HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!!!!!

Here are some pictures we took this weekend and tonight for Beggar's Night. Becky wasn't crazy about the costume, but she was a trouper and let us put it on her a couple times anyway! A big thanks to Aunt Dawn for letting Becky borrow the elephant costume that Mom bought for Kaitlyn. It sure helped to make it a special Halloween for me. I am sure Mom never thought she would have three beautiful granddaughters who would all be able to wear the costume, but I know she would be so proud!

We had a pretty nice weekend. Ran around Saturday and got some last minute things for our trip to California. Can't believe Becky and I are leaving on Thursday! On Sunday, we had several visitors. We got to see Dad and Patti, Donna, Larry, and Grandma Willie, plus Stew, Brenda, and Bode. Even got to see Sean and Jennie and meet Tate. What a cutie! Of course I was busy chasing after Becky and hardly got to hold Tate. Next time I'll be sure I get him a little longer! It was great to see Doug and Heather and Sydney too. We are so blessed to have such great family and friends in our lives.

Yesterday was a little hard on me. I cried for about an hour in the morning. Had to mentally relive the day that changed my life forever five years ago. After I got done feeling sorry for myself and feeling sad that Becky would never get to know her Grandma Becky, I started thinking about everything I have that I am thankful for and about how blessed I truly am. While my mom may no longer be with me, I have many other people who care about me and my family. Everyone has stepped up to try and help me feel her loss less. For that, I am grateful. While I miss Mom every day, I know that she would be so proud of Becky and all that she has accomplished in just this one very short year (can't believe it's been that long!), and that she would be proud of Al and I too and how much we have grown over the past five years. I just hope and pray that I can be good and decent like she was and get to heaven to see her again someday. What a glorious occasion that will be for me!

Hope all of you have a wonderful Halloween and don't eat as much candy as I have!

I posted a bunch of pictures from the weekend on Shutterfly. If you want to visit the link, go to aljosjohnson.shutterfly.com.

eating all by herself

Since Becky always want to eat when we eat and seems to like what we're eating as long as it's in small pieces, we really let her go to town tonight. (it was bath night, of course!) She did pretty good with the banana and the veggies. Then she decided to demolish the cookie more than eat it. She sure was having fun though!

new toy!

Becky sure likes to play with the TV and stereo!

Al and I decided to get Becky a walker for an early birthday present. She sure has been having fun walking up and down the living room/dining room this week!

11 months old!!!!!

Oh my gosh! I can't believe that MY LITTLE BECKY RAE is going to be a year old in a month. It just doesn't seem possible! I don't know how this year has gone by so quickly. It sure seems like it has been only a couple months since she was born. Not a whole lot new to report this month. She is starting to walk holding onto things, and she likes to push the little walker toy at day care. She has been a little clingy to Mommy lately. We hope it's just a phase. She even cried when Al dropped her off at day care on Thursday. She hasn't done that in forever. He was running late too, so he had to leave her there crying, and he's never had to do that before! It was a rough morning for them both!

Our weekend with my grandparents in Tingley

Becky loved playing on Great Grandma's bench. It was made for the dolls, and I'm sure she will be too heavy to sit on it next time, but she sure had fun playing with it!!

Reading a story with Great Grandma

Ready to go to church with Great Grandpa Becky and I got to see my nieces Kaitlyn and Becca too. Kaitlyn got to sing with Great Grandma.

Becca had fun dancing and singing

Becky was dancing and singing too

Then Kaitlyn and Becca tried to play together.
What a fun, relaxing weekend! Al had some friends come visit for a "male bonding weekend," so Becky and I headed south to Tinlgey to visit my mom's parents. Becky slept pretty well in her pack n play. I considered it a trial run for when Becky and I go to California in a few weeks. I think she'll be all right sleeping in there, even though it does get pretty small. She didn't nap very well though, and I'm sure there will be so much to do that naps will get overlooked. Oh well. She can sleep when we get home!

She still has just the three teeth, but she's got some pretty white gums and has been a little fussy, so we think she's working on a few more. She had an ear check-up on Friday. Everything with her tubes looks great. She goes back in six months to make sure they haven't fallen out. Her cough and runny nose are almost gone. I think we only had to wipe her nose once tonight before she went down for the night. She'll get rid of her cold just before the constant one she'll probably have all winther!

interesting toys

Becky enjoyed playing with the cat toys this weekend. She really is into everything. After three time on Sunday of Al or I putting picture frames back, we decided toys were better. Hopefully now she won't try to climb the shelf and pull it over on herself to get what she's not supposed to have. If that's the case, we may have to put the shelf away for a while! She's just so curious! That's okay. Keeps us busy on the weekends! We wouldn't have it any other way!

playing in the leaves

Becky had a good time playing in the leaves on Saturday. The weather was so nice! As you can imagine, I took more than three pictures. I've got them downloaded to Shutterfly, and I have an album collection started. If you want to check them out, try this web site:
http://aljosjohnson.shutterfly.com/action/?a=8Actm7Vq4cuWIH

eating bananas

Becky ate some banana tonight. I decided to take some pictures because she was so darn cute, and this is what face she gave me on the first picture. She sure loves the camera. She is going to have the best scrapbook EVER!!!!

Still hamming it up for me!
All right, Mom, but this better be the last one!

another week gone by

Hard to believe another week has gone by already. It goes so fast! Here are some pics of Becky trying to catch the cats. It's so fun to watch them run!!!
Here they are trying to hide from her!!
After them into the kitchen she goes . . .

Is it only Tuesday?

What a busy week already! Had a good weekend. Al's dad came to visit us. We had a nice time. Becky had fun playing with her grandpa. She was a little out of sorts this weekend, but seems to be doing better now. Seems to be doing well with the tubes. Al and I decided that it was time for Becky to fall asleep on her own again, and she has gone to bed pretty well for us last night and tonight. She plays for a while in her crib and then cries, and then goes to sleep. Monday night we had to go in a couple times to tell her she was okay, but tonight we didn't even have to do that. I think day care wears her out! She still has a little cough and stuffed up nose, but we haven't noticed any drainage out of her ears. She has also been doing well during the day in day care.

I have had a busy couple days in court, and it looks like the rest of the week is going to be busy too. Good thing she's sleeping through the night again. I don't think I could function very well if I had to get up in the middle of the night to take care of a screaming baby!

Hello! As you can see, Becky handled getting tubes very well. We had to be there at 6 this morning, and she went in for surgery at 7. She was a little cranky when she woke up from the anesthesia and slept most of the morning after we got home, but Mom and Dad were tired too, so that was okay with us! By this afternoon she was back to being herself, laughing and playing. She is playing right now and seems to have forgiven us for having that done to her!

Clay County Fair

Had a nice, fun weekend in Spencer. It was Becky's first trip to the Clay County Fair. Boy, did she have a good time! She was very good. She crashed pretty hard when we got home from sensory overload, but all in all, she seemed to be having fun watching everything go by. Here are few of the pictures I took. I'm having trouble downloading any more, so I'll send them out on Shutterfly.

Becky is getting tubes on Thursday morning. If there was ever any doubt about whether or not she needed tubes, she definitely confirmed it for me last night when she woke up screaming at 12:30 and would not go back to sleep in her crib. Gave her some of that Tylenol with codeine and brought her to bed with us. Laid her in her crib at 2:30. Good grief! It will be so nice when I know she is only crying because she doesn't want to be in her crib and not becuase her ears hurt. We may have to do a little "tough love" at night to get her to fall asleep on her own again, but at least we'll know she's crying because she wants to be held, not screaming because her ears hurt. That's just too much for us to take! The getting up in the middle of the night off and on all summer long is way overrated too. Hopefully after she gets the tubes put in, it will make our doctor visits almost nil.

Not much else to report. Just trying to recover from our Monday and thinking about going to bed early. I'm still waiting for Shutterfly to download all my pictures from this weekend though, so I'm sure I'll be up a while! :)

football fun

Playing with Drake
Bode sitting with Al
Go Buccaneers!!!
We had a pretty relaxing weekend. Went over to Stew and Brenda's for some GREAT chili on Sunday night. Becky was so excited to be able to wear her Bucs cheerleader outfit. Too bad it didn't bring them good luck! Got to spend some time with the Boedings too. Becky sure had fun playing with both Bode and Drake.

Becky has an appointment to see an ENT on Friday for an evaluation. She went in yesterday for her third shot of Rocephin and there was still quite a bit of fluid in her right ear, so the medicine didn't get rid of it completely.

Hope everyone has a good week!

doctor appointment

OUCH!!! This is what Becky looked like after her shots at her doctor appointment yesterday. She had a good appointment except for the fact that she STILL has an ear infection! She weighed 20 pounds 3 1/2 ounces and was 28 3/4 inches long. Still in the 90th percentile for height. Go, Becky, Go!! She had to get a shot of Rocephin in her leg. This is basically the last resort to help try and get rid of the ear infection. She has to go in two more times to get another shot, on Friday and Sunday. We will most likely go ahead and make an appointment with an ENT to at least talk about the possibility of tubes in her ears. Our doctor doesn't really like to use the shots or suggest tubes in the ears, but Becky has pretty much had ear infections the entire summer. We're afraid to wait until winter when it will probably only get worse!

Becky is very, very resilient though. She cried for about 5 minutes after the shot and then settled down enough to fall asleep. Then we had to go have her blood drawn for testing. She screamed and cried some more. When we got home from the doctor, she got to take a nap on the couch with Mommy :) After her nap, she was in a good mood and slept through the night last night. She was even in a good enough mood to look at pictures!

giving it a try

I'm new to this . . . but will give it a try. Things are well. Becky goes to the doctor for her nine-month check-up tomorrow. Thank goodness, as she's not been sleeping well and grabbing at her ear. Either there's another ear infection or her teeth are making her think her ears hurt!!

Had a nice relaxing Labor Day weekend. Got to watch Becky crawl all over the place! She is becoming quite the pro. She had quite a lot of fun going after the blocks that we had stacked up all over the floor. Becky also spent a lot of time standing up this weekend. She can get up on one foot pulling herself up, but can't quite get the other leg up yet. We put up a gate in the doorway of the living room/dining room, and Al hung a new door yesterday to prevent Becky from falling down the stairs if she's in the kitchen with us. Now all we have to do is make sure the cats don't get trapped upstairs or in the living room/dining room while we're gone! Al is becoming quite the pro at hanging doors. He loves it so much :)