Josh Finally Meets His Uncle Chris!

Chris is home!!!! Josh was born when Greg's brother was on a mission in Idaho. He came home last night. Josh just kept staring like "who is this guy?"

Everyone is so happy to have him home!!! It's been a long, but fast two years!

Surprisingly Good Photo Session!

Even though Josh had a big red bump on his head the day we went to get his Christmas Portraits taken, it went rather well. We had a great woman who made him laugh and got tons of good pictures. The problem with this is I liked more than one so I wanted to order more than one pose! I'm sure everyone knows that's how they get you. The cheap packages only allow you to get one pose for all the pics in the package. How sad!!!! I wanted to order lots and lots of my cute little guy.

Want to check them out????

Here they are:

Josh Christmas Pictures

Just put in my name as the customer name and you can check them out!

You have to do this...

Okay, so you know those lame commercials that Brooke Shields has been doing, well the the VW website has a place where you can input a picture of the "mom" and "dad" and "make a baby." This is so funny. I'm so so glad that our REAL baby is much much cuter than this scary dude!!! Everyone has to do this. Go to www.vw.com and go to "RoutanBabymaker3000"!

These are the pics I used and this is what transpired...

Check it out:

Scary Harry Born on November 29, 2008 at 10:01 p.m. 6 pounds 15 ounces, 21.2 inches Proud Parents: Greg and Kristin

Private Reading Area...

Sometimes Josh really does something that makes me stop and say, what the heck is he doing???

All this week he has found a new place to do his reading. All his books usually reside in this canvas tote. Well, he decided to one by one empty out the tote, climb inside then start pulling books back in with him to "read." Once he has brought enough books back in the tote with him, he then repeats said process by getting out and one by one emptying it back out then getting back in to repeat the process all over again.

All I can say is, it is hilarious!!!!

Happy Belated Halloween!

Josh loved pulling the insides out of the pumpkin! He even tried the seeds.
We made a bat to go with his vampire costume!

Boo at the Zoo was great! We road the train and looked at all the creepy things they have set up. Josh really seemed to like it all.

Josh's first official Trick or Treat at a friend's house.
All he did that night was take the stuff out of his bucket and try to share it. What a giver!

Here is a good view of his costume. He's even flaring his cape.
He was a cute little vampire. Everyone loved his costume. It was such a big hit.
I love Halloween. I'm so glad we got to do so many activities. Last year he just chilled in his car seat as a pumpkin. This year I had to run to keep up. What a blast!

How thin is the veil for our little ones???

So I have this magnet on the fridge. It's from one of those RS handouts...

Anyway, I have shown Josh a picture of Christ before and told him it was "Jesus", but never this picture. So yesterday I was holding him while getting something out of the fridge.

He said "Jesus" plain as day and when I looked up he was pointing at that picture on the fridge. Wow! Was all I could think or say b/c he doesn't say much. His vocabulary usually consists of "dada" "no no no no no", or "dog". I mean, I think he's trying to say other things sometimes like "ball" but it really doesn't sound like "ball". He will occasionally and I mean occasionally say "mamma" or "nanna". But that's it. So I was really like WOW!!!

So really, how thin is the veil for the little ones that have just left Heavenly Father's presence? How much do they really remember?????? Oh to be able to take a peek at how they view the world right now...

Like Father, Like Son!

A young Dave Matthews' fan:






So Josh doesn't watch any tv. He will occasionally look at sports or music and sometimes he will watch for a minute if I put Sesame Street or something on, but not much at all. Well, Greg was watching a Dave Matthews concert last night that he had recorded and Josh just kept watching with him. He moved around a few times, but still, it was the most tv he's ever watched. It was crazy. It looks like I'll have two Dave fanatics on my hands!! Oh joy!

Self feeding...finally!

So I'm sure he's behind on this, but I'm not in the habit of pushing anything. My philosophy...when he's ready, he's ready. Ha. By this, he'll probably still be in diapers when he's a Sunbeam!!!!

Anyway, the other day he took the spoon from me and started feeding himself spaghetti. What could I do but grab the camera!?!?!

So he does it sometimes. I'm still not pushing. I'm just not ready to clean applesauce off the ceiling! But I did get these great new bibs that are hard rubbery plastic that really catch all that he spills.

The Little Things in Life

Wow. I never knew I could get so excited about such a little thing. Grocery shopping is usually okay with Josh, at least until the buggy gets full, then he starts throwing stuff out. It's cute, but gets a little annoying.

Well, we went to Publix yesterday. They had their kids buggies right out front. I had never seen them before, but I'm glad I found them now. Josh really doesn't like regular buggies because he faces backwards, but this thing is so awesome!!!

He was "driving" his little car all around and making car noises. It was so great. I only went for milk but ended up staying for a while just to let him have some fun. He did not want to get out when it was time to go.

General Conference

So the good news about General Conference is that Josh loved the singing. Weren't the Primary kids great???? (I am biased since that is my calling, but I just love to hear them sing!)

Anyway, Josh has been doing a little better about not messing with the tv or any other buttons on the electronics. But not during GC. He kept turining the volume knob all the way up and all the way down, etc. When I would try to go get him from that area, he would laugh and run away...as cute as he is, I was getting frustrated trying to watch and that is the last thing I needed to be when trying to watch conference. Sooooooo, I put good use to the play yard some family members of ours bought us. It worked great!!! It looks pretty funny with our tv "caged" in, but it did the trick. Poor Josh just had to stand there staring in at all the buttons he couldn't get to.

New York Trip

Sorry, I have to back track again. Our trip to New York was a lot of fun. We went to see an old friend of mine that had a baby girl right before Josh was born.

Even the plane ride wasn't all that bad. Josh won the hearts of all the passengers because he is so cute and never cried.

Niagra Falls was one of the best parts. If you go somewhere like this, you just have to share!!!!

King of the Couch

Josh climbed the "mountain." In other words, he won't stop climbing on furniture. The passed few weeks he has been obsessed with going up and down, up and down.

Well the down thing is a little bit iffy. He's good at up, but if he goes "down" by himself it's usually a big crash followed by lots of crying.

Play Group

Josh and Josh are playing on the teeter-totter!

It's the coolest one I've ever seen. I know it's sad that I'm excited about such a thing, but it was so neat. One to four kids could ride it and all you have to do is bounce it.

Up to no good...

I know he knows better. His faces tell me so. Like when he starts to run really fast toward the tv he starts to laugh and gets this cute little look on his face. He KNOWS he is not supposed to do certain things, but it never stops him.

The other day we had some family here and so he was running around free. For some reason he kept trying to run up the stairs instead of staying downstairs with us. So I started sitting there. But then when I would get up to chase him, he would circle around and dart for the stairs again. So then I started to just stay put. Well he is sooooo smart. I couldn't help but laugh even though it just encourages him more! So he would run over to me then run off thinking I would run after him. Then he would peek back around the corner to see if I was still there. When he saw me still sitting there he laughed so hard that it made me laugh so hard.

Being a mom is the BEST!!!!!

So this is the face that he usually makes when he is up to no good!

Which brings us to...

...yesterday. Hopefully this will be it for back tracking. Don't get me wrong. I would love to spend hours going through old pictures. But it makes me so sad. He has changed so much in so little time.



As soon as he was able to grab and pull his foot in his mouth, he started chewing on his toes. He did it for a long time then stopped. Well, he has picked it up again. Weird b/c it has to hurt now that he has a lot of teeth, but oh well. I tried to catch him in the act. This was yesterday when we were out and about at some yard sales.

Side note: He LOVES to be able to look around and see things now that he is in his front-facing car seat.

ROLL TIDE!!!!

Josh's first AL game. Not that Tulane was a great debut, but you take what you can get!

Overall, it was fun!




Daddy's old band.



Mommy's all red from the hike up to the nose bleeds.




I love the shaker!!! Roooooooooooooooolllllllllllll Tide, Roll!

Aren't I cute in my little jersey?

Thank goodness we had very understanding people in front of us. Josh kicked them, threw the shaker at them a few times and then his sippy cup. It was definitely an experience. (I was like, What? There is a football game going on?)




Love my daddy...



The "ride" home.

Man of Many Hats, Literally

He used to not mind hats, but now he hates them. Some times he will keep them on if you can make him forget about it, but it doesn't last long.

He is so cute in hats. I wish he would. I still keep trying.





First hat. Still in the hospital.



Great-grandma bought him a Santa suite.



Check out those chubby cheeks. He looks so different now!



Beach baby...beach baby...you get the idea...



Stealing Uncle Ray's hat.



Roll tide!



Yes, this is a woman's hat. I couldn't resist. How cute is he?!? I love to put hats on him in the store. This one is in Target, the Al one above is in Steve and Barry's.



One of Uncle Matt's hats during a diaper change!



Al visor from Nanna. Trying out something different. But he won't leave it on either.



His newest hat from some lady friends (he has a lot of them).

His hair is getting so long now. It's curling here under the hat. Even after his bath, as soon as it dries it's back to the curls.

Oil Change

So if anyone has an active little guy like mine, you will understand what a blessing it is to have something like this available. We had to wait 30 minutes for an oil change. Josh can't sit still on my lap for 3 minutes, let alone 30. So I was so excited when we walked into the waiting room at the oil change place and they had toys, etc. waiting for him to play with. And yes, he ran around the whole time and never sat still. Plus I had a coupon for a free oil change. What a great day!




They even had a play house!



Funny story, the girl told me when we were checking out that she had a mom in there one time that tried to buy a toy because her son was freaking out when she tried to make him put it down, but when she told her no the mom threw some money at her and ran out the door. Wow. Crazy people!

Grandpa's little buddy...

Okay, today I'm going to make a bunch of posts just to get caught up with all the pictures I want to show off. Plus, Greg is watching football so I need something to do while Josh is asleep. So here goes it...

My dad sent me some pictures today, I will start with those.




Grandpa with Josh, Hayleigh and Jordan (my brother's two kids).



Lots of laughs!



Grandpa's little buddy!



He LOVES swinging. This is at my dad's house.

I swore I never would....

I swore I never would create a blog. Well, here goes it. I realized that I rather enjoy seeing pictures of my friends and their babies that live far, far away from me. So, I'm doing the same for all those out there that don't get to see my baby boy growing up. He just celebrated his first birthday, so I guess I'm a little behind...

And for all those that say we need to get busy having another baby (not that it would be anyone even reading this), that is why it's JUST THE THREE OF US. For now, I love just spending time with Josh. We need time alone. A LOT of time!

To get you started, here are a few pictures from his birthday...



The Ball Pit was my childhood favorite so of course I had to make one for him! Even the adults loved it (but I won't name names).



Opening presents. The paper was the best part! It was a football theme. You can sort of see his cute little football jersey in this picture. (And of course football was on in the background.)



No cake made it to his mouth. He just kept smearing frosting everywhere.