Here are the videos...

So much has happened since my last posting! Here's a quick summary:

- Gwyneth now has 4 teeth (2 front teeth on the bottom and top) -- and her 2 top teeth have a little gap in between them, just like Jason when he was a baby!
- she is now crawling, although still mostly without her tummy up in the air; and wow, can she book it!
- she is pulling herself up to a standing position on furniture, us... and in her crib! It's so much fun to go into her nursery when she's woken up from a nap/nighttime, and find her standing at the crib railing with a huge smile on her face.
- she now weighs 15 lbs. 11 oz.
- she's eating all sorts of "solid" foods (pureed), and has three good meals a day, as well as finger food snacks
- she had her first swimming lesson two days ago, and loved it! She's such a little fish... :)
- I started dropping her off in the nursery on Sunday mornings, and after an initial adjustment (which wasn't too much fun for either of us) she's now doing great with it
- she outgrew her carseat (such long legs!) and had to get a new one, which she loves

Here are a bunch of pictures, and a couple of videos for you to enjoy. We love you, and hope you're all doing well!

Gwyneth and Pa Duke, deep in conversation. Look at those cute little standing legs!
Yup, that's right. I'm standing. Did it all by myself. :)

My Dad is the best EVER!!


While the cat's away, the mice will play...
in other words, Mom turned her back for a minute... so I just dug in!

Sleepy girl on a hike up Grey Rock (Poudre Canyon)

Jason's girls going out to get a few things for his birthday.
Hmmm... what could she be doing?

Gwyneth chewing on Bear's tag, and watching a video of herself on the computer.

Hanging out at the college room work day... supervising. I get it from Pa Duke.
You'd never know from looking at my sweet, innocent face that I'm about to dump Dad's sandwich in his lap. If he only knew...

Little pearly whites

Hello all!
We hope everyone's summer has been great -- it's so hard to believe that it's almost over! And that Gwyneth is almost 7 months old... wow.
Here are some pictures and a couple of videos from this past month -- enjoy!!

Can you see those little pearly whites? They're just barely showing on the bottom -- hopefully we'll get a better picture of them soon. They just seem to like hiding from the camera.

Ok, if I don't get food soon, I might just eat my high chair...


Hangin' out with Jason on a Saturday morning, checking out financial news on the web. Gwyneth looks a bit more concerned about the state of the economy than Jason. :)
First hike in the backpack -- and she's out.
A better view of the cutie...
Gwyneth with her half-brother, Max. They had a lot of fun together!

She "hmmm's" when she kisses Jason -- you can just hear the tail end of it at the beginning of the video.

Playing in her excersaucer. This has been her favorite toy for the last couple of weeks, especially the noise toy that plays animal sounds and music. She just bangs away!

At the beginning of this video, you can see her doing her "cheesy face"; she scrunches up her nose, puckers her lips, and huffs. So cute!!

such a sweet girl -- and growing so fast!

Hello all!

We hope you all had a great 4th of July weekend! It was definitely a beautiful one here in Ft. Collins. Jason took Thursday as a vacation day, so we had a four-day weekend together!! We both loved it, and Gwyneth so enjoyed having her daddy home for an extra two days.

Some highlights from our family's weekend:

- Gwyneth is teething!! Yep, she has a little pearly white showing itself thru her bottom gum. I'd give it another two or three days to be out completely. And what a trooper -- other than a little bit of groaning, she's been her normal, cheerful self.

- Our college students came over for a great night of badminton (which I haven't played since grade school), bocci ball, and s'mores. What a sweet time! One of the girls, Melissa, came up from Denver and stayed the whole weekend; we were able to spend some wonderful time with her on Saturday, walking around Old Town and having some gelato as relief from the hot day (isn't that stuff amazing?).

- Our dear friends, Brian and Rachel Schultz, got home from a month-long summer project with Campus Crusade for Christ. We spent Friday evening with them, and watched FoCo's annual fireworks from their house -- even from 3 1/2 miles away, we could hear the crowd at City Park roaring in applause when it was over. We later found out that it was a miracle our Church was still standing; Immanuel is right across the street from the park, and pieces of firework debris - still burning! - were making it all the way to the ground. Our youth paster was up on the roof with a hose, just in case!

- Jason started work on the last major project at our house -- tiling our basement rec room! He's really getting creative with it, and it's going to look beautiful when it's finished. I'll post some pictures of it when completed.

- I had food poisoning on the first night of Jason's vacation... all from a bowl of grapes. I've always loved grapes, but I have to tell you, I'll think twice before I eat my next bunch of them.

- Gwyneth started drinking - and partly spilling - water from a glass. She was so interested in Jason's glass on Saturday morning that he let her grab it, just to see what she'd do. She reached out, put her little hands around it, and brought it to her mouth, which was wide open and ready to gulp! It's amazing that she's learned this just from watching us.

- Lots of relaxing. What vacations are for. :)

- Oh, and the best beef brisket we've ever had, even while in Texas!

Yep, I'm cool.

At Sports Camp, with Rose (in the youth group)Watching all these kids play in the sun makes me tired...Ok, you can kind of see her new facial expression in this picture -- we call it her "cheesy smile". She's been doing it all the time for the last few days. I'll post a better picture of it as soon as I can get one.Reading time with Jason. She loves that Rainbow Fish book, especially when her daddy is reading it to her.Here it is -- her first drink of water from a glass. Sippy cup, your days are numbered.

HMMM-ing

Hi family and friends,

Once again, so sorry I haven't posted in so long. I don't have time to write much now, except to explain the video clip I've included -- Gwyneth discovers a new sound every 2 weeks or so, and the "hmm-ing" you hear is her sound of the week right now! :) She lay on the bed with me and literally "talked" to me this way for almost 20 minutes straight today. Isn't she a cutie?!?

Oh yes, and she's just passed the 13 lb. mark -- 13 lb. 3 oz. to be exact.

More updates later...

Yummy...

Say what??

Gwyneth's dedication -- May 4, 2008

Look Ma, no hands!!

Baby Talk!

Wow...I can't believe it's been a month and a half since my last post!! SO much has happened during that time!! So much, in fact, that I'm having trouble remembering everything. :) Let's see...
Gwyneth has put on two more pounds (she's now about 12 lbs), most of it in length. She still fits into most 3 month clothes, but anything with legs now has to be for 6-month-olds because of the length! She loves to sit (although not without help quite yet) and loves to stand up even more! I'm amazed at how strong those little legs are; she can already support all of her own weight, and just needs us to keep her balanced. Not long after my most recent blog, she started "baby talking" to us. The sweetest little noises now come out of that cute little mouth all the time! She especially gets going when I'm singing or reading to her. I've included a couple of short video clips so you can see her in action.
Also not long after my last blog, she discovered that her hands belong to her. She kept going cross-eyed trying to study those strange appendages that were bopping her in the face :) and has just - in the last week - started reaching out to grab onto other things.
Gwyneth also had her first plane ride at the end of March - and did great!! We took a trip down to Texas over Easter weekend to visit some dear friends and family, and to introduce our precious little girl to them in person. It was a very short trip, but such a good one! Gwyneth kept up her excellent sleep habits thru the whole trip, and gave out so many smiles and snuggles to all the new people she met!
The weather here has been warming up, and Jason and I have both caught the "get outside and get our hands dirty" bug. Last summer we spent so much time working on the interior of the house, and not much on the landscaping and exterior -- so it's fun to finally dig into those projects, and get our first sunburns while doing it! The funny thing, though, is that in the midst of days that are in the 50s and 60s, we can suddenly have a day when it snows a couple of inches!
The Spring semester of college is wrapping, so most of the students we work with at Immanuel are only 4 weeks away from packing up and heading home. We've had such a great time with them this semester, and it will be so strange when they're gone -- especially since a couple of them won't be coming back. We've been so thankful for what God has done - and is doing in this group, and for the relationships that have developed. Hopefully this summer will go by quickly, and we'll have them all back before we know it!
The summer is going to be packed full of all sorts of things! Jason will officially become an international traveller in June (not counting trips we've made just across the border into Canada) when he travels down to Sao Paulo, Brazil, for work. He'll also be beginning his transition into a new role at work near the end of the summer. We'll be making the short trek down to Colorado Springs a few times to visit friends and family, and possibly be heading east to see more family at some point. First, though, we're all looking forward to a visit from Duke and Kareen (Jason's parents) at the beginning of May. Pa Duke hasn't met Gwyneth yet, so we're very excited that he'll finally get to!!
I'll try to be much more consistent with my blog posts, so that I can keep you up to date on all that will be happening -- and yes, I know, you're really just interested in updates on Gwyneth, not Jason and I! :) :) :) :)

We love you all, and hope you're doing well! God bless.

Daddy time!

What is going on in my diaper?!?

Our sleepy bear on Bear Lake...

Tummy time -- look at that strong neck!