Our pets

Our pets are a HUGE part of this family. With four pets, two cats, and two dogs, our house is not nearly as clean as I would like it to be. I sometimes get embarrassed actually because the walls are a mess due to slobber and eye goop. Hair balls can be spotted under the couch, and other places that I refuse to even look at. Our carpet upstairs has many stains, and if you walk by the designated litter box room you will get whiff of something special. The door frame is scratched up and corners of some window frames seem to be mysteriously missing. Would I trade our pets in for a sparkling clean house? Absolutely NOT! It's a small price to pay for the unconditional LOVE a pet will always give you. We recently found out that Dante our 6 year old boxer has lymphatic cancer. This is the beginning of our hearts breaking. I have been mentally preparing for our cat claude who is 13 yrs old to be the first of our pets to go. NOT DANTE!! I am not ready for this. We got blind sided with this sad news. With Chemotherapy he may get a good two years in, but I am hoping/praying that he will be in the small percentage that beats cancer! He is a strong dog, I know he will fight! Dante is so sweet in nature and hands down the best behaved out of our pets. He slobbers and kisses the most, and just wants to love, love, love! The best part of my day is when I get everyone out for a walk. I love it so much because it makes them so happy! Grady's first word was, "dante". He calls and looks for him in the house when he is not around. He will call out, "dante" as he goes up the stairs to Dante's bed in search for him. THIS is what is going to make this all the more sad. I don't think I can handle this! I am already picturing Grady searching the house for Dante, and he won't be there. OH this hurts so bad. I keep periodically breaking down. How do I stay strong? How do I stay positive! I don't want these thoughts. Ok.........breathe.....breathe.......I have to pull myself together and start focusing on the good things. We caught Diesel on film doing one of his, "spazz outs" which Grady finds absolutely hysterical!

One is fun!

Grady has reached such a fun age! He is becoming more affectionate and giving us hugs/kisses. Well the kisses are kind of scary because it looks like he is going to bite you but then he just presses his face to yours. He is able to learn and repeat things, which is so fun to watch. Finally he responds back to things instead of staring at me like I am one crazy lady. His separation anxiety continues to be an issue but he will out grow it one day. I just hate that others mostly see him as fussy because he is so clingy to mom and dad. Glad I have video now to prove that he is not always serious and cranky. I hope the terrible two's are a horrible myth because I love things the way they are, and just want more of the good stuff! Wishful thinking.

Pumpkin Chuck

What did you do with your pumpkins after Halloween? Did you just throw them out or let them rot? BORING! We chucked ours at a really neat fundraiser event held in Mt. Washington at Stanbery park. Ok busted, we actually never even bought pumpkins this year. However for $2.00 you could catapult your pumpkin, or for $5.00 you could buy one to launch. Or you could have done what we did this year, and just watch everyone else chuck their pumpkins. Not only is this a fun way to get rid of your pumpkins but it also feeds the deer. There was face painting, food, and it was a gorgeous day to be at the park. It was a great way to spend a Saturday, we had so much fun!

The Iphone really can do it all!

The iphone can perform many tech tricks. I was very impressed to see it's latest app called, "Magnetism" When downloaded the app will act as a magnet to your child. I decided to give it a go, and, "Wow it really works!" The second I turned the app on, Grady walked to the iphone. It was the strangest thing. I encourage everyone with iphones to use this app for redirecting their child. Now I don't have to tell Grady, "No" when he is splashing around in the dog bowl. I can just place the iphone where I want him to be and turn on, "Magnetism". Don't worry the app is encoded so only your iphone works with your child. I know you were worried about strangers stealing your tot. Have no fear it is totally safe! Watch how it works, amazing!

Grady Stahl is the new Edward Cullen

Watch out Edward Cullen, there is a new lil vamp in town! Well at least for a night there was a new vamp making the ladies swoon. Oh and by ladies I probably really just mean, "His Mama thought he was adorable!" We are lucky to have friends who have a better neighborhood for trick or treating then we do. For the past couple of years, Mimi and Dave have been having an open house type deal on Halloween. They make chili and people come and go as they please. It is a great way to spend Halloween, we always have so much fun! Their son Oliver dressed as Elmo, it fit him perfectly and was a great costume! Our camera battery was not fully charged so I barely got pics. Perhaps I should just hire our own paparazzi? Wouldn't it be great if you never had to worry about getting pictures? Maybe for special events I will just hire Kim M, to stalk us :). On our way to the Gerwins we stopped off at the new Walmart off Redbank and picked up a wagon to pull our lil vamp in. It was one of the best decisions we ever made! He absolutely loved riding around town in a fun red wagon! Grady did not get the concept of free candy at first but by the last house he caught on. He tried his first sucker which he did not enjoy all that much, probably because it was root beer flavored. Ooops should have given him a better flavor to try. Although we don't really want him to like it anyway because that means more for us! Not sure how many more years we can get away with eating all his candy, this might have been the last one. Grady, "candy is gross." I just spit out the mini snickers bar you gave me because it was disgusting. I will have to continue to see how yucky it is before you eat it. It is for your own good, I promise.

Baby Steps

Grady is officially taking baby steps! He is not all out walking yet....but it won't be long. Really need to run out and buy that flip camera so I actually have a way of sharing videos! He is surprising us daily with things that he has learned. It is so neat when all of a sudden he does something new. He is using the signs to communicate, however they are not always in context. We have to decipher when he really means milk and when he just wants something. I am glad the tedious work of trying to teach them to him are finally starting to pay off. I will continue my efforts as it is neat to see him signing! He also has taken a break from saying dada and says, "Momma!" YAY! It made my morning when I heard him saying, "Momma" over the monitor! Chris is still the favorite but at least he is throwing a little love my way now. I'm sure for the rest of his life he will go through phases of liking one of us over the other. Then there will be times when he hates and loves us both equally :). As long as he knows we will always love him!

Where's the pumpkin patch?

QUIZ: How well do you know the Stahls? There is one false statement in this post, can you identify it?

We went to Gorman Heritage Farms over the weekend in the hopes to wander through a pumpkin patch field. First we stopped at Starbucks so I could get into the spirit of things with a pumpkin spiced latte, yum. Then we sang pumpkin songs for the duration of the car ride there. Once we got to the farm we immediately took a nice little hayride to the top of the hill. The first thing we saw was a beautiful sunflower field! It was so pretty. Across from the field were cows, moo. Grady can pick out the cow among his toys, but I wonder if he realized that he was looking at real live cows? Further down the path we got to see goats, chickens, and mules. I learned that goats say, "naaah", and not "baaah" like sheep. For some reason I completely forgot what noise a goat makes. I have been struggling when I get to the goat in Grady's book. I knew it was similar to the noise a sheep makes so I just kept saying, "baaah" for the goat. Poor Grady I hope he will not be confused. He was a little timid around the goats because of the incident at the Farmer and the Dell a few months back. I am still not sure what happened exactly but he really freaked out around the goats at that event. After seeing all of the flowers and animals we began to wonder where the pumpkin patch was. Every corner we turned I kept expecting to see a nice big field of pumpkins. However the path just curved around and took us to a cute little children's garden and a pile of already picked pumpkins. WHAT??! There was no actual pumpkin patch? I was very confused by this and a little disappointed but we had a nice little outing none the less. The colors were so pretty and we had so much fun meandering all over the farm. It really got me in the mood to start enjoying fall.