Set the washer to the Extra Cute cycle

While working on the MOUNTAIN of laundry that I have in my room, Gabe decided to help me out by playing with the laundry basket. Now that he is growing up, he wants to help all that he can.

Happy 8 Months

Happy 8 Month Birthday Little Man!

Eight months...I can hardly believe it. I look at you with your two bottom teeth, chubby little legs, and bright blue eyes and I still see a tiny baby. But then I go back and look at the photos from the day you were born and I realize how big you really are. And I am sure that this will happen for the rest of your life. Everyday I will see you as my sweet baby boy and every day you will do something to remind me that you are growing up right before my eyes.

This month has been jam-packed with firsts. It started with your first long car trip to Montana where you met your Uncle Todd for the very first time. You did such a good job being in the car for 7-8 hours. Both your Dad and I were surprised and grateful that you did so well. And we are VERY GRATEFUL for your big sister Sera who was so willing to play with you and keep you entertained during those few moments that you started to get bored.

And in just these past few days, you have learned how to crawl. Now I will say this, you can't crawl well. In fact, it is more of a scoot that you can only do for short distances and then you have to stop. But I am still excited to see how you progress with this.

I will never forget the first moment your Dad and I saw you crawl. I had just finished making dinner. You Dad had just finished feeding you your dinner. He got up and came into the kitchen to grab his plate and as we both turned to corner to come around and into the living room and there you were. On all fours and you scooted forward-first your left knee and then your right. I let out a sqeal and it startled you so much that you stopped. I looked at your Dad and said, "DID YOU JUST SEE THAT?!?!" All he could do was smile so big and nod. We were both so proud of Gabe. You make us so happy.

You have also learned how to sit up all on your own. Now you can roll from one end of the room to the other, stop, and sit up. You don't sit up by lying on your back and sitting straight up from there. Oh no! You get up onto all fours and sort of back into a sitting position. This has become very useful for you because now you can roll to an item and sit up to play with it.

You are becoming so very expressive! Your actions are really starting to let your actions do your talking. This can be adorable like when you eat something yummy and you smile and wave your arms all around. Or it can be frustrating like when you eat something not so yummy and you try to slap the spoon away. Or like when I am trying to change your butt and you fight me every step of the way. You will roll away, kick your legs, or arch your back and this causes me stress. You get poop on yourself, on me, and on the floor. I guess we need to start trying to teach you what "NO" means now. DANG IT!

But despite the fact the sometimes you are a grumpy little stink, you are the sunshine in my day. You smile at me and your blue eyes light up. You lean in and give me "baby kisses" which are slobbery and sweet. And you will still fall asleep in my arms at times and snuggle up against me. I love you so much Gabriel Scott. You bring me a level of happiness I never knew I could reach.

So Happy 8 Month Birthday Chunky Monkey! Number 9 is sure to be even better! WE LOVE YOU!

Cached In

This weekend we had Sera and at her request, spent much of our time Geocaching. She got into last week when we went to Decker Lake and found a great cache. And since the weather was perfect to be outside, we decided to humor her and go out caching again. We found quite a few caches and most were big enough for tradeable items. Sera had fun trying to be sneaky and avoid being seen by non-Geocachers. And as you can see from the pictures below, Gabe joined in on the fun as well.

We also had dinner with my parents on Sunday and decided to let Gabe experiment with feeding himself. As you can see this turned out to be more of preformance art than dinner time. He wore most of it as warrior face paint then getting it into his mouth. It was great watching him try though.

And of course, after his dinner attempt, he ended up in the bath. It was a prefect ending to a perfect weekend.

Bad Habits

Hi everyone. Sorry I have been slacking on the posts. It's not that I have been really busy. It's just that ever since I got sick and then we went to Montana, I have been out of the habit of posting. But I promise to try and get back into my normal routine of a daily post.

Tonight was a nice night with Sera. We took her Geocaching after dinner and let he find some treasure. She liked it so much that we are going to try and go again this weekend as long as the weather is nice enough. I'll be sure to take my camera along to get some pictures. But for now, here is a cute picture of Gabe who instead of crawling forward, scooted backwards under his play mat. I am sure that within the next few weeks, my sweet baby boy will turn into a tiny crawling gremlin.

This was Gabe the other night. He was so tired but he would not settle down enough to let us put him to bed. Instead, he wanted to roll around on our bed making grumble noises and looking angry. But even his angry face is cute. And no matter what mean things, like bedtime, that we try to do to him I know that his shirt doesn't lie. He still loves us.

HA-ZAA!

As some of you may know, Ryan and I have been trying to get into Geocaching. Thanks to a friend of mine who blogged about it, I heard about this wonderful activity. And since we have a GPS we decided to give it a try.

After the first time we went, I will admit that I was ready to throw in the towel on Geocaching. We looked for one at Decker Lake and couldn't find it, plus the GPS died. After we tried another near Gabe's daycare and even though the GPS said we were right on it, we couldn't find anything. In fact, the only thing we brought home was dirty laundry for me to wash because Ryan fell in a ditch trying to locate the cache.

So when Ryan suggested that we go "Treasure Hunting" tonight, I grumbled on the inside. I really did not want to go but it was such a nice evening. Not to mention that Gabe and I could use a little fresh air and walking. So I agreed to go and even plugged the coordinates into the GPS for Ryan.

We went to find our first cache and found nothing but a green gas station dinosaur statue that smelled like cat pee. (Don't ask!) Second one we tried to find, Ryan ended up jumping over a wall and disappearing for about 5 minutes so I thought he might have been dead. This was strike 2 for the night. Now all of Ryan's hopes hung on a cache supposedly located at Taylorsville Park.

We drove over to the park and got out of the car. We started walking towards our destination per the GPS. As we got closer I could not off-road the stroller with Gabe inside so Ryan headed into the bushes. I could see his red shirt through the sticks and was starting to get restless. I was already frustrated by our first 2 caches coming up empty.

But suddenly Ryan holds up a pipe with a sprinkler attached to it. I am about to yell at him for destroying public property when he comes running towards me with a HUGE smile on his face and sprinkler-pipe still in his hands. He twists off the lid to the sprinkler and it turns out, it isn't a sprinkler at all. Inside it a ziplock back with a small notebook and various little items. He then yells "HA-ZAA!" in victory. I had to admit my defeat at that point. From that cache we took a small soccer ball whistle and left a little green army man.

But we weren't done there. Oh no! Now Ryan had a taste for treasure. He knew that if we went went to the place where he had fallen in the ditch that he could find the other cache. That cache was his Unicorn or something. So we head back. And after getting busted by a security guard who, after we explained that we were "hunting treasure" (Who would honestly believe that?!?!?), pointed us right to the hidden cache. Where was that guy 4 weeks ago before Ryan ended up in the ditch? He explained that he had met a few Geocachers and knew that we meant no harm so he didn't kick us out, but instead helped us. From this cache we took a little pink plastic chip and left a small green army man.

But we still weren't done because now, I am into it. So we plug in one final set of coordinates. It is so close to our house we could walk there. We drive up to it and trying to be as stealthy as possible to avoid any "muggles." (What Geocachers call passersby who might catch us trying to get our treasures.) We looked under a pile of very large and heavy rocks to find a large old ammo box. SUCCESS!!! From this we took a small rubber snake and left yet another green army man. When it is all said and done, Ryan and I hope to have sleeper cells of little green army men hidden in caches all over Salt Lake Valley. BEWARE!!!

In the end I am glad the Ryan kept pushing this activity. It turned out to be a lot of fun. And hopefully the next time we have Sera we will be able to go again so that she can find some treasure for herself. I know that she would be just as into it, if not more, than we are.

Also for those of you who ONLY stop by to see pictures of the kids, here is a picture of Gabe after a long night of playing video games with Ryan. As you can see, his Mountain Dew high has clearly worn off and his hand are tired from all the "L2, R2, X,X,O...DAMN YOU! I SAID JUMP!"

Easter 2010

I am finally getting to post about the wonderful trip that Ry and I made to Montana for Easter weekend. We left early on Friday morning with Gabe and Sera loaded in the back seat and made the 7 & 1/2 hour drive to Butte, Montana. Ryan's parents made a long drive, about 4 hours, from their home in Billings, Montana as well. We all met Ryan's brother in Butte so that we could spend some time together.

This is the second time I have been in Butte on Easter and it is so much fun. I really enjoy going to Butte and it is a nice meeting point for all of us. Ry and I would love to be able to spend more time with Ryan's family but find it hard with work and now 2 kids that we have to load up and get there in one piece.

The drive to and from Montana was good and we didn't encounter any issues. The weather was great, the kids did AMAZING (this was Gabe's first long car ride), and my Escape made it without exploding.

We ate, we went swimming, we played games, and most importantly, we got to spend some quality time with the Baker side of our family. Like I said, we feel bad that we don't get to see them as often so we honestly do cherish what little time we do get.

So here are some of my favorite pictures from our visit. And I am going to give credit where credit is due: most of these were taken by Scott and Linda. I left my camera at home and our video camera doesn't take great pictures. So thanks to Scott and Linda for such a wonderful weekend. We love you guys and miss you. And thanks to Todd for being such a great host. We hope to see you all again very soon!!!

Grandpa Scott, Grandma Linda, Sera, and Gabe on Easter morning in the hotel room.

Sera & Gabe in their adorable Easter outfits.

The Baker Family on Easter Morning-April 4, 2010

Happy 7 Months!!!

Happy Seven Month Birthday!!!

Happy 7 month birthday Baby Boy! You are 7 months old plus a few extra days because honestly, I was so busy this past couple weeks and didn't get the chance to post yet. But here you are, 7 months old and still doing AMAZING! You're smile is as infectious as ever and you just keep on growing.

You finally got the hang of sitting up this past month. After months of trying and helping you along, you finally figured out of to balance enough to not fall straight on your chubby little face. And now it seems like you would rather be sitting up all on your own than lying down or sitting in your swing. You will sit in the middle of the floor and play with your toys and smile at your Dad and I.

In this past month your first teeth have also come through. It was a long process filled with lots of tears and sore gums. Lets just say that we went through lots of Oragel and Tylenol. But you finally have one tooth that has really come through and your second one has just started. This of course means that we have had to be more careful about what you chew on. When before we could let you gum on apples now we can't because you'll little chunks and that makes you gag.

In the past 4 weeks you have also become expert in rolling across the floor. You'll roll from one side of the room to the other and then back again. This habit of rolling has also continued on into your bed. You are still sleeping in the bassinet in our bedroom and you will now roll onto your side as well as your tummy. Being on your side in fine but sleeping on your tummy is driving me nuts. I have to flip you onto your back and every time I do, you wake up and get mad at me.

You Dad and I love spending time with you Gabe. We will lay on the floor and play with you and your toys. We will give you baths in the kitchen sink while you splash water all over the floor and us. We feed you jars upon jars on baby food and watch you grow bigger and bigger. It seems like every day you learn something new and do something to make us laugh.

Your smile makes us smile. Your laugh makes us laugh. Your cry makes us...well actually you do this little gurgle thing when you cry and that kind of makes me laugh too. You are the sunshine in my life and I cannot imagine my life without you. Thank you for all the joy and happiness that you have given your Dad and I over the past 7 months. I am excited to see what the next month is going to bring us. And as always, Happy 7 Month Birthday Bubba!!!