SNOW DAY!!!

Yes, we live in Las Vegas (well, Henderson actually) but we had a SNOW DAY today. All schools were cancelled and so all the lucky students (and teachers) didn't have to show up today. It was awesome! I don't know how many times I prayed for a snow day when I was living up in the Sierras but it just never happened. I guess when you get 10 inches of snow in a city that doesn't even know what a snow plow is you get a bit of a traffic problem. Good news for us!
Poor Caden didn't get to play in the snow because he is sick with a double ear infection (again). He will be having surgery to put tubes in soon so that we will have no more ear problems. In the meantime, he has to watch the snow out the window.
Anyways, if you are interested in experiencing a Las Vegas style snow storm watch Cory's video documenting the treacherous drive home yesterday. If you have 4 minutes to spare, watch the whole thing so that you can see our house at the North Pole.

Happy 16 Month Birthday!

Caden is 16 months old today! He is getting so big (22 pounds) and he is doing new things everyday. He loves spending time at his daycare (all the girls love him) and he keeps us on our toes at home. We put up the Christmas tree over Thanksgiving weekend and have been trying to help him understand that it is to "look at" not to "play with". The first morning that he saw the tree he went right for the shiny glass bulb... he snatched it off the tree and threw it on the kitchen floor where it shattered into a hundred pieces. Lukily, it was MY day to sleep in so Daddy got the honor of cleaning up that mess and rearranging the ornaments. They are now more strategically placed and we have had no more Christmas casualties.
Cory's masters classes are coming to a close for the semester and he is really looking forward to a month off during the holidays. I have been busy with school and chasing after a very fast toddler. Caden has just started imitating people's facial expressions (mostly Daddy's grumpy faces)... we think we might have a child actor in our future. Check out this video of his "Sad Face" and tell me what you think. :)

That's so funny!

Caden is almost 15 months now and he gets funnier by the minute. He has always been really ticklish but we just realized we have never video taped his hysterics. It's pretty entertaining when he gets going...


Halloween is almost here and we are very excited. Caden looks pretty cute in the pirate costume that Grandma Donna got for him. You can see some pictures in our flickr photos. We will upload some more photos after the pumpkin carving and trick-or-treating.
Cory is still going strong with his master's program, nothing but A's of course. He will have a month off in the winter so we are looking forward to seeing him again! By summer he will be finished and on to bigger and better things.
In the meantime it's just work, work, work and enjoy Caden being his funny little self!

13 Months

Caden is 13 months old now and he is all over the place. He is walking (or running) everywhere and he's got a lot of personality. I got a video of him tonight doing a few of his recently developed "tricks". We think he's pretty cute. :)

Spaghetti Head

So, I had to work late just about every night last week while I was moving into my new classroom and Cory was on Daddy duty. It sounds like the boys had a fun time while I was away and were able to do some father-son bonding. One such bonding experience was captured on camera....I like to call this one "Spaghetti Head". Just watch the video and you'll understand. :)

Happy Birthday Little Baby Man!

Caden has turned 1 year old! We can't believe how fast the year has gone but it's true... our little baby man is now a boy. Exciting and sad all at the same time. His big day was on August 2nd and we had a little BBQ at our house with some friends and family in order to celebrate the occasion. There were hot dogs, hamburgers, babies, balloons, cake (smashing, that is) and really bad singing. We had a fun time and we think Caden did too. Daddy took some videos to capture the day and put them together in this short film. So, if you'd like to experience Caden's 1st birthday... check it out.

He's On The Move!

Last night Caden took his very first steps and we are so proud. It's funny how you think people are being silly when they are so ecstatic about their baby's accomplishments, but then you become a parent and suddenly it all makes sense. We were thrilled that he finally took those steps before his first birthday and now I totally understand why people get SO overwhelmed with excitement about their little ones' "poo-poo in the potty" (I'm sure that post will come someday too). We had been trying for a couple of days to get him to let go of our hands and walk but he would only take 1 or 2 steps and then fall face first. Once he started taking 3 steps at a time I decided it was time to record - but to my astonishment, as soon as that red light turned on he took about 15 steps and even took a little pause to wave at the camera! It's fantastic! :)


Aside from that fantastic news, I also wanted to post the last of our New York videos. The videos from day 1 and 2 of our trip can be seen on the last post if you scroll down the page. Our 3rd and final day in NY is masterfully documented by wonderful husband in the video below. Enjoy!

New York, New York

Cory and I just got back from a 4 day trip to New York. This trip served a few purposes... 1) Cory HAD to attend a game at Yankee stadium before it was torn down. 2) A celebration of our 5 year anniversary (whew.) and... 3) Mommy's first nights away from baby Caden. The trip was fantastic and we squeezed a lot into a very short trip. We saw 2 Yankee games (one really great one against the Red Sox), Central Park, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Times Square (we saw a lot of that since that's where our hotel was located), the Empire State Building, Ground Zero (twin towers site), MOMA (the museum of modern art - only the lobby since they are convieniently closed on Tuesdays... whatever.), Rockerfeller Center, St. Patrick's Cathedral, and a lot of taxi cabs, hot dog stands, and subway stations. It was busy, smelly, crowded and totally awesome! We loved it. Although leaving Caden at home was VERY diffcult, once we got on the plane it was great... and it was nice to know that Gramma Donna and Cousin Carlie were at home taking good care of him.

Cory made some videos to document our trip... they are pretty entertaining (especially Cory's commentary so make sure your volume is turned up... and don't stop at the first one, the second video is the real prize.) :)

My Silly Boy

Caden is 11 months old now and we are approaching his 1 year birthday very quickly. It is crazy to think that our little baby man is not going to be a baby much longer. He looks like a little boy now and is starting to do some very silly things. Cory caught him on video last week playing peek-a-boo behind the curtains. It is hilarious and I think having that video to watch was the only thing keeping me from going insane without my baby in New York. Here is the link to the video... I hope you enjoy it as much as we do.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=rUHBT9q7M9k
More on NY later...
Sarah

Ready to Walk

Our little baby man is 10 months old now and he is ready to walk... almost. He tries very hard everyday and gets a little closer each time. He walks around the furniture and uses his walker like a champ. His newest walking experiment is to grab onto mom and dad's clothes and walk behind us. He's pretty good at it, but it does lead to a lot of falling and baby bruises. The video should explain it all.
Caden is just getting over his second real illness... a double ear infection and a ruptured ear drum (yikes!). Last week was really bad for him and Mommy had to miss the very last day of school to stay home with the sick little man... in total I missed 3 months for my maternity leave at the beginning of the school year and a whopping 13 sick days! Needless to say I think that this wasn't my best year teaching (but I love being a mommy so it's ok). Actually, Cory, Caden and I have all been sick this past week so we didn't get a great start to our summer vacation. But, at least we have 2 more months to make up for it (one of the perks of being teachers). :)
Well, enjoy the "walking" video and hopefully we will be posting more photos and such while we are on vacation.
Ta ta for now....
Sarah

9 Months

Well, it's been a busy past few weeks. With the school year slowly coming to an end we are all ready for summer to start. Caden has been growing like crazy, doing something new everyday. He finally got his first tooth about two weeks ago and he hasn't stopped getting teeth since. He now has two little stubbs on the bottom and his top front two are right on the edge of breaking through. Needless to say, he's been a bit fussy with all of this sore gum business. I am on a mission this weekend to buy his first toothbrush - can't waste any time with his personal hygene. :)
Caden and I went on our first trip alone together last weekend. We flew up to Reno to visit my mom for mother's day and to see her new house and help her get settled. We had a lot of fun and Caden got to meet lots of new people. He finally got to meet his uncle Nathan and spent some time with his cousins, Lilly and Keagan. He also got to hear the uncles play in their band (Mick and Charlie) and he loved the loud music almost as much as he loved hanging out with his cousin Carlie all night.
We got to spend some time with the Pinks too so Caden got to see his Aunt Leslie again while Rick helped fix some odds and ends at mom's house. We left to come home on Monday but had to stop in Carson City to meet up with some more friends (Becky and Jessica) for lunch. We flew home that night and we have been trying to catch up on sleep ever since. All in all it was a great trip and we are very glad we were able to go.
Cory has had an exciting couple of weeks as well. He finished the first semester of his Master's program with flying colors and even got 100% in one of his classes. Pretty impressive. He was invovled in presenting a "webinar" online this week on the social networking he is doing with his high school students. He is making lots of connections and moving up in the world of online education.
Until next time...

Remote Control Video Plus Bonus Update

Caden loves "playing" with an old remote control we gave him. Thing is, when he plays with certain things its a love/hate situation. He demands to play with his remote then once he gets it he has no idea what to do with it so he gets mad at it. Wonder where he got that from? He does the same things with books. So, with remotes and books he has a very short love span and an even longer hate span. Wonder how long that will last. Those two things are very important we can't have him getting so upset in their presence :)




In other news, I'm at home with Caden for a couple days this week while Sarah is back at work. She stayed home with him all last week because of the RSV. Caden is better now, but the daycare lady's daughter is sick and Sarah didn't want to expose Caden to anymore possible illnesses. After going cold free for the first 6.5 months of his life, seems like he has been sick for almost the entire last month or so. He was okay in Costa Rica, but besides then he has just been a mess.

We are still reeling from the CR trip. The ear and respiratory infections Caden has are from the plane ride, according to the doctor. I took a big hit in one of my college courses because of a missed assignment. We are both still really tired and because of his colds both really behind at work. That "vacation" set us back about a month. As I told my college professor after she wouldn't accept my late work, "thats the last vacation Im taking during my Masters." We'll see, still got 2 planned over the summer, San Luis and NYC, but neither of those require disconnecting for a week. In fact, just the opposite, will need to have computer on those trips since taking full-time summer school courses. I went through my schedule with my advisor yesterday and it looks like I will complete the Masters program in Spring of 09. So this time next year will be taking Comprehensive Exams and wrapping up last 3 classes.

I'm doing an informal presentation, called a poster session, at one of the biggest education conferences in the country over the summer. The conference is called the National Education Computer Conference and is in San Antonio at the end of June. There were over 20,000 people at last years conference so its a big one. Look forward to the challenge. Im in the process of putting together student samples and will make a video with my students to show the unique types of Web 2.0 tools kids are using in my classes. I wrote a proposal to lead a group at the Virtual Schools Symposium in Fall of 08, so if that gets accepted will present for the 2nd time there. All in all, work is going really good. Kind of feels like I've hardly been there with all of the missed days because of the baby.

Speaking of the baby. He is crawling like mad right now. Mostly he just crawls to stand on things. He is pulling himself up onto everything right now, including the rails on his crib. We have had to lower the crib to the lowest setting but his head still reaches over the top when he stands up. Hopefully he wont get strong enough to pull himself over anytime soon. From what I understand, I used to get out of my crib, then get out of my house, rip off my clothes and run down the street naked when I was little. Ahh, good times. I also bit my tongue in half falling out of my crib once, rumor is that I had to get it sewed back together. Hope the same fate doesn't lie in the wake for Caden, have a feeling that hope is just a pipe dream though. He is a maniac (Sarah is trying to wean me off the word monster) and is quite the handful. Wish us luck.

Cory Playing with Flickr Slideshow Tools

I've been playing with a slideshow program called Slideoo that connects to your Flickr account. Its pretty clean.




This one is called Flickr HTML Badge. You can create horizontal or vertical slideshows with up to 10 photos.

mrplough's Not Caden photoset

Caden Crawls and Costa Rica

Here is the newest video of Caden, crawling and attacking. Enjoy





The Kids in Costa Rica.

My Sicky Boy

Well, we returned home from Costa Rica on Friday and ended a great trip with a torturous day traveling. We arrived at the airport in CR at 4:30 in the morning and did not return home until 10:00 p.m. Needless to say, the 18 hours of airplanes, airports, bad food, and no sleep left us and Caden a bit grumpy (the 2 1/2 page letter that Cory wrote to Delta airlines provides the happy details of the adventure).
Although the trip was exciting and relaxing, we were glad to be home and settle in over the weekend. We were back to business as usual on Monday (just a little more tan) and things were going well. Yesterday Caden got a little cough and throughout the day it got progressively worse while he was at daycare. By the time I got home from work he was at home with daddy and he looked like a baby zombie. His eyes are puffy and red, he's got a raspy cough, runny nose, congestion, sore throat, fever, and to top it all off he had some projectile vomit last night all over the couch, floor, coffee table and mommy (yuk.). So, I took the day off work today and brought the little baby man to the doctor. Apparently he has an ear infection and RSV (some respiratory virus). Now he is on amoxicillin and 4 albuterol breathing treatments a day, which as you can see by the photo he absolutely loves. The doctor says he has to stay home from daycare for two weeks! So much for teaching this month - Cory and I will each miss a week of work.
Anyways, this update was meant to say that we really enjoyed our trip to Costa Rica... however, life has quickly shocked us back to reality. So, no more walks on the black sand beach or margaritas by the pool. Now it's naps between coughing fits and vapor treatments morning, noon, and night. Welcome to parenthood. :) I'm off to get my poor sicky boy to bed.

Pura Vida

Its 8 in the morning on Day 6, and this is the first time I've been on the Internet since arriving in Costa Rica. Considering I spend over 10 hours on the computer on a daily basis, thats quite a shock to the system. Thats par for the course this week, everything in a 3rd world country is a little shocking.

Im sitting in the outdoor restaurant by the infinity pool overlooking the dark blue Pacific Ocean at Bahia Paz Vela. Its certainly beautiful here but not quite what we expected. We are on the Northwestern coast outside of a town called Playa del Coco. There are lots of jungle like trees all around the beach that we are on, but just above eye level if you look towards the mountains, the green lush stops and its a dirty, dried out brown color. A lot of the roads are half paved and there is a tremendous amount of dirt and dust everywhere. We were definitely expecting more greens and less browns, but then again, this is the dry season so I'm sure that lush tropical look is coming back later this year.

There is so much to talk about from the people, the towns, the activities, the friends and so on. Maybe I will just cover a few things in this post.

Our biggest adventure so far was the jungle ziplining trip. The Canopy Tour interesting because we were completely off the main path and saw how a lot of locals lived. Sometimes the houses are literally tin shacks. Of course there is no running water and the way that people get electricity to their house from the road is something special to see. At one point in our drive the road took us through a dried out river bed. It was pretty cool. Sarah, Willy, Brian, their two older kids and me all went on the ziplining tour. We showed up at the gate at 8 in the morning and were the first ones there; they actually opened for us which is a great way own a business (don't have to open til the first customer arrives). While we were waiting for the tour guides to show up to work, we walked around the complex. They had a mariposa (butterfly) farm and a mono (monkey) house that we checked out from behind the fence. Once the main tour got started we had a wonderful time. The longest zipline was 400 meters and I did the Superman for that entire line. I also got to hang upside down about 80 feet above the jungle floor for a couple of the lines. We saw an Iguana that was about 5 feet long and lots of monkeys. Monkeys are everywhere was about a 45 minute drive from our beach house. 6 kilometers of that trip was spent driving down a bumpy half paved dirt road with little or no signs to direct us. It was really around here. Sarah had a blast too, I think she even did a Superman or upside down line, but cant remember for sure.









Yesterday about 7 of us (there are 13 total staying here) went into town for the day. We took a taxi and got dropped off a couple hundred yards from town then spent the next 4 hours just walking around and checking out local places. We did a little touristy shopping but mostly just took pics of life down here, spent some time on the local beach, ate at a local pollo shack called Pollo Crispy (KFC without the K), and got off the main road a couple times to see what was just around the corner. It was an exciting day but, as with all activities, came to an end when the babies got too frustrated (overheated).

We have spent a lot of time at the beach, pool, or just sitting around the patio at our little complex. Its about 85 degrees with 80% humidity (dry season) so muchos calor. I have been sea kayaking almost everyday and we both have had professional massages on the beach.

We have today and tomorrow then make our way back to the airport at about 4 in the morning on Friday. Will blog more later, hopefully from CR.

Pura Vida, life is fantastico, wonderful, pure

C

Almost Crawling

Caden's First Finger Foods

6 Months Old

Well, Caden recently had his 1/2 birthday and is enjoying being 6 months old. The doctor says he looks good but she wants us to fatten him up because he has dropped down to the 27th percentile for weight. Not too bad but he started out in the 80's so she wants to keep him chubby. As you can see, he is much happier now that he is old enough to do more on his own. He is eating solid food (if you call mush in a jar solid food), sitting up on his own, and scooting. I really think he will be crawling soon but for now he gets where he wants to go by rolling or scooting on his belly. He likes to make sure that he is the center of attention so he does a lot of screaming and squealing. He is definitely not a quiet baby.

Cory is still at home with Caden for one more week. It has been a learning experience for them both but we are all really glad that he was able to stay home for so long (our bank account is especially glad). Although Cory's happy to go back to work he's going to miss hanging out with the little baby man. He is really excited about the new ideas he has for work and hopes to improve the success rate for students at school. Between implementing all these new ideas, keeping up with his job, working on his masters, and taking care of Caden he's a little busy. But we know that it will all pay off in the near future.

I am enjoying being back at my school and working with all "my kids" again (after three years with the same students they really start to feel like they're mine). I'm learning what it means to be a working mom - balancing teaching, yearbook, fundraising, diaper changing, feeding, cooking, laundry, and cleaning leaves little time to do much else (especially sleep). Of course it's all worth it and I wouldn't change it for the world, but it's definitely a learning process. Poor Max certainly doesn't get as many walks as he used to.

Lastly, Barack Obama won all four states in the primaries today! Yes We Can!

The Tale of Two Babies

Caden has recently discovered his vocal chords and makes sure that everyone in the neighborhood knows it. We took a video of him happily "talking" in his jumperoo.




Five minutes later.... Caden's evil twin arrives...

Hello Again...

Well, it's been a long time since our last post and I take full responsibility (this is Sarah, by the way). Yes, Cory has officially transferred the family blogging duties to me. Between working from home, taking care of Caden during the day and preparing to start his master's program, Cory decided that he didn't have time. We are now learning the value of the precious little time we have to do "other things" that don't involve diapers, crying, or bottles.
So, here's the update...
Caden is 5 1/2 months old now. He is eating solid food, almost sitting up on his own, and laughing a lot. He has become a very happy baby and is getting the hang of sleeping through the night. He still wakes up once or twice, but usually goes back to sleep fairly easily. Cory is thankful of this since he is now the one getting up at night. Caden enjoyed Christmas (mostly the wrapping paper) and slept through his first New Year. :) We really enjoyed our 2 weeks off for winter break - my Dad and Carol took us to Utah for a weekend where we got to tour Bryce Canyon and spend some time in the snow; we spent Christmas with Niki and the grandparents-in-law; my Mom came to visit for a few days; and we caught up on sleep.
Cory is still at home with Caden until mid-February. He is doing a great job as "Mr.Mom" and balancing work with baby time. Last weekend Cory took the GRE (Graduate Entrance Exam) and passed! I helped him with studying and was VERY thankful that it wasn't me that had to take the test... but, Mr. Smartypants passed with flying colors so he starts his Master's next week! Good luck with that. :)
I have been back at work for 5 weeks now and although it's nice to feel productive and engage in some "adult" conversation, I still miss Caden every day. I'm sure Cory is sick of me calling everyday at 11:00 but I can't seem to make it through the day without checking in on the little baby man. Working full time and being a mommy full time is difficult, but it's definitely worth it. I just need to remember to find a few moments to update this blog and keep you all posted.
We hope you all had a wonderful holiday season!
Sarah

Basic Ideas Behind Photo Sharing Online