A Brave New World

We have made our big move to the east coast.  We left home with Pop and Lola...24 hours later we arrived at our new home.  With the grandparents on childcare duty, Kristi was amazing unpacking and organizing the house.  We've been in for a couple weeks and we are settling into the house well.  We are obviously going to have to live off of our GPS systems for awhile to figure out where everything is, but we've got the gym and the grocery store scouted out, so the basics are covered.
We had a nice trip into the city to see the Cherry Blossom Festival with Lola and the kids.
Abby decided to celebrate the move by starting to crawl and can now move around pretty much wherever she wants to go.  She is also cruising around the furniture; she's pulling herself up and walking around which holding onto the couch, chairs or whatever else she can get her hands on.  As a result of never wanting to sit down, she has a new bruise just about every other day.  Right now she is sporting a couple on her head where it looks like she is about to grow horns, and a slight black eye.  But she is a happy little baby and just wants to play with her brother as much as she can.
Corin just wishes that it would stop raining every other day so he could go outside and play on his new playground.  He has got a couple swings and a fort with a ladder and climbing wall leading up to the top of his slide.  He is taking his spills learning to get up to the top on his own, but just like any little boy he just wants to climb and run around his fort.  On the downside, he has created an unfortunate contraction of "Fork" and "Truck" and enjoys yelling it quite loudly.  We're working on that one.
I started work this week and the new job is very enjoyable so far.
So to sum up:
Abby loves crawling and standing up.
Corin loves running.
Mommy and Daddy love their babies.

Corin: 23 months; Abby: 9 months

 Mommy couldn't find Corin's gloves, so he had to wear some of hers.

 Corin chopping veggies...his new favorite activity.

 Playing with Monkey and Dexter.

 Sharing a nice refreshing drink with Monkey and Dexter.

It has been a crazy month for our family. We sold our house faster than we thought we would and have moved in with Grandma until we get transferred for my new position. It has been great being so close to family, but with crazy sleeping arraignments and 95% of our stuff in storage, we are looking forward to getting into our new house and being able to setting in a little bit.

The kids are doing great with everything and are as happy as ever. Corin turned 23 months old the other day. He is ready for the warm weather to come for good, since there is nothing he would rather do than play outside. He is saying more and more words all the time (flower, truck, bye-bye, outside, Abby, doggie, monkey, fish, bubbles, Mommy, Daddy, Pop, Lola, up, down...), and is babbling many more that we can't understand. He enjoys playing with other kids at the gym daycare, and loves playing with his cousin Dmitri. He is a big fan of pretty much any playground and gets very upset when you take him away from one or try to bring him inside before he is done playing.

Abby had her nine month check-up the other day and she is going wonderfully. She weighs 17 pounds, 11 ounces (29th percentile), and is 28" tall (66th percentile). So she is tall and trim (although you wouldn't know it to look at her chunky little body. More than anything, this little girl just wants to be able to move around. She can flip from her back to her front and back again when she is on the ground. She can push herself up into a sitting position and works very hard at pulling herself up to her feet, but she is not quite there yet. She will take steps when you hold her hands, and that is all she wants to do. She hasn't made any real movements towards crawling and it looks like she will be running before she can crawl.

We have just a few days left before the big move. We are looking forward to the next stage in our great adventure...

Snow Time

 

Ice storm

Things are going very well here are home.  Abby is able to sit up on her own now (or I should say "stay sitting on her own"...she can't get up by herself but can stay there once placed).  That has made life a little easier since you can plop her down and she will dig through a bucket of toys to get whatever she wants.  She is definitely getting bigger and growing up.
We have had a good deal of snow and ice here.  Even in the bad weather, Corin has to be taken outside at least once a day.  If not he will go crazy in the house.  He is just starting to get to the point where he is willing to walk on the snow.  Most of the time he likes to stay on the cleared portions of the driveway or sidewalk.  He also enjoys using his rake to "help" clear the driveway, as well as paintbrushes to clear snow off of the car bumpers.  Just yesterday he decided to pick up chunks of ice and fight you to keep them.  He doesn't care if his gloves are soaked through to his hands and he is freezing.  Those are his blocks of ice!  But we have enjoyed getting out of the sled for some spins around the yard.