow and develop. We are amazed at her personality. She is very cautious and sensitive like Kim. Hailey is very kind and social. Singing is starting to become normal for her. She really has a good pitch. I think Hailey will be sarcastic like me.

Her every day routine is she wakes up around 7am. I or Kim will get her and put her in our bed. Hailey generally brings 1 or 2 night nights (blankets) with her to our bed. She likes to drape her night night over me as she tries to wake me up to watch TV with her. I allow her to watch 30mins of television while I attempt to wake up and get ready. I get dressed and get her dressed. Kim is nice enough to set out her clothes for the week. So I know which outfit to grab for her (I’m good but not that good). We go downstairs to eat and she watches 15mins more of TV so I can get everything together for her and me. Out the door I go with a little bit of resistance. We head in to her daycare and she waves to all the employees there. They smile and say hi to her. She then goes around her toddler room and gives each kid a hug; if they didn’t meet her at the toddler room door for hugs. When I come home from work she is playing while Kim gets dinner ready. She greets me with “DADA!!” I say “HAILEY!!” (We repeat this exchange for another 1min or 2).

The bad habit she has right now (it’s pretty darn cute). She says “no… no!” while shaking her finger at someone. I don’t mind her doing this if someone is doing something wrong to her but she does it to her mom and me. It makes me laugh but we are giving her timeout for it.

I know that I will make several mistakes with her because I am fairly new to fatherhood but I will have fun doing it. The world is changing not because of the populous but because the leadership in charge of our nation; they were elected by the people because they ran on hope and bipartisanship. They misrepresented themselves and I worry about the future not for me but for my daughter. I’ll continue to pray that God works to right this nation.

Here is a picture of Hailey and Kim.

Here is a video of me trying to catch Hailey singing. Unfortunately, she stopped for the most part when I started to video tape her.

Gymboree ~ October 25, 2009

Hailey is enrolled in Gymboree and she has a few classes that she needs to make up. So we decided to go with Jon and Kim to Gymboree this past sunday. We attended 1 regular class and participated in the next class up from her regular classes.

These pictures are of free time in the first class; her regular class.

Jon and Kim's family having fun during free time.

Hailey going down the wrong side of the obstacle course.

Emily is pretending to be caged in

The videos below are of the first class that we went to

This video is of the kids balancing on the

inflatable tube and then jumping off at the end

Bubbles... bubbles everywhere!

Ok, Hailey runs off...

Mommy and Hailey are having fun!

Hailey runs off again...

The next class up is her age group; 22 months and up. It has a lot more structure and she has to do more structured activities during play time like rolling objects down slides and then running after them. Kim and I felt that she is ready to move to the next level because she listened to the teacher and then did what she was instructed to do.

Fall Festival ~ Cypress Bible Church ~ Oct. 24, 2009

We decided to attend the Fall Festival that Cypress Bible Church put on for free. Jon and Kim met up with us. Cypress Bible Church did a really great job with the festivals. Their volunteers were wonderful and polite and the activities they had for the kids were creative and thoughtful. It was a blast... Hailey, Emily and Aiden had a lot of fun there. We got to see several of our friends that attend the event too.

Mitch, Ann and their 2 kids

Lisa and Mike Jackson

Jeremy and his 3 kids

Gary and his son

Aunt Joyce and Uncle Greg

Jeremy and his kids saved several seats for us when we were ready to eat; hot dogs, chips, and soda. Yum!!

Here are some pictures of the event. I personally think the two girls had a really good time together.

Here are some videos of the event.

2 videos of the arts and crafts area

This video is of the girls running off when we are trying to take pictures of them.