New Blog :-)

Hello Friends...
We have a new blog to follow our adoption called 2 Asia and Back.  We wanted to blog and document this journey, but we didn't want it to be linked to this blog at this one has a lot of specific information about our family and the new one will stay more anonymous with code names, etc. I wanted to make sure anyone following this blog has the new link, though. :-)  Just click on the name above to get there.

Things are Moving Quickly!

In August 2005, I (Ashlee) started a new chapter in my life.  I moved to Dallas to go to college at DBU.  After living on campus for two years, I spent the rest of college living in the heart of downtown Arlington. I fell in love with the area- the Rangers, Six Flags, downtown Fort Worth, the Parks Mall,  and everything else that this area is home to, including a lot of very special people. During this time, I also met and fell in love with Tyler, who was also living in the area during this time. After I graduated, we got married and started our lives together on the far southwest side of DFW in Cleburne.

For the past three and a half years, we've made this our home.  We've become our own little family.  We've made friends that have been like family.  We've transitioned from college students staying up late, hanging out at friends' houses and seeing every new movie the week it comes to theaters to parents who are asleep by ten and see movies once they're out on DVD while Parker is asleep.

Things have changed a lot in the past seven years since moving to the Metroplex.  However, after a lot of prayer, thought, talking, and more prayer, things are about to come full circle.  Tyler has accepted a job with The Woodlands Fire Department (north of Houston) and we'll be moving back to my first home soon.  We don't know what to expect with this move.  Tyler has never lived away from this area and I haven't lived in Houston full-time since I graduated high school, but we're excited to be back.  We're sad to be leaving most of Tyler's family, but excited but be near mine.  We'll be able to go to church with my parents, grandparents, aunts, uncle and cousins.  Parker will get to grow up with first and second cousins close by to play with.  We're excited we'll get to be around for the day-to-day events like watching dance recitals, baseball and football games, and birthday parties.

Normally I hesitate to make "big announcements" online because they don't seem very personal.  However, with the speed things are going and it being the end of summer, I wanted to just get it out there so no one is caught by surprise when we're gone soon.  Tyler is starting work in about two weeks and will be commuting back and forth for a few more weeks until Dallas is born, probably at the end of September.  After about a week at home in Cleburne after he is born, we'll all finish the move and be down there full time.  We'll be staying with my parents until our house here sells and we find a new one there.

For those of you reading this from Cleburne- We've loved our time here and the people we've gotten to know.  We'll really miss each of you, but we'll be back to visit a lot!

For those of you reading this from Humble- We're looking forward to getting to spend more time with you in the coming months.  (And would appreciate any house hunting hints you may have.)

For those of you that don't live in either of these- No worries, our Facebook statuses and pics won't be affected at all. :-)

In other news- Parker is still happy and healthy, getting into everything and learning new things, especially new vocabulary every day.  Dallas is measuring exactly where he should be, even a little bigger.  His due date is still Oct. 2, but since he's so big, we're hoping for an early arrival. :-)

We'll post again soon, or at least when there is something worth reporting.

Plays, playing and playing

Here are some pictures to play catch-up (again) because we seem to never post pictures anymore, (other than straight from the phone).  However, since there is a living room floor covered in 4 loads of folded clothes that need put away, floors that need swept, a dishwasher full of dishes that need unloaded and countless other things that need done before nap time is over, I thought now would be a good time to upload some pictures and update the blog. :-) Who knows, maybe the cleaning fairies will show up while I'm not looking.

In April, my (Ashlee's) brother played the role of Jesus in the University of Mary Hardin Baylor Annual Easter pageant.  It was a huge honor that he was picked for this part out of the whole student body and he'd spent a year preparing for the role.  I was prouder of him than I think I've ever been watching him play his part.




As a bonus, Parker got to play one of the "townspeople" in the opening scene and even got to sit in his Uncle Coley's lap.

We just pretended that he was either from the far-northern part of the middle east or didn't get out in the sun much as he was significantly whiter and blonder than the average Jewish person.


For the first time in a few years we got to spend Easter Sunday with my family in Humble. It's a rare occurrence that we get to visit on a Sunday and see friends at church that I don't normally get to see and an even more rare occurrence that it was possible on Easter.

 

Parker was old enough to hunt for eggs this year, although once he found the first one, he lost interest in the "hunt" part as he thought he found a ball and didn't care for the rest of them. His cousins were nice enough to share some of theirs, though.

Ok, there's a fun background story on this firefighter costume. When Tyler and I had been dating about a year, Tyler had already been through fire academy and had just been hired by the City of Cleburne as a firefighter. It was a given that he would be a firefighter indefinitely. One weekend when I was home, Mom and I went to a specialty kids clothing store (probably to get a baby shower or birthday gift for someone) and saw this firefighter costume. It was really cute and not something you can find many places, but at this point Tyler and I weren't married or even engaged so we didn't get it.  However, suspecting that some day we'd get married and that we would probably have a boy eventually, Mom went back and got it because the store was closing and she knew we wouldn't be able to get it later. So after Parker was born, he got this at the hospital. It was going to be his "Fall Festival" costume this year, but as he's growing so fast, we went ahead and let him wear it before he outgrows it. He loves it!

We've spent most of the summer playing outside. This child is like a little frog going back and forth between the water and the sandbox. He doesn't care what he's doing so long as he's outside and dirty.

When Tyler's at work, we usually try and visit him every shift. Parker got to play in the firetruck on this day. He thinks he's pretty cool.

This is Parker's first ride on a four-wheeler. (No worries, it never left 1st gear.) He loved it.

Burleson has an indoor kiddie area that is the perfect size for Parker. Okay, maybe it's a little big, but don't tell him. As far as he's concerned, he's just as big as the 6 year old. He quickly got tired of the "baby" slide and thought he needed to go on the bigger slide all by himself.

A couple of weeks ago we made a quick visit to see family in Houston. My cousin has a little boy who is just a few months older than Parker and they love to play together. The older they get, the closer in age they seem to be because they can do more of the same things. This time, they could say each other's names (although Parker won't perform when asked) and played on the playground at church together. When we got in the car to leave, Parker kept saying "Ti-tus, Ti-tus").

Hope you enjoyed our little overview of the last couple of months and a pat on the back for anyone that read the whole way through this.

Obvious

By now it is obvious to anyone still reading this, that we are not very good at keeping up with a blog. It has been a long time since I have written as Ashlee wrote the last post. Where to begin?? It has been an amazing, exhausting, adventurous 11 months. It seems to have flown by. I now see what people mean by "time is relative." 

Because we have not kept up with this, here is a summary of the last few months. 

October- December

We took Parker to the zoo. 

We went to Erica's graduation from the Fort Worth Police Academy.

 We visited Tyler's parents in Kopperl.

 We went to Ashlee's cousin's wedding followed by a Texans game.

 Parker grew.

 We spent Thanksgiving in Whitney with Tyler's family.

 Parker got his first haircut.

 Parker grew a little more.

And then he decided he'd grow a little. 

These are just a few pictures. We spent a week celebrating Christmas between Cleburne, Kopperl, and Humble. It was a great holiday and we enjoyed getting to spend some time with family. Parker has a house full of toys and says thanks to everyone who bought him gifts. 

We are truly blessed to have our families and friends. We thank God daily for blessing us and are grateful for every day that we get to spend with that beautiful little boy. 

I'm not going to end this by saying that I'll post more often this year, we'll just wait and see what happens. Thanks for reading.

Commercials...

Apparently keeping up with a blog isn't our thing here in the Knutson household.  I don't even know how long it's been since we've updated this.  Oh well.

Parker is growing bigger and smarter every day.  As soon as he figured out how to crawl, he almost immediately took off and started pulling up on, (and falling off of) everything.  It will be a miracle if he makes it to his 2nd birthday without a broken bone or concussion.  He is ALL BOY!  If it can be climbed on, pulled up on, crawled over, eaten, or pulled… he's done it.  This includes, much to his dismay, Mac's tail.  Out of everything in the house to play with, Mac's tail and collar are Parker's favorites.  Mac is a good sport about it all, and I think he secretly likes the attention.

Parker has continued to grow tall and skinny.  His weight stays around the 40th percentile while his height is usually just below the 90th.

Since Parker has become increasingly active, a few commercials have jumped out at us that I wanted to share.  These commercials very easily could have been Parker under the right circumstances.

This one takes the words right out of his mouth, although Parker hasn't gotten in trouble for it, yet.

This is why Parker will never have a walker…

Hope everyone is having a great week and enjoying the cool, fall weather.

Update

So it's been another two months since we've updated this blog. It has been a crazy two months.
We went on our annual trip to Riverbend on the Frio River. Parker had a blast playing in the water and took a nap every day down by the river.
Then after 36 hours at home we left with 5 families from church to go to Colorado. We spent a week in a cabin on Oleo Ranch in the rockie mountains. We drove into Creede one day and Lake City the next. Spent some time out fishing for trout in a couple of ponds.
All in all it was an awesome week to be there with high temperatures in the 70s and lows in the 40s while Cleburne was a nice 110.

Yesterday we took Parker in for his 6 month shots and checkup. He weighed  17 lbs and 11 oz and is 28 inches long. He got 3 shots, but handled them pretty well. Other than that he's healthy and eating like crazy.

He's learning how to roll to get somewhere and starting to push up onto his hands. So it looks like our days of an immobile baby are pretty much done. Here are a few pictures from the trip.

Brushing off the dust.

Well the first half of Parker's life so far was well documented. As time has gone on, we've let this blog get a little dusty. So let's brush off the dust and see if we can keep it a bit more current...

Since last time, Parker has...

• Had a 3-month "birthday", weighing in at 14.7 pounds and measuring 25 inches
• Gone to the zoo for the first time
• Gained 2 new little cousins making him not the youngest anymore on Mommy or Daddy's sides of the extended family. They'll all have so much fun being so close in age.
• Started smiling and laughing when we make faces at him.
• Learned to noticeably recognize Mommy and Daddy's face and voice when we enter a room- especially in the nursery at church. He looks up and looks around until he finds us and smiles.
• Become mesmerized with his rainforest mat. He lays on it as much as we let him looking up at the birds and elephant toys over his head and hits them with his hand.
• Started to grab onto things- toys, blankets, Mommy's hair and earrings, etc.
• Continued sleeping through the night. He goes to sleep around 8-9pm and wakes up at around 7am, only to drink a bottle and go back to sleep.
• Finally learned that he has a puppy. Parker has started to pat Mac on the head and likes to lean up against him. Mac is somewhat skeptical, but I think with time they'll be best buds. Mac has also decided to acknowledge our new family member and will run to his room to make sure he's still here when we let him in. He also looks at us when Parker starts crying as if to say, "Are y'all going to make that stop, already?"
• Was dedicated on Mother's Day. We had most of our family here, too.
• Had his first shots. :-(
• Had his first fever. We're blaming that on the first teeth that we think may be making their debut soon.

Having Parker is a somewhat surreal thing. It's strange when we see people that we haven't seen in a few months and they say things like, "I can't believe you have a baby!" because I want to say, "I can't remember what life was like before him!" It's strange how well he fits into our little family, further showing us that families must be appointed by God, because he couldn't fit any more perfectly. Just looking around our house things are completely different than they were just a few months ago. There are bottles in the sink and cabinet, there is a swing and bouncy seat in the living room next to a rainforest mat- all dedicated to keeping Parker happy and entertained the few minutes a day his mom puts him down. A room that used to have a twin bed and was decorated with dolls and beanie babies now has blue painted walls, a crib, and is safari themed, and pacifiers have been showing up in the strangest places. Life is so different and yet, so perfect. We're so blessed to have this little boy in our lives and pray that his future is bright and full.

When I was pregnant, I got a lot of the same comments from people over and over and over and over. Some were nice, some weren't so much, some were ignorant, and some were just flat out inappropriate, (although that could have been a mix between my hormones and private personality). The comments that we get now that Parker is here are a lot more fun. Everyone seems to have an opinion, though, of who Parker looks like. Some people will say he looks just like me. Others will say he looks just like Tyler. Occasionally, someone will tell us that they can see both of us in him. We usually just see Parker. :-) However, he definitely has traits from Mom and Dad. For example:

• Parker got Tyler's bright blue eyes. This is one of the things that attracted me to Tyler almost 5 years ago and I'd always hoped that when we had kids they would get his blue eyes. So far they're holding strong and staying a beautiful dark blue.
• Although his eyes are blue like his Daddy's, they're shaped more like mine.
• He got Tyler's blondish/ brownish/ redish hair. Depending on the light, his hair is a different color every day, just like Tyler.
• He has my chin. Almost everyone on my Mom's side of the family has a dimple in our chin, and Parker has it, too.
• Parker is laid back and chill. He definitely got that from Tyler.
• Parker would sleep all day if we let him. That's from me.
• Parker goes to bed early like Dad and wakes up late like Mom- the perfect combination.
• Parker smiles ALL THE TIME. That's from us both, too.
• He could be an olympic burper... I'll let you guess on that one. :-)
• Parker loves his baths. That's from Mom.

Parker also has things that are totally unique to him, too. For example, he loves car rides. We do not. We love destinations, but do not enjoy hours in the car getting there. (He's allowed to sleep in the car, though. That may make the difference.) He doesn't like it very much outside yet. He doesn't like the wind in his face and gets sunburned very easily, so it isn't a pleasant experience for him. He also doesn't seem to mind strangers, yet. He'll let anyone hold him, but always finds either me or Tyler if we're in the room. We are neither one super excited about being around new people.

Anyway, if you made it this far down, you're probably either really bored, killing time at work, related to us, or any combination of the above. Either way, props to you. :-) Hope you enjoyed a not-so-brief update on our happenings. I'll try to add a few pictures for your reward, but I've never done this before, so no promises.

This was when he was dedicated.

First Rangers Game

Trip to Galveston and Moody Gardens
"Riding" a Horse on the Strand in Galveston
3 Month Birthday Pic with Edgar
This makes Parker laugh every time.