Ears

We have apparently determined where Joe's Yoda ears come from. My Mom recently came across this picture of me and said all of a sudden it hit her. He looks nothing like me, but apparently, he has my ears. Poor kid. I never realized my ears were Yoda ears. Guess I should stop poking fun now.....

Joe's First Christmas

Merry Christmas to everyone! I hope your day was warm and happy and healthy!

We had a wonderful Christmas here at Casa Spanos. We had everyone over for our second annual Tex-MeX-mas dinner. Last year we decided that after Thanksgiving we were all turkey and hammed out so we did fajitas for Christmas. It was so good we decided to do it again. It's always so nice to have everyone together. This year Paul's Aunt Marcia joined us as well!

Santa must have thought we were extra good this year and brought us all really nice gifts. Joe had so much fun with the wrapping paper we could have saved a bunch of money on toys! (I knew that going in....). Here are a few pictures of our Christmas Day.

Joe couldn't decide which toy to play with first!

Our three babies! Look how happy they all look!


Hey look! Someone else was finally taking a picture!

Our family's favorite gift of 2009.

Happy New Year to everyone! I wish you all many blessings in 2010.

Birthday Fun

Sorry for two posts in one day. I realized I never actually posted this one last week in all the pre-holiday bustle. You get a double dose of Spanos fun today.

Saturday was my birthday. I'm not going to say how old. And right on queue, I woke up to a stiff hip. Seriously? That's not a very nice birthday present. Couldn't God have given me something that made me feel youthful instead?


I had but one request for my birthday. I wanted to go out for date night, eat at a restaurant without high chairs, and see a movie. I guess that's actually three requests. Paul and I have tried a couple of times to go out without Joe but something always happened. Last time it was the day it snowed and we were supposed to have frozen roads. This time, no excuses. So we actually made it out of the house! I think after 9 months, my movie picking abilities are a little rusty though. We saw a really sad, depressing movie that made me not want to get old. I'll have to go back to the tried-and-true chick flick next time. Sorry Paul.


Paul took the girls to a concert on Dec 18. It was a concert hall full of screaming girls anxious to see Justin Beiber. Unbeknownst to him, the venue was standing room only and tweenage girls are crazy strong. They got pushed all over the place! Luckily Paul and another Dad were there to make sure the girls were safe. They had a ton of fun.....but no pictures that I'm aware of.

Not so sure about this Santa guy...

I'm realizing why online shopping has such appeal, moreso than I ever have before. We just barely balance everything in our normal lives. Holiday shopping just doesn't quite fit! The girls are excited for Christmas break to start in a few days. It actually snowed here about a week ago (see picture below for proof) so that makes it seem even more seasonal than it usually does in Texas at Christmastime. Alex had her holiday choir concert last week and did fantastic. She's also gearing up for track season to start. Maddie sprained her ankle and is sidelined from dancing until it heals. Dance is such a big part of her life she doesn't know what to do with herself.

Joe has started saying Dada a lot recently. And he says it directly to Paul so we are sure its not an accident. He really boves his Daddy and gets so excited when he walks in the room. I think they are going to be best buds. This is a little video Alex took on her phone of him saying "Hi Dada." Alex gets the best pictures and videos on her phone! I never seem to catch these things!

He's also doing a pretty good job of crawling now. But only when he really wants something. Otherwise, he thinks if he grunts long enough we'll figure out what he wants and he won't have to work for it. So far, that's working for him. He's also pulling up quite a bit too.....but so far, only on me and not on the furniture. (We have to keep his nails trimmed short for that trick. I don't learn very quick as is evidenced by the slices all over my neck.)

My office puts on a Christmas party for the children of employees every year. Santa and Mrs. Clause are there and they play Christmas movies and have all kinds of activities such as baloon animals, games, snacks, etc. I know Joe is too young to enjoy any of it yet, but I thought it might be a more successful first visit with Santa there as opposed to visiting him at the mall with a big long line of people. Joe did so good! He just kept staring at Santa and then looking at us to make sure we were still there. He stayed there for a good minute or two while we snapped some pictures. No tears! Although as you can see in the second picture, I think we saved him moments before the tears were set to appear...



Joe's been getting a cold and cough over the last few days. There's nothing more sad. He's just not himself and he just wants to be held. This was taken during one of his better moments. He was in his high chair and he had his foot propped up. I think he thought it was a lounge chair. Very cute. Yes, that's a bruise between his eyes. Not sure how it got there, but it doesn't seem to bother him. Must be one of those "just-learning-to-toddle bumps." Either that or his little girlfriend, Avery, at the Day Care whacked him a good one.


Hope all of you are well and having lots of fun during these holidays!

Thanksgiving Blessings

I hope everyone out there reading this had as wonderful a Thanksgiving as we did. We had the whole family over to our house for dinner. As we all went around the table saying what we are thankful for, I began to realize that this time last year I couldn't have even imagined how many blessings we would be given this year. Not only that we are all healthy and happy, but that by having Joe in our lives our family has come so much closer together. It's amazing that you can have a puzzle piece missing and not even realize it until it clicks in. As a side note, in case you were all wondering, in addition to family, Alex was thankful for electronics and Maddie was thankful for chicken. Go figure.

On Saturday we put up Christmas decorations. I was going to turn on Christmas music while we decorated the tree, but I thought it was cute that in the absence of anything else, Paul and the girls were singing Teddybear Picnic (see last post in case you are wondering).

I love going through all the boxes of decorations every year. One of my favorite items is the Nativity set my Mom got us. The set is from Israel and is carved from Israeli olive wood. As I got it out of the box and set it up, I remembered that last year, we couldn't keep Cloudy (our cat) away from it. (Tina - yes....same cat that peed in your suitcase) She kept getting up on the wine cabinet where we had it set up and we'd find her licking baby Jesus. And when she wasn't there, inevitably there was a pool of cat spit under one of the nativity animals. No sooner had I opened my mouth to ask Paul and the girls if we wanted to take bets on how long it would be before Cloudy found her long lost friend baby Jesus again, and there she was! We had to take a picture so you could all see that I couldn't make this up. For some reason this year she's become fond of the donkey.....not sure what's going on there.

Christmas is my favorite time of year and I can't wait to share this with Joe. His first Christmas! He's really into ripping up paper, magazines, kleenex, and whatever else he can get his tiny hands on. So I'm going to wrap EVERYTHING and let him have at it. It is not lost on me that this year, he will probably enjoy the paper and not even realize what's inside the paper. That's ok too.

Speaking of ripping up paper....I asked Paul if Joe is different than the girls were when they were small. I was curious if there was a big gender difference. He said he's definitely more restless and squirmy than the girls were. For example, Paul said he could sit and read a book with the girls. Joe just wants to tear up the pages of the book. If he's awake, he wants to be reaching for things and grabbing. When we put him in his bumbo seat now he practically pushes the tray off when he's turning around in the seat reaching for whatever he can reach behind him. I think maybe he's just more "boy" which is a good thing since he is a boy. Although if this is a sign of things to come.....I'm tired just thinking about it. He's been getting closer and closer to crawling here in the last few days. He's been spinning around in a circle on his belly for a while. But now that he's really interested in reaching for things, he gets frustrated if he can't get to them. So he's started getting his knees up under him and rocking back and forth in the crawling position. Let the baby proofing commence.

Teddybear Picnic

Alex came home the other day and said that they got their cross country track pictures back and that she actually likes them! This coming from one of the people who will hardly ever let me take her picture let alone put her picture out here. She said "I look sexy." So, of course I had to capitalize on the opportunity and scan it in for everyone. It is a pretty great picture.



We got a chance to see a sneak peak of Maddie's solo dance. It's amazing. I was really, really impressed. She is so graceful and her turns are beautiful. It made me realize how much she grown up in the last few years. She's been practicing a ton! This year she's doing 7 dances...a solo, a duet, group pom, group jazz, group lyrical, group kick and group hip hop. She practices about 10 - 12 hrs a week. It makes me tired just thinking about it. But, she loves it! Their first competition is in February. (Which happens to also be when track season starts up for Alex....weekends will be CRAZY!)


Joe started getting a little bit of a runny nose over the last few days and I think I'm finally catching on. Runny nose = more teeth. Sure enough, he has two more coming in up top! That's a total of 6 now in case you are keeping count. He seems so much more like a boy and less like a baby every day. He tried apples today and really liked them! After a month of just veggies and rice cereal I could almost hear him saying "FINALLY!"


We've also discovered that he has a favorite song now. It can make him stop crying on a dime, and smile and laugh like nothing else. So we have it in the car and play it all the time. And when we aren't in the car, he gets Mommy's version. The song is "Teddybear Picnic." Not very popular, but much loved in our house. Well, Joe loves it. Alex, Maddie and Paul think it's creepy. Creepy or not, it works. Paul has tried to jump on the bandwagon, but for anyone who knows him, you know he can't remember a lyric to save his life. Unless the song was popular before the year 2000. Teddybear Picnic is no exception. His version makes it somehow a Christmas song, and the Teddybear's are having breakfast instead of a picnic, and then it morphs into a song from The Wizard of Oz. But....it has the same tune so Joe loves it just the same. I really would have thought that after hearing it 50,000 times by now he would have learned the words. No such luck.
I'll try to get a good little video of Joe reacting to the song.....hold me to that promise.

The latest news on the homefront

We now officially have two front teeth poking through. And....he bites. Hard.



In other big Joe news....he's started saying Mama. The first time he said it I wasn't even there! I missed it! But Alex called to tell me about it. And now he says it alot. And mostly when he's cranky. We've unleashed a beast. It's so sad too. He'll wake up from his nap and stick out his lower lip and start saying "mamamamama." I can't tell if he is really associating it with me yet. But even if he's not, he still said mama first!

I've been asked recently whether this is supposed to be just a Joe blog, or if it's supposed to be for the whole family. My answer to that is that its supposed to be for the whole family....but Joe is the only one who will let me take their picture and put it on the blog for the most part. Everyone else is old enough to veto it and I get A LOT of vetos. I also get a lot of back of the head shots and hand in front of the face poses. And I'm the one taking the pictures....so you don't get to see much of me in here. I'm going to keep trying, but no promises.

Pretty boring week...

Other than his two front teeth popping out, not much happening around here lately. We are laying low in preparation for the upcoming holiday's.

Here's a picture of Joe typing me a message.


I was looking on the internet and he just reached for the keyboard and started typing. I pulled up a blank Word document and let him go at it. Here's what he typed:

Lk;;asdo-m.k.2902ikepe a ao9
tTTTTTTTTTTTT

Anyone know a cryptographer? I'm sure it's pure brilliance and I'm just not smart enough to decipher it's hidden meaning.

He's been giggling some lately. Which is a big change from his normal silent laugh. I tried to capture it. It's hard enough to get him to laugh, let alone do it over and over so I get a good take. Here's the best I could get. Appreciate the effort if not the product.



And here are a few other random pictures from the week. Enjoy!

Joe on our walk. He's in his stroller without the carseat now!


No, we aren't letting him take the car out alone until next year. Don't worry.

Happy Halloween!

This Halloween we went to a pumpkin patch (see previous post) and bought a few pumpkins. This was the first time I've ever attempted to carve a pumpkin. So I convinced Maddie to do it with me (Alex was a no go on that). We got our carving tools and carved beautiful pumpkins. So, as said previously, I've never carved pumpkins before. I hadn't really thought about how quickly they would spoil. After about 3 days, I noticed that my pumpkin was starting to look a little fuzzy. Then by the next day, the face was melting and fuzzy mold was growing out of its mouth like it had rabies or something. It all happened so fast. The verdict on pumpkin carving....the process was super fun, but not so much fun as to outweigh how gross rotting pumpkins are. No more pumkin carving for me. We will forever-more be enjoying the pumpkins from the outside only.

On Tuesday night, things were busy around here as usual. Paul was cooking, I was getting bottles ready for the next day and Alex was sitting at the kitchen island talking with Joe. She had just said "Hi JoJo" to him and all of a sudden we all three heard "Hi" clear as day. So much so that all activity in the kitchen stopped and we all turned around to look at him. He was just smiling away. He hasn't said anything since, so I'm not sure if it was an accident or not. But it sure sounded intentional at the time. Alex is so happy and touched that the gift of his first word went to her. I think she'll never forget that moment.

We were trying to find some early evening Halloween activity to do with Joe so we could get him in his costume and let him look at all the other kids. As many activities as there are here in The Woodlands, there wasn't anything like that for Halloween. Oddly enough, there were three dog costume events going on....strange. So, we decided just to take him trick-or-treating with Maddie, Alex and their friends this year. Alex was a Candy Corn Witch and Maddie was the Queen of Hearts. Maddie and her friends all went as characters from Alice in Wonderland. Joe slept through most of the walk, but when he woke up, Maddie insisted on carrying him around and taking him up to doors with her.

As you can see Joe went as our dog Maizie for Halloween. The actual costume is a dalmation....and Maizie is not a dalmation, but it was close. We wanted to put a sign on Maizie that said "Eat More Chikn" like the Chick-fil-a cows, but she's not a very good dog to take on a walk so it would have been for nothing. Here's a cute picture of the two of them....guess which one's Joe!

The First Date...

Last Monday, Joe and I visited with my friend Gina and her 4 month old daughter Ava. We took a mighty long walk and did lots of catching up. Ava hasn't been around many babies so she was pretty enamored with Joe. He would smile at her and she'd smile back and then he'd get super excited about that and start squealing. We set them on the floor and he started just talking away to her and even reached out to touch her a couple of times. It was very sweet. I think he's smitten. It was such a nice visit I can't wait to have our next play date.



Joe's newest trick that he's quite proud of is squealing as you can see in BOTH videos. It is just so cute I had to torture you all with TWO videos this time.



Sorry for all the neck cramps you will get on this one. I'm not smart enough to figure out how to flip it.



We will be trying veggies this month now that he's 7 months old...so far we've just tried Avocados since they were easy to mash up. I can't seem to find a baby food grinder around here anywhere and I'd really like to give him "real" food instead of the jar baby food. I'll have to see how difficult it is to keep up. But for now, he's still nursing and taking rice cereal so we'll just keep trying with the veggies. The avocados were semi-successful. He ate what seemed at the time like just a little bit. I think either he ate more than I thought, or the avocado multiplied during "processing." He kept opening his mouth for the spoon so that was good. I did get the nasty face similar to the first time we tried rice cereal though. We'll keep trying. Peas and carrots are next. If I can just keep Paul from gagging we'll be ok.

I can't believe he's 7 months already. He was 7 months old on Paul's birthday. I won't say how many month's Paul is... My how time flies. Joe looks like a little boy to me now more than a baby. And he has such a personality. I just want to bottle him up and keep him like this forever. I say that, but really, I look forward to all the things we have still to enjoy. I'm so conflicted!

Here's a cute picture of Joe and Uncle Jimmy making the same face. This was taken at Paul's birthday dinner last night.

Fall has...fallen?

Day care closed for Columbus day so Joe and I had a day together to run errands. I decided to brave the grocery store. This was our first time grocery shopping by ourselves. Joe did EXCELLENT. He loved looking at all the groceries and people. And he even helped by holding on to the cart (I know, gross, gross, gross). I kept him in my baby bjorn facing forward. He chatted and laughed at all the people. Charming them with his smiles. Even as we were checking out an elderly couple stopped to talk to him. I was distracted and putting things on the conveyor and as I turned around, the lady was right in my face, reaching for his head and gave him a kiss on the forehead. At first I was extremely freaked out...I had always heard that if you keep them in a carrier, people are less likely to touch the baby because they'd be invading your space to do so. Apparently not! But, I soon realized that the lady must have had dimentia or alzheimers and Joe's smiles probably made her day. Joe did his good deed for the day.

Alex had a chior concert on Thursday night. I rushed home to get Paul, Joe and Grandma, got in the car to drive across town to the school only to find no one there. Paul called around and found out that the concert was actually at the High School (about 3 miles from our house). No one told him (or so he says). So we had to RUSH to try to get there in time. And as luck would have it, there was an accident on the highway so we were stopped for a period of time. The whole time, Paul's saying...."and Alex made a point of saying that I've never been to one of her chior concerts because they are always during the day. And now I'm going to miss this one." Needless to say it was a very tense situation. But....alas, we were finally there so we shoved Paul out of the car at the door and we parked and met him in there. I kid you not....we were there about 30 seconds before Alex's group came onto the stage to perform. There had to be some divine intervention on that one. Joe loved the singing but HATED the clapping. The first time they did it he was so startled he started crying for a second. He never really got used to it, but he didn't cry after that.

Paul took pictures as evidence of his attendance in case it was ever called into question.

The Woodlands has so many activities going on during the fall. I'm so excited! I never really paid attention before I had Joe but now I notice all the fun stuff and potential photo ops. Speaking of, we have a word that we use in our house now to describe the level of humor, interest or cute factor of events. That word is "blogworthy." For example, if something happens and we are relating the story to the family, someone will comment, "that's definitely blogworthy." Who'da thunk....

Back to the photo ops and fall activities. This weekend we took Joe to the Taste of the Village and all three kids to a Pumpkin Patch. I must say, the Taste of the Village was kinda fun. They had all kinds of food samples from area restaurants and cartoon characters walking around. The Wells Fargo carriage was there and police cars and firetrucks the kids could climb on.

We saw SpongeBob, Dora, a random snowman, and the creepiest Spider Man ever. He was creepy because he was wearing this old, faded costume and had on undies that you could see through the outfit. I purposely didn't look, but Paul said they were red and black checked. Not good, Spidey. Not good.

The Pumpkin Patch was too cute. We got some cute pictures and a couple of pumpkins to bring home and try out. I've never really carved one before so Maddie and I are going to attempt it this year. Alex said she isn't going to help. Paul almost couldn't get her out of the car at the place....he told her "Ho Ho" needed her so she got out. Anything for her brother. Isn't that sweet? At least now Paul knows what her motivations are.

We had a strange urge to try on his hats one day. He seemed to like this one the best.

Joey - this picture's for you! Joey was #5 on his high school baseball team so that's his favorite number. Paul also pointed out that Joe is the 5th member of the family!

Joe, Meet your Uncle Joey

This past weekend we got to spend some time with my brother, Joey, and his kids, Easton and Lauren. Easton and Lauren have met Joe before, but Joey, his namesake, hadn't. He's been in Iraq since February and was home on 2 weeks leave. It was so good to see him and spend some time relaxing. Here's a picture of them together. (Notice the drool on Joey's shoulder....nice one Joe!)

Joey and the kids went on to San Diego after their stay in Texas. They were going to pick up Caroline (my Sister-in-Law) and take a trip to Disneyland while Joey's home. He heads back out October 12. Everyone keep him and all our troops in your thoughts and prayers! Let's hope the next 4 months until he's home for good goes by quickly for everyone.

Last weekend we took a mini-vacation and the five of us met up with Do, Grandma, Joey and the kids in Grapevine, TX to stay for a few days at the Great Wolf Lodge. If you aren't familiar with the resort, it's a big hotel with a huge indoor/outdoor waterpark inside. They have several of them around the U.S. It was way too cold to go outside (way too cold being about 75 degrees and overcast), but they have huge waterslides, a wave pool, lazy river, a giant fort and an area for little kids indoors. It was a lot of fun. All the big kids (Joey, Paul, Easton, Alex and Maddie) loved the slides. Lauren and Joe liked the hot tub the best. NOT TO WORRY....I only put his feet in....and it wasn't any warmer than his baths are at home. I tried to sit with him in the shallow end of the kiddie pool but the water was just too cold. So after he got his tootsies warm in the hot/warm tub, he took a little nap with Grandma.

Amazing that the noise in the park didn't bother him one bit. Overall we were very impressed with the resort. From the cleanliness, to the staff, to the activites....all very worth it. This was the first time all of us were in one hotel room with Joe. It was tough trying to keep him quiet at night and early in the morning so Alex and Maddie could sleep. And I realized, when it's not your house, you can't just get up and go walking around in your pj's either! Luckily Do and Grandma get up early so I could go bug them.

One of the nights the boys all went to the Texas A&M football game and the girls had "Girls Night (plus Joe)." Lauren didn't really get why Joe go to join us for girls night since he was a boy. But, she quickly got over it when we went down and checked out a game to play. Unfortunately, the game didn't have any directions, but we had lots of fun with the props that came in the box as you can see.

We also played Simon Says. Lauren didn't understand the rules of the game quite yet so she would just go on and on saying "Simon says touch your nose" and "Simon says touch Baby Joe" and so on and so on. Then all of a sudden she'd shake her finger at us ad squinch up her nose and say "Simon didn't say!" even though he really did. We didn't have the heart to tell her that's not how the game goes, and besides that....it was pretty funny when she did it. Another one of her favorite games apparently is Mercy She asked Alex to play with her and Alex asked her what the game was about. She said very matter of factly, "that's where you hurt me and then I say Mercy." Like it was the most fun game in the world. Can you tell she has a big brother?

On the last day of the trip we made all the kids get together for a picture. We couldn't get everyone to be serious so we told them if they took a serious picture, then we'd take one of them being goofy. Here they are.....you almost can't tell the difference.

Here's a cute picture of Alex and Joe watching TV in the hotel room

And this last one is on here because I told Alex and Maddie I wanted a good picure of them but they kept making faces. So I threatened them by saying the next picture was going on the blog regardless of how it looked. Apparently for Maddie my threats mean nothing.

Progress!

This week was so eventful! Joe started sitting up by himself. Let me qualify that statement. If I sit him up, he can stay there by himself.....until he flops over. BUT, he doesn't flop over right away! Progress! He's doing so well!

The doctor's 6 month stats are in. He's almost 25 in and 13 lb 4.5 oz. She's never given me any "percentile" stats on him. I'm sure that's because he isn't on a normal growth curve since he was so small when he was born. She did say that he's catching up and growing well. He's doing all the normal 6 month things, just in a smaller body.

He also tried his first taste of rice cereal. This is the first thing he's ever had to eat besides milk, other than the time Do thought it would be good to let him taste peach popcicle. I thought for sure we'd never go back after that, but we did! As you can see from this picture, he is NOT fond of the rice cereal. Not nearly as fond as he was of the peach popcicle anyway. We've given the cereal to him a couple of times this week and he just curls up his lip at it. I'm not sure we are going to have much luck with the rice cereal.

Alex continues to do well at her track meets. This week she finished 23rd out of gobs of girls after having been sick with the flu bug for two days and not running for three. This being the flu bug that spread like wildfire through our house to everyone except Joe. Thank goodness for small blessings. And yes gobs is an exact amount.

Joey came home from Iraq yesterday for his two week R&R. The trip as he put it was "long and arduous." He left Iraq on Tuesday (which was really our Monday) and got to Dallas Saturday morning. I'm really impressed with what the DFW airport does for returning soldiers and sailors. They have members of the community come out for each returning flight and stand with the families to cheer for the men and women coming off their plane, wave flags, hold signs and provide them with snacks and drinks. I'm so glad there's still some show of appreciation that we are doing for our heroes. I can't wait to see Joey and the kids this week!

Ok, Joe's on my lap as I type this and he's saying thats enough talking. He has some things to say.

Do - this picture is for you....... This is your "bonding over helicopters" outfit.

Seriously? 6 Months already? Happy half-year birthday Joe!

Tomorrow is Joe's 6 month birthday. I am really finding it hard to believe that he's half way to a year old. I look at him and think about how much he's grown and changed. It's all pretty amazing. I think he's so big but then when I talk to my friends who had babies after me but were born full term, they are so much bigger! Most of my friends babies were the same size as Joe when they were 2 or 3 months old. Joe is just now fitting into his 3 - 6 month clothes. He's almost a full size behind his age. The doctor says he'll catch up over the next 6 months so we'll track that and see.

We took Joe to the mall to have his 6 month pictures taken yesterday (That's where the picture above is from). They turned out so well! He's a pretty happy baby and he thinks Mom, Dad, Alex and Maddie are hysterical so it wasn't hard to get some smiley pictures. Interestingly, he is a vigorous, almost violent smiler (head and arms thrashing about) but he rarely if ever laughs out loud.

For anyone who has ever gone to have pictures taken at JC Penney, Sears, etc....you know that right after the pictures are taken, they load them up on the computer and then start doing their magic...putting them into collages and cutesy pictures and fuzzy borders and all that jazz. Then the pressure is on to hurry up and pick your favorites so they can move on to the next person. So we are all standing there, sorting through the pictures, super-hungry by this point. I keep asking Paul what he thinks and he seems distracted so I turn around and he's looking at his phone. I asked him what he was doing and he says "oh, nothing." Yeah....so he was looking at his Fantasy Football scores leaving me to the stressful picture picking. Nice.

Joe has TWO teeth now and has discovered his love of spitting (see picture as evidence of this). I keep trying to get it on video to post here but he's too sneaky and won't do it when I want him to. I know a video of him spitting sounds more gross than cute, but it really is cute. Maybe that's just the mommy in me talking.

In our house you have to have a nickname. Its just what happens with Paul. For example, Abby (the dog) became "Goat" because she has a beard. Then we got Maizie and she was "Baby Goat" even though she does NOT have a beard, and is in fact bigger than Abby. Then they became Mazola and Goatina. The list goes on. So Joe now, has quite a few nick names. Paul's favorite so far is "Hoho." This would only make sense to you if you watch the Ni Hao, Kai Lan cartoon. Hoho is her little monkey friend. I've included a picture for comparison sake. You all can be the judge.

Here's Hoho....

Here's JoJo....

And here's Yoda. I know, odd that I include Yoda, except that I happen to think he looks a lot like Yoda in this picture, NOT Hoho. Again, you can be the judge.



Joe can't wait to meet his Uncle Joey and take his first vacation in a few weeks. I'm sure we'll have many pictures and stories to share once we are home from that trip.

Love to all!