Car Wash

Since it was such a beautiful day today we decided to take the van to get washed. The last time my van was clean was back in September when my Dad took it to be washed since it sat outside for most of the summer getting sapped on because our garage was filled with furniture for their new house. Mom and Dad just recently gave us some money for gas due to driving back and forth to their new house to help them unpack and paint. I had just recently filled up my tank so I decided to use some of the money to wash the van. As you've probably figured out washing my van is not a high priority on my list especially when it involves my money. I actually don't ever think I've personally paid for my van to be washed. The closest I've come is washing it by hand once this summer and I didn't do a very good job so I probably won't be attempting that again. Anyway back to the point I was trying to make...this was Owen's first time going through one of those automatic car washes. I wasn't sure how he'd react, but he's a pretty brave kid. I mean he chases the vacuum cleaner when it's running because he loves it so much. However, by the time the second "octopus" (the long soapy arm things at the car wash) came by he was really freaked out. Daddy had to jump in the backseat and calm him down. He has a little bit of a cold so he's been kind of sensitive all day anyway so he might do better under different circumstances.

Christmas Day

After opening our presents we got ready pretty fast so we could get over to my parents house early. We helped set up and ate way too much before dinner was even ready. We had dinner at 2ish and it was so yummy. I have been craving ham for the longest time so it was perfect. There were 16 people in all at Mom and Dad's new house in Orting. It's a good thing it's quite a bit bigger that their old house. They have done so much work unpacking that it was hard to believe they have only lived their 6 days. After dinner we opened presents going oldest to youngest...sort of. It got all messed up along the way, but it doesn't matter. We ended up having Owen open his presents last since he takes forever. Of course he's more interested in the paper and boxes right now than the actual presents. Once we got them out of the box though he enjoyed playing with them. We watched the movie Home Alone during which Michael fell asleep on the floor, most likely from a food coma. Enjoyed dessert later on and headed home around 7ish. It was almost a white Christmas too...we had about 5 minutes of snow early in the day. Too fun!

We'll take a table for 16 please!

Owen eating ham for the first time and being one!

Owen's bouncing zebra he got from Grandma & Grandpa Grant!

Owen and Grandma being silly with a bow!

Ryan and Dad...it was nice to share Christmas with everyone this year!

Christmas Morning

On Christmas morning Michael, Owen and I woke up at 8 and went downstairs to have breakfast. Owen is a much happier boy when he's been fed...come to think of it so am I! We had Owen open his presents first which included...a musical barn, an Elmo tub toy & 3 books from us. Great Grandma & Grandpa Giest in Wyoming sent him a package too that included...a baby's first Christmas ornament, a track outfit and a teddy bear (I think I'm missing something).

Michael got a computer game, a movie, cargo pants, a gift card to Starbucks, a cellphone charger and candy.

I got, 5 peppermint chapsticks (In heaven!), a maternity retreat day at Gene Juarez thanks to Owen for "stealing" Daddy's credit card ;), and a wonderful storybook scrapbook that Michael made me. It was a flashback at our lives so far and it was the best gift ever. I never knew my husband could be so creative. It's fun that I'm still learning things about the one I love.

Christmas Eve

Michael's family tradition has always been to celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve. It really works out great since my family's tradition has always been celebrating Christmas on Christmas Day. This year we were at Mom & Dad's duplex they are renting. It was decorated so nice! Dinner was fabulous and we had such a fun time.

Owen trying to eat paper...it's a daily thing!

Avery, Cooper & Paige in their new PJ's...it's a Christmas tradition!

Camryn being sweet with Grandpa!

Michelle super excited about her gift cards to Starbucks...they have probably been used up already! :)

Becky with baby Samantha...she's almost 2 months old now!

Not Eco Friendly!

Lately Owen has learned something new that involves using up a bunch of water. Whenever he is in our bathroom he just loves to reach up and turn on the water to the big tub. Fortunately he's too small to touch the water itself, but he loves to turn both knobs and let it run full blast. About a week ago after Michael got home from work he needed to take a shower and I needed to make dinner so he took Owen up with him. While I was making dinner I thought I heard water running louder than normal, but I didn't go up to investigate. Turned out poor Michael's shower was cut short because Owen had turned the hot water on in the tub and it ran out before Michael was finished. That little stinker! :)

12 month clothes

On Friday I went through all of Owen's 12 month clothes gearing up for him to fit into them. To my surprise he could have actually been wearing many of them for some time now. It really irks me that all baby clothes can't be standard. Like Gerber clothes they run terribly small, but Carters run big. These train engineer bibs are from Oshkosh and they fit Owen perfectly, but he's only in the 1 percentile for his size. This just makes no sense to me. An average size baby would have been wearing these 12 month bibs back when they were 3 months old. It just really makes it hard when you are trying to organize your clothes for you child.

Straws

Owen still loves to chew on pretty much anything. He's not teething right, but he still just chews and chews. I've been trying to drink more water so I've been using this mug my friend Nikki got me and I have to use a straw with it. Well Owen thinks that the straws are something new for him to chew on not really for me at all.

What A Ham!

On Friday I was having a lot of fun with Owen while he was in his Exersaucer. For the most part he doesn't really like it anymore, mainly because it keeps him in one place. The thing is if we want to get anything done on the computer we have to put him in it or there will be a baby playing in the cat food or litter. YUCK!!! Anyway I was spinning around in the office chair scaring him and he was laughing so hard. It was tons of fun!

Tongue!

Owen has recently discovered that he can stick out his tongue. Here's a little video for you to enjoy!

French Fries

What kid doesn't like french fries??? Owen sure likes them...in fact he enjoys potatoes all around as long as they aren't mashed.

Got Her!!

Triumphant at last!!!!

Packin' On The Pounds

By the title you might think this post has something to do about me gaining pregnancy weight, but it's not! Yesterday I took Owen to the doctor to get his flu shot and since we were there I had them weight him. It's been two months since his last appointment and he gained 2lbs 3oz!! That's really amazing since from his 6 month to his 9 month check up he only gained 1lb 3oz. He's now weighting in at a whopping 17lbs 6oz. He went from being 0.5% in weight to 1.64%. Pretty Impressive!!!

Playing on the toys

Yesterday after lunch and going shopping for a little bit we took Owen down to the Super Mall to play on the toys. At first they were way to busy and there were too many big kids, but we did a little shopping at came back and it had really slowed down. The wonderful thing about the toys at the Super Mall is they are really geared for much littler kids than other mall toys. Most of the malls have those boats and they are just way to big for kids that aren't walking yet. The toys at the Super Mall are all really low to the ground and the theme is breakfast foods. There are two pieces of bacon, two eggs, a banana and three banana slices. It really is cute. They use to have two waffles and a bowl of cereal, but they have been taken out. I'm not sure if kids kept getting hurt on them or what. Yesterday was actually Owen's second time playing on the toys. He played on them when we went shopping with Aunt Michelle, Cooper and Paige on Monday. I was really surprise how much he actually got into it. I thought he would be clingy, but he just started having a ball. Yesterday was no different except once he saw that people had brought strollers into the play area the toys were really chopped liver. He just kept crawling over trying to play with all the wheels of the strollers. He's such a funny kid!

Elf'd

Check this out!

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1218248936

Excuse the stranger dancing with us. There needed to be four people so the program randomly selected someone. Also I think it's hilarious that both Michael and Owen are dancing with girl bodies and I'm with a boy body.

Kisses

Owen has learned how to give kisses! It's the sweetest thing. Of course like all kids he doesn't understand that he should close his mouth yet so instead of looking like a kiss it looks like he's going to eat your face off, but it's still so cute!

First Boo Boo!

On Monday night Owen got his first real boo boo. He was playing with his Leap Frog Learning Table and I think he just lost his footing and banged his face into it. He cried for a little bit, but nothing out of the ordinary. A few minutes later I looked at his face and noticed his lip was bleeding. He actually split it open. We think when he hit it forced his tooth into his lip or actually made him bite his lip. Michael examined it as close at he could without making Owen freak out and he didn't think it went all the way through so we didn't make a trip to the Urgent Care place down the road. The next morning all was well though. He's one tough cookie!

Exploring His World

Owen has been getting into more and more stuff. We really do need to baby proof the house more. We used to be able to put his police cruiser in doorway that leads to the stairs and he didn't understand that he could move it...well now he just shoves it aside and up the stairs he goes. He's such a bulldog! He's usually on the third or fourth stair by the time I get to him. I'm going to get Michael to put the baby gate up TONIGHT!

Yesterday Owen decided to crawl under the dining room table for the first time. His main motivation was Punkin our cat. Punkin is absolutely terrified of Owen! Punkin was lounging under the table very content and then Owen caught a glimpse of him...the lounging was all over. You can still see Punkin in the picture above he's in the upper right hand corner. I was shocked he didn't hightail it out of there...I guess he was being brave.

We also need to get a baby gate for the office door. We can't shut the door because that's the room where the litter and the cat food are, but that's precisely why Owen wants to get in that room in the first place. It's the only room upstairs that he really hasn't explored yet. Every time I leave him in his room to go wash my hands after changing him he is on his way to the office. He knows he only has so much time before I come and scoop him up. Today I decided to let him get into the cat food and see what he would do. A little cat food never hurt anybody. Plus I decided he needs to find out the consequences to his actions so if he's wants to try cat food it's fine by me. Of course I had the camera handy so I could get a hilarious picture if he did in fact eat some. Sadly, he never did eat any. He did bring a piece to his mouth twice, but it fell out right before it reached it's destination. He mainly just wanted to feel the food and play with it. He made a total mess, but since it's dry cat food it was easy to clean up.