Emma's Birthday, 12/31/11 at 11:03am

The first pictures of our sweet baby girl, Emma Rose Hood. Our labor and delivery went so smoothly. My sister Kara was there--she even said that it was "abnormally normal"---and that she (as a labor and delivery nurse) hardly ever gets to see such an "uneventful" labor and delivery process. I had wonderful nurses taking care of me and we just love our obstetrician. Randy and I couldn't have asked for a better experience. We feel so blessed to have had an uncomplicated, healthy, and happy delivery. She weighed in at 7lbs 9oz and 20 1/4 inches long. Welcome to the family Emma Rose!

One very proud Daddy.

We are so happy with the newest addition to our family.

Aunt Kara with baby Emma---Randy and I were so happy that she was with us for the big birthday moment.

A group shot, with my obstetrician, Dr. Mark Thompson (he has delivered all 3 of our children).

Another normal morning in the Hood home

Ben lost his 1st tooth!!

Ben lost his 1st tooth today!! It has been loose for weeks, and after a lot of wiggling, it finally came out! We are very excited to see what the tooth fairy brings tonight. :-)

Wordless Wednesday

Breakfast with Santa

This morning, we went and had breakfast with Santa. The boys loved it. Ben took Santa his list (that he wrote himself!) and Santa read it (deciphered it) well. :-) They wouldn't let us take our own pictures in the room with Santa---thus the hazy picture below, that I took of the actual picture!






After pictures, we headed over for a wonderful breakfast buffet. We had a fabulous family outing and morning together.

Little Late, Better than Never...

We had Logan's 3rd birthday party the weekend after Halloween. We had a big bouncy castle in the backyard, a piñata, and lots of wonderful friends over to help us celebrate. Here are some pictures from the big day!

Kindergarten Pow-Wow

The kindergarten classes put on a "Kindergarten Pow-Wow" the week before Thanksgiving. They recited poems and sang songs of the pilgrims, Indians, and the first Thanksgiving feast. Afterwards, we all went back to the classroom and the children read poems out of the poetry notebooks to their parents, grandparents, etc. Ben had quite an audience: Mommy, Mimi, Gran, and Colonel. We were very proud!! Ben did great!!

Logan's 1st dentist visit

Logan had his first dentist visit this last week. He did great! He sat still and let the hygienist clean his teeth, take Xrays, and then followed up with the dentist consult. They said his teeth looked great! I was very proud of my little boy!!

Arghh!

Playing pirate!

Baby #3 Update!

Well, we have hit 32 weeks and everything is going great! I am feeling good---I get pretty tired at the end of the day, but I guess that is to be expected with 2 little boys running around and working full-time! Randy has been wonderful picking up my slack at the end of the day; he's such a good Daddy and husband.

Randy and I decided to keep the gender a surprise until his/her birthday, and we have quickly found out that choosing names is a lot harder when you have to choose one for each gender! We haven't decided on any names yet...we have asked the boys for suggestions and they are no help---they want to name the baby after a "Backyardigan", like, "Pablo", "Uniqua", or "Tyrone". I have nixed those names quickly. :-)

I'll keep ya posted on our progress and will post some maternity photos after we have them taken in a few weeks.

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Trick-or-Treat!!

The boys were Angry Birds for Halloween and had a great time!

Happy Halloween!

We carved pumpkins with, err, for the boys tonight in anticipation of Halloween! The boys drew pictures of their pumpkin faces and Randy and I carved, cut, and cleaned out the pumpkins. They turned out really cute!
























We hope everyone has a Happy Halloween! I will post pictures of the boys in their costumes tomorrow before we trick-or-treat. Sure to be fun!

Too Good to be True...

I made these...



...and they turned out too good to be true.

I originally made them for my Bible study group snack this last week, but was unable to go because Ben was still sick (4 days of fever progressed to 9). So, I was forced to eat them at home...
My new weakness is called Buckeye Pretzel Bites.

4 days

Well, Ben made it through the first 8 weeks of school without getting sick...then the 9th week hit, and so did the fever and illness. We held out as long as we could, hoping things would clear up, but 4 days of continuous fever later and 2 doctor visits, he has an upper respiratory infection and very congested lungs. Since this is his first illness in quite sometime, the doctor wants to see how he will respond to antibiotics and delay IVIG infusions for now. Ben missed most of the school week, and really missed his friends, teacher, etc. Hopefully he will begin to feel better over the weekend and be well to return to school Monday.
Here is a picture of Ben today while at the doctor...you know your kid doesn't feel well when he asks to lay down on the exam table "to rest".

Happy Friday!!

Trip to Dallas

Last weekend I was blessed to fly up to Dallas for the weekend and spend time with one of my very best friends, Meagan. She recently moved back to Texas from Colorado and had a new baby! This has been a very busy time in her life! We had a wonderful visit and I got some quality time with her beautiful girls too: Lauren, 2 1/2; and Julia, 10 weeks. I hope that we may get to see each other a bit more often now that she is back in Texas. :-)
Here is a picture of me and Julia:

Bike Rodeo

Ben participated in his school's Bike Rodeo today. He was one of very few kindergarteners that did not have training wheels---and he had the biggest bike of all his grade level too. We have been riding without training wheels for about a month now---still a little shaky, but he is progressing great. I was so proud of him today. He fell a couple of times, but got up and kept going without a hitch! My mommy heart swelled with pride.



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Ben's Kinder Class

The Blattman Kindergarten class of 2011-2012 ordered class t-shirts this year. Here is a picture of Ben's class with their new shirts. (Can you tell how much taller Ben is, compared to the rest?? He's in the back row and at least a head taller than them all!) It's a cute group of kids!!








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No Training Wheels!!

Logan's Bike Ride too

Rock Star!!

Bonnie playing with bubbles!

Labor Day Weekend

We spent a really nice, quiet, relaxing weekend in Port O'Connor with my parents. We always love going down there...especially on long weekends. We ate too much, took naps, read outside on the porch, watched the kids play in the pool, and of course, fished! We are looking forward to our next trip...

Ben loves using the net and bringing in the catch!



Logan didn't have his sunglasses, so he wore Gran's. So cute!



Logan was very proud of his catch!





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Grandparents Day

Last Friday was "Grandparents Day" at Blattman Elementary. In Ben's class, the Grandparents were invited to the classroom to read to the students. My mom was excited to attend---and being a retired 1st grade teacher, she had an arsenal of books to choose from! She finally settled on 2 of her favorites, Leo the Late Bloomer and Chrysanthemum . Ben was so happy and proud that his Mimi was in his class. And my mom was just as proud and had a great time. I think she is "hooked" at volunteering some extra time in Ben's class.




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