duck...

duck duck duck duck duck duck duck!
 

Maybe...

If I kiss it, it will turn into a beautiful princess!
 

Waaaaaaaaaaaah!

What did you do with my duck duck duck duck duck? 

It's MINE!

My precious....
 

Sitting up like a big boy!

I propped the boppy up against the arm of the couch and sat him in it. He loves sitting up!
 

me and the hubby

 

Why is that?

Why is it that every time I talk to someone after Christmas their first words are "What did you get?" Seems to me that it's terribly commercial of them. Anyway, here's what I GOT:

I got to spend a day with my husband, my baby, and my puppy
I got a visit from Bob's dad and my mom
I got to decorate a tree with pretty lights
I got to receive the kindness of strangers
I got to help some children by donating to St. Jude's
I got a day off from work
I got to eat the delicious pancakes that Bob always makes on Christmas morning.
I got to take a 2 hour nap cuddled up with my family
And as always, I got to be healthy, have enough to eat, and be warm and dry.

I was also given some presents. They were all very nice but won't be listed here. Christmas this year was wonderful. I'm so glad that I got everything I wanted.

He's talented!

Oliver put the Christmas angel on the tree.
Here's the tree when we were all done.
 

Merry Christmas!

Yay, Christmas! Oliver loved our tree, and all the presents underneath.
This is a picture of our tree that Bob took. It turned out kind of cool.
Oliver and his stocking.
Oliver playing with some of his new toys. The turtle on the left and the frog and duck hanging.

We had a wonderful Christmas at home. Nanny and Pappy came to visit on their way to WV on Saturday, and Gramma and Grampa came on Sunday. Christmas morning we got up early and opened up all our presents. Bob had fun with the treasure hunt I made for him...I did too! After the presents Oliver and I snuggled down on the couch and Daddy made pancakes! They were really yummy...I put strawberries and blueberries and whipped cream on mine. Oliver got a little taste of the fruit and he seemed to like it. He kept licking that strawberry! After breakfast we all took a nap, then we got up and wanted to watch Christmas specials on TV, but there were none!! Bob went out after it stopped raining and played with his new BB/pellet gun while Oliver and I played with his new toys. I spent a good deal of time looking through the photo album that Bob and Oliver made for me. I still have to go through and write descriptions of the pictures...I can't wait! It was a very wonderful present! There were pictures from our wedding, and some from before we were married. There were lots of pictures of Oliver and Jasper. They also had some pictures framed for me. My very favorite picture of Oliver, and a few from our wedding. I can't wait to hang them up!! 

I'm so excited!!

With Christmas just around the corner I can barely contain my excitement! We're putting up the tree today and there's lots of presents to put under it. Mom finished my stocking last night. Nanny and Pappy came by today on their way to WV and Gramma and Grampa are coming tomorrow. What a fun season!

I slept in my bed for 3 hours last night before I woke up. I didn't like it that I was all alone and I'd kicked off my blankie so I started wailing. Mom came in and got me after a minute, then she fed me and I fell back asleep. I guess she was too tired to put me back in my own room because when I woke up I was snuggled up in Mom and Daddy's bed. 

trying

I'm trying to post some pictures but Picasa isn't cooperating. Oh well.

I've almost finished my Christmas shopping. I am going to have to go out tomorrow to get it all done. I'm excited about my mom visiting on Sunday. I have no idea what I'm going to cook. Any suggestions? Maybe we can go eat somewhere, but I don't know what will be open. Probably everything. We'll see.

My boss scheduled me to work until midnight on Dec 26th. The store is having a special sale so we're staying open that long. I guess we'll have to see if that happens. Also, I didn't get my bonus like everyone else because I'm still showing as being on LOA even though I've been back for 2 and a half weeks. That means I'll have less money to finish up my shopping. I'm hoping we can buy a mattress for ourselves. The store is having a special employee sale on them and they are about 300-400 dollars less than the normal employee prices. We'll see about that, too.

updates

I tried to put Oliver in his crib to sleep for the first time last night. I rocked him until he fell asleep, then very carefully put him in the crib. I crept into bed and turned up the monitor nice and loud so I could hear every noise (not that I couldn't anyway, his door is directly across from mine and both beds are right inside the door). I laid there for a few minutes, then I really got upset. I felt like I had abandoned him. What if he woke up and was scared because he was all alone? What if he kicked his blankie off and got cold? what if he needed me and I was WAY OVER HERE?!?!?!?! Of course, he only slept there for about 15 minutes, then he started wailing and I ran in to get him and appologized about a zillion time for leaving him all alone. Needless to say he spent the rest of the night sleeping right where he could see me.
Then again, he slept for ***8 hours*** That's a first. It was so nice. From midnight to 8 in the morning. Then he ate and slept for another hour and a half. Hopefully this will be a trend. For the past few nights before that he had been sleeping for 5 hours, getting up to eat, and then sleeping another 4 hours. That was pretty nice, too.
Tomorrow we have to finish our Christmas shopping and send everything off. I don't think I'll be doing the secret Santa thing with my dad's family next year. I have such a hard time trying to find something to get for people that I see MAYBE twice a year. Oh well, they are all getting the same thing this year. I hope they like it.

easy recipe

I didn't have much time to make dinner yesterday because Bob was late and I had to go to work. I found this (very easy) recipe in Bob's cookbook, A Man, A Can & A Plan. I think it'd be good with chicken too, but it turned out so yummy that Bob ate almost the whole thing. Then again, he hadn't eaten all day so maybe that had something to do with it.

Tuna Pot Pie

2 cans of tuna, drained
1 can of cream of chicken soup
1 10oz package of mixed veggies
1 tube of Grands biscuits

mix teh tuna, cream of chicken soup, and veggies in a bowl. Put them into a casserole dish once they are mixed. Tear up 4 or 5 biscuits and put the pieces over the top. Bake at 375 for 40 minutes.

what's he lookin' at?

 

BIG smile!

 

Oliver's new favorite song...

On the twelfth day of Boobah, my boobah sent to me

Twelve boobahs drumming,

Eleven boobahs piping,

Ten boobahs leaping,

Nine boobahs dancing,

Eight boobahs milking,

Seven boobahs swimming,

Six boobahs laying,

Five golden boobah,

Four boobah birds,

Three French boobah,

Two boobah doves,

And a little boobah up in a tree!

Yeah, I know I just changed everything to boobah...so what? He likes it!

do you remember...?

Mr. Men and Little Miss books?
Rose Petal?
Where's Waldo?
The American Girls?
Nancy Drew?
Liza, Bill, and Jed?
Curious George before the movie?
Anne of Green Gables?
Little House on the Prarie?
The Mouse and the Motorcycle?
The Indian in the Cupboard?

I was having a very nostalgic conversation with my sister and these are some of the things we came up with. Fun fun!

peace and quiet...

that's what it is now in the house, but the last two nights starting at about 10:30 or so it's been havoc. Oliver has decided that from that time until about 1 that it's time for screaming! I've tried everything...rocking, walking, bouncing, feeding, burping, singing, talking, leaving him alone, cuddling, swaddling, putting more clothes, putting less clothes, blankets, toys...everything! Nothing works. At 1am though, he turns off and falls right to sleep.

Right now he's sleeping and I'm having some lunch. He's been asleep for about 2 hours, ever since we got back from the grocery store. I've been working on the hat I'm making for him. It looks really weird right now so I'm not sure I'm doing it right.

Anyway, i guess that's all for now

playtime is fun!

 

he moved!

He turned his head as I was taking the picture...it turned out kinda creepy
 

now all i need

is some ice cream!
 

that's funny!

 

are you sure!?

Can you believe this is the same baby? He's so BIG now!

 

Look!

He's entertaining himself with shadow puppets 

if you insist

Oliver would really like everyone to donate money to St Jude's Children's research hospital instead of getting him a present. He is a lucky boy since he has everything he needs and he's so healthy. If you insist on getting him a gift though, here is what he wants.

http://www.softclothbunz.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=107

we're going with "large" size.

Playing

Here are some shots I took today of Oliver on his playmat


 

3 months!!

I can't believe Oliver is 3 months old already! Let's see, he started out at 19 inches, 5 pounds 8oz. We measured him a few days ago and he's 24 inches long now. His last weight measurment was 13 pounds 8oz. That's 8 pounds and 5 inches of growth in 3 months.

He is starting to do more too. He smiles all the time, and he loves his playmat (thanks Sarah!) He hasn't learned to roll over yet, but he's working on it. He got close a few times today during tummy time. He sleeps better than he used to. He still wakes up every 3 hours or so to eat, but he goes right back to sleep afterwards instead of staying awake for a few hours. He's awake a lot during the day, too. He loves to sit up, and he's always trying to stand any time he's held upright. He has really good head control now. He is almost always looking around trying to see everything. The only time he's floppy is when he's tired. He talks a lot, and squeals when he's happy. If you talk to him, sometimes he'll talk back. We've had quite a few conversations consisting of "agoo" "agoo" "aaaaahg" "aaaaaahg" "uuuuhma" "uuuuuhma" and so on...it's very amusing for me, and I suppose he enjoys it because he keeps doing it. His favorite toy is Spike the Dinosaur (Thanks Brenda!)...he loves those Dino Smooches! Whenever he's on his back playing he's always kicking his legs and waving his arms around. It looks like he's trying to crawl, but he's just upside down. We're working on trying to get some upper body strenght so he can crawl, although he's really good at scooting himself along, propelled by his legs. His nickname now is Mr. Boobah.

Overall I think he's progressing well. Happy 3 month birthday, Oliver!

Yay!

I guess they had a good time while I was at work, this was taken yesterday.
 

back to work

today I went back to work. I had a really hard time leaving the house...I felt so guilty about leaving poor Oliver for 8 hours. I'd never been away from him for that long. (I think the longest amount of time was 3 hours) It was hard!! When I got to work it was a little better because I had lots to do so I wasn't sitting there just missing my boys all day. However, about 4:30 I was suffering! It sucks to not be able to feed your baby when you have been doing it for so long. By the time I got home I was about to burst! Luckily Oliver was hungry so he ate a bit then I pumped the rest.
I guess Bob did ok, Oliver is still in one piece. He wasn't screaming uncontrollably when I got home or either of the times I called. Bob did send me a picture of him crying though. Talk about making me feel bad!

not much...

I don't have much to post about just now, but Oliver is sleeping and I've pretty much cleaned up. Bob's dad is coming over today to do some stuff around the house. They are going to put a light switch in the laundry room to replace the stupid cord that I can never get to work - hooray! Other than that I don't know.

It's cold in the house. It looks sunny outside, I wonder if it's warmer out there than it is in here. It was yesterday.

Oliver is all congested again. I'm almost over the cold I had - I hope I didn't give it to him. I've been very careful about washing my hands and not touching anything that's going in his mouth. Also, not smooching him - TORTURE! I think that I did give my cold to Bob...sorry honey!

Jasper got groomed yesterday and he looks super. They didn't put a bandana on him like they usually do, but he still looked nice. He smells way better, too. We had to get him a new leash since he broke his other one when we were in WV.

I need to go to the craft store and get supplies to make Oliver a stocking. I made one for Jasper last year, and Bob has one that I made from the first year we had Christmas together, I think. I'm not sure where we'll hang them since we don't have a fireplace this year. I'm sure Bob will think of something.

looking back...

I've been sitting here for a while reading all the old posts on my (older) sister's blog. It's kind of fun to look back and see what was going on last year. I might have to find time to look back at my old posts to see how much everything has changed since I started blogging in February '05. That's almost two years ago! Wow, how time flies.

I also figured out how to put links to my favorite places on the side over there. Yay!

Thanksgiving trip...

I started writing a big long detailed post about our trip for Thanksgiving, but I stopped because I couldn't remember some of the details. So here's the short version.

We went to WV. Oliver did great in the car except for a "poopsplosion" on the way up. Jasper did ok, but threw up twice. We had Thanksgiving with about 30 people. We ate by candlelight because the power went out just before we ate. Oliver got overwhelmed and cried for two hours the first night we were there. We spent some time with Chris (uncle hedgehog), eating and shopping and just generally hanging out. Oliver got some new outfits and I got some new pants. We got to spend a little bit of time with Birch and Gretchen when they got back on Sunday. We left Monday and when we got home pretty much just sat around the rest of the day recovering from the trip. Oliver slept most of the trip back, so did Jasper, so did I. I got a cold while we were there, luckily I didn't give it to Oliver (yet, anyway)...I'm almost over it today.

I go back to work on Sunday. I'm not excited about it. I'm only going back part time, and will only be gone when Bob is here. I still hate it. We'll see how it goes though. The Christmas party is on 12-10. I'm not sure I'll be going, but we'll see about that too. Bob doesn't want to go. I don't really want to leave Oliver to go party for 4 hours. Maybe I'll just stop by or something. We'll see. I got invited to another party on the Friday before that. Joey, a salesperson at RTG, is having a party. He and his wife had a baby (Ava)about a month before Oliver and we were comparing notes today. Oliver weighs more than Ava! They are all doing well though, and Whitney (Joey's wife) is quitting her job to stay home with the baby. Hooray for her!

I'm hoping to have some visitors for Christmas or at least in December. My mom said she was probably coming up. I'm having a superbowl party at my house whenever the superbowl is and I'm hoping to have a better turnout this year than last. Last year only 4 people were there, and two of them were me and Bob.

I guess that's all for now because the boy's waking up and I'm trying to make dinner for Bob.

sleepy boy...