Wing Man

Brooke makes a pretty good little wing man on our long car rides. Even when she's not sleeping, she does a nice job of entertaining herself - or letting Ozzie entertain her. Typically when Ozzie's in the backseat with her, he lays down out of sight and when he pops up to look out the window, it cracks her up!


When I headed back to St. Louis with my parents awhile back, I got to sit next to her and do the entertaining.


She ended the ride happy, but not the most well-rested she's ever been. I'm trying to savor these days when I don't have to pull out all the stops for car ride entertainment!

3/4 of a Year

Brooke turned 9 months old yesterday. We spent a large portion of the day playing with Ozzie. They're definitely interacting more lately. I think it's a combination of her being able to do more (like grab his tail and fur, which doesn't seem to bother him at all) and his realizing that A) she's going to be around for awhile, B) she's a source of increasingly desirable food and C) when he's nice to her, we're nicer to him. Whatever the reason, it's fun to see.

Here are Brooke's 9 month stats:
Weight - 16 lb, 15 oz; 18%
Height - 27 1/2 in; 49%

And her head circumference was in the 81st percentile. I've joked enough about the size of her head, so I'll just leave it alone this time. I don't want to give her another reason to be mad at me when she goes back and reads these when she's a teenager.


What can I say about Brookester at nine months old? She continues to be such a sweetheart. It seems like she's getting more and more easygoing. This could also be that I'm getting more comfortable with her and getting to know her better, but she really is a pretty chill baby. She's still quite the "talker" and she loves to laugh. She's still sleeping well and eats anything we give her. She's great a finger foods and I must say that her fine motor skills are pretty impressive. She's seems to be very observant and loves older kids, especially girls.

She's able to stand when we give her something to brace herself on, like her crib railing or the ottoman. I guess you could say that technically she's mobile. She's great at rotating in a circle and is now moving backward. She can't seem to get forward movement, but I'm much more frustrated about that than she is. She'll just find something else to interest her. She continues to love to cuddle and read. Her current favorite book is one with a bunch of pictures of real babies in it. She really gets a kick out of it!

This photo wasn't taken right after she was crying - her right eye still has a blocked tear duct.

We continue to thank God every day for the blessing of getting to be her parents, and pray for wisdom as she grows.


Here's a video of us playing with Oz. If you look closely, you can see her two teeth on her bottom gum. I've had a hard time getting a photo of it because she always sticks her tongue out when she smiles.

Sundays

We're so excited that our church is now in it's permanent location and we're able to meet on Sunday mornings (we were using another church's building and meeting at 4 pm); however, church now falls smack in the middle of Brooke's morning nap. This means that on Sundays her morning nap consists of any sleeping she does on the way to church (she usually falls asleep about 10 minutes before we pull into the parking lot).

She's been a trooper the last few weeks, even hanging in there for lunch plans afterward, but she usually crashes into a monster afternoon nap. These are some pictures I took this afternoon when we were visiting with Michelle while Matt and Jeff did some "very important work" for WMOY. She was still pretty happy, but you can tell her eyelids were getting a little heavy. What a sweetie!

For Your Viewing Pleasure

Every once in awhile, I feel really inspired about a blog post. This is one of those times.

Next weekend is the Second Annual Wheaton Man of the Year (WMOY) competition. There is no website or Facebook page for WMOY, so I'll do my best to explain it concisely. WMOY is basically a bunch of events that Matt and his friends spend lots of (too much, some may say) time planning and organizing for that culminates in a weekend of sportsmanship and fun. Events this year include: punt, pass and kick, home run derby, ping pong, the highly athletic beer pong, tennis, three-point shooting, bags, golf, free kicks, and a car pull. The prize is your name on a trophy and bragging rights for a year (holla, Mike Alley!).


We were over at Jeff and Michelle's today and the guys decided to practice the car pull. Pardon the shaky camera work, but I was laughing pretty hard. Enjoy.

Guys, good luck next weekend. Have fun and please don't hurt yourselves!

*To clarify: I was inspired by wanting to post this video of Matt, NOT by WMOY.*

Who Knew?

Brooke's made some fun discoveries lately, including mustaches...


The Girl also really likes her bling. If you're wearing jewelry around her, look out. She also took the walker for a spin...


I thought they stopped making walkers, but it turns out they still do. Just like the exersaucer, Brooke was MUCH more interested in manipulating the control panel than she was doing much moving, but we did get some backward movement. I'm looking into getting one for our house.

Oh, Babies!

Brooke and Lexi were able to spend a lot of time together last weekend, and Lexi took her role as older cousin seriously.


She "helped" Brooke in the walker.

She also decided that she wanted to feed Brooke during their "picnic" yesterday. She kept clanging the spoon around in the empty baby food jar and Brooke was happy to oblige.

They did this for about 5 minutes. It was really cute.


We also got to spend some time visiting with Amy and Mati. Mati is all over the place these days, but she was kind enough to sit still for a few pictures.


Clearly, it's time for Amy to cool it with the "Twilight" stuff at home.

Lexi's cousin on Krissi's side, Kennedi, was also at her birthday party. Kennedi is also a couple of months older than Brooke and on the go, but that didn't stop us from trying to get a few photos of the girls.


The ONE time Brooke won't look at the camera!


Mati was really freaked out by the electronic dog, so naturally, we got a photo of it before pulling the dog away from her.

Little Miss Lexi

Our niece, Alexis, turned two on Saturday. It seems like just yesterday we were rushing down from Chicago because Krissi was being induced, only to wait...and wait...and wait until almost 2 am for her to arrive.


I've tried to live up to my duty as her only aunt to spoil her thoroughly. We took her to Build-a-Bear on Saturday. She was a little overwhelmed and honestly probably a little too young to fully "get it", but we all had fun nonetheless. I didn't get any good shots of her face because she was busy looking at her bunny that she named "Jaimie" (not to be confused with her new fish that she named "Poop").




On Sunday, Lexi had her birthday party. She was dressed as a princess, naturally. She led us all in singing "Happy Birthday" to her. She's always on the go, so these were the best shots I could get of her.



That evening, she took her new bike for a spin. Like everything else, she picked up on it quickly.

She wore that helmet around the house for over an hour on Tuesday. Hilarious! I wish I had gotten a photo of it.

A few more shots of her, just 'cause she's so cute!


We love you very much, Miss Alexis!!!