Can't believe Christmas is almost here!

 A few weeks ago Eric and I got to go with our friends the Cardons, Ashley and her kids Cal and Tinsley, to the Milwaukee Zoo. Let me tell you, it is awesome! There are tons of animals and it is huge! Way bigger than the one we were used to in Utah. It was pretty chilly, but Eric held up really well and looked at the animals way more than I expected! I was a slacker though and forgot to take pictures of all of us together. We're grateful for fun new friends and excited to hang out with them some more!

Eric's face when he saw the elephant

Perfect timing, it started peeing right after I took this one

Cal and Eric-so cute together

Eric and mommy

I love this little man

Happy Thanksgiving! Sadly, the only picture I remembered to take

Helping decorate the tree the day after Thanksgiving

 Our friends Jack and Diana took us to the Domes. They are three domes--one has a tropical habitat, one is desert, and the third one they are always changing. This time we went it was a Christmas display with tons of different poinsettia plants.

Eric and Jack in Santa's sleigh

These were the best pictures we could get before they dove right back out

Eric loved all the plants

So fascinated

Rockin' his Christmas jammies

Look how long my hair is!

Cheeser

He just started this little grin where he scrunches up his nose-too cute

Candy cane bliss

When Tanner was little, he loved Christmas so much, his family called him Christmas boy. We are so excited now to have a little Christmas boy of our own! I think he looks excited, don't you? We are trying to soak up all of this holiday season and enjoy every minute, despite Tanner's crazy school schedule. We are so thankful for our many blessings and our wonderful friends and family. And most of all for our Savior Jesus Christ and the opportunity we have to celebrate his birth and his Atonement for us. We leave for Utah in 11 days and are so excited to spend this special time with our families and loved ones!

Just hear those sleigh bells ringaling..

 Christmas is almost here!! We are so excited and loving every minute. We just wish it could be a month longer. The decorations, Christmas tree, lights, music, and hot chocolate, they're all so wonderful. We had a wonderful Thanksgiving with our friends the Ostlers and the Lloyds. Eric enjoyed the sweet potatoes and also some strawberry Jello, other than that, he wasn't too into the dinner. We are slackers of course and forgot to take any pictures. I am ashamed. We have so much to be thankful for though, this Thanksgiving was a big reminder to me of that. We are so blessed and Tanner and I keep saying how we couldn't ask for anything more.

 Eric is growing so fast and as you can see is our little ham for the camera. I love how he stops and poses with this cheesy grin. Tanner and his dad both do this close lipped smile, maybe it's hereditary? He looks just like his handsome daddy and I love it! He is such a sweet boy and is doing fun new things every day. He now loves to cuddle and make a cute little giggle sound, he does it to his stuffed animals too, he loves cars and trucks, balls, watching Elmo, watching mom and dad dance, high fives (this is more like patting my hand a few times, but still cute), claps, turning off the lights when we leave the room, turning the pages for mommy when we read books, and our new favorite: the army crawl! I finally got a video of it this morning. There are so many things I love about it, the way he uses his whole head to propel himself, the butt in the air as he inchworms, and the random way his left leg flies in the air. I'm sure he'll be crawling and into everything soon enough!
He doesn't like getting stuck under the couch, getting dressed, or any kind of meat. Even baby food with meat in it, he hates it all. He is still toothless, so it's probably good.

Aren't you so grateful I'm so cute?

Won't use his sippy, but he loves drinking from our cups

 Here he is making noise and yelling, which is what he now does all day.
Below that is his face when we lit up the Christmas tree. I love his expression so much, he is just so amazed.
Lastly, the army crawl! He'll be 10 months on Saturday, so it's about time, but I still can't believe how fast he is changing!

Playing with Daddy is always so much fun!

If I can just get there....hey an Elmo phone! He's easily distracted. He's a baby, go easy on him.

Spazzing out with the butter box I gave him to play with while I made dinner.

All we have to do to get him to smile now is smile at him. I love it! I just smiled at him and he made this adorably cheesy face, he's such a cheeseball! I love how he acts bashful too.

Eric's alternative to crawling. Instead of moving forward, he rolls side to side, which gets him forward about a centimeter at a time. I love how he'll come back to his belly and look around like he expects to be in a different place. Someday he'll figure it out.

I love listening to Eric's voice. Today he was rolling around in his Utes tracksuit talking up a storm, I couldn't resist recording him. We sure love this little guy!

Hey Mom, look how great I can stand!

Busted the little couch potato stealing the remote-granted his stories were on (aka Sesame Street)

Hey! I have hair!

Cute fuzzy head

Snuggle time with Daddy

Oct 2011

Eric laughing at his puppy

Eric likes to throw fits when he gets fed veggies he doesn't like-so how could I not keep feeding them to him? it's hilarious!

I surrender!

Babbling/yelling

You can guess what he's doing-I just love his motivational little clap in the middle-way to push through it Eric!

9 months!

Eric had his 9 month appointment last week. He is healthy and perfect (as we already knew!). His stats are:

Weight- 21 lb 4 oz -75%

Height- 29.5 in -75%

Head- 90% :)

He still isn't crawling and still is toothless, both of which the doctor said are fine. We love our round headed, gummy little butterball! He does have a bad cough, so we took him in today and he was wheezing a little so they gave him an inhaler for when he coughs a lot at night. They gave him a nebulizer treatment in the office too. He was so good and sat still almost the whole time even though he didn't like the mask. He doesn't act sick, as you can tell:

Chowing on veggie puffs at the dr's office

And I just had to add this one from the other day because it's so cute I could spray my face with ketchup. And I hate hate hate ketchup. But it's that cute!

Bending over to look at a toy he got plumber's crack-I love this stinkin' nutcase!

Eric at 8 months

 Eric is getting to be such a big boy! He is changing every day and is so much fun. He is so crazy when he sleeps now, we find him in a different corner of the crib every time he lays down. He falls asleep like this, with his left arm under him. The other day I think it fell asleep because he woke up crying and couldn't get himself off his tummy. I picked him up and his little arm was all limp. It was sad, but funny.

Here he is with his jammies and toy from Grandma Embreus. It scared him at first, but now you can see he loves it!

 "I wonder if that fuzzy spider on his head tastes good.."

 Eating his carrots. And this is a pretty clean day actually.

 I just love this picture. It was after our morning walk. He looks so pensive and happy. I also especially love the long hair behind his ears that is blowing in the wind. Tanner won't let me cut it, he thinks it's cute.

 Practicing crawling. We have to put him in this position and he lasts maybe a minute and goes on the tummy, then promptly rolls to his back. I don't think he has the arm strength to support that heavy head yet! He'll figure it out eventually, I'm not worried about it, it's actually nice right now that he can't move all over and get into things. But I can tell he's getting frustrated about not being more mobile, so I kind of want him to start at the same time.

 Wearing Grandma Fullmer's sunglasses. He knows he looks good!

Listening to Daddy. I love when he gets this serious face.

At Costco with Jack and Kenzie. I got this picture of him with Kenzie, they kept their arms on eachother like this for a few minutes, it was so funny.

Eric is getting more picky with his eating. He used to simply open wide and eat anything we offered him, but now if he doesn't like it after one or two bites, he just closes his mouth and it is ridiculous to try and get him to open it again. If Tanner and I are eating it though, he will eat whatever it is. He is babbling all the time and says 'dadada' but doesn't get what it means yet. Every time I try to get him to say 'mama' Tanner runs in and starts saying 'dada.'
He is starting to get a little more clingy to Tanner and I. He is rolling a lot and will probably be crawling by next month. He still is toothless and is so cute gumming all of his food. He loves singing, when mommy or daddy dance, balls, books, the vacuum, mirrors, fake laughing, blankie, swinging, smiling, yelling, clapping, elmo, watching football with Tanner, and bathtime. He doesn't like other kids crying, getting dressed, or getting strapped into the carseat.
We love our little stinknut!!