Pictures from Christopher

Ok, so Daddy updated you on what was going on last week, now I'll show you the pictures.

First, I met my great-uncle Denny and my great-aunt Barb. They're Grandpa Didyk's sister and brother-in-law. I really liked Aunt Barb. I smiled and talked to her and snuggled close to take a nap.















I got to spend lots of time with Grandma and Auntie Meg. Auntie Meg even watched me for a few hours all by herself while Daddy and Mommy went out on a date. I like her a lot. We were good buds for the week. She played with me a lot, and I really liked that!















I got to spend some time with Aunt Stephanie too. She gave me the shirt I'm wearing.






















Sorry for this picture...Daddy made me put it on the blog. He took a picture because he thought it was funny. I was just trying to show off my pooping abilities to Daddy's family. They laughed a lot. Mommy said it was yucky and I had to go straight to the bathtub.















I also got to meet some new friends. We spent some time with Daddy and Mommy's friends, Mr. Patrick and Ms. Kristen. They have three boys: Daniel, Aidan and Levi. It was fun to play with them. I can't wait until I'm bigger so I can run around too and wrestle.

Here's a picture of Daniel holding me.

















And Ms. Kristen.

















While I was in Fort Wayne, the boys shared their swing with me since I had to leave mine at home. Aidan cried for a long time when he helped his mommy drop the swing off at Grandma's and I wasn't there. But then he got to hold me and give me kisses, so he was happy.






















Grandpa Didyk has a swing set in his back yard. Auntie Jen helped me climb up to the top of the slide.






















Then I slid down while Mommy held me. It was fun!















On the way home we stopped at Mr. Dan's house. I slept and ate while Daddy played x-box.

















Last week was more fun...now I have to help Daddy and Mommy pack. Office paperwork is BORING!





















Ok, so Auntie Jen's sunglasses didn't really fit, and since I've got some Tolan blood in me and always sneeze when I see the sun...















...Daddy and Mommy bought me my own pair! Oh yeah, Daddy and I are awesome dudes!
















Check me out...now I can go get the mail with Daddy and not sneeze and squint the whole time I'm outside.















Well, that's all for now because we have to get back to packing. Thanks for catching up with me.

Love,
Christopher

Quick Update

Just wanted to drop a quick note to tell everyone that we are alive and okay! We're currently in the process of packing up the house for our big move on Sunday. We just got back from a great week and a half in Fort Wayne, and had a wonderful time visiting family and friends. We took lots of pictures, and hopefully will get a chance to post some of them before we leave. We load up the moving truck on Friday, then paint all day Saturday and Sunday then leave on Monday. Oh, and here's a tip Rachel figured out today. It's a great move (pun intended) to play moving truck companies against each other. Rachel will call one company (budget) , which is always cheaper than who we like (penske), and get a quote. She will then call Penske and get them to match Budget's quote. Then Budget calls us back to see if we went with them, and took $100 off our price to steal the deal from Penske! Rachel's so good at stuff like this...must be all of that negotiating with people in Kenya.

We make a great team...I'm good at selling and she's great at buying! It's been a blast to spend so much time at home with her and Christopher (my last day at Cre8tive Group was March 9th). Please continue to pray for us as we get all of this crazy moving stuff done!

Love to all!

--Andy

From Christopher - For Real

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It all started with Krispy Kreme...kind of...

Christopher had an adventure this weekend - his first taste of Daddy and Mommy's crazy spontaneity. Friday night, we were at our friends' home (Dave and Lizbeth) for supper. Afterward, we decided to watch a movie. To make it more fun, someone suggested that whatever the first food was in the movie, we go out and get it to eat. Well, it was doughnuts...so we hopped in the car and drove to...















...where Andy ended up getting us a dozen doughnuts for free. On the way there, we were all laughing and joking around when I suggested that we should just get the doughnuts and keep driving on a road trip. Instead of planning where to go, we would just drive for x-amount of time or exits and then turn right, drive x-amount of more exits and turn left, etc. until we were too tired and then we'd get a hotel. Much to my surprise, everyone else thought it sounded like a fun idea and AGREED to ACTUALLY DO IT. Of course, we do have a baby and Dave and Lizbeth have a dog, so we had to stop back by our houses to pick up the dog and Christopher's medicine, and we allowed ourselves the pleasure of packing our toothbrushes - but nothing else. Then, at 10 pm at night, we hopped back in the car and decided to head east. Four hours later, we found ourselves in Charleston, WV!!!!! We stayed in this "luxurious hotel" at a reduced rate after the hotel front desk worker gave into our pleas for a cheaper room and made Dave an employee so he could get a discount.















Christopher was a trooper and slept through it all. He awoke briefly when we unloaded at the hotel, but after eating went right back to sleep until morning. He's amazing!















In the morning, we drove by the capitol building to take a few pictures and then headed home, arriving back in Lexington around 4 pm. We had a lot of fun.






















Our first family picture on a spontaneous, crazy, unknown destination road trip. We had so much fun.






















Gramma and Papa Tones and Uncle Tony came to visit Christopher on Sat. afternoon - Sun. morning. We all went out to celebrate Mom and Tony's 10th wedding anniversary. The food was delicious at Three Suns, as always!


This evening, Great-Aunt Dorcas, Great - Uncle Dan, and cousins Becca, Mark and Noah all stopped by to see Christopher on their way back from FL. Christopher loved them and laughed a lot at Aunt Dorcas. He's laughed 4-5 times today, so maybe he'll start laughing a little more often now instead of once every few days/weeks.















Merry Monday, Everyone! Have a great week.

Ready for Rugby!?!

I'm growing fast! This first picture is just to remind you all of how little I was when Daddy and Mommy brought me home.
















Now I weigh 11 1/2 lbs and I'm ready for my "Big Boy" bed now...there's just not enough room in this bassinet to stretch out, and I LOVE to stretch.






















In fact, I'm so big now, that I wore a rugby shirt yesterday with my jeans.






















I was really excited when Mommy told me all about the manly sport of rugby. She said my Uncle Silas will teach me when I'm a little bit older.
















Mommy warned me that it can get a little rough. My response?

BRING IT ON!

Christopher's First Trip to "God's Country"

Great-Grandma Steury lovingly refers to the mountains of North Carolina as "God's Country." I suppose less than an hour west in the mountains of Tennessee is pretty similar. Christopher made his first trip to Johnson City, his soon-to-be new home, this past weekend. He was a great traveler - stopping once on the way down and not at all on the way back to KY. What an amazing little guy.

The first night in a new bed, he tossed and turned most of the night...but only until it was time for Daddy and Mommy to get up. Then he fell into a very deep sleep for another hour or so before waking up for breatkfast. At least he got an hour of sleep, right? =)















Christopher had fun at Babu and Nana's house. Uncle Silas and Babu were amazed at how much he had grown since Christmas.

On Saturday, it was finally warm enough again to take him outside again for a walk. Bundled up in his little snow suit for warmth (easier than a blanket), he walked around the neighborhood with Mommy and the girls. He must not have been all that impressed since he slept through the whole thing. Afterward, he sat for awhile in the little sled Babu built for Nana a few years ago.















Christopher also got to meet Mommy's cousins, Aaron and Faith Tolan. He loved staring at Cousin Aaron. When Mommy explained later that they were going to have a little boy soon that could play with Christopher in a few months, he was excited.
















Here's our little man enjoying some tummy time, playing with his bus from Auntie Meg. He rolled over both ways for the first time last night. It was funny to see the startled look of surprise when he ended up on his back.
















And another favorite thing to do...STAND! "If only I had some good balance to go with these strong legs," says Christopher. "Then I could go anywhere I wanted to go."
















And here is our munchkin showing off his gut. He's now 11lbs. 4 oz.






















And showing off his drool...another new, messy thing.















Last night, Daddy got out his guitar and played Christopher some songs before bed. It was the first time he's seen/heard that, and he loved it. He never stopped staring at Andy's hand as he strummed the guitar strings - he just sat in Mommy's lap with a little smirk on his face. It was precious.

Well, that's it for now. Please continue to pray that our house will sell quickly. We've finally got all the signs/flyers together and plan on putting them out this evening. It took a little more prep work than we anticipated, but at least we're ready now. Thanks.

~Rachel

A Weekend of Firsts

What a whirlwind! We've sure had a busy weekend. Andy recently received a job offer from a company called N-tara in Johnson City, TN. Last weekend, he accepted the position and we began to make plans to move at the end of March. Part way through the week, we found out we would be moving March 10 instead...leading us to realize...WE NEED TO GET OUR HOUSE ON THE MARKET YESTERDAY! So my mama came up this weekend to help pack and take care of the baby. In 2 days, we packed and loaded about half the stuff in our house and Mama drove it to a storage unit in TN. Talk about crazy. Though I've moved a lot in my life, this was definitely a first...finding out your moving and packing/moving some stuff in about 4 days. Hopefully, it's also a last. And it was definitely a first for Andy, since he's moved between cities/states only once before in his life...Fort Wayne - to KY - and soon to TN. Thank the Lord for the help of family and friends this last weekend in trying to get a jump start on things...with that much stuff out of the house, hopefully it will be a little easier to keep clean for showings. We hope to have it on the market in the next couple days - so please add that to your prayer list. And if you know anyone wanting to buy a house in Nicholasville...send them our way! =)

At first, Christopher didn't take the news that we were moving very well. In fact, he screamed for a little while as seen below...

















...until we placed him in his favorite place in the world right now (unless he's being held) and promised that he could take this animal mobile with him when we moved. He then gave us another first, as Mommy was changing his diaper and telling him what a stinky little boy he currently was...he laughed! It was precious and melted our hearts even more.
















After he had calmed down about the move, Christopher decided to help Daddy and Mommy take some pictures of the house before it got "torn apart" and packed. Here he is showing off some of his animal pictures in his room.
















And finally, he decided to put on his best behavior and sleep peacefully almost the entire weekend whenever he wasn't eating. A tremendous help to us as we packed.