Run Run Run Run!

I really wish I didn't feel like I had to apologize at the beginning of every post, but I have been less than diligent with my blogging. Life just feels like it's a race being run at full speed, and my legs are barely keeping up. Last week, my mom was here and the five of us spent Monday night in Pacific City...funny story, I'll tell it to you some time. Hopefully tomorrow, if Mommy gets a chance to sit down at the computer for longer than 30 seconds, which hasn't happened much lately.

In other news, my parents are moving to Newberg!!! For those of you not native to Oregon, Newberg is a scant 25 miles from McMinnville, which means that we can easily jet over there for family dinners, babysitting, homebrew marathons, etc. Mom and Dad will be heading up a dental practice in downtown Newberg, which is right up their alley, and they are moving into their rental on Friday. So excited! Nathan is going to be doing some graphic design work for them, creating a logo that will also be their letter head, business card, etc; in exchange, they bought us....

*drum roll please*

ADOBE CREATIVE SUITE 4!!!!!!!!

(Aka CS4)

For the non-computer geeks out there, that is the latest edition of the software we use to edit photos, create graphics and illustrations, etc. Oh my-lanta, I am so giddy! I've been dreaming of CS4 ever since I knew what CS4 was, and so far it hasn't disappointed me. To give you an idea of how far behind we were, up until a few days ago, we were operating on Adobe CS...that's THREE versions older than CS4. THREE times Adobe has decided that the current version is out of date and released a better one. We have finally arrived! Now all we need is a digital camera that will allow us to offer clients prints larger than 8 x 11 and we'll be set!

After I got off work this evening, we tossed the boys into the car and took a drive up one of the locals roads into the hills outside of McMinnville. I want to live up there...but the houses for sale were in the $600,000 range...nuff said. Anyway, when we returned home, it was so nice out that we decided to let the boys roam around on the front lawn, which lended itself very well to an impromptu baby photo shoot. Here's a quick preview, since it's now almost midnight and I hear my bed calling my name. Again, the editing yumminess of CS4 gives me goosebumps...lordy, I love editing!

Ok, here's the cutest two little boys in Yamhill County. Levi's on the left, and Asher's on the right. I swear we don't arrange them like that on purpose, they just always seem to be in that order!

Disclaimer: Blogger, for some reason, thinks it's a good idea to drop the data in photos that holds all the really vibrant colors, making it necessary to save web files to a less-than-optimal color type. Long story short, the colors in this version of the photo are not nearly as yummy as the edited-for-print version. So sorry. Stupid Blogger.

Call To Prayer!

Our friends, Aaron and Autumn, need your prayers. More accurately, their daughter, Trinity, who has been having seizures, needs all the prayers we can give her.

Read her story and updates here:

http://www.swarrell-life.blogspot.com/

334 Days

That's how old the boys are.

(Btw, that's 11 months.)

They haven't had a dr's appointment in two months, but we plan on getting them in to a real pediatrician within the next month. Gee, what a concept...living in a town with a real live pediatrician!

Both Levi and Asher have been astounding us with how quickly they've developed in the past few weeks. It seems like they've both just taken off like crazy! We're pretty sure that Levi has finally caught back up to Asher, in terms of size, and that they're both right around 19-20 lbs. That's just 1-2 lbs and one month away from being in forward-facing car seats! And not a moment too soon; they're both almost too big for the straps in their infant car seats!

A few weeks ago, Asher started using Levi as a platform to push himself off the floor with. Needless to say, Levi didn't like that very much. Since then, they have both started pulling themselves up on anything they can get their hands on, including Mommy and Daddy.

They still haven't moved up to real crawling, preferring to stay with the army crawl that has been working just fine for them. I'm torn about whether I would prefer them to really crawl or not...part of me likes that the army crawl slightly keeps their speed down! Every once in a while, they bust out a real crawl but only get a couple of strides in before going back down to their tummies. Ah well, at least they're mobile!

Their favorite game, you ask? It's called "let's see how we can take THIS apart!" Nothing is safe or sacred. We finally broke down the baby corral, putting two sections across the hallway between the living room and dining room, and the rest of the sections around the tv and dvd's in the living room...throw a baby gate across the bottom of the stairs (yes, they've started climbing up the first step onto the bottom landing) and we have a mostly baby-proof living room that they can roam freely through.

If they are this determined to be destructive at 11 months old, I predict that our house is going to be in pieces by the time they're six years old.

Hmm, what else? Levi now has three teeth, two on the bottom and one on top. Asher still only has one tooth on the bottom, but you can clearly see the outline of his two top teeth.

I can't even describe how blessed the past year has made me feel. Pretty wild. And we have two beautiful boys to show for it!

Tomorrow I'll get some photos and a video put up...I'm just too tired to do it right now!

Night!

Boys In The Tub

Here's some cutie patootie photos of the boys taking their first baby-tub-free bath together. They had so much fun being able to play with each other and share the toys.

Levi (left) and Asher (right) enjoying bath time.

Asher (no) Pants

Love the old-fashioned feel of this one.

Fighting over toys.

Asher (no) Pants again.

Really? Again?

The boys are sick again. So far, the only symptoms are runny stuffy noses. Heaven help us, we're exhausted. Please be praying that the boy-o's get well very very soon and that we can avoid ear infections this time around.

And why is it that the boys seem to always get sick after spending time with the group of kiddos from church? As far as I could tell, none of the other kids were sick and I should hope that people wouldn't bring their sick kid to nursery or to child care during bible study....that's just not cool. The thing that sucks is that we can't very well isolate the boys from being around other children. They need to build up their immune systems. But it's just so heartbreaking to see them suffer like this.

So yeah...be praying, both for the boys and for us parental units. But mostly for the boys.

Oy

I'm tired. I worked last Thursday through Saturday, had Sunday and Monday off, drove up to Oregon City and back on Tuesday through Thursday for EMD training, and then worked today. Thank the maker, I have tomorrow off. Nathan went up to his dad's for the day today, taking the boys with him and giving me a good 6 hours at home to myself. And what did I do? Balanced my checkbook and futzed around on Photoshop. Go to my photograph blog, there's some fun photo fodder on there. Here's a preview:

And that's really all I've got for you right now. I'm tired and I don't really feel like typing anymore. I really wanted to make a new label for my photos, something better than the "lindy labunski photography" stamp I'm using right now, but the creative juices just aren't flowing. Maybe tomorrow. And if I promise it on here, maybe tomorrow I'll actually deliver some photos of the boys' first bath that was sans baby tub. Too cute. Night all!

Yes, It's 3:30 AM

Levi has been having trouble sleeping tonight. Not sure if it's teething or what, but he's been waking up crying every 20 minutes or so; he has now been moved to the swing downstairs and I am patiently waiting for him to fall asleep before I crash on the air mattress down stairs. I'm two hours shy of being awake for 24 hours, might as well round it out. In the mean time, I thought I'd share some photos from our hiking trip yesterday.

I woke Nathan up yesterday morning asking him if he'd like to go for a hike at Silver Falls State Park (formally known as Silver Creek Falls State Park; evidently this is a sore subject for the locals, so don't ask about it). After taking a brief detour up to Tualatin to get a second external frame baby backpack, we headed back south again. I had never been to Silver Falls but had always wanted to go. It was definitely beautiful, regardless of the creek being a little low on water and how many other people had evidently shared the same inspiration that had struck me.

Side note: why do people come out into nature and then spoil it by smoking? I mean, seriously? Isn't one of the quoted reasons for coming out into nature to get some "fresh air"? Smokers irk me. But I digress.

After walking to the base of the falls, we hiked along the edge of the creek for a bit, which was beautiful; we even found some places were you could walk out onto the lava stone bed into the creek a bit. Very cool. Lava definitely rocks.

Second side note: twenty minutes into moving Levi into the swing, he's still crying. Normally it only takes him at most two minutes to konk out in the swing. This is going to be a loooong night.

Sorry to ramble, I'm exhausted. I'll just share some photos with you and call it a night...hopefully.

Asher in the pack Mommy was carrying.

Levi in the pack Daddy was carrying.

Huh, I took a lot of photos of leaves. It felt good to have a camera in my hand, regardless of it being our little digital point and shoot instead of our nice camera. You have NO idea how hard it is to stay balanced for a good shot, especially if kneeling, when you have a baby pack on!

Post-Script: An hour later, I finally figure out that what Levi wants is a bottle. Sorry that Mommy is so dense sometimes, little guy. It's just so rare that the boys want fed during the night anymore that it takes a while to figure it out. Now that his little tummy is full, he is happily zonked out in the swing with his nose buried in the little stuffed otter we got them in Lincoln City. And now it's my bedtime...finally.