FEBRUARY, MARCH, APRIL - THE CLIFF NOTES

I haven't felt much like blogging lately. Cancer has been touching our lives a bit. At the end of January we lost Uncle Allan, Aunt Kathy's husband, to brain cancer. He was diagnosed just before Thanksgiving, preventing them from coming to San Francisco to meet Keenan and be part of the family reunion. We miss you, Uncle Allan.

Granny Ernestine had some skin cancer on her face, but the Mohs surgery went quite well and she looks great!

I had some elevated blood work numbers and weird symptoms, but a CT scan didn't show any tumors, so I'm doing fine. Thank you, God! Maybe it was one or more of the viruses that seem to be plaguing the family, but it was a sobering reminder that life is precious.

This week I read an obituary for a friend in Seattle. She was diagnosed with Stage IV colon cancer after we moved to California. She had four small children.

I celebrated my 43rd birthday this year with my husband of 19 years and our two children, in our new family friendly house. It was awesome! I am reminded that this was the last birthday my brother Michael celebrated, with two small sons, and I am ever thankful to be cancer free. My nightly prayer is of thanks to God that I am a mama.

Medical stuff aside, the children are a daily delight and a great deal of entertainment. Keenan is 8 months old and walking a little bit and talking a little, too. Everything about this little person is impressive.

His physique has gone from the 5th percentile in months 1, 2, and 3 to the 75th percentile in month 6. It's the barrel chest and powerpacked quads and glutes. He is a Brick House! Not fat, just stout and coiled to spring.

He's been able to stand since birth, holding onto our fingers, but at 7 months he started pulling himself up to standing the middle of the floor, then doing squats - one! two! three! - up, down, up down, up down. Coach Hoyt tried to follow Keenan's workout, and couldn't keep up. This baby is a stud!

He has taken a step or two, but now he drops down on his hands and bear crawls to where ever he needs to go. No knees for this crawler - he uses his hands and toes. So now, if I leave the room, I hear him huffing and puffing and beatboxing down the hall after me, with an unmistakeable look of satisfaction.

Our little he-man can also say a few words: Mama, Dada, bottle (not ba-ba), bath, and hi. I swear he said diaper today on the changing table. Maybe he has some other words - he sure does talk a lot with the most adorable, upbeat inflection in his voice - but I tend to only give credit for true English words, not baby versions of words. Whatever the case, he's a very happy, chatty guy.

Vanessa is developing her vocabulary, too. This week she was using the word "approaching" in verious ways with me and Daddio. We both found that... curious. Not sure where that one came from. "Milo is approaching me to smell my food," she'd complain. Okay. She is trying to write her letters and loves to use a knife to cut things. She can do addition and subtraction up to around five or six, not on paper, in her head. We think she knows the alphabet and her numbers, but we aren't quizzing her on anything and we're not pushing her. She seems to dabble with concepts for awhile, then WHOOSH! master them all at once. Interesting kid.

Since we moved into this new house February 1st, we've been busy unpacking and getting settled. We lost our water for two days (eek!), discovered termites, hung curtains, moved furniture, seeded the lawn and repaired the sprinkler system. (See friends Jennifer and AJ in this photo, taken the weekend we moved in.)

We have also blown a lot of noses and hosted many guests, including "Auntie" Sarah, Cousin Sarah and Katsu, Granny Ernestine, Uncle Jimmy and Auntie Susan, And our French student Fleur and her family, who came through on their spring vacation in the American West. We hope to host Keenan's mother Nicole and sister Zoey this month.

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It takes me hours to write the blog, so instead I've been posting pictures on Facebook, which I can do one-handed in just minutes. See more pics there!