Videos

We got a sweet new video camera yesterday and have had a great time already taking a few videos of Spencer.  It's similar to a Flip, but from Kodak and it is waterproof to 10 feet and takes a memory card, so we're only limited by how the size of memory card we happen to have. Here's a few videos of Spencer.  He's mostly just smiling and waving his arms, but at this point that seems pretty amazing to us, so we have to get it on video. :)  He's a social little guy, surprise, surprise, so we have tons of fun talking to him and getting him to smile and talk back.  It's not that hard, to be quite honest, but oh so rewarding.

I just love this little guy!

Looking towards graduation

Wow, the last few weeks have just been crazy.  It is not the easiest thing to have both Bill and I in school plus learning this parenting thing.  Good thing Spencer is so cute because it really makes it easier to do all the work it takes to take care of him.  There is only one more month of school left and the idea of being done with school for the near future gives me mixed emotions: 1. I'm very happy for a little bit calmer life that will be coming; 2. I'm sad because I love school and learning in that atmosphere; 3. I'm so ready to be done with this crazy time with both Bill and I in school; 4. I'm uncertain what I'm going to do once I graduate with work. This is round two for me and it's still weird. I like the being married with a baby part though. It's much better than when I graduated with my undergrad. :)  I probably need to work, plus I want to do stuff with some of the things I learned the last couple years.  But really I want to be a stay at home mom and maybe work on the side and that means I'll have to go out and market myself and that part isn't so fun.  Hopefully the work I'm doing in my department will help me have a good resume to find some stuff to do.    We shall see.  


In the meantime, we took some new pictures of Spencer.  He's as cute as ever.  He's discovered his hands recently and likes to suck on them.  He is also smiling like crazy.  He grins at me all the time and I love it.  He's cooing all the time and starting to sort of half laugh.  I can't wait for him to full on laugh.  Pretty much he melts my heart.  Bill came to take him home tonight while I went to my evening class and I totally didn't want to let them leave.  I just wanted to walk right home with them and spend the evening together.  Today was the first day I put him in the stroller without his carseat.  It was awesome.  He's getting so big!  He can hold up his head really well these days, though sometimes he gets tired and he doesn't want to anymore and he slumps over.  That's pretty funny.  He loves to stand and gets so mad when we hold him laying down.  He only likes that when he's tired now.  I exercised for the first time besides walking yesterday.  I've been wanting to for weeks but have been so busy, but I finally started with a Jillian Michaels workout video.  Let me tell you, I am so sore today!  That's more because the video is harder than any other workout video I've ever used than because I'm that out of shape.  If you want a challenge, definitely buy one of her DVDs!  

And of course, all the fun Spencer pictures.  :)

Spencer likes to sit up, but for some reason he didn't like this much.  He hates it when we leave him alone, so that's probably why.  He's so social.

Look at that stylin' outfit he had for his blessing!  And those sunglasses of Vince's might be just a tad big. :)

All the wonderful family  members that came for Spencer's blessing.  Yay for family!

These are Spencer's first pair of jeans.  I think they're pretty much the cutest thing ever!  And the sweater just makes me happy.

So funny.  He thought it was hilarious.

Love this little face.  So cute!

And those eyes!  I can't believe how different he looks from when he was born.  I just love how pretty his eyes have turned.

He worked really hard to get his hand out of my swaddle to suck on it.  Apparently it tastes pretty good.

Smiles

Spencer has started to smile a lot.  Last Saturday I had a girls day with my mom and sister and we took a whole bunch of pictures trying to get him to show the cuteness.  He has such great expressions, smiles and normal looks alike.  Here's the results:

We like to do things a little bit different

 So lots of people take monthly pictures of their babies next to a stuffed animal or something like that to chart how big they are getting.  Bill and I thought that sounded nice, but stuffed animals aren't nearly exciting enough.  We have all kinds of plans to introduce Spencer to the great outdoors and all the fun things we like to do, so we thought it would be apropos to show his growth next to something having to do with the outdoors.  So behold, Spencer at 1 month, cuddling up to Bill's mountaineering boot. :)  Well, not yet, but he will sometime!

 

In other news, yesterday I made these adorable booties for Spencer from this pattern.  I copied the ones my sister made out of the same pattern and they turned out pretty awesome.  Don't look too closely at the soles, as they are really strange shaped, but they totally fit Spencer and they don't fall off. 

Our Bald Little Monkey at 1 Month

Earlier this week, inexplicably, all the hair on the front half of Spencer's head fell out.  It's still long in the back, so it looks rather strange.   I'm betting it all falls out and comes back in a different color and curly.  That's what I want at least. :) 

  

Spencer is so much fun these days.  On Saturday I had a little girls day with my mom and sister at my mom's house.  My sister was playing with Spencer, doing "baby exercises" with his arms and legs, and he was smiling like crazy!  I took at least 50 pictures trying to get it on camera, and I got some great shots, but they're on my dad's camera so I'll have to post some later.  

He is officially 1 month old today and growing like a weed.  He weighs 10.8 pounds according to our home scale.  He is starting to interact with us and smile and just generally be more interested in the world around him.  He's out of his newborn clothes and diapers and getting bigger all the time.  He's sleeping in 3 or 4-hour stretches at night, which is wonderful.  Now we just need to get to bed before midnight so we can take advantage of those long stretches.  He has spent a lot more time awake the last few days, which is fun and at the same time makes it very hard to get anything done.  I think we'll keep him! :)

We put up this little stuffed animal net to get them out of the crib so we could use it.  Yes, I climbed up on a stool while holding Spencer in a sling.  It was awesome.  It's amazing what you can do with those things.

His eyes are lightening up and getting so much clearer.  They're so pretty!

Some quality father/son time here.  Spencer was out about 2 second later.

Spencer needed that WHOLE blanket to keep him warm. :)  It's our favorite blanket, so why not let him enjoy it too?  It's lamb's wool kind of stuff on the black side and filled with down.  Talk about amazing.

Valentine's Fun

Bill came up with an awesome idea for celebrating Valentine's Day this year.  He got the idea from a blog he follows.  We did a little world tour via a 4-course meal he prepared for us Sunday night.  It was fantastic!  We had this tasty salad, which Bill and I decided was the best part of the whole meal.  We'll definitely be making it again.  He used to have this same thing when he was on his mission in Peru, and it reminded me of salads when I was in Russia.  They didn't use any lettuce there, so salad was more a mix of vegetables.

The next course was grilled tuna steak over spinach.  It was also really good, though the spices didn't come out nearly as strong as we expected.  Then we had pork chops with another kind of spice on it.  It had the same problem as the tuna, but it was really good anyway.  The dish originally called for lamb, but we could not find any at the few stores we went to, so pork chops worked well as a substitute.  We finished with a dessert of homemade vanilla ice cream and mini cinnamon rolls made from biscuit dough.  Bill discovered how amazing those are last week when he made some biscuits for another dinner and used the extra dough for cinnamon rolls.  They are divine and so much easier than raised ones.  Those will also be on the menu in the future. 

So Bill is pretty much the best husband ever.  The first couple years of our marriage have been wonderful, and now that we have Spencer too, it's even better.  Bill is a fantastic dad.  He does so much to help take care of Spencer and it makes me love him all the more.  Yay for families!  And speaking of Spencer, here's a couple more cute pictures of him.  Oh wait, all his pictures are cute. :)  I'm not biased or anything.

He doesn't quite fit into this yet, but it was hilarious to try!  Can anyone say A Christmas Story? 

Isn't that a fantastic hat?  Bill's dad got it for Spencer, and it's my favorite.  Whenever he's wearing it, when we get to wherever we were driving, it is always twisted around so the Y sign is over his ear or even farther back.  So funny.

Bill's aunt Ann got this blanket for Spencer, and it is wonderful!  He sleeps like a champ under it. 

This is the quilt my sister made for Spencer.  It is beautiful!  Spencer seems to like it too.

At the moment Spencer occupies this little place of honor at night.  It's so much easier to nurse him at night when he's right there, and it's not like our bed isn't big enough.  Hopefully he'll start sleeping a little longer at nights and then we'll move him to the pac'n'play or his crib.  For the moment, he seems to be enjoying the memory foam. :)

The Many Faces of Spencer

Indifferent, but wearing awesome shoes

Hands to the face

Worried

Almost smiling

Kind of pleasant look

Totally relaxed

Falling over

Sucking in his lower lip

Hey what's over there?

Wide eyed

Just chillin' on mom's lap

Yelling at me

What the heck are you doing to me?!

Hi, my name is Spencer and I'm just chillin' here on the couch...

Thinking look

Daddy mimicking the thinking look

Hey mom, I'm kind of tired of sitting up like this.  Can you put me down now?

A Fun Picture Shoot

My sister-in-law Miriam came up with Bill's parents this last weekend to welcome Spencer here.  She is a junior in high school and also happens to be a fantastic photographer.  She doesn't have but a tiny bit of experience shooting baby pictures, but Saturday night we had some fun and took a bunch of shots of Spencer.   Some of them turned out really fantastic.  Thanks for taking them, Miriam!

I love that you can see the little skull on his onesie here.  It's red with white skulls on it, and so adorable.

This isn't entirely in focus, but I love his chest wrinkles and the hand getting in the way and his glowering brows.  He gets his hands in the way all the time.  Those eyebrows are just like mine.  So cute!

Again, slightly out of focus but I can't get enough of that face.  I hope he excuses us for laughing at him when he makes it.  It's not a happy face, but it's so cute beyond cute that it gets a different reaction than he might like.

He's pretty skinny still, but I love his double chin in this picture!

So there you have it.  Our newborn photo shoot with Spencer.  He didn't always like it, but we sure had a good time!