Note to self:

A few of the things that I need to remember to blog about when I get home (because my parents internet is soooo slow!)

* Brynn on the airplane
* Hair
* Get-together at the Old Jaol
* Christmas celebration #3
* Chad's sister Jami
* Get-together tonight at my parents

Having fun - it's sooo nice to be on vacation!

Christmas celebration #2 (Christmas Eve!)

Merry Christmas everyone!! Last night we had TJ, Jenn, Matt, Luke, Nick and Jody over for a Christmas Eve dinner!! Chad and I just about caught the house on fire!! The glaze for the ham that was on the bottom of the pan burnt to a crisp and before I knew what was going on, Jody goes "What's burning?" I'm like "Nothing", turned around and saw smoke coming out of the top of the oven!! Then we were like "OH SHIT!" and took the ham out the oven. the ham still tasted pretty good... and the house still smells like burnt bacon!! YUCK!!

We had a lot of fun, Luke and Matt got to open up some fun presents and here are some pictures that we took last night. By far, the blocks that Jody got for Luke were EVERYONE's favorite present!!

Talking to Auntie Bri on the phone

Christmas with Gramma! (X-mas celebration # 1)

This morning Jody, Chad, Brynn and I all exchanged some gifts and had a nice early Christmas!! Here is some of what Gramma bought for Brynn... after we took the tags and hangers off. I think she likes to go shopping!!


She also bought a 25th Anniversary edition white Carebear (who is going to be staying in the box!!), along with about a million other things, including her jumper which she thinks is the best thing ever!!


I really want to post a picture of what Brynn gave Gramma but I can't for a few more days (other family members that read this blog are getting similar gifts!). Check back to this post later in the week and you'll see what I mean!!

Here's a picture of Brynn eating one of her presents from Mommy and Daddy!!

Merry Christmas Gramma Jody - thanks for everything!!!!! Love you!!!!!

Brynn with THE REAL SANTA CLAUS!!

I think this is the real Santa.

I've been meaning to scan this for a while but hadn't had the chance to!!

On the 15th, Chad and I went to his company's Christmas party. Kelsey (our babysitter's daughter) was going to watch her while we were gone, but instead, the whole family watched her!! Brenda asked if they could take her to dinner with them, which we were ok with. Well, we got back to their house to pick her up and she handed us this awesome picture!!

She really did go to dinner but then she also went to the mall, where they bought her this super cute dress and headband!! How cool is that?! Brenda was all excited because Brynn didn't spit up until AFTER the pictures. ;o)

Caudill's... thank you so much for being such great people and for taking care of our baby girl!!

Highchair

Gramma bought Brynn a highchair on Thursday and we finally tried it out last night!! Guess how many different Wal-Mart's we went to so that we could find the one that I wanted? Three. Yes, three. The one that we got it from ended up being one of the closest ones to the house too... that figures. We ended up with the very last one and it was on clearance, so we got it for $20 less than what it was normally!! YAY!!

She wasn't very happy with us at first, I think it's because she didn't realize that she was going to get to eat if she sat there. She got all excited a few times and her arms were flailing all over the place!! By the time we were done, she was content in her cool new seat!!

P.S. Jenn - like the Ikea bowl??

Party reminder!!

Just a reminder to my Ohio friends and family...

My parents are having some people over on the 28th at their house in Wooster, starting at around 6pm. If you are hoping to come and need their address or directions, just let me know!!

Also, Rachel Miller (Roelant) is trying to get some people together at 7pm at the Old Jaol on the 27th AND if you can't make it to either of those, I'm hoping to get people together for drinks on the 29th, since it's a Saturday. (I need to pack in my Ohio-friend-and-family-time while I can!!)

Hope to see all of you IN TWO WEEKS!!!!!!!!

YAY!!!!!!

Hangin' out

Notice which finger is in her mouth??

Matt's Christmas program

Last night, Chad, Brynn and I went to see Matt perform in his school Christmas program!! We met TJ, Jenn, Luke, Ann, Amy, Scott, Garrett and Connor there!! Matt had a speaking part this year and did AWESOME!! His name was also listed first for his class in the program and it wasn't in alphabetical order either. I think it's because he was is so great at performing!! (I think he gets that from TJ?) Jenn said he was excited about using the microphone. ;o)

Luckily, Santa was there too!! Here are some pictures from the big show, in no particular order!!

Instead of sucking her thumb...

AFV Update!

So this doesn't mean a whole lot yet but it's a step in the right direction!

Received a package in the mail today from America's Funniest Videos with some additional paperwork that we need to fill out!!

Atleast this means that they've watched the video and we're a step farther than we were yesterday!!

Keep your fingers crossed!!!

New things

Peek-a-boo is her new favorite game.

Diaper/burp cloths are her new favorite chew toy.

Mommy and daddy's hair is her new thing to grab (and PULL!).

She loves to have Mel and Allie kiss her hands, when she realizes that they are next to her, sometimes she'll move her hand just a little bit closer to them.

She's starting to laugh more, it's more like a giggle. I need to try and get it on video.

She loves to stick her tongue out and hum. She won't blow raspberries but she's always got her tongue sticking out and humming.

She likes to sit up, she tries to pull herself up when we're holding her.

She loves her new jumper that Gramma (Jody) got for her!!

Tries to EAT EVERYTHING!!

Pictures to come later this weekend...

Lottery numbers?

Seriously, I would really like to find some winning lottery numbers. Or for America's Funniest Home Videos to call.

I hate money and I hate stress... and I'm more broke and more stressed now than I've ever been before.

Doctor's appointments

Ugh. I don't like going to the doctor myself, let alone take Brynn!! On November 21st (Wednesday), Chad and I took Brynn to the doctor for her 4 month shots. (She's 4 months old already!!) She was not a happy camper.

Here are her stats:

Weight: 13lbs, 8oz!!
Height: 24"
Head: 40cm

We saw a different doctor than what we normally do because ours was in another office and I really wanted to do her shots the day before Thanksgiving. That way, if she ended up getting sick, we'd be home to take care of her.

Well, the doctor that we saw noticed that her eyes were crossing quite a bit and he told us that we needed to make an appointment with an eye doctor ASAP. The guy didn't have the nicest approach to it and really freaked us out. He said that he had a nephew or grandson or something (I was so freaked out, I don't remember what he said!) had crossed eyes and he's had four surgeries to attempt to correct it. He said that she may need to wear a patch or have surgery. Chad and I were so frustrated with this guy that we made an appointment with our regular doctor so that we could talk to him about it. Just a week and a half before this scary appointment, she had seen her regular doctor and he said that she should be growing out of it soon and he wasn't worried.

The next morning (Thanksgiving morning...) I got up and googled "crossed eyes" or something along those lines. I was really freaked out because it didn't seem like there was a good "solution" to the problem. Some of the results that I had read said that she may need eye drops, she may need to wear a patch, she may need glasses, or we may need to do surgery. A few of the websites that I was reading even said that if it wasn't treated by the time that she is 6-10 years old, she may go blind in the weaker eye. Talk about freaking a first time mom and dad out, we definitely were.

After reading all of the scary stuff online, we decided to cancel the appointment with her regular doctor and just go ahead and make one with the pediatric eye doctor and get her in there NOW. The next opening wasn't until December 3rd.

So, I took her to her eye appointment and she actually did really really well. I held her while they put the drops in her eyes to dialate them, which kind of freaked her out a little bit. She kept looking at me like "Mom, what did you just do to me?" Her pupils were HUGE!! Anyway, the eye doctor told me she can see out of both eyes and he really wasn't too concerned yet. I have to take her back in a month so he can check her again and then if her eyes aren't straight by the time she's 8-10 months old, we'll talk about doing surgery when she's about a year old. He said that her eyes aren't too bad, he said that they alternate being crossed, which is a good thing. He said that a patch wouldn't do any good because it's both of them that cross and it's mostly when she's concentrating on something. He said that the surgery isn't a big deal, it's an outpatient procedure and it only lasts about 15 minutes.

I talked to a girl in the waiting room, whose son's eyes were "different" too. She said that he is 8 months old and they are going to do surgery on him when he's about a year old. She said that two of her cousins had the surgery done by the same doctor and the results were great. Her son's eyes didn't start crossing until he was about 4 months old, which really freaked me out. She said that for about two months, they didn't think that he could see at all but they found out at their appointment last month, that he could!! You could tell she was really relieved. His eyes were REALLY bad, he went to look up at the ceiling and as soon as his eyes focused on a spot, they just started going crazy. They went up, down, left, right and in no pattern at all. I really hope the surgery works for them.

So, I realized that her eyes aren't as bad as what they could be. Atleast she can see, and focus. We're lucky to have such a beautiful baby girl!! I haven't posted any pictures lately where you can really tell that her eyes are crossed a lot, but in most of the others that we have, they are crossed.

Some interesting information... She's getting so big now, she's so much easier to hold. She loves to talk to you when she's laying on her changing table looking out her window and to cuddle and hold on to your arm when you're holding her. We've heard a few squeaks of laughs creep out of her but no big belly laughs yet!! She's so ticklish too!! Her teeth are going to be coming in any day now, her gums are really raw!! Boy, will she let you know when she's hungry. She's got some pretty big lungs now!! We started putting rice cereal in her bedtime bottle last week and (knock on wood...) she's been sleeping from about 8-6 every night!!

Baby Brynn, we love you so much and are so lucky to have such a beautiful, kissable chubby-cheeked little girl in our lives!!

Getting ready for Christmas

We're really diving into it this year!! (Ha ha...)

Somehow we started buying those ginornous blow up things that go in your yard a few years ago and every year, we end up with one more!! I'm not quite sure on the rhyme or reason behind the mixture of what we have but whatever, it's fun!! Here are a few of Chad last weekend. And yes, "Size Matters"!!

Today, we worked on the inside of the house. We have a lot more room to work with in the new house so we aren't quite sure how to set everything up yet.

Here's a picture of the tree, this is pretty much what it looks like now. We bought this tree last year after Christmas, for $49.99. According to the box, it was supposed to be a 7.5' skinny not so cute tree but it was going to have to do for a few years. Instead, we put the thing together and after AN HOUR AND A HALF OF JUST PUTTING THE BRANCHES ON IT AND FLUFFING THEM, we got this beautiful HUGE tree!!

Brynn checking out her first tree...



Here are a few others that we've taken of Brynn lately!! Look at that crazy hair!!