Baby's First Christmas

Owen had a GREAT first Christmas this week! He and I went on cold morning walks, he opened fun presents, he ate new foods, and loved spending time with family and friends.

Santa Claus

Owen met Santa Claus today for the first time. And we experienced three Christmas miracles at the mall!

1) We got a parking spot right in front.
2) We parked on the right side of the mall - Santa was right inside the doors we entered!
3) The camera there broke so we got to take our own pictures for free. :)

Crawling Update

Owen made forward progress crawling yesterday! Until then, he had only been able to crawl backwards or roll sideways. He is still not moving very far or fast, but he is figuring it out. Time to baby-proof this house!

On the Move

Owen is getting better and better at getting around. He is crawling backwards pretty well, can get from his tummy up on his hands and knees, then up to sitting. He likes to practice that one all day long! He's getting really close to being the cats' worst nightmare. :)











But all that moving and shaking gets tiring...

Overtime

While we are waiting for overtime in the Washington vs. Texas Tech basketball game right now, I'll post some pictures from Sunday's game against Montana. It was the first game that we went to this season with cheerleaders, and it was the first close game of the season too. Even though it was an earlier tip off than normal (6:00 instead of 7:00), Owen didn't make it the whole way. He fell asleep sitting up in Dan's arms with the last 10 minutes or so to go. He amazingly stayed asleep through the cheering as the Huskies pulled off the victory.











He's such a sleeping angel! If only we could get him to sleep that peacefully at night... :)

Owen's First Swim Lesson

Our little fish had his first swimming lesson tonight. Luckily, all of his practice on land has really paid off! He splashed and kicked and had a fantastic time. Here are some pictures of the big event!

More Big Pictures

When I uploaded pictures to our online picture site, they uploaded bigger than normal. Since I'm too lazy to upload them again smaller, we have more big pictures today! Owen is getting dangerously close to crawling these days. He has figured out how to push up with his arms, and if he's sitting, he'll lean forward in what I like to call "tripod" or "kickstand" pose.

Observe:



From there, he'll kind of rock back and forth and either sit back up, or flop forward. When he gets his legs involved, he often forgets his arms and uses his face...not so effective, but pretty cute!

My Aunt Kathy ("Grammy" to Owen) brought a polar bear puppet down with her from Alaska, which Owen is warming up to. Here are some pictures of their first playtime together:





And some cute pictures of Owen using his arms:





He is such a cutie pie!

Owen's First Thanksgiving

Yesterday was Owen's first Thanksgiving! It was a great day of food, family and fun. Owen was a little picky about the food, but did try mashed potatoes and Jello before he got his familiar pear yogurt. He had fun playing peekaboo and fetch (he threw it, we fetched it) with all kinds of things. Owen played with candy while we decorated gingerbread houses, and entertained his audience for hours. He's such a social butterfly!







And the gingerbread competition photos:





My house:



Uncle Cruz's and Mel's house:



Steve's house:



Grandpa Louie's house:



Aunt Katie and Joe's house:



Grandma Liz's house:



Aunt Kathy's house:



Whew! While, of course, my house won yet again this year, Steve's came in a very close second (with a blue ribbon in the speed category), and Uncle Cruz gets props for his potato shingles, even if they did melt the frosting...