Girls just want to have fun!

Sydney is definitely a girly girl. She loves putting on dress up clothes and most days insists on wearing dresses, which is a problem since most of her dresses are nice, fancy, Sunday dresses not casual ones. Well, it looks like Savannah is following in her big sisters footsteps. She will bring me necklaces to put around her neck.




Here's Sydney putting on all of her cousin, Audrey's dress-up clothes on her birthday last year. She barely fit in the skirt without tripping over it.
































Since she loves playing with Audrey's dress-up stuff so much, Tim & Christine (Sydney's uncle and aunt) got Sydney her own set of dress-up clothes for Christmas, which she loves.



















Here's Sydney looking cute in some of her necklaces.




Here's the necklaces I was talking about Savannah bring to me to put on her.

More pictures

We finally got our scanner hooked up so now I can post some pictures of the girls we got taken in the last few months.

Savannah 1-12-08

Sydney 2-15-08

Savannah & Sydney 3-15-08

Sydney 3-15-08

Savannah 3-15-08

No baby yet

Okay, so the baby can come any day now. He's due on the 30th of May, but we're 38 weeks tomorrow and our babies have a history of coming 2 weeks early. Of course that was with the girls. I don't know what our boys have a history of doing because this is our first. I'll keep you posted, but we are almost there.

 

Oh, congrats to those who recently had babies, including Alex and Genna, and also Brett and Liz.

Mothers day

Today I want to let the many mothers in my life know how much I love them and appreciate them. My mom has had numerous trials with us growing up in the situation we were in. She loved us and protected us. She has been selfless through out her life. Somehow my brothers and I have made it without becoming drug addicts or bums (I really don't have anything against bums). She continues to be very supportive of us. My mother-in-law does so much for us. She is a wonderful grandma or rather "Bama". Sydney always crys when we leave her house. My kids absolutely adore her. My wife deserves a lot of raves. I took my younger daughter Savannah today in priesthood with me. I barely survived. I don't know how Lindy takes care of these girls every day while being pregnant. My wife is 8 1/2 months pregnant and has been having a really hard time, worse than with the two previous kiddos. She is amazing, even if she doesn't think so. She is very caring and she is always putting the needs of others before her own. She is a wonderful mother.

I also wanted to say how much I miss my grandmothers, particularly my mom's mom, who passed away just before my mission. For a while I didn't have any grandparents till I got married, now I have 3 grandparents, which I love and appreciate. I'm glad that my daughters are getting to know some of there great grandparents.

Sorry, no pictures. I'm not at home right now.

Howdy people

So, I only have 3 more IEPs this week then only 7 next week. Almost done, as long as our baby doesn't come in the middle of all of that. Lindy has been having a really hard time with this pregnancy (the two little girls don't help much). Our little girls are too young to yet be helpful. At least Sydney is mostly pretty independent. Savannah isn't though, she's a handful. She was absolutely crazy at church. What can you expect from a 15 month old that you are trying to get to sit still? The next couple of months are going to be challenging. Sure, I work for the school district so I'll get time off this summer, but I work at a year round school, so I won't get time off anytime soon. But we have family that will help us out, so we should be just fine.

more pictures when two post

So, lindy will do some of the posting on the blog. All of the pictures were her doing. I do most of my posting before work at work, so I don't usually have the pictures with me at the time. Hopefully this will make some of you happy. I don't know what to do for the rest of you, lol.

 

Sydney's New Habit

Sydney has decided that every time she goes down for a nap she has to empty out all the drawers of clothes and the hamper and put them all over the floor and in Savannah's crib. This is quite annoying for mom and dad. I haven't been folding their clothes anymore, just throwing them into the drawers since they will be all over the floor the next time Sydney takes a nap.

 

The other picture was just cute of Savannah in a hat she got from Sea World.

New Bed

Here's Sydney in her new twin size bed. She had no trouble transitioning from the toddler bed to the twin. I'm sure the Tinker Bell bedding helped with that.

Love Sac

Here are the girls enjoying our new love sac. They love jumping on it and playing with dad in it.

Our Little Princess

Well, Sydney is obsessed with the disney princesses. Two Halloween's ago Sydney was Snow White. Well, I still had the costume in the back of her closet so during her nap time she found the costume and put it on backwards. This costume is a size 1 and Sydney is almost 3.

Easter

Here are some pictures of the girls hunting for eggs, and on Easter morning.

Pictures

I know you all have been waiting for pictures of the girls for awhile now. We lost cord that connects to the computer so we really didn't have any new pictures to put on. Well, we found the cord so here you go.

 

Here's Sydney & Savannah in their bunny ears bama (Lindy's mom) gave them for Easter.

More pictures!

Well, the thing I heard the most from my feed back post was more pictures. So, ironically enough, I'm not going to post any pictures right now, but I have given my wife keys to the blog so that she can help me post pictures of my girls. If we get into the habit now then maybe you'll be able to get to see pictures of Logan James soon after he arrives. Keep your fingers crossed.

Feed back

So, I'm at a loss (and I don't have much time). I don't know what the people who read my blog want. Well, that's not entirely true. I know you want more pictures. My problem is that I frequently email my blog entries in from work where I don't have any of my pictures. I just need to get Lindy to start emailing me pictures to post on the blog (I'm happy that the school district is no longer blocking blogger.com so I can actually get in there and edit the template).

 

So, what do you want? Amusing antedotes? Political opinions? Daily journal entries? Random information that I think is interesting? Commentary on popular TV shows?

 

Please, please, throw me a bone here.

What to write, what to write???

I don't know how some of you guys do it. I have to admit, one of the reasons I don't write on my blog as often as I do is because I can't think of stuff to write about. My life is pretty boring at this point. I wake up, go to work, then go home. That's about it. (Well, I guess there's a little more to it than that). I'll have to make my wife make some posts of what the kids are doing from time to time.

 

I can't believe that Logan is almost here. We (the parents) are going to be out number very soon. I'm glad that we at least are in the house and are able to get somethings settled first. And it helps that I don't have as much work to do during the summer. We need the money, but I think my wife also needs the extra help. Our daughters are needy. They aren't content to just play, they follow you around the house. When I go into the den to do something with the computer they come following in. Savannah is particularly interested in the mouse, she'll take that thing from your hands every time. Sydney loves to type on the keyboard. We often open up the word processor to let her type to her heart's content. However, when they are both attacking you, it gets very difficult to do anything on the computer. I can just imagine that they are doing this to Lindy all day long. But they are so cute so you can't help but love them.

 

Not that I'm going off on my children (because I'm boring, but they are not) I want to write real quick about Sydney and her Disney Princess shows. She will act them out as she watches them. She actually will pretend to be asleep like Sleeping Beauty before the prince comes to wake her up with a kiss. Consequently the other day she was asleep on the couch and Lindy wasn't sure if she was really asleep or just waiting for her princess. It turned out that she pretended to be asleep for her princess, but then fell asleep while waiting (I'm sure some people can relate to that).

 

Anyway, for one who can't think of anything to write, I sure wrote a lot.

Bed Building

So, we got a new bed for Sydney. We finally got a twin size bed for her (no more toddler bed -- besides she chewed that thing to death, but it still has to last for at least two more kids... but I'm tangenting). We got a great deal on a bedframe at Shopko (as shown above, but we didn't get the headboard or nightstand) and we bought a mattress and boxspring for her. By the way, that bed is only $88 at shopko right now, 50% off!!

 

Anyway, my father-in-law, Vyrl, and I spent forever last night building the darn thing (Thanks Vyrl!! We appreciate the help!) and then we put the boxspring and mattress on the bed. Well, apparently this was designed only for the mattress, because with all of that the bed was taller than my bed. It looked like we were beginning the story of the princess and the pea (or whatever that was). But we got it all settled. Sydney LOVES her new bed (partly because its covered in Tinkerbell blankets and sheets. She had to have every tinkerbell blanket on before she would go to sleep (and it was not cold last night so I don't know what she was thinking).

The Love Sac

We broke down and bought a love sac. Can I tell you how cool they are. My daughters love them to death. I've been wanting one for ever. For those of you who don't know what a love sac even is go to this webpage for details: http://www.lovesac.com/. Basically, they're what a bean bag was meant to be, but never was. We are so happy to actually be getting furniture that is nice instead of furniture that some one else was getting rid of. Its a nice change. We're still waiting on our microfiber couch/sofa combo set that we bought. Its back order, but in my opinion, its worth the wait.

We're in!!!

We spent our first night in our new home. There are boxes everywhere, but we're excited. Our little girls didn't understand what was going on. Poor Sydney cried when we took her bed out to the truck. All those mean people from the Elders Qurom stealing all of her toys and furniture. When she got to the house and saw her bed it was like her finding a long lost friend (she missed it for only a few hours, geeess). Savannah is loving this place because she can roam around (no stairs). She loves it! We're excited to have more room. I get to have a den for once (Lindy likes the idea of having the computer in the bedroom anymore). We also got a new bedroom set and we're waiting for our new sofa/loveseat combo.

Now we have a LOT of work to do. I think I'll go get some donuts.

Projects...

Well, now that I have a new old house (new to me, but build before I was born) I have a million projects. I don't even know where to get started, but when I walk around the yard or the house I just think of what I can and need to do. Is this normal?? I guess that's part of the difference of the mentality of renting versus owning. I could careless about my apartment, but now I'm obcessed.

 

I found a website for people like me how want to do it all, but don't have a clue. Its called http://www.doityourself.com/. The nice thing is that they give you tons of articles about how to do things on your own. So, I'm probably going to be going to this webpage a lot in the years to come (that and homedepot).

It's official. We have bought our house! I already have a long list of projects I want to do. Is that normal? I haven't ever been able to do "projects" before. I'm mean what can you really do to your apartment? What's the point? So, we are moving all this week. We didn't want to leave to one day, its worth the little bit of rent that we'll have to pay (5 days worth).

Moving Soon!

Okay people, I need to get the pictures on here quicker. Some of you are so amazing with you blogs. I'm a little lazy myself. I need to repent and get more pictures of my girls on here (I know Jodi, I need to be better). But the girls were really cute with easter eggs. Savannah is at that awkward walking walking stage, she's so cute. Sydney is obsessed with ... well... she's just obsessed (disney, candy, tinkerbell, you name it). I'll have to put pictures on here soon. But we are sort of busy with the buying a home and moving thing.

Okay, like I said, we're moving rather soon. Hopefully everything will go okay with closing. With an older house and government grants, we get to jump through a few extra hoops. But soon we will be enjoying home owning (and all the good and bad that comes with that).

So, who's reading this? Please leave a comment. I was trying to figure out who I knew in the different cities I got hits from. I'm just curious. So, please indulge me.

We're under contract

We finally found a starter home. Its nothing compared to some your homes (I've been in some of your homes so I know), but we're poor and houses are expensive. We figure that we can live in this house for 5 years then look for something else (the home-start grant requires you to live in the home 5 years before you get the grant completely forgiven). The house is in Layton, its a bit older (built 1955), but we really had a hard time finding something built more recent in our price range. We will be moving to the ghetto of Layton, but that's no big deal. We live a ghetto of Layton right now (at least we won't share walls with our neighbors anymore). The nice thing about the house is that its complete refinished inside (that was a big seller for us) and it has a huge kitchen (a big seller for Lindy). Sydney will actually have a garage to run around. We're excited.

Of course we're not done yet. We are having our home inspection of the place next week and we're still trying to get everything ready with the financing. But our closing date is March 29, so we'll be moving the first week or so of April. It's not so far from where we live right now so moving should be really easy. This will be nice because it will give us a little bit of time before baby number 3 comes along towards the end of May.

Anyway, no pictures yet, maybe after closing.

New Lost Episode "The Constant"

Okay, here is another geeky Lost entry. So, was that a wild episode or what?? It was my favorite for the season so far and it ranks up there for the entire show. What did you guys think? I thought it was funny that the "flashback" wasn't typical of their normal shows. Where are they going with this show. It feels like they have a definite direction this time. (Sometimes in season 2 & 3 we were always sure about that).


Okay, so some things to look at in this episode. Penny's dead bought the journal from the Blackrock, the boat that ended up on the island that we see in the first season. What kind of connection does he have with the island? Some thought they saw Ben sitting in the back row at that auction, hmm, I'll have to watch it again. So, has Daniel done the time thing a little already? He's brain seems to be a little fried and they made it a point to mention that he wasn't protecting his head. Oh, and why did it take Penny so long to answer the phone? She knew that Desmond was alive because she spoke with Charlie (so sad, :( poor Charlie).

The "lost" people admit that Charlotte's (Charlotte Staples Lewis) name is referencing CS Lewis, maybe referring to Narnia, where there are two worlds that are connected by the wardrobe.

At any rate, after watching "The Constant" my wife and I could go to sleep, too much to think about. What do you guys think? Any theories?

update on things

Sorry, I haven't written for a little while. I meant to give my lost update for the week and give my two cents on a range of other subjects, but I haven't. (By the way didn't they take quite the turn on Lost?). So, I thought I'd just leave a quick note of what we are doing. We got all the lender stuff done and now we are officially looking for a house of our own. (note the picture attached is not the house we're buying, just some random house on a google image search, but we're poor so we'll be lucky if we can find a house like that). So, that's going to be our life these next few weeks: house hunting. We can't afford a whole lot because we're living solely off of my income (and I work for Davis School District). So, any advice for those 1st time home buyers looking to buy an existing home?

Winter Blues

Has anybody else wondered when this season will end. I start to get the winter blues in January (post Christmas) and they don't tend to let up until things start to warm up in March. Right now I'm feeling the winter blues heavily at the moment. Will this icky cold ever go away????

Lost - Confirmed Dead

Warning - Lost Spoiler Alert- if you plan on ever watching the lost series, its best done from the beginning one episode at a time, its not fun if you get spoilers. I suggest you go get yourself the DVDs and join geeks everywhere in lost mania.

Okay, so we finally watched the last episode "Confirmed Dead", you can actually watch all of the episode from the ABC website at http://dynamic.abc.go.com/streaming/landing. We gave up TV for internet (its a long story). So, we watch lost on the web now.

So, who are these people and what do they want with Ben? Ben's kind of a creep and he deserves anything thats coming to him, but these people kind of give me the creeps to, (especially Miles). I talk to dead people, hmmm. Oh, and what happened to the rest of the "others"?

I'm constantly amazed at how complicated this show can be. If someone were to tell me the plot (without watching the show) I would think it wouldn't be worth watching at all, too complicated, a little too much mystery. However, it works. I don't know why, but it works. I'm hooked. And they are taking the show a new direction. I'm excited for the 13 episodes this season (yes because of the resolution to the writers strike they are adding 5 more episodes - yay!).

What do you guys think???

Savy's B-day and Ultrasound pictures

Okay, so I'm not always good at putting pictures on here. I get reminded by friends and family from time to time. So, in trying to catch up. Here are the pictures of Savannah's (Nana or Savy for short) 1st birthday (we didn't really have a party on her birthday, just our little family). Oh, and here are the pictures of our boy's ultrasound (on the bottom).


We still like to eat everything.


What you aren't seeing is her older sister dying to figure out what are in the presents (Sydney just assumed that any presents belonged to her).
So, this winnie the pooh rocker was a huge hit with both kids.
Instead of making Savannah a whole cake to destroy, we made a bunch of cupcakes and gave her one. She was much more enthusiastic about getting into it than Sydney was on her 1st birthday.
Now, introducing Logan James Bateman, well, maybe not quite yet. Here's a sneak preview. This first two shots show his face pretty well.

And, yes, definitely a boy. We're excited, our girls don't have a clue yet. I'm not sure how Savannah's going to take it, she's only had 1 year to be the baby so far. She might not like a little brother taking the attention where it's suppose to belong.

Who should you vote for?

Well, I'm not actually going to tell you who you should vote for because you probably think differently than I do, but I found this interesting website that helps you figure out which candidate comes closest to your own political views.

Its at www.votechooser.com. You take a quiz and it lets you know which candidate share's your opinions.

Of course I don't really like any of the candidates that are still in the race, but what do you do???

Super Tuesday

This is and was never meant to be a political blog. I don't feel like I know enough about politics to put my two cents in. I just wanted to express my disappointment in the political religious bigotry that has been occurring on the conservative side. I really think someone's religion shouldn't have anything to do with their politics and they should be laid aside. On the note, I don't think that their moral conduct should be laid aside (as in Bill Clinton's situation a few years ago), but their personal beliefs in good shouldn't be a determining factor. I feel that Huckabee is a bigot and he's only stayed in to take votes away from Romney. Would Romney be able to make it anyway? I don't know, but he would have had a better chance if Huckabee just dropped out (he didn't have a chance anyway). Anyway, my political rant is over. I'll try to keep this to a minimum in the future.

Addicted to blogging

Apparently I'm not really all that addicted to the blog thing (as you can tell because I've been so bad about posting messages). I'm only 64% addicted to blogging. I wish I could say that about pop or wow. I think its rigged, for as Sheryl would say (or rather did) " I thought you would be closer to 18%...you never update! (OR COMMENT...) :( Sad... "

64%How Addicted to Blogging Are You?

Baby Bateman Boy

We found out last week that we are going to have a boy! Sydney and Savannah are going to have a baby brother. We're excited (and a little nervous) to have our 3rd child. We kind of wished we had spaced them out a little better, but what do you do. For a few months each year their years will be right in a row (Sydney 3, Savannah 2, baby boy 1, or later on 6-5-4, etc). Wow we are gluttons for punishment. But it will be good. Sydney likes to pat Lindy's tummy and say "hi baby brother" and Savannah is completely oblivious to it (which she should). By the way, Savannah is turning one on Thursday (Jan 17th). We got a really cute picture of her at a photo studio on Saturday. When we get it back I'll post it, she has a cute red dress and hat on. Anyway, without any new pictures this post is pretty much pointless so I'll end it right now.
~bob

Ho ho ho!

Sometimes I'm surprised by what my job description includes as a speech-language pathologist in the schools. I got enlisted to play Santa for the kindergarten classes. The kids were so cute. I had a little girl run up and give me a hug. When I walked in the hall children followed me. One girl pulled on my beard then started yelling "He's a fake! He's a fake!" Luckily most kids believed.

Yes Virginia, there is a Santa Clause not some bald speech teacher.

At least I'm not really that fat. I had some stuffing to help fill me out.

A long Awaited Carebear picture

We were suppose to post this awhile ago, but we didn't (I'm still blaming dial-up - even if it was more laziness than anything). So, when we got this picture taken the Carebears were hidden (we knew that Sydney would be instantly obsessed). Sydney apparently has a 6th sense when it comes to Carebears. She found them anyway, but at least it makes a cute picture.

Long awaited pictures

Okay, so here are the long awaited pictures that I've been talking about for way too long now. I finally have DSL (mind you it disconnects more often than a dial-up so I'm probably going to switch soon.

These pictures where from November (no snow), but they're still cute. I like Sheryl's idea having a day where you put older pictures (ahh, memories). However, I don't post everyday so they'll be a little more sporadic.

Announcing Baby Number 3

Just so y'all know. We are expecting... again. Lindy in the beginning of June (or the end of May) next year. We won't know if its a boy or a girl for another month or so.

Happy Holidays

So, my aunt Jodi let me know that I really need to get on the ball about posting pictures. Good news is that we're getting DSL at home soon so it will be a lot easier to do that (I wouldn't recommend uploading pictures with a dial up!) Bad news is that I don't have the pictures right now.

 

So, we were at a family party yesterday when Sydney finds what she thought was lip gloss. I heard her saying "Lips, lips lips!" as I watched her put a glue stick to her mouth. She was a little upset when I took it away from her, but I do believe it was in her best interest. Anyway, I promise (again, lol) to post pictures in the near future (preferably when we have our DSL Internet).

Dire need of a good editing

Wow, the message below this is in a dire need of a good editor. I wrote it real quick with my gmail account. The blogger dashboard is blocked from my school computer so that is the only way I can send messages in. So, that means I have no means of editing them (after I send them that is). Anyway, I do believe in proofreading, but I have my weak moments. I'm not a writing teacher for goodness sake.

key words: Bob Bateman

So, a friendy of mine from high school stubbled on to my blog. I thought, "Wow, how easy is my blog to find?" So, I tried to do a google search on myself to find my own blog. And it wasn't as easy as that. There are sooo many Bob Batemans and Robert Batemans out there. I'm not unique :( so sad. So, I decided to add "key words" in my blog entries to add in the search for Bob Bateman. So, I went to West Jordan High school (WJHS), lol, and then Utah State University (USU). I'm an SLP (Speech Language Pathologist) for Davis School District. I should probably stop before I give too much info out there. I don't really think there is anybody who reads this blog who doesn't know the basic info anyways, oh oh I went on an LDS mission to the Kentucky Louisville Mission (1998-2000). So, lol, if you thought this was a different Bob Bateman or Robert Bateman (like the Canadian Painter) then you were wrong! Even if I do post his art on my blog, it really isn't mine.

 

Okay I'll stop before I hurt myself. lol.

House shopping blues

So, we decided that we are sick of throwing money away in rent. We want to live the American Dream and become homeowners. We've met with a realtor, we've driven around different neighborhoods, we are starting to get things figured out with some lenders. Well, it's not going so well at the moment. All we can afford is houses in scarey parts of Ogden. Our lender told us that we could afford what we wanted if Lindy was working, but we decided a while ago that Lindy wouldn't work while our kids are still home. We don't want someone else raising our children. Anyway, that means I'm living off of a first year teacher wage (and we don't get a whole lot) at least I have a master's degree so that I start a little higher.

 

Anyway, after looking in some of the neighborhoods that have houses we can afford we decided to save up money for a downpayment and keep an eye on the "Good Neighbor Next Door" program (a program that helps teachers and police officers get into a HUD house with 50% off). I guess it was good for us to see what we were up against so that we can be a little more serious about our budget and savings and get our debt paid down. Still a little frustrating, after being in school for all those years, I guess I thought it would be easier now that I have a real income.  Anyway, we are still holding on to our "American Dream", but we are going to be a little more patient about it.