New Grass...New Drum

This was what Gabe and I were up to this morning. We have new grass. It looks great but now we also need to do some maintenance on the old grass. It's now clear how bad we've been at taking care of it! We had it all done, including a trip to Home Depot to pick up sod and look at their kitchen remodel stuff, before noon. That's what happens when we're up and ready to get to work before 8am. Oh, the days of sleeping in on Saturday mornings are long gone.

When we ran errands this afternoon we couldn't resist picking out a toy drum for Levi at Target. He's reached the stage where he loves making noise. Especially hitting the tray on his highchair at dinner time. We figured he'd love having something that actually made music when he banged on it. So, here's a picture...mostly for the grandparents out there!
Well, Gabe leaves for Florida in the wee hours of the morning...again. This will be the third trip he's made in six weeks! I'm so sick of it. Luckily they're quick trips. But it makes me sad for him to be gone, even for a short time since we see so little of Levi as it is. This little guy is only going to be a baby once and I hate Gabe missing out. Even if it's only for 48 hours at a time. Having to work gets in the way of everything. Speaking of work...I have 8 more weeks myself!

Earth Day 2010

Well, it's the 40th anniversary of Earth Day and I really wanted to celebrate by doing something big this year. I've been racking my brain for weeks, and up until the last minute...right before bed last night. Yet, I was unable to think of anything Gabe and I could really do this year. Neither of us were really willing to turn our 30+ minute commutes to work, into an hour or more by taking public transportation.
Of course we would love to put in one of these, but that is definitely not happening this year. Maybe for Earth Day's 50th anniversary. Perhaps since we're good at living "green" every day, we can be off the hook this year? Oh, wait! Gabe did print the coupon he just took to Dairy Queen on previously used paper. That counts right? Unfortunately, the gas he's using to drive there and get our blizzards will cancel that good deed out. (Everyone has heard about the buy one get one for $.25 right?)
Happy Earth Day!

Spring Cleaning...(sort of)

Wish I would have thought to take some before pictures. Gabe and I started the process of "remodeling" our yard. We have some big dreams of what we'd like to do. Get the hot tub up and running again, gas fire pit, lots of native plants, new sod, steel raised beds for the veggie garden, taking out the rock front lawn and replace it with no-mow grass. Those are just the big things on the list. Well, this weekend all we really got done was a little trimming and some demolition. Gabe tore out a bunch of wild blackberries and was going to mow the lawn. That was the plan anyway. He worked for about half an hour trying to get the lawnmower working but with no luck. Leaving an old lawnmower out in the elements all winter is probably not the best idea. Guess I know what someone will be getting for Father's day.

I worked on removing a stupid flagstone path in the yard. I hated it. It just took space from what little yard we actually have. So, we'll need to lay some sod in the next month to give Levi a little more grass to play on. I also removed what was left of the previous owners water feature. They left the small "pond" of stagnant water but took the electric fountain. It was disgusting. The smell almost made me lose my breakfast. So, now we have a huge hole in our flower bed. Oh, I also removed at least 100 iris from the front yard. I'm giving some to my mom but if anyone else wants some let me know. We have no idea what color they are. I just don't like iris...unless they're of the native variety.

So, we don't really have much to show for all our hard work, other than our sore muscles. The yard actually looks worse right now. I guess I'll have to go at it alone next weekend. Gabe's off to play with his dad and his buddies for the weekend.

It was a very productive weekend. Got lots of other cleaning done around here that I've been avoiding. But in the mean time, also avoided the school work I brought home to do this weekend. Guess I can't do it all!

Happy Easter!

Levi slept over at Grandma and Grandpa G's house last night so that Gabe and I could go out with friends to the Spring Beer and Wine Fest. We met up with the family at church and then went back to Grandma and Grandpa's house for lunch. Here's Levi checking out what the Easter Bunny left for him in his basket. No chocoalte bunnies this year.We had a nice but short visit with the family...the little guy refused to nap!

I hope everyone had a happy Easter. Next year Levi will be on the hunt for eggs. That will be fun.

Cousins

These pictures are mainly for Grandma G. But I figured there may be a few more of you out there who might also enjoy a few shots of Levi with his big cousins.

We tried desperately to get Sawyer and Levi in the bath tub together. But I guess when you're the big boy cousin you have no desire to get into the bath tub with a baby. So here's Sawyer "helping" me give Levi a bath.Here's one of Levi watching Savannah and Sawyer feed what few ducks were inhabiting the duck pond. I think most of them must still be hanging out down South, waiting for winter to be completely over.And here's the best of our attempted photo session with all three kids. I love this picture but I hate that the depth of field is off and Savannah and Sawyer are out of focus! And it's really one of the best ones we got.This one's ok too. Except the kids are all looking at me on the floor being silly...trying to get Levi to smile, rather than looking at the camera.We got a few more cute "silly" pictures too. Sawyer was definitely more into taking the silly pictures so he could stick out his tongue. So, there are a few more good ones to look at if you're interested Mom.

And that completes our St. Louis adventures. I'm really thankful for our wonderful family. Thanks Heather, Ryan, Savannah and Sawyer for having us. We loved seeing you guys. Wish it could happen more often. We miss you!

Butterfly House

Our last big outing in St. Louis was the Butterfly House. It's now part of the Missouri Botanical Garden, but is located in a different area. The building is basically a giant greenhouse, with all kinds of tropical flowers for the butterflies. For March, the butterfly of the month was the Blue Morpho, there were around 3000 of them flying around the building. There were so many, that at one point or another, I think all of us had a butterfly land on us.


I apologize for the quality of these pictures, they came from Gabe's phone since the building was too humid for our regular camera. It fogged up as soon as we got it out, rendering it pretty much useless.

-H

Anheuser-Busch Brewery

The one thing Gabe really wanted to do in St. Louis was go on a brewery tour. I'm not really sure why. He doesn't even drink Budweiser. In fact, I think he'd probably drink water before drinking one...well, maybe not. So, we pulled Savannah out of school early to head into the city. One of the things on our agenda...the brewery.We saw the brewery, the Clydesdales and historic stable, the bottling facility and drank our complementary free beer.

Here are the boys enjoying the sights and smells of the brewery. Savannah said the brewery smelled bad, to which both her dad and uncle strongly disagreed!

Missouri Botanical Garden

This is the biggest botanical garden I've ever been too. 79 acres of plants! It took us a good 3 plus hours to explore. Unfortunately spring was not in bloom in St. Louis and I feel like we missed the most beautiful time of year to visit this garden. I was surprised to find not even daffodils in bloom yet. They've been in bloom almost a month here and are just about spent. Even though the plants weren't 100% ready, this was still a big garden to explore. Plus they have the Climatron, the world's first geodesic dome greenhouse. It made us feel like we had our Hawaiian vacation...sort of. All the plants in there are tropical and it seemed like we were back on the big island. They have tons of different types of gardens. Here's the entrance to the English boxwood garden.They also have a traditional Chinese garden.And a Japanese garden. The koi in the pond were hilarious. We stood at the railing to look at them and they were all under the impression we were planning to feed them the food you can by in the candy like dispenser. They all swam over to us and just came up to the surface with their mouths wide open. It was funny but also really disgusting. Carp are such a gross fish. Here we are watching (and not feeding) the fish.

St. Louis Zoo

Well, I think it's going to take me a while to get all of our adventures in St. Louis on here.

Levi had his first visit to the zoo in St. Louis. The St. Louis zoo is an awesome zoo and what makes it even better...admission is FREE! We enjoyed a beautiful day. The elephants were definitely Levi's favorite. He made all sorts of noise as he tried to talk to them. And the two baby elephants were running around, jumping in the water and playing. It was so fun.Gabe, Levi and Sawyer also rode the carousel. Here they are waiting in line.And here's Levi after his first ride. It was so cute. Levi rode like a natural. When Gabe set him down on the lion, he immediately grabbed onto the pole. It was like he knew exactly what to do.And just one more shot...here's Levi watching the Sun Bears lounging in the sun.I'm not sure how aware Levi was of all the animals. I think we'll have to make some visits to the Oregon zoo this summer. I'm sure Levi will love it!

Gateway Arch

Probably the most famous, and certainly the most visible landmark of the St. Louis area is Gateway Arch. Any trip to the area wouldn't be complete without a visit. This being the case, we made it our first stop on our trip. Unfortunately, the weather wasn't really willing to cooperate. As you can tell from the picture, the sky was gray, and we were bundled up. From a distance you could barely see the top of the arch. Further dampening the day was the fact that the tram to the top was sold out for the day. We were already planning a second visit as we walked back to the car. Our second trip, later in the week was much better.


The weather was great, and we bought tickets to the top ahead of time. The "pod" that takes you to the top only seats 5 people, and was a bit claustrophobic. Even the viewing area at the top was a bit tight for comfort. I will say the view was amazing, there's nothing like a view from 630' in the air. The view of downtown with Busch Stadium and the Historic Old Courthouse was fantastic.

We're Back!

We got into Portland around 5:30pm yesterday. Won't make that mistake again. Gabe and I could have used a day to recover from our vacation before heading back to work. Guess that's the way our vacations will be now that we've got the little guy.

Flying did not go so well this time around. On the trip to St. Louis, Levi refused to nurse on the airplane. So, he pretty much went from 7am to 7pm without drinking anything! We brought along a few cans of food, which he ate, but I was pretty worried about him not having enough. On the descent into Kansas City he refused to nurse, refused his pacifier (Which he really doesn't take anyway. He mostly likes to chew on it.) and refused to suck his fingers. Therefore, he screamed for quite awhile. After that, I did not want to get back on an airplane for the short flight from Kansas City to St. Louis.

Coming home we were more prepared. For the return trip, I had a bottle ready for him and we also got some apple juice. Things went much better. But he hardly slept so he was pretty cranky. Definitely wasn't the same as flying with a 2 month old who slept the entire time. I think we'll hold off on flying again for a while! It's too exhausting!

Anyway, it was great to see family and explore the St. Louis area. As I type this, Gabe is downloading pictures off the camera so I'll have to work this week at getting pictures edited and uploaded. So...I'll be back soon.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

Hope you enjoy the luck of the Irish today!
Gabe is enjoying a Guinness now. I'll be enjoying mine after this little guy is down for the night. That's as "Irish" as we're going to get tonight!

What's the world coming to?

Two posts in one weekend. I think it's my attempt to avoid the pile of work I brought home with me this weekend. It's the end of the grading period and spring break is in sight. I just can't seem to get myself motivated to do any work. After I'm done here I'll probably find something else to distract me...like filling in my bracket.

We actually had the camera out quite a bit yesterday and this was one of my favorite shots. I just had to share it!Levi loves it when you blow in his face. Seriously loves it. Like busting up...full on...hysterically laughing...loves it. He's also really into grabbing faces. So, that's what he and his dad are up to here. And the explanation for Gabe's funny face.

Our schedule is a little off today with the time change, and spending what was suppose to be Levi's afternoon nap at his friend Taya's 1st birthday party. Hopefully the little guy will be ready for bed at his usual time and Gabe and I can get back to playing this. Super fun. When Bryan ever wants his copy back, we might have to go get it.

I probably won't make it back on here before we take off to see the my sister and her family in St. Louis for spring break. So be thinking of us on Saturday morning as we try the whole flying with baby thing again. Levi is so much older now. I'm not sure what to expect. I'm going to assume the sleeping through the whole fight thing won't happen this time around. Plus it's not a quick two hour flight this time either. Although, at this point I'm not sure I'll make it through 5 more days with 150 8th graders the week before spring break. It's always a wild ride. After surviving that, what's a 5 hour plane ride with my 7 month old teething baby?

Double Trouble

Levi has TWO teeth!
Yes, you read that right...one broke through last weekend and the other one early this week. I think I first felt it on Tuesday morning. They don't look like much (look carefully at those little white things on his bottom gum or you might miss them) but we're pretty excited. We've all been sleeping better the last few nights and we are starting to see our old happy baby again!

Happy Birthday Gabe!

It's Gabe's birthday weekend. And it is a celebration literally lasting all weekend. Yesterday evening his dad and Joanne came up. We had a nice dinner, cake (sour cream orange...one of Gabe's favorites), and presents. He was thrilled to finally have this in his hands. I'm a terrible wife. He picked out, and purchased, his own birthday present. He even had it delivered to himself at work. I never know what to get him. I think it makes things a little better that I wrapped it up and made him wait until his actual birthday to use it. I'm sure he disagrees. He was like a little kid, asking me every day if he could please just get it out early.

Today, Gabe and his dad took off to spectate at the Doo Wop Rally. The weather is perfect for it. I think every year I've gone up there it's been pouring rain or REALLY cold. Levi, Joanne and I are holding down the fort here. We took a trip to the park and enjoyed the sunshine. I need to get out and work in the yard, but our baby has been on a sleeping strike.

This week was definitely the worst sleeping week we've ever had. Even worse than when he was a newborn. Almost every night this week Levi has woken up screaming several times. A few nights he literally screamed for hours. (Usually between the hours of 1 and 3am). The only time he'd stop was when Gabe held him upright and rocked him. We thought maybe he had an ear infection, so Gabe took him into the doctor, only to be told he's probably teething and suffering from separation anxiety. Great! Neither of those things will be easy to fix. Needless to say Gabe and I were both on edge most of the week.

But I'm glad this week from hell is ending by celebrating the birth of the man I love. Tomorrow my family will come over for dinner and the final party. It's my sister, Tricia's, birthday today. Good times!

Our Beautiful Rose City and Other Weekend Happenings

Oh my goodness the weather has been beautiful this week! I love Portland, but it's even better here when the sun is shinning. Saturday morning I had an appointment to get my hair cut so Gabe decided to drop me off and then take Levi up to Mt. Tabor park. Since our move this summer, we've missed living over on the east side.
Here's Levi once he and Gabe got to the top. Not sure who the statue is...but that baby is sure cute!











It was a great morning to be out, so we also did a loop of the waterfront. Spring sunshine is so rare. And it seemed everyone was out enjoying it!










We spent the late afternoon and evening over at the Freitas house. Lots of wonderful food and time to talk and play. Levi wasn't too interested in playing with his friends. He was more interested in playing with all the new toys. Here's a picture of everyone (minus Gabe of course...since he's behind the camera). I just love Finn's toothy grin!


Today Gabe's been helping out a friend, so Levi and I have been getting laundry done and hanging out together. Aunt Becky came over so we went to the library and sat at the park for awhile. It's been a nice and relaxing weekend. Wish it wasn't over so soon! All weekends should be three day weekends.

6 Months!

Can you believe it? I can barely believe it myself. Saturday morning we celebrated Levi's 6 month milestone before taking off for the beach. We're just posting now because this morning was Levi's checkup at the doctor's office and we'd have all his 6 month stats. He weighed in at 19lbs 10oz and measured 28.5" long. That length puts him pretty much at the top of the growth charts. We definitely had noticed him slimming down a bit, he was apparently putting that energy into gaining some length these last couple months.

First Family "Camping" Trip

I don't think you can technically consider staying in a yurt...camping. At least in this family it isn't. Being protected from the torrential coastal downpours and having electricity and heat isn't camping. So that's why we're referring to our weekend at Ft. Stevens State Park as Levi's first "camping" trip. I decided this weekend would give us an idea of what we might be in for when we take him camping this summer.
I was a little nervous we wouldn't be able to fit all our gear in the car. Even without the tent, it was a tight squeeze. I told Gabe we need to get a car carrier now. Not sure he's really ready for that. Our goal was to leave "early" Saturday morning. We ended up getting on the road just before 10am. Not bad since I didn't really have much ready to go before hand. Plus that timing worked great because the little guy was ready for a nap and slept pretty much the whole way there.
We decided to grab some lunch in Astoria before starting our weekend in the yurt. Gabe wanted to try out the Ft. George Brewery. The food was really good but I was disappointed in my beer. I really wanted a good strong IPA and the server said she couldn't give me the one I asked for. They "might be out." But then later she came by and asked me how my beer was, I decided to be honest about it and tell her it was ok. She responded by telling me she's bring me the beer I'd originally asked for next time. Too bad I'm at a one beer limit these days. Why didn't you just bring me that one when I asked for it? Anyway...rant over!
After lunch we headed to Ft. Stevens, got settled in our yurt and took off to explore the park. I can't remember ever going there as a kid so it was all new to me. We tried to hang out at the beach where the Peter Iredale wreck is but it was so windy! All we did was get out and take this picture. We had sand in our eyes and mouth from just being there a minute. So, we ended up spending most of the afternoon playing in the yurt since the rain and wind was beating us hard. Before dinner, things let up and we walked down to Coffenbury Lake. Not much was going on, the lake was nice and still. Peaceful. Wish we would have thought to bring some fishing gear.
On Sunday morning, we decided to try the beach again only to discover it raining once we got down there. The wind had stopped but the three of us were pretty wet after walking for just a few minutes. So we decided to head inland just a bit and check out the historic fort. Like I said, I'd never been there. And I'll probably never need to go back. I might be a historian, but nothing about military history interests me, and very few of the original structures are still standing! Not much to see in my opinion. While we were there, the rain found us and we headed back to our yurt to get dried out and wait out the rain. Since we needed more indoor activities to keep us occupied, and out of the rain, we decided to head back to Astoria and check out the Columbia River Maritime Museum. Surprisingly, neither Gabe or I had ever been there. It was pretty cool and the sun even decided to make an appearance.Our last stop of the day was to try the beach again since the sun finally decided to come out. We really wanted Levi to be able to put his toes in the sand. He doesn't seem too impressed but I got him giggling about it on video. He dug his hands in too. Thought the sandy hands would go directly into his mouth like everything else but surprisingly they didn't!With all that activity, our little guy decided the only naps he needed were in the car about 5 minutes before we reached our destinations. So he probably only slept an hour and a half...all day. That's about half of what he usually sleeps. Needless to say, he was ready for an early bed time. After he was asleep, Gabe and I enjoyed some Valentine's day chocolates and beer. When Levi was up at dawn on Monday morning (after not sleeping and ending up in our sleeping bag) Gabe and I were ready to head home. We packed up camp pretty quickly and were on the road before 10am!
We spent the rest of our holiday cleaning up the messes we brought back. Not much of a relaxing three day weekend but we had some fun times! It's just nice to get away every once in a while. I am glad we won't be trying the whole "camping" thing again for awhile. What a lot of work!

Getting ready...

for some March madness around here! Gabe went out with the guys on Saturday morning to shop a beer store going out of business, so Levi and I used the time to watch some college basketball. We watched most of the Duke vs. Georgetown game. Here's Levi enjoying the game.














And here he is cheering when Georgetown scored! I'm teaching him early to dislike Duke!
Looks like Levi might enjoy watching basketball as much as his mother does.

Mars Vs Venus?

I made an observation a while back about just how different Gabe and I are, and I wondered if it was true for most men and women.
Here's my nightstand:And here's Gabe's:Notice the difference in reading material?
I tease Gabe a lot about not being able to read anything other than magazines. Seriously, I've really only seen him read 3 books in the 6+ years I've known him. Looking at our night stands got me wondering...
Is this just a fundamental difference between the sexes?

Help my research. What reading material do you have next to your bed? Books? Or magazines?

Levi Keeping Himself Entertained

As you all know, I got Heidi a video camera for Christmas. We've been using it quite a bit, but haven't really shown anyone any video yet. This was from last week when Levi was hanging out in his new play area thing that my dad and Joanne got him for Christmas. I'm not really sure what it's called, it's officially a "stationary entertainer" but I think that's a stupid name. Anyway, Levi likes to spin around and chew on all the different toys he has available. It's not clear what he's laughing at here, but I thought it was pretty funny.

"Real" Food!

Ok...so I've been trying to blog all day. But our internet hasn't been working. I restarted every piece of it, at least a dozen times, in an attempt to get things working. With no success. Only to have Gabe walk through the door, go down stairs, and call up to me that it's working about 10 seconds later. Totally frustrating!

Anyway....
Levi's been eating rice cereal this weekend!And he seems to like it! He's been eating it really well. Expect for the fact that he'd be just as happy chewing on the spoon. He likes to grab the spoon out of your hand, as you can see he's about to do in this photo. After we gave him cereal on Friday and Saturday he was more spitty than usual. So we think his stomach may not be quite ready for it. I gave him a little bit more this afternoon and so far so good. If it seems like it agrees with him today, we'll continue cereal for the rest of the week and maybe try some avocado over the weekend. Exciting!

Along with this milestone, I think we've also reached the teething one. There have been times I think he's been teething but now I'm sure of it! Last night Levi was up about every 2 hours and then wouldn't go back to sleep at 4am. The only thing I can figure is that his teeth are bothering him so bad he can't sleep. He seems fine otherwise (minus biting and chewing on everything...like the spoon coming into his mouth). We have some homeopathic teething tablets, so I'll be popping those in him before bed tonight. I don't think any of us want a repeat of last night.

I'd really like to get on here more often but work is keeping me pretty busy. Yuck!

I'm Alive...

barely!
We've survived my first week back to work.
I was sad about leaving Levi but that wasn't what had me most worried. It was dealing with 150 angst ridden 8th graders I was really scared of. I knew a lot of them would be unhappy to have me back. They've been able to get away with a lot from my sub that would never fly with me. But I also did hear a lot of "Mrs. West...I'm really glad you're back."

Well, Monday was really tough and there were many moments that day I started writing my letter of resignation in my head. This job just takes a lot out of me emotionally. I have about 8 girls in my 6th period class who I call the "mean girls". They got really pissed at me this week because I've been asking them to stop socializing the entire class period and do some academic work. It didn't seem like that ridiculous of a request, but I guess when you have to discuss who's breaking up with who and who's fighting who because she looked at your new boyfriend, there's no time to learn anything about America's westward expansion. Oh...I miss them as sweet innocent 7th graders. So much happens to middle school students between 7th and 8th grade! I guess that's when the hormones really kick it into high gear. Anyway, all this to say it's been a tough adjustment for them and for me. But things did get better each day, and I haven't put any of those resignation ideas actually down on paper....yet.

I'm very thankful that with the stress of my job, I haven't had to worry about Levi at all. It's great knowing he's with someone who really loves him. Maybe even almost as much as I do. My mom's been great this week! She puts in 9 1/2 hours a day and I can't get her to leave! (Mom, I'm just teasing.) She does dishes, she's done laundry and she even graded some papers for me! How did I get lucky enough to get a nanny, house keeper and assistant?

I do miss Levi a ton. I told myself I wasn't going to cry when I left him on Monday morning because I knew I'd then be sobbing all day. Unfortunately, I did tear up a little bit as I drove away from the house but I just reminded myself that he'd have a great day with Grandma and I could look forward to seeing him when I got home. Which I did. The smile that broke across his face when he saw me melted my heart! He even got the excited arm flap going too. Boy, I love that little guy!

So, here we are on Saturday morning. The first week down, and only 5 1/2 more months to go. On the agenda for the weekend is lots of snuggle time with Levi, going to the wedding of one of Gabe's co-workers, and some grocery shopping. Oh, and of course that work I had to bring home with me. Work sucks!

Happy New Year!

I can't believe 2009 is over already! It was a really great year for us. Lots of changes and many moments of stress. But overall, one of the best!

We were invited to ring in the new year with Alexis and Eric. My babysitter (AKA: Mom or Grandma) made plans of her own, so Alexis said we could bring the big guy with us. I wasn't sure how he was going to behave since his bed time is usually between 7 and 8. Well, he did great until we tried to lay him down and get him to sleep so we could play games. He just wouldn't settle down and sleep. So we ended up heading home about 10. Here's Levi with his "Auntie" Alexis before he refused to fall asleep. Celebrating his first new year!Gabe and tossed around the idea of just going to bed ourselves when we got home. But we decided to wait it out a few more hours. Here we are enjoying a Bellini right before midnight.Definitely not a great picture. But it's WAY past our bed time!
Here's to an amazing 2010!

The "Perfect" Storm

We didn't have a white Christmas but we did get some snow this week. About 2:30pm on Tuesday, my mom and I were playing with my new Wii game when all of a sudden my mom declares: "It's snowing!" We'd gone to my school and done some work that morning and were just relaxing while Levi took his nap. The flakes were big and wet, and neither of us thought it would stick. Along with everyone else in the Metro region, we thought it would stop soon and be gone in a matter of minutes. Well, that didn't happen.

It snowed the rest of the afternoon and into the evening. We got about 3 inches of snow. I know...it doesn't seem like much but the city isn't really equipped for dealing with this wet slippery snow and neither are most drivers. Gabe left work a little early because he knew the traffic home would be crazy. Little did he know how crazy it truly was. It took him 5 1/2 hours to get home. He walked in the door at 9:30. His commute is usually 30 minutes. 45 on a high traffic day. Plus his stereo was stolen out of his car a few weeks ago, so he had no way to listen to traffic reports or take his mind of the fact that he was stopped on I-5 south for hours at a time. I felt really bad for him.

So, while Gabe was in traffic hell. Levi, my mom and I did enjoy the snow. This picture is at the beginning of the snow fall. We didn't take Levi out again because it got dark and it's not like he really can play in it yet! It does seem he was interested in what that wet white stuff was. The snow is gone now, but we might have to take Levi up to the mountain to play in some more before winter is over.

Over the river and through the woods...

to grandmother's house we went.
We got to Oakridge in the early afternoon on Christmas. Levi got to visit with his "great" relatives (great uncle, great aunts, great cousin) and his grandma. We had dinner up at Gabe's aunt and uncle's house. Of course, Levi was ready for his last meal of the evening, and bed time, right when we sat down to our meal. I just realized I didn't take any pictures the whole time we were in Oakridge. I took some video but Gabe needs to show me how to get it off my new video camera.

On Saturday we visited a little longer and then drove to Gabe's dad and Joanne's house. Levi got quite the gift from his grandparents. Here's grandpa Tom helping Gabe put it together.And here's Levi playing once it was all put together. He's still a little short since he has to touch the base with his tippy toes, but he really likes "playing" with all the different things. Really I should say he likes putting them in his mouth.Once again, Tom made us quite an amazing feast for dinner. The most delicious rack of lamb I've ever tasted! And once again, guess who was ready for his dinner and bed time at the same time? I had a really hard time tearing myself away from Tom's good cooking. Gabe's aunt Jaki and her husband, as well as Gabe's cousin Nikki, came over to say hello too. So Levi got to meet even more "great" relatives.
We said good-bye around noon on Sunday and headed home. The drive was fine until we hit Albany where traffic hit a stand still. Apparently a dog decided he had enough of the drive and decided to run down I-5 North. There were several cars stopped to catch him and traffic was all sorts of messed up. We still got home pretty early and were able to get unpacked and relax a little before Gabe had to head back to work this morning. I really wish he could have taken this week off since it's my last week at home too. Oh well. I'm already planning us a little family getaway on President's day weekend.


We enjoyed seeing so many members of our family this holiday. And even though the pictures may not show it, I know Levi enjoyed it too. I just wish he'd smile his adorable smile for the camera!

First Christmas

Our 4 day Christmas celebration started on Thursday (Christmas Eve). We drove over to my mom and dad's to spend the day. Becky was there, she flew in late Wednesday night from Las Vegas. Tricia and her fiance, Travis, were there. We ate a lot of snacks, opened a ton of presents, had a big turkey dinner and then came home to put Levi in bed. Gabe and I were going to stay up and watch our traditional Christmas movie, but we decided not to wait up for Santa.
Here's Levi opening his very first Christmas present.And this is what he did once it was opened. In fact, this is what he did with all the presents he opened. He was much more interested in the wrapping paper. But not to play with...it went directly into his mouth. He does that with EVERYTHING these days.
Christmas morning my family came over to our house. We opened more presents, including those from family far away. Levi got a really cool book made by his cousins (ABC's for Levi). It was both written and illustrated by Savannah and Sawyer. I was totally surprised to open up this for Christmas. Now I don't know what to do...should I take pictures or video? You should have seen me debate it for the rest of the weekend. I think we've decided that Gabe will have to take one and I'll take the other! Here are us girls showing off the new matching PJ's my mom got us. Poor Levi got stuck being in this shot too!Gabe made our traditional Christmas breakfast of biscuits and gravy. And after Levi had a nap, and some lunch, we took off to see Gabe's family. I wasn't sure how Levi would be. It's about 2 and 1/2 hours to Gabe's mom's house. The longest car ride Levi's taken yet. But he did great! He talked a little, sang us some songs and slept. It was pretty uneventful.