Aunt Trudy's Party

While we were up north we went to Aunt Trudy's surpise 70th birthday party. Trudy is Betsy's sister. She was clearly very surprised!



These are Trudy's kids: Steve, Dave and Darla - the hosts of the party, along with their spouses.



This is Karin and Miriam. Karin is Dave's wife. Miriam is a little less than a month younger than Stian, and Stian is about twice her size.



Klebo hanging out.



Yeah, he's clearly my kid.



Poor Stian. By the end of the party he was exhausted, and Auntie Karin just mocked him.



But he likes her anyway.



Kris took lots and lots of pictures at the party, these are just a few. If you want more, e-mail Kris.

Up North III

A few more pictures of our visit at Grandma and Grandpa Skjervolds' house.

Up North Part II

Then we headed to Kris's parents' house in The Cities.

And yay! They have Tinkertoys!









(uh oh, Stian is supposed to be sleeping but is crying! I'll have to finish this later!)

Up North

We just got back from another trip up north to visit family.

But first, I should mention that a couple of days before we left (on September 17th) we were installing Stian's new car seat in the car and I had laid Stian down on a blanket in the grass next to the car while we read the instructions, and I looked over and Stian was sitting up. That's the first time we know of that he has sat up on his own. He's been doing it quite a bit since then.

Anyway, we headed north on the 20th, and went to my parents' house first. Wayne and Nathaniel were there the first two days. It was rather amusing to watch Nathaniel with Stian. He was a little skeptical, as is evidenced in this picture:



He was interested in Stian, but not too sure. I'm sure he's not overly thrilled with having to share all the attention. Hopefully soon Stian will get to be a playmate for him.

We have been working on finger foods with Stian for awhile. Finally on this trip he seemed to master the art of Cheerio eating.



Here we are going for a walk down the road with my mom and Nathaniel. Look at Nathaniel walking! It's so exciting to see him walking so well!



Later in the day the boys played on the grass while all the adults sat in chairs and watched. What did we do before there were kids around to entertain us?







There's the look again.



You've got a Cheerio stuck on your chin kid.

"No I don't!"



"I do?!"





The next morning Stian hung out with Grandma. I'm sure my mother won't be happy with me for posting this picture as she hadn't showered yet. But I think it's cute!



And then - very exciting! - on Tuesday evening, our last evening there - Stian did this:



He started crawling!!! He really wanted to get to that Herberger's catalog. Poor kid. We kept moving it to get him to crawl more. And then in the end we still wouldn't let him have it because he just wanted to eat it. I guess he was really excited about the sale!

The next morning we headed to Kris's parents' house...

Fake?

This is Stian's new smile. I can't decide if it's a fake smile, an exaggerated smile, or if he's just making faces at me. It's pretty amusing though, whatever it is.

Getting closer

A Saturday Afternoon

I rarely get to see Stian sleep these days. For one thing, I don't like to disturb him while he's sleeping. But for another, he is such a light sleeper that as soon as I open the door to his room his head pops up. But yesterday afternoon I went in to wake him up from his nap - it was a little after 5:00, and I don't let him sleep later than that or he'll have a hard time going down for the night on time - and he didn't wake up. And I thought he was awfully cute with his butt sticking up in the air, so I ran off to get the camera.



After I woke him up we played with him in his crib for a little bit. He's getting really good at getting up on his hands and knees, especially in his crib. After dinner we were playing on the bed, and he was doing this then too. And he was trying to move forward. He'd rock back and forth and then lurch forward. But for now that just means he face plants. Good thing we were doing this on the bed!



And then just a cute picture Kris got of him going downstairs to have dinner.

Hand and Knees and Feet

We were trying to get a picture of Stian up on his hands and knees, but he wasn't really cooperating. He'd do it if there wasn't a camera pointed at him, but not when it was. He's almost doing it in this picture. He's been doing it more and more lately.



He's also getting better at standing.

Me and My Cup

Stian's new favorite toy is a green plastic cup. Life is so much better if you have a green plastic cup to share it with.

Movin' on up!

Good-bye cute little green car



Hello snazzy charcoal gray car (the color is technically "lava sand")!



It's actually kind of sad to say good-bye to my little '95 Geo Prizm. As Kris pointed out, I've had that car for a third of my life! It's been a good little car too. But man, don't I look cool in my '05 Volvo XC70? ;)

Labor Day

We went to the park today to celebrate Labor Day. It was a beautiful morning at the park. This time we went to Happy Hollow Park, which is a really nice park in West Lafayette that has two enormous playgrounds - one for little kids and one for big kids. It also has picnic shelters and grassy areas and trails through the woods.

We played on the swings, had a picnic lunch and then went for a walk in the woods.