Fishing

Joey and I came to Pittsburgh a week ago by airplane. Joe packed the car full of baby stuff and a few other things and drove here to drop CeCe off here. She is going to stay here while we are in Tampa. My dad caught a few fish to put in the pond in their backyard. We were excited for Joe to get here so that the boys could go fishing. For the first attempt, the dogs came with us. They both barked as soon as they saw the worm on the hook. We think that scared the fish away. So Joey didn't catch anything.

CeCe tried to catch a fish or two, also. She didn't have any luck but did go for a swim.

A few days later, we tried again to go fishing. This time, we left the dogs in the house. We had much better luck! Joey wouldn't stand by the fish so we didn't get a picture of him(infact, when I said "Joey, go stand by the fish for a picture" he said his new favorite saying "NO WAY!" Here is my dad taking the hook out of the fishs' mouth so that he could go back into the water.

My Baby Shower!

My friends at Edwards decided to have a baby shower for me. We had a great time and some delicious food. Instead of buying me a lot of little things, they bought me two bigger items, an Ergo baby carrier and a new baby playmat. Here are a few pictures of the shower:

Here is the delicious food. Missing from the picture is a sandwich thing that my friend Mindy made. It was so good, but it was still in the oven.


The shower hosts, Mindy and Dina.



The best shot of my baby belly, a picture with Jodi...who is making fun of my "arm on my hip" pose that my friend Lisa taught me.


I had a great time at my shower and really appreciate my gifts!

Joey's Scooter

We bought Joey a scooter last week. It is a cute little thing. He loves it. We took it outside today, despite the 100degree temps. He rode it around for a few minutes and then decided that it was better to have Joe push him! Here are a few pictures(he woke up from his nap and we never changed his shorts...so that explains the weird outfit!):

Two New Babies!

This past week was a busy one for us! Well, not as busy as it was for both of my sister in laws, but still busy:) Last Wednesday, my brothers wife, Maggie, had their baby a few weeks early. We were all suprised by the early addition, no one more than Maggie. They were out to eat when her water broke. That is every pregnant woman's nightmare! Luckily both mom and son are doing great.
This is my first blood related nephew/neice! Here is a picture of Michael Allen Chornick, III or Cole as we are going to call him! Cole was born at only 5lbs 10oz. He is so small. And I have less than 3 weeks until I can hold him and kiss him!

Last week, Joe's sister went into and out of labor. Finally on Sunday, she gave birth to her fourth child, third boy. So Joey already has 3 cousins in New York and Liam Patrick McKenney makes 4! And here is a picture of little Liam. Liam was born weighing 8lbs 1oz so he is full sized and ready to go!

Joey and the unnamed baby boy in my tummy are going to have lots of playmates when we visit family!

Memorial Day Weekend in San Francisco

We decided to go to San Francisco last weekend for the long weekend. Joe actually had a 4 day weekend, so we left on Friday and came back on Monday. The drive is about 6.5-7 hours and it really wasn't that bad. I have been having some back pain issues so I was a little concerned about driving that far but since I didn't have to do the driving and could sit in a variety of positions in the car, it turned out ok. It is a great city and I LOVED it! I wish that it wasn't so far because I would love to go back again!
We stayed at the Marine Memorial Hotel and Club. It is right in Union Square and a great location to most things in the city. To join the club, members have to pay $100/year but the fee is waived for military. By joining, we got the member discount which made the cost of the room A LOT cheaper! Instead of paying around $200/night for the hotel and hotels right across the street, we paid $89/night for Friday and Saturday nights and $69 for Sunday night. That included a free full breakfast. We were very happy about our deal!

Joey's favorite thing that we did all weekend was go to the zoo. On the way there, he kept talking about the animals that he wanted to see. He wanted to see the giraffes and elephants.

Well, bad news Joey...for some reason, the elephants are no longer at the zoo! (If you look on the list above Penguin, Elephant is scratched out. The poor little guy was disappointed but we distracted him with the other animals.

Since we got there when it opened at 10am, we had a lot of space and not a lot of other people around. It really was great and we enjoyed all of the space:) Another part of the zoo that Joey loved was the petting zoo. They had food for you to feed the animals. Joey fed the goats and ducks. The goats pretty much attacked anyone that had food and really, Joey wasn't fond of the goats attacking him. He did like feeding the ducks, though.

The rest of the day Saturday was spent with Joey taking a nap and then a walk through Chinatown. I was excited to eat some good Chinese food. Unfortunately, Chinatown is not the place to go if you want Americanized Chinese food. We should have just went to PF Changs.

On Sunday, we went to the Fisherman's Wharf. While there, we stopped by the aquarium on the pier. It was a small aquarium but pretty nice. There are tunnels for visitors to walk through and the fish swim around. Joey didn't really like it but Joe and I loved it!

We had a great weekend and Joey was so great the entire time. We were a little nervous about the sleeping situation because anytime that we have ever stayed in a hotel, we have always used a Pack n Play. Because he is no longer in a crib, we had to figure something else out but were afraid of him sleeping in the high off the ground hotel bed. So we bought a twin sized air mattress. He LOVED it and jumped right into bed when we told him that it was time to go to sleep. And of course, we can't go anywhere without his books to sleep with!

Joey's Books

Joey looooooooves his books. Everynight when he goes to bed, he has to have all of his favorite books in bed with him. I am not just talking about 3 or 4 books. He likes to have 15 or so on his bed. In the morning when he wakes us, he grabs a few and carries them out to the living room. When it is time to take a nap in the afternoon, he grabs those books and carries them back into his room. His new favorites are the I Spy books.

While posting this picture, I realized that I never made a post about Joey in his big boy bed! When we moved houses, we figured that it was the best time to get Joey a new big boy bed to get the crib free for the baby coming in September. So we bought him a queen sized bed frame because we figure that he will keep that forever! He doesn't sleep under the covers, though. He still only likes to sleep with just his silky, blue blanket. He has done great in his new bed and new room!

Happy Mother's Day to Me...a week late!

How could I not have had a great Mother's day with this little boy???

We are Alive!

OMG...I just looked at my blog and realized that I haven't updated it in over a month! Wow! I didn't realize that it had been that long. Well, we have been very busy so atleast I have a good excuse!
The beginning of our business started when we decided to move houses AGAIN on base. This is our third house at Edwards! We were living in Senior Enlisted houses that were fine, liveable, and not too old but we decided to move because we could get a brand new house by all of our friends that is bigger and just better for us. So, Joe took off one day and moved EVERYTHING by himself. Since I am pregnant and have a bad back everyday of my life, I couldn't really do much. Joe started working at 7 am with a rented trailer from Outdoor rec. (he pulled it with our new Honda Pilot that we bought the week before!) and took a lunch break and dinner break. By 6 pm, we had everything moved except for a dresser, our king mattress/box spring, and our couch that were all too heavy for him to lift by himself. A friend of ours helped him move those things. When I say that we had everything here and put together by Saturday, I mean that curtains were up, pictures were up, dishes were put away, and beds were made. I am sooooo thankful that my husband is a no-nonsense guy and doesn't procrastinate! The next week was spent cleaning the house and getting it ready to pass the Air Forces crazy cleaning test. We passed and in the end, it took us less than 2 weeks from the day that we got the keys for the new house to get rid of the keys for the old house!
After the moving weekend, we have had a bunch of visitors. Unfortunately, I haven't taken a picture of ONE SINGLE VISITOR! First, my mom came to visit. She came on the Sunday that we moved. The main reason that she came to visit was because I went with some friends to the Ellen DeGeneres Show! They got picked to play a game(I couldn't play because I am pregnant) and each won a $400 gift card to Pottery Barn! It was a fun day and I am so lucky that my mom wanted to see Joey so bad...free babysitting!
The next visitors were Joe's parents. They came on Thursday and left on Monday. We did A LOT while they were here and Joey and I were exhausted when they left. Infact, the day after they left, Joey took a nap from noon to almost 4:30!
A few days after Joe's parents left, my cousin Tina(Joey's godmother) and her boyfriend, Ryan, came to visit. They came for a vacation, but little did any of us know that Joey would want to play with them both nonstop and wouldn't leave Ti-ta or Ry-yi alone! They were good sports and played with him...really, they had no choice with my persistant son!
We don't have anymore visitors scheduled so we are going to relax and enjoy our new house before the fun starts again this summer and we travel to Tampa!

Joey Can Spell:)

Joey has started spelling his name. He learned how to spell his name by playing with his stool in the bathroom that says Joey on it. Last night while in the bathtub, spelling his name got a whole lot more fun when he decided to scream "Joey" after spelling it. Here he is spelling his name. he still has some trouble with that darn "J" sound, though!

And please excuse the "Patrick Swayze" no shirt and jeans outfit. We were in the middle of getting dressed!

An Easy Flight, but an Interesting Night!

We got to Pittsburgh yesterday. Our flight left LAX at 10:30am. Joe couldn't take us to the airport because of work so Joey and I took the shuttle van to the airport. The drive is about 90 miles but usually takes 2 hours, especially during rush hour traffic. So we woke up at 5, left our house at 6, and got on the shuttle at 7 to drive to the airport. The traffic was bad because of an accident but overall it all worked out good! Joey ate his breakfast in the van and slept a little. Our flight was a direct flight and took a little over 4 hours. I was nervous that Joey was going to get restless and want to get up and move around but he sat in his seat the whole time and watched his dvd player.

(Sorry about the sun!)

One of the flight attendants told me that he was so good and couldn't believe that he just turned 2 in January! When we got to Pittsburgh, Joey was only concerned about seeing Pap Pap, my dad. And when we got to my parents house, he took Pap Pap into the other room to set up the train table. He didn't even want to go to bed last night because he was so excited about all of the toys at my parents.
At around 3am, Joey woke up. I went into his room and told him to go back to sleep. He said "No, play." He was up for awhile crying at me. Finally, I fell asleep. At around 4am, I heard him crying again, but this time, the crying sounded different. I opened my bedroom door only to realize that Joey had woken up, opened his door(he has a toddler bed at my parents), climbed over the gate, and walked down the stairs in the dark! I guess when he got downstairs he thought that he was going to see everyone that was there before he went to bed. When he realized that no one was there and it was dark, he started crying. I picked him up and put him in bed with me. While trying to go back to sleep myself, he kept spelling his name. It's his newest trick. He spells Joey phonetically "ga oh ee, why, Joey". Over and over and over again. I have to admit, it was cute the first 3 times(especially because he doesn't say Joey, but he says "da-dee" for his name)but at 4am when I wanted silence, it wasn't so cute. Finally he fell asleep and slept until about 9am, when I left to go meet some friends for breakfast.
What an interesting night...hopefully after I get the door handle locks today, we will have a better nights sleep!