Week 22: Grandpa-ha's 60th Wake/Birthday :-)

Well MiMi threw a spectacular 60th Birthday party for Grandpa-Ha. Marshall was very excited to see his family.

Photo of the Birthday Boy.

Clearly we all had our fun with Grandpa-Ha's "Reading Glasses." Mostly we all just looked like the Old Guy from the Six-Flags commercial.

Marshall is ON THE MOVE now! His posture looks like he is going to move forward. I was getting him ready for his bath and was AMAZED that he was trying so hard to CRAWL. Hello baby - what's your rush?! Two weeks ago you were perfectly happy on your back! It was too funny seeing him naked. He had tried so hard he got his little bottom straight up in the air.

Then he just brought up one knee to try to crawl and just ended up going backwards instead of forwards.

Then he flipped over to his front and looked at me like - okay lady I'm ready for my bath.

His school has also noticed his amazing progress. They are just so shocked that he is trying to crawl and he is all over the floor. He especially likes to watch the older babies in the class and tries to mimic him. His teachers think he will be an early walker and will keep me very busy getting into things when Chloe is born! They are also so amazed at his drinking from the cup skills. We decided to put him on a sippy cup since he is trying to give himself the cup and was making too much of a mess on his own. He isn't strong enough to hold the cup or bottle on his own, but he certainly tries. His teachers are just in awe of his independence. They also say when he is mad, he really likes to let everyone know (you can hear him down the hall) and he turns from his pale skin color to BRIGHT RED. I said that Chris was like that when he was little.

Week 21: Spring Time

I just can't believe that Spring time has already arrived. Where did the Fall and Winter go? I guess everything starts to blend together when you're sleep deprived (not to mention how unattractive the Mommy is in the Morning!).

The whole "family" was just so anxious to get outside and start planting. I was excited to get to go to the Farmer's Market at lunch and pick up some begonias from the Aggie-Plant Man as I call him. The flowers are such wonderful quality and the blooms were really huge. Although having the plants in my car, I did have a few "Spider" incidents while I was driving. Yep - I'm really afraid of them and had two of them drop on my hand while I was driving, two days in a row. I was so phobic of my car after the second day that I was ready to sell it. But reason set in, and I just rolled down my windows to let the rest of the critters out.

Marshall was put into his carrier and was so happy to be outside helping Mommy and Daddy plant flowers. He's got a green thumb like his Daddy. If he's crying all you have to do is take him outside and he'll stop. After Bundling him up....We set to work! As you can see he was helping Daddy carry the flowers (and then try to pick them!).Marshall also LOVES his Pooh books before bedtime. The first one I read to him he tried taking Tigger off the page with his fingers. (Of course, he is attracted to anything that is the color Orange, which is his favorite color). After seeing how interested he was, I pulled down the bag of Beanie Babies from the back of some long forgotten closet and found him his very own Tigger. I have NEVER seen him get so excited to see something (except for the first time we brought his piano home).


Last week, Marshall had his first Roll Over from back to front. By the end of this week he was getting to be VERY proficient at Rolling to his front, but he HATES being on his tummy so he would start out fussing then just crying until his face was bright red. Chris and I decided to one day, just let him cry it out a little, and when he realized we weren't going to flip him he just laid there VERY STILL. It was actually pretty funny.
Then he realized how silly he was before and how much he ACTUALLY LIKED BEING ON HIS TUMMY! Wow it is amazing that at the beginning of last week he was perfectly flat on his back and NOW HE'S ROLLING OVER!!!!!!!! It is so amazing at how fast he is developing.

Baby Number Two: Chloe Jane

Surprise! As you can see from the photo, we are expecting another baby on September 27th. For those of you doing the mental math, Marshall will be 11 months old when his sibling comes. It was quite a surprise that despite it taking us 5 years to have Marshall, we became pregnant within two months of having Marshall. We were so happy to have Marshall in our lives that we knew that we'd have another baby within two years anyways. BTW - you can get pregnant while breastfeeding! :-)

It was very convenient that we tried so hard to have Marshall that we had an extra pregnancy test laying around the house. It was an odd feeling to have so many years of negative results, and then to take one at 4am, which was the time I was waking up with Marshall at the time, and have it come back positive so fast. Poor Chris was out of town on business and so I called him and woke him up at 4 am to tell him the news. I think we were in shock for a while , but were both so excited that Marshall would have a playmate. It was especially ironic because Chris' mom had asked us a few days before when we were going to have the next one. She always knows things before we do...

When I tried to call the doctor's office to make an appointment, the receptionist was confused as to when to put me on the schedule since it had been a year since my last period, and had to put me on hold to call the nurse. My doctor's nurse picked up the phone and said - Oh my gosh is this Jane Loomis?! - Justine loves me. :-) It was funny going into the doctor's office for the initial exam because EVERYBODY we met said "Didn't you just have a baby?!" It's especially bad when the insurance person at the end of the visit says that they just closed out our previous claim.

At our 12 week visit, our sonogramist, who is really amazing and was able to predict the timing of our second miscarriage, said "don't paint the walls pink just yet, but it looks like your having a girl." Chris and I both had feelings that we'd have a girl. If the gender is confirmed at our gender sonogram on April 21st, we will be naming our baby Chloe Jane. Chris picked out her name (as I picked out Marshall's). Also when we get confirmation, I will make her (or him) their own blog.

Week 20: Foodie

Our little foodie is getting to be a much better eater. After about a month of working on this, Marshall is finally starting to enjoy eating from a spoon.

This week he still doesn't like cereal, but he has started to enjoy taking his meal with water from a regular cup! He saw Mommy drinking from a cup and seemed interested in it, so I gave him a few sips, made a huge mess, but he was VERY determined to figure it out. From then on, whenever he would see me drinking, he would make a "Uhh" noise at me to get my attention (Chris is funny because he told Marshall to "use his words."). By the end of the week, he started to actually master drinking from the cup instead of letting it all drip out of his mouth. Since he likes to eat we decided to try letting him eat at school. Somebody is becoming a big boy!

Computer Fixed!

Okay Folks - I fixed the computer. I took it to Geek Squad last week and they said it would cost $200 to fix my virus, plus $20 to dust off my computer. What a joke. Since I have such great skills - I picked up my Spyware software at Fry's and removed it myself for under $40. Then went into the computer's registry and cleaned out the last of the virus manually. So I know I have about 4 weeks of posts to catch up on, so I should have this updated by Sunday!

Computer on the Fritz

Hi Everybody. Our computer has a bug so we can't log into it right now to update the blog. As soon as it has been fixed, I'll update the site. Marshall has developed so much over the past few weeks. I can't wait to update y'all with his accomplishments!

Week 19: Our Little Ralphie

Well we've finally gone and done it - we've made Marshall into Little Ralphie! Here are some of his Easter and St. Patrick's Day' Photos! Needless to say he does not look happy about the bunny costume...

SNOW DAY!

Marshall's First Snow Day was a top story on NBC's website! :-) Here's a print screen!
Marshall's Surprise at Seeing First Snow. Photo on the NBC website.
Meanwhile here are some notable moments of his first snow day. Well the first snow day He slept through it...

More Surprise at seeing snow (meanwhile I am not paying attention to the dogs and they are running up and down the street making yellow snow...)

Little Mini-Daddy. Both in their navy pea coats!

Wow Mommy it's cold!

Posing with Mommy on the Front Porch.

We ended up with about 5-6 inches of snow.

Week 18: Riding in Cars With Dogs

Well this was the first week that Marshall has ever been in the car with his 3 psycho pups! First he made a special trip with Molly to the Vet to get her annuals. Then he went to PetsMart to drop the Stinky & Shaggy doggies off at the groomers. Thank heaven for that.

Marshall also learned his civic duty and went with Mommy to go and vote. It was his and Mommy's first time to electronically vote. He loved looking at the screen and playing/flirting with all the old ladies at the voting place.


Speaking of electronics...no not the TV... he likes to play on the computer. One of our blogger friends has a website link on her blog - Kneebouncers.com - that we decided to try out. He had a lot of fun with it. He really went after my keyboard's spacebar.


He is very independent and is always trying to put the bottle in his mouth on his own.

He's trying to tell Daddy here that he wants to do it on his own.

The Frankenstein pose:

He also enjoys eating his bibs...