Monroe bound and Christmas ready!!

Well, we're off to Monroe tomorrow and excited to celebrate Nate's first Christmas!  People keep asking if I got him lots of stuff.....my response...no :)  I did get him one book because he is getting more and more interested in reading.  I don't really see the point in going crazy on toys especially since his favorite toys are empty toilet paper rolls, Christmas paper rolls, spoons, and paper.  We have to be careful whenever we have paper/cardboard/plastic around because he attacks it and tries to eat it instantaneously.  I don't know if he's low on some sort of vitamin or what!
Here's us a few weeks back hunting for our perfect tree...well our affordable tree this year :)

Here's the morning after I did my decorating.  Joe won't help me because it's MY tree since I always want a real one.  I don't mind though because I love real trees and I do all the cleaning up afterwards too, so there Joey.   One year I even took it down myself, threw it over the deck, and drug it to the front to be picked up!

Nate's growing like a weed and fitting in to his 12 month clothes pretty easily.  He's back to eating pretty well now that his first tooth is cut so hopefully he's in a good eatin mood for Christmas.
Here's a few at home photos..

Nate's using a sippy cup pretty regularly now and has a good grip on that.  He says gooooooo a lot but is still mostly a fan of screeching, gurgling, and yelling rather than making any noticeable sounds.  He loves standing and holds on to the coffee table for 20 minutes at a time.  He can walk all the way around the coffee table on his own by holding on to the edges and side stepping around it.  He's fallen quite a few times of course but doesn't usually make a peep and just tries to reach back up and get back standing.  Joe lowered his mattress all the way down because I went in to get him after a nap and he was standing up holding on to the edge of his crib...slight heart attack on my end!  His favorite games are when we sneak up and down the stairs and attack him, play peek a boo, and bark at him....yes bark at him.  He thinks it's a riot! 
Like I said, he likes books and especially loves this book with a mirror in it.  He LOVES looking at himself and kissing/licking himself.  It's pretty gross actually.  A lot of times he lays his face on the mirror and just stares.

Well, that's it for now, I should get back to packing up for the weekend.  Have a wonderful Christmas all and hope to see a lot of you over the next few days!

Yes...we're alive

Ok, sorry for the lack of blogging but we are having some serious technical difficulties at the Ruf/Olson household.  The camera is dead and the charger can't be found....and no it doesn't run off of regular batteries so we can't put in new ones.  Plus, my computer has been hacked and I can't get online and now have to fix my computer....blah.  Anyways, here's a few old photos off of the video camera and a funny video of Nate enjoying the swing at the park back in late fall.
Tipping.....

 Slipping....

 Fallen...

Here's a video from swinging in the park a while ago...I believe Nate enjoys it!  Sorry the video is sideways.

We enjoyed the blizzard this weekend by staying home and doing a whole lot of nothing.  It was way to cold to head out and enjoy the snow, plus I doubt my car would start if we went out.  We got our Christmas tree last week and Nate hasn't been too interested in it or the gifts underneath it so that is nice not having it get attacked! 
He finally finally finally cut his first tooth.  For the past 3-4 days he's been insanely cranky and refused to eat much of anything.  Thankfully, we've had some experience in frustration with this before so we didn't lose our cool with him not eating.  He won't really let you look at the tooth but I can feel the little dagger in there.  He's back to his old eating ways now and wants everything in your hands!
What else has happened...?  We had a great Thanksgiving back in Monroe and plan on heading back for Christmas.  Nate's crawling everywhere and having no problems getting around.  He loves getting in the kitchen now and opening drawers.  I give him pans which he likes to pound on so that ups the noise level.  He laughs hysterically out of nowhere sometimes.  It's kind of odd/funny.  He was in the highchair the other day and I was going to the fridge and making a bottle and he started low growling in to a crazy shrieking laugh.  Trisha came in the door and we were both talking and out of no where he just started laughing again.  Like I said, it's funny but kind of odd!  I'm afraid he's plotting crazy plans. 
  Alrighty, I'll try to fix our tech problems and blog more!!  Happy Holidays

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow!

This past weekend we got our first snowfall.  I think our area had about 8 inches or so that came down.  It was that very heavy wet snow so it was good packing snow.  It snowed Friday night and pretty much all day on Saturday.  When Nate and I got up on Saturday I couldn't help but put him in his snowsuit my mom got him and prop him up on the deck!  He was too cute and didn't seem to mind....only when the huge wet snowflakes got in his eyes, he didn't really know what that was!

This is Nate in the window getting his first look at snow!

Hanging out in his bouncy watching the snow fall.

This is a pic from a week ago when there was no snow and just a nice fall day...Nate loves to be outside and is the happiest when we are outside or just anywhere doing something. 

My mom came up this past weekend for a big craft fair that's held every spring and fall.  My friend Mary came along with her son Finn and mom Kathy.  Finn is 3 months old and Nate had been donating his clothes to Finn to wear, but Finn is a champ eater and has caught up to Nate in baby clothes size!  Here's Finn showing Nate how to eat like a man!

The wonderful thing about this giant craft fair is that they also sell beer and wine....this is what originally got me to start going to this craft fair a few years ago, but lo and behold I have become a crafter myself and tend to buy more than my mom and sister do, crazy I know.  Don't worry I still enjoy the beverages and we had a good time with our photos and shocking the crafter ladies with my baby strapped to my chest and beer in hand!

Now that's just what I call classy.  Not to worry we only had one beer....keep in mind we were there for about 5 hours....I'm not kidding, the fair is huge!
Nate and Finn were champs the whole time we were there.  Finn mostly napped and Nate was either carried, hanging out in his stroller, or strapped to my chest.  However, having a baby strapped to your chest at a craft fair with a million women opens yourself up for TONS of random conversations and ladies wanting to touch the baby, ask questions, interact, and tell you how cute he is.  Not my favorite thing but my lovely sister likes to watch me squirm away from strangers. 
Here's a montage of trying to get a picture of the grandmas trying to pose with the boys...didn't go too well!

Yah, we tried.  Nate was too interested in touching Finn or trying to hold his hands.  Soon enough Nate and you'll be good buds!  It was a fun weekend of snow and crafts!

9 months old!

Alright, just kidding that's not really Nate for all you slow folks out there.  I was checking out people.com before I posted this blog, saw this monkey and kept showing it to Nate who would squeal like crazy!  Maybe it's his brother from another mother.  You have to admit the big eyes are similar to Nate :) It's quite the likeness if you ask me.

Nate went to the doctor today for his 9 month check up.  I lied to him and told him it would be shot free but apparently you are supposed to give babies flu shots so he got one today.  The nurse gave him the shot and he didn't make a peep or seem to notice, it was kind of bizarre.  Joe, myself, and the nurse all looked back and forth at each other shocked that he made no noise, but oh well!

As you can tell, Nate has a bit of an obsession with grabbing his diaper.  When the diaper is off he has also found stuff to grab down there and he's quite fascinated...what a boy :)
Nate's weight was 18 pounds 13 ounces------Joe and I continued our betting and I said 19 lbs. 1 ounce. Joe said 22 lbs........obviously I win!
Height- 27.5 inches
Head - 17.5 inches
Everything was around the 25th percentile for 9 month olds so he is now solidly on that chart. 

Nate failed to qualify for any early intervention programs when the ladies came out last week....woo hoo!!  Two ladies came to the house, one was a teacher in the district and the other was a motor skills person.  After she was done evaluating Nate she exclaimed, "well congrats he failed to qualify!"  Confusing I know.  Basically, he is up to par on everything for his age and they don't have major concerns. The only concern was that he isn't so accurate with putting food in his mouth but that's it.  The sitting and crawling is all good stuff!  What he did qualify for was a program called the Follow Along Program.  Basically a public nurse calls every 3 months to see how he's doing and if there are concerns they send people out so we signed up for that one.  It'll be nice to have that resource around.

Happy Halloween!

Hope everyone had a great Halloween weekend!  Here's a few photos of that crazy lion with our friends Jake and Jamie's daughter Jacqueline.  Nate was very interested in petting her face for some reason :)

I gathered some of my old 80's gear to head out on the town a little bit on Saturday night...

Nate also poses well as a lovely M&M!

Head tickle game!

Nate's bear hat modeling.

Latest news....Nate's swing has been retired to the basement.  He has not been a fan of it for a few months now so we made room for his standing/bouncer thing----I obviously can't think of the name for it :)  This coming Friday a nurse and a teacher from the district are coming to the house.  They are with an Early Intervention Program that a woman at the county told me would come out for free to check his progress as a preemie.  I don't really feel like it's necessary since he's doing well but they follow up regularly so if anything comes up it's nice to have the contact.  His 9 month appointment is coming up in a few weeks on the 11th of November so we'll see how he's growing.  Haven't been since his 6 month and thankfully we don't have to do shots this time around.  He's continuing to crawl/drag himself all around so he's getting quite mobile!

Fall Adventures

Here are some pictures from our trip to the zoo a few weekends ago.  Nate was not in a bad mood even though he will not look at the camera and generally looks annoyed.  I don't believe he smiled in any photo...he was just a curious, quiet observer of everything.  He also had a nap that was cut short so that may have had something to do with it as well along with a ton of people, the sun was bright, and he's also easily distracted. :)  He definitely enjoys being outside though.  Eatin lunch...

 Inside the zoo watching the gorillas.  Nate was a big fan of watching the spider monkeys run around.... again it would not be known by that face.

 Attempts at getting Nate to look at the camera and smile.....not gonna happen!

This is just funny

 Since Nate is obsessed with lions we had to stop and see him.  There was a mouse in there as well so of course Joe had a panic attack :)

 There were lions everywhere!

 This is also the pretty park where Joe and I had our engagement pictures taken a few winters ago.  Weird to be back with a baby!

 Nate sits up on his own now quite well and here he is showing off those skills.

W

e got Nate's lion costume at Macy's at the Mall.  Here we went to surprise Aunt Trisha at work...he's an intense lion

 Much less scary lion here!

Here's a pre-lion video at the mall...I just think it's funny.  I was there with my friend Andrew and we were feeding Nate applesauce when he decided to attack the stroller for no apparent reason....apparently it's delicious!

 

Here's some attempts at crawling/booty shuffling!  He gets closer and closer every day to full on crawling.

We'll end the blog with a little future Chippendales shot....we're aiming high!

Happy early Halloween!