The Fowler Family

True to form, we are ready for our semi-annual blog post. Take a deep breath...this could take a while.

We have been enjoying our boys so much lately, as have our friends and family. We feel so fortunate to have two healthy and beautiful children in our family. Zachary, shortened to Zach (yes, with an 'h'), and now usually referred to as "Zachie", "Zacharoni Penguin", or "Zach Attack", is nine and a half months old and growing fast. He's a portly little fella, and we love him for it! He smiles all the time and loves to follow around his big brother Will. Will is learning how to be gentle with a baby and loves making Zachie laugh. As Zachary gets more mobile (speed-racing crawler, astute climber, stand-up-against-anything) we've been enjoying watching the two of them become friends. Will is ready for Zach to grow up RIGHT NOW so that they can wrestle, play football, and all of that cool dude stuff that Will likes to do.

Will is fully potty-trained now, thanks to Mommy and Daddy finally discovering his Achilles' Heel - gummy bears and gummy worms! We started and stopped so many times to wait until he was ready, and it finally paid off. We've decided to force the issue a bit sooner with Zachie when that time comes, but are still so proud of Will for the great job he's doing now. He's still wearing a pull-up at night to battle those variable nighttime accidents but is waking up dry fairly often now. Yay Will! Here is our big boy:

Zach just learned how to wave hello and bye-bye to people and loves to interact with us that way. He's a busy baby (like Will was) but loves to snuggle up with us when he's eating, tired, or sad. Zach is all love and we regularly want to eat him all up; we have not done that....yet. Here is our Zachie:

Whitney just had a birthday and she and I enjoyed a nice time with family, as well as a special horseback riding trip through some trails in the woods of Conway, South Carolina. She did great (choice of shoes aside) and we had a nice time together. We stopped at a gas station on the way to pick up a snack and were discussing who was going to go in and who would stay in the car, when we realized that we could BOTH GO IN AT THE SAME TIME! A very rare luxury, proving that "special" can happen anywhere. As I read back through that sentence I realize that it was cheese to the Nth degree. Forgive me.

Whitney and I are diving into a new adventure with the help of Dave Ramsey's "The Total Money Makeover" book. We are giving our money-related behaviors and thoughts a much-needed facelift, and it's been eye-opening. I am so proud of Whitney for her support and in many ways her initiative in making relatively drastic changes to the way we handle finances. I would have zero chance at success with this program without her help. Thanks Whit. We're only on our third month with the "Baby Steps" but plan to stick with it for the long haul. We've even sold some things lying around for years to help us attack our debt (yep, I have sold over 300 dollars worth of Magic: The Gathering cards on Ebay). It feels good to have a plan. Special thanks to my buddy Derek for giving me that book so many years ago.

We have been fortunate to have Whitney's mother and both of my parents visit us in SC over the past month. Will adores his grandparents and had a blast with them. Of course, they had fun getting to know a growing Zach too.

Work for me has been very busy, as we move towards wrapping up year 2 of our research study in Horry County. I also got to attend a national conference on school psychology in Philadelphia, which was a great learning and networking experience. It's a great field to be in, where grad students, practitioners, and esteemed researchers and professors all co-mingle with great approachability and respect. I've been to many conferences but this was one of the best. Equally as important was the consumption of my first ever cheesesteak, and what better place to do so than Philly? I took a photo for my life's record book. I won't be offended if none of you want to download the photo and frame it. Just consider it...

We all miss our out of town friends and family and look forward to seeing you all as soon as we can.

With love,
Johnathan, Whitney, Will and Zach

Most of you know this by now, but we are expecting a new munchkin around May 28th of next year! We had intended for a while to start trying for a baby after I graduated, and we're fortunate to have been successful so quickly. Poor Whitney has been VERY nauseous and we're all ready for Mama to feel more like herself again soon! Yesterday Whitney was 11 weeks pregnant so we think the worst of it will pass soon. We have narrowed down boy names quite a bit but can't seem to find one for a girl (which my sister says indicates that this will definitely be a girl). Any ideas? Here is a picture of our little friend.

We've had a nice couple of months since our last post. Both sets of grandparents came to visit in October and we all had a great time together. Will especially had fun showing Grandmommy, Granddaddy, Grammie and Grandpa his favorite beach and his favorite playground. Grammie and Grandpa were here over Halloween and got to see Will in his train conductor costume. He looked so adorable - it's too bad that he took a face plant into the corner of his toy box the day before! Oh well...you can't be a cool dude without getting banged up every now and then. Will keeps telling me that he's amassing scars to help him pick up chicks anyway. Enjoy a slew of pictures from the past couple of months.