Air show

Saturday we went to the Hillsboro airshow with Uncle Stevie and Aunt Bethany. It was quite a day! Nathaniel seemed somewhat interested in the planes, but more interested in the people and the surroundings. The Thunderbirds were a little too loud for Nathaniel but Ken and I were fascinated by them.

SIL Birthday Party

Birthday season is approaching :-) Mine is in Sept, Amy's in Oct and Bethany's in Nov. Since Amy is in town we thought we would have a sis-in-law birthday party... Friday night we headed downtown to get pedicures. It was a little stressful getting down to the 23rd area and finding parking but we all made it close to 6pm. We had a wonderful time together and enjoyed the back massaging chairs we got to sit in. Then off to dinner. We walked a few blocks to Urban Fondue. I've never been to a fondue restaurant and thought it might be fun... and it was! We ordered dinner for two which was the perfect amount of food for us. We started with cheese fondue (bread and sausage to dip in) and then had two plates of meat and veggies to dip into a broth. We had little timers to tell us how long our meat/beef/seafood had been in the broth to make sure it was cooked to perfection. And there were 7 dipping sauces for us to try ... all of them were excellent. The final course was dessert.... a tray of cheesecake, cookie dough, and fresh fruit to dip into chocolate! MMMMMMMMMMmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. It was fabulous! I loved my birthday party!!!! I loved spending time with these terrific women that are now Tuttles :-) Sometimes I wonder what it would have been like to have a sister. Maybe not having one makes Sis-in-laws that much better.

PS. I forgot my camera... so Amy needs to send me a picture to post.

75 pounds of Peaches

Okay so I bit off a little more than I could chew. Nathaniel and I went to Jossy farms out in North Plains and picked peaches last week. It was delightful. Nathaniel had fun too. I had him in the front pack for awhile but then it seemed a bit dangerous as we ducked under branches to get the perfect peach.... so he had to sit in the car seat and just watch mom pick the peaches. It was a beautiful day.



We brought home the peaches and I got out the canning supplies. It quickly became apparent that 75 pounds was a little too many. I thought maybe I could can them all while Nathaniel was sleeping... but he didn't plan a nap into his day and every time I tried to put him down he would cry and cry "I'm not tired mom!". Ahhhh. Thankfully my friend Steph stopped by for a visit and was able to assist. I couldn't have finished without her!

Next time I need to remember only get 30 pounds of peaches.

Garden

Loving the cherry tomatoes! What a yummy snack! Every other day we pick at least one big bowl full. It's been hard to keep up with them. Next year we will need to plant regular size tomatoes too.

Random

I got this in the mail... I'm certain it was mailed to the wrong house. Mom's been out of town, Micah and the boys are holding down their fort, Jeremy is in the middle of a move... They must be reffering to Stevie and Bethany's house :-)

Zoo Fun

Monday we went to the zoo with Amy and the girls. It was lots of fun. Wish they could stay with us longer.

Waiting for the "Birds Of Prey" show to start


Bria on a horse.


The craziest exhibit we saw... Bria

First Solid Food

At 6 1/2 months we finally let Nathaniel try his first "solid" food... rice cereal. Mmmmm. He made a few Mr. Yuck faces at first but warmed up to the idea after a while. Dinner will now take twice as long and will need to be followed up with a bath. What a mess!

Little Miss Mya

Amy's here!!!!

Hooray! Amy and the girls arrived on Friday afternoon from a very long trip up from Peru. We are so excited they are up for a visit. Saturday the family came over for strawberry shortcake. Uncle Ken asked Bria if she wanted to go to the Pirate Park down the street. She wasn't quite sure about the pirate thing... I think we should have said it was a Princess Park. None the less we went for a walk and fun was had by all. Swings, slides, bridges and yes a pirate mast which was the only sign of Pirates.

First Plane flight and First Wedding

I think we can say we are fully recovered now from our trip to the Midwest. My only complaint is that we gave Nathaniel his 6 month shots on the Tuesday before we left and so he was a bit under the weather for the flights. Even so, Nathaniel did really well on the plane flights... slept through most of them and we didn't have any blowouts to deal with. The wedding was fun too. These Midwesterners sure know how to party! He did have a blowout on dad at the wedding so we had to change into more casual clothes for the reception. Oh well. We tried to keep Nathaniel on Portland time which was actually harder than I thought. Sleeping in a different place kind of threw him off. But he acclimated back to Portland schedule fairly quickly this week.

This was the best trip for me.... I loved seeing family and being able to relax. I loved eating fresh corn from the farm, playing croquet and RISK and Settlers, getting my $1 15 minute back/foot massage from my cousins, seeing Grandma, eating, eating, eating. Its fun to see how my cousins have changed and grown over the years. I remember all my cousins when they were little babies (I think I was 6 when the first one was born) and now we have a baby of our own. Crazy how time flies! Nathaniel got to spend some quality time with his extended family and it also gave Ken and I a little rest. We stayed at Uncle Paul's house and I must say Anita did a fabulous job of taking care of us (plus the other ~20 guests). These four days went by way too fast. I wish we could be closer and visit more often.

Family Picture

4 Generations

Nathaniel, Me, My Mom and My Grandma

Picnic with Aunt Bethany and Uncle Stevie

We joined Stevie and Beth downtown a few weeks ago for a little picnic on the waterfront. One of the benefits of living downtown :-)

6 month picture

Off to South Dakota!

See you guys soon! I've spent the last two days packing and re-packing. I think I have everything but the kitchen sink :-)

Nathaniel had his 6 month appointment yesterday. He's 16 pounds 6 oz! Hefty boy! He got his shots and has been miserable all day. Praying he is happy tomorrow! We will be off to the airport at 4am!

A New Bed

We have finally grown out of the Pack N Play Bassinet and now have a real crib. Nathaniel looks pretty excited about it. If you look closely you can see his two little teeth on the bottom there.

6 Months old

Nathaniel turned 6 months this week. Wow! He is growing so fast! And now for a little reflection from mom.... It's amazing to think about all the hurdles we have been over in this short period of time. I remember the challenges with nursing at the very beginning... wondering if we would ever make it to the 6 month mark which is the minimum recommendation for breastfeeding if you can (1 year is the full recommendation). Now it seems much more natural. I used to have to set up my "station" before the feeding began, complete with pillows both for me and Nate, a big glass of water and a burp rag. While those things are all still helpful I often just sit down and feed him without them. At the beginning I thought it would have been helpful to grow and extra set of hands during pregnancy... hey why not, my belly was growing! Now I'm amazed that I can strap Nathaniel in his car seat with one hand if needed and I can go from sitting Indian style to standing without using my hands! Ohh and the sleepless nights. Wondering if this dear child will ever let me sleep more than 3 hours in a row.... it's taken 5.5 months but we are up to 5 hours, sometimes 8! When we first brought Nathaniel home with us we had him sleeping at a cradle at the base of our bed. I would wake up in the middle of the night and start patting the bed around us and ask Ken where the baby was. His answer was a sleepy... I don't know honey, where did you put him? Every single time he was in the cradle right where I put him. Sometimes I will wake up now and Ken looks like he is cradling a baby (it's a pillow) but I'll pat all around and make sure it's not Nathaniel. Am I crazy? We've also become much more proficient at diaper changes (as my sis-in-law Amy would be happy to know!). The first few weeks I was constantly getting pooped on during the changes... I naively thought that if a diaper was off, no pooping was allowed. Hmmm... Nathaniel and I have worked through it and now it's a rare occurrence. I remember first putting on his little outfits over his head... it would take 15 minutes to get Nathaniel dressed. Ken and I were being so careful with his delicate little head and body. Now we can do a change in 2 minutes although I still see a little panic in Nathaniel's eyes when Daddy is doing the change and leaves the eyes covered for a few seconds. Nathaniel has always been smiley but over the last few months it's been fun to have found what makes him laugh. Our little boy is getting so big, we asked him today to not grow up too fast.

Garden Growth

Our garden seems to have exploded with the hot weather last week. The sun scorched a few of our plants so my beans look done and the zucchini is slowly fading :-( I haven't had my full of zucchini yet. The tomatoes are still going strong... mostly cherry size.


And our pumpkin is already orange and almost ready for carving! I wonder if it will last till October?

Fussy-ness!!!

Apparently there is a reason to the fussiness! We have another tooth! If only I could get a picture of this teeth grin.

Graduation Day

I can't believe it's here already. We officially graduated from the New Moms Group today (Nathaniel turns 6 months old this week). I actually looked for a graduation cap but couldn't find one... if only I had thought of it in June. So I made a little cap out of a key chain tassle from Ken's high school graduation.




It was hard to imagine ever making it to 6 months with all those sleepless nights but we are here. And we actually feel like we've learned a thing or two along the way and made some good friends.

Bathtime Fun

Big Week for Nathaniel

First Tooth! Yikes! I felt something sharp in his mouth on Thursday and sure enough its a tooth! You can see it when he's smiling but if you try and look for it he thinks your playing a game and sticks out his tongue. My little baby is growing up.

First Rollover!!!! Nathaniel was on his back yesterday playing with some toys that were dangling over his head. One toy was just out of reach of his left hand but he was determined to get it and actually flipped over onto his belly in the process. He stayed on his belly for about 3 minutes and then remembered he doesn't like tummy time... so mom came and saved him :-)