Vocabulary Explosion!

Luca has started using a few more words this week. 'shoe and eat' (I am surprised 'eat' wasn't his first word :-). He is also signing for water and saying 'wawa'. He also signs for milk. It is so cute! My baby is growing up.

He totally understands us when we talk to him. I tell him to get me his shoes, he trots off and comes back everytime with a matching pair!

He is quite the ham too. I wish I could figure out how to load the video on here from my dvd's so I could show everyone his cuteness.

Luca is really starting to get the language thing down. However, I just love listening to him 'babble' off a whole sentence that he surely understands, but we don't.

His newest words are ' yellow, balloon, night-night, and choo-choo train'. He is able to say NICO and also calls Nico 'Bu-bee' which is what Nico wants to be called by him. I just love the bond that these two rascals have.

Luca really tries to imitate the words we say to him. It is so funny because he will nod his little head when he says it and laugh. He is so proud of himself. He still only signs for 'more, please, and thank-you'.

He now imitates an elephant by making the nose and using his arm up to his face like a nose. He also imitates a chicken and duck. (Added to horse, cow, dog, and cat).

He is all about daddy and cries when Mike leaves without saying goodbye to him. Luca is such a loving little boy. He loves to give hugs and kisses. When I tell him to say 'night-night' to everyone he makes his rounds to everyone giving kisses (even the dog and cats if they are within range). Everytime he sees a helicopter he says, 'daddy!' (because daddy flies one at work).

I cannot imagine our life with out this bundle of joy. He has such a personality and knows he is a comedian.

Pictures and info about our spring break later this week.

Spring Break

Mike's Dad, Jim, and Step-mom, Darla, came to St. Louis from CA. This is their first time to St. Louis and they didn't get to stay long enough. Mike has lived here for 15 years and, of course, I have been here my whole life. Nico wanted to show them so much, but there are just not enough days.
Luca was running to Darla by the last day. He took to her quickly. She doesn't look old enough to be a grandma does she? (Luca had many nicknames over the week. These included, Rocky, Popeye, and Chucky....his face swelled all across and he did look like Chucky).

We spent Monday waiting on Mike and his dad to get back with Mike's new 'pickem up truck'. Darla came over and brought the boys "Mario Cart" for Wii. Nico was SUPER EXCITED! Grandma's are so good for spoiling our kids. Once the guys got back we took Jim and Darla to Mount Pleasant Winery (only 25 minutes from our house...yipee!). They were celebrating their 24th wedding anniversary. It was a beautiful, but breezy, day.


This is just the wine tasting and Darla looks looped already! (Love you Darla)
My honeybunch and I. It was so nice to have some time off and away from home.

On Tuesday we went to Branson and home on Thursday. They left on Friday. Darla's family was having a family reunion in Branson, so she was able to kill two birds with one stone. :-)



Here is 'Papa Quackers'


As you can tell, we rode the ducks and got our 'quackers'. We had a 'quacker of a time". Nico even lost his tooth because of the quacker.


We were able to get in some miniature golf. Luca found it was a lot easier to pick up the ball and try to throw it in the little hole rather than using the golf club.



I love how Nico is linning up the ball.

I absolutely love homeschooling. It was nice to pick when we wanted to take spring break and the weather turned out AWESOME!

Boy vs Dog

This photo is from Friday morning (4/24). The bite happened on Sunday (4/19). We took the stitches out Thursday night. As of this Sunday (4/27) the eye is almost all the way open. There is still some swelling at the top of the eyelid. I am amazed at how fast he healed!

Update:
Luca's eye and head are doing much better. He was able to start opening his eye yesterday (Thursday) and Thursday night we took the stitches out while he slept. He twitched a bit, but never opened his eyes. The thought of holding him while the doctor attempted to remove them was not good, especially with the one cut right on his eyelid.

The wounds look good and he is as happy and active as ever. He is also still petting and kissing on Petey. Yes, Petey is still there. I am making sure to keep him locked in the laundry room with his food until he is finished and then it gets picked up. If we are upstairs I keep Petey downstairs. Petey is giving kisses back and still seems to avoid Luca if he can. I truely believe he realizes he did wrong and did not mean to; it was just instinct.

My poor little Luca was bitten by none other than my own dog yesterday. I am so mad at Petey, but Luca was playing in his food dish while he was eating. Petey is 12 years old and came into my life when I just had Brian. Petey has never bitten anyone (he has snapped at a few people), so this was really disheartening to me. We were not in the room when it happened, but Mike had just fed Petey, Luca walked past him, Mike went to the restroom, and suddenly heard the dog noises and Luca screaming. I am kicking myself because I was upstairs on the computer. I didn't even hear anything, until Mike said, "OH NO!" Of course, I was a beeline downstairs and saw Mike holding Luca with blood streaming down the left side of his face and Luca, of course, in hysterics. We were quickly in action getting to blood off to see the damages. We weren't sure what happened to his eye....Thank God it was still intact!


I knew the cut on his forehead would need stitches, so off we went to the hospital. 2 hours later, Luca had 4 stitches. There is a pretty good gash right underneath the eyelash too, but the dr. did not want to try to stitch it. It swelled up big time by 9pm but I think this was due to his running around.

He slept through the night fine and it still sleeping at 8am. I will wake him soon to see how the healing did over night. I am hoping it is not too pasted shut to irritate it all again.


Before the stitches, but after we had it cleaned up. (3pm)




After the stitches (5pm), it is already starting to swell up.

Taken at 9pm. It really swelled after an evening of running around. The one tear breaks my heart!

Our Own Photo shoot

I took the boys to the local city park to try to get some photographs. (I spend too much money when I go get professional photos taken.) The trees were all in bloom and it was sunny out for a change. However, it was a bit chilly and windy. But, we got a few good shots. Brian was even with us. These are untouched photos. The focus on some of them is out. I need more practice with my camera!!! But, this is our life and our casualness. I am a scrapbook addict and will admit it. I like my photos to capture who we really are.

It has been so rainy, windy, and cold here. I am so ready for the nice weather. One of the many perks of homeschooling is we can take our spring break when we want to. So, we have postponed ours until April 20, for two reasons: we have family come in from California, and two hoping the weather will finally break (maybe they'll bring some warm weather.)
The Three Amigos - Luca not so much wanting to stand there, he wanted to get the ducks. This resembles the first photo I took of the boys in Guatemala when we visited for Luca's first birthday.
This was our first photo in May 2008....Luca still not wanting to be there, although this time was because he just met these crazy characters.
Brian, he just turned 17 the end of March.
Nico was not into posing and trying to get great photos. I always have to catch him on the fly or in action when we are outside. Nico is 7.5 years old.
Look at me climb!

I just love this photo of Luca. He was laughing hysterically at Nico. He can be seen laughing in the next photo. He finds his big brothers so funny. This is Luca's Embassy shirt.

"I'm going to get me some ducks!!!"

Momma and her Luca Bear!