A day trip to Austin, TX

We took Matthew to the Children's Museum in Austin, TX today and he had a blast! We met up with my cousin, Shele', her husband, Bobby, and their sweet son, Blaze (he's a year old). Matthew loved spending time with his cousin and experiencing all the neat gadgets at the museum. Afterwards, we went to Matt's Famous El Rancho for a yummy lunch! It was great to spend the day with family and Matthew and Blaze had a chance to prove just how smart they are at such a young age!

8 Months Old

Our sweet little Matthew is 8 months old today and I honestly don't know where the time has gone. He's growing by leaps and bounds and his little personality is really starting to shine! He's just precious and I feel so blessed to have such a sweet little boy!

As the weeks pass, Matthew gets more and more ready to crawl. He's up on his hands and knees and can rock back and forth -- it's going to happen soon and then our world as we know it will change completely! He still loves to play in his exersaucer play gym and loves his "tummy time" on the floor. We are fortunate to have such a happy baby. Every time we go out to run errands, Matthew is very popular and gets lots of attention. The little ladies we see in the grocery store just love his red hair and his dimples! We have also joined a few playgroups and enjoy spending time with other children and their Mommmy's. It helps for me to have some adult interaction and Matthew loves watching the other kids. It will be so much fun for him when he can move around and actually "play" with others. The ladies in the nursery at church always comment that Matthew is a happy boy and this past Sunday they were laughing because when Ryan went to pick him up, he was smiling at one of the other little girls! Looks like he's already flirting at the young age of 8 months!

Since Matthew seems to change on weekly basis, we've taken quite a bit of videos lately to keep up with what he's doing. Sadly, I haven't done a good job of posting them regularly so I've posted a few below and will post more in the next few days.

This is one that we took back in July that I could watch over and over again... Ryan was throwing the ball to Matthew and he thought it was so funny. He kept giggling and it was too cute so we had to capture it on camera!

This was also from back in July - Ryan got this on video one Saturday morning. Too cute!

Here is a preview of Matthew's attempt to crawl. He's a strong boy despite his chunky little legs!

We are so blessed with such a beautiful baby boy!!

7 Months Old

Matthew turned 7 months old last Friday, July 24 and Ryan and I still can't believe how fast the time is flying. We love watching Matthew grow right before our eyes and he looks more and more like a "little boy" every day. We've had a fun month and since I haven't made any posts recently, I'll do my best to recap what's been going on with our family....

Matthew had his 6 month babywell check-up at the end of June and is a "healthy boy" weighing in at 21 lbs. 4 oz.! He's almost tripled his weight in 6 months since he was 7 lbs. 4 oz. when he was born. It's a miracle that he can grow like that from just breastfeeding...God truly is amazing! We had to buy a new car seat for Matthew because his "baby" seat only goes to 22 lbs. (which we thought would last us at least a year when we purchased it!). At least we'll have a baby car seat ready when we decide to have baby #2. So, Matthew has officially advanced to a toddler car seat.

Aunt Sissy (aka: my sister, Anna) came for a week to visit at the beginning of July and we had a wonderful time! She was a huge help by cooking dinner every night and playing with Matthew so Ryan and I could get some extra sleep. It was such a blessing to have some quality time with my sister. It's tough to live so far away so every little bit of time we get with family is important and needed. Here are a few of my favorite photos from Aunt Sissy's visit.

Snuggling on the couch before bedtime...

Playing with hats during our shopping trip to the outlets...

Watching the airplanes fly over the house...

We're also enjoying trying new foods with Matthew. I've uploaded Matthew's 1st Taste of Peas video and here is the link to watch it (it was too big to post on the blog) --

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=siXv0NGEeNk Since his first hilarious taste of peas, he now seems to really enjoy eating peas and other fruits and vegetables. He's a good eater and so far has tried peas, carrots, sweet potatoes, prunes, apples, and pears.

Matthew's latest tricks include: roaring like a dinosaur (I'll be sure to post a video for you to hear - it's too funny!), giggling, playing and rolling all over the floor, looking at and eating his books, sitting up, and he just started babbling "ma-ma-ma-ma" - I love it! We're working on "da-da" but haven't mastered that sound just yet.

Enjoy the video of Matthew eating his peas. Here are a few more photos of our family from July. Hope you enjoy!

July 4th Holiday weekend

Ryan, Matthew and I enjoyed a nice relaxing (and uneventful) July 4th weekend. It was great to have some quiet time as a family and to spend quality time together playing with Matthew. He's changing so much each day, that it's hard to capture all of his new "tricks" on camera.

His tricks lately have consisted of: sitting up on his own, transferring toys from one hand to the other and banging them on anything he can to make noise, playing with his beach balls that Poppy (my Dad) brought to him in during their visit in May, making lots of new sounds and squealing and yelling as he plays (he definitely has my loud voice!). He's rolling all over the place and is starting to push up his torso with his arms, so he may be on his way to crawling within the next few months.

We started solid foods about a month ago. He first ate rice cereal and had no problems. After the doctor cleared us to start other foods, we decided to begin with peas! I got it all on video, but it's not downloading to the blog since it's a large file so I'm working on ways to share it with everyone. It's priceless -- Matthew's facial expressions when he tried the peas for the first time were hilarious! He kept opening his mouth for more, so I kept giving it to him and he would pucker his face and even gag a little but he managed to swallow every bite and never spit it back out. Now that he's been eating them for about a week, he has actually grown to enjoy peas. Next food....carrots!

I've posted a few pictures below from our July 4th holiday. Grandma (Ryan's Mom) sent him a cute outfit that was perfect for the occasion. Ryan and Matthew even sat down and read the "Declaration of Independence" -- We're proud to be American's and so proud of Ryan's service in our military! Thank you to all the military families out there that sacrifice for our country's freedom!

Splish Splash

Matthew loves taking baths. We're still using the baby tub that sits in the sink (although we're realizing that we're going to have to graduate to the larger tub soon...). Ever since Matthew was born, he has loved bath time. Here's a little video to prove it...enjoy!

I'm a happy boy!

Here's another cute video of Matthew riding around on Ryan's shoulders. I'll post more updates on his latest "tricks" this weekend. Enjoy the video!

Matthew is 5 months old!

Matthew is 5 months old today and is cuter than ever!!

I've been rather slack with my blog posts lately, but it's not because there are a lack of things to share about sweet Matthew...I've just been busy keeping him entertained and haven't made time to write. I try to make up for the lack of blogging about Matthew's life by taking lots of additional photos (we average about 200 a month!). He's growing by leaps and bounds and has new "tricks" (as my Dad likes to call them) that he performs each week. Lately, he's found that he can twist his little body around and roll over from his back to his tummy....and this is a pretty good "trick" considering that his thighs are so chunky that it's a mini-workout for him to lift and roll them! He's laughing and giggling more and more, and really loves exploring the toys on his exersaucer (a "jungle gym" for babies that was a gift from my college roomie, Jill). Here's a picture of him in action in his exersaucer...



His other new favorite thing to do is to sit on Daddy's shoulders and ride in his Baby Bijorn. I think it's because it's a new "view". Last night he was riding around on Ryan's shoulders and was literally "eating" his hair! Here is a video...it's too cute!

It's been a fantastic 5 months with my little munchkin. I love him more and more every day!