Ohhhhhhh

Gracie is becoming so verbal now it is wonderful. My favorite is her say "Oooohhhh." She received a wonderful Jack-in-the-box from the Shiers for her birthday and every time she gets the clown to come out she say Ooohhh. That is her new word for anything she thinks is neat or is something she has learned. It is so sweet.

Right now we are dealing with a fever, which I think is due to the 1 year immunizations. This afternoon she has perked up. This has made me realize how much I miss being with her when I am working. Someday I look forward to a time when I can be with her the whole day and not think about everything I have to get done for work. Don't get me wrong, when I am home I know there will be plenty of other things to keep my mind occupied as well. We are taking one step close to our goal with Adam changing firms this week. We felt the previous company did not provide the potential for us to achieve our goals as a family. Here is a link to the new firm that Adam officially starts on Oct 1.

http://www.assetsandincome.com/

We look forward to this new step of faith and pray that God blesses this new chapter in our lives. More photos and updates to come after work!

Gracie is 1

What an amazing year it has been. To be honest I am so glad that I have kept this blog. As many of you know I don't have that great of a memory, so this will provide documentation to Gracie as she gets older and starts to ask me questions about her first year. Her birthday celebration started a little early with a cake the night before her birthday. We will just say the cake wasn't good enough to provide Gracie incentive to smash the cake in her face.

The birthday morning started out very nice with her sleeping in a bit. Daddy was off to church to serve while my folks came over to help prep for the party. Grandpa kept Gracie busy while my Mom and I got things ready. The decorations were minimal, cake provided by Aunt Michelle, and many friends to celebrate with.

The cake could take a whole page of the blog to explain how amazing Michelle's hard work looked. Here are a couple photos of the bear cake with the mini smash cake. It was almost too perfect to cut. Gracie was completely spoiled by her Aunt with this amazing cake that could have been in contention on Ace of Cakes!

Gracie didn't really enjoy the smash cake nearly as much as we thought she would. Like us, I think she didn't want to ruin the amazing cake. Here are photos of her starting to enjoy the cake before we had to run inside due to the rain that started that quickly stopped after the huge rush into the house.

There were two traditions we started this day. First I made a plate at a pottery store that we will use for celebrations to come. Gracie's first birthday cake as served on this platter. Second we took from the Korean tradition and had Gracie select an item from a tray of different objects to help tells us what her future will hold. Items like a hammer - judge or carpenter, ball - sports, money - wealth, calculator - finance, photo - photographer, were on the tray and our lady picked the money. There are worse things she could have chosen.

We were able to enjoy celebrating with family and friends. Gracie is loved by so many people that we feel completely blessed to be in our lives.

Gracie's big achievements:

• As of today Gracie is using about 10 words: mama, dada, uh oh, dog, ball, ollie, out, up, quack (just she ck sound) hi, and is working on bye.


• Today was a huge day of milestones: she signaled all done with her hands up in the air.


• SHE TOOK HER FIRST UNASSISTED STEPS!! Baylor was enjoying some Cheerios that she wanted to share, so she walked a couple steps to him. Here is a photo afterwards.

• Gracie is 19lbs, 10oz (25%), and 90% on height. She is long and lean like her daddy.
• She loves to wave, say hi to people, blowing kisses and giving high 5s.
• The girl will eat pretty much anything without teeth. I can only hope she is getting them or she is completely taking after Brandy and her drooling.

Looking back to one year ago it is so hard to imagine our life without Grace. She continues to be the light of our life and what we focus our time on. Her smile brings such joy to every person she meets. There is nothing more that I love then coming into her room, after hearing her say mama over and over in the monitor, and seeing her standing at the edge of her crib just smiling and motioning for milk. How can you not love your daughter giving you the biggest open mouth kiss with a little lick from her tongue to show you how much she loves you?!?! Daddy might get a little nervous knowing that his little lady just give her buddy Baylor a big lick kiss as well. The girl loves everyone.

Thank you all for celebrating our daughter's life! She is a gift from God that we are thankful for everyday.

The three weeks before turning one

Since it has been a month since my last post we are going to cover a few weeks. Lucky me got to spend a night with my goddaughter and her brother. It was such a joy to spend time with them and Gracie got some really good daddy-daughter time.

Just before Labor Day weekend Gracie and I were able to take a quick trip to KC. Hillary and the family were such warm hosts, Hill even watched Gracie for a day while I worked, and Maddie couldn't get enough of Gracie. Here is Maddie giving love to her. What a wonderful trip which I survived traveling with Gracie on my own. Gracie did great on the flights and slept pretty good. Now that she is older she is well aware of her surroundings and if we are in the room. This lead to our trip to the farm for Labor Day.

Labor Day was pretty quiet with a trip to the farm to get some work done. Gracie even tried to help Mommy attach gliders to the bottoms of the chairs. She is following in her mothers love of projects.

Adam volunteered at a CSU prep rally event that included many different fun activities for kids. We were lucky the event surprisingly drew Adam's brother and family. Here are photos of our little cheerleader from the wonderful CSU rally

Adam was very excited when CSU beat CU at the Rocky Mtn. Showdown. So awesome!!! After this fun I had to take a trip to ATL for work. Being away from Gracie is hard and Adam is such a wonderful father to me Mr. Mom during these times, not to mention my mom and Nicole.

The week before her birthday was a busy week too. We were able to celebrate my parents 40th wedding anniversary. The anniversary dinner included my folks, aunt & uncle, family friends, and Brad with dinner provided by a chef. What a wonderful reason to celebrate!

Next onto her birthday fun....

Another day of fun

Gracie was able to show Daddy today how much she loves her dog. Now anytime Brandy is around Gracie tries to go over and pet her. Then if we have a ball or Brandy's toy, Gracie wants to be involved and throw the toy as well. It is the cutest thing to see Gracie have the pull toy, try to toss it around, and then throw it about 1 inch away from her. She is trying to hard.

Today Gracie also started to stand more on her own unassisted by anything. She is going to continue to test her abilities and we can't wait for her to walk. Honestly it is so hard to see her crawl everywhere and pick up things from the floor, no matter how hard we try to keep the items out of her mouth.

We are ready for the weekend together and some fun as a family. Hope you enjoy your weekend as well!

11 months & a fun vortex of a day

So we weren't as quick as we thought we would be on updating the blog. Work, life, and prep for a party kept us busy during the nights.

Gracie updates:

• Gracie now officially says many words, Mama, Dada, Da (dog), Ba (ball), and just on Friday started Hi. Also while reading "Ollie the Stomper" she actually said Ollie.


• She is now very confident in standing on her own. So confident you can see in her 11 month photos a few scraps on her face from the few falls she has had trying to move from one thing to another.


• We are lucky that Gracie still doesn't have stranger anxiety, though she does love to lay her head on our chest when she sees us again.


• The lady loves all types of food. Yogurt or ice cream still are her favorites.


• Any baby, child, or nice animal in a book is given a kiss. Kisses are thrown out with no abandonment.


• The girl has got rhythm. Music on the radio, pumped into a store, or just made by a funny parent, leads to Gracie bobbing up and down.


• Shopping also is a new past time as long as she can play in the racks like her mother.


• Still no teeth!

This past weekend we had some fun. After a crazy Bunco night at the house on Friday, I headed up to Fort Collins to watch the Sanderson kids. Though I missed Gracie it was so much fun to enjoy time with their kids and see what my future could look like. Boy am I glad that I have 3 more years to prep for an almost 4 year old. While I was gone there was some good Daddy daughter time that included pool time, church, and lots of loving. Gracie was also lucky to have a brand new house for play. We now have a new chair and the box it came in is her playhouse. Grandpa cut holes in the box for windows bringing many laughs while playing inside or out.

This week we are getting back to a bit of more normal life only to be altered next week. My work has allowed me to travel to Kansas City for work and Ms. Gracie will be coming to visit with the Guenthners. Can't wait for the fun!! Here is a photo of our little frog in her frog coat from Auntie Jessica. Way too cute!

Here are photos from our vortex of a day. The day started with a sick puppy (Brandy) throwing up on the floor once, then twice, then a baby girl gagging on something to produce a little too, then dog again, and again with a final activity of the night...you knew it would happen some time, but I just wasn't ready for it today... Gracie pooped in the bathtub. We of course had to get her out, clean her up in the sink and then clean the tub. Seeing her in the sink just reminds me of how much she continues to grow. I am not ready for her 1st birthday!!

Enjoy the photos and your week!

One day shy of 11 months

Where has the time gone? Gracie continues to perfect her crawling and has decided that she really wants to try this walking thing. Now she wants to play standing on her own two feet when she can. This has led to a few diggers and some tears that are just a part of learning. Now with her walking toys she is getting the hang of the walking thing. I have no doubt she will be walking by her birthday.

You know you might be too busy when you can't find your day planner and you don't remember what you have done the past 10 days. We will work our way backwards.

Gracie's week has been a bit of a shuffle. Nicole had to leave town unexpectedly so Grace is with three different people during the day, though hasn't complained since she has had playmates at each location. She is just the happy little lady. This past weekend we had some good times with the Peters. Papa J is near us now and we had a wonderful Sunday lunch with the family. Saturday night was a great date night with the theatre, picnic, and babysitting by Grandma and Papa. What more could we ask for?

Now I remember the weekend before, how could I forget? Our friend Kacey was a saint on Saturday. After a day of hiking she had us over for dinner and then watched Gracie while Adam and I played in Central City to celebrate a friend's birthday. We even left the place with some extra dough and Gracie was pretty good. Again, we are blessed with great friends.

Here is a photo to tide everyone over until the 11 month photo shoot. She loves her cheerios and yogurt! It doesn't matter where they are on her face either.

Countrygirl - Ride 'em cowgirl

Another busy couple have weeks have kept me from updating the blog, which is bad because so much has been happening. We were able to enjoy some time at the farm the past weekend. Adam and I were busy painting while Gracie had some great visitors to keep her busy. The first visitor was my Aunt Nancy from Oklahoma. Gracie sure loved to wave at her and hear her laugh. Here is a great photo of them together. Sadly I forgot to bring in the wonderful books she gave Gracie as a gift, the Gossie & Gertie books. Love them! Our family friend also came to entertain Gracie, which she loved.


The next day we were able to spend some time with the Sandersons as well. Our goddaughter Abigail decided that she liked playing and helping Gracie. Ian, her brother who is only 6 months older then Gracie, is a whole different ballgame when you are playing. Every day it amazes me how much Gracie is changing. She loves to play now with other kids, wants to be around other kids, and especially loves older kids about 3 - 4. Abigail was a wonderful friend teaching her how to play with this toy. At the pool this week Mom was chopped liver and the 3 year old in the baby pool was so entertaining for 30+ mins. Now that Gracie can move around easier she is seeing so much more. One of her favorite items is a doll I got in S. Korea years ago for Great Grandma Peters. Grandma Jeanne thought an official doll would be a great gift and she was right. Here is Gracie looking a lot like her dolly that she loves to give kisses to.

This week Gracie has also started testing the waters everywhere, literally as well as figuratively. The 3rd she started to climb the stairs at the house and got up 3+ stairs before we started working on going down them correctly. Tuesday we got her out of bed to find her standing in her crib. TV components and Brandy's water bowl are her favorite "No" areas to test daily. She wants to keep trying to see if we will let her play with them or if she can sneak some play time past us. We have been learning to have eyes in the back of our heads. Here she is trying new locations for play.

Brandy is the best dog "horse" in the world. They both are starting to enjoy playing together or at least being around each other. Brandy sure isn't a fan of the baby gates and their ability to keep her away from us. Now she is even closer to us while Gracie is around so she can make sure she is on the right side of the gate.

This weekend we are looking forward to some fun as a family with our friends. Some great news for our family is the move of Papa J to Denver. Gracie's only living great-grandparent will now be in Denver. We look forward to seeing their relationship grow over the years. Until next week.