A Decade...

How is it possible? Today is Rolf's and my tenth wedding anniversary. I know we married young (21 and 22), but I just don't feel old enough for ten years to have passed. I suppose part of it is that I had no idea it would take nearly a decade before we had a baby, and somehow we lost two years of our lives miserable in McKinney (we never felt it was home) and six months living with my grandparents as my Granny went through chemotherapy, but time really has flown. We've been in our house for nearly four years, and I get my 5-year paperweight at the end of this school year. We can always remember how long we've been together overall because our first date was the Halloween after my nephew Aidan was born, so we just keep track of his age. He's twelve now. Dang.

To celebrate, Rolf and I are leaving the little man with my parents and flying to Vegas for two nights next week. We had originally planned on renewing our vows, but that costs nearly as much as a wedding, so we just decided to spend the money on a fancy night out. We don't need to renew our vows to affirm our continuing love. True, having a baby has changed our relationship, and we are both looking forward to time to reconnect and re-energize by spending time together, but there isn't any doubt that we're both in this for the long haul.

Will's First Christmas

I will post more about it later when I can get some pictures uploaded.

Suffice it to say, Will was spoiled rotten. Among the cooler of his gifts: a Johnny Cash onesie, a Trout Fishing in America CD, a Xylophone piano that he just LOVES, books, books, and more books (including the Leap Frog touch book), and a TON of cute clothes. This boy is going to be stylin'! I think because of the lead paint scare, most people were too afraid to buy him toys, and I don't blame them. We generally stuck to simple things like balls and CD's, although we did get him this activity table (we did NOT pay that much for it!), which Rolf loves because it plays jazzy music and Will loves because it lights up on his command.

No real crawling yet, although Will can hold himself up on a coffee table or chair for quite a long time before falling. He has started to shuffle himself along as he holds on for dear life. He gets frustrated that he can't go forward when he crawls (he generally pushes backwards) and looks around for something to pull up on or sits himself up instead.

All I Want for Christmas...

As of Saturday, December 22, 2007, Will has officially cut his first tooth! Huzzah! I could feel the difference in texture as he bit down on his spoon while eating yesterday, so after the cereal was all swallowed, I stuck my finger in there, and lo and behold, there was a rough little spot on his lower gum. Will doesn't like to show his lower gums - his tongue is usually over it - but this morning, I caught a glimpse of the tooth. It's really there and not something I just imagined. I am so excited. I was afraid the poor baby would never actually cut teeth. We have a feeling another 2 or 3 are just behind.

So maybe he'll just have one front tooth for Christmas, but hey, that's more than I was afraid he would have. If we can ever get a picture of it, I'll post it, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

UPDATE: Rolf dug his finger in to Will's mouth after dinner tonight, and there ARE two teeth in there! Hooray! All we wanted for Christmas was his two front teeth, and we got it!

Family Pictures - Finally!

The last time Rolf and I had our pictures professionally made, it was December 27, 1997, at our wedding. Needless to say, we were long overdue. I always wanted to wait until we had a child to expand our family to get our pictures made again. Little did I know that would take as long as it did. We've had requests from family members for a family portrait, and since we only had ONE picture of the three of us together (that we took ourselves) where Will is not crying, we decided Saturday would be the day. Some of them didn't turn out too bad. Of course, the best ones are of Will alone.

The Fam

Will and Rolf

Will and Mommy

There's that impish smile again!

O Christmas Tree

Today we got to fulfill our task from last week: cutting down and putting up our Christmas tree. We tried to go last Sunday, but it was too cold and pouring rain. This morning, we rode out with my mom and dad to our traditional Christmas tree farm to find our yuletide pine for the year. Pickings were slim, since north Texas has been so dry the past few years. There were lots of great cedar trees, but Rolf is so allergic to cedar that was out (it's one of the few things that doesn't bother me, oddly enough). After much deliberation, we figured out that we had come back to the same tree three times. We figured that meant that tree must be the one for us. Rolf cut it down, and we met back up with Mom and Dad at the barn. Will had a good time. I took a couple of pictures of him as he was in the infant carrier, strapped to me, and Rolf took a couple of him investigating the tree on the hayride back to the barn.

After we decorated the tree, we put Will on the floor, and tried to get him to go from sitting to his hands and knees by putting his toy to the side of him. Damned if that little booger didn't start trying to pull himself to standing on the crates of Christmas stuff around him. Rolf may be right - he may skip crawling and go straight to walking.

Will riding with Mommy

Will inspecting the tree (it's prickly!)

Will and Grandma back at the barn