Rock got the honor of hanging the first ornament on the Christmas tree.
A gift from Rock's Great Aunt Valeta, it's a miniature Fred Flintstone ornament with the words "YOU ROCK" in 'stone.' She got matching ornaments for Rock and my dad.
Then Fix hung Rock from the tree.
Leave it to Iowa to finally make some corn that Fix can eat. If you didn't know already, Fix is allergic to corn. That includes cornstarch, cornmeal and corn syrup. It's in a LOT of stuff, but thankfully not in this yummy cheese that my dad bought for Fix on a recent business trip.
Rock didn't quite know what to make of Christmas tree shopping.
So he started crying.
Not that I blame him -- it was about 10 degrees outside. The tree that we ended up with is not the best I've ever seen, but it's not bad for a whirlwind-my-eyeballs-are-going-to-freeze-if-we-don't-pick-one-soon-tree-shopping excursion. And it was a good chance to teach Rock about the true meaning of Christmas...
Via this vinyl Santa Claus.
A lot of things have happened in December. In fact, we've had so much going on, I haven't had much time to blog. As always, Rock has done a lot of growing.
And a lot of drooling...
And a lot of hand-munching...
And a lot of staring...
And of course, a lot of sleeping. Appreciate his LONG eyelashes! I don't know where he got those from but they sure are adorable.
We hosted Thanksgiving at our place this year. We had nine guests total so we got to use the leaf in our new dining room table for the first time! In attendance were (from the Fix side) Papa John, Nana Kerry, Uncle Jason (unfortunately no fiance Heather!), and Aunt Susi. And from the Brockman side, Grandpa Rock, Grandma Melanie, and Aunt Zuni. Notice how I did not call either Susanna by her full name. I did not want to be accused of playing favorites! This was true even on their candle place cards. Instead of typical place cards, I printed everyone's name on vellum and wrapped them around a glass (tea light) candle holder in front of their places. I was pretty pleased with how they turned out.
I was also pleased with how our cheeseball turkey appetizer turned out. This recipe is from my old coworker Cheryl and it is AMAZING. And it tastes even better when it's shaped like a turkey. YUM! Speaking of yum, ALL of our food was incredibly delicious this year. Since we all contributed something, I think that everyone had the time to really make their part of the meal truly wonderful. It was the best Thanksgiving meal I've had in a really long time. Of course, we did miss being with our California family -- the Millers/Colemans/Rosencrantz' clan and Mrs. Miller's amazing wild rice. Alas, you can't have everything.
POP QUIZ - 2 Questions:
1) Who weighed more our turkey or Rock?
2) See if you can spy the difference between the two pictures below. (answers to the pop quiz are at the end of this blog)
At Rock's 2-month appointment (11/20/07), he was 15 lbs. and 4 oz. This puts him in the 97-99th percentile for weight and makes him the average size of a 4 1/2 month old! In order to be considered 'healthy' doctors like to see babies double their weight by 5 months of age. Since he was 8 lbs. 1 oz. when he was born, we were excited to see that he has almost accomplished this feat in 2 months. What an overachiever!
His head (which we thought was big) is actually only in the 25th percentile. I didn't get the exact measurement, but I had the doctor double check that he was reading the measurement correctly because we couldn't believe that his head is little!
His length was 24 inches. At two feet long, he is in the 70-95th percentile. Don't ask me why that range is so big. Anyway, all this is good news because it means three things:
Uncle Jason is getting married on Dec. 29th. For his wedding, he and his best man (Fix) and his father are all wearing kilts. They had kilts made especially for this occasion in the Gillespie dress tartan. Last Tuesday, we met Uncle Jason and Papa John in Alexandria to get fitted for the jackets and other accessories that they will be renting to wear with their kilts. In the picture above, Jason is doing his best Rock-sad-face impersonation and Papa John snuck in the back of the picture!
Here are all the men getting ready to try on their jackets (by the way, I apologize if there is an official Scottish name for the jacket... I can't remember these things!).
The groom being fitted. It should also be noted that we got extra tartan material for me to sew (unofficial) kilts for Rock and his cousin Caleb to wear to the wedding. If anyone knows of a great kilt pattern for babies, send it my way!
This picture was taken for two reasons:
Everyone loves a good game of "Let's Compare the Babies!" Here Rock and Clip pose again while the adults took a million pictures.
Holding hands.
A close up. The crazy part is how they are almost the same size even though Rock is a month younger than Clip.
Fix you are not a baby. We will not compare you to the other babies.
Aiden and Sophie checking out the growing boys.
For our November Monday Night Dinner with the Rabenhorsts, Hathaways, and Brockmans, we had a fake Thanksgiving. Because everyone loves the Thanksgiving meal so much, Annie suggested that we eat it twice this year. Of course we all agreed. Above is a pic of Rock with his favorite Aunt Susanna in Maryland.
Fix is doing his Clip impersonation. Clip has an adorable habit of sucking on his lower lip. It's so cute!
Sophie looking cute (if dazed) in her matching striped shirt and tights.
Jumping on Nana's lap.
Aiden does an awesome "Mater"(tow truck from the movie Cars) impersonation.
After playing with Aunt Valeta and Uncle Bob, Rock fell asleep on the way home around 9:45pm. When we got to our place he was still snoozing away so we left him in his carseat in his room and went to bed. When we woke up at 7:00am the next morning we couldn't believe that Rock had slept through the whole night! I took the picture above the next morning at church when Rock was sleeping (again in his carseat!). His adorable outfit is from Stephen and Carrie, Rock's favorite people in North Hills, CA.
My Uncle Bob and Aunt Valeta came all the way from North Canton Ohio to celebrate Veteran's Day weekend with Rock. We had a lot of fun having them over for brunch at our place on Saturday morning. Then, Saturday night we gathered at my parents house for dinner...
Yay for Brockmans!
Rock's having fun with his favorite Grandma in Maryland. His adorable chick nightshirt was a gift from our sweet new neighbors Misty and John.
So, the night before the picture above was taken, Fix and I went out on a date while Mommarama watched Rock. We left a bottle of breastmilk in case he woke up and freaked out from being hungry. He didn't wake up. Since the milk was already thawed, we decided to try a bottle the next day when he was hungry. Rock HATED it. So I did half a feeding the usual way and then we tried to get him to take the bottle again. He didn't really like it, but he finally settled into eating from it...
Or so I thought. When I tipped the bottle up after a few minutes of 'feeding' it was still just as full as when I started. We tried for a few more minutes but Rock never figured out the whole 'sucking on the bottle to get the milk out of it' thing. Needless to say, we are taking baby steps (pun intended) in the direction of bottle feeding. I guess we won't be planning any baby-free vacations in the near future!
Rock can't take his eyes off of his favorite Nana from Virginia. Why? Because she gave him such a great Redskins outfit! You'll see more shots of it in the next blog...
Rock loves his bouncer seat which was given to us by a sweet family from church.
Fix loves that Rock loves his new bouncer.
Mom loves that when he's in his bouncer she can take care of other things...
Like laundry for example.
