Our Christmas...

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Zoo

On Monday, we decided to take a trip to the zoo. The day was a typical Oregon day, raining. But it was wonderful! There was just a slight drizzle, and the place was empty. We didn't have to fight crowds, and there was a good number of animals out. Some of Stanley's favorites were the bobcats, the ducks, the chickens (aka bawk bawks), and the elephants. Heather's favorites were the lions, the cheetah that was really close to us, and the giraffe. Scott's favorites were the eagles, the beavers, and the tigers. It was worth it, and for Christmas Heather "might" be getting a zoo membership, and she can take one free guest with her each time. We're looking forward to using it this year!

We had to bundle up, so we didn't freeze!

Stanley's new favorite animal is the "bawk bawk" thanks to our friends Keith and

Rachel and their wonderful farm in Corvallis.

A family photo, with a Cheetah sneaking into the picture to the left. Actually, he was just taking a nap, and we got him in our picture!

Fun Google Tools

Recently, I've been playing around with some Google tools, and it's fun what is available. I'm hoping to get Google Voice, and then I can solve the dilemma of my Salem phone number when I live in Sandy. But for now, I've learned an easy way to post on our blog from my iGoogle home page. Pretty nifty. Have a great day!

Recovery

A big thank you to everyone who was praying for us, asking how we're doing, and providing different things for us. We are now fully recovered from our week of Swine Flu! Well, almost. We still have some lingering coughs, Stanley is still a little fussy still, but we're feeling so much better. Our mothers/mother-in-loves were awesome. Both Cinda and Sue would bring us Gatoraide, drugs, food, flowers, and more. It was weird waving to them through the window, and not being able to give them hugs to say thank you. When I went back to work on Friday (fortunately it was an enter in grades day) I had a lot of coworkers asking how we were. We also had a lot of people praying for us from Facebook. Thank you thank you thank you.

Now Heather is in full swing with her Dove Chocolate business, which she is enjoying. She had her first party today, and another tomorrow night. If you want more information you can see her Taste and See blog.

Last night Good Shepherd had its kickoff on a new thing happening. It's called "The North," and it's a new type of service in the North Auditorium. It's geared more towards the younger generation. The music is a little louder, and the focus is more relationship building. They provided a great place to hang out before and afterwards to meet people and to "do church." It will be great to see how God uses this new venue. Seth lead the worship and it is always fun to see his heart and what God is doing in his life.

Thank you again, and we'll keep you posted on what else happens.

Swine Flu

We've all been hearing about it. It's been in the news, and spreading like a pandemic. WHO (World Health Organization) categorized it as a phase 6 pandemic. Well, it made it's way to the Overby home. That's right, myself, Heather, and Stanley all have (had) the H1N1 virus. It started in the Gresham-Barlow School District at an Elementary School. Then it made it's way to Barlow where several of my students were out with it. Then I got it. I started feeling crummy last Thursday. By Thursday night I was out. They are not officially testing people because if you do have it they don't want you at the doctor's office. But I had a high fever (up to 103), aches and chills, cough, sneezing, runny nose. No vomiting or diarrhea though. That's the main sign of swine flu (which actually isn't related to pigs). All the other symptoms of the flu without the nausea. Well, I was out all Friday, and into Saturday. Heather and Stanley were trying to stay away from me, Heather even wore the mask when she brought me something. I started to mend by Saturday, but by Saturday night, Heather and Stanley were starting to show the signs. Which means recovering dad is now caretaker dad. I've been tending to my two sickies since then. Stanley mended mostly by Sunday night. He had a slight fever though Monday night. We're most worried about Heather since she is pregnant. She gets to take this nasty Tamaflu which helps battle the H1N1 but adds the delight of extra nausea and vomiting in the mean time. So be praying for recovery. I still have a slight cough, but God's definitely given me the strength to press on. I'm taking Monday-Thursday off work to heal completely myself and care for Heather and Stanley. It's weird waving at Grandma Sue or Nana when they drop something off from the window and not be able to go give them a hug. That's what we're up to now. Here's a picture of what Stanley has been doing a lot of as we're in quarantine. Watching Movies :-)

With Autumn's Arrival...

I have a few pictures of Stanley to share with you.

I'll have these and some more on Facebook if you want to check them out. And Picasa for Beth.

Chocolate anyone?

Hey everyone! Click on over to Heather's Blog to learn about the new adventure she has just begun! (And place your vote on her poll to make her really happy.) Hope all is well for you.

What's Stanley Getting Into...

We thought it would be fun to post some pictures of what Stanley's been up to...or into. Enjoy.Here I found Stanley climbing into the cupboard at our old house. This was a cupboard that he was allowed to get into. He just took that one step further. You can see the two little Gerber jar lids on the floor. We had a stash of them hidden away in the back of the cupboard because they were a pain to clean up. Stanley finally found them...

As we were packing, I couldn't resist putting Stanley into the box that had all his stuffed animals in. He loved it, as you can clearly see by his expression. :-)

Stanley loves playing with the pots and pans and mixing bowls. He thought it would be fun to use the mixing bowl as a hat (or did daddy think it would be fun?). Either way, it ended up on his head, and resulted in some laughs and good pictures.

Hope you are doing well. School is in full swing for me, and Heather's body is still adjusting to the new baby. Here is one last picture of the newest (or soon to be) addition of the Overby family.

At first glance this new baby might seem to have a very predominant Overby nose. If you look closely, those are actually his/her hands up by the head.

...and summer is over

Wow, the summer sure went by fast. This has been a huge summer of change, and a lot has happened. I won't go into a lot of detail but here are a few things that happened.

• Heather got a facebook account. Another reason we haven't updated this recently. I (Scott) might take it upon myself to keep our blog updated for those who still read it :-)
• We bought a house!!! We are now residents of the booming city of Sandy. :-) With our mortgage, home insurance, and taxes we now only pay $40 more a month than we did in the house we rented. Not bad, and it's ours. Although I've been doing a lot of home improvement projects. More on that later.
• We went to Tahoe with Heather's family. It was a blast seeing Beth, Thomas, Andrea, Gavin, and Kade. Little Bentli is to be born any day now. It was also interesting having 10 people staying in a two bedroom condo. Well worth the time and memories.
• We found out that Heather's pregnant with our second baby!!! ETA March 20th.
• Scott worked with the Multnomah Education Service District (MESD) on some math test question writing. Not very exciting, but it paid well.
• Scott ran the Hood to Coast Relay. I ran with a group of Barlow teachers/counselors plus a few others. I surprised myself by running mostly sub 6:30 minute miles, and on my 7.72 mile leg I was able to pass 34 people. Although I did get passed by someone who was running sub 6 minute miles maybe even 5 minute miles. It was a great time, and I'm hoping to do it again next year.
• A few days after we moved into our new house we had Urska (pronounced Ursh-ka, Stanley says are-da) stay with us for a week and a half. Heather met Urska in 2003 in Slovenia at Heather and Urska's first Josiah Venture English Camp. In 2006 when Heather and I went that was Urska's fourth and last English Camp. The relationship has continued, and when Urska was visiting the United States this summer (she worked at a summer camp in Connecticut for most of the summer), Heather invited her to stay with us. She was very helpful with Stanley, and we really enjoyed having her stay with us as our first houseguest. She flew out this morning to visit San Fransisco, and when Stanley woke up he was calling out "are-da, are-da." Yes Stanley already misses Urska too.

Now that summer is over, we'll be getting back into a routine for the school year. Our "normal" always changes, and "normal" this year will be much different than what it was. As Heather grows around the middle with a new baby forming inside of her I will be tackling one home improvement project after another while trying to balance work and family, and with Stanley getting bigger and more vocal, things will never be "calm" around here again. But we are so thankful for our home and family. Hopefully, I can keep you more updated on some of our adventures to come. Hope everyone is doing well and please let us know if you read this blog or if you only do facebook now.

Summer is Here!!!

Yes, it has been a long time. We hope you are doing well, and that everyone in your family is healthy. Right now, we are enjoying the summer. These last few months have been very crazy with Scott coaching the track team at Barlow, Stanley starting to run everywhere, and Heather chasing after him and working on a lot of new crafting projects. Now that summer is here, Scott is at home, and life is good. While we are resting, we are not sitting around doing nothing. Scott is starting to run more with his new free time, and is taking Stanley with him. They are enjoying those morning excursions together. While they're doing that, Heather is working on her business endeavours. She is planning on opening a shop on Etsy (a giant craft fair online) and planning on doing some music classes with babies, toddlers, and preschoolers. We're spending time with our families, and hoping to go on a few trips this summer too! We'll try to keep you more posted this summer on our activities. In the meantime, stay cool, safe and have fun!

A Status Update...

Our little boy is walking everywhere! He has been walking for a while now but as of Monday he is walking all the time! It is soooooo fun to watch our little boy just stand up and walk. He toddles all over the house and when he loses his balance, he just pushes himself back up into a standing position and walks some more. I love it!!! By the way, I love this season of our life. He is also improving on how he communicates his desires and needs with me. Often times I give him a few options and he points to what he wants. Did I mention I'm having fun? I love this boy! What made my Mother's Day a happy one is Stanley Mac Overby. Thank you Lord for this wonderful gift.

Sorry I don't actually have any walking pictures. I'll work on that. Here's a new family pic though. Hope you like it. And check me out on Facebook some time. -Heather

My Funny Valentines...

January cuteness inside and out...