Walkin' and Rollin'

Once again I'm about 6 weeks behind on the blog - and a busy 6 weeks it's been. Get ready for a series of short posts that will hopefully bring us up-to-date.

When Owen started crawling and pulling up at 7 months, we thought he would be an early walker. Not so. Whether it's because it takes a lot of coordination to figure out your balance for a kid his size or it's just a confidence issue, Owen has become a world champion crawler - with absolutely no interest in walking by himself.

In early March he finally started making some progress!

After a few days, he was going even farther and would eventually push the stroller completely around the couch.

We thought he would start walking any day. Little did we know he would make us wait more than a month!

I also captured this video during the stroller phase. I love how it shows Owen using his inside voice. :)

I can't believe he's 11 months

Who are you looking at?

I love this picture. :)  Owen typically takes a 2 hour nap after we get home from daycare (to make up for not sleeping the entire time he's there) and always wakes up cranky. He's smiling within a few minutes, but this captures his usual "woke up on the wrong side of the crib" expression.

Owen is at such a fun age right now. He hasn't really reached any new milestones in the last month, but has developed a few new habits. Most are cute, some more than others.

• If you look closely in the pictures above you can see he's holding a book. Owen finally likes us to read to him - I was beginning to worry about the kid - and now has favorite books that he pull out for us to read over, and over, and over. His top picks are a winnie the pooh book and a beach bugs pop up book.
• He likes to dance - well, it's more like bouncing up and down, but he loves to push the musical button on one of his toys and dance with his mamma. I always oblige, no matter how ridiculous I look. :)
• He's cruising more and more and walking really well when we hold his hands
• He likes pointing at objects and having you tell him what they are - his favorite is an animal book and he "barks" when we point at the dog.

Now for the less than fun achievements ...

• His new found height means that he can now open the front door - daddy is installing new locks on the front and back door at about 6 ft high as I type. :)
• He can also see on top of the bathroom counter - which means he starts pulling things off the counter. Mom has had to have a few moments of "discipline" with little O this month
• He has decide to talk VERY LOUDLY. He yells down the hallway, in the car and during dinner. We've tried to ignore this in the hopes that he'll stop if he doesn't get attention.

No matter what, we absolutely love being parents and can't believe Owen Lars is almost a year old!

Fun in California!

In early February Eric, Owen and I headed out to California for a week of fun! Well Owen and I had fun, Eric had a conference for half the week down in San Diego while we hung out in Fallbrook with Mimi and Papa.

Owen and I enjoying the sunny 70s while Texas was in the single digits!

I love this picture - it totally illustrates his personality.

Owen had two big experiences while we were in California...

Hanging out on the beach!

Waiting for the waves ...

The beach is fun!

Owen, Mimi and I went to the beach in Oceanside. We had such a good time and Owen let Mimi hold his hands and "walk" down to the water. He wasn't scared of the waves at all and really liked crawling on the sand.

The next day we went down to Coronado Island to meet Eric for lunch. There's a great beach there as well so of course we had to check it out. :-)

Owen LOVED the sand - until he tried to eat it...

Papa giving O a ride.

Hotel Del in the background ...

The other big event on our trip was an early birthday party with our California family!

Uncle Marc, Aunt Becky, Aunt Jen, Brynn and great grandma Oslund were all able to join us.

Ready to party

Now what is this ...

Total destruction accomplished!

Owen actually didn't eat much of the cake. After he destroyed it, he finally put his hands in his mouth and started screaming. We weren't sure if he accidentally bit his finger, if the sweet frosting made his teeth hurt or if he got it up his nose - he was sneezing blue frosting the rest of the evening.

We had such a good time and can't wait until we can go back and visit!

10 Months

What did 10 months bring? Two more teeth! Poor kid gets them every month like clock work.

He's also taken the mimicking to a whole new level. He can do tons of sounds, says momma and dadda regularly and loves making his daddy laugh.

Again it's impossible to get him to pose for pictures - he cracks himself up!

We love you Owen Lars and can't believe you're getting so big!

Christmas

We had an amazing Christmas. Eric's whole family was able to join us in Texas! It was cold, but we had a wonderful time and loved celebrating with the Oslunds.

We hosted Marc and Becky at our house and the rest of the family stayed at a house a few minutes down the road.

On Christmas morning, Owen checked under the tree to see what Santa brought (All of Owen's gifts were at the other house waiting for us to unwrap them together)

 This was actually a NICE camera that Eric surprised me with!

One of Owen's favorite gifts was his new wagon - he let Brynn and Margaret ride on it too.

We also celebrated Papa Lane's birthday

It was a great first Christmas!

9 month photos

We got some great pics of our growing boy at his 9 month photo session.

Here are a few of my favorites:

Owen in front of the Christmas tree

Who could resist those big eyes!

At the park 

The whole family

9 months and off the charts!

Man it's been a long time since I've blogged. A lot has happened over the past few months, and I'll try and cover the highlights so they'll be recorded for Owen's future baby book. :-)

Owen went in for his 9 month check up and surprised his mommy - he had two teeth I didn't even know about and was off the charts in height and weight! Owen often sucks on his bottom lip and doesn't show his top teeth when he smiles, so I had no idea his two top teeth had come in. They are huge with a huge gap in between them (thank God he's a boy)!

He clocked in at 25.4 pounds and 30.5 inches at his appointment - my poor back can't take much more of this and still no sign of walking.

He still is a speed crawler and pulls up on everything he can. He loves mimicking sounds and "clicks his tongue" so mommy and daddy can do it back.