Brushin' those teef

Yep, we are already brushing. I actually decided to start it today. He seems to really enjoy having his teefies brushed. That’s what we call em – teefies. I noticed yesterday that Holden had a 3rd tooth coming through. It is another bottom tooth, right next to the first 2. I didn’t put him in a headlock this time for a picture. Sorry, you’ll just have to trust me on this one. So the third tooth has broken through and I declare it time to brush the teefies.

3 Amigos

This is Holden and Jeremy having some playtime after work one day. Of course Abbie wanted to get in on the action. (She thinks she is too fancy to sit on cold floors and must be on Holden's pallet, no matter how often I boot her off.) Have I mentioned that Jeremy is a great daddy? Well, he is.

Rough Naptime

Last week I heard a little fussing during one of Holden's afternoon naps. I let him fuss and within a few minutes he was quiet again. I went in to check on him once I was pretty confident he was sound asleep. This is what I found:
I always put him on his tummy for naps, but I guess he just couldn't get comfortable. But this just DOES NOT look so comfy to me.

Silly Face

Holden has a new expression that we get to see much of these days. I’m not really sure if he is biting on that bottom lip to soothe those top gums or if he is just being silly. But it sure make us laugh.

A thought from Beth

I am in my last week of my Beth Moore bible study, Stepping Up. To be honest, it hasn’t been my most favorite of her studies. But still, lots of wisdom I am taking with me from this study. And so today I read:
“He’s [God] answered you above and beyond what you asked on some of the requests you assumed He answered negatively. If time and opportunity have passed, we assume God said no. Sometimes we’re right. Sometimes we’re wrong. Our finite minds simply cannot grasp God’s infinite ways of answering prayer. You have no idea how many times you’ve prayed and God answered affirmatively but is awaiting the proper time for its revelation.”
You know what this makes me think of . . . of course, my Holden. Holden is without a doubt, above and beyond what I was praying for, during my time of fertility struggles. Will I associate everything to my infertility and adoption experience for the rest of my life? Quite possibly. :)

Baby it’s cold outside!

The cold front blew in today. And who knows if this is truly the beginnings of our winter. It could be back in the 70s next week. I love the changing of the seasons. And I do enjoy that I live in a place where I get to experience it all. Hot hot summers. And cold, often snowy, icey, fireplace-goin' winters. And then the nice, yet sometimes fleeting, times in between . . . spring and fall. Jeremy HATES the cold and kind of made a growling noise as I informed him yesterday evening of what I had heard earlier by the trusty weather man – “Enjoy your last day fair of weather. Tomorrow the temps will drop.” Well, sure enough, yesterday was fair and today was frightfully cold. Well, maybe not frightfully. Last I checked this evening it was 51 degrees, but with the wind, that can be frightful. Holden enjoyed bundling up for the cold today. (You knew I had to get a cute picture in, right?)

Bellies and Babies

My old college roommate, Sarah, is due in just a few weeks with her baby boy, Cason. We had a fun football couples shower for Sarah and her husband, Toby. That is one way to get boys to a baby shower. Put college football on a big screen. Of course, as we learned, they (a boy) may say inappropriate things that you might not want mentioned to the room full. Perhaps things they learned about in birthing class. Fortunately, Sarah is pretty transparent and was unbothered by the honesty. Here is Sarah and her pregnant belly. Looking pretty fabulous I must say!
And on our Sunday drive back home, we stopped to meet mister Max Christian Taylor. Isn’t he cute at only 3 weeks old.

You forget how little they come and how fragile they seem. I grew up with Max’s parents Greg and Amanda. Amanda has been a dear friend since the 4th grade and I am so thankful to still have that friendship. We haven’t lived even close to one another in 12 years, but the friendship is still so easy. Those are the kind you hold onto ever so tightly. We loved meeting their little boy. I wish I had a picture of Greg so you could see the resemblance. Max looks like his daddy!

Another Weekend in Texas

Well we went out of town this past weekend. So I think we are finally going to stay put for a while. We travel so so much so that we can see all of our dear friends and family! I was helping with a baby shower this past weekend in Dallas. So we took the opportunity to spend the weekend with my parents. As you can see, all nana and papa J wanted to do was kiss on Holden.
They hadn’t seen the boy since Labor Day weekend. And he is much more fun and full of energy at this point of his little life. We had a great time visiting.
checking out the pretty flowers

What’s for lunch?

(and, yes. I did attempt to color coordinate the food with his plate.)
I don’t really know what the normal consumption for 5 month old baby is. Obviously it probably has more to do with their size than their age. But here is a typical lunch for Holden. I normally just choose 1 veggie for him. But I only had 1 ice cube of green peas left that I wanted to finish off and I knew that wouldn’t cut it. So today we began like normal with 7 ounces of formula. Then it was on to the green peas, sweet potato and apple. And after he finished all of this I actually gave him some peaches because he was still acting hungry. I mean, I’m not trying to make my child another statistic in the growing epidemic of childhood obesity. ;) He tight lips it when he is full (that is our communication method for now). And so until I get a tight lip from him, I keep feeding. He is just a growing boy!
And the damage is done . . .

Lookin' Festive

After running a quick errand yesterday, look what I found on my doorstep.
Well, no. Not this cute little baby, but the cute little outfit that the baby is wearing. I’m a huge believer in online shopping. Even with a small shipping charge, I think it often saves money. So I made a couple of purchases for Holden and some Christmas gifts at Old Navy and they arrived yesterday. So Holden will be wearing his little Halloween get-up as much as possible in the next couple of weeks. And after getting him dressed this morning, I got a little carried away and we had a photo shoot. Enjoy!

God showed mercy

A couple of weeks ago we were invited to a friend's house for the OU/Texas football game. I was a little hesitant. I prefer to stay in the safety of my home with like-minded fans for this particular game. And it is one of the few football games I watch all season. I wouldn’t have ever called Jeremy and I huge Longhorn fans until we moved here and it seemed everyone assumed that we would be. Since we are from Texas and that is the only major University in that state. *sarcasm* So the last 5 years of living in Oklahoma has developed a loyalty in us to the University of Texas. I’m pretty sure, a loyalty that will stick around no matter where we live. Maybe more so for me, than for Jeremy. (I did mention last week to him that I wanted to pray for Texas to win this game. And Jeremy got on to me for sharing those thoughts.) Back to my story. We agreed to join our friends for the game and realized that a few other Texas fans had been invited. We thought it would be a mixed crowd. Well, it wasn’t. We were outnumbered, as we were the only orange shirts in the house.
OU was ranked #1 (before today) and UT was ranked #5 or #6, I believe. So I didn’t have much confidence in my team. But low and behold, Texas pulled it off (and possibly God answered my secret prayers). And for the record, we were very non-obnoxious fans. Just our normal quiet mannered selves. :) And the OU fans were the same. Surprisingly, it was a very pleasant experience. And here are a few more pictures from our fun game day!
Sooners and Longhorns can be friends, as proven below.
Here is some intense game watching.
Holden was so excited for the Longhorn win!
One particular girl was not such a good sport. ;)

cute little pumpkin

Jeremy was off work a little early today, so we took Holden to a nearby pumpkin patch. It is such a neat little place for kids! I know Holden will like it next year. And he will absolutely love it 2 years from now. But this year, I guess the entertainment was more for us. We were doing more of the laughing and it was quite a bit of fun. Here are a few pictures from our afternoon at the pumpkin patch.

New Toy

I’m not really sure what this little toy is called. Maybe it’s a jumperoo? My friend, April (yeah the same friend that sent me a ton of her boys clothes) gave me this fun toy, a walker and some other big things items. We finally pulled this out of the garage last night. And Holden loved playing in it this morning after his bath. I think he loves the independence of being able to stand without holding our hands. So it seems like our living room, is slowly but surely looking like a daycare. Except there is only one baby living here. I purposely didn’t register for a lot of these items, thinking we wouldn’t really need them. And in truth, we don’t NEED them. But Holden is enjoying this fun toy and we are very grateful for all of it!

Documentation of the roll

Well, Holden has been rolling from front to back since around month 3. You know how sometimes they do it when they are teeny tiny by a fluke? But somehow I never actually documented when he became so consistent with the roll. I let him nap on his belly and so he has always (since around 3 months) rolled to his back once he wakes up from his nap. Since we have the wood floors he is always on a thick pallet, which I noticed made rolling quite more of a challenge for him. But now he is even consistent on the thick pallet. So here is a recent documentation of Holden's roll.
enjoying some tummy time

getting in the head down position. (he pushes off the surface with his head.) notice fingers in mouth. they are now ALWAYS in his mouth. more teeth to come, i suppose.

bottom's up and ready to roll. fingers still in mouth.

action shot: mid-roll

and now, we're on our back and able to view the world (or the ceiling)

So now we just need to work on back to front. He rolls from his back to his side, but really has no interest in staying on his belly anymore. Unless, he can view himself in his little mirror. He still thinks that little reflection looking back at him is so funny!

mirror mirror on the wall . . .

Visiting with Family

We spent the weekend with some of Jeremy’s family in Texas. On our way to Texas, we stopped by to visit with Jeremy’s mom for several hours. This was her second visit with Holden and I am pretty sure it made her day. Here is grandma and Holden.

Then we got to Jeremy’s dads house late Friday night. He was excited to see his little grandson. And Holden was full of energy after the long drive. Somehow we never got a picture of the 2 of them together. We got to spend some time with Jeremy’s granny on Sunday. She is quite the professional at baby talk and got lots of smiles from Holden.


Saturday we were able to visit with Jeremy’s sister a little (again we didn’t take pictures). And then Sunday morning we got up and drove back home. It was a good weekend visiting with family. We are well aware that everyone cares to see Holden a bit more than they care to see us. :)
There is just something homey about driving through the Dallas area and specific places - Frisco, McKinney to name a couple. Towns that I have never lived, but places that feel like me. It's not good for me to drive through these places, because then I just want to move there. But every time we head this direction, I inhale as we drive through and take it all in. As Jeremy complains about the traffic. Traffic - smaffic. There's a reason there is traffic. There is so much to do and see. People actually want to be in these places. And I guess we can always visit . . .

Good Little Traveler

We have a pretty happy traveler in our family. Holden and I are actually pretty similar in that we both tend to fall asleep once we are riding in the car for a while. Though I do hold out a little longer than Holden before dozing off. But with all of the trips we make to Texas, I am so happy that he is not yet hating his car seat. As long as he has a full belly he is quite content. He was in the car a little over 5 hours on Friday, 3 hours on Saturday and another 4 hours on Sunday. But he was such a trooper!

Looking more and more like daddy everyday

I only say that because this little top was picked out for him because “it looked like Jeremy”. My friend and roommate (college roommate, but those girls will forever be known to me as roommates), Alicia told me that as I opened her gift at a baby shower. Often on Sundays, I have to be at church early and Jeremy and Holden come together at the normal time. A few weeks ago, I didn’t set out something for Holden to wear. I just wanted to see how Jeremy would dress him. And this is how he dressed him. Like a big boy! And doesn’t he make a cute big boy! But this picture was taken today. We have had some cooler days (such as today) and most of the things that fit Holden right now are summer things. But several weeks ago my friend April mailed me a surprise. All of her boys baby clothes that she had been holding on to. So that’s where Holden got these cute little jeans. Apparently they were worn by Luke or Cooper. So this is the one cooler day outfit that Holden can wear right now. But at the speed he is growing, he’ll be into the other stuff in no time.
Speaking of looking like daddy . . . Holden and I made a WalMart trip this week. The nice man that checked us out said, “Must look like daddy.” I explained that he really didn’t look much like his daddy since we had adopted him. He told me more than once how deeply sorry he was. I think he was just embarrassed that he had said anything, though it didn’t bother me in the least. There are plenty of things people could say to offend. But assuming Holden looks like his daddy, when he clearly does not look like me, I think is normal.
I feel like I should be practicing now, how I will respond to comments like these when Holden is 2 or 3. I do not want him to hear all day “he is adopted.” That just isn’t going to happen. Obviously he will know his adoption story and it will be discussed a lot at our home. We already are sharing the story with him now. But there is no reason for that to be constantly shared just because people are curious. And sometimes, not necessarily even curious . . . just making a statement like this man had done. I was trying to think how I could have responded . . . “No, he really doesn’t look like his daddy.” (the end) or “Yeah, he does.” (big lie) I know that we will figure it out. I am reading lots of books to help. But more than that, we are just praying our way through this. We know God gave us Holden and he is 100% the creator of this family. And I know he has His hand is on us, so there is no reason to make things more complicated than they actually are. Jeremy and I just thought it was a funny little story. And now I have turned it into 75% of this blog. Really, I just wanted you to see him in his big boy clothes!

Sweet Potatoes

Holden was entertaining us Sunday as he ate his sweet potatoes for lunch. So I got out the camera . . . again.
Hello everyone. My name is Holden.

He hasn't quite learned that it is bad manners to talk with his mouth full.
All done.