The Ballard Bunch

Okay, now I'm sufficiently frustrated. I just typed and ultimitely lost an entire family update. Let's try again...

I'm hoping that this will serve as a good way to keep friends and family far away up to date on our family goings-on. I loved Tanya's site and was inspired yet again by my Canadian BFF. :)

To the left is one of the latest pictures of Tatum. She's growing so quickly - I can hardly believe she's already a few weeks past one year old. She's walking like a pro and keeping me on my toes. We have Emmit (Beau's black lab that lives with the rents) for the week, but she's not so sure of the whole animal thing. She loves him from afar, but heaven forbid that he gets close enough to touch or lick her face! She's learning though, she'll venture closer and closer as the day goes on. I think by the end of the week, they'll be in puppy love.

Beau's doing really well post-surgery. This time around he was only out of work for a week, so we feel really lucky about that. Now the goal is to watch the knee and hopefully prevent a third surgery from being necessary. He's going to physical therapy and is back at work, but taking it somewhat easy. Luckilly, his softball season was postponed a month, so he'll be much more healthy for that when it starts May 1. It should be fun - he organized a team with friends last year and loved it. Tatum and I had a great time, too - all of the player's wives or girlfriends come and watch, bring their kids, etc. Fortunately, I enjoy hanging out with the girls and Tatum is big enough this year to run around with the other kids. Plus, it's a great, guaranteed excuse to a day in the sun at least once a week, right? We're all looking forward to a fun summer before the baby arrives!

Speaking of baby, it's a girl! Beau and I were very excited to find out at our ultrasound last week - I was secretly hoping for a girl. A boy would be great as well, but I have EVERYTHING for a babe, plus it will be nice for Tatum to have a buddy since they'll be so close in age (17 months). I've been feeling great and everything is progressing as it should and the baby looks healthy and big. Let's just keep our fingers crossed that we're not growing another 10 pounder this time around!!!

I'm still working hard with Tesla at getting this business up and running. I think things are going really well - we have our first product showing early next month. There's a lot of work involved, but I think it'll really turn out to be something great if we can just get through these next few weeks of prep work. Once our website is up and running, I'll be sure to let you all know how to access it and see the fruits of our labors.

I think that's about it for now. I'm going to try and post some more pictures so that you can see how things are at the Ballard house as of late. I hope you are all doing well and would love to hear from you whenever possible. Love to all!