We're 26.

Our friends son Andrew. He's 5 months younger, and just as tall.

Carter pretending to share. Don't worry, he'll take it back.

It tok one day for Carter to learn to drink from a straw, once he knew what was on the other end. I did bribe him with juice and chocolate milk. Which I give him once a day now for his afternoon snack, since the doctor said he needs to be fattened up a little. He's only like 10% for weight now that he's so active. But he loves his fruits and veggies, and rarely eats fatty things, he just doens't like them as well. Well.....Mac N Cheese I guess is his favorite.

Carter eatting a twissler. That's his favorite blanky too. "Taggy"

Carter also started to want to sleep with the white polar bear. He is very sweet when he give his loves.

That's right. Chris and I both just had birthdays. There was no big party or anything, so don't worry no one missed out on an invite. We had some friends visit from Midland, and we did get to go out and eat dinner at Boston's Pizza. We also played games, and went to a Superbowl party. (Speaking of, I know I am not the best speller, and I mistype many things, but I was reading on MSN, and someone posted about their Super BOWEL party.........really......that's funny.)

Anywho. Here are some pics of the past week or so. Carter has gotten to try candy, becuase Daddy got a lot for his birthday.

Carter has also been waking up again in the middle of the night since friday, so 4 nights now, he isn't happy at all. In fact, he is SCREAMING, down right LOUD. I try to give him a minute to calm down, but he just gets more worked up. Last night I gave him tylenol and he fell right asleep for the rest of the night. I can't figure out what's going on. He has been off his night time schedule for the weekend, but could teething be causeing that much pain? Molars? When do tose come? But for 4 days now.....I just can't figure it out, and it's always at 3am. It must be when he stirres a little. It's really weighting on me, and I am becoming more and more tired as the days go on.

Baby Chase on the other hand is doing well. Friday I have my glucose test. I feel Chase much more than I ever felt Carter, but he isn't a puncher, he just wiggels a lot. He seems calm, but consistantly moving. (Especially after 3am, when I go check on Carter from his screaming, Chae seems to think it's funny to keep mommy up for another 30 minutes or so. Those two boys, I tell you, I will need to get my running shoes on once they team up.)

Busy Busy

This past week and weekend was so busy for us. First of all, I made a mistake of washing Carter's "taggy" blanket when he was going to take a nap. That's why He ended up being rocked and help for his whole nap. He just would not calm down without it....kinda cute how much he likes that thing. Koda found something to cuddel with too.
Chris and I try to get out as a family every weekend to do something just us. We were so busy, we just went down to the park for a while. Carter thought the swing was the best thing ever. He was laughing and laughing.
Chris and I went to a 27th birthday party downtown Fort Worth at Razoo's for our friend Michael. A bunch of other friends from church were there too. It was great cajuin food. I even tried aligator. (it wasn't bad, it tasted like chicken, really. But the spices were definitly Louisiana hot.) .
Carter also finally got a new dresser, Chris and I have been hunting for a nice cherry wood dresser for months. I finally found one, at walmart.com of all places. Chris' dad and mom and I put it all together quickly, with kids running around, and it looks great.
Chris and I were invited to a rodeo too. It was a lot of fun. I guess I am REALLY allergic to horses though. Dispite my allergies it was fun, and funny. The rodeo clowns and announcer were making all kinds of jokes about Tiger Woods, Dallas, and the fact the most of the roapers were missing the calf, and not very good that night.
The more I started thinking about a rodeo I thought.....WHO WOULD COME UP WITH THIS STUFF...... BOYS. What kind of a board cowboy tells his buddy, hey, guess what I did. I made a bull real mad by tying up his "boy parts" and I rode him to see how long I could hold on. Wanna try? Thus: Bull Riding. funny. Boys will always be Boys I guess. None the less, I had a good time.

Carter "bye bye bye"

Many of you might remember the backstreet boys singing "bye bye bye" Well, I truly don't know where Carter got this, but I noticed him playing with one of his toys, that I just got out again after a month. He would lift open a part of it, and it would play a little tune, and he would use his left hand to cross his body in a bye bye bye motion. It was the funiest thing. It has transformed a little to more of a hand toss across the body, but man is it funny. He will listen to music and "drop it like it's hot" He just sqats down. It's so weird where they get this stuff. He likes to also spin in circles with a hoola-hoop. (I am not claming to have one.....but he found it somewhere.) Kids really do love to make people laugh. He loves to make me laugh.

Dale and Cindy Visit Texas

At Kobeya's for dinner

In the dressing room

Mom and dad at dinner

at Target

grandma rocking Carter

I have to make a quick state before I talk about my mom and dad's visit. If you read this, pretend you didn't, or don't tell my mom you saw the pictures. She's going to kill me. She told me specificaly not to post the last photo, but I thought it was a good picture.

My mom and dad were here for a short weekend, but it feels like we did so much. We went shopping. My mom and I did a LOT of shopping. It was great. We went to church, which my mom and dad got to go with Chris' parents, so they met some adults their age....maybe a little bit younger. We ate out. (Carter playing with chop sticks), we tried on lots of clothes, went to Target a few times, and my mom and dad bought us way too much stuff. But it was all so appreciated.

They flew Southwest this time, instead of DFW's American. Chris and I are starting to think about switching our loyalties to Southwest. It's in Dallas, so it's a little farther, but no cost for bags, which with one kid and one on the way, we really have to think about that. To portland we would fly a 737 not an MD-80, which I am tired of flying in. And it seems southwest always has $99 specials. I just hate driving in Dallas.

Anyway, I loved having my mom and dad here. Carter loved it too. I can't wait to see them again soon. Much love.

Thanks Again

I was cleaning my house today after I got ready, and it occured to me how many things in our home that we use everyday were gifts. We appreciate everything we've ever been given. Please don't think we forgot about you.

When I get ready in the morning I always appreciate my Grandma Cook, for the hairdryer.
When we go to sleep at night I always think about Chris' grandma Marxer, for the quilt on our bed, that we have needed so bad the last few weeks.
For books I read to Carter that were from my grandma and grandpa Stuewe, or quilts made for Carter.
When I cook I ALWAYS think of my aunt Tina, so I don't get burned using those pot holders I look forward to every year.
When Carter gets takes a bath, for my aunt and uncle Doug and Tracy for the bath toys carter loves.
When I see a clean sink I think about my mom, and how she would love to see that I am turing out to be so much like her, and I LOVE IT.
When I vacume I ALWAYS think about Chris' folks, for a great gift. I have never seen so much get sucked up from a vacume, and I love feeling clean.
When I use my knives, I think about my parents neighbors for the wedding gift, or the spices, or kitchen things. So many wonderful gifts.
Picture frames from friends and family (I still have a picture my cousin Carmen developed herself of the three cousins snowbaording at Bachlor)
Our dresser matches our great friends, which it reminds me of them often. Carter had the same crib as another friend, and I think about her and her son.

We love and thank you all again. I know I have missed so many people, for the things you have given us, but we do remember. We love you and thank you.
Not for the things you have given us, but the thoughts, love and prayer that came with them. We think and pray for you every time we are reminded of you. If you didn't know what an impression you made on us, YOU DID. We love you. Thank you again.

Chase Vincent Knapp

Carter is going to have a little brother in May sometime. I am due May 29th, but feeling more like May 20th-ish.

We are very exited to have another Boy. His name will be Chase Vincent Knapp

Chase, because we really like it

Vincent, becuase it's my dad's middle name. Carter got his middle name from Chris' family, so we wanted Chase to have a middle name from my family.

The measurements looked great, the doctor said.

Thank you

Jolene

Carter's Growing So Fast, and being Sick

Carter 1 year
Carter newborn

Becuase of the heckticness of Christmas, New Years, Carter being sick, now me super sick. I just haven't realy gotten the chance to talk about Cartr turning 1.

It's been 3 weeks now since Carter turned 1. WOW time goes by SOOOOOO fast. It's also been 3 weeks since Carter's real bad diaper rash. (Still just a little hint of it left, it looks like a bruise, but no bleeding for about 5 days now. Praise the Lord. ) Carter still has a respatory thing, but he's getting better daily. This cold weather isn't helping him much at all. We have a humidifier in his room that I think helped him a lot. On Monday I started to feel a little yucky too, but Wed. I had Carter's sickness full on. Coughing, sneezing, runny nose, headache. Last night my lungs hurt so bad we bought another humidifier for our room too, yes, another frog one like Carter's, that way we have 2 the same for both our kids. I don't know what I would have done without that. It was only 9*F this morning when we woke up, the air was so dry I thought my lungs were bleeding, and i could barely breath, I am afraid that I am getting bronchitis, or phnemonia (sp....public school child my dad always says.) Good news, I called by OB, as far as me being sick, poses no real threat to the baby. I just am so limited on what I can take for easying the congestion. Carter is too, since he's only 1.

Anyway enough about that.

Carter:

To this day, I don't know how anyone can see a child, and not know that God created them. I have NEVER knows a love like being a mom. Seeing Carter gives me a lot more understanding of how much God loves us. I was guilt of this too, but I know people who don't have kids say, "I know I'll love my kids so much", and you will....but you have NO IDEA...NONE. How much is So Much. The day Carter was born I thought I could never love him more, and everyday I do.

Carter has taught me so much, what it means to have fun, love life, learn. Talk about learning. Chris and I were saying that in a matter of 6 months Carter went from 100% nursing and not moving around at all to, sitting, crawling, walking, eating anything and trying to talk and understnad. that's learning. We were going over our goals for the year and what we can accomplish in one year, we are ever motivated by all that Carter accomplished that we have high expectations this year. But if you work on something everyday, like Carter has, it's easy.

It's been almost 1 year since I quit my job too. (my out of the hosue job) I know there are some people who wait to have kids till they are finished with school, or find the "right" job, or get established in their career, or travel, but you know what. I was one who thought like that too a little at one point or another. But there is NOTHING more fun, rewarding, accomplished than holding your baby. I would give up travels forever, money, a good job, or anything to hold my baby for just one day. Being a mom is more satisfying than anything.

At 1 year Carter is saying, (in his own way): Carter, mama, dada, yum-yum, cho milk, (yea I have given him chocolate milk, call me a bad mom, when you're baby is so sick like he was, you'll give him something yummy too.), water, duck, block, cat, dog, Koda, frog, ut-oh, help, grandma and grandpa, and more that i am sure I don't understand. He loves to pull the yogert out of the fridge, I think he must really like it. He knows our house so well. If I say grandma is going potty, he'll go to the bathroom door and pound on it. If I say let's go to Carter's room, he goes to his room. I tell him I am going to mommy and daddy's room, he practically beats me there. He's so fast now. He isn't really walking anymore, it's more or a sprint. I have steped on him, becuase I didn't see him right behind me. He eats well, breakfast is his best meal of the day. He loves grown up oat meal, yogert and bananas, mac N cheese, spagetteO's, peas, sweet potatos, corn, green beans, kiwi, cho strawberries, grapefruit, rice, chicken nuggets and lots more. He can stack blocks, cups, throw balls, get almost any toy I tell him to (he knows what they are called), He likes to play with his sports balls more than anything. He still has only 5 teeth, his hair is almost blond, blue eyes, the occational bruise here and there. He can point out toes, eyes, hand, nose and we are working on belly button, (he can show you yours but don't understnd he has one.), when his diaper rash was real bad we gave him lots of naked time and he found something else......he kept checking on it to see if it was following him. It was funny.

He still sleeps great. We are still on two naps a day, but I can tell sometimes the first nap is super short, so we might be moving to one nap soon. While he's been sick, 2 naps still work good.

I am 20 weeks pregnant today. I find out next wed what we are having. I can't wait. We do already have our names all picked out. We will reveal the name when we find out if it's a boy or girl. There are times I forget I am even pregnant. I think it's because I have a little "tornado" I am chasing all day long. I lost 5 pounds at my last doc's appointment, so I haven't felt guilty about those chocolat covered strawberries lately.

Birthday, Christmas, and More

Sorry for the lack of posts. I have been hunting down old photos for weeks it seems like. I lost everything. So I was trying to go all the way back to college. I don't even have pictures of my college roommates, friends, classes, my old house, it's kinda sad. But then on Carter's birthday he started to act sick, of course right.....!?!?! He had real bad diareha (he won't care about me telling you that yet, he's only 1) Due to taht, he got a diaper rash soooooo bad, it covered his wole bottom, red, oozzzy, and bleeding, we don't even wipe him, we just give him a bath every diaper change. He is actually better health wise, but we are still getting rid of the last bit of rash. It really it so hard to hear him just SCREAM in pain every time we have to change his diaper. We have been giving him lots of naked time, as much as we can. Yes, we do a lot of cleaning.

His birthday was fun. He gets a little unsure when there's a lot of ppl watching him. He doesn't love the attention yet. In small groups he does, but not larger ones. There were about 10 ppl at his party. I got a glace at what it will be like in years to come, fighting for time with the Christmas parties. We will have to think of a solution for that. He got great things, he loves the balls, blocks and slide. We didn't get any annoying toys, you mom's know......the ones without an off switch.

Christmas was fun. It snowed about 4 inches here on Christmas eve......wierd. It was so windy and cold, Carter was still sick, and that bummy was soooooo red we didn't even make it to Christmas eve service, but we opened gifts with My dad, Chris' parents, and the three of us. Once Carter was all diaper creamed up and in bed, we played some games taht we got for Christmas, Scrabble, Wits and Wages (very fun) and Chris and I stayed up half the night playing our new Wii.....(cool huh, we didn't even ask for one, and yet, we love it....Chris' Wii age is 36, mine is 46 (I am pregnant), hey it's alot better than last week, I was 77)

Christmas day, CHris went to get gas and test the roads for ice, it was safe enough he said for us to drive to plano. So my dad, Carter, Chris and i all laoded up in the cold, and drove to Frisco/Plano. (about 1 hour NE. by IKEA) We enjoyed the day with (as my dad says it) The elder Stuewe clan. It was great to be around family, and meet some I have never met before, or it's been ages. Suzzie (my dad's aunt, who's home we visited) she is just a remarkable hostess. She had all the fod made, table set, snacks out, a place for coats, and never once did I see her "working" she was mingeling just like us. She was so great. It was great to listen to stories about what everyone is up to. Most were from elsewhere, so there was much to talk about. The snow was a surprise for us all. It was a great day. We creamed up Carter's booty again, loaded him up and headed home.

I NEED PHOTOS (HELP)

Okay. So we had soooo many computer problems.

• We tried a defrag
• I tried to restore .Net framework 3.5 (3 times)
• I tried a system reboot.
• I ended up doing a system reboot to factory settings
• OOOOOPPPPPPSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!!!!
• I LOST EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!!!
• Chris reinstalled Windows.
• Chris reinstalled Microsoft Office
• Chris had to install FireFox,
• Inorder to get Internet Explorer
• Chris reinstalled lots more programs
• I got my photo software reinstalled today, it did not keep the shadow copy on the c drive, so I LOST ALL MY BABIES PHOTOS.

Luckily I made back up cd's in June of all my pictures. So I have uploaded all those back onto my computer, but from June till now I need pictures.

If you have any picture of Carter from June till December, will you please email them to me at:

joleneknapp@hotmail.com

Thank you.

(I also lost all my documents, so our Christmas letter will not be on time this year.)

Santa

Well still having lots of computer trouble, so these photos are not edited or anything. I am just using the laptop from now on.
We went to see Santa this weekend, during the 3 hour wait, (It was great the way they did it, we got a card to cme back and it reserved our place, so we didn't have to wait, we could walk around.) So we saw fish, trains, Carter rode one of those machines that you put the quarters in. It was a Tigger fishing boat. He didn't want to sit, he wanted to hold the wheel, it was soooo cute. I have a video coming soon.
Carter wasn't scared, or screamed with Santa, but he wasn't really happy to be there either. He did good though. He also LOVED the candy cane he got. He sucked it till it was supper thin, then he chomped little bites very fast. He really liked that. After each bite he would say, "mmmm" On Sunday, Carter helped me make/eat some chocolate covered strawberries too. He really liked that. He of course loved the chocolate, but it ws the first time he ate a strawberry too. I was happy about that.

Walking and No Pictures

Well, Carter has been walking now for a while, but it wasn't until last Monday, DEc. 7th, that he decided, no more crawling. He would rather walk everywhere now. If he falls, he just gets right back up and continues on his way. He's geting supper fast too. I had my bedroom door open for a second and before I knew it, Carter found his way to the pile of pillows at the food of our bed, and threw himself on them. He is just sooooo funny.
He's supper smart too. He started stacking many things, high. He can stack about 5 blocks and the 6th one brings the tower down. He also has one of those toys that you have to match the shape to get it in the bucket. He is really good at putting the circles in the right hole, but the squares and rectangles are hanging him up a little, but he still gets the point of his "game" : get the blocks in the bucket. So once he tries a few times and doesn't get the block in the right hole, he just takes the lid off, and puts it in the bucket and puts the lid back on. He looks at me like, "See, I am smart. Tell me good job and clap." and I do.
He has really started to like our Christmas tree. He touches the bottle braches (it's real). He also loves to hold and shake the presents. It's soooo cute, but I have to stop him from getting tooo courious.

I am sorry I have no pictures from the past week or so. My computer decided to eat up my picture software. I have an icon, but I can't get it to open. Yes, I have tried EVERYTHING. I have spent MANY hours on the phone with IT ppl, and working on fixing things. This weekend, Chris and I are just going to uninstall Windows and reinstall it. We have a problem on the 2.0framework pack1 I think. I already tried to repair the framework packs for windows and it just isn't working. So next step. If that doesn't work. I think my car will run over the computer. then maybe....just maybe, I'll think about looking at a MAC. The only problem is most of the software programs we have need windows to run, so we'd have to have the mac run 1/2 pc, so what's the point right? UUUUGGGG.....computers. Everyone loves them, till there's a problem.