Santa. Baby.

14 December 2009

Lincoln did not much enjoy his first visit with Santa,

as you can see.

However, Linc was fascinated with Santa's beard

when he (Lincoln, not Santa) was safely in Mommy's arms.

What a great photo for future extortion!

Toys!

Lincoln LOVES the singing chair friends handed down to us:

It sings! It reads the little book! It's easy to pull up on! The different songs are so fun to dance to!

Can you tell how much he loves it?

But even more fun is a diaper box!

George stuck him in one the other day and Lincoln really liked it. Maybe we'll just go with boxes for Christmas this year. :)

Thanksgiving

Lincoln had a great time at his first Thanksgiving! We went to Aunt Carolyn's house to celebrate with family, and Linc loved everything, especially the food. Mommy, however, did not love that Lincoln wouldn't settle down to take an afternoon nap (definitely too many distractions), but he slept in the car on the way home and still went to bed fine, so it was all good.

Hope your Thanksgiving was wonderful! We are very thankful for such wonderful family and friends.

Standing up, of course:

Lincoln and cousin Seth

(apparently I need to do something about Linc's posture. No slouching!):

Lincoln playing patty-cake with Great Grandma:

Trying to eat the couch:

Great-Grandma and Lincoln:

10 months old--photos

Lincoln is 10 months old! (and has been for almost 2 weeks...I'm a bit behind)

A good shot of the mess he made on his sweater on his birthday

(and of his habit of trying to gouge his eyes out):

Unofficial 10-month stats:

21 pounds

?? inches (keep forgetting to measure him!)

Favorites at 10 months:

*Crawling SUPER FAST

*Playing peek-a-boo & hide and seek

*Pulling up to stand on everything!!

*The singing toy chair (photos to follow)

*Saying "ruff ruff" when he hears a dog bark or when we ask him,

"Lincoln, how does a dog go?" It's so exciting!

*Eating, eating, eating

*And, of course, Llama cat!

10-month dislikes:

*Not getting bites of whatever we're eating--even if he's stuffed

*Teething: Lincoln is finally cutting more teeth. The top left (not middle, but just to the side)

tooth is poking through and the opposite gum is really, really swollen.

*Waking up super early (6 AM) because gums hurt

--Oh wait, that's one of OUR dislikes!!

*Not getting the paci whenever he sees it (this is bad bad bad!)

Most of the time, Linc is a happy little guy! He has been very needy and slightly whinier of late, probably because of the pain in his gums: he always wants us to hold him, wants to suck on the paci, etc.

But I can never get enough of cuddling my little man, so it's all good!

Standing up!

Out of the blue, Lincoln has decided he likes to be on his feet!

He pulled up on the ottoman last night and I managed to get some super-fun photos:

"Aaaah! I'm on my feet!":

"Hey, where'd the newspaper go? More, please?":


Since George took the newspaper away, Lincoln went for his nose instead.
Honk!:

This really is random. I about fell over when I found Lincoln standing in the crib, crying, at 6:15 AM. He was stranded and, I think, confused about how he stood up in the first place! It was a surprise because, before yesterday, he had only pulled or pushed up on his own a few times--usually he needs our help.

He still doesn't walk very much when we hold his hands and try to get him to take steps. He mostly just falls toward us with his torso and head while his feet remain planted and looks at us like "What the heck?" I'm betting he'll start getting into it, though!

Really, though, I'm not that worried about him not wanting to walk. We can put off that day for a long while! I'm not ready for it for two reasons: one, when Lincoln is walking, he won't seem like my little baby anymore :( ; and two, I'm not ready for the whirlwind of climbing & getting into everything that I know he will be!

Meeting Uncle Chris & Aunt Katie

My big brother Chris & sister-in-law Katie came into town this weekend & met Lincoln for the first time.

Katie, Lincoln, Chris:

We had a good time! We celebrated Dad's birthday on Saturday (it's today; he's 63. Happy Birthday, Dad!) by eating at TGIFriday's and then eating chocolate pie at Dad and Mom's. Yum!

All of the "kids" pose for a picture:

George, Lincoln, me, Zack, Chris, Katie

Katie, Dad, Chris, Mom:

There was so much sibling love in the air! Just look at Chris and Zack:

You can tell they miss each other so much, can't you?

Dad opened a few of his gifts Saturday night and will open the rest today: double gift days! Lincoln got him a tie, slippers and some chocolates. Mom got him a cool soundbox (for lack of a better word) that includes a CD player, cassette player, and most importantly, a turntable:

We spent the rest of the evening going through Dad & Mom's record collection & jamming out to the sound of vinyl. They have a ton of records!!

All in all, it was a good visit, and Lincoln did great with all the fun. See you next year, Katie & Chris!

Griswold Family Halloween

Meet our little Lincoln Tiger!

As always now, it is difficult to get a good photo because little man won't sit still.

In this case, it was helpful, because I got an action shot

(albeit from far away):

Lincoln tiger on the prowl!

Here's the story of Lincoln's costume:

We have no money, so when I found the costume on eBay for $6.74 (including shipping!), I was thrilled.

The costume was marked 0-12 months, so it should have been perfect.

Except that it wasn't.

The hood was too big and everything else was too small.

We had to scrinch up his arms to get them in (which he hated), I could hardly get the leg snaps snapped, and there's no way the crotch snaps would close. No. Way!

And after we finally got him in, the elastic around the legs was so tight that I couldn't get a finger between it and his leg--so I unsnapped those, too. So Linc was mostly just in the costume from the waist up. And the hood kept falling down over his eyes, driving him crazy!

Lesson learned: Never buy costumes on eBay, or if you do, try them on your child before the big day.

Anyway, we finally got Lincoln transformed into a tiger, and we set off.

We went to John and Kristy's to say hi (thanks for the puffs & pirate duck!), and then we went to Trunk or Treat at church to say hi to Grandpa and Grandma. Thanks for the book, puffs and goodies, Gpa and ma!

Lincoln was a bit overwhelmed with everything and couldn't really figure out what was going on, but loved looking at all the people and kids dressed in crazy costumes.

We got home, handed out some candy to the last of the trick-or-treaters, and went to bed.

Then the doorbell rang at 10:35: teenage idiots trick-or-treating.

George told them to go away, and then grabbed his baseball bat (since he doesn't have a gun) and stalked around outside for a few minutes to make sure we didn't get "tricked."

Definitely a Griswold Family Halloween.

Here is Lincoln's Halloween video for your viewing enjoyment:

And here is Lincoln's "Man, I'm beat!" pose

after the craziness of his first Halloween:

PS I am REALLY irriated with Blogger for screwing up all of my carefully-inserted line breaks. Why does it shove everything together when I publish?! Anyone know how to fix this?

The park!

We took our first trip to the park last week!

Lincoln sort of loved the baby swing, at least for a few minutes:

Linc and I also went down the slide together and sat on the big swings, but as it was just the two of us, no photos of those moments.

Then, over the weekend, we went to another park with Grandpa and Grandma Mac and Uncle Z. Daddy was a kill-joy and stayed home. (shocker!)

Lincoln goes down the slide on his own (OK, with Grandpa's help) for the first time:

Playing on the bouncy horse with Mommy:

Ride 'em, cowboys!

9 months old!

Lincoln turned 9 months old on October 23!

Gone are our days of being able to get wonderful, super-cute photos of him easily. He never stays still!

Hey, look! The wall!

The "I'm a winner!" pose:

Crawl, crawl, crawl:

Linc always sits on his knees, never his butt:

Official 9-month stats:

19 lbs, 12 oz

29 inches long

Dr. Griesemer says, "He's not a fragile child." Ha!

Lincoln's favorites at 9 months:

*Crawling*

*Crawling*

*Crawling some more!*

*Crawling holding on to a toy in one hand*

*Sitting on his knees*

*Dancing & bopping*

*"Mamama," "Dadada," "Bababa"*

*Clapping hands*

*Giving fives*

*Talking, squealing, shrieking*

(this has been a favorite for a while. Apparently we have a vocal child.)

*Eating*

*Looking at people & other babies; talking to them, too*

*Llama cat*

*Peek-a-boo and hide and seek*

*Being outside!*

*Grandpa (Grandma too, but Linc loves guys)*

9-month dislikes:

*Teething*

(but still only has 2 teeth!)

*Waking at 5 or 6 AM wide awake*

(oh wait: this is one of my & George's dislikes!)

(and Linc hasn't done this since last week, so hopefully it's over for a while)

*Rousing when we put him in the crib & yelling his head off*

And: I am NOT looking forward to the time change.

Lincoln will probably wake up Sunday morning

at 6:00 AM ready to eat! (he usually eats at 7 AM)

Lincoln is such a wonderful little boy.

We are so blessed!

Cute photos of Linc--surprise, I know!

Fun photos from the last couple of months.

Linc loves to be up on his knees:

And crawl through the tunnel:

Almost doing the splits!:

Cold fall weather has started early this year, so we've switched

from baseball caps to stocking caps.
This isn't the greatest photo of Linc, but isn't he cute in his Cardinals hat?

Smiley Lincoln in his Gryffindor hat made for him by one of my friends:

Dance, Lincoln, Dance!

OK, this is from a few weeks ago, but is a great example of how much Lincoln loves to dance. The tunnel has a sensor on the inside that plays music when it's tripped; Linc couldn't get away because every time he tripped the sensor, he just had to dance!

8 months old!

Lincoln is 8 months old! (as of last Wednesday)

(Funny thing about digital cameras with a "no red-eye" setting: they don't actually get rid of the red-eye! If anything, I think, they increase it.)

Lincoln is super-smiley these days:

He LOVES Llama (poor Llama cat!):



And he LOVES to crawl:

Unofficial 8-month stats:

29" long

19.5 lbs

(based on the "weigh myself holding Lincoln, weigh myself and subtract" formula)

Oh, our baby is so much fun these days!

He eats, eats and eats some more, and, thankfully, he has been nursing much better lately too. Still only nurses a max of 8-9 minutes, but doesn't pull off and scream as much. I'm not as worried any more about not having enough milk for him, either. (which, with as much as I started out with, was something I never thought I'd have to worry about)

Lincoln's 8-month favorites:

Crawling!

Smiling, squeaking, squealing, talking nonstop (Mama, Da, Baba)

Pulling up to knees & trying to get to feet

Being chased

(he tries to crawl away but gets so tickled that he doesn't go anywhere)

"Climbing" the Boppy, Daddy and Mommy, etc.

Bopping/dancing

Crawl-through tunnel (video forthcoming!)

Eating/feeding himself finger foods, which is hysterical

Jumping in the Jumperoo

He has also done well three times now in the church nursery. YES!!

Lincoln's dislikes at 8 months:

Going to sleep: he's started this thing where he screams as soon as we put him in the crib.

It is heartbreaking to listen to him cry himself to sleep; this is the first time we've had to do it.

That's it. Linc is a happy boy!

And now, here is Lincoln showing off his mad crawling skills (our "easy" time is over!):

Lincoln's first word!

I'm counting it, anyway. :-)

When life hands you lemons

Every Labor Day weekend we go to Branson with my extended family on mom's side: Grandpa and Grandma, aunts and sometimes uncles, cousins and their kids...It's a tradition of many years and is always loads of fun. Lincoln and I went down Saturday, spent the night (he woke up about 5 times. My poor folks! We shared a room with them) and stayed through Sunday.

Anyway. George came down Sunday and we all ate great barbeque at Famous Dave's. While there, George thought it would be fun to let Lincoln suck on a lemon. To let Lincoln SUCK on a LEMON! What the heck!

I wasn't thrilled with it, but George couldn't be stopped and Lincoln--the little booger--seemed to enjoy it.

If Lincoln ends up with a citrus allergy, I'm blaming George and this lemon!

Linc's new big boy seat

Lincoln outgrew his infant car seat and is now in an actual throne of a seat. He loves it!