Mary's Birthday

I celebrated my birthday week by spending time with N and G, and by working at home on my birthday day, and having a yummy Tuesday night dinner with Shannon, Carlos, and Renata. My folks flew in on my bday and we spent the week hanging out with them, which was a wonderful visit (pixs from that visit in the next post!).

Garbiel sporting Louie's railroad hat.

Me opening my card from G (and G enjoying the envelope).

A little playtime.

G studying the block (and sharing it with N). Check out G's strawberry blond hair starting to get a little curl in the back!

Carlos, teaching Gabriel to go pbbllllttttt.

48 hours in New Jersey

I flew home to attend my 20 year high school reunion on Oct 13th. I also did some visiting, of course. I stayed with Patti, Ernie, and Louie. It is so beautiful there, and was great to have some hang time with them. I even got to see Louie's soccer game. I also visited my grandmother both days, and my folks (who then flew here on the 16th!). Here are some pics...

Louie getting ready for his soccer game.

Louie (2nd from left) and his teammates warming up.

Me with Mom & Dad. (Yes, that's what I wore to the reunion...they said "business casual".)

The two Mary Scottons. :-)

It was great to catch up with Francesca, Fiona, and Chuck (he's taking the picture) before our reunions. Then Fiona and Chuck crashed our party to visit Fiona's old gradeschool pals.

Visiting

Gabriel and Renata playing with cars.

What? Us? Time for dinner?

Bedtime ritual, reading Goodnight Gorilla.

Shout out to Auntie Bri for this Boulder, CO batik onesie.

G decided that he was done getting dressed, and tried to escape...

But instead I convinced him to pose on the chair.

Once I did get his bottom half dressed, he spent some time contemplating the Decaf coffee lid...

Until a visit from Tony! Yeah!

"Vroom! Vroom!" goes the car...

Vroom Vroom goes Gabriel!

It's much easier if you just kick back and let Tony do the work!

(belated) shout outs

A shout out to cousin Rachael, who designed this cool onesie (honoring Good Dog Luther), as well as many other very sweet onesies:



And a shout-out to Aunt Ande, who chose this cool, hip topper to match her brother Duncan's style:

He is just so darn cute!

Getting a squeeze from his Mama.

Charming the camera (and me).

Concentrating on getting his rattle, so that he can show it to Tom.

Trying to get closer (and closer and closer) to the camera.

Wondering why I'm wearing his hat.

Caught chewing on the Bjorn strap, again (who, me?).

9 months old!

Omigoodness! I've been out as long as I was in! 9 months has gone by so fast. I hardly remember not being able to crawl, or eat solid food, or bang my toys together. My favorite thing right now is the camera. I'm a total poser! :-) Check me out...

p.s. for those of you plotting on your percentile charts at home, Gabriel now weighs 18 lbs and is 28.5 inches tall. 50th percentile in height, 15th in weight. We had our well-baby visit last week and the Dr. says he's looking great and everything is going along well. She swears that he will, eventually, get teeth (there are no recorded cases of children NOT getting teeth, it seems).

What else?

Well, when not sleeping, of course, then, there's ...

eating...

working...

and eating some more...

What's Been Going On?

Well, this has been a challenging week -- we started a rigorous sleep training routine (to train us, not him). It was very hard at first, and we slept even less, but it seems to be going well, and I slept for four straight hours last night (and then another two, and another two, so that's 8 all together!).
Alas, I haven't posted in a while, so here are some pixs and what else has been going on (no photos of us not sleeping...). ;-)

G has discovered the inside of his "toybox".

And loves to chew on this wooden toy (not made with lead paint).

Last weekend I went up to Arcata to visit with Bailey. She is modeling with the sunflowers we got at the market, from a man riding on a carraige, being pulled by a horse.

A nice man in the pizza place offered to take our picture (good help is hard to find!).

Another nice man on the plaza offered to take our picture, this came out a little better (no pun intended, but it was Humbolt Pride Day). ;-)