So much going on....

Sorry for the delay in any updates with us. We've been keeping busy. Dave is playing primary parent a lot more lately and WD has definitly become a Daddy's Boy. I'm taking a graduate class and working on my application to graduate school (I can take a few classes w/o being admitted); that on top of work, family, doctors' appointments, etc. has kept me pretty preoccupied. I've also been having several health issues as my body still tries to recover from childbirth, including numerous physical therapy appointments for my back and hips, as well as other things I'll not go into here.

WD is growing like a weed, and so smart. He had his 18mo check-up yesterday (even though he's 19.5 mos - it was the soonest we could get in). He's 26 pounds which is the 50th percentile for weight, he's between 25-50th percentile for height, and he's at the 75th percentile for head size. We did get a referral for a speech assessment, as he's not saying any words yet. He talks up a storm in jibberish, but not in English yet. So there is a free program that will assess and help him if he needs it that we will be doing. We're not worried yet, but the doctor suggests we just have the free evaluation to be proactive, rather than wait until he's 2 years old and behind others his age and trying to play catch-up.

Hope you are doing well, and we'll try to do a better job with pictures and posts in October!

Copperhead was Sunning by the Pool

Drew C. Wilson
Havelock News
http://www.havenews.com/news/0in-5994-style-span.html

When Kim Waters found a copper colored snake curled up on some decorative rocks next to her backyard swimming pool the first thing she did was call Havelock Police.
“I have a small dog. That’s why I had to call,” Waters said.
Officer William Pressler responded to the home at 215 Manchester Road Thursday morning.
The city’s animal control officer, Kim Van Houten, was in New Bern at the time so Pressler and Waters had to wait as the snake lay still, not moving from its apparent nap in the sun.
Pressler described the snake over the radio to Van Houten as being copper colored with a V-shaped head and splotches.
“Stay away from it,” said Van Houten in return.
Upon arrival Van Houten identified the snake as a copperhead, one of North Carolina’s venomous snakes.
“It was right by her pool by some decorative rocks,” Van Houten said. “It was curled up like it was sunning.”
“I poked him with the snake stick and he didn’t move,” Van Houten said, “so we took it out into the grass and made sure he was dead.” Van Houten decapitated the two-foot long viper on the spot and put in a bag.
“It’s the kind of snake you don’t want to be messing with,” Van Houten said.
“I’ve caught plenty of them,” she said. “They’re all over the place.”
North Carolina has the highest annual frequency of snakebites in the nation with 19 bites per 100,000 residents, according to WebMD, which also said the nation has 7,000 bites per year yet an average of only four deaths per year.
Van Houten doubted that Havelock’s recent rains had anything to do with this snake’s appearance.
“It’s a little late for him to be coming up because of the rains,” she said.
“He picked those rocks to sun on. I don’t know why he was dead. He didn’t have any bite marks on him,” Van Houten said.
Van Houten gets lots of snake calls. She encourages people not to kill snakes but to call her instead.
“There are endangered species out there,” she said.
“If you get something in your yard that needs looking at, call me,” she said.
“Hopefully I won’t have any more,” said Waters.
Down the street, her neighbor Irene Zaccardelli heard about the two-foot-long snake. “Two feet? That’s a python to me,” she said.

Both pictures here are of the actual event. Bottom from Mike & top from the Havelock Paper.