Hudson 7 months, Boo @ the Zoo & Pumpkin Patches...

This week Hudson turned 7 months old! Here are shots we took of his growth in respect to the glider, pillow & his little bear. I wanted to keep this to like 2 shots but I think these 5 shots capture his personality. He is just a really pleasant kid. He is such a content baby. We have started feeding him more varieties of baby food and we have also started giving him puffs. He is doing really well with all of that. He is kind of crawling and is very mobile. He can sit-up if we sit him that way but still hasn't gotten into the situp position on his own. He seems to spit-up a little more than he used to but I guess that's just because he eats more. And so far, he still never meets a stranger. He seems to love attention from anyone.

This week we worked a lot and we also had fun. On Saturday we went to Boo at the Zoo and then we met Mimi & Granddad at a Pumpkin Patch. On Sunday Hannah had her last Alta match for the season at our home courts. So the kids and I got to go down and watch and play on the playground. Below is a slideshow walking through this past week.

Crawling, New office space, Fall parties & costumes...

This week has a few things to share. But first I forgot to mention something from last week. I ran across this picture I took from my Blackberry at the Catalyst Conference I went to last week before we left for Boston. It was a huge conference with many Christian speakers and worship music. My brother was there too so I got to sit with him. This picture shows you how big the conference was.

Back to this week. Tuesday night we had small group. We've been doing a study by Francis Chan called "Crazy Love". It is really good. Hannah had a girl's night on Saturday night to celebrate her 30th B'day. And she had tennis on Sunday afternoon - she won.

Starting Wednesday night and then really late on Friday night, I helped with the move of 250 PCs from our main Chick-fil-A corporate office to a new facility across the street. We've outgrown our current space and for a while now they have been fixing-up this rental space to help handle all of our people. This space is really modern (current space is traditional) and has an almost IKEA look to it. I really like it.

One of my favorite things is their furniture. Have you ever been frustrated by all the cables and cords wadded at your feet under your desk. Checkout the two shots below.

Mess of cables...

...now they're hidden behind the door... genius! (maybe only those of you who are OCD like me will care about this)

Anyway... if you care to get a glimpse of the new building from shots taken from my Blackberry, see this slideshow. These picture are the calm before everyone moves in on Monday. So it will probably never be this uncluttered again...

On Saturday morning, we went to a neighborhood Halloween party hosted by Drew & Tyler. Hudson wore Raegan's first costume... a cow outfit. See below... which one is Raegan from 2 years ago and which is Hudson? OK... they don't look that much alike...

Below is a slideshow of a few pictures I took at that party. After the party, I went to a dance ministry service project with our small group. I didn't really get to do anything but I got to watch some cool dancing. See the slideshow...

Lastly, here is a quick silent video of Hudson's forward motion. He's not quite crawling yet. And last week it looked more like an army crawl. This week it looks more like the worm. But he can definitely get to what he wants now. (it's silent because there was too much random noise in the background of the videos...)

Tomorrow Hudson turns 7 months old!

Weekend in Boston

This past weekend we went to Boston for Hannah's 30th Birthday. Granddad & Mimi stayed at our house with the kids for the first half of the weekend and then Nana came for the second half.

We had fun in Boston. We stayed at the Liberty Hotel (which used to be the Charles Street Jail). It was very nice. We got to visit Heather (Hannah's sister) & her family in Hull. We got to see their Coast Guard base. We tried to see a lot in Boston in our short time there. We didn't really have time to get history on a lot of what we saw - or to even know what it was we were looking at. But we got a taste of Boston. Speaking of which, one of the main things we did was eat. I've tried to narrate some of the slides below. I don't know that we did the best with our picture taking but this gives you a slight record of our trip.



One of the best stories we have from the weekend is that getting back into our hotel at night was like trying to get into the most popular night club in town. Luckily we flash our room key and they let us through. So our lobby was very popular and you had to be on the list to get in. To make a long story short, we were in the area between the elevators to the guest rooms and the club scene lobby. Out of the club scene came Tom Cruise & Katie Holmes to go to their room. Security held most of the crowd back from the elevator area where we were. So we were standing 2 feet away from both of them. They both made eye contact with me. But... I was too star struck to speak or get a picture. Oh well. But it's cool that they were staying in the same hotel as us!

This is a slideshow of pictures from the grandparents with the kids. They all seemed to have fun. We really appreciate our parents for staying with the kids so we could have a get away!




Other interesting things are that Hudson seems to be almost ready to crawl! He definitely can drag himself forward. And now he is putting his knees under him and doing the rock. And even moving a little that way. It's crazy!

We have a squirrel problem. We have a lot of columns around our porch. Hannah discovered that we have a family of squirrels living in the one by our swing. See these pictures.

Finally, the other week was Grandparents Day at the kids' school. Hannah's parents went and they just gave us copies of the pictures they took. Below are some of those shots.

A weekend at home...

This past week was spent working and staying around home.

I thought this past weekend would be spent with me trying to get a handle on all the things I've let slip. I did some of that but I also got to have more fun than I originally thought I would.

One thing we did was managed to transform our breakfast room with a new light fixture and a smaller table (that was my parent's first piece of furniture ever bought when they got married). I think it makes our breakfast room seem bigger and is better for the four of us to eat meals together.

Hudson seems so close to scooting toward objects on the ground and is sitting-up better. Raegan is getting more and more confident. She is really friendly to people that she used to be shy around. She is even initiating conversations with them. And where she used to stay away from the playground if other kids were on it, she now runs up and plays - And talks to the other kids.

Below is a slideshow of some of the things I mentioned (& I'm starting to add captions to dialog).