On the 10th Day of Christmas...

...Grace turned 9 months old.

Month 8 was a big month for her milestone wise.

• She started scooting/army crawling. 
• She can sit from laying down.  It is her new favorite thing. She can't go down for a nap without sitting in her crib and playing for awhile and immediately when she wakes up she must sit.  
• She pulls up on furniture now, so we had to lower the crib.  I think we lowered the crib only a couple of days before she pulled up for the first time.

• She took her first long car ride to Houston for Thanksgiving  Other than not really napping she was great.  She is a seasoned flier but hasn't ever had to drive any where longer than about 1hr 45 mins.  Lets hope the flight to Michigan on Wednesday with a layover in Milwaukee goes as well as the rest of her flights.

• Grace now weighs 18lbs 8 oz and is 28 inches long.  25-50% for weight and 75% for height - tall skinny baby(strangely enough though the onesie she is wearing in the pictures is a 3-6 months).  Her head is still at the top of the charts.  

• 6th day of Christmas outfits.  If you are wondering - YES!  I did get a new camera.  I got a Canon T1i for an early Christmas present.  I am still learning though so bear with me as I figure it out.  This picture is a bit over exposed.

• Grace's final milestone of the month was getting her first tooth.  If you look closely at the bottom you can see it.

2010 Christmas Card

Under The Mistletoe Christmas 5x7 folded card

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Wordless Wednesday

Today

Yesterday

Santa Bloomers!

Santa Baby

On Saturday, we went to our neighborhood 'Holiday on the Plaza'.  There were carnival games, a snow mound, face painting, carriage rides and most importantly Santa!  There were supposed to be live reindeer but we never saw those.  It was actually much chillier than we had anticipated so we didn't stay long.   We invited the Brasseaux's to go with us and then we all headed out to Zea's for dinner.  A bit of fun for all.

Grace was less than impressed with Santa though.  We are planning to do a more formal trip to see Santa again though.  It was a bit difficult getting a good picture this time.

I have to take a better picture of this outfit.  It was adorable.

Dec 1st Wordless Wednesday

Turkey Butt!!!

Yep, Grace has a turkey on her butt!  It was so cute.  Thanks to my Aunt Patti for making the bloomers.  Perfect for our Thanksgiving day feast.

We drove down on Wednesday to Keith's Aunt Patti's house for Thanksgiving with his aunt, uncle, cousin and their kids.  It was good to see everyone.  We learned that they will have not one but 2 new babies in the family next year.  More little playmates for Grace.  She was fascinated with Kadee who is 15 months old.  Both Keith and I are amazed at what a difference 7 months is going to make in our little girl.  There were some big changes for Grace last week but more on that later.  Here are a few pictures from the festivities.

Happy Baby in her Turkey Day finest

Ready to eat with Thanksgiving Day bib.  We let her feed herself the turkey, but she had some of my mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes.  She loved them both.  

After dinner with Daddy.  

Happy after a great meal.

Hanging out with Aunt Patti

This is Grace's new 'Fake' smile.  Who knew an 8 month old could give fake smiles.  

We think the fake smiles are actually her way of trying to show off her new tooth!  Yep, she has a tooth. It is one of the bottom teeth.  It is barely out but definitely there.  We had no idea until on the way down to Houston it had gotten dark and I was trying to entertain her in the car.  She grabbed my hand and started to chew on my finger.  What had been this gummy gnawing was now replaced by a sharp little tooth.  She didn't complain about it I guess.  It still isn't through enough for me to get a picture though.  She keeps sticking her tongue out to feel it and that prevents us from getting a good picture  

Also she has finally decided to scoot/army crawl.  Here is a video taken right after we saw her do it for the first time.  She has gotten better already in the last couple of days so I think real crawling isn't too far behind now.  She also can sit from laying down.  Lots of milestones in one week.  I need to update the baby book.

I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving!

Wordless Wednesday

8 Months Old!

This post is a few days late, but the pictures were taken on her 8 month birthday.  I think that I will say this every month but boy does time fly!!

There haven't been any major milestone this month, but she is definitely working on a few.  I think this month we are going to see lots of changes.

• Still not crawling, but tries.  She does what Keith calls the "inchworm".  She gets upon all fours and pushes with her feet so she lands flat on her belly a little bit further ahead of where she started.  She'll do this a few times in a row to get what ever she wants.  Shoes still are a favorite.
• We all went to North Carolina for Mike and Sabrina's wedding.  This makes the 5th state that she has been to - Georgia, Texas, Michigan, Alabama, and North Carolina
• First Halloween!!

Still have my baby blues!!

Blueberry Beret

When we brought Grace( 4 days old) home from the hospital one of the gifts that we got was an adorable blue beret, sweater and booties set from Aunt Patti (the Great).  It was huge on Grace at the time.  We had a bit of fun trying out a few hat styles that day.

Little Baby Pope

Oui, Oui Grace est précieux!

What a difference a few months makes. It finally got cold enough for Grace to wear it.

I should have taken a few more pictures, but the outfit was absolutely precious.  She got lots of compliments.  What was funny though is if the hat fell down and covered her eyes she eventually would fuss, but never would try and remove it.  Let's hope it stays that way.  We have a special hat for our ski trip and I can't wait for her to wear it. 

Wordless Wednesday

Election Day

Did you Vote Today?  Grace did.

She had fun!

Happy Halloween

We had toyed around with various plans about Trick or Treating.  I mean really, a 7 month old going Trick or Treating?  Isn't that really just the parents using the baby as an excuse to get candy?  We thought about tagging along with the Woy's and it wouldn't be as strange.  We knew that we really didn't need the candy.  T&T was right about Grace's bedtime so if we drove somewhere we risked a meltdown as well.   But I really wanted to take her even if it was only for a photo-op.

We eventually decided that this was the perfect excuse though to go out and meet our neighbors.  We went out for about 30 mins, going door to door introducing ourselves, turning down candy and met some great neighbors.  Turns out that there are quite a few babies that live right around here.

I couldn't resist taking a few photos of our little Ladybug out in the yard even though the grass was very itchy and it didn't make her happy.

Ready to go!

Knock Knock - Trick or Treat!!

I hope everyone had a Happy Halloween!!

Last Weekend in Oct?

Well it is finally showing signs that fall is here if you count a couple of mornings that started in the high 40s.  Ok, so yeah the day ended up in the 80s, but it is almost November(Wow Christmas is around the corner and then 1st birthday- where has the year gone!!).  We woke up Friday and it was a bit chilly so I took that as an excuse to try out some new outfits in Grace's closet.  I have learned that hats, headbands, etc really don't bother her.  She was more than willing to smile and model this cute outfit.  I just realized that her socks are the same color as the sofa and it makes her look like she doesn't have feet.

Saturday morning was another chilly start and we had an early appointment for Grace's flu booster shot. They were having a flu clinic and that was the way to do it.  We were in and out of the office in less than   5 mins.  She cried for maybe 2 seconds if that; such a big girl.  I again used the weather as an excuse to dress Grace up.  I bought this Halloween outfit before Heather gave her the ladybug costume.  I figured that she could wear all of the pieces and parts throughout the winter and I didn't expect we'd really do much trick or treating (post on that later)

Isn't she a cute cat?

"Meow" - or more like her current squeals

Sunday morning we headed over to check out Keith's new office.  They've got a great space and it looks fabulous.  This little company really is growing up.  We were very impressed.  We'll have to drive down and meet Daddy for lunch now that they are much closer to home.  

Grace wanted to sit at the big desk.  

Tasty Desk 

Showing Daddy how it is done.  She said that working was easy!

Grace isn't crawling quite yet, but she has started trying.  I have been very excited for her to crawl, until it is about to happen.  I just realized that the attention I have to give a rolling baby vs a crawler is very different.  Yes, I watch her like a hawk now but I can run to the bathroom or switch over the laundry without much worry.  Pretty much all I have to deal with is her fussing if she realizes that I left the room or she fell over from sitting.  I think our lives are about to change and some baby proofing is in our near future.  Check out this video I took Saturday.  Yes she is trying to get my shoe.  She loves to roll and get our shoes.  I about expected her to do a somersault a couple times.  She just needs to figure out how to move her arms too and not just the legs and feet.  

Halloween Playdate

We hosted the playdate for our PTA group this week at the house.  We asked that everyone come dressed up in costume or at least in a Halloween shirt so that we could get pictures.  Additionally, I was chosen to host an Earth's Best Playdate Party so we had great goodies from them to hand out as our treats!

This was the largest playgroup to date.  There were 12 moms/dad plus babies.  We ended up moving the party upstairs to the game room to have enough room to spread out and play.  It was a great time.

I made 2 different types of muffins for the adults: Cinnamon Streusal and Pumpkin Cheesecake Muffins.  Both were a hit, but the Pumpkin Cheesecake ones especially. I wanted to make stuff that I could whip up before everyone arrived at 9:30 am.   I had planned on making Pumpkin bread and bought a box mix for it when I saw the muffin recipe on the side of the box.  I had everything on hand so I made them instead.  It was a good call since they were delicious and everyone raved about them.

Grace wants to thank Aunt Heather for her Ladybug costume.  She looked so cute in it and never once in the 2 hrs she had the costume on did she bother with the hood on it.

Earth's Best Goody Bag contents - coupons, rice cereal sample, halloween bowl, spoon,

jar of Earth's Best baby food and bib.

All of the goody bags

Muffins and Apples

Grace modeling the bib

Baby way of making friends. 

Cute as a bug

There were some really cute, creative costumes. Kiet as BamBam

Kai as a Chick-fil-a Cow - Kelli made the sign. 

Taking a picture of babies is kind of like herding cats

Just taking the whole group in.

This was about as good as it gets with the group photo. 

And we are missing one baby who refused to be in the picture.

After the group left, we both ended up taking naps and then I began making dinner for the night.  Brad and Krystal were coming over to watch the Rangers first game of the World Series.  I made the Pioneer Woman Lasagna.  Best Ever seems like a big exaggeration.  The reviews are glowing, but I just thought that it was ok.   I've made kind of a quick and dirty lasgna with no cook noodles,  spaghetti sauce, and quick bechamel that I thought had more flavor than this.  I did make a couple substitutions such as using ricotta instead of cottage cheese and mild sausage versus hot and I used better brand of tomatoes, but I doubt those made that much difference.  I just felt like it was a bit bland.  It lacked the sweet bite of tomato I think.  Not sure at this point if I'll try it again.  Maybe I had just way too high of expectations with this recipe since everyone else seemed to like it.

Busy but fun day!