Little Drummer Girl

Was a pretty uneventful week, except for the snow. We got a lot of new snow and we went snowboarding a lot this weekend. Friday, Stan shredded Breckenridge in the morning, then Tracy went to Abasin in the afternoon. Lots of powder. Saturday, our friend Kristi was kind enough to watch Casey, so we could go ride together for the first time in a long time!

Casey has a bit of a cold and fever this week. This afternoon her temp was 102.2 so we took her to the Doc...weighs 17.1 lbs with a wet diaper on. Doc thinks it's just a virus, but we'll monitor her temp the next couple days.

We started her on baby food dinners this weekend, which includes meat. I think she's a little unsure about the taste, but hopefully she'll get used to it. She is still army crawling, no hands and knees crawl yet. She gets up on her knees and rocks a little, but then drops when she wants to move. She has learned how to pull herself into our laps and is interested in pulling herself up, she just doesn't know how to just yet.

Casey wants to wish her Uncle Dave a belated Happy Birthday and her cousins Jack and Ashlynne a Happy Birthday!!

our lil' drummer girl

watching the hokies win the acc championship game

enjoying her exersaucer...from below

Thanksgiving Week

We all flew to VA on Nov 20th for a week and a half of VT and Thanksgiving activities. We drove down to VT for the weekend to watch the Hokies beat Duke that Saturday. Casey stayed with Gramma Lois and Great Aunt Linda during the game and definitely kept them entertained.

Monday was spent at Dulles Town Center mall with Jessica and her 2 boys, Hunter (4) and Jacob (2). Casey enjoyed lunch in the food court, riding the carousel, getting her picture taken with Santa (she was so good, no crying at all), attention from Hunter (he loves playing with Casey) and people watching.

Tuesday we headed to MD to visit some CO friends (who also have a house in MD), Kathy, Sean, Dillon (1 1/2) and their new baby boy, Connor. We also visited Stacey and her kids John Patrick (1 1/2)and Cate (11 1/2 months). We then headedto Aunt Marcy and Uncle Stuart's house for dinner. Aunt Kel was in town from Boulder, Grandma Gail and Grandpa Tom were also there. Casey had her first finger food...Sweet Potato Puffs. Quite a treat!

Wednesday we hung out at Grandma Gail and Grandpa Tom's house. Aunt Kel was there and Aunt Marcy, Uncle Stuart, Lily and Jack came over too. Marcy, Tracy and Kel went for a 5 mile run around Burke Lake to try and fend off any Thanksgiving Day pounds. Tracy spent the rest of the day making pies (pumpkin, apple and pecan). Stan came over in the evening and Great Uncle Mike, Great Aunt Jeanne, Alli and Davis arrived that evening from KY.

Thursday was a fun day hanging with everyone. Casey entertained all day and got to stay up late to visit. She sat at the dinner table eating puffs and veges and was very well behaved. Turkey dinner was delicious!!

Casey is army crawling everywhere. She loves any type of cord she can get her hands on. Everything still goes straight into her mouth. She can find any piece of anything on the floor...no matter if you vacuum that day or not, she'll find something. She also talks non-stop. Sometimes it actually sounds like she is having a real conversation. And she is very smiley! She has started understanding peek-a-boo and we've gotten a couple little laughs out of her while playing. She is trying to figure out how to pull herself up. My parents have a step from the family room to the kitchen and she kept trying to crawl up it. She is still eating 5 6oz bottles, and we have now added fruit to her day. She eats oatmeal in the morning, fruit at lunch and vegetables at dinner. She seems to like everything so far.

Friday we drove to Roanoke for our second turkey dinner at Great Aunt Linda and Great Uncle Marvin's. Auntie Cousin Blair and Chad were in town from Pittsburgh. We met up with them again on Saturday night at Gramma Lois' house for a couple rounds of Family Feud...after we got back from the Hokies game. VT beat the Wahoo's to win the ACC Coastal division and to move on the ACC championship game (being played in Tampa on Dec 6 against BC).

Sunday we spent 6 hours in the car on our way back to NOVA. We finally made it to Grandma Gail and Grandpa Tom's house to put up the Christmas tree with Aunt Kel, Aunt Marcy, Lily and Jack. The big event was Santa Claus stopping by. Lily was very shy and wouldn't look at him, Jack wasn't sure about the jolly old fellow, Casey screamed when she looked at him.

Tracy and Casey fly out tomorrow. Looking forward to some rest and relaxation:)!

Casey's jungle gym

proud of herself

posing

enjoying her first carousel ride

where did that puff go?

playing with Grandma and Grandpa

cousin Jack beating up on Casey

cousins on Thanksgiving Day

go hokies

at the UVA/VT game

Aunt Kel and Casey putting a Santa ornament on the tree

Casey and Santa...

Lily, with help from Uncle Stan, putting the finishing touch on the tree.

6 Months

Casey is very active nowadays. We had to move her crib down since she is so active. She is still all about army crawling. She loves crawling straight towards the fireplace and TV electronics. We're working on "no" a lot this week. She does get up on her knees and rocks a bit, but when she's ready to move, she drops back down to her belly and cruises along. Yesterday she went from crawling position to a sitting position.

She is VERY smiley, especially if one of us leaves the room and then comes back in...she'll give us a huge smile. No laughing yet, but she is getting close. She's still eating about 3 hours, but some days can push it to 3 1/2...at least for a couple meals. She eats her oatmeal with bananas in the morning and loves its and eats a vege in the evening. She loves sweet potatoes. She actually finished off an entire jar last night.

She's been sticking out her lower lip a lot this week. Very random, but very funny. So now it's either sticking her tongue out or giving us the lower lip.

She went to her 6 month doctor appt today. She weighs 16 lbs 3 oz and is 26.5 inches long. She's 50-60 percentile for everything. She had 2 shots which made her cry a little, but after her tweety bird bandaids were applied, all was back to normal.

Stan got into town Thursday night, so we got to go snowboarding on Friday afternoon at Abasin. We took turns, one would watch Casey in the lodge the other would go ride. Saturday Aunt Kel came up to babysit Casey while we went to Blackhawk for some gambling and to celebrate Mark and Amy's engagement. Sunday Kel and Tracy went riding at Keystone. We are all def ready for more runs to be open...the new gondola line was forever long...but once we got up on the mountain, the lift line was good, so we got a bunch of runs in. Stan went by his lonesome after we got back. We need it to snow!! Hopefully while we are in VA for Thanksgiving.

We leave tomorrow!! We'll have a lot more pix next post.

Tongue Twister

Casey found her tongue on Saturday. She woke up and stuck her tongue out all day long. Needless to say, it was pretty funny taking her to get her picture taken at Sears on Monday. We got a couple of her smiling, but after a few good pix, she decided she'd rather stick her tongue out.

We were in VA all last week. Thursday we drove down to Blacksburg for the VT/MD football game. It was a 7:30 p.m. game, so Casey got to tailgate with us during the day. Stan made yummy pastalaya! The weather was beautiful and the Hokies did not "Fear the Turtle" and pulled out a nice, fat W. Casey had lots of fun at the tailgate, entertaining everyone with her cuteness...of course. She did not attend the game, instead, she and Ellie (Sweets and MA's girl) went back to the Bonadeo's to play with a babysitter.

The weekend was spent in Roanoke at Gramma Lois' house. Great Aunt's Linda and Donnie made a couple visits to play with their great niece...who showed off her army crawling and tongue tricks. She is also getting up on her knees, ready to crawl, but then drops back down and army crawls.

Sunday we drove back to NOVA. We went to Aunt Marcy and Uncle Stuart's house Sun afternoon to play with Lily and Jack. We all got in some great playground time. Casey loved the swing and slide. Grandma Gail and Grandpa Tom joined us for dinner and playing.

Tuesday, Tracy and Casey boarded a plane back to CO for the week. Stan will join us Thursday night. It was exciting to get back to Dillon and see snow on the ground! Hoping to get lots of snowboarding in before we head back to VA for Thanksgiving!

Thanks to Geoff, Sarah, Kaelin and Otto and Aunt Kel who took care of Frisco while we were out of town.

on the plane

showing her tongue in crawling position

casey loves swinging

lily showing uncle stan her new bike

hanging with aunt marcy and jack

wrestling with gramps

cute

Halloween

Sorry for the delay! We're in VA. The whole fam flew to VA on Thursday. It was nice to have an extra pair of hands on the plane. Casey was great. She slept and ate and ate and ate!

Friday we dropped Casey off at Grandma Gail and Grandpa Tom's house for the weekend, while we headed to NYC for the NYC Marathon.

Casey had a great weekend hanging with Grams and Gramps. We were told she was a perfect little baby...and that she got more baths she's had in all her 6 months of life. She got to play with her cousins Lily and Jack on Saturday. Jack tried to get her from army crawl to hands and knees crawling, but she's not convinced just yet. She adjusted well to east coast time and daylight savings. She's eating cereal in the morning and vegetables at night. She had her first peas on Tuesday...went over good.

While Casey was busy keeping Grams and Gramps entertained, we took a bus up to NYC to visit our friend Tiff who ran the NYC marathon on Sunday. What an exciting day...we even got to run in the race...4 miles as "support" runners.

All in all, a weekend away from the kid went very well.
Congrats to Tiff for finishing 26.2 miles. Thank You to Grams and Gramps for watching Casey!

We're off to Blacksburg for the VT/MD Thursday night game...GO HOKIES! Then to Gramma Lois' for the weekend.

our little skeleton

the full look

chasing after Jack

Casey hanging with her cousins

Tiff and Tracy running in the NYC marathon

hanging with ms. liberty

Army Crawler

We have an army crawler on our hands. We used to be able to leave Casey on her activity mat for 15-30 minutes with no worries...now, if we leave the room for a minute or 2, she will have scooted her way to the other side of the room by the time we get back.



She also started on real baby food yesterday. Stan fed her sweet potatoes for dinner. Not bad for her first time, but we're hoping she will start enjoying them a little more! She eats oatmeal in the morning and a vege in the evening. Still eats 5 6oz bottles a day.


What else is happening in the Ward World...Wednesday we got a huge snow storm...over 6 inches on our deck, which helped open another run at Abasin. We've already gotten a couple of days of snowboarding in.

We've also been continuing on our house updates. Tracy painted more this week and Stan installed more trim.

Snowboard Season Begins

Saturday was our first day of snowboarding of the 2008-09 season. The 3 of us ventured to ABasin to shrow the pow. Okay, it's actually man made snow, and it's only 1 run. I went on a couple runs while Stan and Casey hung out on the deck, then Stan went out for a few runs while I hung with Casey.

Sunday we rode our bikes to Keystone in the morning with our friend Steve. Aunt Kel showed up at lunchtime. After spending some quality time with her niece, Kel and I headed to ABasin for some snowboarding then to the outlets for some shopping. Casey stayed home with Dad and Steve to watch football.

Other news...I got the stairs oiled so the floors are finally finished! I also started painting the hallways and half the living room...practical beige. Stan put in a little bit of trim this weekend. Mainly so we could move the piano back to it's place. We'll be finishing the rest when Stan is in town next week. I'll be working on painting more of the house this week...as long as this sick bug that I woke up with this morning doesn't slow me down too much.

In Casey news...she is getting used to eating oatmeal now. She opens her mouth and actually eats it. This week we'll see if she is interested in eating more than once a day. Casey is also looking like she wants to crawl. Today she was playing on her activity mat on her stomach and actually used her arms to pull herself towards her toys. At one point, she brought her knees up under her and got into a crawling position.

hanging in her bike trailer

The Squirrel

Let's first discuss the Squirrel. Saturday night Stan and I are sitting on the couch in the living room watching TV and Stan looks up and says, "What is that?!" Apparently, Squirrel has decided to mimic us and renovate his home which is on the beam separating the living room and dining room, and juts outside of our house right above our TV. While renovating his winter hibernation haven, he broke through the drywall! Yes, there is now a small hole (with some insulation sticking out) above the TV. All I could think of was that Stan would leave on Monday and Tuesday, somehow this Squirrel would end up sitting on the couch watching TV with me!! Yikes!

We had set the trap out on Saturday morning and actually watched as the Squirrel went into the trap, grab the apple and leave without being captured. Pesky little rodent! Now that time was running short, Sunday, Stan set the trap and 30 minutes later we heard the wonderful sound of metal to metal...the Squirrel was trapped. We drove him 13 miles away to Abasin, his new home.

Monday morning we scurried off to the hardware store and bought metal plates and spray insulation to again, close up this hole. Keeping our fingers crossed that this pesky rodent does not find his way back to Dillon and try to eat his way into his cave.

More activity this weekend...our floors are complete. Our friends Jason, Gretchen and Dave came over Friday and with Stan's help, finished installing the stairs. The oil will be applied this week! Now we just need to paint the walls, stain the columns and install the new trim.

Casey has been great with all these projects. Hardware stores have become her second home. She will most likely become a famous developer/architect/builder with all this experience at such a young age!

Casey is still taking 3 naps during the day and her bedtime is 7:00 p.m. She cannot make it much past that time. She sometimes wakes up in the middle of the night (3:00 a.m.) and talks for 30-60 minutes, which isn't that fun, since we can hear her through the monitor. In the morning she has been waking up between 6:30 and 7:30 a.m., but seems content to playing and scooting around in her crib until we decide we're ready to get up and get her. She loves to kick on her crib aquarium, so Stan and I have been waking to Canon in D most mornings.

She drinks 6 oz bottles 5 times a day. She is still trying to figure out the oatmeal with bananas. She is slowly learning to open her mouth to take the oatmeal in, but then spits most of it back out. She's more interested in eating her bib or the high straps than the actual oatmeal.

She is getting so much stronger sitting and can even pull herself into a sitting position when she is leaning back. She loves to squeal, sometimes does it the entire 1 1/2 hours while she's up.

We oovooed (video calling) with Gramma Gail last night and Casey was mesmerized with the pictures of her and Gramma on the computer screen. She kept trying to grab at the faces.

Friday, Casey and I went to our first Mommy & Me yoga class at the Rec Center. There were about 10 other pairs there...kids of all ages, from 3 weeks to 15 months. Casey met a girl, Rowan, who was born the same day as her. Casey was very well behaved and seemed to enjoy the class. She watched the other kids, rolled around, sat around. Not much actual yoga going on, but it's fun getting out with other moms and babies.

As for the weather out here...we got some snow this weekend and the temperature has definitely dropped into the 30's at night and upper 30-upper 50's during the day. Arapahoe Basin Ski Resort has been making snow and they are supposedly opening on the 15th. Looking forward to taking some runs this weekend!!! Maybe we'll run into Squirrel (or run over him...)

Casey wants to send a HUGE Congratulations out to Aunt Marcy who finished a 1/2 marathon this past Saturday in Baltimore!! And a Good Luck to Aunt Kel who has her midterms this week.

Casey loves the new carpet.

and loves to eat her feet

playing with her new blocks. frisco actually relocated next to casey.

open mouth smile

new living room rug

new dining room rug. nice to have our dining room table back.

A Girl's Gotta Eat

Casey turned 5 months old on Wednesday, Oct 1. By our scale and measurements she weighs about 16 lbs and is 26 inches long.

Stan got in Thursday night after a mean game of paintball with his company. He arrived home with plenty of welts and very sore knees. The hot tub came in handy this weekend!!

Friday night we met up with Erica and Khristian for a 2 for 1 dinner at Cafe Alpine. Casey was great. She had her bottle before the apps arrived, had a tiny melt down in her car seat, then passed out for the rest of the evening!

Saturday Casey got her first meal. After eating her 6 oz bottle of formula, she got to try some banana oatmeal while sitting in her high chair for the first time. She wasn't quite sure what to do with it, but she seemed to enjoy thrusting it back out with her tongue then giving us a big smile. Sunday and Monday she did much better. She actually opened her mouth when the spoon touched her lips and looked like she swallowed a couple bites.

This was a weekend of house chores! First things first, Carpenter Stan the man, built a workbench in the heated garage. He even got to use it to stain the baseboard and window casing. We also worked on trying to find a color for the interior window trim and doors that might match our floors and trim...still working on it.

The unfortunate part of the weekend was while we were on our way to Breckenridge, to meet up with Geoff, Sarah and Kaelin for dinner, the always reliable Burb, broke down. It was towed away and after a new fuel pump, regulator and filter...it's as good as new...well almost.

It started to get cool here this week. It rained Wed-Sun with a little wet snow/sleet. Last night it snowed enough to leave a trace on our deck and yard. The peaks definitely got a lot more than Dillon. Snowboard season is right around the corner!

can you see her two teeth?

ready for the hokies game

using the autotimer with mommy

first eats

stan's workbench

casey playing with her toys in her crib after her nap

swinging at lake dillon

frisco giving casey a bath

what are you looking at?