First Food - Oatmeal!

In our effort to get Eli sleeping through the night, we've started giving him cereal.  

 First bites.

It went pretty well.  He ate a lot of the cereal and didn't seem to mind it either way.

 It's taken a few days, but he seems to be getting it down.

And he does seem to be sleeping a little bit harder during the night, only waking up for feeding.  We're trying to cut the feedings down in time, with the plan being that once I'm only feeding him a couple of minutes a night, he'll start sleeping through it.

Tuckered Out

He's just as cute today as he was when he was a baby.  I can't wait to get to know him as a grown man.

Dust In The Wind

We recently headed to Kansas to visit some friends of ours.  They have a 7-month-old boy that I desperately needed to squidge, so we carved out a four-day weekend for Silas' birthday and headed up.

Eli on our trip up.  He didn't do so well with the car ride.  If he was awake, he was crying.

Silas, as always, was unphased by the journey.  As you can tell, completely normal behavior.

Their little boy, who is absolutely adorable.  I really hope him and Eli grow up to be pals.   

Mr. Brown can moo.  Can you?

We went to a pumpkin patch up in Kansas, which was right up Silas' alley.  There were animals to pet, slides to go down, playgrounds to run around on, a corn maze or two, a hay ride, and plenty of pumpkins for me to take pictures of him next to.

 Checking out the animals.

The slide made out of a mound of dirt.  It gave me ideas.

Eli chillin'.

The hay ride!

Daddy and Silas on the hay.  It was a gorgeous day with perfect weather!

My BFF and her family on the hay ride. 

At the front of the maze.  

In the middle of it.  It took us over half an hour, with a map, to get through it.  It was in the design of a barn, which you could see from the air (or the pictures anyways). 

Eli chillin' not so much.  We transferred him over to the baby carrier and he quickly fell asleep.

 Some good old fashioned fun.

 I love this one.  I wonder what he's thinking?  

"Who are those weird people?"  

"Mommy and Daddy are goofballs."

"What's the meaning of life?" (He already knows; it's 42.)

Four Years Old

Silas turned four recently.  There was a lot more understanding this year of how exciting an event it is meant to be.  The anticipation leading up to it was great.

We celebrated his birthday by driving 7 hours to Salina, Kansas, and visiting some friends (which I will post about later).  Can I say that he wasn't bummed at all about having to ride in a car for that long, and never complained?  We would open a present every hour or so, which gave him plenty of things to play with. 

 We made up for it the next day by going to a pumpkin patch.  

 He recently had his 4-year-old checkup with the doctor.  He officially weighs 36 lbs and is 41 inches in height, which puts him in the 50th percentile for weight and 75th percentile for height (he's always been in the 95th percentile in height, but I guess he has slowed down).  Oh, and the doctor wanted to delay his vaccinations until next year since he's homeschooled.  He also said that my boy was way ahead in speech development.

Wedding!!

All of my boys before they headed up for the wedding. 

Eli in his wedding clothes, which lasted less than an hour.

All of us together.

Eli with his namesake, Uncle Raph, and Grandma, Daddy, and Grandpa.

The wedding, at the top field of our place.

 The cakes.  

Silas and his cousin Abi dancing the night away.  He enjoyed the dancing a lot and had no problem leading Abi out onto the floor.  You can tell he has a stranglehold on her hands, "You must dance with me!  Ve haf vays of making you dance."

This one has so very much personality, and it really showed that night.  He had a blast dancing and didn't care too much about everyone else out there or what they thought.

Eli's Four Month Checkup

Am I a bad mom because it's only been six hours since the doctor's appointment and I already can't remember what his vital signs were?  Good thing the doctor prints it out on a handy paper for me.

Eli weighs 13 lbs 4 ounces and is 25 inches long.  I think he said he was in the 50th percentile for height and around the 15th percentile for weight.  He has mild plagiocephaly, which means his head is shaped a little funny.  This is because for the first 2 months of his life he would only look to the right.  We've been working on making him look to the left, and his head is looking a little bit more round in shape nowadays.

Besides being a string-bean, he's doing really well in all areas except sleep.  He puts his weight on his legs, holds his head up really well (no worries Mom!), and is grasping toys and pulling them to his mouth. The doctor recommended a book for me to read about starting healthy sleep habits in order to get him sleeping through the night.  I'm not sure this will help, but it won't hurt to read.  I can't remember the name because of sleep deprivation.  :-)

As always, he's a complete joy and lovable little bundle.  I could go on about his smiles and laughs, but I'll save it for another post sometime.

Kitty, Kitty

If I could write a poem

It would be about our dear, departed cat.

But I'm no good at rhyming

And she is no longer here for me to pat.

If I could write a poem,

It would be about our kitty.

With her big green eyes,

She was so extremely pretty.

If I could write a poem,

I would talk about her fur,

Soft and silky,

It was so nice to pet her.

If I could write a poem,

It would be about her slow life of ease.

How she would come when you whistled,

And meowed at your every sneeze.

 If I could write a poem,

It would be about our dear, departed cat.

But I'm no good at rhyming

And there is not much more to say about that.