Thanksgiving at Nanna's

Thanksgiving turned out to be a really nice day/night. We went to my Mom's house around noon and Owen took a nice long nap over there so we could relax, and help cook (though Mom seemed to have everything under control and wouldn't let us do much). David BBQed the turkey perfectly as always. Everything turned out great, from the homemade stuffing, whipped sweet potatoes in orange cups, the cranberry sauce 'competition,' to the pumpkin pie with almond spiced whipped cream. The food was delicious, Owen ate non stop as usual. The sweetest part of the night was when Grandma Zena (David's Mom who just turned 96 years old on Monday) was saying grace with her eyes closed. Owen sat quietly and watched her while she spoke. As soon as she was done, he said "Grandma Zena is tired" (because she had her eyes closed!). So cute.We are so thankful to have such a supportive and loving family. This goes to all our friends and our family on the east coast as well! I am grateful to have you all in my life.

We also got to watch our friend's pug, Jaquemoux (pronounced 'Jock a moe' :) for a few days. He was so sweet with Owen and tolerated all the demands a two year old can make on him. For example, Owen came up to him while he was sleeping soundly this morning and sweetly said "Good morning Jaquemoux" which was then followed by "Jaquemoux, GET UP!" He wanted to read his books to him. Owen now has a new best friend he can't stop talking about. Sorry there are SO many pictures of us with this dog that's not even ours, I couldn't narrow them down : )Wiping a big wet dog kiss off my face!

Sweet

Owen was so sweet tonight. We had a great day together, and the night was even better. He is starting to slowly wean himself off the paci and his blanket a bit more than he was previously. But tonight they were replaced briefly with "Silky" his stuffed sea lion, and his bowl of plastic fruit. For the past week or so he takes this bowl of fake fruit with him everywhere in the house. He has to eat his meals with it by his side. He snacks on it all day long pretending to eat it and sharing the grapes, oranges and banana's with Adam and I. He usually pretends to take a bite and then says "mmmm, juicy strawberry!" or whatever fruit he happens to be "eating." It's pretty cute seeing him start to pretend a lot lately.

Tonight he was reading a book to Silky and feeding him plastic fruit. He made his sea lion kiss all the animals in his book he was reading and then proceeded to kiss the pages himself. That is the most loved sea lion ever. He got a ton of hugs tonight! I am a little jealous actually.

Photo Shoot

I have been interested in photography for many years and have been in and out of practice throughout my life. I just got a couple of great photography books this week and thought that I would practice with my little "subject" during sunset in our backyard. I of course deleted more than half of them, but here is (more than) a few of what I got that I am happy with : ) You can see the rest on www.picasaweb.google.com/adamanton. Stay tuned for more advanced work as I figure out what the heck I am doing in the creative modes with my camera!

Dentist Appointment

Owen had his first real dentist appointment today. He got to watch a fun video of two (real) dogs driving a kid sized jeep to the office (I was cracking up!). Then they came in the office and played with the chair up and down while they learned about all the tools that would be used to clean their teeth. Owen loved the movie! His dentist was very sweet and let him hold all of the equipment like the small mirror, the water sprayer ("Mr. Elephant") and the suction ("Mr. Thirsty"). He didn't let the dentist do anything except brush a little with the toothbrush. He wanted nothing to do with the gritty polish she started to use! She took one picture of the inside of his mouth with an oral camera, but couldn't get much. He would rather look at it than put it in his mouth. He walked out of the office loving the dentist as he got an Elmo toothbrush, a monkey sticker, a Dinosaur AND a bouncy rubber ball out of the treasure chest!

Conclusion: we will go back when he is 3 and has all of his teeth, he is still waiting for more to come in. The dentist said it was a successful first visit because he was happy and left happy. He now knows what to expect when he comes in next time.

My thoughts: I think we should have gone to a pediatric dentist who knew of different ways to get his teeth cleaned the first time. He has deep grooves in his molars (he has Adam's teeth...not a good thing), and it's hard to get them clean. : ( Maybe we'll try someone new in 6 months??

My visit was great, no cavities and healthy gums! : ) In case anyone was wondering about my oral health (Mom).

Funny Times

Here is our Naked Cowboy, or as Aunt Joanie would say, "he is Riding bareback" : ) Today was Owen's first day eating his very own bowl of cereal with milk. I wish I had a picture, but I was at work, and Adam rarely thinks about picking up the camera : ( He gets spoonfuls of our cereal once in a while and it always makes him smile big! Adam said after every bite he said "Mmmmmmm, cereal." He has been saying "Mmmmmmmmm" after eating just about everything lately. Then he says "thank you Mommy" and I follow with "your welcome sweetie pie." He has picked that up and now says, "Thank you Mommy Sweetie Pie" ; )

He has been calling me "Mom" a lot lately too. Usually when he's yelling my name across the house to get my attention. Once in a while I'll hear a "thanks Mom." It makes me laugh, I feel like I was MUCH older before I made the switch from Mommy to Mom.

Also, he has a Sesame Street Alphabet video that he loves and one of the characters is Baby Bear. Baby Bear is trying to learn his ABC's and Big Bird and other kids help him through songs and little skits. So, he happened to pick up on one of the lines in the show, and will sometimes blurt out "Nice goin' Baby Bear!" out of the blue. He cracks us up. Now that his vocabulary is so wide, every day seems to get funnier and funnier with the stuff he makes up or repeats! We are pretty careful what we say around him now.

On Saturday last weekend we went to the downtown Farmer's Market. When we go, it has become tradition to buy an animal balloon of some sort. This time he got a giant flower balloon. Sadly, the pictures didn't turn out good because he was so quick and I had my hands full of produce, so you will have to use your imagination. Let me explain, he was chasing people (usually women, go figure) around with the balloon, hitting them in the butt and cracking up! Oh my, we did a LOT of apologizing that day!

After our quick farmer's market jaunt, we headed over to Pacific Crepes for breakfast. This place is run by true French people who speak very little English. I have never been disappointed by the food there. No matter how full I am we, always order dessert for the table to share. One house made crepe with Nutella and banana's and berries of course! "Mmmmmmmmm" (I just now realized where Owen picked up his "mmmmm's" from : )

Holiday Shopping

Hi everyone! Owen needs your help in saving his good friend Gwendolyn, and all of her peers.

First of all I want everyone to know that if you do any online shopping this season (or ever), please start at this site: http://www.shoptoendsma.com/. It's so easy, the link is on the side of my blog and all you do is enter this site, find the store you want to enter and a percentage of what you buy goes directly to curing SMA (Spinal Muscular Atrophy). That's it! It doesn't cost you a dime more and there are hundreds of stores on that site, like Amazon.com, Sears.com, Oldnavy.com, etc.... Please check it out, it takes no more than than one second to hit this site first and your done!

If you need holiday cards or stationary, there is a great company called Rock Scissors Paper http://www.rockscissorpaper.com/ that will donate, AND give YOU a savings! If you use the coupon code GSF9, you will get 10% off the entire shop! The Gwendolyn Strong Foundation will get 15% of all sales that use this coupon code!

Our dear friends, Bill and Victoria Strong have done an incredible job in raising awareness about their daughter, Gwendolyn's disease. SMA is the #1 genetic killer of children under the age of two. BUT, there is promising research that is being done as I type this and is VERY close to fruition. The more money they have, the more people they can hire to work and the faster they can come up with a cure. The clock is ticking for many parents of children with this horrible disease, so if you can take one second to start your online shopping at http://www.shoptoendsma.com/ first, you will be making a difference immediately. Let's help them!

Oh and if you haven't yet signed the petition, please go to http://www.petitiontocuresma.com/ and take 30 seconds to sign, and tell your friends! You can learn more about the Strongs by following their blog at http://www.gwendolynstrong.com/

Thank you!!

New pictures

Tonight I gave Owen some sleepy time tea out of one of my mugs from when I was a child. My mom recently dug up a bunch of stuff I had stashed away in storage and this mug was amongst the rest of my childhood memories. I had countless hot chocolates and tea out of that cup, and now it's Owen's turn. He loves it! It has Owl, Pooh bear and Tigger as the handle.

Adam and I at the park. We rarely get in pictures together these days, since I am usually the one with the camera! Owen's smoothie mustache! He's very proud, he kept running to the mirror to check it out after each sip he took in the kitchen ; )

Last week Owen and I played catch with a football for at least an hour in the living room. He has quite an arm already, especially when he hurls it into my head only 1 foot away! We laughed so hard and had so much fun, I just love those memories!

On a random side note, one trait that Owen got from my side of the family is sensitive ears. If he hears anything remotely loud in the house, he covers his ears. The vacuum, blender, food processor, even the microwave...yes, the microwave! Yet, he can bang on a drum, slap cups together and scream and it doesn't even phase him. Crazy. Actually, I take that back, he covers his ears when he screams (screaming is something I DO NOT allow, but sometimes when he sees other kids screaming at the park, he observes and copies them).

Happy Birthday Nanna!

Yesterday we celebrated Nanna's Birthday early. Adam, Owen and I picked her up in the morning and we headed out to the wine country so we could visit the miniature horses at Quicksliver Ranch. This is something she has been dying to do with Owen for almost a year now!

We had plans to go apple picking next, something my Mom has never done, but I know would love. However, it was November 5th and all the orchards we found, closed their doors in October : ( Bummer. Next year I am hoping we can make it to Apple Hill up north and pick them there. So, we decided to head to Los Olivos and go to lunch at one of my Mom's favorite places to go up there, Patrick's Side Street Cafe. Owen was pretty hungry, so he was well behaved as long as there was food in front of him : ) He had ziti pasta and learned how to make it whistle some how. This kept us all pretty entertained for a while!
Next we went for a little walk and got some pumpkin ice cream before heading home. It was a great day! Tonight we continued the celebration minus Adam (work), and added David, and two friends, Joe and Lynn. We all went out to dinner this evening and had a nice time. Sorry you didn't get your birthday dessert Mom, (the food took forever to come out and Owen was very ready for bed by the time we were finished eating) I promise I will make your spice cake this week!

I hope you have a happy birthday and fabulous year!

We love you,

Terri, Adam and Owen

XOXOXO

Random Cuteness

He took his shirt off, grabbed my hat from the Top Shop I got in London 9 years ago and crawled into our bed to read a book with his "friends"

Our friends Gabe and Renee came over for dinner this week with their two darling boys, Gabriel and Grayson. Here they are enjoying their sippy cups at the kids table for dinner : ) They had so much fun together a always.

100th Post!

I can't believe I have done 100 posts already. Some people ask me why I do this. They are usually wondering how I have the time to do it, and why put it up for the world to see. First of all, yes, it does take more time than I should be spending on it, but to have all the little things that usually get missed in a baby book that we always forget to write in, makes it worth it to me. I know that Owen will appreciate this when he is older and can laugh about all the funny things he did. I hardly recognize his infant pictures with dark hair and spastic movements. To record this stuff is priceless, because my memory isn't as good as I wish it was!

Secondly, I post it to keep my east coast and distant family up to date as to what we are up to. They can watch him grow up weekly which keeps them happy and informed :). It's my online baby book that is organized, legible and includes pictures and video, it's genius! I am so glad I started this, I just wish I started earlier!

So, lately Owen has been really into the nursery rhymes, and songs. I wish I had it recorded, but he must have sung "Patty Cake" about 20 times in a row tonight, then twinkle twinkle, ABC's, itsy bitsy spider, I am a little tea pot, and "all the fish are swimming in the water." Patty cake sounded a bit like this: "Patty cake, patty cake.... rooooooollllll it (with the hand movements rolling I might add).......mark it B.... put in oven for MEEEEE!" He finishes each song with an ear to ear smile and lots of clapping. So cute!

Here he is running under Daddy's legs while Adam jumps over him.

Yesterday we were in Sur La Table and one of the employees asked him what his favorite foods were. He thought for a few seconds and listed off, in order: "broccoliiiiiii, mac n' cheeeeeeese, gummy staaaaars (these are his daily vitamins), O's, Panda's (two cereals that he likes to snack on), strawberriiiiiiiiiiies..... So funny to watch him list them all off.

One of Owen's "old favorite" book has returned as a new favorite again, which is Where the Wild Things Are. All night he would randomly blurt out "Max, no get dinner!"

On to potty training:

We went to Target last week to get Owen's first pair of big boy underpants! We found a Sesame Street package that he is quite excited about. He wore them on his head at first, I am not sure if he quite understands what it's all about, but he wants them! I'll keep ya posted when we graduate to those : )

Whenever he gets hurt or falls down, he always says "Mommy, hold you" (instead of "me"). He doesn't quite get the whole "me, you, I" meanings just yet. It just melts my heart to hear those words though : )

I was doing dishes the other night after dinner while Owen quietly played by himself. He came back into the kitchen and was wearing a Hitler mustache. I had to take a picture.