We made it!

Adam is done with classes for the summer. Everyone give him a nice 'Welcome Back, Adam' when you see him because he has been buried underneath books for a long time. It was a big sigh of relief when he came home after his last exam.

While Adam was finishing up classes, Douglas was also discovering big new things.

Crawling.

How to open and close doors.

How to pull him self up on couches and coffee tables.

It has been very exciting around the Reinhardt household, I tell you what.

Now - I am going to try something new. I am going to try and post a video that I have a Douglas. (I have a few in mind, I am going to see if any of them will work.)

So cross you fingers for me and in lieu of pictures, enjoy the video!

Quick - Adam's away from the computer...

Douglas is walking around the living room in his walker.
Adam is at the dollar store buying little prizes for his clients.
The computer is free and so are both of my hands.

I can blog!!

So, here is what we have been doing so far this summer.

Camping with the Newcombs.

Hosting one of my closest friends for the 4th of July.

Visiting with Noah and Nadia - Douglas' cousins.

Also, I didn't have my camera, but Douglas got to meet his West Coast cousins, Benjamin and Sadie last week. Sadie was showing him up in her ability to get on her knees and almost crawl at 4 months! Douglas now feels the need to just try and stand, forget crawling - let's walk!

I do realize the pictures are sideways - I was taking them straight from the camera. I figured the priority was the post (clearing throat at Liz and Dad) not the orientation of the picture ;)

Also, the picture in the laundry basket was just cute.

Hope you are all having a good summer. We are off to watch the women's soccer game in an air conditioned house!

Some pictures to enjoy

Pause for Technical Difficulties

So, there I was, writing a beautiful post with all sorts of pictures and witty captions when...the pictures wouldn't load. I kept getting an 'internal error' message from blogger. So, you will all have to wait a little bit longer before I will be able to give you the masterpiece that is my post.

Back to your regularly scheduled program

Summer is here...I think? (My original post title.)

Well, ladies and gentleman, I am late to this party. To which I say - life with a 7 month old is much more active than life with a 4 month old. It is getting harder and harder to find a chunk of time to sit down and dedicate to anything that doesn't involve Douglas. Not an excuse, just a new discovery on this new mom's part.

On to what we have been up to lately. May was a busy month. A negative and positive addition to the business was all the rain. It is positive in that all the plants are now in extra full bloom and are thriving for the most part but negative in that I wanted to be doing much more outside than I ended up doing. I just read today that we got just short of 11 inches of rain in the month of May! That is a record I think, or it should be. But, despite the rain we accomplished a Baby Dedication, a Memorial Day picnic (2 actually), Adam finished his spring semester, we went on some walks in the brief instances of sunshine, we experimented with more baby food, Douglas figured out how to role over and also all animals are starting to learn that when he grabs them, it hurts. (See my parents dog on the couch with him.)

One of the few evenings of no rain, we went for a walk.

Dad and son wearing matching blues.

Douglas in the christening gown that my mom made for him.

Our life group after the baby dedication. On the right is Lance, then the Moores with Ava (she was born in August) then the Reinhardts with Douglas and then the Walkes with Wesley (he was born in December).

Memorial day picnic complete with Bocci ball!

Adam, Mary and Lance during a Bocci game.

Now, here is a theme that I have been noticing with Douglas. See if you can pick it out in the following pictures:

Anyone see what I am talking about ? It happens all the time and the boy even got my finger once (his teeth are SHARP!)

Now here is the animal sequence. See Douglas with Fiona, then on top of Fiona (looking like he wants to eat her paw), and then Fiona learns to keep space between them.

It has been an exciting month and will be an exciting summer. Adam has a lot of classes to get through (he will be finishing his first summer session this week), we have our 8th wedding anniversary as well as Adam's birthday and we will try our first camping-with-a-baby next week. We'll let you know how that goes. It is a trial run for our big Irvine family camping vacation that we take in August. Here goes nothing!

I am sitting here with my cat staring at my lap longingly. It is a rainy May evening and I am ignoring the cold and envisioning all my lovely growing plants. Adele wants to curl up where the lap top is and be warm but I have determined that I will write this post, so she will have to wait.

April was a very full month for us here in the Reinhardt household, people have been getting teeth, rolling over, sitting on their own and we have also gotten some trees taken down. But before I get ahead of myself let me break it down for you with illustrations.

As I stated, Douglas has gotten his first two teeth. They were actually noticed by Grammie Reinhardt and came in with no fanfare whatsoever. He always likes to put things in his mouth and now it has increased. See below.

His toes.

Any book he can find.

And as much of it as he can get in his mouth.

Along with getting some teeth, Douglas has also figured out how to sit on his own. He still tends to tip from side to side and when he lunges for his toys, well, face plants have abounded.

Here is when he was first figuring out that he could do it.

Now he sits up like a pro!

Remember when I was talking about that walk that we were going to go on back in April? Well, here is proof-positive - it was a lovely day and a lovely walk with a lovely boy!

A friend once told me that when kids start to move most pictures become a blur, and it has begun. We put him in his excersaucer a lot now and as you can see below, well, he doesn't stop moving. He gets quite excited at times and starts jumping up and down.

But I digress.

So after getting some teeth Douglas then also got his first dr. confirmed sickness - conjunctivitis. He has a very small tear duct in his right eye which doesn't let his tears drain very well and we think that is why he got the pink eye. That was then followed up with getting an ear-infection last week. It wasn't fun hearing him so congested and coughing with such a runny eye, but he actually held up pretty well under it all. We think he has rounded the bend and is getting back to his normal self.

Before all the sickness ensued and after the teeth arrived was his first Easter. It was a lovely day where my family came over for breakfast in the morning and then we went to Adam's family for dinner that night. Douglas was quite the looker if I do say so myself.

Easter Breakfast

Family Picture

While he was sick and I was at home with him we managed to get some trees taken down. Three in total, two of which were near the house and not very healthy. It was impressive how quickly the crew was able to take them down and get them chopped up. I have been wanting to do this since we moved in, so it feels very successful and grown-up to finally have gone ahead and have them cut down. Lest anyone is worried, we still have many trees filling out our front lawn.

The sick maple that had to come down.

The quick process of cutting a tree down with a boom truck.

The rolling over that was mentioned earlier was first witnessed by Nanna Irvine (my mom). So both grandmother's have been the first witnesses to major events. He has been trying for awhile but has usually gotten stuck by his shoulders. I think her toys were compelling enough because he hadn't seen them in awhile to finally get him to go all the way over. She has it on video and once we figure out how to get that on a post, I will share it with you all.

In addition to all of Douglas' firsts, Adam also managed to finish up his spring semester. From what I have heard he aced many of his classes. So congrats to him!

Now we are contemplating spring and summer. We have ordered our seeds and seedlings that will go in our 'community' garden (really its a garden we share with our friends the Newcombs, over in their yard. Did I mention that we have a lot of trees?) I have visions of tomatoes and cucumbers and sunlight dancing before my eyes. I think we have had our fill of April showers and the May flowers are definitely starting to arrive, so if we could just back off on the water works a little, it will be a fabulous spring!

Here's to warm weather and lots of great activities outside!

Till next time!

Happy May!

5 months old and April is finally here!

I am sitting here with Douglas on my lap, irish-american soda bread baking in the oven and I am contemplating going on a walk today. Yes, a walk. As in - ambulating outside with my son in the fairly mild and sunny weather. As in - not being in the house and getting some fresh air. As in - NOT being in the house and getting FRESH air. To things that I have sorely wanted but not been able to do yet because of the snow and the cold. It is going to be a good day!

So, now that we have the weather accounted for. Let's discuss other important events. The first being that Douglas is now 5 months old and per his doctor "the very image of a healthy bouncing baby boy". We took him for his 4 month appointment a little late and the bruiser weighed in at 18 lbs. 9 oz. and 29 inches (though we think the more accurate height is 27 inches). If he was 9 months old, he would be in the 50th percentile. Being that he was 4 months old then, he came in at the 90th percentile. So, he is still growing tall and strong. The other important events are that Douglas now loves to be in his stand-up excersaucer and has started on real food - rice cereal and bananas being the name of the game. He also loves to 'talk' now. He is very chatty in the morning and is starting to test out different volume levels and ranges of noises. It is quite humorous to listen to. Along with the standing that he is doing he is also starting to move around in his crib. We are beginning to find him in some interesting positions - as in 180 degrees from the position we first lay him down in. So lots of movement is going on in the Reinhardt household.

(Oh yes, and his mom may have also turned over another year...but the actually number isn't important anymore.)

So we can get outside and take that walk, without further adieu here are some pictures for what we have all been up to. Enjoy!

Reinhardt men getting ready for the superbowl.

The women before the wonderful superbowl.

Liz getting ready to go to Uganda to see the rain-water tanks for which her school had raised money.

Aunt Liz at the airport before leaving for Uganda with the Uganda Water Project.

New mobile that Aunt Liz got for him in Uganda. He loves looking at the new animals.

He is definitely progressing during tummy-time. Now he can lift his head and pick up objects. Crawling, here we come?

Douglas at 4 months old in his excersaucer.

Ignore me, but look at Douglas in his Mr. Rogers sweater, I love it!

How the experiment with food began - Douglas staring at his spoon.

Then he noticed the camera - couldn't take his eyes off it.

Douglas was more interested in the camera than in the rice cereal.

His general assessment of rice cereal by itself - wasn't sure what to do with it, but wasn't sure that he liked it. Thus, the addition of bananas.

I figure having sideways picture is now my signature move, so why change.

Happy Spring everyone!