Anniversary, Birthday, & 8 months old

Boni and Casey came down for a short visit March 16-17. We went to the zoo with Rachel and her day care kids on Monday. It was small, but fun. Very good to see them.

Aunt Casey sneaks Garrett Cheetos!

Then, on the 17th (Our anniversary), after breakfast with everyone at Charlie Parkers, we headed off to St. Louis for a few days. First, we went to the St. Louis Zoo. It was gorgeous weather! We all had a great time.

See how blond Garrett is in the sunlight? You can actually see his hair in this pic- it keeps getting longer, thicker, and lighter. (above)

There was also some fun pool time at the Baymont Inn...


The next day, we went to the City Museum. It was so neat! It has modern art all over the place that you can see, touch, and even climb around in/on. The outdoor portion was open, thanks to the nice weather. There were all kinds of pathways, stairs, slides- it's hard to explain, just see the pics below! Also, there was a really cool pipe organ that you could get close enough to touch a couple of the wooden note things. It played automatically and had percussion, pipes, wood, and more. It was my favorite part of the museum! I couldn't get a good picture of it though- you'll have to go see it for yourself. ;-)

Blake and Garrett in the plane (shown below)

Garrett is 8 months old! Here's his monthly rocking chair photo. He is now crawling up a storm, and pulling himself up all the time.
Here's one of my latest creations- a chili pepper diaper. I've also made a couple with sign language on the tabs. One with "G" and "B", and one with "I love you" hands. So cute! I think he is up to 5 or 6 nice, fitted waterproof cloth diapers. I just keep picking away at it. I have a bunch more cut and ready to go when I have time and when the sewing machine is cooperating. 0:-)

Homemade diapers!

Well, I am experimenting with making homemade diapers. Not your grandma's diapers, either. Fitted diapers, most will be with a built in waterproof layer. Here's my journey thus far...

Diaper #1: my own pattern traced from a Huggies, made with clearance fleece and tablecloth fabric. (Just for practice, that one's already breaking after a few uses.)

Diaper #2: Free on-line pattern called the Tightey Whitey Hipster. Used old T-shirts!

Diaper #3: A different free on-line pattern- I adjusted it to have the cute tabs in front. It's hard to see in the photo, but the tabs have little teal bears on them. It's a little big right now, so I'll have to make the next one a little smaller. This one will fit until 18 months... that's a LOT of diapers saved!


Coming soon... chili peppers and camo. :-) Bet you didn't know saving money could be so fun!

7 months!

Garrett is 7 months! He got his 8th tooth and has been doing GREAT at sleeping through the night. (Yay!) Here's his 7 month photos, plus a couple extras.

And a video, if it works...

update

Wow, we haven't posted since Christmas? Well, we've been doing great. Garrett will be 7 months on Friday and currently is up to 7 teeth (ouch!). He has been experimenting with eating different foods like pieces of cracker and soft veggies. He likes everything but barley cereal. :-) He is working on crawling/scooting with little succuss so far. He mostly rolls around, which gets the job done. He's just over 17 lbs.

Kevin, Kerry, Emily, Noah, Luke, and Lydia came for a working visit in the middle of January. It was so great to see them! They are all getting so big and mature. We love you all!

DCC is going well. We've been planning several things for 2009. We have a guest speaker coming this Friday, and a 2-day conference with some Deaf evangelists at the end of March. We also have a School of Leaders class moving right along and a Monday night Bible study!

Here's some of the latest pictures...

Valentine's day card full of dimes from Great Grandma Stensby

6 months old (Jan. 20)

Look out, Sebastian! This kid is comin' for ya!

I love carrots!

Emily & Lydia- what beautiful ladies!

The rest of the gang, including Hershey...

Our main peeps at DCC: Connie, Bev, Bill, & Martha

Christmas

Saturday after Blake got off work we drove up to Minneapolis. In one night, we went from 30 degrees to negative 13! Talk about a cold snap. We visited Blake's grandparents there and also my friend Jenn and her family. We also went to dinner at a Japanese steak house- yum!

Peek-a-boo!

Great Grandma Healy

Then, we went to Frederic, WI for the rest of the week. We had a nice time visiting with family, some of whom had not yet seen Garrett. He was of course spoiled with love and gifts. We all went to a movie on Christmas day- Benjamin Button. Garrett slept for almost the whole thing, then ate for the last 20 minutes. It could not have gone better! We had a very nice week up north and now are back in our routine- also nice! :-)

Sabastian had a great week up there, too! Here he is on his favorite rug.

Open the present, Garrett!

Somebody loves Aunt Casey

Great Grandma Stensby

Merry Christmas!

Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving! It was my first time hosting, and we had 13 including Garrett. Boni and Casey came down from Wisconsin/Minnesota, Shawn, Lisa, Kelly and Katey came down from Winthrop Harbor, Mom and Dad came from Quincy, and Sam and Rachel came from State Street. :-) I greatly apreciate all of the help; I couldn't have made it otherwise. Thanksgiving dinner was quite delicious and I think we all ate too much! As always, here's some pictures. Sorry I don't have pictures of actual Thanksgiving dinner!

Aunt Casey

Grandma Boni

Grandma and cousins

Hi Kelly!

Look out Katey, he'll get you!




camo smiles

4 months old

Garrett is 4 months old today! His new skills include grabbing his feet & blowing raspberries. We let him try some baby cereal and home made food this past week or so. I have begun to make & freeze baby food while I look for a full time job. It's great to be home with him for now. Other news is that we got a "new" car- 4 doors!

Notice his "t" fingers like Mom, Grandma, & Great Grandpa Reed

Go Packers!

Baby's first food- rice cereal

4 months old!

Look at my 2 teeth!