Hap hap happiest Christmas

Christmas weekend started with

a trip to Portland to weigh in at REI 

 followed by a MAX train ride 

to the Portland Zoo 

to meet an elephant (but we missed Baby Lily by 2 hours)

then we went home for some coloring 

and decorating before

opening presents and 

making a mess.

Christmas Eve we headed back to Portland to see family (4 generations!) 

and meet new friends 

before ending the long weekend back at home Christmas night to practice climbing into our new potty chair. 

Phew! Time for some rest (or just going back to work....)

As Seen On TV!

On Sunday night Jay had the opportunity to go to the Trailblazers game against the New Orleans Hornets in Portland with our good buddy Jordan.  They had great seats and even made it onto to the highlight reel!  Blazers won at the very last second!

What does a dinosaur say??

Beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Yesterday was the day to get into the holiday spirit!  Last year we missed out on getting Wren's picture with Santa and it was at the top of my list for this year, so we decided to drive to Albany to partake in Storybook Land.  We weren't sure what to expect, other than Santa being available at some point, and now we know that Storybook Land involves many, many displays depicting Christmas tales, nursery rhymes and movie stories, all made of a menagerie of dolls, puppets, little houses, etc. Wren really enjoyed the dancing penguins in the "Chilly Willy" display. 

We didn't linger for very long since our main goal was to get that Santa's lap photo and when our turn came I thought we were ready and Wren would love Santa!  The picture speaks for itself.  Classic upset kid photo - even the lighting is perfect!  Santa was a great sport and still gave us candy canes for the effort. We watched the next kids happily participate so Wren will know what to do next year.  

Some of the decor was a little hodgepodge - not sure what the hoodlum-y cabbage patch kid is for... 

We then drove straight to Sunrise Tree Farm, the same location we found our tree last year when Wren was only 9 weeks old!  This time we didn't have to look very far before coming upon the perfect tree for us!  I think the best part about the video/pictures is that I happen to be wearing the same hat and jacket from last year - I suppose it's a tradition now?! With tree in stand at home we placed our modest array of ornaments all on the top half - sneaky fingers would just love to snatch them all down if she could.  And you know it's really Christmas season when the Kenny Rogers Christmas album tells you so.  Let the merriment begin! 

A Wren-sized tree!

A Sunny Day

Two weeks ago we got lucky in our neck of the woods and had a sunny, warm day after a rainy few preceded it (and buckets have fallen since).  That also happened to be the day we scheduled family photos - double luck!  I was pretty excited to have our pictures taken since we have never had someone officially take pictures for us.  Our engagement photos consisted of one of us holding the camera for our pictures together.  Wedding pictures were taken by our lovely family and guests.  Newborn photos were all thanks to the home camera.  So this was a big step for us - paying a photographer.  Who would have thought we'd come to this!  We received our disc back on Sunday and here are a few from the bunch.  I gotta say - we look pretty good!  Our christmas cards have been ordered (look, ma!  I'm ahead of the game on something!) with our favorites (which are being kept secret!). 

13 months!

What's new?  Plenty!  Wren continues to be a chatterbox and on Monday the 19th strung two words together - "Hi Daddy!"  Wren recently spent a whole day saying "ba-pa" after playing with a fellow daycare-goers backpack. Last Friday night Wren threw us for a loop when she woke up about 12:45 a.m. W.I.D.E. awake.  The girl was dancing in her crib and talking up a storm.  She was ready to play and walk around.  A diaper change, milk and a little play time transpired and then I tried to get her to lay down with me.  Two stories later, with lights out, Wren proceeded to poke me with a plastic fork from her new tea set and shove a plastic egg into my face.  Back to her crib she went at 3:45 AM and, thankfully, with little resistance went to sleep until 7:15 in the daylight hours.  Wow.  A quick text to some of my Momfriends gave suggestions and sympathy.  We did discover later that day that tooth #7 appeared - a budding tooth providing a jolt of mid-o-night energy?  Being very clueless about the wonders of babyhood leaves me thinking that anything is possible. 
Wren is now walking about 90% of the time.  She loves to try to climb up and into things and we have even caught her planking under the kitchen table! Over the past few weeks Wren had a belated birthday party with part of her extended family in Portland and had her second visit to a pumpkin patch, mastering the corn maze.  We had a trip to Eastern Oregon to visit Grandma Ramona (and did really well on the long drive!) and the following weekend Gramma Sondy came over for a visit.  Wren's 1 year checkup provided stats of 23 pounds, 12 oz (92%) and 30.25 inches tall (82%).  Growth is slowing!  And with her increased activities those chunky little thighs are slimming down.  (I have to admit that I'm pretty sad about that.)  With her checkup came immunizations, including a flu shot, and one week later she had to stay home with a fever.  She's a toughie, though, and tonight barely made a whimper when she had her second dose of flu vaccine (taking the band-aid off later was a different story...).
We are super excited for the holidays and to see Wren's reactions to everything that is to come!

Wren likes to show off her healthy belly!

Hi!

On Halloween Wren started saying "Hi" and waving as we walked among the other trick-or-treaters downtown.  Now she says "Hi" pretty often and spends time in her carseat waving and "Hi"-ing to me in the mirror! Here she is from last night carrying one of her birthday cards while scooting around on her yBike.  She just gets cuter all the time, if I do say so myself!

Happy Hoo-hoo-lloween!

Love,

 WrenOwl and her monster bag

First Steps!!

On Friday, October 26th, Wren Hazel took her first steps!  

(Ignore the crazy lady on the left)... Wren stayed home on Friday with Jay due to a fever the previous afternoon. In spite of being under the weather she rallied for her first steps. Woo hoo!  

12 months!!

Hard to believe, but we have arrived at Wren's 1st birthday as of 8:10 AM on 10-10!  Wow!  The last year has flown by and now we have a big girl in our midst!  We won't know Wren's official growth stats until the 19th but she is tall and strong.  A weigh-in on the home scale on 10-10-12 read 23.4 pounds.  Not quite walking but standing and getting around happily on all fours.  Wren is a chatterbox with all sorts of sounds.  We thought we heard her almost say "binky" yesterday and she told me "Mama no-no" when I took her away from my hair supplies to get ready for bath time last week.  Over the weekend we went to Newberg to see family and start the birthday celebration early - Wren had her first cupcake!  Lemon filling with yellow frosting.  She did a great job of getting messy!  On Sunday we headed to an expansive pumpkin patch with tons of activities outside Woodburn.  Wren enjoyed watching older kids play on a big jumping pad and we rode on the bug ride - 55 gallon drums with seats welded in them and pulled by a tractor.  For Wren's official birthday she was thrown a little party at daycare and visited my work with me for a short time.  On our way home we stopped by Jay's class and his college students sang Happy Birthday to Wren before she had her first bites of carrot cake - yum!
Wren loves her waterbaby and shoes (especially shoes on her hands) and us, of course!  She really likes all kinds of fruits and cheese and practicing feeding herself with a spoon.  She does not like avocados or getting her face washed and currently thinks very little of her straw cup (it gets thrown to the floor...).  Wren has been a very good sleeper recently and we are so proud of her! 
To think back on where we were a year ago is amazing - one day being a couple and the next being parents.  Bringing home a fragile baby and now watching our lady be amazingly independent.  This year has been full of changes in our lives and we cannot imagine Wren not being here with us.  (But if we could change one thing it would be to have Shepdog back.)

Pumpkin Hill with daddy

This girl loves shoes!

Cousins! 

Three generations 

Bug ride!!!

1 year!!

Happy Birthday, Wren!!!!!

Our sweet girl is 1 year old today.  We love you so much!!!

Little Librarian

The whole family had eye exams recently and Wren modeled kiddy glasses for us - she has no need for a real pair but she sure looks cute!

11.5 months!

In the last few weeks Wren has experienced her first Race for the Cure!  She was a great sport for our 5k walk for a great cause with family.  Wren has started saying "Mama" quite often - it's a very nice addition to "Dada"!  She is still crawling everywhere but can stand unassisted and lower herself back down very well.  We are thinking first steps could be any time!  Wren picked up a cold this past week from daycare but it hasn't slowed her down one bit and, wouldn't you know, she isn't phased at all by a runny nose... but try to come close with a tissue or other snot-removing device and you won't get very far!  Wren's favorite toy is still her water baby and she knows exactly "who" we are talking about when we ask about baby.  Today we were all in the back bedroom and Jay and I asked Wren where her baby was and if she could get her.  Wren thought about it for a few seconds, dropped on all fours and headed for the living room.  She came right back with her baby!!  This girl just keeps on amazing us.  She has also discovered my basket of yarn, that she can rip a corner guard right off of the coffee table, and how much fun it is to put headbands on - she does a great job of putting them on!

We are so close to the 1 year mark - so much reflecting happening for Jay and I.  What an (almost) year  it has been!

Wren had her own entry number and t-shirt!

Daddy is so close but so far!

Fun with yarn!

First independent swing ride!

Naptrap

Caught sleeping with her hand in the Cheerio jar!

Not once....but twice!