Photos
6 Months
Aug 24th
I cannot believe you are 6 months old already, my sweet sweet baby James. You are such a sweetheart. And a great sleeper! You are sleeping now, in fact. You usually go to bed at about 7:30 or 8, and sleep until 6:30, give or take a half hour. Your dad and I know that we are so, so lucky about that. We try not to take it for granted. We are lucky in many ways. You are so mellow; so even-tempered. You are a very go with the flow baby, and it makes our lives so much easier. I wish we could take credit for that, but I’m pretty sure it’s just how you are. Whatever it is, we’ll keep it!
You haven’t started solids yet, but Grandma Mary did give you a pickle last time we were at her house, and you had a couple tiny pieces of watermelon at Daddy’s company picnic on Sunday. You weren’t so sure about either one at first, but after a moment to consider you loved it and wanted more. At least until you were actually hungry. Then all you want is Momma’s milk.
You aren’t crawling, but you can roll from your back to your stomach and then back again. You don’t do it a lot, but you definitely are able, and you seem to do it most often when we aren’t watching you. We’ll be making dinner, or in the bedroom for a moment, and we’ll come back and you’ll be on a different side than we left you. You always look at us as if to say, “Well, duh! Why shouldn’t I roll over!?” You are also sitting on your own. We still need to be nearby, because you will invariably lean too far back or to the side and tip right over. It is so cute, and so far we’ve avoided any head bonks, but I’m sure they’ll be coming.
You don’t like tummy time very much, and so any progression towards crawling is slow. But you are a lot more tolerant of it now than you used to be, and so we’ll take that as a step forward, so to speak. Your dad and I aren’t too anxious for you to start crawling, anyway. That would mean we have to pack up all the cds and movies (or at least get them off the floor). Our apartment isn’t anywhere near baby-proof.
You started saying a couple consonants the weekend before last, and it is so amazing to see that progression. You babble at Daddy and I constantly; especially in the car on the way too and from daycare. I wish we could understand what you are saying, because I’m sure it is fascinating.
Daddy and I love you, sweet pea. We are excited to watch you continue to grow and learn. If you could just slow time down a bit so we are better able to enjoy it, that would be great.
Love,
Momma
In the hospital; just a couple days old.
James 1 month
James 2 months - photo by our friend Jason
James 3 months
James 4 months
James 5 months
James 6 months
And no, we aren’t letting him drink Mountain Dew. I promise.
How is another weekend gone?
Aug 15th
Here are a couple pictures from my weekend at my parents’ place:
All the girls ready to go out for the night. Note to self: hang out with people closer to my size so I don't look so huge.
Grandma gave James a pickle. He liked it!
This weekend Ryan’s parents & sister came up. We all went to the zoo today, and it was a lot of fun.
My future's so bright, I gotta wear shades. (He tried to eat them shortly after this photo was taken, so we aren't applying to Harvard just yet)
Polar bear. Duh.
What you can't see is that he is reaching for the camera. He's trying to eat it, along with everything else he can get his hands on.
Helping Auntie feed the goats (not really; he's just pretending).
We tried to tell him it was rude to chew on the giraffe's face while we were at the zoo, but he didn't care.
Another development this weekend: we now have (1 or 2) consonants. We’ve for sure heard the “d” sound. I never realized how excited I would get about someone making consonant sounds. It’s kind of ridiculous. But awesome.
Hope you all had a great weekend. It finally cooled off a little here (the high today was in the low 70s). I’m loving it.
We are *those* people
Aug 5th
We brought our baby to a bar last night. Not intentionally, but there it is anyway. We wanted to go try out this new place in town that says it’s a pub; they serve pub food and drinks. We have taken James to other “pub-like” places in town. They all feel like restaurants that serve alcohol, so we didn’t think it would be a big deal. But as soon as we walked in I knew it would be weird. And of course the place was almost totally empty, so it was really awkward. We went and sat in the chairs/couch in the corner, and tried to keep James quiet, but we forgot his nook, and he’s at this stage where he likes to scream. He’s happy screaming, but still; it’s a weird noise, and distinctly a baby. In a bar.
I figured we would grab a beer and eat and be out of there quick, but of course everything took longer than it should have, and James started getting a little noisier, and so I fed him. Normally no big deal. But we were in a bar, remember? And I had a beer in front of me. I only drank half of it the entire time we were there, but still. Klassy. With a capital K. Oh well. No one said anything to us about it, and really, for a baby, James was awesome. I took him outside once we were done eating, and waited there for Sam and Ryan to finish and pay, and we said repeatedly that if we ever go back we’ll be getting a babysitter. It probably wouldn’t have been so bad if we had been able to sit outside, but of course the only time it rained that day was right when we wanted to go out.
James & I are heading North after work tomorrow. It is my middle-younger sister’s bachelorette party on Saturday, and Grandma is going to watch the baby for me (and my sister’s kids for her – Thanks, Grandma!). I haven’t been up North in a few months, so I’m excited to go. I’ll try to get pictures, although no promises.
Speaking of pictures, here is one of one of the ships we toured last weekend:
It was cool to see the ships. We only toured 2 of them; the HMS Bounty (from the movies!) and this one – the Europa. It was pretty hot and muggy down there, and there were a billion people, so I was ok with not spending all day wandering. It was fun, though, and seeing them sailing on the lake was AWESOME. One year I want to take the day they come in off work to go see them up close.
I really need to work on figuring out how to end posts. Maybe next time…
Testing
Jul 20th
Testing out the new WordPress app for android.
The pic is James after the parade we were at this past weekend. It wore him right out!
It’s Friday! Do a happy dance!
Jul 2nd
It is Friday, and this is a long weekend. I’m so ready for it I can’t even tell you. Work has been good, but busy and stressful. And I’m ready to get out there and enjoy some sunshine. Plus, we are going down to see Ryan’s family, and some of his aunts and uncles haven’t met James yet. I love introducing him to new people.
Speaking of James; Ryan and I are so so lucky. He’s such a good baby – almost always happy. And even when he’s “fussy” he’s not bad – he doesn’t scream and wail, he just gets grunty and whiney. And he sleeps so well. He slept entirely through the night again last night, and when he woke up this morning he was content to just lay in his crib and talk and smile at us while we got things ready before we picked him up. He makes my heart melt. That’s such a cliche, but it’s so true. I love that little guy.
And for your viewing pleasure; pictures from the birthday party last weekend. All photos were taken by my friend Adrienne.
Who are you? Can I eat your face?
Buddies! My friend Sarah's sweetheart. These cuties are just 5 weeks apart (James is older).
Friends and babies! A one-year old (the birthday girl), a 3 month old, and my 4 month old.
The boys! (The two on the left are brothers)
HAAA! I love to smile with my mouth wide open!!
So basically, it was a fabulous time (and HOLY COW were the decorations awesome!). I had so much fun visiting with my friends and seeing their kids. Now just to figure out how to do that on a more regular basis!
Happy 4th of July, folks!
Fog, fog, go away!
Jun 16th
Duluth has officially had no days that are “mostly sunny” since May. It is now halfway through June. This is unacceptable. However, this weekend is supposed to be warm and at least partly sunny. Heating up just in time for Grandma’s Marathon. Of course. hahaha. Those poor marathon runners.
My sister and 3 of her children are coming to visit us this weekend. They are camping just outside of Duluth (which is good, because inside Duluth is going to be CRAZY). I’m so excited to see them. We plan on checking out the Children’s Museum and the Depot, and going on a scenic train ride. I think they’ll love it. I haven’t seen them in ages, and they haven’t met James, so it should be a great weekend. Photos will follow, I’m sure.
Other than that, there’s not much going on. We are keeping busy with James. He gets more and more animated and funny. He’s really getting the grabbing stuff skills down; he can even reach for specific parts of something hanging in front of him and usually get it. He smiles a lot, and charms people wherever we go. He still spits up quite a bit, but we are used to it and know to expect it (although he does still get each of us good at least once a week when we aren’t prepared). He likes to suck on his fingers, although sometimes when he’s tired he’ll suck on his thumb. It is cute. He’s also been chewing on anything he can get his hands on.
Ryan and I have a goal of walking 52.4 miles before July 6th. So far we’ve gone 21 miles. We have a little bit of catching up to do, since it’s been raining so much. Yesterday we took off on a walk because we knew we needed to get one in. It had been foggy and sprinkling off and on all day, but it didn’t really look any worse than it had, so we just went. And then it rained the whole 3.5 miles back to the house. Whoops. Here we are after getting back:
A bit blurry, but you get the picture.
James stayed nice and dry in his carseat/stroller combo. We opened it up once we got in the house (just brought the whole thing in with us) and he was looking around like “What the heck is going on!?” It was funny. We actually enjoyed being out in the rain. It was relatively warm, and we knew we were going back to a warm, dry house. And leftover chili. That always helps. Yum.
Anyway, time to get back to work. Have you taken a walk in the rain lately? I would highly recommend it.
Another catch up post
Aug 26th
We’ve been busy lately. First we went camping with my family down at a “park” (I use the term loosely) out in the country near my hometown. It was a lot of fun, even though it rained off and on all weekend.
My nephew kept making this face all weekend, any time we pointed a camera in his direction. He cracks me up.
I love my nieces and nephews. Here are a few of them. There are about 6 missing.
My dad won the fishing tournament's "rough" fish category (not Northern or Walleye). Nice trophy, huh?
We had a wedding to attend this past weekend. It was FABULOUS, as is the couple that got married. We didn’t take many pictures (too busy having fun!), but we had a great time.
The core group of friends I hung out with in High School - aka the Fab Five.
Holy cow! We remembered to get a photo of ourselves! Together, even!
And finally, after spending yesterday evening cleaning the kitchen and bathroom (they are about 99% better – we are just waiting for the ceiling to be fixed in the bathroom), we test drove and then bought a pickup today. We knew we were going to need a 2nd vehicle by the time the baby arrived, and since Ryan lost his company vehicle (since he doesn’t go out of the office much) having only one vehicle was going to get annoying pretty quickly. We’ve wanted a pickup for a while, just for the convenience of being able to haul stuff, and also because in case you didn’t know, Duluth is built on a huge hill. Have you seen pictures of San Francisco? Yeah, like that. But with Northern Minnesota winters. We live only 1 block up from the bottom of the hill, and yet there were still a few times last winter when I didn’t think my car was going to make it up the hill. And we had a couple mornings when I had to hike up to the bus station because I couldn’t get my car out of the lot. That’s ok when I’m not pregnant, but I do NOT want to be hiking up the hill to the bus stop when I’m 7, 8 or 9 months pregnant. No thanks. So we kept our eyes open and looked around on the internets and found this truck. It’s a 2001 Ford F150 extended cab with 4-wheel drive. We got a good deal on it, and it’s got lower miles and is in better shape than most of the other trucks we saw in our price range. It gets TERRIBLE gas milage (less than half of what I get with my car), but we won’t be using it to regularly commute, and we’ll take my car on trips whenever possible. So yah. We are very excited. And don’t worry, we already have a request for help hauling some stuff. But, like I told a friend on facebook – we have received help so many times from other people with pickups that we owe it to all of them to pass it along. At least for a while.
So, here it is! Our “new” truck!
The new truck!
We are already planning a trip down to the twin cities and Ikea to put this thing to good use. Of course, thinking about the gas costs of going even that far are kind of overwhelming, but it’ll be worth it!
Whew…I really need to get better at updating this stuff more often. It is DEFINITELY time for bed now. I’m wiped out.
Catching Up
Aug 3rd
First I spent a weekend with my grandparents, and my mom, sister and niece came for the day to learn how to make Kuchen (German coffee cake).
It doesn't look like much now, but it tastes great when it's done!
My mom, sister and niece hanging out.
The finished product. Yum!
Aren't they adorable?
It was so much fun, and I’m so happy that I got a chance to get some first-hand learning experience in how to make these. We’ll see if my first try turns out as well as Grandma’s. I’m guessing this might be a learning experience.
Then, we had 4th of July at my parents’ place. It was fabulous. There was a ton of family in town, including all of my siblings and aunts and uncles that live on the other side of the country. I think there must have been about 40-50 people there all together. There were some wicked games of horseshoes, Norwegian golf (that game with the golf balls tied to strings and you throw them over piping), and Holey Board (a bean bag type game that my grandpa made). My sister brought her guitar and sang for a while, and we had a bonfire and burnt a couch (actually pretty tame for my family). Unfortunately I was so busy watching everything I didn’t take any photos.
Next was a day trip to a Twins game. We went with a coworker of mine and a bunch of people she and her friends knew. We forgot our camera for that trip (do you sense a pattern?), but it was fun. And the game looked like it was going to be terrible, but the Twins almost came back to win it right at the end. SO CLOSE! I’ll be the first to admit I’m not a huge baseball fan, but I do love live sporting events of all kinds, and I like keeping track of the stats on the sheets.
After a weekend off, we had my class reunion at home. And that was awesome! Both pictures of people are courtesy of my friend Adrienne, who is teh awesome. Ryan took the ones from the demolition derby at the fair.
The demo derby:
Here they are, all set to go.
You know you are jealous of that kid's camouflage hoodie.
One of the drivers ran someone up on one of the edges so he got hung up. That guy's friend decided to do some payback and tipped this truck on it's side. It was pretty awesome because everyone was fine.
And from the reunion:
The obligatory "couple photo" at the reunion.
Some of our high school group.
Finally, hanging out with my in-laws, tubing, dinner and a fire with the ladies.
This is another one where I didn’t get any photos. But it was a fabulous weekend. I got to hang out with the in-laws relaxing, and on Saturday I went tubing down the river at Welch Village for part of a bachelorette party. It was fabulous. We also went out to dinner and then had a bonfire at the bachelorette’s house. Her friends are pretty awesome, so it was a great time.
And that catches us up to now. *wipes brow* It’s been a busy summer, and there are still a few weekends to go. I’m glad we’ve been so busy, though, because I have a feeling that while we’ll still try to do visiting and stuff we’ll be spending more time at home next summer. I hear babies do that to your social life. ;-)
Photos!
Jun 24th
Camping photos! (sorry if you have Flickr blocked – they won’t work)
Pie iron cooking – We made breakfast sandwiches with bacon, eggs and cheese. Yum!
Zoa decided to take a nap in the sunshine. Good idea!
Dave had to do some last homework to finish up his Masters during the weekend. I think his face says “this sucks” quite well.
Spider! This thing was HUGE! At least for spiders in MN. We “ushered” it off into the woods away from our food and chairs.
It rained for a couple hours, so we ended up in Alyson’s huge tent, playing Farkel. And then we wussed out and ran to the nearby casino to get something hot to drink out of the rain (and left poor Sam and Zoa at the campsite-no dogs allowed in the casino).
Dave, Jess and Sam getting breakfast in the AM. More bacon. Yum!
Overall, camping was great. It was too bad it rained, and the biggest problem with that was that our site had a LOT of trees, so even once the rain was done we didn’t get the sun in there to dry it all out. But most of the time the weather was awesome.
ps. Ryan was there – he just didn’t get any photos of himself.
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In other news…I’m sorry I haven’t been keeping the blog updated as much lately. There is a lot going on in our lives right now, but I feel kind of like Jess, where we aren’t at liberty to talk about it all right now, but it’s foremost on my mind and so it’s hard to talk about anything else (no, we aren’t moving half-way across the country, which is what their news was). I promise we will update you once things are decided, though! Hopefully soon!
Camping photos (finally!)
May 31st
I finally got around to getting our camera out and uploading the photos to Flickr (ps – our account was about to expire, which reminded me that it’s been almost a year since Ryan and I got married. CRAZY!). Here are some of my favorites. The rest can be seen on our Flickr site here. The campgrounds at Scenic State Park sit along Coon Lake, which connects to Sandwick Lake by a little straight, I guess you would call it. We rented canoes for 4 hours while we were there and were able to canoe around both of the lakes most of the way. We also stopped a couple times to check out some of the canoe or hike-in sites that are on the other side of the lakes. There’s a map of the area here (PDF document), so you can get a better idea of what I’m talking about. There’s a point that goes out in between the two lakes, and there’s a hiking trail out to the end of it. I think it’s about a mile out to the end. You can get some really nice views of both lakes from there, and there are a bunch of informational signs about the kinds of trees and stuff.
The straight between the lakes from the point hiking trail.
Red pines (aka Norway pines) cover the entire point, along with cedar, birch, aspen, spruce and other trees. But the red pines are the most numerous.
Fish along the shore in Coon Lake.
Sandwick Lake from the point.
As you can see, we didn’t get many pictures of the actual people camping – Ryan took all of the photos, and he likes the nature ones. I’ll have to work on that with him. ;-)
