Visit from Papa

We were blessed with a visit from Papa. He flew out for 4 days to hang with his grandson...oh and a little bit of us (his son and favorite daughter-in-law). We had a grand time although way too short as it always is. I took 2 days off work and now I'm spoiled with spending time with my family. Papa spoiled Charley with attention.

Sigh.

We absolutely love seeing family and spending time with them. It is hard being so far away and only seeing everyone once or twice a year. After having Charley, it makes it all that much more difficult especially when you see other couples and their extended families hanging together. Perhaps in the future, ah-hem, NEAR future we can look at moving closer to the west coast. For now, we will relish in the memories of being with family. We do hope that Papa has a safe and quick trip home. We are SO glad you came and spent time with us.

Halloween

I realize it has been a week since Halloween. We didn't really do much but we did dress Bugaboo up as Tigger and did a tiny bit of trick or treating at the mall. He didn't mind the costume as I thought he was going to. I wanted to take him to the pumpkin patch but those plans fell through which I suppose is okay being as it he is only 9.5 months old. I'm sure he wouldn't remember it but now I have no pictures of him next to pumpkins...oh well. Bad parents.

Happenings

For not posting in some time...there really isn't much going on. :) Which perhaps is a good thing. Charley had his 9 month checkup and he's smack dab in the 25th percentile still. He's got 4 teeth, 2 more breaking through. He GRINDS his darned teeth and that drives me UP the WALL. He continuously clicks his tongue after eating and nursing. He's more comfortable standing up now. He is crawling up the stairs like a champ but wants to go down them head first. I've shown him several other acceptable ways but none of which he has grasped. He loves the bath and trying to breath under water. And now for some pictures.

Whatever food this was, he didn't like it. But he certainly will smile for the camera!

Learning to walk. A little tricky especially when you get stuck on a toy and continue to push the stupid thing until you fall head over heels on top of it. Just tonight he was standing up to this walker and fell backwards jamming his bottom teeth into his top gums. Being the awesomely observant mother that I am, didn't notice the blood dribbling out of his mouth until I decided to play with some of the buttons with him. I freaked. But apparently he didn't notice.

Our snake friend. He lives in a hole beside the concrete slab by the front door.

8 months old.

Charley is usually a pretty clean eater. It only gets messy when he doesn't like the food. Case in point, peas. Every time I'd scoop some up and go to give him some, he would cry and then eat what was on the spoon. I'd get some more, he'd cry and then eat what was on the spoon. Now I thought he was enjoying it because he was eating it. But apparently his crying was his indication of his dislike of said peas AND the mess. More got on the surroundings than in his mouth.

AND loving the watermelon. Good boy.

Better video of the crawler...

*sigh*

*sigh*

And...he's off!!!

So first things first...Bugaboo is crawling. I received the following video on my phone TODAY. *sniff sniff*

Secondly, baby kitty has a new home. Yay! Very glad we didn't have to give her to a rescue place. Raisin is back to her abnormally lovable self.

Story time (second hand)...

Ryan was waiting for Bugaboo to awaken in the morning. He was hearing him really close to the monitor. He was making a whole bunch of noise. Ryan walked into the room to get him. Charley had gotten ahold of the monitor and had gotten the cord wrapped around his body SEVERAL times. He had one arm free. I mean, seriously??? We JUST moved it away from him in fear that he would get to it. Now it's sitting on the opposite side of the room. Let's just hope he doesn't figure out how to get out of his crib and crawl to it.

*dramatic pause*

In other news...there is none...oh, child LOVES butternut squash. This weekend we are going to experience some oatmeal, banana, and blueberries. Fun times. Still making my own baby food and loving it. He gives open mouth kisses, stands up holding onto the side of the crib, STILL biting me *ouch*...aaaannnddd laughs like a pterodactyl (<- yeah, I just had my engineering dude friend spell this for me off the top of his head...can I get another "SERIOUSLY???"). We are avoiding having to spend the money on an infant car seat. Eeeck, hate spending that kind of money but oh well, not like we have much of a choice. He's still like 18lbs so we have a tiny bit to go.

Second terrifying story...first hand...

Cracker barrel, love the place, hate the high chairs and ONLY because Charley fell out. I'm still shaky from the experience. Worst Mother of the Year Award? Close. Too close. He reached for something, fell to the ground. Fortunately, Tim's big, fat foot caught his head. He cried for about 3 seconds probably because he saw the look of HORROR in my face. Was hoping he wasn't dying. Went straight back to jumping in my lap. Baby fine, Mama not.

Ugh. Awful.

So we went to Hooters for dinner and to watch a game. Ryan HAD to get a picture of Charley with some of the girls. You see in the picture above there are only 4 girls. There originally was 5 girls but Charley couldn't keep his eyes off one of the girls. So she stood by Ryan so he could snap a picture. Notice he's not staring at the camera. He's not hungry either because he just had dinner.

Recent Developments

Charley is getting so big. So sad. He can push himself into the sitting up position from his belly/crawling position. Yay! So now we find him sitting in his crib waiting to be picked up. He is eating a whole lot and moving a whole lot. This week we are trying brown rice and chicken. I think he may be getting used to the not-so-smooth texture still. But he's still ALL ABOUT PEACHES.

He got his first haircut...complements of his father and his beard trimmer.

No comment

Regardless, he looks more like a boy. Story leading up to the beard trimmer...Ryan and Charley were at the post office. A lady behind him was admiring our adorable baby boy. She made the comment "Oh, what an adorable little girl..."

Ah-hem

Ryan, upon hearing the comment, refused to acknowledge whatever small talk that was attempted. Please note, Charley was dressed all in blue. His car seat is brown and orange. Nothing about his attire is GIRLY. Now, my son has a buzz cut...at 8 months old.

Maybe, just maybe, we won't be hearing any "cute little girl" comments anymore. :)