Catching up

It has been a while since we’ve posted anything, so there’s a lot to cover.  Here are some random pictures and news from the past 2 months.

Gwen brought Isabella home on August 27th.  Nathan and Isaac spent that day with our good friend Emily and her kids.  When I picked them up that evening after work, she gave me this banner that all the kids made together.
Thanks, Emily!  And thanks, kids!  We still have it hanging in the living room.

Nathan started preschool in September. 
He really enjoys it, and is learning things.  Of course, he doesn’t always remember what he learned that day, but it seems to stick with him somehow.  Earlier this week he told us that butterflies go to Mexico when it gets cold.  Gwen asked who told him that.  He said he learned it at preschool.  When she asked if he learned it that day, he said no, it was the 2nd day he went to preschool.  That would have been around Sept. 10th.

Since Isabella has weekly doctor appointments in Pittsburgh, Wednesday’s are pretty interesting.  I pick up Nathan during my lunch break from wherever the boys are that day to take him to preschool.  Someone else picks him up and watches him the rest of the day.  Then after work I go and pick up one or both of the kids, usually at different houses.

Although they’re nice, Nathan’s field trips make things even more complicated, since a parent has to go with him.  He’s gone to Port Farms (Gwen & Isaac went to that one, while a friend watched Isabella for several hours).  I took him to the apple orchard trip (it was on a Wednesday).

My grandparents came to visit us at the end of September.  They hadn’t seen Isabella yet, and they came up on a Wednesday to watch the kids.  It was nice to have them visit and help out.  There was a little excitement when they were visiting:  Grandma called me at work asking where Nathan would go if he went outside.  I said probably the garage to ride his bike.  She said he wasn’t in the garage; they couldn’t find him.  Grandpap was outside walking down the road looking for him.  Eventually, they found him hiding in the closet, behind the vacuum and sleeping bags.  He said he was hiding, and that he had told them he was going to hide.  We had a chat about not hiding when people are looking for you and it isn't hide-and-seek.

One of the boys favorite things to do at the Hospital this summer was to eat their after-dinner snack down on the patio by the rainbow bridge, around the time as the nurses were changing shifts.  The boys would run up to the  windows and wave to the nurses as they were coming and going.  Here they are enjoying popsicles.  And yes, they were messy.
This one is from the end of September, and it was taken with my cell phone.  Isabella started smiling the day after we brought her home from the hospital.