Eight Months!

Look who's eight months old today!

New developments:

Rolls back to front and is starting to sleep on his tummy now!  (His idea, not mine.) Seems to have messed up his night-times a little but we're working on it.

More and more sound effects, including a smacking sort of noise with his tongue and a purr/growl thing.  He also snorts. 

Imitates sounds (coughs, etc)

I think I heard him say mama today but he was pretty upset at the time...  :)

Scoots around on his seat...not very fast yet.  Working on the crawling thing.  Can push himself backwards on his tummy quite quickly, but gets frustrated when he runs into/under stuff.  

No teeth yet but he's had extra grumpy times for the past few weeks.  Both grandmas think that teeth are imminent...

Chomp that toy!

On his way to crawling...or some mode of transportation.

Little cuteheart!

Just awake from a nap on his tummy.

Oh, the things we do...this child loves water, and when I figured out that his odd position while I was washing his hands was an attempt to get his feet in the sink, I put a little water in it for him.  He was delighted.

Such a kind daddy!  Found a "waterfall" for James...the shower is running slightly, though you can't really tell.

Hanging out with Mommy!

Reaction to grapefruit juice  :)

Oh joy!  He was being awfully quiet and I came out to find this...

One of James' very favorite things is to have someone walk him around. 

Mobility is great...except for when he gets himself stuck.  :)

Special baby  :)

Home Tour

It's coming up on a year ago that we got our condo!  That was an exciting time...we lived with Joe's family for about 2 months while we closed on and fixed up our own place.  It was stressful for a while.  I remember realizing about two weeks before we needed to be out of our previous home that I'd better start packing even though we didn't know yet where we would end up.  But God provided a great place for us and we had so much help as we fixed it up (we painted virtually everything, from the ceilings to the insides of the cupboards, and re-did most of the flooring); we are blessed.

Over the past couple of weeks as various parts of the house have been tidy I have been taking pictures.  Here's a little house tour for my distant friends...

Front entrance.  I love that we have a ground floor unit; makes walking (and doing anything else with James along) so much easier!  The door to the left is the pantry and directly to the right is the coat closet.  The other doors are to the utility closet.  

Kitchen to the left.  We haven't replaced anything except appliances in here yet.  It's on the Eventual Home Improvement list though.  :)  Painting the cupboards and adding the handles really helped the look.

We have a really open floor plan.  This is the view from the kitchen sink: dining area, living room to the left and out to our patio.

The view from the other direction!  Love my red accent wall.  :)  Joe recently replaced the lights; it used to be appalling (florescent bulbs with ugly panel covers).  It's so much prettier now. 

That table was a Craigslist find.  It's the same one that Joe's family has.

Dining area, stroller parking, etc.  The pictures over the table are from Michael and David; I'd asked for Scotland pictures as a wedding gift.  

 

Looking back at the entry.  

Living room!  So nice to have a real piano.  It used to be the second piano at my family's so I've put hours and hours of practice in on it over the past years.  :)

Old books and ships...our idea of decor.  :)

A little detail; Joe's Opa does beautiful iron work and made this table for us.

In the back corner you can see the entrance to the hallway--the laundry is directly across.

Love having a real laundry room!  We picked up the cabinets from IKEA.

Down the hall--guest bathroom to the right, James' room to the left, and our room directly ahead.

Guest bathroom/James' bathroom  :)

Looking into James' room!  Also the office.

This is probably the truest representation of the paint color.  I want to put his name in white letters over his bed.  

Oh look, a baby!

Cozy corner

Straight ahead from the hallway is our walk-in closet.  It's practically an extra room.

Our bathroom

Shower room between the bathrooms.  Joe re-did this in January.

Our room!  Wedding pics over the bed; honeymoon pics on the far wall.

We recently re-arranged to accommodate the chair.   I love it!

As seen from the chair.

Outside!  The patio furniture was a birthday gift, and I've been collecting more plants--I have a little herb garden in pots now.  :)

And finally, James and I enjoying the outdoors.  :)  

At The Park

James and I go for a walk almost every day. Today he was particularly fussy so we stopped at the park to give him a little break...he loves to be outside!  

Doesn't mind the grass at all.

He's really into sticking out his tongue these days.

Cute boy

Grabbing that dandelion--just like Grandpa!  (Dad has been waging war upon dandelions ever since I can remember.)

Thoughtful (and still sticking out his tongue).

Lake pictures

Last week Joe and I took a walk at Standley Lake, one of our very favorite date spots (and, in fact, the place where we got engaged).  It was just a beautiful day and I was having a lot of fun experimenting with taking pics on my new iPhone.  Here are some favorites!

Glad we got married.  :)

Windy day!

We got engaged right down there.  It was dry back then.

Favorite!