Family Pictures 2013

We did family pictures with Kimberly Hedges at the Helotes Gardens, a private reception venue in Old Town Helotes used for weddings.  Asher was tricky because he wanted to be hunched over making it difficult to see his face in the pictures.  We enjoyed exploring the beautiful grounds.

Asher's Baby Blessing

It took us a while to bless Asher because we wanted to have some family there for it.  We knew that Matt's mom would not be able to come because she would be coming at Christmas.  My parents had a busy schedule with all those grandchildren turning eight this year and we had Sofia and Teo's baptisms to work around.  We ended up having to just pick a weekend, and luckily they ended up being available.  Camille had suggested maybe waiting until Christmas break so her family could come down for it.  Asher already didn't look like a newborn anymore and we knew if we waited we would risk him sitting up during the blessing and maybe even talking.  Matt gave the blessing and Grandpa Whetten, Mauren Herrera, and Aaron Vaughn stood in the circle.  Asher was quiet and calm throughout the blessing.

October Octivities

On October 12 there was a centennial celebration of the partnership between the church and Boy Scouts of America.  Brayden and Matt spent the day at McGimpsey Scout Park.

On October 13th we celebrated Kristel's birthday.  Matt made a loaded diaper cake because that is her life right now.

October 19th we took the kids to Six Flags to do the Halloween activities.  They were able to trick or treat and Brayden was super happy that he got to meet their  Elvis impersonator. 

October 24th Kristel took Asher and Julia to the Pumpkin patch with Blake's class.

October 26th we took the kids to ride bikes on the Greenway.

Halloween Oz

Cynthia and I were talking about Halloween costumes and discovered that members of both of our families had independently suggested doing the Wizard of Oz.  So, we decided we would have both our families do the theme together.  We figured there were plenty of characters to choose from.  When we pitched the idea some were for it and some were not.  We let them choose who they wanted to be.  We did have to sell some of the characters to them.  It was fun to watch them get excited as it got closer to Halloween.  There were many impromptu plays with the kids acting out their parts from the Wizard of Oz.  Brayden impressed us by playing many parts and showing them how to do their part.  He did an impressive Wicked Witch of the West.  It was a lot of fun putting the costume ideas all together.  We wish that we had more places to show off our costumes.  All that work and we only used them for a few hours at the church Halloween party.

Here is the list of characters
Mauren and Cynthia - people from the Emerald City
Matt - the Wizard of Oz
Kristel - Wicked Witch of the East
Gabriela - Wicked Witch of the West
Asher - flying monkey
David - Cowardly Lion
Kylee - Scarecrow
Brayden - Tin Man
Natalia - Dorothy
Julia - Glenda the Good Witch
Blake - Munchkin (Lollipop guild)
Katia - Flower Munchkin
Analisa - Ballerina Munchkin
Tatiana - Mime (non-participant)

Asher did not cooperate with taking pictures on Halloween.  I put him in his Halloween outfit to take some pictures of his cute flying monkey costume on January 12, 2014 when he was 4 1/2 months old.

Asher 1 Month

September 23 - October 22

Asher has been pretty good about having a good stretch of sleep at night.  He will go 6-7 hours between feedings and then goes back to sleep and does another 3-4 hours.  That means he is usually asleep when I get the kids up and help them get ready for school.  He can stay sleeping because the bus stop is our driveway and I just have to step outside our door to get them on the bus.  Kylee also rides the bus, so by 7:20 it is just Asher and I until the young kids come home at 3:20.  I have been able to enjoy this first month with Asher because I don't have any commitments during the day.  I can hang out and hold him.  He makes a lot of faces, and tends to have a stressed out look on his face often.  He makes lots of noises, especially when he sleeps.  He is the noisiest of all my children.  He will smile in the morning when I talk to him.

We turned on the vacuum while Gabbi took his 1 month pictures, so it would calm him down.
He is fussy during the day  and sleeps well at night.  I am enjoying getting to spend time holding him and rocking him during the day while the other kids are at school.  He takes a lot of naps in my arms.

1 month - starting to try to "talk", occasional smiles
6 weeks - talking and trying to get hands to mouth
8 weeks - starting to suck on knuckle and prefers it more than pacifier
8 weeks - lots of "talking" and interaction
He keeps his fists closed and sucks on them, so they get really stinky.  Brayden held the baby for the first time since the hospital when he was 6 weeks old, he is nervous to drop him.

 

School pictures

I don't think we have ever really been happy with school pictures.  You never know how they are going to turn out.  This year somebody in our ward was offering to take "school pictures" outside at a middle school for $10 per child, so we could not pass it up.  We were so happy with how well they turned out.  She did such a great job and it only took about 5-10 minutes per child.  

We did not purchase the official school pictures because we already had good ones, but here are the proofs.

corn maize

We decided to go to the South Texas Corn Maize in Hondo, Texas and we told the kids that in order for us to go they needed to get their chores done by a certain time.  Kylee was not very motivated to go because we didn't know at first if the Herrera's would be coming.  She is generally only motivated by friends and cousins, so she didn't really try to get her chores done in time.  Brayden got his stuff done in time but debated whether he wanted to go or not.  He ended up going and Kylee was left home alone to get her stuff done. We got phone calls from Kylee during the maze asking when we were coming back.  She didn't appreciate being home 4 hours waiting for us to get back.   

We had tried going the weekend before, on the first day it opened because it was military appreciation day, but it had rained out.  They ended up honoring the military appreciation day the next weekend.  It was a cloudy day, but it wasn't really supposed to rain.   Cynthia and some of her kids went with us.

We made it through the first half with a few sprinkles, so we decided to do the 2nd maze.  When we were in the 2nd half it started to pour.  The baby was covered with a blanket and slept through the deluge unphased.  We were trying to get through quickly because we were getting wet.  It was a little difficult work as mud and straw laid along the path caked to our shoes.