Months 9 & 10

Again, where have the past couple of months gone?  Owen right now is almost 11 months.  We are getting ready to celebrate his first birthday.  It's just crazy.  More on that in another post.  This one will focus on the months September and October. 

I'm trying to remember what even happened during these months and it wasn't very long ago. 

Owen has perfected his crawling and boy, can he go fast!  He still loves to be read to and is getting better at eating solid foods.  Instead of trying to figure out what we did, I'm sure you just want to see pictures anyway!  So, here you go...

 First day of daycare. 

First Hawkeye Game.

 O loves his books!

 Harvesting the garden with Jake and Hayden.

 Celebrating my 30th birthday with a weekend of surprises.

 My girls met us out for drinks.

 Just a lazy Saturday watching college football.

 Look mom, I can stand up in my crib, but I don't know how to get down from here.

 Busy playing in my toy basket.

9 months

September 15, 2013

 Standing up-look mom, one hand.

 Sporting our Bear gear. 

 Hard at play on the new play table.

 Bath time.

 Signing 'more'

 In Iowa City for a wedding.  Good, old, friends Jamie and her son Quinton.

 Owen met Herky!

 Father and son sharing a special moment in front of Kinnick.

 Love those 2 fingers.

 10 months

October 15, 2013

Well, there you have it.  Months 9 and 10.  He's such a busy boy now who just loves to play.  He's very content and has a totally chill personality.  He loves to snuggle and can gives kisses.  We love this boy so much.

Months 7 & 8

Wow, where has the time gone, it's really hard to keep this thing updated.  The summer is over, Owen started daycare and Andrew and I back at school school.

We had an awesome summer.  I'm so sad it's over, we had so much wonderful family time!  You already saw our trips to Door County and New York, the rest of the summer we pretty much just hung around Madison.

It was hard this summer to do much of anything because Owen was taking 2 naps a day.  His morning nap would be anytime between 9-12:00 and an afternoon nap usually between 2-4:00.  That left us a couple hours around lunch and dinner to go out and do things, so we ended up just handing out a lot at home.

Owen has grown up so much and is such a little boy.  He is not longer my sweet, baby boy, he's now my sweet boy.  He continues to be my happy boy.  We're still working on sleeping through the night, but now that we've started school I don't mind my snuggle sessions in the early morning.

We haven't had a check up in a couple of months but I would guess O's between 17-18 pounds.  He has also stretched out.  Andrew keeps hoping for his mommy's legs and height.  Owen is also crawling and working on standing up while holding on to things.  Oh, and he is a very good eater.  We started solids awhile ago and he likes his purees and has started enjoying picking up his own food and feeding himself.  Some of his favorites are sweet potato, peas, green beans, peaches, mango, apples and pears and PUFFS! 

He continues to love the jumparoo and reading books.  Here are a couple pictures from the rest of the summer.

Big boy sitting up on his own.

 First time eating solids and drinking from a sippy cup..

 My happy boy!

No more avocado, please mom!

 7 months old 

July15, 2013

Celebrating 5 years of wedded bliss. 

 Bath time!

 Hugs from Jakey.

 Fun visit from Kris and B.

 Love my Auntie Linds.

 Just hanging at the terrace.

 Smiley boy.

 Best birthday buddies-O and Eagan.

 Look at me sit up like a big boy.

 Family fun at the farmer's market.

 Visit with Great-Grandma

 Look at those teeth!

 Visit in Ohio with Andrew's Nana.

 O's favorite toy-his orange ring.

 Visit from Auntie Mads and Auntie Ceese.

 Standing by the toy basket--almost got my toy out.

 So handsome.

 We loved the terrace this summer!

 8 months

August 15, 2013

Lake Life

In July, we took our first long family road trip to New York!  It was awesome!  My Dad's wife, Kelly, has family that lives out in the Finger Lakes Region.  This is our third summer going out there and as always we had a great time.  See our previous trips here and here.

We were a bit nervous about the ride out there as it would be Owen's first 'real' road trip.  While we were taking 2 days to get out there, it was the first time he had been in the car for that long.  It could go smoothly, or it could go terribly.  It ended up being great!  We planned our longer driving periods around Owen's naps and stopped when we needed to eat and to nurse.

The first day we drove from my mom's in Lake Zurich to Edinobro, PA.  We stayed with some wonderful family friends, the Grants, who were very generous to let us stay the night before they took their own road trip the opposite way towards the Chicago area.  Ann and Gary (and Elisa) are fabulous hosts.  We had a comfortable bed to sleep in, toys for Owen to play with and a delicious send off breakfast to get us on our way.  It was wonderful to see them, even if for a short visit.

We then made it to Himrod, NY.  This year, as we did last year, we stayed at Kelly's parents house on the West side of Seneca Lake.  Their little cottage is a cozy place right on the water.
 
Similar to last year, I'm pretty sure it was the hottest week of the summer.  With highs everyday in the mid 90's, it was HOT!  The cottage doesn't have AC, so we spent most of our time outside trying to catch the lake breeze or in the car.  Owen was a trooper and did pretty well.  With all the fans we had, Owen's morning nap was cool enough, but by the afternoon, our room was too hot to sleep in.  So, we drove around.  Owen sleeps really well in the car, so for most days, we would load up the car and drive around for a couple of hours while Owen took his afternoon nap.  The area is so gorgeous and we like getting to know the lakes and towns, so we didn't mind.  We would then come home and spend some time in the lake.  The water was 76 degrees at one point, very warm and perfect to spend a hot afternoon swimming in.   

This year, we did some house hunting.  If you read about our first trip to the lake (here), you know our dream is to turn some land we have there into a camp.  With that being the plan, we are dreaming of making the move out there one day.  With our family in mind, we are looking for the best place to raise a family.  Before this trip, we really liked Geneva.  The schools there aren't the best though so we were looking for somewhere else we could plant some roots.  This trip we found Canandaigua.  As a far suburb of Rochester, the schools are better, there is a lot of growth (they even have a Starbucks and Bed, Bath & Beyond) and a really cute downtown area.  We spent the last couple of days touring that little town and dreaming of houses we could have there.

As always, it was a very relaxing trip.  We hope to go again next summer.  Here are some pictures from the trip.

Enjoying the view from the lake room.

 Ready for the lake!

 Not so sure about the lake even though he had a sweet float.

 Swimming with mommy.

 A view of the lake, doesn't even look real.

 Owen and Daddy floating on the lake.

 Grampy enjoying the lake. We did a lot of this all week.

 Grampy and Owen.

 Fiona and Owen.  We did a lot of this-naked playing.

 Such a handsome boy trying to stay cool.

Lake living-swimwear on the clothes line.

 Owen and Grandpa Jack.

 The patio where we spent most of our time.

 Fiona-just a good and pretty dog.

 Our family.

The whole group!

We could get use to spending out summer like that.