K. Family Reunion

One of the reasons Joey and I were so excited to be at my parent's house for the summer was because they were hosting a family reunion at their house!  I love the K. reunions.  My family has spread out all over the country and the world.  3/4 of my family has served in the military.  Every single branch is represented by my family.  Unfortunately, we never have every single K. at these reunions due to deployments, along with other things.  Therefore, it's nice to go to the reunions because you never know who you'll see and when you may see them again.  

We had 60 people, yes, 60, at my parent's house for 5 days!  Most of the family actually camped on the property.  This was also when North Carolina was breaking some heat records.  Oh, did I mention that my parent's A/C is going out, aka. doesn't really work that well?  Yeah, fun times.   

This heat did not bring us down, especially not Joey.  He had a blast!  So many new people to play with!   

Every morning, Joey woke up and yelled for "Kids, kids!".  He was in kid heaven!  I think he lived in a swimsuit during this week.   

We had two birthdays to celebrate during the reunion...one of them NOT being Joeys.  However, he did not want to hear any of that nonsense.  Notice how he is helping out his second cousin blow out her candles.  I'm thinking that we will only have one celebration for birthday number 3.  

It was a great reunion and so good to see a lot of our family.  It was really cool to see all the young kids bond up like I did with my cousins when I was their age.  *Insert the 'Circle of Life' song here*  Wow.  I watch way too many kid movies now.  

Summer

Joey has been in little boy heaven here in North Carolina.  I'll discuss more of this later, but for now, here's a sneak peek of some of our time here.

Even though we're in a new place, I have been trying to stay on top of Joey's discipline and "life training".  This has been a little hard with all of the family members that want to spoil Joey rotten, but most have been really great about abiding by Michael and my's rules.  Joey has been sure to show me how annoyed he is with my rule enforcement even though we're on one big vacation!  

I do think it has been incredibly great for Joey to be around so many people at this time in his development.  His language skills have increased 100%!  It seems like he is literally saying 20 new words a day, and forming sentences!  It is so crazy that he was just starting to put words together when we arrived here, and now he's making whole statements or requests!  Now, we just need to work on the whiney voice he has, unfortunately, developed! 

  We have been attending story time at the local library.  This has been really nice and makes me realize how much Joey loves being around other kiddos.  He's been able to spend some time with his cousins, too!  He loves Emma and Evan and repeats their names over and over and over when he has to leave them.  

Luckily, my parents have a pool so we've been trying to take full advantage of it!  We have this super sweet life vest for Joey, as well as swimmies.  Joey doesn't seem too interested in wearing these items, unless we force him which then turns into tantrums.  Oh well, the safety of the child comes before a parent's sanity, right?  

Joey and I have been trying to keep up with all of our friends back home, but it has been hard since we have so many distractions!  We do miss them all and can't wait to see them when we get back.  

Joey also has a permanent photographer, aka. my mother, photographing him all of the time!  This has made Joey's head get very large. There's going to be no living with this kid after this summer!

North Carolina Road Trip

We started our second long road trip of Joey's little life right after our family visit.   This kid just turned two and already has done two cross country trips!  What an overachiever!  

We left Southern California on a Sunday afternoon and arrived in North Carolina Friday afternoon.  Whew! We were all very happy on that first day!  The road trip had finally arrived!

 We took Interstate 8 to the 10 to 85.  This route took us through California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina!

My fam thought the desert was pretty, but none of us were big fans of it.  Glad we got to see it, but okay if we never see it again!  Ha! 

Plus, it was 105 degrees!  What.  The.  Hell.   

 

Meemee and I took turns driving, while Grandpa entertained Joey or kept the driver company.

Joey was pretty stoked about having an entire entourage to cater to his every need.  

We tried to drive about eight hours a day, at least at the beginning.  This really wasn't too much driving time, but for an 8-month prego and toddler, eight hours was a plenty!

We did some night driving, but not too much.  Some nights Joey did not go to sleep until 1 AM!  This was due to time changes, and someone sneaking A LOT of grandpa's sweet tea!  FYI, no more sweet tea for Joey...we learned our lesson.  

We did try to give Joey some down time before and after the day's drive.  An exercised kid is a good riding kid!  Joey loved one of the hotel's pool.  He even tried to imitate his mommy by holding his nose!

One thing we had to do at every hotel was unplug the room telephone as soon as we entered the room!  Someone liked to make phone calls that we didn't want to have to pay for! 

Some days Joey napped in the car, and other days, he did not.  My favorite days were nap days!   

Joey actually slept with me one night.  He hasn't slept with me since he was a few months old.  It was nice to snuggle with him all night, but I forgot how little sleep I actually get when he's in bed with me!  We made sure to set up his play pen the rest of the trip.   

Joey loved to run down the hotel hallways trying to reach the elevators, room, outside doors, or wherever first!

Even though Daddy couldn't be with us in person, we had his substitute stand in!   

The biggest surprise on our trip was Gulfport, Mississippi.  This beaches were absolutely beautiful.  This was an unexpected stop, but we were all so glad that we made the stop.

Oh, did I mention that both my parents, Joey, and I with four months worth of stuff all rode in my Prius!  Talk about tiii-ght!!

By the end of our trip, our driving hours/days were much shorter.  At one point, we were only three hours from our final destination.  However, I protested driving any further because my feet were so swollen and I was tired of being so confined!  Crazy how much attitudes can change with extra hormones and age!

On the last day, we decided to stop at the Greenville Zoo in South Carolina as a final treat. 

We had planned on stopping a little more than we did on this trip, but 6 days in a small little car was a bit more taxing than we all had imagined.   

Our main sightseeing stops were New Orleans and Gulfport and Greenville.   

Even though most of the trip was pretty good and smooth, we all were ready to cry by the end!  Joey and I are so happy to be at our summer home!

Help Has Arrived

The time finally came, and help arrived!

My family arrived at our house around May 18th and I let out the biggest sigh of relief!  I would finally have daily adult companionship and some parenting help!  

My family only spent a few days in our Cali home before we headed east.  

Before we started our big road trip, we celebrated my sister's 30th birthday, hence Joey's cake face!

Had a cookout with our cousins that came down from the San Fran area and our other cousins that are getting ready to move to Hawaii!

We played at the beach on a really rare warm May day.   

Joey had a great time with all of this extra attention he was receiving!  Center of every one's attention=every toddler's dream!

We're hoping that our family will come to Cali again so we can really show them the area.  However, Joey and I were ready to leave our west coast home to start our summer in our east coast home!   

Carolina On My Mind

So, I seriously suck...again.  First, I haven't posted in for-ev-er!  We were in North Carolina visiting, then I wasn't taking pictures, then we got back to California, and then we didn't have Internet...  I know, lots of excuses.  Second, I haven't taken many photos.  When I see someone else taking photos, I guess I get lazy.  Both grandmas took tons of photos while we were in NC, so I didn't even bother to pull out my camera.  The problem with this is that I don't have any pictures for this blog.  Ugh!  So, Nana and Meemee, if you want to send my your photos, I would really appreciate it!  ;) 

Our trip in NC was great.  We got to see almost every close friend and family member.  We had lots of down time.  Joey got lots and lots of Q.T. time with the fam.  Michael and I got some adult time (aka. Joey stayed with the grandparents!).  We each gained 10 lbs from all of the great southern FRIED food!  (UGH!  Paying for that one now!) 

However, I did manage to take a few pics while we were gallivanting in the Southeast. 

Nana and Joey doing a little shopping.  Yes, I know I shouldn't let my son stand up in a shopping cart, but this was on the way out to the car, he's in the big part of the cart, and we were going super slow.  Stop judging.  ;) 

Joey hanging out with his cousins, Emma and Evan.  We really miss getting to hang out with them.  We had so much fun with Emma and Evan and can't wait until we get to see them again.  We really think that Aunt Leanne should bring them to California so we can go to Disneyland.  Hint, hint!  :) 

Michael and I were able to slip away a few times to get some alone time.  One of those times we headed up to Raleigh to watch a North Carolina State football game.  We got to see a bunch of our good friends and just relive some good ol' pre-baby days.  I would never trade Joey for anything, but it is good to have some pre-baby reenactments every once in awhile. 

Aunt Leanne and Uncle Robert also took us to Monkey Joe's, a warehouse full of bouncy houses!  Joey loved it!  He was actually quite annoyed when we tried to leave.  However, he did fall asleep within 10 minutes of leaving.  We may have to find some bouncy houses at our new home! 

Joey got so spoiled hanging out with family for 18 days!  It's been super hard to break him of some of the habits he picked up in the NC. 

Joey was such a trooper dealing with the 45-days of constant changes we put upon him!  He got fussy sometimes, but overall, he did incredibly well!

 

Thank you to all of our North Carolina friends and family for all of your hospitality.  We truly do miss and love all of you!