HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDMA!

Happy Birthday Granny Shelia! We miss you and love you! Have a blast on your trip to Panama!

Baby's First Christmas

We have one ornament commemorating Ed Jr.'s first Christmas. Thanks MIL and FIL!

For the rest of his life, we will tell him the story of his first Christmas and here is what he will hear:

On Christmas Eve, when you were just barely 8 months old, we hauled you over to Strega Nona's FABULOUS Christmas Eve party. The house was decked out in FABULOUS decorations and filled with FABULOUS food. Not only was it Christmas Eve, but it was also Festivus, your Grandpa Bill's favorite holiday. You absolutely loved the Festivus Pole and used your walker to chase the Festivus Pole around the house. Your Uncle Julian was there with his papa Genaro, they helped you open gifts. Unfortunately, you were asleep before you could witness the greatest of all of the Festivus events, the pinning of the head of the household. It took both your mother and father to get it done, but before festivus was over, Grandpa Bill was face down on the kitchen floor. Some might even call it a Festivus Miracle. Your dad beat Josie in the feats of strength and the airing of grievances occurred primarily between your mother and grandpa Bill, but when doesn't that happen?

Christmas morning, it was just the three of us, mom, dad and baby Junior. We opened presents and you enjoyed all of them except the penguin from your Uncle Bill. It scared the pants off of you. You would look at it sideways and crawl up your mom for safety like a little monkey. Even though you were just a little guy, you were very good at unwrapping your gifts. Your favorite gift was a cardboard tube that your mom's new ice fishing pole was wrapped in. You liked it even better than the wrapping paper.
Then after breakfast and a Christmas daddy and baby nap, we loaded 10 thousand pounds of gear in the car and braved the icy roads to Great Falls to see Nanna, Papa, Uncle Ian and Faith. Your daddy protested your Christmas outfit, but your mom insisted on dressing you in your Christmas Poindexter finest. You were adorable. Christmas with Faith was a blur of wrapping paper and you terrorizing us in your walker with your new musical bongo drums - Thanks Uncle Ian. You got your very first Radio Flyer Red Wagon from Nanna and Papa. We even took you out for a ride in the cold icy Great Falls wind. You made it halfway around the block before daddy had to carry you the rest of the way home. Faith got a motorized four wheeler for Christmas, and you in your walker chased Faith on her four wheeler all around the house. After helping mom eat turkey, sweet potatoes, mashed potatoes, green beans and some pears, it was off to slumber town for you.
And that, my little man, was your very first Christmas. Days later your daddy and I are still recovering, but are ready to take off to Missoula to celebrate your very first New Years!

Christmas Card

We didn't send out cards this year, but here is your cyber card.

Naughty or Nice?

You make the call.



His mom says: NICE!

His dad says: Nice!

Miles and Selma: NAUGHTY! NAUGHTY! NAUGHTY! Unless he is throwing food on the floor, than he is nnnniiiiiicccceeeeeeee!

20 Below Zero

The Eds and I are hunkered down in the basement to wait out the big storm. Ed Sr. has a touch of the stomach flu, so it has been all couch all day. I seriously think that Jr. got a little bored with us today. He chased the dogs in the walker, he played with his toys on the floor, he looked at both of us like "hey guys, when are we going to go somewhere. Do something. See someone? Where is Cissie?"



It offered me a lot of time to think.

Every day I think a lot about things to write on this blog. Then I go to type and blah. Writers block.

Lately, I worry that I am not providing Jr. enough stimulation to keep his development up to speed. There is no reason for me to worry, other than it is in the nature of motherhood to obsess over irrational fears. I also wonder if he loves me nearly as much as I love him. Or if he ever will. Although, I doubt that is possible, because I love him so much my heart feels like it is breaking.



I also miss him when he is sleeping. I know that is crazy because I work my ass off to get him to take naps and sleep at night, but when he does sleep, I want to peek at him and give him kisses.



Soon it will be his first Christmas, and at 8 months old, he will have no clue. He did like his first Christmas tree.



I keep asking our other childed friends what they bought their babies for their first Christmases, and they all say the same thing, nothing. I mean, he won't know, and he will be getting all sorts of loot from his grandparents. Never fear, we aren't totally scroogetastic, we are going to get him a few things, a sound machine to play in his room to protect his naps from all of the noises going on outside his room. We are also going to get him a wood toy car. It is made locally and pretty darn cool. I am sure he won't care about either of his presents and be far more interested in the wrapping paper. Next year, it will be a far bigger deal. . .

Home Again

We were asbestos refugees all week living with my dad and Sheree while the hazardous waste AKA insulation was removed from our attic. We had a great time. It was actually really easy to all live under one roof. They gave up the upstairs to us. We ate and ate and ate and stayed up late to play games. Plus Jr. was able to roll all over the house in his walker. He was overjoyed to have 4 of us to play with him and love him.

He also took a big first step in sitting in his high chair and joining us at the dinner table. He also ate pumpkin for the first time - AND HE LOVED IT! Pumpkin pie and pumpkin soup, yum yum.







It is Friday night and we are finally home again. It is nice to be home.

Nigella's Breakfast Bars

This is how we survive during the week.

2.5 Cups of Oats (not instant)
1 C crasins
1 C peanuts
1 C sunflower seeds
1 C shreaded coconut
1 can of sweetened condensed milk.

Mix the dry intredients, heat the sweetened condensed milk in the microwave and add to the dry intgredients. Press firmly into a foil lined and greased 9x13 pan. Bake @ 250 for 1 hour. Let cool completely, remove from pan, and cut into squares. Store in a tupperware.

It is a total rip off of Nigella. Forgive me.

I have made them for all of my baby having friends and literally, everyone loves them. You can also add other dried fruit, or more kinds of nuts.

On a totally unrelated note. HI HEATHER AND TREY!

Little Bear

I bought Jr. the cutest bear hat off of Etsy. My Grandma saw it and made me a matching one. She also made Ed Sr. a hat, but didn't put any ears on it, she didn't think he would want ears on his.



As you can see, we love homemade guifts!

Wyoming

As a Thanksgiving bonus we got to see Ed Jr.'s great uncle Scott. We had one hell of a party last night in Great Falls. We all played my mom's new Wii. We boxed, played jarts and tennis.

My mom beat everyone that stepped up to challenge her, she even beat Ed Sr. twice.





Thank you Joyce, Scott, Adam and Shea for the cool Wyoming football, sweatshirt and cowboy jeans. So cute.

Thankful

I am thankful for so many things. Ed Sr., Ed Jr., Miles, Selma, Ian, Faith, Ed Jr.'s grandparents, my grandparents, Ed Jr.'s aunt and uncles and all of our friends.

I am also thankful that I am stuffed today.

There was so much amazing food. Before dinner we took the Gunderson kids for a beautiful hike. The weather was perfect. Last year it was freezing and snowy. The sledding was awesome, but we were kind of like caged animals locked inside the house because it was so chilly. This year we earned our pumpkin cake, pumpkin pie and chocolate chip pumpkin bread.

Oh, and I am thankful that Ian is teaching Faith to talk like a Asian Stereotype.

More Flickr

We broke down and paid the money to go PRO on fickr. What does that mean? The link to the right "Ed Jr. on Flickr" has all of the photos we have ever uploaded, not just the last 200, plus we can upload videos. Youtube was making me mad.

Enjoy!



Fist bump!

7 Months

I won't bore you with "oh my god I can't believe that he is 7 months old. . ." All I am going to say is that hanging out with a 7 month old is pretty fun.

We celebrated his 7 month birthday by breaking out the walker.



He was pretty jazzed about it. He followed his dad into the bathroom this morning. Selma's days of freedom are just about completely over. Thankfully for her the distance between the couch and the coffee table is too narrow for the walker.

Sad Day

Tuesday our great friend Mark died. He lost a battle against a brain tumor. He was a completely amazing man and we are blessed to have had him in our lives. Today was his funeral. It was terribly sad and amazing at the same time.

Thanks to the Dockter sisters for watching Jr. for us while we celebrated Mark's life.

We are going to work so very hard to take good care of Dona.

The Never Ending List. . .

. . . of things left undone.

Every day and every weekend, I compile a list of things I need to do. None of which get done. Or so it seems. I usually can manage a load of laundry, wash the dishes or on a rare occasion write something on this blog, but it is all of the other things that get put aside. Exercise, dinner with friends, rake the leaves, paint the toenails. Those thing pile up in the back of my mind until I can't take it anymore and destroy the list (in my mind). I think that weekends will be my chance to catch up, but they aren't. Weekends are when we spend more time in jammies. Spend more time playing. Spend more time doing god knows what, and then suddenly it is Monday morning and we caught up on nothing.

The one thing I always get done is baby. He is one well cared for and entertained kid.



I hear other moms lament about the lack of ability to get anything done. Slowly day by day, we will let those things go or get better at multi-tasking. Right now I am petting Selma with my foot while typing. If only I could figure a way to shower and do the dishes at the same time. . .hmmmmm.



What helps out tremendously is when my mom comes over for the weekend to help out. Thanks mom.

Adrienne Talking

I shot this video last weekend. She is the sweetest baby girl.

More Chinook

Some of my favorite photos from the weekend.

We were trying to take a pretty photo of Alana and this is what Courtney did:

So Ed got Courtney back.

Rachel is pretty much up for anything. She was so much fun to take photos with.

We climbed up to the top of this amazing glacial feature (AKA Drifter's Knob) and put all of the horse bones back in place, they roll off of the edges.

Sheree admitted later that she didn't want to touch the horse's skull, but did it anyway. The skull belongs to Brandy, my horse. She died the summer before I first took Ed to the Ranch. My dad, Miles and I hauled her skull up there to be with Drifter, my dad's horse.

Ed Jr. was trying to pinch his great grandfather's eyes.

The old three sided barn. My dad says that a surly bull knocked off the corner. I am pretty amazed it is still standing.

This is what it is like to say goodbye to my grandparents. I never want to leave them. It is so hard to say goodbye.

Chinook

Ed Jr. took his first trip to explore the land of his ancestors. 20+ miles north of Chinook, Montana. It is a pretty amazing place where no one batts an eye when you wear olive green, blaze orange and aqua, and you always smell like bacon.

Jr. had an absolute blast hanging out with his great grandparents, great aunt and uncle and cousins. He loved watching all of those kids run around.

The other big news is that he is actively rolling from his back to stomach to get after things. If you hold your hand behind his feet, he pushes off on them in sort of a scoot/crawl. We are pretty excited and kind of scared at the same time. He can move!

I would write more, but after our 5 hour drive home, I am pooped.

Ed Jr.'s Mom is HILARIOUS

Mom + Baby

As much as we hate it when he leaves, when daddy goes hunting it affords us the kind of mom and baby time that we need to truly realize our amazing love connection.

Saturday Jr. wasn't feeling so great, so we took it easy. Other than busting my buns to get a job application in the mail, we didn't do much. Thanks Grandpa Bill for taking him for a walk while I ran to the mail. The true highlight of the day was the hour long bath. We had to keep adding warm water, but by the end, the plugged nose and ear rubbing was history. We just played, laughed and took some epic naps. We wore cozy clothes and even stayed up kind of late. To watch Saturday Night Live, of course. The baby slept, but I watched damn near the whole thing.

Sunday he was feeling much much better after sleeping for an unprescidented 11 hours. His momma got a ton done around the house and when his dad got home, we had a turkey dinner coming out of the oven. He got to play, nap and nurse just about as much as he wanted, I spent the entire day just watching him and responding to his needs. I was totally on his schedule. During the week it feels like we are always running around like crazy maniacs, but this weekend we only had one thing on the agenda, to love eachother.

I would hate to put an estimate on the number of hugs and kisses we had over the weekend, but it was easily 1 million.

Just when it seemed like everything was going his way. . . we took him to see Dr. Frank today. The good news is that he is 29 inches long, 22 lbs and 13 oz heavy and his head is, well it is still quite big. All of his measurements are in the 98% for babies his age. Dr. Frank said that he is very proportionate - proportionately big! My mom says that I was always over 100% and I am sure his daddy was no small turkey. The other good news is that he doesn't have to get any more shots for 6 whole months! YAY! I hate getting his shots. He cries so much. Talk about having a case of the Mondays. To have an amazing weekend and then whammo.

He did pretty well, little to no fever and has taken a couple of serious naps. He also went to sleep at 7 tonight. I just laid with him snuggling him for as long as I could stand it. I wanted to make up for the shots by being extra sweet to him. Since I got home from work, it has been all about making him happy. Nursing for as long as he wanted, playing with him on the floor, his first banana mashed with breast milk (not such a big hit) and for dessert a DELICIOUS maple teething biscuit. We both had maple smeared all over us. Selma was the big winner when he dropped it on the floor. These are the days she has been waiting for, the dropping of the food. It really makes up for all of that being locking out.

Oh and as for daddy, he killed a baby boy deer and a little lady antelope. He has been in the garage since butchering his kill. It was Uncle Neil's first deer kill, so he is out there with him. I will spare you the gruesome details and well, the gruesome photos.

Sweet Pea

Halloween started on Wednesday for us. Ed Sr. and I carved pumpkins and I made Ed Sr.'s costume. Ed Jr. got to enjoy chewing on a piece of pumpkin carved from one of the jack-o-lanterns. Ed Sr. made a Jr. inspired pumpkin, two big eyes and two lower razor sharp teeth.


On Halloween night itself, Jr. was SUPER tired and SUPER cranky and had to take an evening nap pushing back his trick-or-treating until pretty late. We only ended up going to see Mark and Dona, Grandpa and Straganona and Aunt Kim and Uncle Jon. Adrienne was also a sweet pea, but that sweet pea was asleep by the time we got there. It is a bummer because I really wanted to get a photo of the two sweetest peas together. You know, for their high school yearbook. . . he he he. I am sure we will have plenty of naked bath time and naked pool photos to embarrass them with.

Jr. didn't get any candy, but his Straganona bought him some DELICIOUS maple flavored teething biscuits. So yummy.