Hodin Family Blog: 2009

Thursday, October 01, 2009

Ethan's 8th Birthday, Part 1

Yesterday Ethan turned 8 years old!! We went to Joe's as usual and Ethan ate a BBBQ chicken sandwich and 3 helpings of mac 'n cheese! Here are some shots...

Ethan with his carrot cake...

Ethan, mom and dad (I look tired, I know! I have had a nasty cold for 8 days now!)...

Ethan with Grandma, Grampa and Rhys...

Ethan, memere and Gpa Dave...

Ethan with his bucket of LEGO's from GG...

Poor Rhys, he sustained a nice head injury last weekend. We were shopping at Fry's grocery store and Scott called him, so he came running around an end cap and gouged out a nice chunk of his head. The store had no first aid kit and they ended up hading us a tube of expired Neosporin. Nice. So after fililng out an incident report we took him to Urgent Care, where he had to get about 5 injections of lidocaine into the scalp (this did NOT go well) and then a staple in his head. We should have just gone straight for the staple with no numbing, it would have been less painful! Anyway, we talked to our pediatrician and he said we were lucky, as the cut was right over a major artery. It could have been SOO much worse, so we are praising God that it was relatively minor in comparison! Here's a pic...

More pics of Emme

OK, I love my cat and think she is so cute, so here are some recent pics of her. These were taken on her birthday, she turned 2 on Sept. 29th :).

That beat up toy is her favorite crinkle ball of all time. It used to have feathers, but those are long gone :). We need to find a replacement...

Emme with her feather wand. She will drag this thing around the house and drop it at your feet and look at you like, "Come on, time to play!"

This is where she hangs out while I am on the computer...

Look at those pretty blue eyes!

Wednesday, September 30, 2009

1st Day of School

July 27th was the boys first day of school. Ethan started 2nd grade and Rhys started his last year of preschool. Here are their super cute pics :)...

Ethan

Rhys (Of course he couldn't forget Lambert!)

Rhys

More Newport Pics

Rhys jumping off the diving board...

Ethan jumping off the diving board...

On the fairy boat from Newport to Balboa. My favorite shot of my 3 guys...

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The boys sharing a bed, they were very tired from a busy day at the beach!

Ethan's 'model' shot... That or he's got something in his teeth :)

Newport Beach

We spent the 4th of July in Newport Beach this summer at GG's house. As always, we had an awesome time! Here are some pics...

Ethan and Rhys overlooking the beach...

Ethan, Rhys, Scott and GG...

Mom and Ethan...

Ethan and Rhys on the beach...

Ethan

Ethan lost one of his top teeth recently. I think he looks so cute with that gap on the top!

Here's Rhys helping him show off that gap...As you can see, Rhys is enjoying that more than Ethan!

He is also playing baseball now with other 2nd graders and is really enjoying it. He is on the Astros and is a pretty good hitter. We are still working on that catching, though :)...

Ethan at bat. He got a single on this hit.

Rhys has Amblyopia

Rhys has amblyopia. His right eye has very bad vision so his left eye is taking over and is slowly 'shutting' off vision to the right eye. We were so very lucky to have even found this out, we took him in for his first check-up right before his birthday and noticed that he was cheating on the eye chart. So, now he has the cutest glasses and has to wear an eye patch 3 hours a day. It was 4 hours, but there has been imrovement over the past 3 months, so we get to do it for just 3 hours. It is definitely an adjustment and some days are harder than others. But overall, he is taking to the patch well and does a good job keeping it on (if he takes it off, he gets ALL of his trains taken away till the next day!)

Rhys with his cool glasses...

School

Whew, I finished my second semester of Anatomy in May and also took Microbiology over the summer. I did very well, earning high A's in both classes. I have recently applied for a scholarship and should find out within the next month if I got that. If so, I will start nursing school in March 2010, if not, I'll probably have to wait until January 2011 :(....

Glen Rose, TX

We were fortunate enough to experience a wonderful family adventure to Fossil Rim Wildlife Park in Glen Rose, TX this past May. All of the Hodin clan was there, GG, her four children, their spouses, her grandson (Scott) and her two great-grandkids (Ethan and Rhys). The boys LOVED the wildlife park and we had an awesome time!!!

Melanie and Scott...

The higlight of my trip, feeding a giraffe by hand!

Ethan feeding an Emu, mean little buggers!

A very friendly and hungry deer. If it wasn't for his antlers, he would have had his head in our van! He was drooling all over me, it was hilarious!

The whole gang...(Adults: James, Karin, May, Rob, Margit, Russ, Gayle, Scott, Melanie, and Ken; Kids in front: Ethan and Rhys)

Rhys' 4th Birthday

Well, this is 5 months late, but I guess better late than never! Rhys is 4 now and still a big fan of trains. Here's some pics from his party..

Rhys with his friends...

Rhys opening his train from Grandma and Grandpa...

Rhys 'reading' his birthday card...

Tuesday, April 14, 2009

Grandpa Ron Comes to Visit

My dad recently came out for a 12 day visit. It was nice, as always, to have him here with us. This year was great, since we have our new house and he had his own room! Not sure who was happier about that, him or the boys (since they didn't have to share a room this time!) We did so much stuff-eating out (we ate chimichangas EVERY DAY for a week!), going to the train park, going to the Ostrich Festival, riding the Dolly, taking the kids fishing, even replacing our kitchen sink! It was fun and I always look forward to his annual spring visit. Here are some pics...

In front of the Dolly