Since last summer… Everyone is growing up.  Cole:  finished his 2^nd year of preschool. I hope he is ready for kindergarten! He had a hole in his bottom back tooth that had to be pulled out in January and they ended up capping 7 more teeth.  We had to go to the hospital since he is so young, so they could put him under.  It was very amusing seeing him on the “silly juice”. So he has a mouth full of silver already! Isabel: follows a lot of what Cole does.  They fight a lot, but then play well together also.  Izzie is still very loud. Very drama queen. But so much a princesses. She loves wearing dresses.  Brooke is walking all the time.  She has found her voice and screams all the time. She does sign “more”, “please”, and “eat”.  She loves giving kisses and hugs. Cant wait till she can talk.  We have a busy schedule this summer.  Have something to do everyday, so that is fun.  By the time yall get this, I hope we have the house up on the market.  Got title done in our entry way, replaced most of the carpet in the TV room.  Still have our bunnies.  The mom has died/disappeared, but the dad is still here and we have 6 babies left, plus our 2 chickens.  Who knows what we will do with them when we move. Elliott got a dirt bike and drives it to work a lot and hopefully we will have him a new car when yall get this too.  Its so stinking hot for him to drive to work. Us girls here ran the mud run and had so much fun! We are going to do it again in November!

Forgot to mention:

 Last summer the only trip we took was up to AR to see Kendell.  That was a horrible trip. Guess I should say a horrible drive and hotel.  Elliott was on call and with 3 kids we had to stop pretty often.  Elliott had to find internet in one little town on the way up there so it took us like an hour before we were on the road again.  Then the hotel was nasty.  There were 2 inch long ants, spiders, white trash people and a bloody fight.  Needless to say we won’t stay at a Red Roof again. And diarea kids pooping all over the bathroom. Gross! It was great to see the Becks and the new addition.  It was a great blessing.  Since it has been so hot we have been spending a lot of days at water parks and pools.  We got this awesome gazebo for our deck to cool us down and we have a window a/c unit in our tv room to help.

Elliott applied for Border Patrol. We went down to Houston Sept 13 for him to take the test. We stayed in the condo and the kids and I had fun, while Elliott studied.  We went swimming and tried to watch a movie at the theater there, we played games and had ice cream.  While he was taking the test we went to hang out with Jenny and her family.  It was fun and nice to see them. Elliott’s grandmother found out she had stage 4 stomach cancer and only had weeks to live.  Her memory was like Big Mom’s for about a year. As soon as they found this out, his family made funeral plans.

growing up

Has it really been since November that I posted something?! Well the kids are growing up, and too fast. I feel sad that they are growing so fast because I cant baby them anymore. I love my babies. But Elliott said to be grateful that they are growing. Which is true. Cole is still in preschool and its going great. He is able to write all his alphabets, and is starting to understand the sounds. He loves to fight and wrestle with any older kid he can find. He had a hole in his tooth and we talked to a friend of ours who is a Pediatric Dentist and said he needs that taken care of. So we had to go to Children's and they had to put him under. Turns out he had 8 cavities and an absest on the tooth with the hole, so it had to be pulled. He did a great job at the hospital and recovered so fast. It always amazes me how quick little ones recover.

Miss Princess Isabel is just as pretty as they can get! She is just so girly! Loves her My Little Ponies her cousin, I mean Santa, gave her. She is totally potty trained! She is attached to my hip and wants me to hold her all the time.

Brooke is 10 months now and is crawling everywhere! She is walking around furniture. She is still the best baby. Goes right to sleep when I put her in bed. Doesn't cry and scream when she is hungry or poopy. She is so pleasant!

As for Elliott and I, we are starting to train for our Survival Run at the end of April.

News

So Elliott quit his job and has had a few interviews. Hopefully
by the time everyone gets this he will have another job. So he has been taking it easy and “recuperating”.
I’m trying to stay afloat in the house work. It is never ending and never clean. Got to
see the Twilgiht marathon with Whitney and we had a blast. Trying to sell
Pampered Chef, but its not going so well.
My best customers have almost everything now. Thanks Mom and Lindsey.
Cole is in preschool and loving it and doing so well. He is
getting excited to start Kindergarden next year.
Izzie finally is potty trained.
Its been 2 days that she hasn’t had any poop accidents. Only takes a pacifier at night now. She loves to sing and dance lately, its so
cute!
Brooke is 7 months now, has 2 teeth. She is rolling all over the place, sitting
up, and now getting on all fours. She
will be crawling soon. Finally sleeps all night. We have her in our closet still since Izzie
still wakes up screaming. That’s it for
us. Cant wait for the holidays. I just loving being around yall! See you soon!

Stay'n Alive

Poor Brooke!

I think Izzie is trying to get rid of her baby sister.

For the past couple weeks I have found Izzie being to rough with Brooke.

2 Sundays ago Cole and Izzie had a bath and were still in there towels. Brooke was laying on the floor in my room. When I got out of the shower I saw Izzie over Brooke. Brooke wasn't making a sound and I couldn't see her because Izzie's towel was covering both of them. I pulled Izzie off of Brooke and she was blue. Scared me to death. I guess Izzie was sitting on her chest to where she couldnt breath.

A couple days later she was giving her a kiss and was to hard and bit her. It was very deep.

Wednesday she put a plastic coin in her mouth and she was gagging on it.

Thursday Izzie was playing in dirt and decided to put some dirt on her baby sisters head.

Friday she put a balloon in her mouth. I was doing dishes and luckily looked up in time.

At the lake yesterday with Lindsey and the Fousts, Brooke was laying on blankets under an umbrella and through sand on her. Poor girl, just trying to stay alive.

I guess Izzie thinks since she isn't the smallest now, she can pick on Brooke.

Potty

Izzie has been wonderful these last couple days. She has been so helpful when I ask. She is even been potty training herself. Yesterday after nap she woke up and wanted her diaper off and went potty. She went all by herself and didn't want her diaper back on. So after awhile I put underwear on her and she stayed dry the rest of the night. When she needed to pee she just went all by herself, didn't say a word. Today she went poop all by herself too. Although I had to wipe her, she is doing wonderfully.

New Addition

Brooke Celine Garland

April 19, 2011 at 12:23 pm

7 lbs 11 oz, 19 inches long

I had been waiting to go into labor any day. At week 38 I was 3 cm dilated. At the end of week 39 Dr Reyes stretch my membranes to see if anything would happen and nothing did so we scheduled an induction on the exact date of my 40 weeks. He was worried she would be big since I had gestational diabetes. I was cramping a lot after he stretch my membranes so I thought I would go into labor that day. But Tuesday the 19th came and we checked into the hospital at 6am and they got us situated in a room. I got prepped with IVs and monitored the baby's heart. By 9 the doctor came in and broke my water and we waited to see if anything would happen and it didn't. So at 10:30 they gave me pitocin and waited again. Contractions started and they started hard and fast. I remembered how hard they were with Cole and told them to get me an epidural. 11:30 I got the epidural and felt so much better. Contractions were so close together by 12 I was at a 10 and Dr Reyes came. I pushed 3 times and she came out. The cord was around her neck, but she was fine. Elliott filmed her coming out for me. Its such a miracle. It took her awhile to warm up, so she was under some heating light. We didn't have a name when she came out, but by day 2 Elliott came up with Brooke and Coren mentioned Celine since that's my favorite singer. So here she is. She has been a great baby and the kids just adore her. Izzie is always saying, "Hold it, Brooke" and "kisses". Its so cute!

For those who have weak stomachs don't look at this next picture:

On March 24th we decided to go to the park with Natasha and Giovanny. I was going to walk but Natasha said lets drive. So we played at the park by our house for a little while. Cole was playing with some older boys and after a few mins we heard him screaming and saw him running towards us. Since I was so pregnant I couldn't move very fast, so Natasha went after him and yelled, "He's bleeding." When I got to him I could see the gash was very deep. I said we have to go to the ER now. So I grabbed a wipe from Natasha's bag and put it over his head and we packed the kids up in the car drove by my house to get my purse and drove to the hospital. I tried to call Elliott 4 times and he finally called me back and said, " This better be an emergency" and I said it was to meet us at the hospital. He was having a check up from his nose. We waited in the ER about an hour before they first saw us. Then another hour for check in. Then another hour till the doctor saw us. Natasha took Izzie and Giovanny to our house while we were getting stitches. They put some numbing gel in his cut then about 30 mins later came and stitched his head. He was freaking out, screaming and crying. He got 4 stitches and his first tetanus shot. My wonderful parents showed up and Cole was so glad to see them. Needless to say Cole got ice cream at 9 o'clock when we got home. All this from chasing after some older boys, tripping and falling on the balance beam.

On March 3rd Elliott had surgery on his nose and tonsils. He had been waking up every morning with migraines because he wasn't able to breath very well.