The Little Swedish Boy

I'm not sure exactly who Baby Bjorn is, but the little baby carrier that was designed in his name is nothing short of genius. It never fails. Any time Calvin is fussy, we bundle him up and stick him in the Baby Bjorn and walk him around the neighborhood. He loves it. He loves looking at the Christmas lights and watching the cars pass and even listening to neighbor's barking dogs. This little gem has more than paid for itself. God bless Swedish ingenuity.

My sister-in-law Rebekah gave us this hand-me-down coat from her boys, and I can't even tell her how much use we get out of it. Calvin gets excited every time we put it on because he knows it means he's going outside. It's like our own little version of Pavlov's Dogs.

Safari Outfit from Auntie Riah

Auntie Riah and Uncle Curtis brought several adorable outfits for Calvin for Christmas. Thanks for helping keep the boy in style!

Christmas 2007

We had a wonderful Christmas, though not much sleep. I had Calvin on one side of me in the bed fussing most of the night, and Andy on the other side with his laptop tracking the progress of Santa and saying "Can we open presents now?" every time he caught me opening my eyes. He and I left the boy in bed and opened presents at 4:30am. So much for Christmas morning being less exciting for adults.

We had Andy's parents down for a couple of days, and enjoyed their company. Calvin especially appreciated all of the attention.

We have had an amazing year and feel very blessed by all that we've been given. Merry Christmas to all!

Winter Outfit from Auntie Ruthie

Auntie Ruthie gave Calvin some really cute little clothes and blankets for Christmas. Here he is in one of the fun outfits. My favorite are the little striped socks. Thank you!

Pro Photographers, Watch Out!

When my family was here they all had amazing cameras and took such artistic photos. David, Mariah, and MaryRuth all took such great pictures that made me feel inferior and uncivilized (all of the pics I've posted below from their time here were taken by my brother David). Andy had been researching a camera for several months that he has really wanted, but we couldn't justify buying. When I whined about our camera, he went online and the price had dropped significantly, so we bought it. We figured the boy is only going to be this size once. The clarity is amazing, and we love our new Nikon D40 (Look at how clear these are compared to the Santa pictures below taken with our old camera). I still need to work on the artistic part, but at least now we have the camera.

Bad Santa

Mariah and Curtis gave us this darling outfit for Calvin. At first we got some cute shots, but by the end of the photo shoot he was falling apart. Andy calls it going broken arrow.

(My sister-in-law Annette sent me an email about the "broken arrow" picture that was hilarious. She said: Me and Ariana LOVED the pictures. We gave them all captions. According to us, he seemed to have developed a Mad Mexican accent in every one though "I don't want no stinkin' canycane". )

Gift Exchange

Saturday night we did a gift exchange. We always draw names of one sibling to give to, but some give to everyone, everyone gives to mom and dad, and most give to the nieces and nephews. This year we did it here since we are never all together for Christmas. Jesse gave us Raving Rabbits 2 for the Wii (wahoo!) and for Calvin we got some adorable outfits and his first Tonka dump truck, which David III immediately broke in for him. Everyone had a great time and we really miss them already.

Calvin's Baby Blessing

Andy did such a wonderful job and we were so glad that his parents could make it. Calvin gets more adorable every day and looked especially cute in his white tux. He did of course wait until 10 minutes before his big moment to have an enormous blowout and turn his white pants bright yellow. I scrubbed everything down in the bathroom, wrapped him in a white blanket, and he was a quiet and alert the whole time he was on stage. I'm so proud of my two boys.

Sealing

We had a wonderful experience and I was so happy to have my entire family here. Baby Calvin stole the show and I feel blessed beyond belief to have such an amazing husband. I wouldn't trade them for anything.

Air and Space Museum

It has been so much fun to have all of my family in town for the week. Today we spent several hours at the Dulles Air and Space Museum. We thought it would be fun to do a guided tour, until the guy told us that it was a 2.5 hour tour, but by then it was too late and we had already committed. Over the course of the afternoon, we all gradually wandered off one by one because we felt bad for the tour-guide and didn't want to leave in one mass of people as he droned on and on. God bless Dad and Joey for sticking it out to the end, taking one for the team and indulging the rest of us and our short attention spans.

All Decked Out For Christmas

It's so fun to have our own house this year to decorate for the holidays. Andy and I had wanted to do a Christmas Vacation style light show on the outside, but the roofs are just too steep. It wouldn't be worth Andy falling off and killing himself. This is a small light display, but still we're happy with the results.