Happy 1st Birthday Ben!!!

It is hard to believe that a year has gone by since Ben came into our lives!! We will look back at these days and laugh. I just can't wait to play some of these videos at Ben's wedding and some other special events... for future girlfriends, etc. Happy Birthday lil' buddy!!

Enjoy Ben chowing down on his first cake!

Visit to Davenport

A week before Ben's birthday we finally made it back to Davenport to visit grandma Diane. We were also finally able to introduce Ben to my cousin Janice. Grandma was impressed by Ben's walking abilities and hooked him up with some early birthday presents... More on those later...




Janice meets Ben


Mommy was doing something funny off-camera...

Ben's New Swing

Ben loves to swing at daycare and parks, but we don't have a swing set or anything for him at home. So I built him a simple A-frame to host a swing for him and he loves it! He also destroyed some personal records of his by staying on his feet and walking for about a half-hour without sitting or crawling! He's officially a full-time walker I think - just before hitting 1 year old. Now we're waiting for the running...

Uh, what did he say??

I'll give you 25 points if you can figure out what Ben is saying here... Well, he knows what he is saying. This is what I call Ben's language.

Ben, the walker

Ben is making the switch: His preference in getting around has changed from crawling to walking. He's now taking 10-20 steps at a time. His progress in this video comes less than two weeks after he took his first unassisted steps! Pretty soon we'll be chasing him around the grocery store!

Mommy's Day Off with Ben!

I love it when I get to spend some time home with Ben! I had conferences this week at school, so we got Friday off. The weather is nice too so we plan on getting outside at some point. Ben took a bath this morning since Mommy usually does bath night on Thursday and I was wiped out by the time I got home from school. So we had lots of fun in the bath!!! He loves playing with his toys, especially these foam flashcards for learning objects and words. And he likes to make me fetch after his toys by throwing them all out of the bathtub, fun stuff. Daddy is currently working from home downstairs----typically home doing this a few days a week. Grandma and Grandpa may come down later too to help us enjoy this lovely weather and have some play time with Benjamin! I'll talk to you all later, gotta go change a questionable diaper and keep being productive!