Happy New Year!!!

2008... crazy. I can't believe how fast time is flying by. Here's a quick update on us:

Jordan is now a big 10 year old, we begin 5th grade this month (ack!), his assessment in November went better than anticipated... he improved in every subject and was a couple years head of schedule (whew!). Now comes the hard part, for some reason I feel like FIFTH grade is a biggie, a changing point of sorts. I'm kinda scared. ;o)

Katie will be tested this upcoming November along with Jordan... she is my challenge and will be a true test of me as a teacher. That scares me more. She begins 3rd grade this month and will be turning 8 in March. She is praying desperately for a baby girl this summer.

Joshua, he is my Eeyore. He turns FIVE this March and has grand plans for his b-day... which will result in him complaining about why we couldn't rent the entire museum for his b-day and why didn't he get (insert any specific toy here). It's the most bizarre thing, here's a small example of his moodiness... we go to Jack in the Box for dinner, the kids get the new National Geographic underwater sea creature toy. Everyone is happy. Josh, while watching a movie later, absentmindedly bites his toy a few too many times and there's marks on it. He then decides he does not want the marked toy and tries to switch it with Katie's. Kaitlyn is not having it. He then proceeds to fall apart crying about why doesn't he ever get anything cool??? At that point he realizes he is hungry (he barely ate any dinner because he wanted the sea creature and so falsified claims about being FULL)... now he is complaining about why I don't feed him any food??? Good grief. It's so insane that it's funny... but don't EVER laugh in front of him, that will trigger another fit. ;o) Oh I forgot, we begin Kindergarten for him this month. He is very excited about learning how to read... but doesn't want to use the ABC's to do it.

Ryan, he turns 3 in a month. He is my happy mischief maker... all.the.time. He wanders around smiling and doing bad things. He is too cute to really get too angry with, but after he has marked up the walls, the carpets, torn off the drapes in the living room, ate 4 fruit snack packages without permission, took off with my coffee, threw Jordan's camera across the room while laughing, and emptied out a bag of cheerios on the floor... well, the cuteness really isn't that cute anymore. LOL!

As for the littlest Taylor... he/she is growing right along. I'm about 10.3 weeks and the morning sickness is beginning to taper off a bit. I saw the midwife on Dec. 27th and while we could not lock in on the heart beat, we did hear baby moving all over the place. I go back in Jan. 24th and should hear the heart beat then. We will be peeking as soon as possible (usually around 20 weeks to find out the gender), we will need to prepare Katie and let her have time to adjust if this is another boy. I will let all of you know when we find out.

Mike and I are doing well... plugging along trying to keep up with the kiddos. My leg is doing pretty well, no major complaints. We are hoping to get a lot done this new year. Mike has hopes of finishing up the basement and I'm merely hoping to get back to myself 100% and to get the homeschooling rolling along... and to prepare for the newest member.

More later as I get some time to write.