What does Santa say?

(By the way, if you are wondering why the the Giants "helmet" has a hole in the top of it... it's really a chip and dip server!)

Weekend fun!

Our friends from Phoenix came in town this weekend with their baby, dog, and cat. The dog was definitely a hit with Bryce! Such a sweet dog, too. He didn't mind when Bryce climbed ALL over him!




Bryce also made an Indian headband at school last week. I guess they were learning about the first Thanksgiving, although it seems a little politically incorrect to be making Indian headbands?

Colors

Bryce is learning his colors! He doesn't quite associate the words with the correct color yet, but he's starting to say them pretty well.

Little Gym!

Bryce loves the Little Gym. For those of you who are unfamiliar... the Little Gym is just that - it's a gym with scaled down equipment for toddlers. We sing songs, do activities (i.e. hula hoops, parachute, airtrack, etc.), then the kids have "Exploration Time". This is Bryce's favorite part. The kids get to run around and try out all the fun equipment. And the best part is that everything is padded, so little chance for blood. :) Here's a few pics from Saturday's class:

Hanging on the bars

Climbing course

Flips!!

Balance beam

Medal day! (Note: the teacher played the Olympic theme for this!)

The Littlest Yoda

Bryce had so much fun trick-or-treating! He was apprehensive about going up to the door at first, but once he realized they were handing out candy, he was ALL over it! He was then running from house to house!

Bryce has new slippers. We've named them "Melmo Shoes". :)

Sneak Preview

Here's a sneak preview of Bryce's Halloween costume! :)

Also, we went to the Fall Festival at Bryce's preschool last week. There were lots of little games, including this one where he won goldfish crackers.

"Dip"

Bryce is starting to explore the wide world of condiments. Ketchup is his new love.

End of Summer

Summer is coming to an end here in TX. A final cute picture from the boat:

That means that fall is right around the corner! Here's a few pictures from our neighborhood pumpkin patch. We've been twice so far, and there's still a couple weeks until Halloween.

So many new tricks!

Bryce's second week at preschool is going great! He loves doing art projects at school and bringing them home to show us. We review his "papers" every evening before dinner. Yesterday, he brought home a new favorite. He used multiple colored markers to put dots all over the page. I raved about how great it was and asked him what it was. He replied "Ball" (bottom lefthand corner below), which I thought was very clever! Here's a sampling of this week's artwork:


We are also learning how to use utensils! Bryce can't scoop yet, but he is able to get the food into his mouth. Check him out!


Last new trick... baby slam dunk!

First Day of Preschool!

Bryce started preschool today!

Alex and I dropped him off this morning, and he didn’t seem at all concerned that we were leaving him there. He was like “Alright, bye. I’m playing with these cool new toys so see ya!” There were 2 kids that were screaming and crying, and Bryce watched them for a minute, like “Should I be scared? Do they know something I don’t know?” but they obviously didn’t deter him from finding all the new toys to play with.

Alex and Karen picked him up at 2:30. Alex said that he spied on Bryce for a few minutes, and he was playing with another little boy, so that was good. The teacher said he was really good, that he played very nicely with the other kids. The only time he got cranky was about 11:30 just before lunch. He was hungry and tired, so he got a little fussy. She did rub his back a little at nap time to get him to sleep, and he slept almost the whole 2 hours, so that was VERY good. The teacher did say that every once in a while Bryce would go to the window and say “Dada vroom vroom.” I guess he watched us drive off this morning from the window, which is kinda sad.

All in all, a very good first day! Let’s hope it continues!

Also, Bryce and I started the Little Gym last week. We do some group activities, then he gets to explore on his own. He LOVES that part - actually, he wants to do that part the entire class. The whole place is padded, so he can climb, etc. without worrying about getting hurt. At the end of class, all the kids get a stamp on their foot. Bryce wanted two:

New Toy

Bryce got a jungle gym for his birthday, and Daddy put it together yesterday. He's had so much fun on it! He's really good at climbing up the "rock wall" and going down the slide.

The great thing about being a boy... topless when it's hot!

I love my new slide, Dad!

Strong like Ox

A few videos of Bryce's latest tricks...


Our son is strong like ox!

Marching

Bryce Mega-Update

It's been a while since I updated you guys on Bryce. He changes so much every day, even frequent updates seem quickly outdated, but I will try.

Here's the list of Bryce's latest tricks:

1. Walking! He's been walking for a few weeks now. I mean really walking he's all over the place!
2. Itsy Bitsy Spider
3. Marching (adorable!)
4. No more bottles or formula (I guess this isn't really a trick, but I'm happy to not wash bottles anymore!)
5. Playing peek-a-boo by hiding behind doors and corners
6. Throws a ball for Duncan
7. Says "vroom vroom" when he pushes his toy cars
8. Gives high 5
9. Calls for his "Ba-doom" (his word for Duncan)
10. Wrinkles his nose and says "Oooooo" (this one is going to get old very fast!)

Here's his 1 year old pictures:

Our neighbors love us now!

We had the landscaping redone this week. When I say "redone", I really mean it. The previous owners did NOTHING with the landscape. The jasmine completely took over the front, suffocating whatever bushes were there. The entire front beds were ripped out and replanted. The only things we kept were one crepe myrtle and 3 boxwoods. Adios, ugly landscape! Our neighbors are thrilled, believe me.

Before:

(It's hard to tell in this picture how bad it really was. The trees were dying, too close to the house, and had broken limbs. The bed in front of the garage was one giant bush. Yuck!)

After:

There are lots of small daylilies and things that don't show up well in the pictures. It will take some time to fill in, but we are so excited about it!

Birthday Bash

Bryce had a great birthday. Actually, he had a few great birthdays, as we celebrated over the course of a week.

On his actual birthday (Wednesday), Alex and I took him to Chuck E. Cheese. Yes, I believe I just heard groans from the readers. That's exactly how Alex reacted to my suggestion of going there. Bryce had never been to a place like that before, and since they have a Toddler Zone with stuff for the little kids, I thought he'd enjoy it.

The CEC trip started out on the wrong foot... When you walk in the door, there's a kid check-in desk. (Essentially, they stamp the kid's and the parents' hands with the same special code. On the way out, they check to make sure you are leaving with the correct child. Great idea, actually.) As we were checking in, the attendant asked if we were celebrating anything special. Upon hearing it was B's birthday, the guy pushed a button. All of the sudden there were flashing lights and a loud voice and trumpet announcing the birthday. Bryce immediately donned the block-head face and started crying.

Luckily, it went uphill from there. He loved the mechanical dancing/singing mouse while he ate his pizza. He didn't seem like he was going to like the live version of the mouse, but luckily, the mouse has an eye for that sort of thing and kept right on walking! After pizza, we played a few games: the baby whack 'em game was a hit and another game that had a steering wheel. The only one he didn't want to try was the Barney car ride. He was scared of the giant purple dinosaur sitting in the passenger seat... and really, can you blame him?

Then there was the birthday party! We had an Elmo cake, which of course meant red icing. Gross, I know. But, Elmo only comes in one color, so red it was. Bryce once again proved he's our son, as he wanted nothing to do with the sugary sweet icing, but eventually ate the cake.

Happy Birthday, Little Man!

One year ago today, our little man was born. SOOOO hard to believe, as this past year has just flown by!

Happy birthday, baby! We are so proud of the little man you are turning into.

Pictures to come...

Love,
Mama, Dada, and "Bah-doom" (aka Duncan)

The Graduate

Tonight was our last night at swim lessons! Quick picture of B-man showing off his ribbon. He really was more excited about it than he displays in this photo.

Won't be long!

He'll be walking before we know it! We leave for London in 2 weeks... I hope he walks before then! If not, Gigi's regimented training schedule will definitely have him walking before we get back from our trip.

Welcome baby Cole!

Congratulations to Melinda and Mike on the birth of baby Cole! He was born yesterday, May 20. Big Boy Bryce can't wait to be your friend!

Bend it like Baby Beckham

Who knew Bryce could kick a soccer ball? Well, I guess he did. He surprised us with that new trick the other night. Take a look.

The new boat!

For those of you that haven't heard, we bought a new boat last week! We took it down to the river this past weekend. The weather was super warm during the day, but the water is still very cold and it was chilly at night. The guys were wakeboarding, nonetheless. I'm sure the beer kept them warm!

Here she is!

Beautiful morning on the river

Early morning campfire

Kisses for Mommy

Just a short video of Bryce doing kisses. :)

Water Baby

Bryce is now able to swim underwater for 7 seconds! He loves swim lessons. Check him out!

9 Month Catch Up

Bryce only started crawling 4 weeks ago, but he's already working on walking. Just a few amusing video clips and pictures from the last few weeks.

New Push Toy!


Haircut #6


My new swing! Thanks, Daddy!


I like to pull up in my crib and stick my arms and legs out!

Welcome to the Neighborhood

We have some new neighbors that just moved in a couple months ago. We were SO excited to see them move in, as they are about our age and have a 2 year old. This is very important, as Alex pointed out at our first HOA meeting, "Most of our neighbors could be our parents!"

Back to the story... their daughter's 2nd birthday party was on Saturday, and they invited us to it when we stopped to chat with them while on a walk the week prior. So, at 4:00 on Saturday, we get Bryce all dolled up in his 'party outfit' (jeans, green checked button-down, and green sweater vest) and head over to the party. We were having a great time mingling, and Bryce was having fun in the daughter's outdoor swing. He looked so relaxed, swinging back and forth in the breeze. Then, out of the blue, vomit! Not spit up, vomit. Like the projectile kind. All over himself, the swing, the driveway.

I felt awful... first, because we are the bad parents that swung their child so much that he got motion sickness (in all fairness, we didn't know he GOT motion-sick. This explains why he didn't like his baby swing much!) And second, because we hardly know these people. They were so nice to invite us to the party, etc., and our son puked all over everything. Luckily, we live just a few houses down, so I scooped Bryce up and ran off to change his clothes. While we were gone, Alex hosed down the swing and driveway.

Horribly embarrasing. But, the neighbors were pretty cool about the whole thing. Turns out they aren't germ-a-phobes (we aren't either), and as soon as the swing was deemed 'clean', their kid was in there... sans motion sickness.

Crawling wasn't fast enough...

Out of the blue, Bryce learned how to work his walker. Literally, he's had it for 4 months now, and never went more than 6 inches at a time - backward. Then tonight while I was cooking dinner, he started running. Check him out!

'Out' as long as he was 'In'

Bryce had his 9 month checkup yesterday. He is doing great - very healthy and happy... and BIG! He is 30" tall (95%tile) and 23.5 lbs (slightly off the charts!) At least he's proportionate, right?

Here's a few pictures we had taken about a month ago for Alex's birthday.

March Update

It's been a while since I posted, I know. But now that I have a crawler, he's keeping me much busier! Seriously, who knew that learning to crawl also teaches you how to open a drawer and pull its contents out? I see babyproofing in our future for this weekend.

Swim lessons continue to be great. Bryce is able to swim underwater for 4 seconds now, which makes him the Star of the Under-One-Year-Olds! He's so cute under there; I can see him looking up at me through the water. But he's a champ - no coughing, just a "what just happened?" look when he surfaces.

Alex's birthday was last week - shout out, honey! We went to dinner with some friends on Saturday night, then saw an 80s cover band at the Glass Cactus. They are great and dress like Revenge of the Nerds. Classic.

I've got a crawler!

Bryce is still perfecting his technique, but he's definitely on the move! Last night he was only doing a couple of steps at a time, but he's up to 5-6 at a time now.

Swim Videos!

Bryce loved swim lessons tonight! We got in the pool about 10 mins before class started, like the instructor suggested. He was comfortable in the water before class started, and he had a great time! During one of his jumps today, he went almost all the way underwater!

London Bridge

The tip over

Underwater jump!

Slide!

Teeth and Apple Bottom Jeans

7 months, 7 teeth. Seriously? The kid is going to have a full mouth by a year old! Let me catch you up.

The first tooth arrived for Bryce’s 4 month birthday. The second bottom tooth arrived a few weeks later.

By about 6 months old, the 4 top teeth all appeared at the same time. (Thank goodness for baby Tylanol!) Those were harder on him than the bottom teeth, so he woke up once or twice a night for a few weeks.

Yesterday, tooth #7 made an appearance on the bottom. Amazing. I think his first birthday dinner will be at Bob’s Steak and Chop.

I should also catch you up on swim lessons. You saw pictures of the first class – smiley, happy water baby. Well, it was a good thing we took pictures the first class, because the second class was the exact opposite - crying, sniffling, and the occasional scream. The little girl next to him started screaming the moment she hit the water. I figure Bryce thought, “Oh no, it’s that bad?! I should be crying, too!” And he never turned it off. But, unluckily for Bryce, I am one of those mean moms that keeps making him participate, regardless of tears. Hey, the lessons aren’t cheap, ok? We’re getting our money’s worth.

Luckily, our third lesson was a big improvement: crying for 10 mins, neutral (but on the verge of tears) for 10 mins, then happy and participatory for the last 10 mins! The instructor suggested we come early next week to play in the pool before the class starts. The hope is that he’ll be over the scared part by the time we crank up the corny swim songs. (As a side note, you know that “Apple Botttom Jeans” rap song? Apparently, it’s one of Bryce’s favorites. So, instead of “I’m a little swimmer, short and stout”, mommy sings “Apple bottom jeans and the boots with the fur” in his ear. It helps to calm him. And let’s be honest – it’s a much better dance tune.)

Swim Lessons!

We started Waterbabies swim lessons last night! Bryce had a great time, kicking and splashing the whole class. We sang lots of corny swim songs. In fact, I think this one penned just for Bryce: "I'm a little swimmer, short and stout..." :)

Bryce "jumped" off the side of the pool a few times, from a sitting position. He didn't submerge yesterday, but we are building up to that.

I think his favorite activity was in the "motorboat", which is a noodle with the ends tied together. I put him in the noodle, and he holds onto the front, while we kick, kick, kick to chase some plastic balls around the pool.

The only time he got upset was the very end of class, but I think it was because he was tired and hungry. Each kid gets to go down the 3' plastic slide into the pool, while we sing a goodbye song thanking them for coming to swim lessons. Bryce started crying at the top of the slide, but he was over it by the time he hit the water.