No Photo, Oh Well

I've realized I tend to not post because I want to add a photo of Joshua each time (he changes so quickly), but this isn't always feasible when I need to alter it in photoshop....so....I'm just going to write to you now without one.

That said, Joshua is 8 months! In the past month he has been doing so many new things. I think we've gotten to the stage where there's something new almost every day. He is a major mimicker now. Let's see, a couple of weeks ago he started rocking back and forth. He'll copy us if we start rocking back and forth, and tonight he was rocking with the music from his new Leap Frog music center. Whether that was a coincidence or not I have yet to find out. And Joshua does the cutest thing with Matt. For awhile he'll make this noise that's like a growl, just without the vocals (if that makes sense)...kind of a gurgling in his throat, but like a growl. Anyway, Matt started doing this with his "claws" in the air while calling Joshua a grizzly bear and the two of them will just go back and forth growling at each other. Joshua gets the biggest grin on his face! He has also resumed opening and closing his mouth (the first time he did this was while watching Daddy eat a sandwich). He didn't do it for a couple of weeks, but now he'll do it across the room at me- so cute! One more thing, this week I noticed him moving his tongue forward in his mouth, sometimes accidentally making a slight clicking noise. So, I will click and he'll mimick. He's so smart! Okay, he's doing what every baby does, but I'm allowed to be enamored with my son, lol!

Also, our baby is mobile, but not on all fours yet. Joshua rolls everywhere, including smack into the entertainment center or couch or whatever is in his way, though he sometimes doesn't quite get he should roll the other way so he ends up smacking his head over and over. He also has started to roll onto the brick in the entry and the kitchen, which says "OUCH!" to me, but he doesn't seem phased. Today Joshua rolled to get something I had and once he was on his belly I moved the item further to his side to see if he'd move for it. He did!, and almost turned 45 degrees, so this is the closest to scooting thus far. Matt is very eager for Joshua to crawl. I'm not in as big of a hurry, but I have been wondering if he'll be interested soon. So, we'll see how quickly this will progress.

Okay, I need to sign off. Joshua and I have a day in Bakersfield ahead of us, and I'm going to attempt to do a bit of homework before bed to make up for tomorrow. Joshua will be taking his 8 month pics at Picture People (I'll see if I can load a link for everyone to see them). A slight pat on my back, I set a goal to finally finish the quilt I began while I was pregnant so we could have it in the pictures. It was almost done before Joshua was born, but I just haven't had the time. Very sad, two-thirds of a year later and it's finally complete. What a wonderful feeling, though (even if it was a super easy quilt and I'm just lame for taking so long)!

I'll add a new pic soon. This weekend Melissa, Joshua, and I are going to the baby shower of my friend Emily (Rosander) Sardo from high school- fellow jr. miss'r and graduate. My dad is meeting us for lunch, so we get to see Hudson, yea! We'll definitely get some cute shots of the two boys together ;). Love you!

Exciting news!

For those of you who don't know, I'm an avid scrapbooker (that is, when I have time). My fave scrap store in Bakersfield announced a contest beginning in February with gift certificates to the store as awards for 1st ($50), 2nd ($35), and 3rd ($20) place. Melissa (my sis) and I decided to give it a shot because from experiene we know that there usually aren't too many people who enter, which would give us a good shot at a fun shopping spree. The challenge was to scrap a purse photo album. We finally worked on ours a few days before they were due, and let me tell you I lost a lot of sleep because you can't scrap during the day taking care of a baby and doing homework! When we turned them in we got pretty excited because there were a total of 9 entries and we deemed ours in the top 4 (not cocky, maybe a little biased and confident, :D). All of the purses were left out in the store for two weeks to be voted on by customers. Well, yesterday I got a call and was told that I won 2nd place! And when I asked who won 1st I found out it was none other than Melissa! Yipee!!!! I was so proud to tell the gal that she was my sister! So, while we really didn't have much competition, which means we most definitely would not have done so well in a magazine or even online contest, we're still pretty stoked! And, we have some cash to spend at our favorite store (oh yeah, Melissa's almost more hooked than I am now, going to the store for crops on a weekly basis with her nursing friends- not fair!). We think we'll spend it at the end of next month when we go for National Scrapbooking Day (okay, okay, I don't call your hobby lame, jk)! Below are some pics and here is the link to the store where we're announced! http://www.simply-scrapbooks.net/suggestions.aspx?pageID=11-82-0

I'm so bad at this!

Wow, finding the time to post on this is a little harder than I thought. I hope you forgive me for taking so long to write, but I definitely think I'll be posting more often from here on. For starters, there's a photo I don't have today that I want to make sure I get by the weekend. Besides, Joshua is growing so fast and he'll be hitting some major milestones in the coming months.

He's 7 1/2 months and in the past few weeks he has been trying out some new skills. He now uses his thumb and index finger to pinch and pick up things; not mastered, of course, but he's doing so well! He's expanded his vocals to include the phonetics of "d"- dih, duh, da, day, dee- he loves repeating these sounds and trying out various combinations. This is definitely his favorite now, because even though he started out with "m" sounds, including ma & mama (obviously without knowing the meaning, same with da), he hasn't used it in weeks and won't repeat when we try to get him started. Joshua has also been practicing his raspberries. He tried them out about 2 months ago, but only for a couple of days. In the past week he has been blowing raspberries like crazy, with plenty of drool in the mix. It's fun to join in or even start them and watch him mimic.

There's a fun new toy that Joshua has discovered this month- the balloon. He loves to hit them (with help of course) back and forth, grab hold and bang them everywhere (even on his head, he doesn't mind at all), attempt to suck on them, and today he giggled so hard when Daddy rubbed his hands on one causing it to make sounds. When Joshua first started laughing, the giggles were few and far between. Now, his laughter brightens up our home several times a day- it's one of the most wonderful sounds I've ever heard.

Speaking of Joshua's laughter, you have got to check out this video I placed on YouTube. Joshua was taking a nap on Matt and started giggling. He did it for several minutes and then Matt figured out he could get Joshua going just by laughing. I just caught the tail end of it all. Disclaimer: I don't have any video-editing software, so it isn't cut and the sound isn't right, but it's cute anyway!



Hope you're having a great week and I'll post again soon!