No!

Yes, this is Sam's new word. He says it about 100 times a day. Even when he wants to reply yes, such as "do you want a cookie Sam?" he will say no! Hopefully it is just a phase, hopefully. We think the "get up 30 times from bed" phase is coming to an end, however, the "waking up at 5:30" phase is in full swing. At least he is happy when he wakes up.

Today when I picked him up from school he made the whole class laugh. Whenever he sees me or Cheri at school he does his best touchdown dance. Today all of the kids and teachers got a great laugh out of it. He loves school and he is doing well in his new class. His speech therapy was supposed to start last Wednesday, but his bus never showed up. We are going to try again this Wednesday.

The renovation is coming along nicely. The drywall is up and being taped and mudded now. Cheri is the best mudder. She loves to put on some Mozart, get a glass of wine and mud away. Should be painting soon and then its onto the cabinets. Oh the fun.

The renovation continues...

Well the project is going along as smooth as possible. I had hoped that we would be done with this project by March Madness and it looks like we are going to come in early. As always the finish work takes the longest and that is what we are starting now. The beam is still holding in place and now we are framed out for drywall. Last weekend we kicked butt and it has paid off. Today I was able to wire all the new receptacles and switches for the new lights in the cabinets as well as in the soffit above the cabinets. Very rewarding to get that done. I still need to wire all the A/V connections in the wall, gonna be cool. So...by the superbowl, we hope to have the drywall hung and the frames in place for the cabinets.

Sam is having a great time learning the tricks of the trade. He is a great helper when it comes to opening doors for debris removal and then saying "thank you Daddy". He loves to play with his little tool set banging on his scraps of wood when we are working. He had a great time with Grammie last Saturday, he loves to go over there and never has a problem when we leave. He is a smart little guy and we see flashes of brilliance all the time. Love that kid.

The Mayor

This is Sam's new nickname. He has his Uncle Rich's personality in so many ways. I call him the mayor because at school all of the kids in his new class call out "Sam"! when he comes into the room in the morning. They also yell goodbye to him when he leaves. He in turn returns the greetings with hugs and waves. When we walk down the hallway to his room he stops at all the open doors and greets everybody in the room. He even went and said hi to his old classmates when he saw them on the playground. He is the Mayor of the Discovery Center.

We did have a breakthrough in Sam recognizing himself in pictures as Sam. Previously, whenever he saw a picture of himself, he called out "Peter". Just last week I heard him say Sam when he saw a picture of himself at his birthday party. Pretty cool.

The renovations are going well as planned. The 16' long beam is in place thanks to the help of Tim, Joe, Grey, and Peter. It went in pretty easy and having the material lift here really helped. This past weekend we removed all the studs from the old wall and cleaned the place up. Cheri has designed the layout for the bookcases and we are going to start that this weekend...after a much deserved date night on Friday.

They say its your birthday!

Yes, yes we did the birthday party!  Our lovely little boy turned 3 on Sunday and we had his party on Saturday.  At least based on everything we have in print he is 3, we secretly think he might be 15 or 16.  We decided to take the big leap and have the party at Chuck E Cheese.  Having only been to one very low key party at CEC before, we really had no idea.  It was loud.  Sam had a great time as he always does at big events.  After he warmed up to Chuck he was able to stand on his chair and belt out his very best Happy Birthday song ever.  He got lots of love from his friends and some great presents.  Only one recommendation for future parties at CEC, earplugs.  

Tonight American Idol starts, thusly another hour of my life a week is lost.  I do love it so.  

The renovation is going as planned.  Today, the steel I-beam we are using for supporting the 2nd floor showed up and is currently on the front lawn.  It weighs somewhere around 360 pounds, thats why its on the front lawn.  Me and the dude delivering it put it there.  Tomorrow, me and 3 of my BEST friends will help get it inside and on the lift.  Should be fun.

When the walls come tumblin down!

Well now that the holidays are over, the tree and ornaments are put away, the exterior lights are down and the family has been visited, its project time. We are taking on perhaps our biggest project yet, outside of traveling to Russia twice last year to pick up a certain someone. Our house is known as ad Arts & Crafts style Craftsman. This was a popular house in the 30's and Sears actually sold this style house at one time. We love our house very much and it lets us do projects on it without much hassle. To date we have completely renovated the kitchen, as well as the upstairs bathroom. We have refinished the floors in the bedrooms and the sunroom. We have replaced the windows in the sunroom and done some minor renovations in the mudroom. Our last project took us outside to the garage and patio area where we resided the garage, replaced doors and windows, and moved the brick patio. So, what is this new project you ask? We are taking down the load bearing wall that separates the living room and the dining room. The finished project will have built in bookcases with seating on top where the walls once stood. This will give the house a new look on the inside and open it right up. At this point we have removed all the drywall and lathe and are looking at wall studs. Here are some shots of the action. Sam is doing great!

Fortunate Son

The tree has been shook! The good thing about this Christmas is that Sam does not know its Christmas. Sounds funny, but as many times as we told him that Santa was coming and bringing gifts, he really did not comprehend it. Not to say that the boy does not enjoy opening gifts! So, Christmas morning for us started around 7 AM when Sam got out of bed. Mommy and Grammie were waiting downstairs with baited breath for his arrival, and he made em wait. The first thing he ran for when he got downstairs was .....a cup. He was really excited about the cup too. He eventually warmed up and got into almost everything. He has to take all the paper off the gift before he says "wow". We opened everything and played with it all. He really loves the kitchen set that Santa brought and as soon as he figures out how to steer the Jeep, he will be big time. The little guy is really tuckered by this season as he has taken to sleeping in until 8 and taking 3+ hour naps. We are heading to Louisville this weekend to see Pop Pop and Grammy Re. Merry Christmas!

Dont look at my bum

This is Auntie Em and her new boots, I have removed the unauthorized portion of the photo....