Last Miscellanea

To be added to this year's book for David:

David shows strong tendancies toward being a leftie. He throws all balls with his left hand...even switching hands to throw left-handed when necessary. He also eats with his left hand, even when food is inconveniently placed near his right hand. As a probable home-schooling candidate though, I will likely encourage him to learn to write right-handed.

His spoken vocabulary has grown amazingly in the past week or so. It now includes the following words- most of which are spoken on a pretty regular basis: "Kitty Cat", "Uh-Oh" (his second word after "Kitty Cat" and by far the clearest and most regularly used), "hi", "Dada", and "ball." He is a jabber-mouth and is constantly saying many other things but as yet, unidentifiable.

David is exceptionally strong! Not only are his arm and leg muscles in plain view, but he can perform all sorts of stunts on pure power alone. For example, he regularly hangs from the kitchen or bathroom counter and pull himself up to a chin up. This has also been true on the baby gates, the side of the bed, the couch and other items just out of reach. Also, often reminding me of an ant, he carries around household objects that are far heavier than him-- tubs and lids, baby gates, chairs, heavy toys, etc...

How I am constantly amazed by this little boy that God has blessed us with, but most of all, I am overcome by the great and precious gift he truly is!!! How much above and beyond did God provide in answering our prayers!

A Tent, a Scale, and a Cupcake

We bought David a tent and some ball pit balls for his birthday. This way, he can use the tent as he grows up--even beyond the "ball pit years." He really likes it! (but this is already 500 balls; I imagine it could use another 1500 to really fill the tent!)

Last week David had his 12 month check-up (2 weeks late due to a reschedule). He now weighs 23 lbs. 7 oz. (50-75%). His length is 30 1/2" (still 75%) and his head circumference is now 46 1/4 cm. (dropped a bit to the 50%). He also had 4 shots. Let's just say they were super traumatic! He normally lets out one scream and then calms down. This whole visit (from the dr. stethoscope to the shots) was one of tears and crying. It was hard to see my little boy so scared, but he came home, calmed down and was fine thereafter.

At long last, we celebrated the "official" first birthday by a party! Yesterday we had a very low-key party with just family. We started it by a dip in our neighborhood pool...brrr...(the sun had not come out and there was a bit of a cooler breeze) Everyone was happy to get out and warm up a bit after an hour. We came home, changed, and had a bbq lunch under our carport. It was perfect weather for that!!! All present enjoyed hot dogs, chips, watermelon, veggies and dip, and drinks. (all excluding David who munched on his latest favorite, grilled chicken and peas.) We then enjoyed a fish (cup) cake for dessert. David was exhausted by this course and began crying when we presented him with his cupcake to "dig in." (no suprise to us, judging by our last attempt at a cake for him) However, we fared better this time when after I fed him several bites, he finally got over his distaste of dirty fingers and truly "dug in" and finished off the entire cupcake! After a quick clean-up and opening a few presents, he went in to take a nap. Thank you Gram and G-Daddy Brown, Aunt Susan, Uncle Paul, cousin Caleb, cousin Colin, Aunt Shayna and Uncle Andrew, and Aunt Anna, cousin Alex, cousin, Fritz, cousin Emily, and cousin Jane for coming to the party!

Fritz wasn't too sure about the cupcake...he only ate off the frosting!

Goodnight!

Grocery Shopping on a Dime

Well, actually it ended up to be quite a few dimes, but the answer to the cost of my shopping excursion? It cost $52 after coupons but was $200 before! Now to eat through lots of this stuff...:)

PS: to anyone who was shocked by some of the items, I really paid most of the bill for a few of the items that we actually use now or would purchase regularly. The rest of the items, I got free or paid less than a dollar for and decided to add to my cart.

Multiple Birthdays a la the Brown family

So, just when you thought David's birthday was over...

We "accidentally" continued the celebrations last night. He had gotten a coupon for a free meal at Red Robin for his birthday. We decided to go there last night for dinner--I should have known better when he awoke 5 times the night before crying. The ONLY time he has awoken at night (since he started consistently sleeping through the night) was the last time he was teething. So while he had all the symptoms of a cold or ear infection yesterday (runny nose, loss of appetite, crankiness), I was fairly certain he was teething. Sure enough! Late yesterday afternoon, I managed to finally get a glimpse in his mouth and he is FINALLY getting his upper teeth--or at least the left tooth. Poor chappy...I could tell he was in pain all yesterday--even with the tylenol.

So with this background, we should not even have attempted dinner out, but we did. He actually was doing pretty well despite moaning a bit when we arrived. (he was far less cranky at dinner time than normal-despite his teething) However, when his dinner arrived (chicken fingers and mandarin oranges-both a favorite of his), he refused to eat it. Fortunately, I had brought some yogurt just in case and plied him with that. We ate in a hurry and had gotten up to leave after gathering our things when the staff came over with a birthday sundae for David. Rather embarassing to be walking out as they showed up, but...David watched in wonder as they all sang to him and then proceeded to fuss. He refused the ice cream and whipped cream...also normally not an expected response. Michael, however, took it upon himself to try and finish it for David...of course for appearances sake! :)

So, the birthday dinner which was expected to be understated (just another dinner for us) and smooth was rather a disaster!

An AWESOME Flashback

We had an 80's night social with our Sunday school class on Friday night. It was loads of fun and so well planned out by our social committee. Thank you, guys!!!

When trying to decide what to wear, I reminisced about what I wore in the 80's: jellies, jams, and multi-colored scrunched socks, long tie-dyed t-shirts held in a knot with a homemade watermelon t-shirt clip or the t-shirt dresses my best friend wore constantly, long flowery dresses with huge collars. How about the tennis shoes with colored laces or the polo shirts with the collar up (yes, I was a "preppy" 80s dresser)? What about the long dangling earrings or the large hoops and the super feathered bangs? Whatever the case, I most certainly did not wear an outfit like the ones below, but this is another side of the 80s that I was able to put together from my closet...oops, my top-of-the-head ponytail already had fallen by the time these pictures were taken. (oh, and the old picture are us in the 80s-sweet but pretty dorky, huh?)