Another great find (In my opinion)

So I know that many of you have suffered the same pain that I have lived through for the last thirty years...headband head. It's the awful headache you get from wearing a headband that is too flipping tight and feels like your brain will soon start coming out of your ears. Well, suffer no more ladies! I was at Target recently (I know, weird right? It's not like I go to Target every other day) and I saw these new Scunci headbands on the endcap of an aisle. They look like think plastic headbands, but they're actually completely flexible headwraps. I can wear one all day with zero headband headache! Joy :-) The suffering is over!

(I'm trying really hard to find a pic of them for you all. So far I can just find a pic on the Walmart website, but you can definitely find them at your local Target.)

Images by Lori

Our friend Lori took some amazing holiday pictures for us.  She also did our maternity pics back when the duder was still just a peanut in mama's belly.  You can actually see a couple of them on her site under Portraits - Beautiful Bellies.  She is not only an extremely talented photographer, but a beautiful person inside and out and makes the entire experience so much fun.  Just wanted to share with you all some of the moments she captured for us!

Seriously?  I could eat this face.  I know that sounds creepy, but I could seriously eat it, it's so adorable.

My little man

Thank you Lori for capturing this precious moments for us!

Christmas 2010

Ok, I feel a little ridiculous posting this in the middle of January, but I want to share! :-)

We had a wonderful Christmas this year! My sister Missy and and her boyfriend Matt traveled out from Lafayette, LA so Duder and I picked Uncle Adam up from the BART station and headed out to Saddle Creek to spend some time with the fam. a few days before Christmas.

It's so much fun to stand on the couch

Someone spotted the doggies

Poor Taco gets pounced on.

Hi Duder!

Notice the little orange blur on the left hand side?  Yeah, that's pretty much what he looks like in real life too.

Uncle Adam finds Duder very amusing.  Also, he likes to snuggle Taco in a baby blanky.  To each their own :-)

Duder is obsessed with the dog beds.

New favorite toy - exercise ball - especially when Uncle Adam held him on his lap and bounced up and down!

We also loved playing with anything we could find in the kitchen ;-)

He got this little Frisbee from my brother and would not put it down.

Poor Taco

Chasing Ellie

Seriously, this kid is always on the go.

My mom has this little decorative chair that the duder discovered. 

Yay for Duder-sized chairs!

Super proud of himself.

The chair had to be moved into whichever room the duder was in.

Playing with Granma

What's this?

Whatcha lookin' at Mama?

 

We attended a beautiful Christmas Eve service and church with Jason's mom and stepdad and went to get some dinner afterward.  Unfortunately the duder started to get a bit of a fever - the poor thing fell asleep on the bench of the booth at the restaurant!  Usually on Christmas Eve we head out to Copperopolis to stay with my parents, but this year we decided that we would like to have Christmas morning at our house with our little family, which worked out well not only because we got start our own little tradition, but also because we had to drive around trying to find something that was open that sold infant fever reducer.  And let's just say that there aren't many options in Copperopolis.  And by the way, Walgreens is the only thing open after 7pm on Christmas Eve -just an FYI.  After getting him some baby Advil, he fell asleep and we drove around looking at lights for a bit before tucking him in to wait for Santa.

Christmas morning, when the baby woke up, we headed downstairs to light the tree and see what Santa brought!

Jackpot!

Taking a rest after opening his stocking

Weeble!  One of the girls at work got him two Weebles.  He thinks they're hilarious!

Weebles wobble but they don't fall down!

My friend is a Discovery Toys rep and we ordered the Big Tangiball for him for Christmas.  This kid is obsessed with balls and this one is so cool because it's soft, just tactile and best of all (to me anyway) it smells like Strawberries!  Yay!  So fun!  :-)  He  laughs hysterically when it gets squished and then pops back into shape.  Side note - Discovery Toys are awesome!  They're fantastic quality toys that are all educationally based.

Throwing the Tangiball to Mama

Throwing Tangiball to Dada

Elle is seriously never more than a foot from the baby.

Ellie, would you like to play with the Tangiball?

Radio Flyer red wagon!!!

And back to the Tangiball!

Hugging the Tangiball.

Obsessed.

Present from GG (that's Great Granbeth for those not in the know ;-) )

A doggy bank!!  It barks and wiggles it's ears when you drop money in :-)

Present from Miss Brooke!  His daycare provider got him a Little People bulldozer :-)

Distracted by the Tangiball!

I love Christmas

Little People!

Doggy, how do you like my wagon?

I'm sure Elle would have given anything to be in the wagon.

My lovely husband got me tickets to Avenue Q, which I have been DYING to see for ages!  Then this sweet, adorable man scoured the Tri-Valley looking for a 5th Avenue bar to put in my stocking.  Apparently, they don't make them anymore and if they do, they are not distributed to our area!  But I thought his homemade version was way cooler anyway! :-)

Atlanta Falcons luggage handle covers.  Showing his Falcons pride and easily finding his luggage at the same time!

And back the the Tangiball :-)

After our little Smith Christmas celebration, we headed over to B.J. and Sara's house to celebrate an extended Smith Christmas celebration!  It was so fun to watch the kids together :-)

Miss Savannah and her Little People race track.

Christmas spirit :-)

Non Christmas spirit

The really funny thing is that they did not coordinate before hand.  We walked in and they were both wearing it!  Brother connection :-)

Duder and Nanner

Cousin love

Look at what we've got Meme!

Styling Duder's hair

Definitely in a climbing phase!

After much fun with the Smiths, we headed off to Chaney land.  And yes, my brother was wearing the same hat and yes, it was weird! 

Stuffed German Shepherd from my brother.  Duder is obsessed with kissing his nose!

My parents got him this adorable Rudolph from Build-a-Bear. His nose lights up and he says quotes from the movie!

Love Rudolph!

Loves!

Again with the nose kisses.

His hat comes off!

Star Wars Christmas paper :)

Apparently it's more fun to look at the paper than actually open it.

It's more fun to open presents on Joe Gibbs' bed.

This is such a Missy look I had to share it.

So is this :-)

Auntie Missy reading Duder the book she and Matt got him.

He liked pressing the buttons

Hi Parker!

I can pretty much guarantee she is watching to see what the baby is doing :-)

The best present ever!

We had to take advantage of all us being there to take a family photo!  As you can see, we didn't realize that my camera takes two pictures when it's set on the timer. :-)

That was amazing y'all!

See ya next Christmas!