Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone! Here are some pictures of Vince in front of his first Christmas tree - not our tree but Uncle Mark & Aunt Mindy's. Thankfully they also stayed local this Christmas so we were able to all get together for some Christmas fun with family!

Our little elf (9 1/2 weeks old)...

Joys of home ownership

Turns out it was a blessing in disguise that our flights were cancelled this week. Monday morning Brian sat down at the computer desk to check our flight status and felt some water under his feet. Upon inspection we found more and more wet spots so we moved furniture out of the way and started pulling up carpet. This is what we found.

It's dripping in from the roof into the wall and then is seeping in at the floor. We don't see any wall or ceiling damage so it's just coming in through the floor - for now at least. Now all the carpet is pulled up in Vince's room. The water is leaking in the entire length of the wall from the window to the closet. We talked to the neighbors and found out they're experiencing the same thing. Out of the 25 townhomes in our community, we know of 8 having these issues. I'm sure when people get home from their vacations the list will be longer. Thankfully we were here to move furniture out of the way! It would be terrible to come home to so much damage!

We next found water dripping from the heat vent in the living room ceiling. It's hard to see but there are 5 drips from the vent.

This is one evening worth of accumulation. A contractor was here yesterday to break away the ice dams which are apparently causing all the problems (actually as Brian keeps telling everyone, it's not the ice dams but the holes in the roof that are the problem) so hopefully all the drips will slow down and/or stop.

This is the floor in our bedroom which is right above the living room vent. We did find some water starting to accumulate in here as well but it doesn't feel as wet as Vince's room so we haven't pulled up the carpet yet. We definitely are monitoring the migration of wet carpet though! We'll keep you posted.

All this, and a million calls to State Farm, and we still haven't heard from the adjuster to get the green light to start getting this all fixed! Hope all is well everywhere else and we'll keep you posted on our latest adventure...

Snowed in...

Our flight was cancelled for today due to the crazy weather Portland is getting so we're at home making the best of being snowed/iced into our house. We got 8 in. yesterday plus freezing rain last night and it has started snowing again! Hopefully it'll hurry and melt so we can make our flight tomorrow! Here are some pictures from our house.

The snow and ice were too much for the bush outside our front door!

Brian took Vince out to play with his first snowball! This was before the freezing rain.

Some professional shots...

Last Friday we had Vince's pictures taken by a photographer that goes to our church. They turned out AMAZING!! I love them all (of course!) and can't wait to share them with you! Favorites are posted on his blog, check out his blog entry for Dec 15 at http://www.curtisleefarmer.blogspot.com/. There are a few of Brian & I too (not on his blog) that I will include on my blog once I get our copies.

Our family

Our first official family pic with Vince. I finally read the book and learned how to use the timer on my camera so we were able to get a good shot at home. We have so few pictures of us together that actually look ok (both looking at the camera, both smiling, etc) we'll have to do it more often!

I also had my 6-week appt today (post c-section appt) and had Vince weighed while we were there. He's at 9 lbs 13 oz!! That's 2 lbs in just under 3 weeks! Good job Vince!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving from Vince!

Vince's Great Grandparents stopped by for a visit and to meet him. Here is our first 4-generation picture: Great Grandma Juanita, Great Grandpa Jim, Grandpa Terry, Mommy & Vince.

Here's the complete 4-generation pic: Great Grandma & Grandpa, Grandma & Grandpa, Mommy & Daddy, and Vince.

Great Grandma and Vince.

Aunt Angela and cousin Kelsey came for a visit too.

At one point while Aunt Jenny was holding him, Vince grabbed her hair and wasn't about to let go - he's got a really strong grip! I love how innocently but intently he's looking at her while yanking on her hair.

Go Blue!

Brian's coworkers got Vince a bunch of cool U of Michigan stuff, part of which was this pacifier that he got to try out while watching a recent football game with his daddy. Hopefully this will be a new good luck charm for the Wolverines!