Drew's big Christmas gift this year was a Jumparoo we got from our neighbor. I didn't think he would really be able to use if for a month or so but as you can see he loves it! Here is a video showing off his new toy.

Friday we took pictures of Drew. He is already 3 1/2 months old. I can't believe how big he is getting, even from just a few weeks ago. Recently he has discovered his ring toys. He gets so excited when he sees them and he tries to put them in his mouth. Sometimes he is really good at it.

So I'm finally posting our Thanksgiving pictures. We had quite a bit of family, who came from all over. We sure had fun and plenty to do.

We played hours on the Wii






























We then competed in real bowling instead of virtual.








What a split!








Just guiding the ball along.

We had our strike club. You had to bowl a strike to be initiated. Good thing everyone was.

Of course the rest of the entertainment was watching and playing with Drew.

So here's something that was confusing me for a long time, and when I found out what was going on, it made me wish I had my old BB gun. We bought a heavy duty BBQ cover for our grill last spring because the cover from our old grill was shot. Anyway, during the sommer I noticed it was wearing out on the top - it was fading and the material was starting to thin out and look ratty. I couldn't understand what was going on until I was watching the cute squirrel eating nuts on top of the grill on evening. I didn't think much of it until the stupid animal started tearing up the cover after he finished eating, like some sort of after dinner toothpick. Wishing I was armed, all I could do was chase the evil critter off. But he kept coming back. So I moved the grill to the other side of our tiny yard. This helped for a few months, and then about two months ago the varmints renewed thier war on the cover with some sort of perverse new motivation. They were actually tearing off peices and carrying them away to who knows where. In about two weeks the entire top of the grill was naked. Then the cover became a big donut on the ground. Evil little critters. Next year will be different for you.

Our Thanksgiving Feast! It sure was fun having family in town for the week. Drew was spoiled the whole time. He rarely was ever put on the ground. When Monday came and everyone had left, he couldn't understand why he had to play on the ground by himself.

Drew was blessed last Friday at the church. Since we had family in town for Thanksgiving, and most everyone had to leave before church on Sunday, we decided to go untraditional and bless him during the week. Two of Drew's uncles, Ian and Matt, got to be part of the circle as Rob gave the blessing. It was special to have family be apart of it, since we orignally didn't think anybody would be able to come out for it. We had a very good boy the whole evening. Although, by the time we got him home, we found him to be tired, hungry and dirty!



















Grandpapa, dad and Drew

Every day I give Drew some tummy time. This picture is from a few weeks ago. As you can see he was doing real well at lifting his head, but now when he goes on tummy time he just lays there. It's as if he is saying: "This is too hard, I'm not even going to try. I like it laying down just fine." The scratches on his face are from him. When he sucks his thumb, he also claws himself. I've learned to cover his hand during naps to prevent this. But I've cut a hole in his mittens so he can still get at that thumb!

Here's some family pics we took of ourselves. It doesn't happen often, but they turned out nice despite the Scout troop running around where we were taking them.

Today drew had his first real doctors appointment - you know, the one with the pain. He was really good even after the nurse gave him his 3 sticks, not to say he didn't give a piercing scream during. I was imagining what he might be feeling - he's only had one needle stick before, and that was the hepB shot in the hospital when he was born. And he probably can't remember that, so getting stabbed in the leg was a whole new unpleasant experience. It took him a few seconds after his first shot - like he was processing what the heck just happened, and then let out the scream. But they all were done in less than 20 seconds (the nurse was quick), and he quieted right down when mom picked him up. A pause- as if the wheels were still turning in that head of his, and then a few more screams and a betrayed look on his face. As if we were guilty. Speaking of his head, it's official. It's big. Of course he was weighed and measured before the doc saw him, and he reached 11 pounds exactly. That got him into the 10th percentile in weight, and his height got him to 25%. But the head was the knockout. 50%. Gotta have room to store all those brains from his smart mom in there.

Despite our best effort against it, Drew has learned to suck his thumb. When he is in his crib, he'll get real quiet so we think he is asleep. Then when we go to check on him, he is happy thumb sucking along . . .

For Halloween, Drew was our little surgeon.
As you can see he was very happy about his costume.


We went to our church's trunk-or-treat. Drew was a very good boy. He slept in his car seat the whole time. He even won us third place in the trunk decorating contest. I think this will be the first and last year he will sleep through the "candy collecting" on Halloween.

Drew had his first pumpkin carving experience on Monday for family night. While he swung in his swing he coordinated the work. See he is telling dad that "all is okay" with his left hand.

Every morning Drew tells us he loves us with his award winning smiles. We wanted to share what we get each morning.

I give up. I cant fight going to sleep anymore.

This is the preferred sleeping pose. I think it's very cute, like he's throwing up his hands to say "I surrender to the sleep monster". There's just so much to see, and he doesn't want to miss a thing.

Drew has learned to smile. After his nap and feeding, he gives us a few grins. We happened to capture some on camera. These were the winners of the bunch.

Although he is doing better, Drew has never been one to want to take a bath. When he was first born, the only two things he screamed about were changing his diaper and taking a bath. After this particular bath, he grabbed the towel really tight and sucked really fast on the "soothie". I think it helped him forget the whole bath experience he had just had!

I thought we needed a picture of us before Drew came along to make it seem more like a family blog and not just the "Andrew Times". Right now he's just fighting hard not to go to sleep in his car seat behind me on the floor. But anyway, this was at a Royals game in the beginning of August. My school puts on a BBQ (with the same exact food catered every year) and buys everyone some tickets. This year our seats were great compared to the last 2 years, maybe because a winning season for the royals seems more and more distant every year. But it really is cool to be in a city with an MLB team and an NFL team - even if they're both terrible (The Chiefs won thier first game in over a year last week). Ah, the sleep demons have almost overtaken Drew. He's got the one eye barely open look - which means he's losing his last bit of strength to resist.