Air Mattress Fun

This is what happens when you don't deflate the air mattress immediately after your guests leave...

Isaac thought this was outrageously fun.  I missed the incredible onslaught of giggles that told me to get a camera, but you can see the ear-to-ear smile.

Quick Videos from Grandparents' Visit

If I wait until I have time to write about the great visit from Todd's parents, this will never get posted.  Here are a couple new games that Isaac learned with Grandma and Grandpa:

This one, however, continues to be the favorite.  Isaac and Jackson play this several times a day, sometimes for 5 minutes or more.

A cute picture of Isaac in some of his Hokie wear:

And from our fun last night with the grandparents (at a dance hall in Granger).

9 Months!

OK, so this post is a little late...

I took Isaac to the doctor yesterday for his 9-month checkup.  He actually weighs less than he did at Thanksgiving.  I guess he's burning a heck of a lot more calories with all of his crawling.  The doctor wants me to feed him 3 meals (each a full jar) per day, in addition to as much nursing as he might want.  He weighed in at 17 pounds 2 ounces, but was 17 pounds 12 ounces back in November.  (He's now 27 3/4 inches long, so he's over an inch taller than he was back at his 6-month appointment).  She assured me that she wasn't too worried, but she wants to check him again in one month.  So, we began our new feeding regimen today and, so far, Isaac seems quite content.  He has been really hungry for the last few days and I've been doing a lot of nursing, but I wasn't increasing his "solid food" intake as much as I apparently should have.  He did eat quite a bit yesterday, though not really on a schedule.  He only woke twice to eat during the night, which was a vast improvement over the previous night.  I fed him breakfast this morning, but he didn't eat a whole container of food.  Judy (Grandma) fed him lunch and he ate most of the jar of sweet potatoes and an entire jar of apples!!!  I think he probably already weighs 10 ounces more than he did yesterday morning!


We are all having a wonderful visit with Todd's parents this week.  They arrived on Sunday and we got to celebrate Christmas one more time.  Isaac got lots of fun new toys and a bunch of new chew toys (books).  He is happily showing off all of his new crawling skills and has been pulling to a stand any chance he can.  I am wowed by how much stronger he is this week compared to last.  He can crawl all the way across the room now, which he certainly couldn't have done last week.  He is really moving now!


Here's a little video of Isaac when he finally sat still for a few moments a couple of days ago...

Judy babysat Isaac for an hour this afternoon and I was able to get out for a pedicure.  I can't even remember my last one - it may have been last Christmas.  I know it was with Kristin, but I don't know how long ago it was.

Bathroom Update #3

Todd is still working on tiling the shower, but will be taking a break after today.  His parents arrive this tomorrow and will be here through next weekend, so he expects to take some time off to enjoy their company instead of working.  Yay!  Here's where he stopped today:

I got to take a bath in my Jacuzzi last night.  In a word:  awesome!!!  I had a book and a glass of wine.  I got to watch the sky darken through the sky lights.  I may never take another shower again because the bath tub is entirely too wonderful.  :o)

Entree du Jour: Butternut Squash with Corn

I would say this has been Isaac's favorite meal.  I couldn't feed him fast enough!  He finished his meal in record time.  I fed him a little more than I was "supposed" to since it was his first exposure to corn, but I am glad I did.  Hopefully, there will be no allergy issues.  I'm a little jealous of some of Isaac's friends' moms (Cash's mom, Stephanie, for example) because they seem to be able to feed their sons any and everything.  I have to carefully screen for milk in everything.  I still haven't called to make sure that he isn't allergic to anything else.  Hopefully seafood isn't on the allergy list because a lot of the "second foods" seem to have tuna oil in them.  I am not a big fan of worrying about everything Isaac might eat...

After Isaac finished eating, I set him on the kitchen floor while I put my dinner in the crock pot.  Isaac is not wearing pants today because it's in the 70's outside.  Gorgeous, January weather.  LOL  God bless Texas!  Anyhoo, he seemed to crawl much better on the hardwood without the slick pants he's been wearing.  I can tell he's getting stronger and enjoying crawling much more.  Not nearly as much belly-crawling...  He's also pulled himself to a stand a couple more times.  It's so fun to see how proud he is of himself when he does it.  Hopefully I will be able to capture it on camera at some point so you can share his excitement.  :o)


In other fun news, even Todd has noticed that Isaac's laughing more now.  He loves to be tickled and seems to generally be having more fun.  He still gets a huge kick out of me trying to crawl on the floor, too.  He's such a joy to watch.

Bathroom Update #2

The bathtub is finished!  All it needs is a good cleaning and I can use it.

Todd also started tiling the shower.  He is about to change the tile pattern from here on up, so this was his stopping point yesterday.  As you can see, we are each going to have 2 shelves (there are separate shower heads) and there will be a small seat in the middle of the back wall.  We are still debating what to do for the shower doors.


On the right, you can see the red towels on one of my Christmas gifts - a towel warmer!  Last year's gift was a heating system to go under the floor tiles.  Are you noticing a theme?

Isaac Feeds Himself (Sort of)

Warning:  These videos are much longer than usual.  The first one is 1.5 minutes (if you're in a hurry, skip to about the 40-second mark) and the second one is over 2 minutes long.


I may have missed my window of opportunity on getting Isaac's horrible expressions from trying to eat his Gerber Puffs.  I tried, though.  This video will give you a hint as to what his reaction has been to the Puffs.  The funny part is, he'll make these faces and then stick another one in his mouth!

After this, I fed him some sweet potatoes, but he was still hungry afterwards.  I thought I'd try to give him some banana.

Isaac has started really crawling over the last day or so.  It looks like a zombie crawl and more like a real baby crawl now.  He does opposite arms and legs as he crawls (which is correct, there's better balance this way).  I had to relearn to crawl to help him learn because apparently adults do it wrong.  If you haven't crawled on the floor in a while, get down on your hands and knees and try it.  You'll see what I mean.

Splish Splash

Isaac was takin' a bath...  Isaac loves to take his baths!  His favorite bath toy is his rubber ducky.  It keeps him occupied while I bathe him, so everyone comes out a winner.

Favorite Toys

This was taken on my iPhone today.  Note the plethora of "appropriate" baby toys in the background.  Note that they are the toys he was sitting in when he decided to crawl over and grab this toy instead...  Jackson is not going to understand what's happened to his peace and quiet...

(In case you can't tell from the white on white in this photo, Isaac is holding a well-chewed "Nyla" dog bone).

Yes, we have no bananas!

He ate some of the bananas, but not all of them.  But then he spit them up 20 minutes later.

Bathroom Update #1

There will be at least one other bathroom update within the next 48 hours (I think).  Todd's currently working on tiling the walls in the shower!  The bathroom counter and sinks were installed on Saturday and they look *amazing*!  It worked out really well for us.  We hired these guys to install our kitchen counters several months ago and were thrilled with the way they turned out.  We were going to use the remainder of the slab from the kitchen counters to install in our bathroom.  Since the kitchen install, the company has moved.  I am not sure whether the piece just didn't get moved or it broke, but one way or another, they didn't have the remainder of our slab (which we'd paid for).  The gentleman, Demitri, who helped us before told us to come pick from one of their other remnants and they'd just give it to us.  This was even better than expected!  The counters downstairs are very light and are exactly what we wanted for the kitchen, but we wanted something a little different for the bathroom.  Voila!  Ask and ye shall receive...  To give you a perspective, I'm standing with my back to the shower, the entry to the room is on my left (beside the tub) in this photo.

 Todd got the water running!

 We have drawers under the sinks, as well.  I love it!