Brothers

I have beautiful visions of these two as brothers and best friends growing up in perfect brotherly harmony. La la la. I can even see them playing on the same football team, smiling with their arms around each other in family photos, fishing contentedly side by side. Maybe even be in a band together some day. Something like the Black Keys, Oasis, or maybe even the Doobies but not like the Osmunds.





You are rolling your eyes and saying that I am a totally sappy crazy hippie, but BEHOLD video evidence!


I never would have predicted that Jr. would be such a sweet loving adorable big brother, but he is.

Today we had to take Baby Graham to see Dr. Frank to make up his 6 month shots and both boys got weighed. Jr. = 42 lbs and 41" tall. Graham 22 lbs 8 oz. Bubba bubba.

Some sweetness from Nanny and Aunt Lisa's brief stop through town.

Big Boy Genius

I have to stop calling him a toddler. He is a big boy. His 4T clothes are getting a little tight/short. OH NO!



**click on me, I am a video**

He puts his own boots on.



And put his own "pack pack" on.


Here is some Graham. He is pretty cute too.

Welcome to Seven Months

So far, seven months is the greatest Baby Graham age yet. He is working on crawling, I overheard Aimee tell one of the other parents that he would be crawling within the month. I consider her an expert on all things baby. Graham, unlike every other baby I know LOVES to be on his belly and play on the floor. Jr. used to FREAK OUT the minute he was on his stomach. I didn't think he would ever crawl. He pretty much didn't, he just rolled and then walked. I am so not ready for Graham to walk.


It hit me pretty hard this weekend that he is our last baby so as he hits every developmental milestone, that also means that he is becoming less and less of my baby.


We are ready to be done with "baby", but it doesn't make it any easier to mourn the loss of my sweet tiny little man. Not so much with Jr. I don't know why, but it seems like we were always in a great big hurry to see that kid grow up.



See how his haircut makes him look so darn cute - try to overlook the blue lips. He just sat there all spaced out sucking on his marker. To this, his dad said - "Okay Buddy - no more markers, just crayons from now on!" Yeah right. If Jr. even sees the marker aisle at Target and you don't go down it and purchase new markers, well lets just put it this way - SOMEONE is getting Child Protective Services called on them. I am sure marker deprivation is some sort of child abuse.






Jr. had the stomach bug this last week and into the weekend. Boy howdy, nothing brings you to your knees like a sick kid. Baby Graham refused to be put down for longer than one minute and of course Ed was completely paralyzed by pain from his - eh hem - man surgery. He is a champ though.


Oh and I got a new camera - I was thinking that if I got something nice and fancy all of a sudden my photos would get really smashing. Well so much for that. They are still mediocre. Luckily I have two super cute models so you won't notice.

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.