The Gorge

Let me explain my long hiatus from blogging. There is a little curious, button-loving almost 9 month old baby who won't let me. When I open my computer his eyes light up and he immediately crawls over to abuse my keyboard. So it's only while he is sleeping that I'm able to use the computer and I usually have his naps booked. By booked I mean every second is being used to frantically wash the dishes, cook, clean, etc... I previously relied on his exersaucer and johnny jumper to occupy him but he isn't in to being confined anymore. He is crawling all over the place, pulling up on everything and standing all by himself. He even took a tiny step the other day. He may be over confident in his standing skills so I am watching him like a hawk these days. He also has started eating much better. He eats anything we are eating or something close to it. Pureed foods are NOT popular with this baby. He prefers chunky foods. My mom told me I also had nothing to do with baby food. Today he ate blueberries and oatmeal for breakfast and chicken, barley and steamed apples for lunch and dinner. He still eats relatively small amounts but he is finally interested. He also has a expanded his vocabulary, to include not only Maaama, but Daada, Naana, Yaaya, Baaba and lots of car noises. One really cute thing he is doing everyday is crawling to the bathtub to take his bath. Esten always strips him down while I get his bath ready. One day he just took off to the tub before he could get him undressed. Now he does it every night and when he turns that corner into the bathroom he has the same delighted look in his eyes that he has when I open my computer.

We just got home from a vacation to Washington where we reunited with some of our best friends. We all met at our friends Joel and Clint's grandmother's lake house. She was such a saint to let 14 of us stay with her. Then we traveled via 12 passenger van and minivan to The Gorge to camp and see Phish. It was an amazing trip and we had a blast. It was Rowan's first camping trip and he did really well. The time change made things a little difficult but he's a trooper. We saw Phish two nights and the first night Rowan stayed up and danced (jumped) for about 30 minutes, the second night he passed out before they even came on. This is from his dancing night. I made those Huck Finn's.

Mama and Ro.

Still dancing.
He loved the tent. And yes, we used disposable diapers for our vacation. His carbon footprint grew a wee bit but it's still smaller than most.
This is a group photo of the crew. We had a baby and pregnant mama with us.

Rowan eating his shoe. One of two pairs that actually fit him. Most shoes are too tight due to the chub on the top of his feet.
Family photo at The Gorge.
This was Ro's first beer. He loved it and slept through the night. Only kidding, it was not open but he liked it because it was cold on those gums. Oh yeah, since last time, Rowan has two teeth! The bottom front two. They are adorable.

Thunder Thigh Giggle

He calls me Muuum.

Some things you might hear if you were a fly on our wall today would be: "Baby Boy, you're going to fall", "Rowan Mason, be careful", "Rowan, how did you get there?", "You can't pull up on that, it's going to fall over." I think you may get my point. He is getting really brave with this pulling up thing and uses his crawling skills to get him to whatever it may be that he wants to pull up on. Oh yeah, he says "Muuuuum" now! My mom heard it, I've heard it and Esten has too, although he will probably never admit it. So far the only time I've heard him say, "Muuum" is when he is tired or hungry so therefore, I think he knows what he is saying. And tonight I'll leave you with some pictures from our family photos. We had them taken by Butterfly Chaser Photography. Sarah did an amazing job and even put together a video compilation of some of the photos. Those eyes and thighs...

All Images Copyright Butterfly Chaser Photography

Here We Go

Rowan is officially crawling. He has been inching around for a few weeks but last night and this morning he is mobile. We had a party this past weekend and our friends Bo and Elizabeth brought their son, Isom, who is well on his way to walking. Rowan LOVED him and told him that by screaming in his ear, pulling his hair, and poking his eyes. He really thought that Isom was a super fun toy. Needless to say I'm looking for a playdate for Rowan very soon. He should know that he is not the ONLY baby in the world, right? I think Rowan picked up a few new moves from him too, like crawling.



We took Ro to Fredericksburg a few weeks ago to swim. We were keeping our fingers crossed that he would enjoy the pool since he cried about his baby pool we bought him. Fortunately for all of us, he enjoyed every second of his swimming. He splashes until he is choking on the water, catches his breath and resumes splashing all while kicking his little legs under the water.



Esten and I have a wine barrel that we planted some strawberries in this year. They were doing really well until this sweltering heat came upon us. We would have a few strawberries at a time and they were really sweet. Rowan took interest in them when Esten was picking them while holding him. Esten let him try the berry and he took a few "pecks" at it and made the decision that he liked it. He then continued to suck on it until he was practically gone. Then when we went to Fredericksburg, Esten was picking some blackberries and Ro loved those too. He's a berry baby.






For Father's Day this year Rowan and I made Esten a tie. Rowan helped by letting me work on the tie while he napped or played. I found the pattern on one of the blogs I read. It turned out really nice and he says he likes it. I know, I know a tie is the one of the worst gifts ever, but it's a tradition to give dads ties. So we did. A lot of love went into that tie. This picture is not the best but you'll get the idea.



We had some family photos taken this past week so stay tuned, they should be finished in a few weeks.

Half a Year Old

Here are some recent pictures of Rowan. He is still not crawling but determined he will. No matter how many times he face plants it, he'll get up again and continue to try. These pictures are from our front yard yesterday at lunch. He was picking and eating grass, a big step considering a few months ago he would cry if you put his feet down in the grass. And I suppose eating grass is better than the post it note he ate last week. Oops!



We've been trying to get Rowan to start eating solids, with little success. Somedays he'll eat and somedays he won't have anything to do with it. I don't force him to eat if doesn't want to but try to offer something to him everyday. Last night he was attacking the spoon for carrots. They were so good that he thought it was essential to smear them all over his face. Ian was taking advantage of this and getting in a few licks of carrots off of his hands. Rowan loves dog attention so I see him feeding his food to the dogs in the months to come.

And these beauties are from our garden. I made stuffed bell peppers last night. This is the first year that Esten and I have actually had enough peppers to make a meal. There are more to come too along with the eggplant.

Rowan's sitting up skills are much better now. He will sit up for long periods and play with his toys. Here he is playing with his favorite flower chime. That toy is a hand me down from Mara and I have to say it has been put to great use. Maybe someday he will be into the trucks, trains and dinosaurs...

These two are best buds. Pablo surprisingly tolerates all of the pinches, pulls and pokes from Ro. And if you leave Rowan alone for a few minutes, you'll come back to Pablo sitting beside him keeping a close eye. Pablo is Rowan's keeper in his little chihuahua world. Their relationship may change when Rowan can chase him, we'll see. Oh and the poor cat, Rowan sees him and screams at the top of his lungs. I suspect Rowan will be chasing him too. The cat is beginning to realize that the screams are screams of interest and scurries away at the sound. Rowan is more and more fun everyday and it is so hard to believe that he has already been here for six months. Time is racing by.

Rowan Meets Jackson James

So this is a late post but at last the meeting between Rowan and Jackson is documented. Stuart, Jackson and Amanda came to College Station a few weeks ago to visit and meet Rowan. Jackson is about 6 weeks older than Ro so there's no doubt in my mind that they will eventually get together and cause lots of trouble. This was Rowan's first time to share his toys and I think he actually learned a thing or two from Jackson. See how Jackson is pulling the toys on the bar that goes across the exersaucer, well now Rowan does this too. Before this day he never even noticed the toys hanging there.



And here they are both on a giant soft book. This was too cute as they reached to touch one another.


Next time these two get together they will probably both be mobile. Here is a video of Rowan trying to get up on all fours. I put him down on the other side of his room, went to get some clothes out of the dryer, came back and he was by his changing table. Since this he has gotten really good at it and is so close to getting it moving. I guess plug covers and cabinet locks are in my future.

And finally John graduated this past weekend and of course we couldn't resist putting Rowan in his A&M overalls for the event.

Sweet Baby in The Big Apple

We took our first family trip out of state last week to New York City. We stayed in Brooklyn with our friends, Susan and Bruce. Uncle Cy was in NYC so we got to hang out with him too. We left early Monday morning from Austin and I mean early, up at 5:00 and wheels up by 7:30. But not before Rowan had a chance to spit up on my pants and on my boarding pass. His first plane ride was perfect, I was more anxious than he was. Here's a picture of Daddy and Rowan on the plane.



Once we landed in Baltimore we decided to let Rowan stretch out on the floor while we waited to catch our next plane to New York.



Susan picked us up from the airport and we went to her house and relaxed for a bit. For dinner Monday night we met up with Aunt Ava at an Indian restaurant. Rowan was glad to see Ava and fell asleep while she sang to him.





We traveled from Brooklyn to the restaurant on the subway. It was Rowan's first. He had a very surprised look on his face when the train came racing through the tunnel. This is a picture of us on the subway. We used the subway frequently while we were there and Rowan made lots of friends on the train. Most NYers avoid eye contact on public transportation, but our little man was staring them down and forcing eye contact. I've never seen so many smiles on the subway.



Rowan, Susan and I went to H&M for some shopping while Esten went to the Heartland Brewery. We met up with him there for a photo op.



It was dreary for most of the time we were there but on Wednesday the sun decided to shine and we took advantage. We walked across the Brooklyn Bridge to start off the day.






And then we went to the American Museum of Natural History. You can see a dinosaur if you look behind Esten and Rowan. And not to get you down or anything but these hard economic times have even hit the museum, the gem room was closed because they can't afford to have a guard there all day.



After the museum we went to Strawberry Fields in Central Park. It is just across the street from the Dakota where John Lennon was shot.





We had a great time and Rowan proved to us that he travels well, as long as there isn't a car seat involved. We had a great Mother's Day weekend too. Our friends came over from Houston and Moms and Pops came too. Another post for that visit.