Christ is Risen! He is Risen Indeed!

Happy Easter from the Martins

Christ is Risen!

It's been a long time since I've posted...so there is a lot to share!

Xander looked so cute for Easter service.  He always cries when I leave him in the nursery, but they say he plays and snuggles and has a great time as soon as I am out of sight

Xander had his first Easter egg hunt with the Hunters and absolutely loved it!

Seeing the eggs as 'billy balls,' Xander was eager to get started on the hunt!

We've also had family come visit, which has been truly wonderful.

Hat swap with Gandpops

This is one of my favorite pictures ever!

My mom and Jan came down for their spring break

We had a couple crazy storm days, but also had some gorgeous park days

Sometimes, we get to talk to daddy while we're at the park!

We've been having a lot of play dates with our friends Alyssa and Kiera.  Kiera is nearly two, and amazes me with how much she knows!  She and Xander are two peas in a pod

Xander loves to follow Kiera around, and Kiera loves....

well, Kiera loves Zoey and tolerates Xander

After three days of Xander's hair being so heavy, the curls became a mullet, I decided it was time for a trim

At first, he kept reaching for the scissors

So I distracted him with a popsicle.  Success!

We tried a beach day with Karlee and Brighton on Saturday. 

It was fun for the Martin crew, but a bit of a disaster for the Goeres's...  The wind swooped the umbrella, which Karlee's quick hand saved from hitting Brighton.  Moments later, a dog charged our area and trampled Brighton, covering her in sand, and then the blanket kicked up in the wind and covered her in sand again.  Poor thing was miserable with sand in her eyes, but her mom's gentle touch made everything better once we got away from the sand.  Hopefully we can try it again on a less windy day!

One last dose of cuteness!

Milestones

This boy talks so much!  My friend and neighbor, Jenifer, asked me how many words he has, which made me want to write them all down, because I have no idea.  He is a talker like his mama, though!

His newest word is Zoey ('Woh-wee')

He now has two chores

He puts his clothes in the laundry before bath time, and he feeds Zoey twice a day

One day, Leaha and I got home from our run, and I went straight for water.  Xander was following me, saying "woh-wee, woh-wee" and doing the sign for drink.  Leaha quickly figured out that he was telling us it was time for him to feed Zoey, and was signing for her food cup!  What?!  This blew my mind.

He is now climbing dangerously on everything, even the chairs that I overturned to prevent him from climbing.  He has started climbing the cabinets in the kitchen by the handles.

Here are some of our latest videos:

 

Living room dance party

Bubbles are so exciting!

Five Years, Fifteen Months, and Family

We had a crazy couple of weeks around here, and I am way behind on reporting our family milestones!

Right at the tail end of Xander and I both being very sick, 

we celebrated two major milestones in one day.

On March 15th, Princess Zoey had her fifth birthday, AND Xander turned fifteen months old.

We had plans to play disc golf for Zoey's birthday, which is our family tradition, but early Wednesday, we got terrible news that our flying family suffered a catastrophic loss when a plane crashed, killing all three on board.

This devastated our community and hit very close to home.  Zoey, Xander, and I headed to our good friend Laura's house to surround ourselves with someone going through the same loss, but also one of the strongest people I know.  It helped immensely to be with Laura throughout that day.

Potatoes had a blast being in a new house with lots and lots of balls to throw with Laura's Golden Retriever, Adelaide.  The two of them gave us smiles on a day when we were so sad.

Zoey's birthday present was having Potatoes harass a different pup.  It made Zoey very happy to still get to share his snacks, but not be the object of his constant attention (and Adelaide loved it, too)!

The weekend before the birthday, while we were both at the beginning of being sick, we were lucky to have my mom, Aunt Jan, and dear friend, Shorna come to visit.  We had so much fun playing and Xander thought Shorna was so cool.  He ate Hot Fries the whole time she was here, which shocked us all, but wouldn't touch them once she left!  He just wanted to be like her!

I was on spring break for the week, but as soon as I was well, I began a four day real estate class.  I'm exploring a new venture, and it will be a lot to learn!  I felt like I was learning a foreign language.  I enjoyed the class, though, and Alexander enjoyed all the attention he got playing with different friends while I was in class.

=

Kassie and her boyfriend, Michael played with our little man while I was in class Saturday

They played hard and wore him out (he fell asleep with his head in Michael's hand!)

Milestones:

At fifteen months, Alexander

climbs EVERYTHING (all of our chairs have to be turned on their side for safety)

has a number of words including ball, cracker, here ya go, thank you, puppy, mama, and dada (he says down for up, so I'm not counting that one)

(he also signs and is beginning to pair the oral language with sign language)

loves attention and making people laugh

loves water, books, balls, and slides

is uninterested in any television beyond about 90 seconds of a song

he knows lots of songs, but his favorites are still Wheels on the Bus and 

If You're Happy and You Know it

eats very well, but prefers to eat off of other people's plates rather than his own

has a great time 'jumping,' which may be the cutest thing I've ever seen

loves to fist bump and say, "pow!"

gives the best hugs
sleeps 11 hours straight at night!!!
takes one long nap (about 2.5 hrs) midday and has a cat nap or quiet time for about 30 min in the early evening

raises his hands to the side when asked any WH question

 

My thoughts and prayers are with the families and friends of the fallen airmen of the 318th.

Freedom is not free.

Martin Family Making Memories

The Martin family looks a little different right now with Daniel on a new work schedule.
I know he is nervous leaving the bulk of, well, everything on me, but I am confident the crew will stand together and make it out stronger than ever!  I feel very blessed to have a huge Hunters community surrounding me through the next few months.

Loving on her daddy

We enjoyed a beautiful park day before Daniel started his new work assignment.

Last week, my mom and Aunt Jan were in Grayton beach with a group of friends that I have known all of my life.  Literally, they were there when I was born.

The ladies took Potatoes for the afternoon so Daniel and I could enjoy some time together before his new work assignment.

  

  

I then went and spent the night at their beach cabin and enjoyed a mini staycation.

We celebrated my mom's birthday while they were here, and her friends were so sweet to make her a guacamole 'cake' because she is avoiding sugar.

The weather was gorgeous!

Potatoes had so much fun on our staycation!

This family is my world, and I know we will be strong through this period of separation.

A boy and his dog.  Love.

Birthday fun to celebrate Leaha

We've been having family fun at different parks nearly every day.  Zoey is especially happy when we go near the water.

Night to Shine

On Friday night, I got to take part in an unforgettable event.  I got to be a buddy at the Tim Tebow Foundation's Night to Shine, a prom for people with special needs.

My coworkers did it last year, so they knew what to expect, but I had no idea.  It was magical.

My buddy was named Brian, and he knew nearly everyone there.  He is attending a college program for adults with disabilities and had a big personality.  We got along great!

He was not interested in participating in the limo ride, the balloon artist, or the photo booth that were available.  A man after my own heart, he just wanted to DANCE!

We spent the evening dancing with his group of friends that were also guests at the prom.

At the end, after over an hour of dancing, his friends decided it was time to tear up the stage for some karaoke.

I had such a wonderful time being Brian's buddy, making sure he had a blast.  I'm not sure which of us had more fun!

The event was in Gulf Breeze, so my coworkers and I got a hotel in Pensacola for the night.

After a quick outfit change, we hit the town, first with some line dancing and then on to Seville for more dancing.

This was my first night EVER away from Xander, not to mention I am usually in bed by 9:30.  I wasn't sure how long I would last before needing to head back to the hotel.

The girls were such a blast, though, and I love dancing so much (plus I had a little help from an Advocare Spark), we stayed until last call and then headed to Waffle House.  I may have nodded off at the table once or twice, but somehow I made it until we returned to the hotel at 4:30 in the morning!  I slept until an impressive 8:30 Saturday morning.

Daniel and Xander spent the evening at Uncle Bryan's and both survived the night without incident.  Luckily Potatoes has been sleeping straight through until just after 6am for nearly a week now.

Milestones:

Xander is a bit of a hot mess right now as he goes through a growth spurt and a leap in his mental development.  He is in the leap of principles, meaning he is figuring out rules, so he is constantly testing his limits.  He is fussy during the day, unlike his normal happy self, and wants to be held a lot.  He is still my happy boy when we are doing something new and around a lot of people, so we have been going to new playgrounds and being very active to help us all keep our sanity.

This guy is a LADIES MAN!  Leaha was out with her class on the playground one day, and spotted Xander standing between two girls from his class.  She said he turned to one, hugged and kissed her, then let go a turned to the other and did the same thing.  What a stud!

He is fairly competent with a fork and spoon when he is focused and motivated.  He loves to use them to catapult food as well, though.

He still loves his blankies and uses them to self soothe, helping him to sleep from between 7:30 or 8pm until about 6:15am

He still nurses before bed and on weekends also in the morning so that I can stay in bed until nearly 7am

He is a great eater, and often goes into the snack drawer on his own to pull out his favorites- anything daddy eats!

He talks all the time and has an incredible receptive language vocabulary.  He makes sounds for ducks and, most recently, for gorillas (in honor of Harambe), but his favortie animal is the owl.  He always pulls out my owl autism shirt for me to wear, and recently grew into his owl shirt from Aunt Jan and was thrilled to have one of his own.

No need to mention the superbowl other than to show off his dance to the awesome halftime show.

Birthdays and Dedications

As we get ready to RISE UP tonight to cheer on the Falcons in the Superbowl, I realize I have not posted about the festivities we enjoyed last weekend.

I've begun attending Stroller Strides with Karlee and Brighton.

It's an awesome workout that the kids and moms enjoy

It was a big weekend for our Florida family, with Brighton's dedication into the church and then Adam's birthday.

We were honored to be invited to attend Karlee and Jonathan's church last Sunday and to witness their beautiful daughter, Brighton, being dedicated into their church family.

It was wonderful to experience a different service, and I can see myself joining Karlee at this church in the coming months when we will be attending church without the guys.

Later that afternoon, Leaha and Jesse took on Potatoes duty (thank you!) while a group of us took on Escape Zone 60 in Destin, to celebrate Adam's birthday.

I have done one of these previously with my work team, but it was nothing like this.  This group was so in sync!  We were so fast, the Game Master stopped our progress to tell us he was officially impressed.

We broke the all time record by a full two minutes, completing the challenge in just 23 minutes!

Afterwards, we enjoyed chicken n' dumplings at Adam's request, and even got him a smash cake!  He had looked longingly at Potatoes's smash cake back in December, and now that his birthday came around, we felt it was the perfect surprise.  Unfortunately, Potatoes did not understand that this aprty was not about him and immediately began the most forceful sign language for 'eat' I have ever seen, furiously pointing to the smash cake and then smashing his hand into his own face to show us exactly what he thought the cake was for.

Luckily, Uncle Adam graciously shared.

This weekend, we celebrated another birthday (a bit early), as our sweet friend Harper gets ready to turn one.  Ashley and I leaned on each other greatly throughout our pregnancies and it has been so wonderful watching our kiddos grow this year.  Their family will be moving shortly, so they had a combined going away and birthday party.

Potatoes was fascinated by the balloons, and was talking up a storm about them!

He even left Harper alone with her smash cake (well, I may have had him playing outside during this part, but at least he wasn't around to interfere!).

Now, fruit tray in hand, we are heading to Uncle Bryan and Uncle Adam's house to watch the big game on Bryan's new 75 inch tv.

RISE UP!