Thanksgiving

Ben is back in business, after a week long stomach virus, and we had a good ole time at Grammie and Grandpa's house for Thanksgiving. When Ben is sick and then rebounds, I always forget how funny and what a happy baby he is. Cruising the store at Walmart last night, Ben is sitting in the cart, lifts his right leg up and toots!! Hilarious and he did it twice - thats my stinker! I'm thankful this Thanksgiving for Ben getting back to his usual Stinkerboodle self, my hubbie for doing things he never thought were possible, my family and my fun surprise visit from Gesell! She actually surprised me, which is hard to pull off, I am too sneaky to surprise but she totally got me. It was a short visit, but Ben loved seeing his Aunt Allyson!

For real Uncle Nathan?!?!

Carrying his pansie... loves his flowers

Reading with Grammie Thxsgiving night

How can you resist this face?!!? Love you Ben!

Love you Coneflower

My mom took Ben out to the backyard on Monday and he found himself a new buddy - a pink coneflower. From what Grammie said and as you can see in the pictures, Ben was quite attached to this flower. Once they came inside, he made his way to the bathroom, said his goodbyes and threw the flower in the toilet!! Love my boy!

Happy Birthday Daaaa-De

Happy 29th Birthday to my most perfect adoring husband!!!! I had these fantastic plans for today for the best 29th birthday for John.... why I thought these plans would go through with without a hitch with a 13 month old, I don't know! I've learned to just let it roll on days home with Ben, can't plan ahead cause it nevers works out :) With that said, John and I did make it to our spa hour - John got an hour massage and I got a spa pedicure. Very nice and relaxing and then it was back to daycare to pick up the coughing, snotty nose, teething, scraped and bruised up Stinker. Our afternoon/evening plans will be a 50% completion - dinner at Mahogany steakhouse. The other plan, family photos which is our 4th attempt, is a no-go. I swear, Ben knows photos are coming and bangs his head on whatever he can find. At 7:30 this morning, we leave the room for 2 seconds and he knocks his cheek on a copper tub we have..... a purple/blue bruise was the result. Aarrrggg. I give up on family photos. I'm not doing a family Christmas card with a child that looks I like I have beat him up. Make up wouldn't even hide his bruise and scrape.

Happy Birthday to the best ddaaa-de and husband anyone could ask for!

Love to sit on da-de's shoulder

My boys!

You can see the new war wound on the cheek.

Giggle Box

Ben was all giggles while eating his snack of apples, cheese, and squash.... I was only slightly tickling his toes :) At the very end you can see his version of a kiss, a big wide open mouth. That kiss will come out every now and then. Who doesn't love a kiss from an open mouth full of toofers!! He is our silly string bean!

On the feet!

Ben is now officially, 100%, a walker! I know before I said he was walking, but after 1 week it has gone from a few steps to Mr. Independent Walker. After 3 months of crawling, he has finally made the jump to standing up and going. And he is going, going and going. Tonight he was even attempting to try out some running....that was ending in a face plant into our new plush CLEAN carpet :) It is strange to see him coming around the corner and there pops in our little man walking! What's even better, is he looks like a drunk man when working on his walking skills. Also he likes to clinch his right hand into a fist and hold it up, sometimes even shrugging his shoulders when walking. My lil stinkers smart ways of helping his balance :)

No real words from him yet... he did bring back his "little girl" most high pitch scream tonight. I was out cooking chicken on the grill, the back door was shut and I STILL heard it. He wanted more cereal, he was just letting John now.