I'm going back to college!

This week brought a major change to the Vargas household. For the first time in a while, I am no longer going to have the worry of being laid off hovering over me! On Thursday I was offered and accepted a new job at UTSA! Needless to say, a big weight has been lifted and Toni and I are both very excited. I will be doing computer support and actually doing a lot more hands on type work which I’ve always enjoyed so it’s definitely a good thing. Really there aren’t many negatives with the new job, I’ll be 8 miles from home and the environment is very secure. They haven’t had layoffs in IT and if anything, they are growing. I think it should be a good fit and look forward to getting started. I gave my 2 weeks notice at Wachovia and will start on Monday March 9th. I will say that I am a little sad to be moving on. I made some really good friends and worked with and for some pretty classy people. Wachovia has far exceeded everything I ever expected from a large company. I can honestly say that I never expected the incredible amount of respect and class that Wachovia has shown me. At every level, they are a class act that embodies integrity and I only wish that the economy had been different and I could have continued with them. Just as I still miss my coworkers from before Wachovia and think about them often, I’m leaving good friends behind again who I hope to keep in touch with.

Caitlin isn’t crawling yet but she’s started to get a little more mobile. She is crawling backwards and rolls around quite a bit. If there’s a toy she wants to get to she can usually manage to find a way to get to it. I don’t think it’ll be much longer before she’s crawling or walking. This week she also got very vocal for the first time. She’s actually saying the word “dada” but it’s obvious that she doesn’t know what it means yet. It’s funny to watch her playing with a toy and talking at the same time. From everything I’ve read, she should start knowing the meaning of mama and dada in the next couple of months.

Other than that, things have been pretty quiet for us. I think I’m finally getting over the sinus infection that I’ve been fighting now for 3 weeks . Tomorrow Toni and I have our dentist appointments in the afternoon and then after that I’ll be taking Caitlin to the Doctor. She’s had a cough that we want to get looked at since I started with a cough. Hopefully Caitlin won’t get the same thing I got.

7 months old and Happy Valentine's Day!

What a week! To start the week, I continued fighting what I thought was a cold. By Wednesday, I was doing pretty bad and decided to go to the Doctor. Turns out I'm actually now fighting a severe sinus infection. I left the Doctor's office with 4 prescriptions and missed another 2 days of work. I can honestly say that I don't remember being this sick ever. I'm still sleeping quite a bit but I at least feel better than I did at the end of the week.

Besides Caitlin's eye appointment that I've already posted about, Caitlin turned 7 months old on Friday and as usual for her birthdays, we had another monthly checkup. This time she only had to go in for 3 shots which she obviously did not enjoy. Luckily, she won't have another appointment until she turns 9 months old. :) After her appointment, we decided to take her to the Guenther house with us for breakfast. She seemed to enjoy the new surroundings and even attracted some attention. We had a woman come over to our table and tell us how beautiful Caitlin is. :) We had a nice breakfast and enjoyed getting out for the morning.

We didn't go anywhere for Valentines Day but Caitlin's Nana Bev and Aunt Sarah stopped by and gave Caitlin her presents. In the middle picture above, Caitlin is sitting with her stuffed dog that I gave her and her giant caterpillar from her Nana Bev. In that picture, her mouth is open so you can see her front tooth that is coming in. It's still kind of hard in this pic but it's the best pic we have so far.

The only other news this week was that I had an interview for a Network Support Analyst job with UTSA (University of Texas at San Antonio). I thought the interview went well and I should find something out by the middle of the week. They had 73 applicants of which 12 were interviewed. I am in the final 6 so far and there are 2 more people to interview. Hopefully I'll find out soon!

The eye appointment

Caitlin's eye appointment today went well. They dilated her eyes and did a bunch of tests to measure her eyes and look for any problems. Everything came back fine except for a minor case of what's called "Duane's Syndrome". It's not nearly as bad as it sounds though. The problem essentially is that one of the 6 muscles that control Caitlin's right eye isn't fully developed. The muscle in question is the muscle that controls her right eye moving to the right. What ends up happening is when Caitlin tries to look to the right, her left eye moves as it should but her right doesn't. End result is that her left eye looks like it's crossed because her right eye hasn't moved to the right to match the left. The good news is that Caitlin usually compensates for this by turning her head to the right to keep her vision in focus which is a good thing. Caitlin doesn't have to move her head to look to the right all of the time so it's not anything that is going to cause her problems. Hers is a very mild case and while it will never improve, it won't cause her any problems down the road either. The only thing that it would change is that Caitlin would not be able to be a fighter pilot. So overall, things went well. There's nothing seriously wrong and surgery won't be necessary. If you want to read more about it, check it out here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Duane_syndrome

Happy Birthday to me!

Today I celebrated my 37th birthday! Toni and Caitlin got me a new universal remote control so I'll no longer have to deal with the 6 that I was having to deal with before. Definitely a lot nicer to just have the one now! It's a really nice remote that I hooked up to my computer to program. The programming was really easy and now I can control several components with the touch of one button. Way cool! :) We decided to just stay home today because I've been fighting a cold all week and still am not back to 100%. Luckily Caitlin and Toni haven't seemed to catch whatever I had.

Caitlin continued doing good eating this week. She's moved on to her green vegetables and hasn't been fussy at all about eating them. This week we'll probably even get to start her on fruits as well. That should taste a lot better for her than the vegetables.

This week should be busy. Tomorrow morning we are taking Caitlin to the eye doctor to get her left eye looked at. Sometimes it wanders and we want to get it looked at just to be safe. I don't think it's anything serious but we'd both rather get her looked at. This coming Friday Toni and I both have the day off to take Caitlin for some vaccinations in the morning. I'll try to post something quick tomorrow to let everyone know how Caitlin's eye appointment goes.

SUPER BOWL XLIII CHAMPIONS!!!

What a week!!! This week’s post is a little late due to the excitement in the Vargas household last night of watching the Steelers win Super Bowl 43 by defeating the Arizona Cardinals 27-23!! It was definitely an exciting game and probably one of the best Super Bowls I’ve ever seen. Being a lifelong Steelers fan though, it was rough watching them have to come back to take the lead at the end. I would have preferred a Steelers blowout but overall, I’m happy with the results. Caitlin didn’t watch too much of it with me but she was showing her support with her Steelers bottle (thank you very much Laura!) and her Terrible Towel.

This week was long! We started the week exhausted. Caitlin has started teething and we can even see one of her front teeth starting to show under the gum! Because of the pain, Caitlin didn’t sleep well all week. It seemed like we were up most nights during the early morning hours trying to comfort her. We’ve tried teething rings that you put in the fridge and Baby Orajel but they seem to only offer temporary relief for her. Most nights it seemed like we were going to bed before 9 just trying to get caught up on sleep!

The week started with closing on the house. We’re now officially refinanced at a lower rate which is obviously a good thing. For the life of me, I can’t understand why closing on a house has to be so difficult though. We spent quite a while signing countless forms to make it all official. Toni has also been putting in a lot of hours at work but this week it should slow down for her so that will be nice.

On Saturday we had to take my truck to the dealer to get some work done. The check engine light came on and with only 3 weeks left on the extended warranty, I figured I’d better get it in and get it fixed. Luckily I had the warranty because the problem was with the Air Conditioning and would have cost quite a bit to fix. I still had to spend more money than I wanted on brakes, tune up, oil change, etc.. While we were waiting for my truck to be finished, we walked around the lot and looked at cars. Actually, we looked at the last vehicle I ever thought I’d be looking at – a mini-van! Toni took one for a test drive and after seeing all of the features and driving it, she’s now hooked! She really likes the Dodge Grand Caravan. I have to agree that for trips and day to day use with Caitlin that it would definitely be nice. Maybe once I land a stable job, we’ll get Toni one. We’ll see….

Hopefully this week will be smooth. I’m fighting a cold so hopefully that will clear up soon. Hope everyone has a great week!