9 months!

This past month has flown by! I can't believe August is almost over. I'm happy, but sad at the same time. I love summer, but I'm ready to have my husband back home. His school schedule for the fall won't be terrible, so I'm looking forward to many date nights and just having my teammate back home with me :]

Other news: We have a 9 month old now!!

That face in the bottom picture gets me every time!! Brady has such a fun little personality and he has been changing so much the past month! 

He is officially an army crawler, and there is no stopping this little boy. He will get into anything on the floor, or within his reach. We had to move his crib down because he started to pull up on the sides!!

He also loves to play on his belly in the bath! I am a fan of this, because when he is on his back he kicks his legs non stop and literally splashes all the water out of the tub...

Brady also loves to be with me wherever I go. In the kitchen, bathroom, closet... I know I will have little hands grabbing at my ankles in a few minutes :] While I cook dinner, Brady is happy in his high chair being a good little helper!

He loves to pull all the toys out of the basket and sit with them on the floor. So one time I decided I would put him inside the basket with his toys so he wouldn't have to take them all out :] He was pretty amused.

Brady has started to pull himself up on to things and stand! So crazy when I think that it was only a month ago he started scooting around. This is one of his favorite places to stand :] He could hang out here all day!

Okay and I have to show this picture just because. One day, Brady was a little tired and was crawling around my ankles before dinner so I set him in his high chair and let him play. We ate dinner and afterwards, I took off his tray and saw his bulging diaper. I was dying laughing and couldn't help but take a picture. His face KILLS me!!

Ohh I am so in love with him :] He always gets the biggest smile on his face when Jordan walks in the room. He definitely knows who his parents are. Jordan has been trying to teach him a thing or two about golf on his days off... 

I am so grateful I get to stay home with this little chunk all day long :] And I am so happy that Jordan is always such an amazing husband and father. I LOVE my boys!!

Eight is great

This baby boy of mine is 8 months old today.

He is the sweetest baby in the world! He loves to play on his belly and grab everything in front of him. Brady started scooting on his belly this week. It was so fun to watch the determination in his eyes. 

Brady's favorite foods right now are pears and sweet potatoes. The past 3 weeks Brady has been a pro at the pincer grasp. He is able to pick up the little pieces of food I put on his tray and get them in his mouth most of the time :]

He makes me the happiest mom in the world. I love spending every day with him.

We love visitors!

Okay so some very exciting things have been happening around here! First off, my parents came to Sacramento to visit for the weekend :] They got here Thursday evening just in time to give Brady a hug and kiss goodnight. We had a very relaxing time here in Cali.

On Friday we slept in a little and hung around the house until about 11. We all piled in to my parents new 2013 Honda Accord Sport :] My dad was happy to take me for a spin in it and show off all the details. It was a very smooth ride, and my mom definitely deserved a new car after all these years! We strolled around the mall for a while and headed home to put Brady down for a nap. After, we went to Target to pick up a few things (seriously, who doesn't love Target?). It got up to 108 degrees on Friday and I was DYING. I enjoy my 75 degree weather much better. We grabbed a pizza for dinner and hung out at home watching a movie until Jordan got back from work. 

Saturday was our exploring day! My dad loves to go to pawn shops in Boise and look for guitars, amps, or whatever he can find. Meanwhile, my mom will look at the jewelry or a quilt store nearby. We mapped out our route and headed out after Brady's morning nap. First stop was a pawn shop downtown. They didn't have much as far as music, but they had a huge jewelry selection that my mom and I were checking out. 

Next stop was a little yarn store, Rumpelstiltskin. My mom was in heaven :]

They had so many different kinds of yarn, but she was specifically looking for sock yarn. She found one she loved and will make a pair of socks with it to always remember her trip to Sacramento! She is such a talented woman!! Meanwhile outside the store...

The boys waited patiently :] 

Our last stop was at another pawn shop close by. This was a legit pawn shop... You had to ring a door bell and they would look outside at you and then electronically open the door for just you. The workers were behind glass like at a movie theater, but I'm sure it was bullet proof. There were bars on the window too! It seemed like a sketchy area from all the security in the store haha. They had more of what my dad was interested in!

This time, Grammy and Brady were waiting around!

Oh and it got up to 108 degrees again on Saturday. So we were ready to head back to the air conditioned apartment after this! We had a fun time chatting and reflecting back on memories from my childhood. They gave me some advice on parenting with things they wish they would have done different, or things they liked doing. 

After Brady's nap, we met Jordan and the rest of the sales team at The Cheesecake Factory for a yummy dinner!

It was hard to say goodbye on Sunday after church, but we had such a fun time with them here in Cali!

OTHER EXCITING NEWS:

1 Brady has been eating solids for a few weeks now. He usually eats twice a day and will finish off a whole container of baby food throughout the day - on a good day. Over the weekend, our schedule was crazy and I wasn't as good about feeding Brady solids on schedule. Tonight I opened up a new jar of sweet potatoes and Brady ate THE WHOLE THING in one sitting!!! I was so happy. 

He got a little messy during the process :]

2 I ran today for the second time since I was pregnant with Brady. I have had a really hard time making time for myself and getting motivated to exercise. I ran for 22 minutes and it felt amazing :] More days like this will definitely be coming up.

3 Okay and just for fun :] Here are some pictures I took of Brady Sunday afternoon while Jordan was taking a little nap.

Love this little guy so much!

What's so great about Pier 39?

Yesterday, Jordan, Brady and I took a day trip to San Francisco. We left thinking that we would go to Pier 39, see the Golden Gate Bridge and Alcatraz, and also go to the zoo. Little did we know, that is A LOT to do in one day. We parked about a mile away from Pier 39 and started to walk. It was about 11:00 A.M and we were freezing!! I didn't realize how windy and cold it would be by the water, it's always so hot in Sacramento. Luckily we brought lots of blankets for Brady and he stayed nice and warm.

I'm a little embarrassed, I honestly didn't really know what was so special about pier 39. We were walking past like pier 25 and pier 32 and I was having a negative attitude (partly attributed to the fact that I was a little chilly) and I said to Jordan, "can't we just take a picture by one of these piers instead of 39? What is so special about 39?". We kept walking and I got really excited when I started to see the flags for pier 39, we were almost there - then we could go see something else, right? ;)

So as we got closer, we saw tons of shops, places to eat and the huge aquarium! I realized why this was the pier we wanted to be at :] It was so much fun to walk around and see all the shops and vendors as we were walking up to the pier. After walking around for about 45 minutes we decided to grab a bite to eat. We had a recommendation to try Neptune's, and we were so glad we went there! It had an amazing view over the ocean and you could see Alcatraz perfectly. Oh and of course, the best clam chowder bowls you've ever tasted.

Okay the sky light made it hard to get a good picture of Jordan, but you can see our view in this picture. We were literally sitting right next to the water. It was so much fun to watch the sea lions splashing around and the sailboats going by.

Brady would only look at Jordan when I pulled out the camera... little stinker! haha

Jordan got a hamburger (of course), and I tried my very first clam chowder bowl. Yum!!

After we finished eating we stopped to watch a magic show for a few minutes and started to walk back towards the aquarium and the entrance. As we were walking back I saw one of those booths that lets you open up an oyster to find a pearl! I remembered that my mom and sister both did this when we took a trip to San Diego. They both got their pearls set into jewelry and I wanted one really bad. Jordan made me walk around for a few minutes (because he said my buying temperature was really high lol) and we looked in a few more stores. I still really wanted one so we went back to the booth :]

The woman working there told us that it is more sentimental if the husband picks out the oyster. Jordan picked out the hairiest, shortest, and fattest one in the bucket. Apparently they said the uglier the oyster, the prettier the pearl.

After he picked the oyster, we had to welcome the pearl into the world. I tapped it 3 times and we all yelled, "ALOHA" as loud as we could. 

She opened the oyster and found this beauty inside!!

All the workers were surprised by the size of the pearl. It was pretty big compared to their sample pearl that they guarantee you will get. Woot woot!! Jordan picked out the best one :] So the worker rubbed it down with salt to clean it, and then she let me be the first one to hold it with my bare hands.

I was seriously having so much fun! Jordan let me pick out a ring setting and I went home one happy girl :] 

We will definitely be going back to San Francisco again! We didn't get nearly as much done as we were planning, but we had an amazing day :] Next time we are planning on taking the tour of Alcatraz, and we can't wait to go back.

Starting solids and a new haircut for Brady

Brady has been so excited to start solids. He told me :] He always leans forward to try and grab my food when we are eating dinner, he is so interested in what we are eating, and he is officially 6 months - time to start :] I was so excited when I went to the store to get some baby food!! I got some rice cereal, oatmeal cereal, and a variety of starter fruits and veggies. On Sunday we tried the rice cereal and Brady loved eating it!!

He would lean forward toward the spoon and open his mouth :]

Unfortunately, he got a little rash on his chest, neck and back after we tried so I've stopped giving it to him and in a few days we will try oatmeal. I hope he isn't allergic to rice! Has anyone had a similar experience or know anything about rashes after eating rice cereal? It also made him really constipated which was not fun... So hopefully things go better with the oatmeal!

Another fun activity for the night was giving Brady a little hair trim. His hair is only growing in the top middle section of his head, so it is a perfect faux-hawk! I love it, but it was getting rather long on the top haha. So I used our clippers and put on the longest guard we had so it wouldn't take off much. It wasn't a huge change, but it was fun to see Brady's reaction to getting a hair cut! He was smiling so big for his Daddy!!

A little bit nervous for the first buzz! 

But he was so good the whole time, and didn't get sad once :]

We didn't really get a good after shot... but like I said, it doesn't look much different. Just a little shorter on top :]