Interactive

William has become so much more interactive recently.  He turned 10 weeks this past Monday and has been delighting us with so many smiles in return of ours, lots of coos, giggles and other strange noises.  It's as if he has discovered his voice box and has started experimenting with all of the different sounds he can make.  He tries making noises with a big grin, with pursed lips, and all sorts of other facial expressions.  He has also started to love his animal gym and talking to the toys in his own language.

Captured a video of the back-and-forth babbling we love doing with him.  Sorry you're seeing more of me than of him, but once he sees himself being filmed, he usually quits the cute stuff.

We are loving talking with our baby boy, even though we don't have a clue what he's saying :).  Guess it's mutual.

We love that grin!

"Ready to strike" as Matthew says

Makin faces at mommy

Milk mustache

Animal gym that he hated when he was first born but now seems to enjoy.  It was as if he thought the animals were attacking him.

Stare down with the zebra

Talking to zebra

Since these photos were taken he has started swatting at his animal friends!

Sweet Bedtime and Morning Time

Before becoming a mom, I wondered how two people could bond without understanding each other's words.  How would I know my child's needs from his cries alone?  And how could he know his parents and their love?

Finding ways of expressing our sheer joy over William has been one of the things I enjoy most about being a parent.  This often takes the form of making multiple googly-eyed faces within a 10" distance from his face, squeezing him tightly while smothering his chubby cheeks with kisses, and singing.

Now that William is 10 weeks old, he is even starting to respond to my non-sensical, love-struck craziness.  And that just melts my heart.  See Morning Time video for more of that :).

Matthew and I sort of stumbled into a certain pattern for William's bedtime by doing things we liked to do with him...things that fit our personalities as well as met W's needs.  For some reason I had become deceived into thinking that I had to use a particular "method" based on what a book told me to do in terms of putting my child to bed.  (Problems with trusting my own instincts run deep!)  I became weirdly afraid of doing certain things for fear I would create "bad habits" or a child that needs x,y,z, in order to go down.  While those books are helpful and well-intentioned, I almost allowed it to govern my parenting and steal a lot of joy and personal expression in the process.  But the Lord has taught me through this struggle.  Now I'm even trying to utilize this new freedom in other areas such as not being too reliant on recipes, step-by-step instructions for a DIY project, etc.  Learning to be more free in those things.  And it's fun!

So, I choose to share with you all this video of how we often put William to bed - with much snuggling and cuddling, prayer, and singing.  To view the video, click the link below the picture.

I wrote the lyrics to this song before William was born.  It's special to me because I can remember praying "So now I lay me down to sleep..." as a child.  It always brought me so much comfort to picture Christ and His angels guarding me during my sleep.  It's to the tune The Chain by Ingrid Michaelson.  Such a magical song.  Matthew usually does the echo part that you can hear in Ingrid's version.  He was too camera shy to do that in the video :).  It's a mesmerizing song that puts William to bed every time.

Lyrics:
The sun sings bye, the clouds clap back.

The stars and moon come out to play, and it's time to say goodnight.

Our God is near, you're in His sight.

Tomorrow will be another day, and it's time to say goodnight.

So now I lay me down to sleep.  And pray the Lord my soul forever keep.

Angels guard me through the night. Until I wake to morning's early light, so now

I lay me down to sleep.  And pray the Lord my soul forever keep.

Angels guard me through the night. Until I wake, until I wake, to morning's early light.

William's Bedtime

This next video shows William the morning after the video above.  He is starting to giggle and make noises in return of our giggles and noises.  It's a lot of fun.  And I don't even care that I am totally making a fool out of myself by talking baby talk all day long and singing when I am NOT the singer of the family.  My brother got those genes!

Songs in this video: Desert Lullaby by Chris Stuart, Little Bird and Who's My Pretty Baby? by Elizabeth Mitchell
I love Desert Lullaby because he will likely be our only child born in Colorado.  And we have loved listening to Elizabeth Mitchell's CD 'You Are My Little Bird' from my sister, Christine.

William's Morning Time and Giggles!

Sweat, Smiles n Swaddles

With just two more weeks until we leave our home in Colorado Springs, Colorado, for Clarksville, Tennessee, we decided to take one last weekend adventure to Twin Lakes and Aspen, Colorado.  We wanted to experience another part of this beautiful area and to take William around to see the sights of his home state.  Matthew also wanted to "break in" his beloved '99 Mustang that had been in storage all winter.

William might not remember it later, but he has already been to the top of Pike's Peak, been fly fishing at Eleven Mile Reservoir, gone hiking at the famous Air Force Academy, driven along Independence Pass, and seen the famous Maroon Bells in Aspen.  We are hoping he gets many more outdoor adventures in Tennessee and develops a love of the outdoors and appreciation for God's beautiful creations.  Looking forward to future "wimp" camping trips with my baby boy and husband and whoever else would want to join us (i.e. some hiking/fishing by day and s'mores by a campfire singing songs by night!).

At William's two month checkup this week, he was 13.5 lbs (72 percentile) and 24.5"long (82 percentile).  He got vaccinations for Pneumonia, Flu, Rotavirus, DTP, and Polio.  He didn't like it, but I cried much more than he did.  His daffy duck band-aids were pretty cute, though.

We celebrated William's turning two months by removing the swaddle and beginning "cry it out."  Happy birthday, right?  I know.  It's awful.  He kept wiggling his left arm out his swaddle to try to suck on his hand when he awoke and realized his paci had fallen out.   But when I would try to leave him swaddled with the arm out, he still fussed.  Turns out he wanted the WHOLE body out!  There are now much fewer grunt noises coming from his room as we heard when he was actually trying to wriggle himself free like a little Houdini.

And if he wakes early from a nap, we are trying to let him "cry it out" to get back to sleep.  This seems to be working better than when I would try feeding him.  He would only eat for 5 minutes and then just be awake and fussy, rubbing his eyes and yawning as if he was saying, "Put me back to bed!"  So far, he has been crying for about 25 minutes and then going back to sleep for the rest of his naptime.  It's torture.  But having a fussy, overtired baby who is all a mess because he really wants to be asleep is probably worse.  So, we are giving CIO (cry it out) a shot.  No judging!!!! :)

This past week brought its fair share of tragedy along with it as the Waldo Canyon fire claimed two lives, 346 houses, and over 18,000 acres of beautiful Colorado forest.  Record high tempertures and strong wind gusts made this the worst fire Colorado Springs has ever seen, although the initial cause is still unknown (some say arson).  We were thankful that our main complaint was a lot of smoke and having to keep all the windows closed in our un-airconditioned house.

Firefighters worked day and night for days to get the fire under control.  With 65mph winds and embers blowing distances of 1/2-1 mile across water reservoirs and any barriers they would create, the task seemed insurmountable.  The last news report I read said it was now at 55% contained and with much fewer mandatory evacuations.  The smoke eventually dissipated enough to where we were able to open back up our windows and get back in the beautiful outdoors.  

Waldo Canyon fire at its worst on Wednesday, June 27th

Tummy time face-off for playtime as I watched the news and we both sweltered indoors without a/c

Will vs. the lion

Finalized paint colors, countertops and flooring for our new house.  Turns out the flooring in picture was discontinued, so we chose brighton walnut instead.  Also decided against using orange color for now.  Gray-ish countertop goes in kitchen and tan-ish one in bathrooms, both with white cabinets.  Hardware tbd.

Matthew at the place where we stayed in Twin Lakes, CO

Breeze felt like we were at the beach!

Standing at top of Independence Pass

Maroon Bells

LOVE

I am in love with the Aspen trees here and all the colors/textures of the western landscape.  Considering this photo as inspiration for guest bedroom color scheme and decor.

William loving his personal shade tree

We spent much of this week lying on a blanket watching the news, and sweating.

Finally captured that smile.  Now imagine him doing this while saying, "Gaaaooooohhhh..."  Makes my heart melt.

Can't get enough of that dimple.

So much fun that I miss him when he's sleeping!

Another milestone this week

Got some pretty long and dark eyelashes this week that I love!

Saturday morning: We put him on our bed while we got dressed to all go on a run together.  Five minutes later he fell asleep.. without his swaddle!  So it was time to kiss the swaddle days goodbye, much to mom's dismay...

Our Saturday morning tradition - family run in Monument Valley Park

Pre-run

Post-run

Night no. 2 with no swaddle and big boy PJs.  He seems to be enjoying the space.