Yellowstone

Return from Yellowstone

Hey everyone! We are back from Yellowstone and thus ends our neverending month of travel. It feels so good to be home, but our vacation was just amazing - it beat even my high expectations. The weather made it feel like a winter vacation instead of a summer one, but despite the cold and snow, we were able to see all the sights of Yellowstone. Hayden got to experience Old Faithful, several different smaller geysers and hot springs, and the Upper and Lower Falls of the Yellowstone River. In addition to exploring the park, we got to spend some really great quality time with our family. There were several wild games of Catch Phrase and some really great home cooked meals, and the cabin we stayed at was beautiful, with a great view of the valley and surrounding mountains. One night the clouds cleared out and we were able to catch a colorful sunset.

While we were on vacation, all of Hayden's aunts and uncles were helping him learn how to walk, and guess what?!? Our little guy took about 8 steps today on his own! Nate and I were so excited. Here is a video below of him and his amazing feat :) Also, check out the slideshow above of Hayden's adventures in Yellowstone.

10 months old

Hi everyone. Well Hayden is celebrating turning 10 months old today :) Since our last update he has grown another tooth on the top, and he has learned to clap. He claps for everything! First thing in the morning when he sees us, when he eats something delicious, when an airplane goes overhead, when he meets someone new and exciting, you get the picture. It is his new trick and he is fond of practicing. Now we are moving on to things like waving and "so big" and high fives. So far he just claps whenever we try to get him to do any other hand gesture....but we'll get there.

Still no walking, but he continues to stand on his own (usually standing and clapping), and he will take up to 3 steps before falling to the floor to crawl. I suspect it will awhile before he walks simply because he has become so good and quick at crawling. He now does the triangle crawl - on his hands and feet (instead of knees) whenever he is on an unfamiliar surface like concrete or grass.

Lots of interesting things have happened since I last updated. First off, he visited with his good friend Henry from Wisconsin, who is the 16 month old son of my friend Nicole. They were good buddies and we went to the aquarium and swam often at our neighborhood pool. Henry introduced Hayden to many exciting foods like PB&J sandwiches, cheetos and apple juice :) Then after Henry left we got on a plane bound for Ohio so I could drop Hayden off at his grandparents while I traveled to London and Copenhagen for work. It was quite a traumatic parting (for me, not for him!), but he did great. I had partially transitioned him to formula, so that was an easy switch for him, and he could explore all of grammy's house and he became quite proficient at climbing the stairs and getting into the tupperware drawers in her kitchen :) They loved having him and it was hard to say goodbye when we came back to Dallas on Saturday. But his dad was VERY glad to see us after 10 days alone. It's good to be back together as a family.

We leave on Friday for a 5 day trip to Yellowstone with Nate's family and we can't wait to do some hiking with Hayden in his backpack, and to see Old Faithful and spend some time together as an extended family. I'll post some photos from our trip when we get home. Good bye for now and I'll leave you with photos of Hayden and his buddy Henry.

First Mother's Day!

Sorry I let so much time go by since my last entry. Our life has been very full these past few weeks with family in town visiting, and a heavy work load, so I haven't had much time to update this blog. In fact, I haven't even really taken many photos lately, which is really out of character for me. But now that my family has flown home, I finally have some time to take a breath and write a little note. As nice as it is to have some down time, I do miss having family around. It's always so lonely after everyone leaves, and Hayden just looks around like "hey, where did everybody go?". He is used to constant entertainment, so spending time with just mom is pretty boring in his world.

Sunday was our first Mother's Day and it was so much fun. Hayden (aka Nate) bought me some beautiful plants that I am going to pot this weekend and put in my backyard. He cooked a wonderful brunch of eggs benedict for all of us (my Aunt Kathy and cousin Matt were visiting from Wisconsin, and my mom was here from Ohio), then we spent the day by our friend Kneila's pool. Hayden had a blast floating in his raft in the hottub, and we all got some fresh air and sun. I had some time to reflect on how amazingly lucky I am to have such a great family, and such a beautiful, happy and healthy son.

Although Hayden may be bored with his newly quiet household, he is anything but boring! He keeps Nate and I laughing all the time with his new tricks. His new thing is to say "kitty" whenever Evi comes around. I never thought that I would be writing "kitty" as his first word in the baby book! But it is clear as day and he only says it when Evi is around (although he will occasionally call Dallas and Lilly "kitty" too). We live right in the landing pattern for DFW airport so we always have planes flying low overhead, and my mom would sit outside with him in the morning and point to them. After two weeks of this routine, he has learned to point at airplanes too, although he has not yet mastered that word. He also will point at cars when they pass outside and say "car". It's so funny because now when he is in his carseat he will point out the window and repeatedly babble with an occasional "car" in the mix. He clearly likes his "k" sounds. He says mama and dada but I'm still not sure he associates the syllables with Nate and I, whereas he says "car" and "kitty" at the appropriate moments that make me believe he is actually making a connection.

He is also a solo stander these days. He did it for the first time on Saturday. I was holding his hands and encouraging him to walk towards me. He just got this very stubborn, confident look on his face, and he shook off my hold. Then he stood there, very steady, for about 10 seconds! I was shocked. Now that he is has done it once, he can't stop. He'll pull himself up on our coffee table, grab a toy (or lets be realistic - the TV remote), and just stand there playing with the toy with no support. Last night (and I wish we had this on film), he grabbed his sippy cup and started drinking with his head thrown way far back and both hands holding the cup. He started to get tipsy like he was going to tumble backward, and then he overcompensated by lurching forward and spitting all his water out in this huge arc before tipping over. He never cries when he tumbles - he just looks dazed for a moment and then it's right back to crawling, pulling up and standing. He is such a boy :)

Here are some photos of my busy baby:

Playing in the sand at Life's A beach


Hanging out with his Aunt Kath and Cousin Matt


At the pool on Mother's Day






With his grammy


With his friend at Going Bonkers

First Rangers Game!

Hi everyone! Today was a big first for Hayden - his first major league baseball game! We watched the Rangers beat the Twins 10-0 at Rangers Ballpark in Arlington. Even though Nate and I cannot claim to be huge baseball fans, it was still so much fun to share this experience with our son. We went with a few other families from my moms group and the babies were all really sweet and well behaved, and pretty intrigued by everything going on around them. Here are a few photos from the day:

Frequent Flier

Hi everyone! We just returned from a trip to Denver - Hayden's 6th plane trip I believe in his 8 short months. Let's see - he has been to Ohio three time on a plane, to Wisconsin, and to Denver twice. Wow, he is my little frequent flier and he is SO good on the plane. The trip to Denver is only an hour and a half, and Hayden slept almost the whole flight both ways. When he wasn't sleeping he was making friends with the people sitting in the row behind us, or jumping up and down on his daddy's lap, squealing with delight. We had two people tell us that he is the best baby they've ever had the pleasure to fly with :)

When he's not on a plane though, he is major trouble ;) Right now he is trying to "help" me type. He is busy and is very into making funny noises. He is experimenting with his voice. There were several times this weekend when he clearly said the word "mama", but I'm not sure if he was just stringing a few syllables together that he had just learned and that were fun to say, or if he really was trying to get my attention. He was looking right at me 3 different times when he said it, so I have faith that he was calling for me :) We'll see if he keeps using this word.

Dallas Arboretum

Last weekend we headed to the Arboretum with my mom's group and had a blast. That is one of the most beautiful places I have been to in a long. There are huge gardens filled with so many colors and varieties of flowers. The azaleas and tulips were in bloom, and the weather was picture perfect - sunny and 80. The Arboretum is situated on the shores of White Rock Lake and it's just really picturesque - it makes me take back everything I've said about Dallas not being as pretty as other places we have lived. Here are some photos of Hayden that I took while we were there.

Fort Worth Zoo!

Nate has been out of town all weekend, entertaining clients at the ranch, so I took Hayden to the Fort Worth Zoo with my mom's group yesterday, and we had the best time. I think Hayden actually could see the animals, because he would reach out of his stroller toward the animals and squeal in delight. He seemed particularly interested in the giraffes. There was a baby giraffe who was showing off and running around his habitat, and all the babies really enjoyed that. We also saw tigers, lions, cheetahs, rhinos, elephants, black bears and assorted reptiles and birds. It was a cool and chilly day, but I think that was probably for the best because I can only imagine how hot and crowded it is at the zoo on summer day.

Now that Hayden is fully recovered from his stomach bug, we have been giving him some table foods. I typically will give him some of my bread or potatoes if I'm having any, and he's also gotten corn kernals, apples, bananas and a piece of muffin. I'm so paranoid that he will choke, so I'm making the pieces incredibly tiny, but he does have 4 teeth now and he appears to be chewing and gumming all of his foods, so I may start to gradually introduce more food. He is getting so big! He continues to crawl more quickly every day, and he is standing all the time and getting into everything he shouldn't be getting into. We have our baby gates and Nate is going to be installing them when he gets home this afternoon (I hope!).