Welcome to our blog!

Hmmm... where to begin? I suppose a quick update on each of us is in order.

Matt spent all of 2004 in Saudi Arabia where he was sent with his National Guard unit. He was pulled out of his senior year at Western Washington University in October 2003 to go. He was on track to graduate in June 2004 but all of that was put on hold for the military. He returned from the middle east in March of 2005 in a lot of pain. He was diagnosed with Reiter's syndrome before he deployed and as a result he developed Rheumatoid arthritis in his feet and shoulder in the year and a half he spent on active duty. The Army kept him on active duty status while he underwent surgery and physical therapy and was finally put on a medication to get the arthritis under control. Once that was done the army began the process of giving him a medical discharge which was finally complete on May 22. He is a civilian now- NO MORE ARMY!!! He will re-start his senior year at Western this fall. In the meantime, he has landed an excellent position at Alpha Technologies in Bellingham, a company that manufactures power supplies for cable and telephone.

As for me, I quit working at Lenscrafters soon after Matt left in 2004 so I could stay home with Isaac. That was one of the best decisions I ever made! Being home with him was such a gift after working full time for the first 18 months of his life. That same year I went to school and received my certificate in Residential Interior Design. I have been free-lancing ever since. Matt and I decided last summer it was time to add one more to our little family. In October we learned we were expecting baby #2 and in May we welcomed our second son Max. I am home full time with both boys for the time being, time will tell what I will be doing next.

Isaac is almost 4 now! He starts preschool this fall and I can't believe it! My baby is not a baby anymore! He is such a good little boy. And man is he ALL BOY! He loves anything with wheels or wings. His latest fixation is of course the Cars movie. Though you might expect him to be into Lightning McQueen (the red racecar) he instead really likes Mater (the beat-up old tow truck). He calls Lightning "Mater's race car" and he loves to quote Mater's tagline "daggum!" though Isaac insists it is pronounced "dagoom". He loves books! He will get a book out and say he is going to read it to you. He gets all settled in, opens it up and says: "ok now, you say the words". He is a great big brother too, he loves to help out with Max any way he can.

Maxwell Duncan was born May 28, 2006 at 10:13 a.m. by c-section. We named him Max because we just love the name but felt it needed to be a proper name so we agreed on Maxwell. His middle name is in honor of the town I grew up in. Max weighed 7 lbs 2 oz and was 18 and a half inches long at birth. He will be 6 weeks old on Sunday July 9th. He probably weighs a little more than 8 lbs right now. Max is a sweet baby. He sleeps well at night already, only waking once to eat. Isaac was an easy baby and everyone told us that we couldn't possibly get lucky twice but it seems we have.
Ok so that's it for all of us. This blog will be updated regularly with pictures as well so be sure to check back and watch our boys grow!