Turkey and smashed potatoes

Hey loved ones!  Happy Thanksgiving!  No crazy Black Friday shopping for us today.  We found the good deals online with free shipping!  No crowds!  We had a lovely Thanksgiving at home with Mike's Dad.  Mike cooked a great turkey in the Big Easy.  So we decided it was time for Kaylen to have her first turkey dinner.  Although she mostly choked on the turkey, I think she enjoyed it.  She enjoyed some mashed potatoes and sweet potatoes too.  Here is a video for ya.




Here is another video of Kaylen clapping......




I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving and hugged your loved ones!  We love you all!

Moving Right Along

Hey friends and family!  We are moving right along!  It's gonna be Thanksgiving this week and Christmas will be here before you know it.  Kaylen turned 9 months on the 15th!  She is still cruising the furniture and now she can stand alone without holding on!  No steps yet but soon enough.  She is really observing the world these days.  She wants to touch everything, and put it in her mouth.  She loves our phones, remotes and pens.  She also has learned to clap her hands.  And we are teaching her to wave goodbye.  We had her 9 month appt and her pediatrician was very impressed with her social skills.  KJ will stare you down with her serious face until she decides she likes you, but then she smile and laugh with you.  She is now 20 pounds (75th %), 29.5 inches (97th %).  She had another couple of shots but she barely cried.  She is such a good baby.

We went to  a friend of mine's daughters second birthday.  It was at a My Gym which was really fun for the older kids.  KJ enjoyed interacting with the other kids, once she warmed up.  We put her in the tub of balls but she wasn't too sure about it when she started sinking!

We also got to visit with Mike's cousin Crystal.  She used to live in SoCal but now lives in Georgia.  She has two daughters, Aubrey and Reese.  Reese was born exactly one month after Kaylen.  It was fun to get them together.  We went to a park next to the Rose Bowl and had a blast swinging on the swings.  We wished they lived closer.  Hopefully they will move back one day. 

Here is a fun pic of Kaylen not holding on to anything.  And she loves to put socks in her mouth.  Silly girl!

Now for some videos!

This first one is of Kaylen and her crazy tongue!



This one is of her cruising the couch.  She is much faster now but its what I have.




And this last one is her laughing hysterically at Daddy!  I love it!  The first few seconds are dark but then I turned on the flash.

Cruising!

Hey everyone!  Another month has flown by!  KJ is officially on the move.  She can crawl around pretty fast now.  She can pull up on anything and now she is cruising the furniture!  She has more balance every day.  I see her contemplating letting go of the furniture but then she chickens out.  I am sure walking is just right around the corner.  We got a leather coffee table to make things easier.  She loves it. 

KJ was 8 months old on Oct 15th.  And now she will be 9 months in a couple of weeks!  Here are some pics.

And then she grabbed a pen to play with...........oops!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well Mindy finally got to come visit us on Oct 24th.  KJ & Mindy became the best of friends.  There was a lot of laughing, giggling, tickling, snuggling, smooching and fun times.  Oh and lots of picture taking.  Mindy's the best!

Mindy will be giving me all the photos taken this past week but here are a few to tease you.

 Here is another adorable photo of KJ

Now we all know how much I love Halloween.  Of course my daughter has to have good costumes!  Two of them in fact.  Aunt Barb got her a pink leopard costume and I had to put her in a beaver costume!  We took lots of pics even though it was hard to get her to look at the camera or smile sometimes.  Thanks Mindy for the awesome pics!

So on Sunday Oct 30th, Mike, Mindy, Barb and I went to Belmont Shore to walk around and see the doggie parade.  There are like 500 dogs in costumes.  Mindy was in heaven.    Here is our favorite dog,  happy as can be, letting everyone take his pic.

We even had a couple of strangers wanting to take KJ's picture of her in the pink leopard outfit.  Kinda strange but kinda cute. 

On Halloween, we celebrated Mike's birthday.  We went to the LB Aquarium and then had lunch at the YardHouse.  They brought him a chocolate souffle with a candle and KJ helped him blow it out.....well sort of.

Here is a video of KJ when she first started pulling up on the couch.




Here is one of her eating a teething biscuit for the first time



And my favorite video this month....Mindy feeding KJ....they had a lot of fun