Baby Dedication

Last Sunday, our church had a Baby Dedication Service, and we dedicated Drew. For those of you non-Baptists out there, we don't sprinkle or baptize babies. We perform baptisms when the person is old enough to make their own decision of faith. So when a baby is born, we do an informal dedication service, where the parents vow to bring the baby up in a loving, Christian home and the church vows to pray for and support our family. This time we dedicated 34 babies, which was a huge crew. They have these services about 3 times a year and usually dedicate about a dozen each time.

Before the service, the church held a breakfast for the parents and grandparents where they showed a slide show of the babies being dedicated, and the pastor gave some words of encouragement. We were so lucky to have both sets of our parents join us, along with Ashley and Gavin and Damien and Christine. Drew did so well and looked adorable.

Sitting and Sipping

It's been a busy couple of weeks. Between the Baby Dedication and Drew being sick (another ear infection and upper respiratory infection), he has reached a few more big milestones. Since I'm still working crazy hours, my mom came in for a few days to keep Drew during the day. She moves him from one "activity station" to another all day, so he gets lots of love and one-on-one attention. This week he mastered sitting up. He had been sitting up for 10 seconds at a time before reaching for a toy and toppling over. Now he has mastered sitting for long periods of time. He's figured out that he can put his hands out in front of him to help keep balance.

With Aunt Ashley

Drew has also been introduced to his sippy cup. We gave it to him first when he was sick and running a fever, with water inside to help keep him hydrated. He loves to put anything in his mouth and was pleasantly surprised when water came out of the cup.

When my parents were in town for Drew's dedication, we had a "1/2 Birthday Party" since he turned 6 months old. My mom had parties each month during our first years of life, so she wanted to have one for Drew. Here are John, Drew, me, Ashley, and Gavin with Drew's birthday cookie. We got a few pictures of Drew and the cookie, but then he decided that the icing looked pretty yummy and tried to take a bite. Can't blame him for that -- what kind of party is it where the birthday boy doesn't get to eat his birthday cookie?

Here's a picture of Drew and Grandmommy. I have a great video of him laughing that I'll post later.

The weather was pretty nice for February, so we took Drew for a walk around the block, then sat outside with my dad for a while, soaking up the warm weather.

Photo Update

I've been a slacker on the blog lately, so I thought I'd do a photo update, since a picture is worth a thousand words. This post should be worth several thousand. This weekend is Drew's baby dedication service at church. My mom and dad are coming in tonight through the weekend and John's parents will be coming up Sunday morning. We're really looking forward to that and I'll post those pictures later. Drew's 6-month appointment is tomorrow. Six months already? It seems like just yesterday that I was still pregnant.

Here's the kiddo in his bumbo chair with his froggie. He was extra talkative this day, so he's making a funny face as he tells me all about things.

As promised, here is the picture from our tornado adventure the other night. Drew seems a little concerned about all the red and purple on the radar screen, but Dad and I have it under control. If you look closely, you can see DFW (the airport) in a green section. We live southwest of DFW, so you can see that we were just about to get hit. Drew loves wrestle time with Daddy. Wrestle time goes like this: Daddy rolls around Drew on the bed while Drew giggles at him and Sadie barks from the floor. Sometimes Drew gets on top to "body slam" Daddy, and inevitably the wrestling match ends when Drew wins on account of soaking Daddy's shirt with drool. I love my boys.

It is still busy season here in Accounting world. I've been getting home from work between 7 and 8 most nights (unless I need to pick up Drew), and often do some more work after I put him to bed. On this night, John was putting dinner on the stove, so Drew came to the study to help me work. He does like the sound of typing and the bright colors on the computer. Future accountant, maybe?

Here's the Drewster on Valentine's Day. Grandmommy sent us a few bibs to commemorate the occasion, and Drew wanted his friend, Spot, in the picture too. For Valentine's Day, John and I had a lazy Saturday, ran a few errands (even Sadie got to come along on family errand-running time), and he grilled out steaks for dinner. It was a great, relaxing day.

Drew's getting to be more and more of an eater. He has rice cereal twice a day with baby foods. So far he's had green beans, sweet potatoes, peas, carrots, and bananas.

Here's a shout out to our cousin Ryan. We are so glad to see your Mom and Dad getting pictures made in Cowboys gear. In Texas, we're warming up for baseball season in our cute Rangers outfit.

Drew's First Tornado Watch

Being a kid in Texas, I'm sure Drew will have the same experiences John and I did -- going to a friend's basement in the middle of the night (sometimes to Grandmom & Pop's cellar), tornado drills at school, being mesmerized by the radar image on the screen, and talking about it the next day ("75 mph winds? That's nothing. Remember back in 2003 when we had 100 mph gusts? Now THAT was wind!") Last night Drew had his first tornado storm experience. We were in a Tornado Watch for most of the day yesterday. The big line of storms rolled through late in the evening. We started watching the weather at about 8 o'clock, when a Tornado Warning was issued. (For those not from the great state of Texas, a watch is issued when the weather is ripe for tornados and as the name suggests, you should keep "watching" for one. A warning is when radar shows that a tornado is forming or someone on the ground confirms a sighting.) At about 8:30, Pete Delkus (our awesome Channel 8 weatherman) said that there was a tornado that appeared to be forming over North Richland Hills, heading toward Hurst-Euless-Bedford. That's us. So, as I've done many times in the past, I started piling pillows and blankets in our closet, in case we needed to take cover. Luckily for us, the tornado portion of the storm went north of us, but we did get some 70 mph wind, torrential rain, and pea-size hail. A couple of years ago we had tornados ALL over and hail the size of my fist, so in comparison this storm wasn't too strong. It was unusual that it was in February and not later in the spring, but Drewby got to stay up late with us and I got a cute picture of him and John in front of the radar screen. I'll try to remember to post it later.

Cruisin'

I think we've reached cruising altitude with Drewby. We've got him on a good schedule, John and I have reached some sort of "divide and conquer" approach to getting everything done, and our family is in what I call Domestic Bliss. The bliss is aided by the fact that Drew has remembered how to sleep through the night. We a couple of great months of 7-8 solid hours of sleep. Then the ear infection hit and there was no sleep. Gradually, he's gone from waking up twice a night to once, then to just waking up early. Now he sleeps from bedtime (usually 9:30) until close to 7:30. I think he often wakes up earlier than that and occupies himself til he goes back to sleep. I put him down on his back on the sleep positioner and he's often still there when John leaves the house at 6. By the time I go in at 7:30 or 8, he's scooted so his head is at the other end of the crib, or he's inched his way into the corner or has rolled over and is on his tummy. One morning he managed to get to his soother that's attached to the side of the crib and turn it on. I heard the soothing cricket noises through the baby monitor and snuck in to check on him. Sure enough, he was wide awake, smiling at his toy. Of course once he saw me, there was no sneaking back to bed, but he's so happy to see me in the mornings that it's worth getting up early for.

Drew's done great with day care. He doesn't nap very well during the day, which is probably why he crashes at night. He gets moved from toy to toy a lot, so he's a master at the exersaucer, bouncy chair, and bumbo seat. He's having his rice cereal twice a day now, and his appetite for veggies now includes green beans, carrots, and peas. Next week, he'll take on sweet potatoes, which are one of my favorites. I bet his aren't as good without all the yummy butter and brown sugar, but luckily he doesn't know what he's missing.

Activity-wise, he is still reaching those all-important milestones. You hold up a toy in front of him and he reaches for it, grasps it, and then usually puts it directly in his mouth. The other day he was on his activity mat in the living room and when John went into the kitchen for a couple of minutes, he managed to roll onto his tummy and scoot a ways across the floor. He hasn't duplicated this effort, so I think crawling is still around the bend. He's doing great sitting up -- he can sit unassisted for about 10 seconds before he tips over. It's kinda funny -- he'll want to pick up a toy in front of him, so he moves his arm and the head goes forward. Or he looks to the side when Sadie makes a noise and over he goes. He ought to get the hang of it soon. He is still loving the jumperoo and bath time. He also still has some obsession with my hair, and whenever he gets upset, I pick him up and he immediately grabs my hair and tries to eat it. I'm not sure why that's soothing, but maybe it lets him know that Mommy's got him. Overall, he's just an easygoing, agreeable kiddo.

I'm lobbying John to get some family pictures made in the next couple of weeks, since Drewby's smiling and cute so much of the time. I want to capture that grin and frame it! So, if you talk to John, tell him what a GREAT idea it would be to have some pictures made. If I'm successful, I'll be posting those before long.