Happy Halloween!

..from the VA Tompkins. A picture of the Dragon and the dragon-taming knight Sir Gilbert. Turns out he wasn't really a knight, he was only a Page. Then I found out that he wasn't even a Page, he was actually a Minstrel. Whatever he is, he's got great legs!:

The (32.5 weeks pregnant) lady bug: Cecilia sorting through her candy:

Looking forward to seeing pictures from the rest of you! Love, Ryan, Mary, Cecilia, and baby Ryan

Matt & Candyce TV segment

Pretty crazy how things happened to prepare them for this! Now Jack is terrified of it happening to him!

Former Real World contests baby delivered on Valley freeway

Dada!

Goal!

Sofia Sofia Na Na Na Na Na Na!

Fall 2010

Here she is in all her glory!

By the way, the title is David's song for her. Whenever we sing it to her, she shouts for joy, "Dada"! meaning, "Daddy sings that song to me!"

Ready to start Notre Dame football season as their cheerleader!

In Sofia's words, "futball" or "goal". Yes, she is a bit confused between American football and European football but she enjoys them both the same.

Tailgating!

Walking home from the tailgate.

The essence of cool.

A few pictures from our quick trip to Florida.

Playing with "Jac ack".

Sleeping soundly during our bout of the stomache flu

Playing in the beautiful fall leaves

She loves to walk through them...

...and to have them fall on her head.

Our little actress letting us know she is tired. This is after we took her to a party one evening, and yes we were out past her bedtime, and as soon as we got home she collapsed on the floor in protest. She refused to move for ten minutes as we "aww"ed and took pictures.

Another tired moment but this time with Daddy.

Bathtime robed in Mommy's towels.

Her favorite activity: reading books

Riding her pony backwards. Definitely more fun.

Her barf bucket making its debut as her hat.

"U gotta problem wit dat?"

Piggy back ride!

Beautiful and amazing story!

I wanted to share this story with you! My cousin Matt and his wife were expecting their second baby girl due today. She went into labor a few days early and the labor progressed much quicker than expected. They were on their way to the hospital that was only 7 miles away and Candyce told him to pull over because the baby was coming. He pulled over, called 911 and minutes later delivered his little girl. You can read the full story here, they made the news. Most likely something we hope not to encounter, but what a story they'll share for the rest of their lives! We're all thankful there were no complications and Mommy and baby are both fine.

Tempe dad delivers daughter on side of freeway

I know, I know... FINALLY!

Hello Family! I hope you are all well. I am finally making some time to post a picture update! I've attached pictures from July - October. There is a slideshow of Mom's 50th Surprise Party and another slideshow with random pictures going back to July.

It has been a pretty low key few months. The most exciting news was finding out we are expecting Baby #2 on May 10th! Telling the family was pretty funny. Jack had an idea (I was unaware of his idea at the time). We called the family together and Jack announced Isabella had something she wanted to show everyone. With everyone's eyes on Isabella, Jack asks "Isabella, how do you show them Mommy's pregnant?" No one reacted, instead they stared at Isabella expecting her to do something. Jack repeated himself and Mom says "Is this a joke?! Are you pregnant?!" Something to that effect. We agreed and of course everyone jumped on me. It was too funny, I wish we had it on camera! We are so excited and of course a little nervous. I am 11 weeks along. It is already flying by for us! I feel pretty sick at times, but it is no where near how sick I felt while pregnant with Isabella. I am so thankful for that! We look forward to knowing if we are having a boy or girl and can't wait to see Isabella interact with her new sibling. She will be a great big sister! Here are a couple pictures from the second pregancy test I took. Just so you know, this stick was dipped in urine so it is confined. BUT it still grosses me out even knowing that. However, the pictures are priceless!

Notice me holding down her other hand. She wanted to play with it!

Ahh! I wasn't always successful!
First and only shot so far of Baby #2 belly. I feel silly taking pictures without a belly showing, but I think a picture will be due soon!

Mom's 50th Celebration

July - October 2010

And sadly, Isabella received her first bloody lip today. She was bending down to pick up and throw her bear because she thought it was the funniest thing! She reached a little too close to her feet and toppled over. Her lip smashed on the concrete floors, yes the ones inside! This picture was taken a while later after a lot of the swelling went down and bleeding stopped. She was a brave girl!

That's all I have! Short and sweet :). I will do my best to post more often! We will be in Sanibel next week for vacation. Jack was able to accomplish the bonus/competition his Dad challenged him to. So it's a nice treat for our family. We are in need of a change of scenery! I'm sure I will post pictures from Sanibel shortly after we return. We love and miss you all!

Here is a slideshow of pictures from Cecilia's big day today. Thank you everyone for the phonecalls and blog posts! Cecilia really appreciated them. :)

Here are a couple videos we took. As you can see, Cecilia was a little out of it during her present-opening because it ended up taking place way past her bedtime. We had to rush through it because she kept asking for the cake which was sitting untouched in front of her, torturing her. Something of a Suarez when it comes to food, she could not think of anything else while that cake was there! She absolutely LOVES her presents though, and I'm sure I'll have follow-up pictures of her playing with them.

This was taken after Cecilia was bathed and her over-tiredness started to manifest itself in her crazy hyperness. She was practically bouncing off the walls (that is, when she wasn't hugging and kissing her new dolls from Grandma and Grandpa Tompkins). When she started doing her adorable belly laugh when Ryan was tickling her, we just had to take a video because we love that sound!

Happy Birthday Cecilia!!!

Here are my favorite pics of Cecilia...they aren't in the order I wanted them...I can't even write underneath them...Oh well...Anyways, I love her faces -so expressive...there's sad and tired, there's in trouble, there's the cool face, there's the happy family face, there's the thinking face and faces I can't even describe. Love you and Happy birthday!

Prayers Needed

Hello Family,

Please pray for me today and especially tomorrow. I have the LSAT tomorrow morning from about 8:30/9 am - 2:00/3 pm in the afternoon. Since this was the week for our Lady of Rosary, I decided to attach one of my favorite depictions of Mary (except, it's not even technically Mary but that's okay)...prayers my good friends, prayers. I know I can count on you all. I'll let you know how I did after the test! Love you all!

Cecilia update

We just wanted to share Cecilia's latest accomplishment with the family: