The Gump Family

Christmas Card 2010

2010-11-20T16:08:00.001-05:00

Bright Colored Lights Christmas Card

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Disney 2009

2009-11-02T19:37:00.003-05:00

We just got back from 6 days at Disney World. We had a great time with Ben, Jennifer and their boys again. We stayed at Wildnerness Lodge this time and we were able to trick or treat at the Magic Kingdom.

Crowds were non existent and we walked on nearly every ride. It was hot (near 90 each day) but with no crowds and no waiting...it was not that bad and perfect for swimming.

Each time we visit Disney it is a new vacation and we are already excited for our next trip :)

Hope everyone had a happy halloween!

Halloween

2009-10-25T13:30:00.002-04:00

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1st Day of School

2009-09-08T09:31:00.002-04:00

The boys started Kindergarten and 1st grade today...here are some pics......

Jake Lost his First Tooth

2009-09-03T19:56:00.003-04:00

Jake lost his first tooth tonight! Bottom middle and it just popped right out!

The boys also started tennis and gymnastics this month.....meet the teacher is tomorrow and school starts on Tuesday.

DC Trip

2009-08-18T12:55:00.003-04:00

We took a short trip to DC this past weekend. Brad graduated and is now officially a special agent with the State Dept. He and Cynthia also bought their first home and we wanted to see Cynthia one more time before she leaves for Saudi Arabia. Brad's graduation was 2 hours long so I took the boys to the American History Museum instead...they really liked it. We also visited the National Cathedral and the Lincoln Memorial. It is nice to have Brad and Cynthia who know all the streets, places to park and metro routes :)

Once Kerry is home we will head back up for another visit and more sight seeing.

School starts Sept 8th for the boys and they report with me Aug 31 to help set up the room where I will be assisting. K and 1st grade already!

Myrtle Beach

2009-07-18T19:39:00.003-04:00

I took the boys to Myrtle Beach last night for a one night getaway. We went to a dinner show called Medievil Times...2 hours of jousting knights, kings and swords. The boys enjoyed it even if Sam had to bring in his own BK for dinner instead of the castle fare :) We stayed overnight and hit Ripleys Aquarium today. They have both been there several times but it is really nice and they have a great military ticket price. So...here are Sirs Jake and Sam (no pic of mom with her crown but I wore it the entire time:).

Hope everyone is having a good summer!

Sam's 5th Birthday Party

2009-06-21T12:53:00.004-04:00

Sam had his Harry Potter party yesterday. It was hot but everyone had a ton of fun!

Graduation 2009

2009-06-05T17:37:00.002-04:00

Sam graduated from PreK Thursday and Jake received his kindergarten diploma today. Both boys will be at the same school next year (St Annes). It was a great move for Jake and I know both boys will have a great year next year.

II MEF (FWD) Family Fun Day

2009-05-31T20:08:00.002-04:00

Family Readiness had a family fun day today for kids with a parent who is part of II MEF and deployed...fun time for the boys...

Sound to Sea

2009-05-27T20:39:00.002-04:00

May stuff

2009-05-27T18:41:00.003-04:00

Just wanted to check in and post some recent pics. Jake had a field day at school last week and today he had a field trip called Sound to Sea on Emerald Isle. For those of you from Ohio..think Mohican but at the ocean :) He spent some time in the sound and then we walked over to the ocean side. Lots of fun. Both boys are done with school next week. Sammy will graduate from pre k and Jake has an end of year concert.

While my recent job did not work out, I am happy to be back with TeacherLine and will just wait a little longer to get back to teaching full time. Kerry is very busy...as the number of Marines there grows smaller...those left have more to do. He is just really ready to get home.

We will post more as school ends......hope everyone is well.

Bike and Board

2009-05-04T20:23:00.003-04:00

The boys were working hard the other night...Jake learning to ride a 2 wheeler and Sam on skate board. A few falls and scrapes later and they both seem to be on their way..........

Busch Gardens

2009-04-18T20:42:00.002-04:00

Video of Jamestown

2009-04-18T19:52:00.002-04:00

Jamestown and Busch Gardens

2009-04-18T19:45:00.003-04:00

We had a great couple of days visiting Jamestown and Busch Gardens with some friends. Jamestown was really interesting and Busch Garden is a really nice park. The boys rode more than ever and really enjoyed the day. Busch Gardens has a great program called Hero Salute that allows military families to get in for free.....have to tell them thank you for that :)

We had great weather and plan to head back when Kerry gets home.

Easter

2009-04-14T16:20:00.005-04:00

Here are some pics from Easter here at home and then the White House Egg Roll.

The Egg Roll was an experience I am glad we had but very crowded and a LONG day. We left base at 4:30 AM and did not get back until midnight.

The boys enjoyed the bus ride but did not sleep at all on the way there and only 2-3 hours on the way back. Needless to say, by the time we got to the White House lawn around 2PM they were very tired and Sam showed it with a meltdown in the grass :)

We hope all of you had a nice Easter!

Soccer

2009-03-22T15:08:00.007-04:00

Valentines Day 2009

2009-02-13T10:23:00.001-05:00

Happy Valentines Day!

Jake's Birthday Party

2009-01-18T08:51:00.004-05:00

Jake had his birthday party with his friends yesterday and it was great! We hired a company called My Once Upon A Theme and they did a fantastic job. Jake chose a Pirate theme. There were games, crafts, a pinanta, a pirate, pizza, cupckaes and most fun for the kids was the giant obstacle course bounce around. The best part was that I got to enjoy the party instead of doing all of the work! :)

Jake, Sam and 7 of his friends really had a fun 2 hours. Since it was so cold we held the party at a local firestation where there was room for the bouncearound....it worked out great.

We hope everyone is doing well and keeping warm! For those of you on Facebook...I will post a few more pictures there as well

Christmas

2008-12-31T14:47:00.002-05:00

Well, we are back in NC after a trip to Hershey and OH for the holidays. Hershey was cold, but a good time. We visited Chocolate World, went on a Christmas trolley ride and the boys had a chance to swim at the lodge.

You can see Jake got all of the Legos he wanted and Sam got his biggest wish (his drum set). The boys have had fun playing guitars, drums and singing in Sam's room with Sam's new disco ball :) It is quite a site! Our next house NEEDS a finished basemet :)

We hope all of you had a nice holiday and enjoy New Years. A special hello to Justin and we hope he gets home and well VERY soon!

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-11T19:14:00.003-05:00

We will be seeing many of you soon, but I wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas! We had this photo taken last week. Our realtor had Santa at her house with treats for everyone in the neighborhood so we stopped by. It is one of the few famly photos we have with all 4 of us so I am glad she did it. You can see Sam was less than thrilled at first, but he did go back later to actually give Santa his list :)

We are heading to Hershey for 2 days before our visit to OH. We wanted to get a small trip in before Kerry leaves for Iraq again. He is set to leave mid January until at least the summer. He is also up for promotion so keep your fingers crossed :)

I will post after the holidays but for now...Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Halloween

2008-11-01T09:23:00.005-04:00

Happy Halloween from NC!

You can see that Jake chose Peter Pan for school (He had to be a fairy tale character) He chose Darth Vader for Trick or Treat. Sammy went with Harry Potter. A BIG thank you to Christy who made his great costume. Both boys had a great day and we now have about a ton of candy :) Talk to all of you soon!
.

Preschool!

2008-09-06T17:14:00.005-04:00

Sammy started his 4 year old preschool this past Wednesday. It is the same place where he was last year but he is with a new teacher (the one Jake had last year).

He was ready to go and it seems like he has adjusted to not having Jake with him. You can see on the video he was about as chatty as Jake on his first day :)

Kindergarten!

2008-08-27T19:45:00.005-04:00

Today was Jake's first day of Kindergarten. As usual, he did not have much to report. He said he had fun and that was about it. His teacher told me he was ready to come home at 12:30 :) It will take some time to get used to a 7 hour school day (pre school was 4 hours).

Sammy has his open house for preschool tomorrow and he starts next Wednesday. He was a little lost without Jake today. He was asking me to play ALOT more than usual :)

Jake's first few days were staggered to let smaller groups of kids come in T-R. He will go back on Friday to be with all 17 of his classmates and starting next Tuesday he will go everyday as usual.

We will post again when Sammy is up and running and now that soccer has started, I'm sure we'll have some of that to post too.

By the way....from the video you can tell Jake was a little tired this morning. He was not talking unless directed to :) He normally sleeps 7:30-7:30 but school has him up at 6:45 now and he is not adjusted yet :)

Talk to you soon!

Late Summer Update

2008-08-07T09:07:00.002-04:00

Hi everyone! It has been awhile since my last post. We have been busy at the pool and we took a trip to Myrtle Beach mid July.

School starts 8/26 for Jake and one week later for Sammy. We are taking advantage of these last days without a real schedule. They will also both start soccer in a couple of weeks.

Jake will need to take a break from Tae Kwan Do so he can try soccer. Last week he earned his Tiger Cub Green belt. When he returns to Tae Kwan Do later in the fall he will be moving up to the junior class. He really seems to like it alot and he is always excited to get a new belt.

Jake has learned to swim this summer and his latest thing is trying to learn to dive....pretty funny to watch :) Sammy has taught himself something that sort of looks like swimming :) Maybe next year he will want lessons.

Kerry is getting ready to work up for his next deployment which means moving to a new office and having some longer hours. In the meantime, he is having fun riding his new dirtbike when he can and golfing. We went to see him in action on the track last week. The boys think it is awesome. I think I may enjoy watching more when it is not 95 degrees with all that dirt flying around!

I quit my job here in Jones County. The drive was taking a toll (40 min each way) and I found some tutoring I can do here 10 minutes from the house instead at a local middle school. That will keep me a little busy while the boys are in school along with my online stuff.

We hope everyone is well. The pics are Jake getting his new belt and the boys playing at home last month. Talk to you soon!

Sammy's 4th Birthday Party

2008-06-30T13:46:00.002-04:00

Sammy had a party with his friends this past weekend. It was a Power Ranger theme (as you can see from the Power Ranger swim gear he is wearing:) and all of the kids had a fun time.

Both boys took swim lessons last week. Jake has become a fish and is continuing lessons. Sammy likes to be in the water but he was not too keen on the lessons so he will put those on hold for awhile.

We joined a local club that will let us take the boys swimming and play golf. It will be nice to have somewhere to take them this summer in the heat...they already want to go everyday! Work is slower for me now since school is out and with the boys out of school too we have lots and lots of time on our hands :) The pool will help us keep busy.

We head to Myrtle Beach in a couple of weeks for the annual father/son golf tournament which will be fun. We will get to see the grandmas and grandpa as well as Aunt Michelle.

We hope everyone is having a fun summer and we will talk to you soon!

Party

2008-06-09T15:50:00.003-04:00

Darth Vader and his most trusted Storm Trooper will see you at Jake and Sam's birthday party.

Summer news

2008-06-09T08:58:00.003-04:00

We have had lots of activity since my last post. Sammy got his "big boy" bike. He is doing really well on it and he is very happy to be like Jake now.

The boys also had "graduation" from pre-school last Thursday. It was truly Jake's last day as a pre schooler, but Sammy has one year to go. As you can see...the true "graduates" wore the robes :) The three year olds got to sing some extra songs as their "special" part of the day :) It was very cute and we got it all on video too. It has really been a wonderful school. In the pics you can see the boys with their teachers. It will be interesting to see how they do on their own at different schools next year as Jake moves onto the big K.

Jake also earned his yellow belt in Tae Kwan Do. It is the second belt for him (they all start at white). He had to "test" last week with all of the TKD students and adults. He had to stand in front of everyone with one other student and show some punches, blocks and how he can stand still for 30 seconds (toughest part!). He was very happy...he has wanted yellow for awhile now.

Sammy is taking a break from TKD :) It is just not something he enjoys all that much right now. It could be his age or maybe it is just not for him. We plan to try soccer in the fall.

We are heading to OH this week for Jake and Sammy's bday party so we hope to see many of you this weekend. We hope everyone is well and we'll talk to you soon!

Summer visit

2008-05-12T14:47:00.003-04:00

It has been awhile since my last post. We are finally back to "normal." The boys are back in school after spring break, Kerry is at his new job and I am on my usual schedule.

It is getting warmer here each week. Pretty soon we can add the beach to our list of activities.

We will be heading to OH the second week of June (13-17). Kerry may be heading to a school in VA later in the summer so we wanted to get a visit in before then. We hope to see as many of you as we can.

Jake and Sam are doing well. Jake is really, REALLY into Star Wars. He has now seen all 6 movies (numerous times) and he loves to play with Star Wars toys and Kerry has Star Wars Lego on Xbox. He gets his 30 min a day to play. It is a nice thing to hold over him when he starts to misbehave :)

Sammy like to play Star Wars too (because Jake does:) and he is really into sports and anything physical. He loves the playset Kerry built and we got him a little nerf bball hoop for his room he plays with alot.

They have a month left of school. I register Jake for kindergarten tomorrow!

Not much else to report. The pics are from my Mothers Day Lunch at school and a look at Darth Jake using the force to "choke" Sammy :) Talk to you soon!

DisneyWorld

2008-04-17T13:11:00.003-04:00

We are back from our Disney trip! We had a great time with Ben, Jennifer, Eric and Ethan. We had good weather and the boys were really good. With four boys between 3-6 years old you never know but they were really great. We hit all four parks during our week there. I have tons of pics but here are some of the better ones.

Our first night was Mickey's BBQ and we got a welcome home cake for Kerry. At Epcot all four boys got their faces painted. We had a bear, a tiger, a super hero and Sammy opted for a less flashy pair of stars :) At Downtown Disney the boys got soaked after dinner in the pop up water fountains and at MGM they spent some time chatting with one of the characters before the parade.

This is still our favorite vacation and all 8 of us plan to go again, like always, in a couple of years.

Here is a link to our other photos if you want to see them. Ben and Jen have theirs up too.

www.disneyphotpass.com

Use my email (kkgump@gmail.com) and the password belle1

We hope everyone is well and we hope to be in OH sometime this summer to see all of you!

Kerry is Home!

2008-03-24T14:26:00.003-04:00

Kerry got in around midnight last night. The boys were tired but excited. They set up some snacks and games in one of the gyms on base and then told us to head outside once the buses and vans were 5 minutes away.

There are some pics of last night and one today by our welcome home sign. You can see me and boys waiting inside for Kerry and then the boys with him after he got out of the van.

Kerry has alot of catching up to do but he will have some time to do it. He has to go in for 4 or 5 days for post deployment items but then he will take 3-4 weeks of leave which will include our Disney vacation.

Thanks to all of you who sent cards, emails and packages while he was gone. We hope his next deployment is not anytime soon!

Return Date

2008-03-19T20:02:00.002-04:00

We have a return date and time for Kerry! Of course, it could change...and most likely will, but only by hours or maybe a day.

He is set to head to Kuwait tomorrow around 9AM EST. He will spend a couple of days there before he flies to Germany and then Cherry Point here in NC. From Cherry Point (another Marine base nearby) he will take a bus to Camp LeJeune where we are supposed to pick him up at midnight on Easter Sunday.

We are all getting pretty excited. We have our signs ready and we will decorate the yard on Friday. For those of you who do not know or live near a military town...when any of the Marines come home families put signs up near base or in their yards. Ours says welcome home with a block O of course!

I will be sure to get some pictures up once he is back so you can also see the signs the boys made. They are counting the days and they have agreed to let the Easter Bunny come one day late so daddy can take part too.

We will keep you updated!

SOLD!

2008-03-11T15:12:00.002-04:00

I had to post that we finally sold our house in Ohio! It took about 14 months and we cut it pretty close with Kerry coming home in 2 weeks but it is gone!!

It was a long process and our timing was awful...who knew the market would get so bad?! The good news is it is gone and a young couple with their first baby on the way is moving in. They can enjoy all the hard work Kerry put into that house.

Kerry is still on track to be home Easter weekend, but as I know all too well, things will and probably will change. I will keep everyone posted. Talk to you soon!

February

2008-02-06T10:44:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone! It has been awhile since my last post but things have been busy. Sadly, we could not make it home for my Grandma Sellman's funeral because we were all sick. We are all feeling better now, but it was a rough week last week.

It looks like we may finally have some good news on the home sale front. I do not want to jinx anything, but I can say we have an offer that we are working on and we are hopeful it will all fall into place. Owning 2 homes for 8 mos was never in our plans!

Kerry is still set to come home March 20 something. When I get an exact date I will let everyone know. We have a family trip to DisneyWorld planned for his return in early April. The boys are getting pretty excited. It will be a wonderful few weeks for all of us..Daddy home and Disneyworld! It does not get much better!!

We hope all of you are well. The picture is of Mr Gump and Mr Gump eating at Mommy's restaurant. They like to act like "grownups" and eat out :) Notice the difference in dress...Sammy went casual with no shirt and flip flops while Jake was more conservative :) Talk to you soon!

Party

2008-01-06T10:24:00.000-05:00

Jake has his birthday party yesterday. He had three friends over and Sammy of course :) You can see it was Pirate theme. The photo is a little dark but they all have on their eye patches and were saying "ahoy matey!"

The kids all had a fun time and Jake is still running around playing pirate today. He is excited to have his family party with Sammy (and Daddy) this summer in OH.

Talk to you soon!

HAPPY 5th BIRTHDAY JAKE!

2008-01-05T08:58:00.001-05:00

This is one day late, but his party is today!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

Holidays

2008-01-05T08:51:00.000-05:00

Sorry it has taken so long for a new post. December was a busy month!

We had a nice trip home to OH. The boys were really good in the car and somehow we made it in record time both ways. It was nice to be back in OH and to see everyone. It would be nice if we lived closer but at least you have someone to visit at the beach!

The boys are now back in school as of this week and I am back to work. We are settling back into our routines.

Kerry is set to be home late March so we will not make it home for Easter as we had planned. We would not want him to come home to an empty house!

I have put up some Christmas pics. The boys attended a Teddy Bear Tea for Toys for Tots at the Officers Club and as you can see they decorated cookies with the grandma's. I will soon have some up for Jake's birthday party. We will have his family party later this summer together with Sam.

Talk to you soon!

The Latest

2007-11-29T19:15:00.000-05:00

Hi from NC! It has been awhile since our last post. We have had Thanksgiving here with the family and soon we will be heading up to OH for Christmas.

The boys are doing well. They were happy to see everyone visiting at the beach house and they are anxious for a visit to OH. I promised them a trip to their old house (since we still own it!!!!) Yes....it has not sold yet so please cross your fingers for us that it does soon! Who knew the market would fall apart the way it has!

You can see from the pics that everyone was able to enjoy some beach time over the holiday. Kerry also had me get the boys new big wheels and they LOVE them!

Kerry is doing well....just really ready to get home and back to a normal life. He and his Marines did get a small tree in a care package and some decorations so they will have a little something.

We hope everyone is well and we will see many of you soon!

Happy Halloween

2007-11-01T21:42:00.000-04:00

Happy Halloween from NC!

The boys had a great Halloween. A few weeks ago they got to go on a hayride with some friends Hayley and Connor to get their pumpkins. Yesterday they had a party at school and then trick or treat. Our neighborhood was busy and they came away with 2 big bowls of candy (just what they needed!)

I had to include the pic of Officer Jake "arresting" Sammy the ghost :) The others are the hayride and their school party.

The Grandma's are here visiting and next month we will have more visitors for our beach Thanksgiving.

We hope everyone is well and keep in touch

Field Trip

2007-09-30T22:43:00.000-04:00

The boys had their first field trip Friday. They visited a firehouse. As you can see from the pics they stand out a little from their average size classmates...Jake looks like a 1st grader! They are enjoying school and Sammy even ate some new lunch foods they served that I never got him to try like peanut butter and jelly.

My job is working out really well so far and not interferring at all with my mom duties. I am able to fit in my teacher visits while the boys are in school and I do all other work at home.

We visited Brad and Cynthia and my mom last weekend in DC. I wish I had better pics but Jake and Sam don't like the camera flash so they always close their eyes. We went to the zoo and the natural history museum. That was pretty much 30 min of just looking for all the dinosaur bones then leaveing :)

Kerry will well.....drop him an email if you have some time. He is still thinking he will get home sometime in March.

We hope everyone is well and we will talk to you soon!

Miss you Daddy!

2007-09-11T14:04:00.001-04:00

The boys took this picture on base today and I know I am their mom but it is pretty cute :)

First Day of School!

2007-09-05T12:24:00.000-04:00

Well, today the boys started school. Jake is in the 4 year old class and Sammy is next door with the 3 year olds.

They were both excited, but Jake was a little more nervous. I think he was unsure since it was a new school for him and he was used to St Joe's in Maumee. Sammy did not even watch me walk out the door! He was at his seat with his box of labeled crayons ready to go!

Jake told me he was not so excited but he did fine too and when I left he was playing with a toy.

They started with a special first day of school breakfast of mini chocolate chip pancakes and then we were out the door.

They are going to First Presbyterian in Jacksonville about 10 minutes from the house. It seems like a great place. They each will go 3 days a week and they have about 15 kids in their classes.

I will update with any big schools news :) Talk to all of you soon!

PS I added a video of the boys at the beach too just to see how that works on here. Please leave a comment to let me know if you can view it or not. Thanks!

The Beach

2007-08-27T22:43:00.000-04:00

With summer ending soon I wanted to get a pic up of the boys at the beach on base. There is a nice beach on base (Onslow Beach) and as you can see the boys love it and they made a friend! :) Check out Sam lounging with his new lady :) Jake is such a third wheel!

It is a little less hot here but still pretty humid and we could use alot of rain! The beach or the pool are really the only places you want to be outside.

I have accepted a part time job with the school district where I used to teach when we lived her before. I will be running their new teacher mentor program. It will work out great so that I can work at the schools when the boys are in preschool and I can complete all other work at home.

The boys start school the 5th and both are excited. Especially Sammy. He has wanted to be like Jake for 2 years now and be in school.

I will be sure to get some "first day" pics up after the 5th.

Kerry is doing well and almost ready to move to his new job where he will be until he comes home. He will still be on the same base....just a new role.

We hope everyone is well and we will talk to you soon!

Hi from hot NC!

2007-08-13T08:53:00.000-04:00

Well, it is finally cooling off...a little. Instead of 100 with a heat index of 115 and LOTS of humidity we have 90 with alot less humidity :) At least it does not feel like an oven outside!

With the heat we have been trapped inside most days. As you can see Jake passes his time arresting the criminal mastermind Sammy!

The boys are doing well and talk alot about dadddy coming home. They seem to understand it will be awhile but that it will be for longer this time.

Kerry is doing fine. Sometimes I forget and complain to him about the heat! I think he has it a bit worse :)

We hope you are all well. Write soon....visit soon and if I sent you the link about the kids books...........shop soon! :)

Visit With Dad

2007-07-30T16:24:00.000-04:00

I wanted to get some pics up of Kerry with the boys while he was home. As you can see Daddy took them to get some new toys (Sam's piano included). Jake played so much he needed a milk break!

We had a nice trip with our families in Myrtle Beach for the annual Father & Son golf tournament Kerry and my dad play in. He managed to plan his R&R so they would not miss it :)

He got home July 15th and he heads back tomorrow, the 31st.

We expect him home sometime in Feb or March. We are choosing to look at it like we are almost half way done at this point.

The boys had a great time and I am sure I will have a fun few days as they adjust to life without dad again, but they will do just fine.

Kerry did a few things around the house. Since this was the first time he has seen the house he had more he wanted to do than he had time, but he can start new projects next spring!

We hope you are all well and we hope to see some of you soon!

Summer

2007-06-27T14:19:00.000-04:00

Well, it is VERY hot here and the boys just got a new pool. They are a little too big for the baby pools so we stepped it up a notch in size. I can even sit in this one with them :)

As you can see, Jake and Sam love it. They would be happy to be in the water every afternoon. We hit the beach on base Sunday and we also have a pool we can use at the Officer's Club so we have enough options ;)

We hope everyone is well. Have a fun 4th of July if we do not post bef0re then!

Happy Birthday Sammy!!

2007-06-22T23:08:00.000-04:00

Sammy's birthday is Saturday June 23rd

HAPPY 3rd BIRTHDAY SAMMY!!!!

House Pics

2007-06-11T22:32:00.000-04:00

Here are some pics of the new house.

Our New House

2007-06-10T21:26:00.000-04:00

Hi from North Carolina! Thanks to my mom and Kerry's mom we are settled into our new house.

They came down to help me with the boys for over a week so I was able to get the house in order. We moved in Thurs the 7th and by Sat the 9th it was all done!

The house is wonderful and it looks great all painted. We had some sod put in (we had black dirt and Apple would have destroyed the house if she had gone out in it) and we are having a fence put up this week so she can run again.

We had a nice time in Surf City before we moved in and the boys had some fun at the beach.

It will take some time for the boys to settle in. Jake said he liked it but he needed to get used to it :) I think Sam is not so sure we are staying here.....he has lived in 4 houses the past 2 weeks (Maumee, Medina, Surf City and here:).

I will post some pics soon. I need to get back to regular life when I have time for things like that.

We hope all of you are well and we will talk to you soon!

Sammy's 3rd Birthday

2007-05-11T20:43:00.000-04:00

We celebrated Sam's 3rd birthday a little early this year since we are moving before the real deal (June 23rd).

Thanks to everyone who came!

He was really excited about it this year. I think he really gets it now...presents, cake....all really good stuff! He was going up to anyone who would listen the whole week before talking about his Doodlebops party.

Everything is still on schedule for us to move out of our Maumee house May 25th. The house has not sold yet so please tell all your friends Maumee is wonderful and they need to move here and buy our house! :)

The NC house will still be ready May 31st. We will be home at my mom and dads May 25- May 28 if you want to stop by for one last visit before we go.

Kerry is still doing well. Just tired of 12+ hour work days seven days a week, but he is fine. He taped a video reading a book to send to the boys and they really liked that. They think he can hear them so they talk to him on the TV :)

We hope you are all having a good spring and we will see you soon!

Happy Mothers Day to all the moms out there!

School is In Session

2007-04-27T09:08:00.000-04:00

Jake and Sam got a new book at the bookstore. It is a flip chart with different learning posters like numbers, letters, bones (the one Jake chose to teach). Luckily Jake happened to have a pointer already :) As you can see Sam is a willing student, but I am not sure how much was actually being "taught." It was alot of "No Sam....." and Sam trying to leave the room :)

As for our move....we are all set to have the truck here May 25th. We will stay at my mom and dads a few days and we plan to leave for NC May 29th. Our new house closes May 31st. Needless to say we have a busy May ahead of us.

Kerry is doing fine...just ready to come home. His R&R will be for 15 days in July so we are counting down to then...not 2008.

We hope everyone is doing well. See you soon!

Warm Days

2007-03-26T23:20:00.000-04:00

It has been great here lately weather wise so the boys have been able to get out a play a little. As you can see they like to wear their helmets and Jake looks like he means business :)

I also took a shot of a #1 Jake wrote in chalk. It is the first time I have seen him write it. He has been writing just as a line but as you can see he has more detail now........big time preschool stuff!

Kerry is doing well. If you have sent him something and have not heard back...you will. He is still working 12-14 hours 7 days a week so that leaves little time for writing and email.

We will see many of you soon for weddings and Easter. Enjoy the nice weather!

Happy St Patrick's Day!

2007-03-16T09:08:00.000-04:00

Jake made this lovely leprechaun face in school so I had to share and say

Happy St Patrick's Day!

I also wanted to put up this photo of the boys with their Little Patriot's bears since I sent all of you the link to their site. You can see they are really cute and the boys were sharing a movie and snack with them last night.

See you soon!

The latest

2007-03-05T20:55:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone! It has been awhile since I posted. Not much to report. Kerry calls and emails when he can. Sometimes it is 3 days in a row and sometimes we have to wait 5 or 6 days to hear from him. It just depends.

Jake and Sam are doing well. Both boys are very excited that the newest Power Rangers now have their show on. The pic of them on the couch was taken moments before the premiere :)

They also have a new train table thanks to mom :) I have to say...it was definitely a "Daddy" job usually, but I think it turned out OK. They have had the train table for quite sometime but they rarely set up the tracks and when they did they would destroy them soon after. I noticed that anytime we went into a store where they had a permanent track set up they played with it so today we got new track, found a layout and glued it down! Now they can just fight over the same 2" of track all day tomorrow :)

We hope all of you are well. We know we will see most of you in a month or so for Easter and Brad and Cynthia's big day. Until then take care and talk to you soon!

PS Thank you to everyone who has emailed and mailed Kerry. Even if he can't get back to each of you right away he wants you to know that he appreciates it.

Valentine's Day

2007-02-11T14:36:00.000-05:00

Happy Valentines Day!!

We hope everyone is doing well. Jake and Sam wanted to blow everyone some kisses for Valentine's day.

We are all fine here. We talk to Kerry most days whether it is email or a phone call. He is well.....just tired from working 13-14 hour days.

I also put up a Power Ranger picture for any of you who doubted Jake's devotion to them :) Sam is not far behind in his love for them either. Anything Jake does he can do too!

We hope to see many of you soon for showers and weddings. Keep in touch!

PS If you look closely you will see the Power Rangers were attending a "dance" Jake arranged for them. The boys dancing with the girls :)

Long time no post

2007-01-30T21:00:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone. It has been awhile since I had added a new post. We have been a little busy :)

Kerry left Jan 20th so we were back and forth between NC and OH.

Jake had his family birthday party this past weekend. Thank you to everyone who made it. He had a great time (imagine that!:)

We are settling back into our routine here at home. Jake has school, we joined the Y and Sam keeps busy running errands with me while Jake is at school.

I have added some photos from Jake's friend and family birthday parties as well as some other news ones. We will see lots of you soon for all the wedding activity in the next couple of months. Have a good February!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

2007-01-04T13:53:00.000-05:00

Happy 4th Birthday Jake!!!!

(pictured with bday present from mom and dad)

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

2006-12-10T20:34:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas from the Gump Family!!

We are not able to send out Christmas cards this year because our address book is in OH so we wanted to post a "card" here for everyone.

We hope everyone has a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Thanksgiving

2006-11-28T07:15:00.000-05:00

We hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. We had a full house which was nice. My parents, Kerry's mom, Michelle, Brad and Cynthia were all here. The boys especially loved all the playmates :)

The weather started out awful but by the last 2 days it was sunny and in the upper 60's.

We hope to get home for 2 weeks at Christmas, but we won't know for sure until Kerry finds out his work schedule.

Our OH house is officially on the market (know anyone looking?:) and our house here is all set...everything has been picked out and now it just need to be built!

As you can see from the photos the boys are well. The BIG NEWS is that Sammy decided it was time to be potty trained about 2 weeks ago. He just started going on his own and in 2 weeks...no accidents! I was going to wait until after Christmas since he is not even 2 and a half yet but I guess he had other plans. He is excited to be like "Jakey."

The boys (especially Jake) are also now really into being "Marines." You can see they have all they need for dress up though some is a little big on them.

Hope all is well and talk to you soon!

GO BUCKS!

2006-11-18T11:54:00.000-05:00

I had to make an entry on such a big day. Professors Sam and Jake say:
"Buckeyes by 13"

Trick Or Treat

2006-11-01T19:18:00.000-05:00

Here are some pics right before we went out trick or treating. The boys are with their friends Lauren and Matthew. Coincidentally Lauren was Cinderella so Sammy was her mouse :)

Happy Halloween!

2006-11-01T08:02:00.000-05:00

Happy Halloween everybody!

I had to get some pics up of the boys in their costumes. They were able to wear them a few times this year. While the Grandma's were visiting this past weekend we went to the Emerald Isle Halloween Festival. It was indoor with lots of games and treats for the kids. They don't trick or treat on the island since there are so many empty rental houses.

Yesterday they had a party at school and then last night we headed over to a friend's house for trick or treat.

Kerry's CO while we are in GA moved here with his family and they have two kids who are 3 and 4. Jake used to play with the oldest (Lauren) when we lived there and they watched him the night we had Sam. We actually have photos of the 3 older ones from Halloween 2003....no Sam at that point :)

The four of them made it to about 10 houses before their little legs could not take it anymore :) I am going to get more photos from Maria since we used her camera and post those as soon as I can, but I wanted to get up some of the boys in costume.

Jake was the blue SPD Power Ranger and Sam was Jaq (one of Cinderella's mice). We could not find Sam's costume in the store so Christy's mom (if you are not in the family that is my cousin's wife's mom :) Made it for him and it was ADORABLE! Thank you to her!!

Hope all of you are well and talk to you soon!

Sam has adjusted

2006-10-24T08:37:00.000-04:00

Hi again. Well, Sam has decided that the beach is not so bad afterall :) As you can see he will head out into the water now and he gets pretty excited when we start talking about the big waves.

Today is the first real cold day since we got here. It is supposed to be 57 (not that cold...I know). There are quite a few people here renting the houses right on the water since it is cheap season, but it is too cold for most of the other houses to be rented.

I have Jake and Sam signed up on base at the Officer Wive's run daycare/preschool. They have drop in care so the boys can go play for an hour or two while I run errands. Helps make up for Jake missing school. I had him in another preschool here but I was not crazy about it. The one on base is much better and Sammy can stay too which he LOVES!

We are looking at neighborhoods and houses so we can be all set for our move next year and Kerry and I plan to attend the Marine Corps Ball Nov 10th which we have not done the past 2-3 years so that will be nice. A chance to dress up and have a dinner that lasts more than 10 min that I don't have to clean up :)

We hope all of you are well. I'll post again after trick or treat with some costume pics!

Lots of stuff

2006-10-10T15:45:00.000-04:00

Hi from NC! We had a busy weekend and we are now settling into our temporary house here in Emerald Isle.

Jake was ring bearer for my cousin Justin's wedding. As you can see he was very handsome and he did a great job! No growling or crawling down the isle :)

We then headed to NC Sunday and got here late Monday night. You can see we have great views. We are second row from the beach with beach access about 25 yards from the driveway.

I took Jake, Sam and Apple down this afternoon. From the photos you can see Jake LOVED it and Sam HATED it :) Sam just kept saying "don't go down there" and then to top it off, on the walk home he got a burr stuck in his heel. Nice afternoon for Sammy :( Maybe he will warm up to it.

It is 80 here today so there were some people even swimming, but it is pretty dead around here...lots of empty beach houses.

Well, time to clean a bit and organize more. 4 months is awhile to live in someone else's house so I need to make it as much our own as I can :) Talk to everyone soon! Visit anytime!

PS Please send your email to me at kkgump@buckeye-express.com. I no longer have my address book with me since I am away from my desktop. Thanks!

First Day of School

2006-09-12T13:47:00.000-04:00

Hi again. I wanted to get some pics up of Jake's first day of school (and Sammy too:)

Jake started Sept 6th and is loving every minute. He has 2 friends from last year in his class again. They are in the photo with him....Allison (the only girl in class) and Stephen.

Sam is starting to talk in full sentences and the day we took that photo he spent the whole afternoon in his helmet.

We hope all of you are well. Talk to all of you soon!

Time to Catch Up

2006-08-23T21:06:00.000-04:00

Hey everyone! I realized I have not posted in awhile so I thought I should get some new pics up.

The boys are both doing well. Jake starts pre-school Sept 6th. He will attend 3 days per week this year and he is eager to see Ms. Karen and his friends again.

Sam is talking up a storm and is as hard headed as ever. He wants to do everything on his own and is not very happy when it does not happen that way :) He is also getting taller and thinner. His shorts that fit earlier this summer are falling down!

Kerry is working on finishing things here on the house and I am just busy with all 3 of them :)

From the photos you can see Jake still likes to make faces and Sammy needs a haircut. We hope all of you are well and we will talk to you soon!

Photos

2006-07-15T13:08:00.000-04:00

Hi again. I know I posted not too long ago but I just downloaded our camera and there are some real winners.

You can see Sam striking a pose (feel free to suggest captions for this one). For those of you who know Jake's "Hey Ladies" photo....I think this is Sam's version :)

The boys are also still VERY into Power Rangers and they recently got some new items thanks to Ebay. They love to dress up. Jake would want you to know he is a Dino Thunder Ranger and Sam is Mystic Force :) You do not want to confuse the two...trust me!

Kerry and I are not sure what the Rangers are doing on top of the vehicles, but Jake put them there and we were told to not let Sam touch them!

We hope you are all well. Talk to you soon!

July news

2006-07-06T14:08:00.000-04:00

Hi and belated Happy 4th! As most of you know the end of June/early July has been an exciting time at the Gump house.

I broke my arm June 24th when I fell carrying Jake down the steps. My ulna was broken and I had surgery to place a plate in my arm. The good news is no cast and each day it gets better and I can use it more. It was my right arm so I need it back to 100% ASAP!

Jake is well into tball. He is on the Dodgers and so far his favorite parts are batting and laying in the outfield and picking flowers :) You can see in the photo that he has great running form :)

Sammy had has 2 year check up and he is doing well. He is right on track with Jake. They were the same height at 2 years, but Sammy weighs a 2 lbs less. And all this time we thought Sam was the big one :)

In case you are wondering what is all over Jake's face in the one photo, it is tape. They both decided one day that they liked it on their faces. Whatever....it kept them happy for 30 min!

We hope all of you are having a good summer. Talk to you soon!

Cedar Point

2006-06-12T12:53:00.000-04:00

We went to Cedar Point with my parents yesterday and it was a perfect day. 70 and sun and we were able to walk right on any of the rides. Kerry and I even managed to get on some coasters between Kiddie Kingdom and Camp Snoopy.

The boys liked alot of the rides, though Sammy was not a fan of anything that went up in the air. We spent alot of time in the cars that go round and round :)

You can see they also had their faces painted. Jake went with a lizard while Sam had his heart set on the "kitty."

I had to post the pic of my dad in the little boat with them...notice the listing to one side :) We were afraid it might tip...especially once he lifted Sam onto his lap, but they made it. You can also see Kerry sitting very comforably in the monster truck :)

Graduation

2006-06-09T13:48:00.000-04:00

Well...summer is here now and I wanted to put up some pics of Jake's pre-school graduation. He finished his 3 year old year and you can see him sitting with his buddies from school. He will move up with them to the four year old class next year even though he won't be 4 yet :) He'll just repeat another four year old year the next year. No need to start kindergarten early...it will come soon enough!

Sam is talking all the time now and he can even recite his alphabet (when Mr. Stubborn want to!). You can also see from the photos that he enjoys a good golf hat and he has some nice moves.

Jake starts t-ball next week and we have already been to the city pool 4 or 5 times. It is really great...a HUGE kids area and about 2 minutes from our house.

We hope all is well with you and we'll see you the 17th for Sammy's party!

Power Rangers

2006-05-18T22:09:00.000-04:00

For those of you who don't know Jake is really into Power Rangers (so Sam is too by default:). Kerry took Jake shopping tonight and he got a Power Ranger set/costume. I had to post these photos of the boys showing their "moves" as Jake calls them.

You can also see that Sam got a new microphone and thought he would combine the two new toys :)

T-ball time

2006-05-05T13:13:00.000-04:00

Hi again! I know I just posted a couple of weeks ago, but we got some good photos of the boys with the nice weather.

Jake will be playing t-ball this summer so Kerry got him some practice items :) As you can see Sam is ready to start too, but he will have to settle for cheerleader this year since he is not old enough yet. At least you can see that they work together and are not hitting each other with the bat :)

We spend most afternoons outside on the playset or playing in the sand/water table. Kerry is all done with Spring exams and he starts Summer on the 15th.

We hope all is well and HAPPY BIRTHDAY DAD (Grandpa)!!!!

Spring

2006-04-20T09:11:00.000-04:00

Hi there! It has been awhile since I got some new pics up so I decided to get moving and get some up :) You can see Apple has adjusted just fine to her new house. Sam is wearing some bunny ears Jake got from one of his friends at preschool. Jake did not want to wear them but Sammy obliged us. He is also trying his best to "be" a bunny....hand movements and all :) The couch shot is just some post nap cartoon time.

We hope all of you had a nice Easter. It was nice to see everyone, but as usual, it was a hectic day. We are now back home and enjoying all this nice weather. It is great to let the boys out all afternoon. Their usual no nap grouchiness seems to be much less when they have time to run outside. It makes our lives much less stressful come 4PM :)

Kerry is wrapping up Spring semester and in a few weeks we plan to head to Cedar Point and Kalahari indoor waterpark again. (Jake and Sam both cannot stop talking about that place!:)

We hope to see all of you soon. We will see you for Ryan and Amanda's wedding for sure! Enjoy the weather!

Welcome Apple!

2006-03-31T19:03:00.000-05:00

We have a new addition to our family! Meet Apple. We adopted her today from a rescue here in the Toledo area. She is an Australian Cattle dog mix and she is about 1 year old. She was rescued from an animal shelter when she was pregnant and almost ready to be killed. The rescue organization took her in, helped her with her puppies and she has been in their foster care since then (Dec 2005).

She is really cute, housebroken and best of all....great with the boys. She loves to play and she listens well. We made a trip to Petco to get her all of her goodies today and she is settling in. The photo is from the rescue site. I will have more up soon!

New photos

2006-02-28T13:25:00.000-05:00

Not much news to share from our house, but we do have some new photos to post.

I had to put up the one of Jake in his "I am so cute" pose as the boys work on their art. You can also see that Sammy is really into his music :) The boys also like their book corner. If you look closely Jake is working on his "music" (a pooh book with a mini keyboard) as Sam reads.

They have also recently discovered that Kerry make a great horse :)

Drop us a line or as Brad likes to do, add your own captions!

We hope all is well with you! Talk to you soon.

Sleeping Bags

2006-02-16T13:59:00.000-05:00

Hi from Maumee! It has been awhile since our last post and since I downloaded some new pics. The boys are both good. Jake had a great Valentine's party at school and they are still living on the candy from it. Kerry is hard at work at school and he plans to run in the law school's 5K in April. I am busy as usual with the boys and work. We are planning a trip in 2 weeks to Kalahari. It is an indoor water park in Sandusky. We'll be sure to let you know how that goes. Everytime Jake sees their commercial he goes nuts!

The pictures are the boys relaxing in their sleeping bags from Aunt Michelle and as you can see...Sammy is quite fond of bannanas at the moment. Jake also attempted to re-create a previous photo of him on the couch with his friends. He saw the old pic and insisted we re-do it ;) I had to include the one of Sammy going down in my shoes......too funny ;)

We hope you are all well and we will talk to you soon!

Just a hello

2006-01-25T14:45:00.000-05:00

Hi there. I just noticed that I had not posted since my Belle post and I wanted to cheer up the blog a bit :)

We are all doing well here. Jake has started pre-school and he LOVES it! He is in a 3 year old group Tues and Thurs afternoons 12:30-3. I thought it would give me some one on one time with Sam, but it is his nap time so instead I get some quiet time which is nice too.

Kerry is into his second semester and busy reading as usual. I have been busy with the usual. Having Jake in school has acutally made me a bit busier. Who would have guessed that just getting him to and from school two days a week could be so time consuming!

I have put up one of the last photos of Belle. It was taken the last weekend. As you can see, she was well enough at that point to try to kiss SaM (and he thought it was pretty funny:) I would also like to know what kind of face Sam is making in the photo of him and Jake on the couch. Any captions Brad?

Talk to you everyone soon!

Belle

2006-01-17T09:33:00.000-05:00

Many of you know that Belle has been sick for awhile now. In July she had a tumor removed, in Septemeber she had knee surgery and in November she had to have another tumor removed. In her last surgery they were not able to get all of the tumor.

Belle was on chemo since then but in the past 2 weeks she was not able to tolerate anymore medication and she was not eating well. In the past few days she stopped eating completely and she was very tired. After taking her to the vet twice over the weekend it was clear she would not be getting better.

This morning I took Belle and had her put to sleep. We will all miss her very much. She was my baby for 8 years before Jake and Sam and the past 3 years she has been great with them and understanding why she lost some attention.

Belle would have been 11 this July. We plan to bury her at my mom and dads.

Disney

2006-01-09T07:44:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone! We have been back from Disney since Friday. I sent out the link with all of the photos. Sorry there were so many, but after it took so long to put captions for all of them I did not want to stay up any longer to weed the bad ones out :)

We had a great time and the weather could not have been better. It was in the mid-high 70's each day with sun. We went to the Magic Kingdom our first day and had a character breakfast with Pooh. Jake was excited to ride some rides this time, but they scared him a little too. Pirates of the Carribean was not exactly where he wanted to be :) Fortunately Sam napped each afternoon in the stroller so he could enjoy the rest of the day.

The next day was golf for the guys and a trip to Downtown Disney for the rest of us. The boys had their faces painted and Sam and Eric rode the merry go round. The shuttle ride back Eric and Jake spent the entire 25 minutes asking which parts of their faces were safe to touch :) That night we went to a dinner show (Spirit of Aloha) which was a bit long, but the fire twirler at the end made it worth it.

Our last full day was MGM. We knew Jake would love the stunt car show they have, but the first stop to meet the Power Rangers was almost as exciting for him. He has never even seen their show, but he could not have been more thrilled to meet them. He has been working on his "posing" ever since :) We had never been to MGM before and we really liked it. It is relaxed with fewer rides and more live action shows. The kids cannot sit through too many of those but the ones we did see were great and it is a nice park to walk around in.

It was a great trip and next time I'd like to stay a little longer. There is just so much to see and do and as the boys get older they will be able to do more and they will want to do more. All 4 boys were really good. Taking 4 between the ages of 1-4 could have been ugly but they were great! Time to plan the next visit! :)

Christmas

2005-12-26T20:21:00.000-05:00

Well, Christmas 2005 is now done. As usual, we were very busy but had a fun time. The boys made out like bandits and they really had fun seeing everyone. We did not get as many pictures as we would have liked so look for a post when we get back from vacation with a few more :)

You can see the boys listened intently as granpda read them "The Night Before Christmas." Sam spent the entire morning on the 25th sitting on the couch, eating a chocolate covered marshmellow pop from his stocking. Grandma Judy opened all of his gifts as he sat back and watched. Later that morning (well, 30 minutes later:) at Grandma Carlson's house, Aunt Carleen got Jake some new tracks for his new train table.

Next on our list......we are heading to Disneyworld this weekend with all of the grandparents and our friends and their 2 boys. It will be a great time and so far the weather looks to be in the 70's! Not too bad. I will get pictures up for that as soon as I can once we get back.

We hope all of you had a great Christmas and we wish you a Happy New Year!

Snow (and other stuff)

2005-12-09T10:27:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone! We had about 6" of snow last night so we took the boys out today and got some pics. It was Sammy's 1st time out in the snow to play. We are not sure what he thought of it, but he enjoyed watching Jake play in it more than doing it himself :) As you can see Jake was "helping" daddy with the shoveling :)

We also have a wonderful :) shot of the boys getting ready for bed with their shirts on their heads. Not sure why, but they both like to do that. I am also not sure what Jake is doing but it looks serious :)

The biggest news this week was that Jake took his first nap in months. I am not sure why that was THE day. We had gone to Applebees for lunch and I guess it really took it out of him :) I know he will not nap again for months so I made sure Kerry took a picture of this one :)

Hope you are all well and talk to you soon!

Ice Cream

2005-12-06T13:34:00.000-05:00

Well, Sam had his first ice cream cone (on his own at least) so I HAD to take a pic or two :) You can see it was some good stuff. We have the "cute" picture to share and the "man this is good" one :) As you can see Jake enjoyed his as well and he knows how to smile for the camera.

We will see many of you in a few weeks and we hope everyone has a great Christmas and New Year!

Winter is here!

2005-11-25T21:01:00.000-05:00

We hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving. We had a nice visit and the boys were about as tired as they could be at the end of the day.

We just wanted to get a couple of photos up. You can see the boys enjoying a snack together....Sam trying on dad's hat and Jake getting ready for his first time out playing in the snow this year.

Kerry has one week of class left and then exams. Jake is getting excited about Santa (he gets it this year :) and Sam is just busy trying to learn new words each day and new ways to get into trouble :)

We hope all of you had a nice Thanksgiving and we'll talk to you soon!

Fall

2005-11-08T21:04:00.000-05:00

Hi again! I got some good shots of the boys so I wanted to post them. As you can see, the large tree in our front yard is now losing it leaves...big time! Jake had fun "helping" Kerry while Sam and I were warm inside making dinner. Hope everyone is doing well and we'll talk to you soon!

HALLOWEEN

2005-10-31T21:10:00.000-05:00

Well, here are the much anticipated Halloween shots :) Sunday, Kerry carved our skeleton pumpkin (he always does something fancy..no triangle eyes here!:). The boys went to town on their pumpkins with finger paint (really smart move on my part!). You can see it was a bit on the messy side and it never did really dry on the pumpkins. Monday they were still wet in time for trick or treat.

The grandparents arrived Monday in time for the big event. Jake was a fireman, in a firetruck and Sammy was his dalmation fire dog. Kerry and Grandpa took them out while the rest of us handed out candy. They both had a great time and as you can see, Sam really, really liked his chocolate sucker. Jake went for the candy corn.

As I am typing this they are both passed out upstairs for the night. Trick or treat takes a lot out of such little bodies...especially since Jake has been waiting for this night for weeks! :) Talk to all of you soon!

Halloween 2

2005-10-31T21:06:00.000-05:00

All the pics would not fit on the last post so here are the rest!

Some new pics

2005-10-17T19:38:00.000-04:00

Hi there. Just wanted to take a minute to post a couple of new pics. We have Jake with all of his "friends" on the couch. He was so proud of how he arranged them that he wanted a photo. He sleeps with them at night and every morning they all have to make it downstairs....then back up at night. Even the BIG bear :) No need to worry about naptime though...that is a thing of the past for Mr. Jake. I thought 2-and-a-half was a bit young to stop napping, but Kerry and I are not really the ones in control or making the decisions :)

Sam is enjoying his first try at eating yogurt on his own...it was a lovely mess. We tried mashed potatoes today but I did not get any photos of that one. He still naps, but only about an hour each afternoon. I guess it is the price we pay since they both sleep 12 hours at night. We should not complain too much I suppose!

Well, we'll be in town this weekend to see everyone and I am coming armed with the Christmas list ( I drew all of the names) so everyone can start holioday shopping in October! :) Talk to all of you soon!

Pumpkin Farm

2005-10-09T14:31:00.000-04:00

We took a trip this weekend to a pumpkin farm with our friends Ben and Jennifer and their two boys. It was a little chilly, but considering that it was closer to 40 degress when we went last year, this year was downright summer-like! As you can see the boys had a good time, though Jake looks confused in this shot :)

The boys picked out some pumpkins and we all had some cider and donuts...not a bad way to spend an afternoon. Turns out it was the highlight of the day too since later that night we all had to suffer and watch OSU lose.

Kerry is plugging away at school. He'll be halfway done in a month or two! Hard to believe. I am busy with the boys and my online stuff. Lots of Halloween activities in the next couple of weeks....Jake thinks everyday is Halloween with all of our decorations up :)

Kerry and I will be seeing Seinfeld live this Saturday at a theatre right around the corner. We are pretty excited about that. Not sure why he is coming to Toledo, but we'll take it!

One last note for this week....Belle gets her staples out tomorrow. I'm sure she'll hate it, but at least she will be one more step to being herself again.....all set and ready to re-injure herself I'm sure :)

Hope all of you have a good week. Talk to you soon!

Our new site!

2005-10-07T13:10:00.000-04:00

Well, after seeing Brad and Cynthia's blog I decided to take a stab at setting one up for us. Now I will post new pictures here and tell you a little more about the boys and life here in exciting Maumee!

For today I have posted a new photo I did not send out before of Kerry with coach Tressel (for those of you who don't know..the OSU football coach). He was nice enough to meet Kerry the Sunday after the Texas game (when I am sure he was not in the best of moods). He spent a couple minutes with us and gave Kerry a signed hat.

I hope to post here often and hear from all of you soon!