Papa's little helper

All geared up

and ready to get busy in the workshop.

The BEST $1.25 + tax I've ever spent

Signature

Oliver signed a handful of greeting cards last weekend for

Father's Day and some Birthdays

In the process he tried to sign his face too.

Variations on a theme (or two)

I am starting to feel like a broken record, but I really am having a hard time capturing pictures of Oliver, unless he is strapped in a chair (more on that later).

Tonight I put him in his orange-and-white-striped-pjs and they are my favorite because they make him look like a Who-from-Whoville or some other Dr.Suess character, especially when he stands up, so I set out to take some pictures.  Here are the results.

{aww...look, stripes}

{uh oh, I've been spotted}

{duck!}

{this one just makes me laugh}

Theme #2, Piglet eating

(because strapped into the highchair I can actually get his picture)

{yum yum, hummus!}

{mom, put the camera down and keep feeding me}

{blueberries, sweet potatoes, and a crusty piece of bread}

{notice the mango slime, we took him from his high chair straight up to the shower}

{I got them!  Look at those teeth! I made it extra big so you could see}

EIGHT MONTHS!?

Oliver, these last few months have flown by.  Probably because I am having a hard time keeping up with you. You are now a master crawler, but at home, you prefer what I can only call a monkey walk.  On your hands and tip-toes you have become pretty quick with your moving downward dog.  Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of that just yet.  I am going to have to try to get one before you abandone your cute modified crawl for a more efficient mode of transportation.

You pull youself up on anything you can reach.  Including the bathtub during bath time. 

You have an older crib, I think it was mine.  Anyway, it has wheels on it.  I went to get you out of your crib the other day, and it was in the middle of the room!  You have figured out how to "jump" in your crib. It is more of a vigerous bounce but, when you get going you actually move the whole crib!

You are also showing an independant side.  You love being naked- and you will use any diaper change as an excuse to prolonge the nakedness.  I actually wrestle you in to your diaper every day.  One day I held a diaper on your butt while you crawled away from me and somehow managed to get it on you. Getting clothes on you is about the same.  It's not that you cry or fight us...you are just so busy and so curious that you can't stand sitting still

evenforjustasecond. 

I've figured a way around it for now.  If I try to get you dressed somewhere unexpected, say, the kitchen floor-you look at me with the most suprised face and I can usually get the diaper and the top on you... then I just chase you with pants.  I'm starting to run out of "unexpected" places, I'm going to have to come up with another plan of attack.

Solids are going well, but you have ZERO interest in finger foods. 

Your vocabulary is growing, including Ba-Ba, Ba-bab, Da-da, Mob, Doh and the cutest shriek when you are really excited!

This post is late, you are closer to 9 months now than 8 months, but you don't care if it's late, do you? 

I didn't think so.

The thing that will stop Oliver in his tracks... or mid-babble.

Dear Oliver,

You are so loud. You yell non-stop in the car and you are so loud that Papa and I can't talk. We just laugh. You LOVE fans. Expecially cieling fans. One day we were in the car, and you were very seriously yelling. "Ba-bab-bab-bab-ba uh Da-da-da-da-ahhhh!" Then, as we stopped at a stoplight, it just stopped. Mid-bab. Papa and I looked at eachother waiting for it to start again. It didn't "Did he fall asleep?" I asked. Andy looked back and saw you, mesmerized. We had stopped right by a big windmill. It was the biggest, most amazing fan you had ever seen. As we turned at the stoplight you turned as much as you could to follow it. Then, it was out of sight.

"Mba-ba-ba-de-de-da-doooh"

Another thing that has left Oliver without much to say is his friend Henry.  They got together last weekend. 

{See Henry eyeing that toy?}

Henry is 10 days older that Oliver and likes to assert his senority.  Every time Oliver picked up a toy, Henry would take it from him. 

Oliver never got upset. 

{Oliver scowling at Henry as he plays happily with his new prize}

Ok, maybe he got a little upset, but he never really protested.

He just looked at me like "Who is this guy?"

Mama, brace yourself

This picture, and this news is about a week old at this point.  I just wasn't ready to admit that it was happening.

This is what I found when I went to get Oliver from his nap:

Doesn't he look proud of himself! 

p.s. he has two teeth too.  has for a while but I can't figure out how to photograph baby teeth without looking like I am torturing him...

To make you smile

I've got some 'splain'n to do

Really, a week?  I haven't blogged for a week?  Geesh.  I am surprised you came back!

Well, we've been busy!  Oliver has fully recovered from the scary fever incident of 2010 and is happily eating again and keeping us on our toes. 

The. boy. never. stops. moving. Ever.

Andy and I have been busy too.  Our yard used to look like this:

We needed to put in a fence, but we had 3 trees that grew directly through the property line.  They had grown out of control and had branches that reached precariously over power lines and our roof. 

Once the clean up was done, we were able to put in a fence.  I wanted a 4' shadow box fence which looks beautiful, but meant a lot of extra work for Andy.  In our area we were only able to find fence supplies that were 6' long, which meant that Andy needed to cut 2' off ever piece of fencing!  It was quite a project.

Ta-da!

Yes, I live next to a purple house.  Shudder.  It used to be white.

I love it, and I think it will look awesome when I get a border flower garden in.  We are trying to make up for the fact that we took down three trees.  If you look closely, you will see three small trees.  They are apple trees, 2 Honeycrisp and 1 golden delicious.  It is like the urban equivalent of an apple orchard--but it will be a couple of years before they bear fruit.

We also got our vegetable garden in:

We have 10 (ten!) tomato plants -- which should be interesting come August.  I'm going to have to learn how to can!  We also have peppers, broccoli, zucchini, green beans, snap peas, onions, fennel and various herbs.

We also put in some fruit, two blueberry bushes and some strawberry plants!

Now that I've spelled it all out I've got a real Urban Farm in my back yard.  maybe I should copy my friend Sarah and call it my 'Minneapolis Farmette.'  But I won't.