Daddy Time

Yesterday we went to the KS State Fair (after Mike got home from work). We enjoyed the beautiful evening walking around outside. We stopped and looked at various tractors, 4-wheelers, hot tubs, and of cours RV's! This is a picture of Mike and Brody hanging out in an RV that cost $240,000!!!

Brody stayed nice and warm inside the front carrier. Only towards the end of the evening did he start to fuss!
This morning I got up (like I have most mornings since I've been on maternity leave) and made breakfast for me and Mike and then a sack lunch for Mike. He drove off and left it this morning...so I thought that was a good reason for him to meet us in the park for lunch! It was a beautiful day. Cool breeze and sunshine! I took this picture with the timer :) Don't worry...if you can tell what shirt I'm wearing know I'm only wearing it for Mike (besides...my Cowboy's shirt is longsleeve) ;)

Brody fell asleep in Mike's arms during lunch. It's such a sweet thing to hold a sleeping baby!
 

I Did It!

For the past few weeks I've been going on daily walks with Brody. I push him 1.5 miles in the jogging stroller down our dirt road and back to our house. Last week I tried jogging the last 1/4 mile back to our house. I could tell I wasn't ready to jog yet. Yesterday I felt great as we were leaving the driveway...so I decided to start out jogging. It felt great! I thought jogging with a stoller would be easier because you'd have something to hold on to, but it turns out it's a little harder because you're not able to swing your arms.

Not only did it feel good to jog...the weather was beautiful! It was so cool outside that I wore a sweatshirt for the first 3/4 mile and had to wear my Earz for the entire run (sorry Megan...that probably makes you a little jealous ;) I had Brody dressed in a sleeper and stocking cap and then wrapped a blanket around him. He was plenty warm and fell asleep as soon as I started down the road.

When I was almost home again the sun peaked out from behind the clouds and something caught my eye. I looked to the left and saw my shadow jogging along beside me and was taken back in time.....*insert dream music*

The year was 1998 and I was running in the Dallas White Rock Marathon. It was a beautiful day, but it was a bad running day for me. Around mile 14 I got heel bruises in both feet and for the rest of the race felt excruciating pain with every step (word for the wise: don't wear the same running shoes throughout your entire training and race!) As I rounded the corner and could see the finish line I could feel the adrenaline pumping through my body. I began to sprint and run faster than ever (or so I thought). I made it to the finish line and into the embrace of my Dad who had finished the race ahead of me.

A few days later I saw pictures of my "sprint" towards the finish line. It made me laugh! I was hardly moving! I probably could've walked faster than I was "sprinting"!

When I saw my shadow jogging yesterday I could tell that I was going about as fast I was going when I was at the end of my 26.22 mile marathon! But it didn't really matter to me. I did it. I jogged again!

NFL

Today Brody is 1 month old! It's really hard to believe that he's already been outside the womb for a month! Each week we've been taking a picture of him with Mike's football after church. This Sunday he spit up on his outfit as I was setting up the picture...so we decided to just do a diaper picture. Mom asked me if we thought NFL stood for Naked Football League! Mike said it stands for Newborn Football League :)
Yesterday I had a baby shower at the LRC. Below is a picture of me & Brody with the shower hostesses.

Marcia made the cake. Check out her blog to see how she made it. The shower was teddy bear themed. She had made the bear cake and then they also had some bear decorations and teddy grahams :) It was really cute!

This is the hostess gift. Tina and her mom made this beautiful quilt! Not only is it a beautiful, comfy quilt...it also goes with the color scheme of Brody's room!
 

More Weekend

Here are some more pictures from this past weekend.

Caleb & Audria brought their dog, Lilly, with them to KS. Brody liked to watch Lilly...and she was fond of him too. Caleb captured this picture of Lilly licking Brody's pacifier!

Mark had a talk with Brody. He told Brody that milk is the secret to growing big and tall ;)

Brody watching Angela talk.

Brody taking a nap with Audria.

 

Guy Time

This is a picture of Brody from Friday. Mike & I took him up to the college to visit some former co-workers. Don't you just love the hiking boots from Caleb & Audria?
While the girls worked on the closet this weekend, the guys were outside being "men".

They shot a bunch of skeet and almost 400 shells!!

Sunday afternoon they got out the football, flags, & cones and made good use of our football field.

FYI: I typed all of this one-handed while holding Brody (one of my new talents). 

Organization

This was a busy weekend! It's gonna take a few blogs to tell you all about it. I'll start off telling you about the girl project this weekend. Our goal was to organize Brody's closet. This is a picture of what it looked like before Project Organization.
Audria, Ann, & I went to Lowes and Target to buy the supplies we needed to organize the closet. We picked out everything we needed and even installed the shelving by ourselves!

Here is what the closet looked like after we put everything back in there! Hard to believe it's the same closet!!! Audria & Ann are organizational freaks and LOVED the fact that they got to come up to Kansas and organize a closet! I'm glad I have them as sisters! I'd been dreading the project.

Staci, Audria, & Ann before church on Sunday.
 

Curly or Straight?

The majority of the time Brody's hair is VERY straight! Last night we gave him his first real bath (in the tub rather than a sponge bath). As you can see in the picture below when his hair got wet it turned very curly!
Just a few minutes later (when it dried and I brushed it) it was as straight as a board. So what do you think? Will his hair be curly or straight?

I love this picture because you can see his double chin!!! Mike got home from work yesterday and Brody immediately fell asleep on his chest :)
 

Powerful Poop

It has been cool here in the mornings lately. This morning it was cool and breezy when I was wanting to take a walk. So...I dressed Brody in his sweatshirt and hat. He looked so cute & cuddley in this outfit! I'm excited for the cool weather to get here. Not much longer!
This afternoon I was changing Brody's wet diaper when he decided he needed to poop. Of course he didn't wait for me to get another diaper on. I caught part of it in the old diaper...but most of it squirted all over the changing table. There is major force behind a baby's BM! So I took him with me to the laundry room to wash out the changing table cover and fold a load of laundry. I put him down on the bean bag in the corner and within seconds he was out!

Even though he was sound asleep...he still had a very tight grip on his paci!
 

No longer a newborn

Brody has gone from a newborn to a little boy! Monday I changed his diaper before we left for the dr and his circumcision bell fell off! (I didn't take a picture...sorry!) Last night the last part of his newborness went away...the cord. It has been barely hanging on for days but the dr warned not to pull it off or it would bleed and we'd feel bad. I was laying on the couch and Mike was on the floor playing with Brody when suddenly Mike said, "YES!!!!" and held something up in the air. Somehow he'd played with the cord enough that he got it to come of (without bleeding). Here's a picture of the stump of the cord after it fell off...

Here's Brody without a cord on his belly!!! He took after both of us and has an inney (have you ever tried to spell that?!?!? Is it a real word?) belly button :)


Here's a picture Mike took of me and Brody. I was trying to keep Brody awake. I'm not as good at that job as Mike is. I tend to snooze when he lays his head down!
 

Dr Appointment

Yesterday was Brody's 2 week check-up. I was anxious to see how much weight he'd gained. He's such a fast eater (only eats for 8-15 minutes a feeding) and always spits up some afterwards. I was a little worried that he wasn't getting enough to eat. My worries were laid to rest at the appointment. When he was born Brody weighed 8 lbs 8 oz and was 21" long. Yesterday he weighed in at 9 lbs 14 oz and was 22" long! She told me that I didn't need to worry but should feel blessed that we have such an efficient eater!
After Mike finishes the yard I'll take a picture of it. Let's just say he's VERY excited about football season. The grass portion of the land in front of our house is HUGE. Mike calls it his football field. This week he has been marking it off and is in the process of mowing it like a football field (mowing 5 yards in one direction and then the next 5 yards in the opposite direction). Our siblings and their spouses are coming to visit this weekend and I think Mike is planning on a football game :)
 

Smile

I guess I'd call it more a grin than a smile. It's REALLY hard to catch Brody's smile on camera right now because it's so random! When he smiles big you can see cute little dimples. Yay! I just love dimples :) Last night Mike finally caught one of Brody's grins on camera. It was a good picture to have so that Mike could look back at it this morning at 4:30 am to remember that Brody is a sweet little boy. He decided to be really fussy during the night and Mike spent 2 hours sitting up with him trying to calm him down. I'm praying that tonight will not be a repeat since Mike has to go back to work tomorrow and needs some rest!  

Family Visit

After I feed Brody I don't just pat his back until I hear a burp...I pat it until he spits up a little. Yes...our baby is a spitter. We've already gotten a TON of use out of the burp rags we received as shower presents. The one below was from Suzanne. I'm thankful that breastmilk doesn't stain and VERY thankful for oxyclean!
Today Jim, Nancy, and Grandma Knowlton stopped by to see Brody. Here is a picture of 4 generations: Mike, Grandma Knowlton, Jim, & Brody.

Great-Grandma Knowlton was very excited to get to hold her first great-grandbaby!

Brody really wasn't a very good baby while they were visiting. In fact, he was fussy the whole hour they were here! Mike put him in his swing when they left and of course he feel right to sleep :)
 

First Walk

Today we tried out the jogging stroller that Jan & Julie gave us. You can recline the seat, put a head support in, and then it works just perfectly for Brody!
The whole family went on the 1.5 mile walk down the dirt road (Mike, Staci, Brody, Remington, & Trevor). The cats were the only ones that didn't want to go along ;)

I'm sure over the next few years that we'll put a lot of miles on this stroller! (Don't worry...we made sure he was not in the sun during our walk.)

Brody absolutely loves his Daddy. It was so cute when he laid on his chest and then wrapped his arms around Mike!

So far Brody has been a really good baby! He's going 3 hours between feeding during the day and 3-4 hours between feedings at night. He's also been doing really well at going right back to sleep after eating during the night! He is a fast eater which is wonderful for time purposes...but terrible on the laundry! When you eat fast you tend to spit up more. I'm just glad that it's spit up and not throw up! lol