Happy Birthday, Dylan!

Our baby boy is one year old today! Words can't describe the joy this child has brought to our lives these past twelve months, despite his recently discovered ability to hit everything (hard) with a wooden spoon/lego/whatever and kiss-bite. It's amazing what a little person Dylan Grant has become-vocal like his mama, determined and persistent like his daddy. He's into everything, imitating us, catching and throwing (and saying!) the ball, and...walking! Dylan managed his first uncertain steps last week, and he has been growing more and more confident with each passing day. Love, love, love this little guy! What a wonderfully challenging and enriching journey!

Ok, enough syrupy accolades for the kid. Life is good...another day, another crazy second grade story for me, another dollar counted and put on a spreadsheet for Casey. Vera the geriatric patient is hanging in there...and getting lazier by the minute. We enjoyed a great (hurried) trip to Pittsburgh over Thanksgiving to visit Great Grandma and Grandpa Gene, and look forward to a visit to Tennessee over Christmas vacation to visit with Casey's family. We were sad to say goodbye to Aunt Jenn, who just moved to Denver (why she moved out west right after we moved east is a bit suspect if you ask me), but now we have another beautiful place to put on our list of future vacation spots. The house is finally settled, and there may even be a picture or two on this month's update. We are thankful for so many wonderful friends and family this time of year, and are excited to spend time with so many of you in these upcoming weeks.

Please tune in periodically for blog updates-you'll no longer hear from us on a monthly basis, since all of the major milestones have been accomplished;-0 We love and miss all of you, and wish you and your loved ones a happy, healthy, and relaxing holiday season.

With love,

Katie, Casey, Dylan, and Vera Phillips

11 months...closing in on a year!

Greetings to everyone, and happy fall. It is extremely hard to believe that the Phillips family's youngest member is almost one year old. Next month's blog will hopefully detail the exciting snake-themed birthday party that I am planning for Dylan (there is still room for discussion on the theme, another contender with a lot more familial support is cookie monster), complete with theme cake pictures! For now, the biggest news we have to share is that Casey passed all four parts of the CPA on his first try! What a proud moment for him and all of his hard work! Good thing he has a wife that likes to brag, otherwise, you might never hear this news:-) We are trying to enjoy the fall before the beginning of another accounting busy season, and Dylan's early birthday present zoo pass from Nana and Grandpa has allowed us to spend these beautiful fall weekends hanging out in the reptile house and big cat corral. If you come visit, you can even come along as our free guest!

It was a tough October for Dylan, as he battled a cold, his first fever, ring worm, yeast rash, strep throat, and another cold, in that order. I think he's finally better. A bright spot was Halloween, when he took the neighborhood by force as cookie monster. We had to cancel our trip to Penn State because of his illness, and now that's just a whole other story that has had way too much media interference already, and so I will not share any comments on that. What's coming up? A trip to Pittsburgh over Thanksgiving, my first round of conferences, and some serious party planning are on the agenda. We miss all of you!

10/10-10 months!

Hi to all of our family and friends near and far. The big news...we're in our new house! After a few last minute postponements for various reasons, we are officially homeowners and loving it! Casey enjoys breaking and then fixing things, Dylan can't get enough of the wall sockets (safety plugged, of course), and I am basking in my red kitchen. What can I say...life has drastically improved since moving into natural sunlight! Dylan is great-I don't know, it's all a blur right now, I can't really think of anything monumental to report. Not walking yet, but I hardly notice considering the efficiency with which he finds and gets into everything. He just spent a wonderful long weekend with Papaw and Mamaw, and is looking forward to seeing Mimi in just a few days. Dylan also completed his sixth/seventh plane rides to Detroit for Hilary's wedding, and did wonderfully on the plane. Casey sits for his last CPA exam this Friday (he's 3/3 so far!), and then we'll have a few short months before the onslaught of another auditing busy season. As for second grade...well, I'm trying to write down the priceless moments that happen each day and managing to laugh more than cry, so that's good:-) Looking ahead, we are heading up to Penn State for the Illinois game Halloween weekend, and then, we're going to relax in our home for a few weekends without weddings and other commitments. Here's to a wonderful fall...Casey's favorite season, and something we are enjoying about the east coast. Miss all of you...hope you are well.

9 months, Holla!

Greetings to all! This month's post will be short and sweet, due to the fact that whatever free time I previously enjoyed has vanished. Dylan, Dylan, Dylan...love this kid! These days, Dylan enjoys crawling all over the place, particularly if it involves chasing after long, skinny objects like the camelbak water tube and the plastic snakes Nana keeps on the deck to "scare the birds away." He also likes pointing, giving five, and throwing balls back and forth with his dad. Daycare has been successful so far, and Dylan loves his time with Ms. Patti, Rocco, and the gang. Well, in my mind he loves it, otherwise, it would be unbearable dropping him off. My first week with my second graders was generally a success, and though it's quite an adjustment, I do enjoy my class. Casey has one CPA exam left, and most importantly, we are officially closing on our house September 22nd! Fun fact to all: did you know that 1 in 5 short sales is sold at auction prior to settlement, unbeknownst to the buyers? Yeah-we narrowly adverted slipping into that category thanks to my detail-orientated, local-paper-scouring accountant husband. Anyway, as football season gets underway and the cool weather moves in, we hope all of our friends and family are enjoying the last few weeks of summer, and we miss all of you dearly.

8 months, Wowz!

Lots of new and exciting things to report from the Phillips family as Dylan Grant celebrates his 2/3 of a year birthday! We'll start with the star of the show. Dylan is on the verge of crawling forward, although he'd like everyone to know that he's quite competent at crawling backwards, thank you very much. He's got lots of ba's, ma's, da's, and ga's to share with the world, although no first words quite yet. I love this age with him, as his little personality (a bit mischievous!) and sense of humor have emerged, and it's going to be very difficult to go back to work next month and leave him with someone who is not me:-( So, my exciting news is that I'll be teaching second grade next year in a Title 1 school in Bensalem, and I am very pumped about this (although it will take a bit of re-learning to adjust to 7 year olds when I'm used to the 10-11 range). Casey is gearing up for his 3rd CPA test, Financial Reporting, and the Phillips family will be jubilant when this chapter of Casey's professional life is over. And the best news of all...it looks like a basement move-out date is finally in sight! After an eternal wait on an ironically named "short" sale deal, we should be homeowners by the end of September. WOOOOOOOOOOHOOOOOO!! Upcoming events include traveling to Minnesota to visit Rachel and meet Noah, and Pittsburgh to celebrate Grandpa Gene's 100th birthday. We are looking forward to seeing many of you there; as for the rest of you, we miss you!

7 months today!

Life is cruising along here on the east coast as Dylan celebrates seven months of life with his two-toothed grin. We just returned from a wonderful trip to Tennessee and got to spend quality time with Papaw, Mamaw, Mimi, Papa Joe, and various friends, uncles, aunts, and cousins. There is never enough time to fit everything in, and we were sad to leave. Dylan has become quite vocal, although at this point in time it seems he might never crawl (possibly because he can't lift his enormous stomach off the ground?). Casey is halfway through his four CPA exams and has done very well on them, and I am putting off thinking about the return to my professional life this fall, as I cannot imagine leaving my sweet little boy with anyone else all day:-( We are still waiting to hear from the bank if our offer was accepted, hopefully the 8 month post will be full of good news! Wishing everyone well...we miss all of you who are far and hope to see all of you who are near in the near future.

Dylan Grant is 6 months old!

It's unbelievable how much we have to report in our new family blog post today. Let's get to it! Dylan has successfully completed half a year of life, and he is loving it. A member of the sitting club for two weeks now, he also has his first tooth, has been enjoying rice cereal, and can't find enough objects to put in his mouth. Dylan met his first maternal cousin, Eliyana Rose Westmoreland, at Chester County hospital this week, and did not try to eat her, which was great. Aunt Michelle is recovering wonderfully, and mom and baby are home in Malvern waiting for Aunt Katie to visit soon. Casey continues to put lots of time into his CPA studies, and is mostly enjoying his auditing position, and most excitedly, we put an offer in on a house off of Big Oak Road. Lots of excitement as the summer season begins!

5 months old

Dylan celebrated his five month birthday by spending a glorious afternoon in the sunshine of Tyler Park and hanging out with Nunu, Aunt Jenn, and Uncle Jeff. We also experienced Dylan's first visible emotion-anger-this past week when I tried to tear him away from his play gym bars. He couldn't detach them and get them into his mouth, and screamed inconsolably until we returned him to his standing position on the gym. Finally, Casey, Dylan, and Vera treated their wife/mother to a wonderful first mother's day, and set the bar high for father's day celebrations in June.

I'm Going to Give This a Shot...

So, it's been almost five months since my "Waiting game" post, with absolutely no informational updates about Dylan. So, he arrived! 12/10/2010, after 20 hours of labor and a c-section. Now that we are back east after a crazy, whirlwind four months, I have committed to at least bi-weekly updates on Dylan's adventures. This past week, after battling and defeating our first illness in the form of a bad cold, we went to the zoo for the first time. Dylan loved the sea otters and anacondas...everything else was a blur during nap time. Dylan currently spends the days playing with toys, bouncing in the jumper, and telling loud stories, while mom tries to get her PA teaching license without having a meltdown about the redundancy of the process. Four and a half months sure have flown by...