Rubberband Wrists

Recently I was chatting with my mother-in-law about chubby babies. She told me about a friend she had that said her baby was so chubby that it looked like she had rubber bands around her wrists. I thought that was pretty funny.

It occurred to me today that my baby, too, has this same phenomenon. Not only is it his wrists, his ankles are clearly becoming his "problem area." Not to mention that crazy cellulite thing he now has going on. It is cute, I'll admit-- but only when worded properly. For instance, we were in the grocery store and one lady said to Jonathan, "Wow-- what a fatty!" Clearly, this can not be a compliment. A fatty? Was she serious? It's not like he's hanging out at the all-you-can-eat buffet. He pretty much has the perfect diet-- fruits, vegetables, single grain cereal, and well I guess the formula couldn't be helping his situation.

I did have another lady today come up to us at Wal-mart.
"What a cute little chubby baby!" Much more appropriate. Chubby is way less offensive than fatty. Fatty? You may as well label him for life. But chubby I can handle.

More so than that, I love it when people say "What a healthy little boy!" This is almost a compliment to his mommy. They may as well have said: "Give this gal a gold medal. She knows the proper nutrition for a baby. Well done." That's how I take that comment. Silly, yes. But, it never hurts to have a little pat on your back for your parenting skills.

Temptation Lurking

It's funny how things sort of just happen, you know? When we lived in Abilene the first few months of our marriage, we felt as though we single-handedly (I guess that would be double-handedly) kept Taco Bueno on Judge Ely in business. We were DINKS (Double-Income, No Kids) and eating out was just a way of life since we seemed so busy. David's weakness was Bueno, mine Starbucks. They put in that Starbucks in Abilene a little farther from our side of town than I cared for!

Muleshoe did not have a Taco Bueno or Starbucks and we made do just fine. Until one day, I was about seven months pregnant with Benjamin and driving around Lubbock after a doctor's appointment. I was on the phone with David when I paused mid-sentence.

"What is it?" He asked.
"They are putting in a Taco Bueno. Here. In Lubbock. Only an hour from our house."
Complete silence. I think he had dropped his phone.

Funny how he started accompanying me to all of my appointments and Lamaze classes after that Bueno opened. I am ashamed to admit that we made the grand opening. I mean, come on, it's Taco Bueno. Target or Harold's would seem a lot more appropriate for a grand opening, but seriously-- Bueno? It wasn't until I discovered the Starbucks around the corner from Bueno that things were all falling back into place.

When we moved to Killeen, we realized there was no Taco Bueno. Thank goodness. I could really concentrate now on losing that stinkin' baby weight (and then some). And fortunately for my waistline, and budget, the Starbucks is way on the other side of town-- although I have managed to darken their drive-thru a few times now.

But yesterday as I was flipping through the Sunday paper-- I don't read it or anything, it's purely for the Target ad that we now take it. Oh, and David does the cross word. He's the smartie. Anyway. I came across an article about a Starbucks being built in Harker Heights, literally less than a mile from our house. Yikes. This could be trouble.

I started reading the article aloud to David when I got to the part where it read..."ground will be broken next to the building under construction which is going to be a fast-food Mexican establishment called Taco Bueno." Hmmm.

I could see the excitement in his eyes. This from the man who had to have gall bladder removal due to 10-15 years of Mexican food and hard water. We both calculated that was about the time David was introduced to Taco Bueno.

Are you kidding me? What are we going to do? Excercise common sense and self restraint? This was not what I was expecting.

Pray for us.

That mommy face...

I realized while I was feeding Jonathan tonight that I was making the same face to him that I made to Benjamin almost three years ago. I do this strange thing where I imitate taking a bite as I am giving him a spoonful. I don't even realize I do it until it is brought to my attention. I remember a couple of people at our church in Muleshoe pointing it out to me at a Wednesday night meal when Benjamin was a baby. I think it was Dave McNeill and Earl Behrends-- stinkers!!
Anyway, tonight as I was feeding Jonathan, Benjamin looked at me and asked, "Mommy, are woo eating Jon-Jon's cereal?" As I said no, I realized what I was doing. I was taking my pretend bites, trying to "show" Jonathan how to take a bite.
I can't believe I still do this silly little thing. What's even funnier is that it has taken Benjamin this long to notice; he was supposed to take note when he was eating that baby cereal!!

Unpacking

I feel a little guilty because I was so looking forward to unpacking at this new house. The stress of job hunting, house hunting, house selling/buying, packing, packing, packing and gall bladder surgery made me so excited to get here and unpack and have all of that stressful stuff behind us. However, I think we just got here and were so exhausted that it just hasn't been that thrill that I envisioned. I set up the kitchen first and it is done, which is a neccesity since we use it constantly. My sweet friend Koti came from Muleshoe and helped me decorate and set up the living room. Other than that, I have completely hit a brick wall. I am starting to wonder if Benjamin thinks all of the boxes are his new toys-- permanently! He has even named a few-- we have the Radiator Springs Courthouse, Flo's Cafe and even the Cozy Cone (if you have seen the movie Cars, you know what I am living amongst right now). My goal, and I would like all of you to hold me to it, is to have this house complete (and I mean complete-complete) by Benjamin's birthday in September. Ah, the joys of moving. With kiddos.

Eating....what work!

Jonathan is now learning to eat his first big boy food-- oatmeal cereal to be exact. He seems to get more on himself than in his tummy. The rice cereal turned out to be a big disappointment, with a little more spitting up than we cared for. But, he seems content to plow through with oatmeal, although, I am almost positive that if I set a hamburger in front of him, he would gobble it right up. He seems more delighted with what we have on our plates than the bowl of mush that is his alternative. He is such a big guy, he weighs the same as my great nephew who is one! So, food seems to come pretty naturally to this chunky monkey. I told a friend of mine how he cries when the bowl is empty. She laughed and said she felt like doing the exact same thing sometimes! ; )
While Jonathan is learning to eat food, Benjamin is becoming our little chef! One of the photos is him "helping" his cousin Kayla make fruit pizza while she stayed with us this week. I think he ate more than he served!

Surgery with a silver-lining!

Amidst trying to move, David ended up in the ER needing emergency gall bladder removal! What an ordeal this ended up being, but we made it and still moved just fine.
The silver lining from all of this was a vacation for mommy and Benjamin. A couple of days after his surgery, Killeen ISD was sending David to Houston for a convention. Since he couldn't drive, we accompanied him on the trip! Jonathan stayed with Grandma and Grandpa Pawlik for a week, letting Benjamin have a little time with us by himself amidst the whirl wind of moving and everything else that was rocking his little world.
We ended up having a blast! Killeen ISD had put us up in the Omni in the heart of Houston, so we were close to all of the fun stuff! Benjamin spent a whole day at the beach, another at the zoo and he even made time for a trip to IKEA for mommy! He loved swimming in the hotel pool and loved the fact that our room over looked it.

And David ended up doing just fine, too. He recovered in no time and was able to make all of the convention and even lift a few (LOTS) of boxes during the move!

The Big Move

Our lives have also been a little hectic lately with our big move that we just made. We recently spent a lot of time in prayer trying to figure out exactly where we needed to be. This has been a very bitter-sweet time for us. Muleshoe was home for four years and it is such an incredibly special place to us. It was the place where we started our marriage (we had only been married seven months when we moved there). It was also the first home to both of our boys. We had such an amazing group of friends and a church family that we loved so much.
We made the decision to move shortly after Jonathan was born. After a couple of stressful months of resumes, interviewing, travelling (A LOT!), selling a house, buying a house, packing, moving eight hours down the road and well--getting unpacked (what a process), we have now landed in Killeen, TX.
Many of you have asked us where in the world Killeen is. It is a little less than an hour north of Austin and two hours south of Dallas in the heart of Central Texas. It is about the size of Abilene and has all of the conveniences of a larger city, without being too big. It is best known for Fort Hood, a HUGE army post set in and around the city. Everyone here is military, or so it seems. We have met four of the neighbors on our street, all of which their spouses are currently deployed. It is very different than any place either of us have lived.
We are still fervently trying to find a church home and have visited several places so far, one of which may be the one.
Please be in prayer that we are able to adjust to our new area, find a good church and make good friends. It's a little hard not knowing anyone, yet. I seem to be burning up a lot of cell phone minutes to Muleshoe!!

The attached photo is of our little family on moving day, leaving our sweet home in Muleshoe. We had just shut the door the final time and realized it wasn't our home anymore.

The new kid on the block!

Well, if you are reading this blog, than you are probably aware that our family got a little bigger back in February. We wanted to give Jonathan a proper introduction on the blog!

Jonathan Miles Dominguez was born February 21, 2007 at Covenant Lakeside Hospital in Lubbock, Texas. He weighed in at 9 pounds 3 ounces and was 22 3/4 inches long.

Since his arrival, he has been such a blessing to our family. In the last couple of months, his little personality has just blossomed and he is such a delight to us all.

Benjamin is enjoying the "big brother" thing. He likes to talk to Jonathan a lot, and even helps feed him with mommy's help. He is not very fond of the times he hears his brother cry, he will quickly let us know "Jon-Jon is cwying--fix him his bottle." He also likes the addition of all of the fun baby toys around the house. Little does he know, he was playing with those same toys just a couple of years ago!

Jonathan is now five months old and continues to light up our lives daily!!

Here we go...again!!

We thought we would try to be better about blogging this go around! Now that we have another child and have moved, we told ourselves we would sincerely try harder to update more often! Part of my frustration with blogging before had to do with having a slower dial-up connection. But, in the new house, we have a faster connection, so hopefully this will go much better!

Here we go!