Saturday Play Date

Today we took a little trip over to my friend Erin’s house for a visit and play date for the kids and also for us adults to catch up.  It was fun day, the babies really checked each other out which is so fun to watch them discover each other and interact. Finley is still a little young to really get into it but Lauren set’s great examples for him as he watches her.  Soon the age difference in these two probably won’t even be noticeable… it’s hard to believe!! 

On a side note, Nate is doing well at Fort Bliss. The rest of the soldiers are actually still arriving in Texas (they obviously can’t in-process 3200 soldiers at once so they staggered arrival times).  They are just getting going with the training they will do down there.  I did send Nate a package today of a few things he had forgotten or needed.  Just the first of many packages that will go out for the next year. 

Big Gym Little Gym

Today I took Finley to The Little Gym in Middleton. It's a kids gym and they have a "Bugs" class for 4-10 month old babies. We were invited to join a friend for the day who takes her daughter there weekly for the "Bugs" class. Finley enjoyed it, though it was a new experience and sometimes he gets overstimulated with a bigger groups of people. There's lots of stretching and practicing crawling and walking and the best part for Finley was definitely the bubbles. He loved trying to get the bubbles. Guess we have to get some bubbles next time we visit Target!! It was just a fun little time for the babies and parents alike. I am not sure if I will sign up for the class (that goes till June) because I don't know if we will be able to go every Wednesday but they do offer more classes as the kids age so perhaps in the future!
After our morning at The Little Gym, Finley and I headed to the "Big Gym", or the YMCA. We were able to get a free family membership due to Nate being deployed (through Military OneSource). They offered free family Y memberships last time Nate was deployed and I took advantage of it then as well. We actually were members of the nearby YMCA several times over the last few years but recently haven't been due to time constraints and other things going on. It feels GREAT to get to work out again. Since having Finley I have not had much time for myself and with Nate's getting ready to deploy and Finley being so little yet, workouts just didn't fit into the schedule. The YMCA offers a great free Childcare center where Finley goes during my workouts. So far he seems to do wonderful and I get a good report- he actually naps there too! I also hope to do some fun stuff with Finley at the Y as he gets a little bit older too. They offer great programming, just renovated the entire facility and are about 5 minutes from our house. You couldn't ask for much more!! I am trying to make this part of our daily routine to visit the Y. It's good for me to workout and be healthy and for Finley to get some exposure to other kids and babies. Win-Win!!

Raspberries and Crawling

Here are some videos I took of Finley tonight.  With all that has been going on lately I haven’t had a lot of time to get videos of his new crawling skills.  Finley started “rocking” on all 4’s awhile ago and has since progressed to being able to crawl about 3-4 strides, falling on his belly, then getting up again to do more.  He also drags, pushes and “army” crawls his way in between.  He actually gains ground quite quickly and it’s usually a bee line for whatever he’s not supposed to have (cords)!  I ordered the baby gates on Monday that will corral him in our carpeted living room as he has a tendency to go for the tile and wood floors and then fall and smack his head!  He was kind of tired tonight but here is a taste. I hope to get better videos as he keeps progressing.  I was so happy when Finley started crawling while Nate was still home since Nate is going to miss quite a few milestones in his little guys life it was great to be able to share this while daddy was still here.  Now… if Finley could have just mastered saying “Dada” for Nate… hopefully soon!

Finley blowing his ever-so-funny raspberries. Notice that he is so happy because he is playing with the forbidden cords!!

More pictures from tonight…

That’s a good head of hair

Static!!

Faux-Hawk?

All smiles with playing with the cords

Reminds me of a Cock-a-too

Nate and Finley

Just wanted to put up a few photos of Nate and Finley spending time together last week. The two of them are so funny to me as I see so many similarities in them. Nate says the same thing about Finley and myself… I guess he’s a good mix of both of us!!

On another note, Nate has arrived safely to Fort Bliss, Texas where he will remain for about 2 months. We aren’t sure of his exact date that he will leave Bliss for Iraq so I will keep everyone posted. I am sure the weather is much nicer in the pan-handle of Texas than it is here in Wisconsin though. I guess that is a positive. I have already sent a “test” letter to the address Nate gave me for him to see how the mail is working. Anyone in the Army knows that Army mail can be un-reliable at times (aka SLOW or LOST!).  I do have to mail him a few things he forgot in the midst of this all. If anyone would like his address for Texas please let me know and I can give it to you.

Finley and I are fairing pretty ok for now. He was great all weekend and I think all the commotion got to him because I had kind of a grumpy kid today. Hey, everyone is entitled to their bad days, especially Mondays! That will have to be my motto for awhile. We are planning on keeping as busy as possible though with a list of “to do’s” around here.

All the “boys”. Nate, Finley, Howie and Opsec. For those of you who don’t know Opsec is the dog Nate brought back from Iraq his first tour. 

 

He’s Gone…

Nate left yesterday afternoon for his year long tour of duty.  There was another send-off at the 32nd Brigade Headquarters guard unit (which is the unit he is now with).  This is at Camp Douglas which is an almost 2 hour drive from here in Madison.  Add in a snowstorm and that is how our day went.  Of course we haven’t had any significant snow fall for weeks but we would have upwards of 5 or 6 inches on the day he leaves. I guess the Wisconsin snow was sending off it’s soldiers properly.  Well it made for kind of a crazy day with trying to leave a bit early to battle the crappy roads, not to mention trekking through the unplowed parking lots etc. Snow or not I knew that the day was going to stink.  After all this preparation and Nate’s coming and going in the last several weeks it was finally the day we have been dreading since late August when we first found out there was the possibility of Nate deploying.  He is actually not flying to Fort Bliss until Monday and I was able to chat with him last night even after the tearful goodbye in the armory. I am sure I will be able to talk to Nate on a daily basis until they leave Fort Bliss in April or May and then we will see. There also is a possibility that Finley and I will be able to fly down to Bliss in April for Nate’s four day pass but  I am not going to get my hopes up just yet!  Finley was so over-stimulated at yesterday’s send off he was “drunken-tired” by the time he had to say goodbye to his daddy!  Poor guy!   This deployment has meant a lot of schedule changes and running around for our little guy but he has done just wonderful.  Nate and I both know we have the best little baby and think the world of him.  Together, yet apart we will all get through this next year with each others love and support!

Bottle with Daddy

Playtime (we took over the little gym in the armory!)

Posing for pictures with parents

Family shot

Finley getting very sleepy..

Bye Daddy

6 Month Baby Well Check Appointment

Nate and I took Finley in for his 6 month check up today. We actually are now taking him to a new Doctor and we really like him. Finley seems to like him as well. Overall Finley is GREAT! We had very little to be concerned about besides some issues with his eating. He seems to have already decided he no longer wants rice cereal or baby food and only wants "big people" food. Mostly only if he can feed it to himself. The Doctor said to just keep offering the cereal and baby foods and he will eventually give in and eat them but I have a feeling otherwise. I think it will be a combination of trying to get him to eat those things and also giving him special "big people" food that is safe for him to eat (without teeth!). We are also supposed to try to get him on a more strict daytime schedule (since his nighttime routine is going very well). Time will tell. Our little boy thinks he is a big boy I guess. His growth is good though he fell to the 34% in weight at 16lbs 12 oz. His length was 26 and 3/4 inches which put him up a bit in that category at the 59%. And then there was his head circumference which was only 43 cm and the 27th percentile. They ensured me that all of this is fine. Finley has always had a smallish head and he is so active that he is not gaining weight as fast as some babies do. Otherwise he meets or exceeds all of the milestones for his age so that is something to be happy for. We still split up his vaccines so he will go back in a few weeks for two more. We were both glad that Nate was able to go to this appointment before he leaves just to experience as much with Finley as possible for the next year.

Wordless Wednesday

32nd Brigade Send Off Ceremony

The “Big “send-off for the 32nd Brigade was today.  It was here in Madison at the Alliant Energy Center so I can’t complain about the location. Actually I wasn’t sure Finley and I were going to make it till just this morning.  Nate’s dad also came to the ceremony.  It was pretty impressive to see 3200 soldiers in uniform filling the entire Coliseum floor.  This is the largest deployment of Wisconsin National Guard troops since WWII.  All the politicians and high ranking military staff were there to speak making it longggg.  It was quite a sight though.  Trying to find Nate in that group was impossible though we were texting back and forth of where he was.  We did get a quick hello in as the soldiers headed out after the ceremony back their buses.  Yes, though we live 10 minutes away from the Alliant, Nate had to drive the almost 2 hours up to Camp Douglas just to turn around and ride a bus back to Madison for the ceremony.  You have got to love the Army.  Nate will hopefully be able to spend all of Thursday and Friday with us and Saturday is the dreaded day.  We have to head up to Camp Douglas, have yet another send off ceremony just for his unit and that’s it. We send our soldier off to Texas and then Iraq.  You could say I am not looking forward to the weekend! Here are some shots from the ceremony today.

That’s a lot of soldiers!

See why we couldn’t find Nate?

The Stage and all the Politicians and Generals…

From where we were watching

Waving his Flag (I was certain he was going to poke his eye out!)

Waving for Grandpa Greg

Obviously Mr. Smiles doesn’t know we are here because his daddy is going away for a year

Hanging out… this ceremony was LONG!

Finley’s 6 Month Portraits

Today we had Finley's 6 months pictures taken. You can see I am in the midst of updating the blog with the new photos. We tried to get a few family pictures seeing as though it may be a year before we can take a family portrait together again!! We are happy with the pictures overall (though sometimes seeing pictures of yourself reminds you of your fitness goals :) Finley was actually quite crabby today and getting through the pictures seemed almost impossible but they still got some great shots. I think he was just tired from a long week. The last pictures we had of him were done at 10 weeks old and my what a change! Enjoy!

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6 Months!

Finley turned 6 months old today! It’s also Valentine’s Day so Happy Valentine’s Day to everyone. Nate and I chose to kind of opt out on doing anything romantic (or gifts) for Valentine’s Day this year In lieu of his leaving at the end of this coming week, we decided to just spend time with our little boy as a family and also visit with his Grandparents who live in Appleton. We headed to Appleton this afternoon for a short, but great visit. Finley did wonderful not only by sleeping on the way to Appleton and back (a 2 hour long trip each way!!) but he was also wonderful for Nate’s grandparents. He showed off how cute and fun he could be and we were very proud and happy for this! We had a great day!

Here are the 6 month pictures I got of Finley in the chair… he was not very thrilled to cooperate again this time around. Also here are the pictures from the visit. For some reason we got all the pictures after we took Finley’s clothes off before putting his pajamas on!

Nate’s National Guard Unit Send Off

Thursday morning was the Send-Off Ceremony for Nate’s Guard Unit, which he commands.  It was a success and since the soldiers aren’t actually leaving until next Saturday (with 2 more send-offs to go!!) it wasn’t a real tear jerker or anything. That will come, however I think the send off  went well. We had a decent amount of family and community members attend and all went well after our short-notice planning. Finley did good, though he was a bit squirrelly that morning- I think he was tired of being at the Armory were he couldn’t really be on the floor rolling and trying to crawl around. Here are some photos from the event. Oh, and the reporter/photographer guy from the local paper (it’s the town where we went to college) took a picture of Nate, Finley and I and I think he was going to put it in the paper. Too funny to me.  I will try to get a copy of the paper to keep for Finley though.

Nate addressing his soldiers and families

 

The Company in formation

Nate’s mom with a sleeping Finley

Nate and his Grandparents

Family Photo with Nate’s Parents

Our little Family