What's going on with us...

I decided it's time for a little bit more than a photo update, so here goes. We have had a few things happen in the last little while, for one I'm not working anymore. What happened you might ask? We got a e-mail from our Relief Society of this family who was looking for a full-time babysitter for her 6 month-old and preschooler. I jumped right on it and e-mailed her back that I was VERY interested. It would be more profitable for us since we wouldn't have to pay a babysitter ourselves. She got back with me and we set up an interview. I went for the interview and everything was perfect they wanted me to take a cpr and first aid class and check some other things out. Next day I go to work and put my 2 week notice in. A couple days later I get a call from the husband ( I usually got the calls from the wife) saying that their temporary babysitter fell in love with the kids and decided to snatch the full-time job. I was very disappointed. Although I was hurt I hold no grudges and I hope the best for their family. I just wish they would've clued the temporary in on the details of them looking for a full-time babysitter to "replace" her with. Oh well. So things have been extra tight financially this month for us. We're still trying to figure out how we're going to get Christmas gifts for everyone. I know things will work out in the end, i'll cross my fingers. I just know I'm going to have to get a little creative this year!
On another note Doug is on his 2nd to last semester of school before he graduates with an Associates degree in Web Development. He already has a couple places he's looking to apply for a job at. Besides school, work is the only other thing that Doug has been up to.
Erik is doing very well, he's getting 2 molars and one eye tooth in. He's holding up pretty well. Some cute things he has been doing lately are, whenever it's bath time he'll come in the room with me and when I start the water filling he'll try to climb in the tub even though I still need to take his clothes off, it's very cute. He also likes to try and get us to feed him our food even though he already ate. He's learning how to drink out of a sippy cup, he climbs the stairs now, so we have to make sure and put the gate up for him. Well we hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. We will be going out to Arizona for a couple of days to visit family so the next time I update I'll have lots of pictures!

Cute Video

I picked up some baskets to hold Erik's toys and he decided to sit in one of the baskets, but couldn't get out so I made a little video, I couldn't resist.

I need your address

I'm actually going to be sending Christmas cards out this year so if you could leave your address in a comment that would be great! Happy Holidays to everyone!

Erik and the lime

Back in late August early September my brother Ken and his wife, Nikki came to visit the family in Michigan, during this visit Nikki showed me youtube videos of babies first experience with tasting lime/lemons and the faces they make. So we decided to make a little video of our own. The only thing is it made him cry a little. So Nikki this one's for you, Enjoy!



A while back I got my hair cut, short. It's been about 8 months and it's getting to where I like it better so I thought I'd share a pic.

Erik's Birthday Party!!!

Erik with his quilt that I finally finished

Erik's quilt, done!

Erik's gift from Grandma and Grandpa, his cousins
enjoyed playing with it more

Erik looking at his birthday card from Grandma and Grandpa

Erik with his quilt

Daddy and Erik

Erik taking off his birthday hat

Julia and Rachel

Erik's birthday cake that I decorated, I was pretty
impressed with my decorating abilities

Blowing out the candle with the help of Grandma and Rachie

Just before blowing the candle out

Present pile!

icecream...

cake...yum!

Erik and Uncle James

Grandpa and Erik, he was getting sleepy

Grandma and Erik

Erik had a wonderful 1st birthday party. He didn't exactly understand what was going on but he is plenty of years to figure it out. I think he was a little overwhelmed! He still had fun though, I know I did!

You've had a birthday shout hooray!

How the time flies! Erik just turned 1 on the 12th, he has grown so much and I just wanted to share some fun things about him in memory of his 1st year of life.

*First of all Erik is the most fun, happy baby I know, ( most of the time :)
*He loves to play with mommy and daddy, and pretty much anyone who starts playing with him
*He is not a picky eater, at least not yet, he tries anything we give him and has never refused food we give him
*He plays well by himself if mom or dad are busy doing other things ie. playing WOW
*He goes to bed at night time wonderfully, and sleeps the whole night
*I love his laugh, if I am having a not so good day his smile or his laughs will put me in a happier mood
*When mom or dad are sitting on the couch he will climb up and sit next to you and cuddle, for a few seconds at a time.
*He is a great walker which is his main mode of movement
*He never fails to try and sneak through the gate when we go into another room, also he always crys once we close the gate and he is not on the same side as mom or dad
*He does very well with other people holding him, although he might look at them with a blank stare for a little while
*His hair is curly and I love it
*He likes to see his reflection in the mirror

As you can see there are so many wonderful things about Erik and we love him dearly and have been blessed since he has come into our family. Here are some pictures of Erik throughout his first year of life, enjoy! Also I have made alot of progress on his quilt that I mentioned about 2 months ago, it will be done in a couple of days and I will post pictures of it.

9 months

5 months

3 months

4 months

1 week old

1 week old

his "birth" day

Halloween and misc. pictures of Erik

Erik was a monkey for halloween,
and a very cute one too!

Eating a banana

One day I came downstairs and saw Erik in the box

Tagged

In this tag you have to post the 4th picture in your 4th photo folder since most of my pics are of Erik I thought I'd pick a different photo and put the 4th photo from said folder.


This was when Doug and I lived at the East Lansing Student Living Center. Me and Doug were dating at the time and were hanging out with our friend Jamie, HI!

Now I tag Ruth, Jamie, Naomi, and whoever else wants to join in!

Pictures!

Erik, me and Uncle Ken

Erik, me and Aunt Nikki

Erik and Daddy

Erik and Mommy

Erik being a cutie

Erik walking

Here is Erik walking the farthest he's done so far!

Splish splash!

This is a video from the summer that I've been meaning to post. It's his first time in the pool and he loved it. Enjoy!

Learning how to walk

Today I have been sick, but I can't take a nap without waking up feeling ucky, so i decided to post a little something. Nothing new has been going on with Doug, or me, but Erik, he has just started walking, well kinda. He can stand up all on his own and he can take a few steps if he's concentrating. For instance if I am sitting in front of him beckoning him to me while he is in walking mode aka standing up, he will get way too excited and fall on his face and just end up crawling the rest of the way to me. It is still the cutest thing! I have been trying really hard to get him to hold his own bottle and finally he is able to feed himself while laying down, ( he hasn't figured out how to tip the bottle so he isn't just sucking on air).

A while back I decided I wanted to learn how to quilt. So I am going to have one of my friends from church help me put together a quilt for Erik's first birthday, which isn't that far away, So I will be posting updates on that. I am very excited! Well I better get some food before Erik wakes up from his 2nd nap of the day!

Much needed update

I have kind of fallen of the blog wagon, so here's my attempt at redeeming this error. I had a request from my sister to entertain my readers with the happenings of mine and Doug's life. Well, sad to say nothing notable has happened lately, which is always a good thing. As I mentioned in my last entry I have gone back to work part-time. I have been back for almost a month now and I am enjoying it, somewhat. I have worked with this company on and off for about 6 years and the owner knows me fairly well. Another thing they know about me is that I am mormon. I was told on my second day of work that one of the employee's that knew me previously mentioned to everyone that I was coming back to work and that they needed to watch there language and such. I really appreciated that. Anyways, back about a year ago we had a temp working for a couple months and we talked about religion and I ended up giving him a Book of Mormon, he read it and we talked about it. Eventually he quit and I didn't get to see if he wanted to go to church or have the missionaries come over. When I went back to work a few weeks ago he was working there again as a temp. I asked him if he still had the book and if he still read it, he said that he has read it a couple times and I asked him if he'd still be interested in going to church some time to see what he thought about it. So I got his phone number and I am going to be inviting him to come next week, or whenever he's able too. Last week I ended up giving away another Book of Mormon to someone that I work with. I'm not sure she is really interested in going to church or anything but I wasn't going to deny her a free book that she could eventually read and then want to learn more. So we'll see what happens with these two.

A couple months ago I was at target, getting ready to leave and I put Erik in the car and I put my purse with keys and phone in as well. I accidentally pressed the lock button on the door. I started to get scared wondering what I was going to do with my baby locked in a car. So I decided to call down people walking into the store to see if they'd let me borrow their phone so I could call Doug to unlock the door. Fortunatley I had the windows rolled down a little bit. I got one lady to help me, she used a curtain rod she was returning and stuck it through the crack in the window and pushed the power button too unlock the door. I was very greatful for this act of kindness, although I felt kind of silly for having locked Erik in the car, luckily he was a good boy the whole 10 min. he was trapped.

If any of you know about Stephenie Meyers and her Twilight series I have just started reading it and I love it. I started reading it this past Wed. and I am almost done with it. I can't wait to start the next one. My reconnection to the library has reminded me how wonderful it is to read books, not that I haven't read them.

Erik is on his way to walking, and soon. He stands up all by himself without holding onto anything, or grabbing onto my pant legs. He has started to take a couple steps as well. Most of the time he'll get overexcited in his attempt to walk to me that his feet will not move as fast as he needs them to go as he leans forward and then he just ends up crawling the rest of the way and jumping onto me. I hope this satisfies my loyal readers.

So, it's been a while

Things have been busy with our family this past month. For starters I just started going back to work part-time, I got a piano, which I don't know how to play. I am hoping to teach myself, it should be fun. We went on a little vacation to visit Doug's mom and his sisters Angel and Stephanie. We attempted camping in my mother-in-laws backyard, she has a large yard on the border of the Manistee National Forest, it's beautiful. It didn't work out as well as we had hoped, but we still had fun. One of the major reasons it didn't work out the greatest is because Doug had gotten all 4 of his wisdom teeth removed, he was completely out of it and in pain for almost 2 weeks straight! Hopefully now he is back to his normal self. My brother Ken and his wife Nikki also came into visit during August. It was really fun to be able to spend some time with them. As for news of Erik, he is moving around and getting into all kinds of trouble. As of late he has been standing on his own for a few seconds at a time and then he falls down on his butt, it's so cute. I have mastered his napping schedule for his and my sanity, which has been wonderful. I think I have just about covered everything, so here are some pics to enjoy, I'll post a video "tomorrow".

Big smile!

Erik playing with Uncle Ken, he had lots of fun

Another big smile

At the Renaissance Festival we got Erik a cute hat

human statue at Ren Festival

chillin' with uncle Ken, until Erik spits up...

and Uncle Ken freaked out and scared Erik with his
booming outburst

Having some fun

After his wisdom teeth were taken out

At Grandma Elliotts

The ride home from Grandma Elliott's