Merry Christmas!

Before I go any further, I want to answer the question that I'm sure is on everyone's minds. No, I did not go to Jared's. Luckily, Heather has already forgiven me for this lapse in judgment. Now that we have that out of the way, I can say Merry Christmas to everyone reading the blog. Apparently people read this thing from all over the country, so wherever you are we wish you a very Merry Christmas.

Here in ‘ol DFW, it’s going to be a white Christmas. I looked outside this morning and everything is covered in snow. You can’t even tell that I’ve been lazy and haven’t raked the leaves up in weeks. Thanks Santa!

Ashlyn was so excited about Christmas that she stayed up until 4:00am, so it looks like she’ll be sleeping through most of the Christmas festivities. We’ll be taking plenty of pictures of Ashlyn’s first Christmas, and will post those as soon as we’re able to. Hopefully we’ll get a few pictures with her eyes open.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Mamas, don't let your babies grow up to be Longhorns...

Relationships with grandparents can be tricky. They fed you, cared for you, and raised you. So it can be hard sometimes when you see them influencing your own child in a way that you didn’t anticipate. Every parent goes through this, especially when your child is lucky enough to have grandparents that want to be part of their lives. It starts with something simple, a gesture or word when you don’t think your child is even paying attention.

You take a picture of it, and laugh. But then later, when you least expect it... this happens.

So let this be a lesson to all you parents out there. Grandparents may love their grandchildren, but that doesn’t mean they won’t happily corrupt them.

Congratulations are in order..

My sister Lisa is now engaged. Her fiancé’s parents have great taste in naming children, and we like him a lot. We couldn’t be happier for both of them, and I look forward to welcoming Jeff into the family.  In response to he news, Ashlyn broke out the crayons.

Okay, so obviously that wasn't her that wrote it.  Ashlyn has much better handwriting.  On a side note,
Ashlyn hda her first restaurant experience last night and did just fine. She mostly slept on Heather while the adults enjoyed some margaritas and charro beans with the Wolfes.  Both of Grandpa Wolfe's brothers were in town, and it was great to hang out with them for the evening. 

To Mr. and Mrs. Wolfe, Mr. and Mrs. Wolfe, and Mr. and Mrs. Wolfe, thanks the dinner and company.  You'll also see more of Heather's family, Jeff and Britta (you could also call them Mr. and Mrs. Wolfe), featured in the pictures below.  It was nice seeing them again and congrats to their son Tip on their team placing 2nd place in the chess tournament.

The baby speaks.. sort of.

Ashlyn has started cooing, which is nice because we get to hear noises other than grunts and cries.  We still have a long way to go until she's actually talking of course, but this is a good start.  Instead of doing a cooing montage, we were able to film a longer segment where she was going coo crazy.  I cut out the parts in between noises to keep it short.  Unfortunately, we had to cut the session short when she started getting hiccups.  Enjoy!

Ashlyn Coos

Smile, it's Colic!

It’s confirmed. Ashlyn’s Doctor feels that it’s the dreaded colic. The past four nights have been long for mom, who’s had to adjust her sleeping schedule to Ashlyn’s 3:00am bed time. The Doctor went ahead and did all the shots and measurements while she was there. They don’t give exact percentages on growth, but they do categorize into buckets: 50% (meaning average), 75%, and 95%. The higher the percentage, the greater above average. Here’s where our little Ashlyn sits:

• Weight: 50%, she’s right on track for her age.
• Length: 95%, she’s a long baby!
• Head: 75%, she’s got a decent sized noggin’.

The best news though is that her Doctor has given Ashlyn a clean bill of health, she’s a still a happy and healthy baby girl. To mark this welcome news, here’s a video of some smiles that we caught on camera.

Ashlyn Smiling Montage

Please forgive the repeating music.  The actual song is over 3 minutes long, but the section I cut out for the video is the only part I could use.  Despite the upbeat words and whistling in the video, the rest of the song would get people in trouble at work for listening to it.