Our Family Christmas Tree

With this Christmas cutie pie crawling all over the place and getting into EVERYTHING, we decided to get a small rosemary bush as a Christmas tree this year. Caleb still managed to get a good chew in on one of Aunt Mary Kay's snowflake ornaments. No damage was done to the ornament or to Caleb :)

Welcome to the World of Blogging

Two of my sweet high school friends have entered the world of blogging! Welcome ladies! They are both about to have babies in the next month, so now is a great time to become bloggers. Soon everything in your life will be either considered bloggable or not bloggable! It's addicting! Check out the Kings and Van Yperens on our friends and family link list.

NCAA's

Although at this point is it old news, I just thought I would let everyone in the blog world know that our ladies team ended up 17th at nationals. Considering everything that has gone on this year as far as injuries to key personnel and such it was neat to see them come through and run well. Obviously there is always room for improvement (16 places to be exact), it was a great performance to end a very successful season that shows a great deal of promise in the future.

Thanksgiving in Wichita Falls

Well we made it back safely from a crazy and fun Thanksgiving in Wichita Falls, TX. Both sets of CA Caprons flew in, and Jon and I drove up on Wednesday. We stayed with Jon's aunt, Maurine. Jon's cousin, Angela and her family stayed there also. Andy and Angela have two cute kids, Addison and Austin. So here's all the kids who were under the same roof: Austin (10-I think), Addison (5), Andrew (2), Caleb (8 months), and Owen (8 months). Needless to say, things were entertaining and exciting! Thinking I would get some great pictures of the three cousins like I did back in June, we tried a little photo shoot. I learned that 8 month olds don't pose for pictures in unison, and 2 year olds hardly pose at all. The pictures seem to capture it pretty well! We got to eat Thanksgiving dinner (and several other meals) with many of Jon's aunts, uncles, and cousins. Dinner was fabulous. I think that there were as many dessert options as there were people. Thanks to all of the family out there for hosting us and making it a great holiday! We can't wait until next time!

Great Friends, Yummy Food, and Deep Thoughts

I just got home from the annual harvest dinner at our church, FBC Woodway. It is probably the biggest of all Baptist potlucks. All the ladies bring their best homemade Thanksgiving plates. With friends, we all eat the abundance of food and enjoy an evening sharing what we are thankful for. While driving home, I was thinking about how nice it is to hear people thanking God for what He has done in the past year. I have been thinking about how this period of my life is so sweet and special (and fleeting), and I have felt especially thankful for the joys of motherhood. Then I was thinking is it wrong to praise God for the specific tangible gifts in my life? Should I praise Him more for who He is than for what He gives me? I guess my conclusion was that of course I should thank God for the gifts He gives me! I will definitely want Caleb to thank me for presents he will receive in the future. However, I should make thanksgiving and praise a habit of my life, so that I can know God and praise Him for who He is at all times- even hard times. So I will just say, thanks Lord for the great season of life that our family is in now, and help me to praise you through all seasons of life. It reminds me of the Matt Redmond song:

Blessed Be Your Name

Blessed Be Your name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

Blessed Be Your name
When I'm found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed Be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be Your name
When the sun's shining down on me
When the world's 'all as it should be'
Blessed be Your name

Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there's pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name

___________________________________________

May we bless the name of the Lord daily!  Let this
Thanksgiving week remind us that God is worthy of our praise
because of the very nature of who He is.  I feel gratitude and
give praise to the Lord for what He has done for me, but I de-
sire to worship simply because God is so worthy of my praise.

8 Quick Months

Caleb is officially 8 months old today. I have to say that I love this age so much. Click on the above picture to see how cute he is! In the last month, Caleb has gone from thinking about being mobile to being a great crawler. This has brought new challenges to Jon and me as far as making sure he is safe. I feel like I have to watch him more than ever. Crawling has also been fun because it is a way for Caleb to show his personality more and more. Often times, he crawls up to me and pulls on my clothes wanting me to pick him up. I am sure that this will getting annoying at some point, but right now I think it is really sweet. Caleb continues to love Heidi, but she has lost a little of interest in him now that he can crawl up to her and wake her up from her naps. Usually she is really good around him. Caleb is just thinking about starting to pull up on things. He sort of pulls up to his knees right now. I am sure that by 9 months, he will be pulling all the way up to his feet. He still has no teeth- although I have thought countless times that he is teething (from 5 months on up). He seems to have the symptoms: lots of slobber, random crying for no apparent reason, and wanting to chew on everything. I guess those could be symptoms of teething or just symptoms of being a baby. Despite, his lack of teeth, Caleb has starting on peach puffs and loves them (thanks from him and Heidi to Grammy Pace!) Well, here the little guy is now pulling on my pant leg. Happy 8 months old Caleb!

NCAA Cross Country

Just wanted to let everyone know that NCAA Championships will be live on TV Monday(11:00AM) so set your DVR or TIVO to pick it up on CSTV. Our ladies are ranked 30th so they don't have anywhere to go except up. 30th may not sound amazing but in basketball you only have to be top 64 to make it to the tournament that everyone gets excited about. For a bowl game you have to have a winning record, so top half. Basically just qualifying is a pretty exclusive club, this is our 5th year in a row. All we need to do now is to get our men on the same trip. I predict in few years, I will have to make larger reservations.

Friends

Last night we enjoyed dinner with our friends the Ecklunds. Their daughter, Gianna, is only a week and a half older than Caleb, so it is always fun for us to see them together. It is amazing that I was able to get any photos of them at all as they were both on the move! They enjoyed grabbing each others' faces and climbing over/on top of each other. The parents enjoyed having someone else to talk BABY with especially since Gianna and Caleb are so close in age.

Power Outage

For some reason the lights went out, Caleb couldn't see and he wasn't ready for a nap, so we put him in his jumper and I gave him my head lamp. Do you think he has a future in spelunking?

What did I miss?

Was it the dry,cool, rarefied NM air, all the Albuquerque folks and their active lifestyles, or was it his Grandparents (I'm sure they will be happy to claim it)? More than likely it was an increase of cool things that were on the floor. Either way, there is no looking back now. Caleb is officially mobile. Hide your keys, dogfood, remotes, cell phones, electrical outlets, lock up your magazines, cupboards and china cabinets, little man is on the prowl (click to see little britches in action).

Caught!

Caleb and I have spent the last several days visiting his grandparents, aunts, and uncles. He seems to be taking after Grandad Pace and Uncle Mike in his love of electronics! Caught!

Anyone else have this problem?

Caleb is fast asleep. Of course as soon as I start to worry about him a little less at night, I check on him and see this. I wonder if he could have gotten out of this position on his own. I guess that he probably could. I wonder how often this happens.... Anyone else have this problem?

Caleb PreCrawl

Caleb's First Baylor Homecoming

At the Bonfire

At the Parade

We went to the football game too, but at that point we were done with the excitement of taking pictures!

Caleb's New Favorite Passtime

Well Jon and I tried to post a video of Caleb playing with this doorstop in his room, but we were unsuccessful. I thought that we would try out the new video button in blogger. Jon wasn't so optimistic that it would work, and it turns out he was right. So we may try to make our file smaller, but for now I will just post some pictures. Caleb loves to find his way to this doorstop in his room. He hits it and watches it spring back and forth with great enjoyment. I try to monitor him to make sure that he doesn't chew on it, but as much as he would like to chew on it, he has a hard time moving his body to the exact correct position for his mouth to reach it without his head hitting the wall. Caleb isn't quite crawling yet, but he rolls and sort of moves like a caterpillar where ever he wants to go. That has brought has several new "Caleb Mishaps". 1. He ate some of a magazine and at a seperate incident a small shiny gold number 20 sticker. 2. Caleb frequently hits his head on the floor or against furniture. 3. The other day Jon went to check on Caleb in his room and didn't see him at first. He turned the corner to see two feet sticking out from under the bed. He quickly pulled out a confused but happy baby!