Pictures from my 30th birthday party Part II

Laura and John B., Ted and Oliver (they go with Krista)

Krista, Henry, and Calvin. Krista made me an awesome chocolate/cherry cake.

Charlie H., our godson.
Dan, Jamie, (they go with Laura H.) Dylan, and Martin.
Me and Laura H.

Jack B. was also in attendence. It was such a fun party. Since everyone had kids the party started at 4pm and ended around 7pm. That just cracks me up. That's one way my life has changed since having kids. But in a lot of ways it hasn't, mostly since Dylan is such a good kid.

Christine and Dylan

Christine was good enough to come visit us before she moved to the west coast. Christine is a special friend even though she doesn't share a birthday with Dylan...(Dylan was due the day before her birthday - the Etner family picture day.)

New Outfit

Grandma Marna bought Dylan this outfit which is my new favorite outfit for him. Not sure why the pictures came out blurry.

Dylan's first trip to the ocean

Dylan was a little bit afraid of the ocean, which is probably a good thing. Not much else phases him. We joke that he's going to be a parachute tester. Today he did a face plant into the carpet and just kept rolling and got up all while smiling. On Friday he practically dove into the pool for a squeaky toy. After I picked him up out of the water he bats his eyes to get the water out, coughs up the water that got into this mouth all the while still going after the squeaky toy.

Pool time at Grandma's

Tomoka State Park

Tomaka State Park (FL) is in Ormond Beach (near Daytona) where Martin's parents live.
Here's the Tomoka Indian statue.

Martin and Dylan and Grandpa Rell checking out the Tomoka Creek.

Dylan and Martin on our hike through the park. The scenery is a lot different than our hikes at home. We loved it but not the mosquitos.

This is a very old tree. Some of the branches even grew into the ground. Originally people thought it was 2000 years old but now they figure it's only about 300 years old.

Darrell and Christa's Wedding

This was the wedding we went to in Florida last month.


This is me with the stunning Mother of the Groom, my friend Jan. Loved the dress!

Darrell and Christa are friends of ours from church, specifically the singles ministry.

This is Dylan with Kathryn, the sister of the groom, who was also his music teacher.

The boys with our friends Thomas and Jonathan.

Dylan's first ride in an airplane

This was from our trip to Florida. Dylan was an angel on the plane!

Waving and New Tooth

Dylan has been moving his hand up and down which looks like a wave but he does it at random times so I'm not sure he gets what a wave is but he's doing it. Bushra told me today that he is starting to clap his hands too. Dylan played with bubbles at Bushra's today. We'll have to get some because it sounds like he really liked it.

Dylan has a new tooth, his third. Now you would think that after getting his bottom two teeth that the next ones to come in would be his top front teeth. Well, Dylan had to be different. His new tooth is the one next to the would-be middle tooth on his left side. I hope he still gets his two front teeth.

Swimming Lessons

Martin was able to come to the first swimming lesson since that was the day we left for Florida. Dylan continues to do really well in the pool. He kicks and jumps (i.e. falls) in and doesn't mind when he goes under all the way. That's Dylan's buddy Jack and his dad John in the upper picture.

Update - Week 38

This was the title of my last pregnancy post. Dylan was born at 38 weeks. He has just now entered his 38th week of life outside the womb. So he's been out in the world longer than he was inside me now....:)

Dylan is also no longer a vegetarian. He ate pureed beef for the first time on Sunday. He seemed to like it. He didn't scarf it down like he does sweet pototoes or pears but he was okay with it. Oh, and I'd liked to retract a statement I made on my blog previously. I said that we had enough bibs so we didn't need anymore. Well, now all our bibs have orange or grey (from the iron supplement) stains on them and being that we use two a day, we go through our 15 or so bibs sometimes before I get around to washing them. So we can always use more bibs.

Dylan weighs about 17 lbs now. I will have the official number next Friday when we go to the pediatrian. Dylan has been wearing 3-6 month clothes for about 5 months now. I decided it was time to retire the 3-6 month sleepers because they were getting a little small. So now he's going to move into the 6-9 month sleepers but the other 6-9 month clothes are mostly still too big for him. Maybe he just long legs. Or maybe it's the cloth diaper.

That's about all that's new with Dylan. He's still crawling and pulling up a lot and we are still having a ton of fun with him.

Happy House Anniversary!

Yesterday was the 3 year anniversary of us closing on our house. We got a card from our realtor. I'm liking our condo a lot more these days (since we got the storage unit). More house would mean more cleaning, something I don't really do much of to begin with and more things for Dylan to get into - like stairs - and more things to buy - like furniture, baby gates, baby monitor, etc. Amist all the house lust I struggle with and the frustration of having only 20% of our mortgage payment actually going towards paying off our over $200K in mortage debt, God reminds me of the blessing of our home,.....our first home,.........Dylan's first home.

Here's a photo of us with our realtor 3 years ago:

Dylan and Tyson

Here's some pictures from our (mine and Dylan's) visit with Angie and her son Tyson (they came over to swim). Angie's husband and Martin were college roommates and he was in our wedding. Martin was a little weirded out by me hanging out with Albert's wife....it was like friends-in-law. But why should it be strange that two guys who got along well married two women who get along well. Hopefully Tyson and Dylan will get along well too. Tyson is two months older than Dylan.

Hiking on Father's Day Weekend

This was Dylan's (and Mommy's) first time on the AT. We hiked from Route 40 in MD to this site...the first Washington Monument (were standing on it). It was about a 7 mile hike round trip. My motivation for finishing the hike was a trip to the outlets in Hagerstown afterwards. We were looking for hiking boots (my birthday present from Martin and Dylan). We didn't find any but we did find a jacket that I had been wanting to buy since last fall at the LLBean outlet. That was my belated anniversary present. We got it on sale and I really like it. Haven't had a chance to wear it yet.

Why we lowered the crib....

Can you tell how I'm spending my 4th?

We went hiking today which was a ton of fun and we wore Dylan out so he was asleep by 7:30pm. No fireworks this year, at least none that aren't on TV. Is the Capitol 4th show always this cheesy? Tony Danza....c'mon. "Hold me closer...Tony Danza." Going to bed early since I have to work in the office tomorrow.

Bath time video added

See the bath time post below for a video I just added.

Dylan's favorite passtime - pulling up

I couldn't get Dylan to pulling up all the way for the video camera but he can get all the way to a standing position. He can also get down by kneeling and then putting his hands on the floor.

New, and not so new foods

I tried yogurt with Dylan yesterday. He likes it, he really likes it. I wasn't too surprised though. But, he also ate green beans! And today, I got him to eat Gerber bananas. Maybe he's not that picky afterall. I'll try the peas and avacado again soon. And I think mashed potatoes will be his next new food. Then some pureed meat. I can't get Dylan too interested in finger food. He doesn't seem to know what to do with it once it's in his mouth. He's doing okay with the sippy cup although sometimes he gets too much water and chokes on it. Maybe he'll get it before he starts walking, which could be right around the corner.

The Zoo

Three weeks ago, I got to do one of those fun SAHM things and meet up with my friend Linda and her son Erik for a trip to the zoo. We got there at 10am when all the fun things happen at the zoo, for instance, the baby elephant gets his bath! We had a great time - we saw the Pandas, merecats, little monkeys, sloth bears, and bald eagles. I got a bunch of pictures of the bald eagle because he was unusually close to the people and he was eating a mouse.

I had Dylan in the Bjorn which is good for the zoo because the kids can see alot better than in the stroller. However, I learned that I won't do the Bjorn if I go by myself. After Linda and Erik left, I hung out for a little longer and realized I had no way of going to the bathroom because I didn't have anywhere to put Dylan. So then a stroller would have been useful.