6 Months Strong...and Growing!

6 months ago today the most perfect, adorable, breath taking, joyful, little man was born! And from the second they placed him on my chest I knew my life would never be the same! He has completely stolen my heart and I have learned the love that so many speak of, the love that you truly do not understand until that moment!

And the totals are in! Ezekiel James is:

28 inches long (90%)

22 lbs 2.5 oz (<95%)

My big boy!

the boys!

Brotherly love!

As you can see we are a pretty awesome sitter these days! We really are loving our jumper! So much to the point that we don't know when its time to call it quits!

He has now done this twice now and I totally love it!

We had a wonderful thanksgiving! We got to host our first holiday in our new home! We had my parents, Darek, Steph, Toby, & Hunny, my uncle Mark, and Steph's dad Dana over for lunch! The meal turned out super yummy! Mike got an infared turkey fryer and it was super delish! After lunch we went for a walk and then came back and took some pics of the babies and puppies!

 For Thanksgiving dinner we went to Mike's cousin's in Roseville and got to see a lot of his family that we haven't seen since this summer at the cabin! It was so fun to see everyone again and show them how much Zeke has grown since then! I totally forgot to take pictures again! Argh!

On the Saturday after Thanksgiving we got our Christmas tree for our Frist Christmas in our new home and Zeke's First Christmas! How special!



I love starting family traditions but I also love carrying on traditions from when we were kids! The picture below is of Mike and Zeke doing a Christmas countdown. This was Mike's when he was a kid, so it is so fun from him to get to do it with Zeke!

A couple months ago Zeke had a new buddy (or potential girlfriend) join the world, Ms. Bianca Bohman! Jenika and I got together a couple of weeks ago and then our whole families got together!Here are the boys with their babes!

Z has been an awesome little shopper! Needless to say we have been spenging a lot of time at the malls to do our Christmas shopping (and for me to just get out of the house)! The whole time he just motorboats or smiles at everyone! He is so fun!

We have also started solids! And boy is he loving them! Here is a video of him eating rice ceral for the first time!

We have  since started on sweet potatos and I am hoping to make some squash and avacado baby food for him soon!

We are looking forward to Ezekiel's first Christmas here in a couple of days! I hope to post shortly after with pictures of all our family time, but we will see how that goes! I hope you all have a wonderfully Merry Christmas and a Happy & Prosperous New Year!

Mary, did you know?

The other day I was riding in the car with Mike and Zeke and we were listening to Christmas music. The song "Mary, did you know?" came on the radio. As I was singing along to the song, a song that I have heard so many times in my life, I really began to pay attention to the words and I truly had a whole new understanding for the song. And it took everything in me to not turn into a blubbering emotional mess.

Think back with me, to over 2000 years ago, to the town of Bethlehem and a little stable behind a full hotel. As Mary holds her brand new miracle of a baby boy, do you think that she truly understood all that he mean to the world? She obviously knew that he was the Messiah, so I am sure she figured he would do some pretty neat things in his lifetime, but do you think in that moment when she first held her baby boy and looked into his eyes that she had any idea?

That thought just brings me to tears! I have often looked into Ezekiel's eyes and wondered what amazing things he will do with his life! Obviously, it won't be quite the impact that Jesus had on the world, as he is not the Messiah (but darn close, if you ask me :-p)! Everyday we pray over Ezekiel and speak amazing things into his life and we do our best not to limit God, because only He truly knows what Ezekiel's future holds! I know we say he will be an NFL quarterback (which has now has more than likely changed to a line backer, because well...have you seen the kid's legs?) but we know he will follow the path that God has placed before him!

I just pray everyday that I can continue to grow and evolve into the mother that I need to be to raise him to become the man that God needs him to be! I know it is going to be a lot of work and some days it will (and already has been) just down right tough, but when I look into that little boy's eyes, it just makes it all worth it! And I get up and continue to fight on to do the best for him that I can!

Ezekiel James you are AMAZING!

5 months randomness!

Ok I will spare you the typical opening line on these monthly updates, but really?!

We think he is about 20 pounds and 27 inches! That's our guess since he dosen't have a doctors appt this month.

My BIG boy!

Ezekiel James is continue to grow and change everyday! He is developing into his personality and may I say, he is a spiting image of his father! LOL! Which I guess I shouldn't be surprised about, but I am not sure if I am ready for him to be growing so fast because one "Mike" is more than I can handle right now ;-p

Zeke has a smile and laugh that will make your day and melt your heart!

He LOVES his to be naked!

So from about 7-8 every night is diaper hang out time! He will just sit and talk and giggle and grab his feet, its SO fun! Then its bath time and he is continuing to love his baths and he is starting to kick and splash and play with his toys! It's so fun to watch him!

He has really started to take notice of the puppies and will watch them and "pet" them. And I love it because Jaxon has really been warming up to Z a lot over the past couple of months. He will lay or sit by him, bring him a toy, check on him when he starts to fuss. I am excited to see how they bond over the coming years, bc I can see it starting to happen already! And Brodie continues to "guard" Zeke for us, he is such a good boy! I just love them all! So we started something new, which I stole an idea from the Wind family. We have Z hold a treat in his hand and let them puppies eat it, what better way to get a dog to like someone! lol! That's the way to Jaxon & Brodie's heart! But really as the dogs see Zeke as a provider to them like we are to them, they will continue to love him and learn that he is important in our house too! 

My boys!

Zeke helped us hand out playdoh this year for the Holloween trick or treaters. We just dressed him up in his Captian Adorable onsie and matching leg warmers. We figured we wouldn't torture him this year with putting him in a full costume! Since he is such an inferno baby, we thought he would just sweat the second we put it on him. So we spared him the heat wave! But no guarentees for next year! But he happily greeted the trick or treaters that we had, it was a fun time!

Zeke has started to do this...

though he is still very wobbley. But he does hang out there for a few seconds all by himself!

And a lot of times we do this...

when we are at the store! Which will b the case moving forward here soon as he is almost grown out of his infant car seat and we will be upgrading to the next car seat soon!

A couple weeks ago we went to the Kalahari in Wisconsin Dells, we had a leadership conference there for the weekend. So we had a babysitter come with us to watch Zeke while we were in our meetings and then we took him swimming for the first time! At first he didn't know what to think of it...

But then he figured out that it was like a big bath!

And he just LOVED it! I think he was in this water jumperoo for like a half an hour!

And then...

He totally and completely crashed!

So I know he was totally exhausted after all of his swimming because he is such a people person, so he usually doesn't sleep when people are around!

He is still protesting rolling over for the most part, though he did it last night again. But I think it will come again soon! He is also showing signs of starting to army crawl, not sure if I am ready for him to be mobile yet! He continues to love his jumper and his curtians too, of course! He is really starting to get the hang of sleeping through the night again, thank goodness! In the last week or so we have had more wakeless nights than we have had wake ups! But if he does wake up its just once and I feed him and normally he goes right back down. Though there are a few times where he has been a party animal and been up for a couple hours, but that is pretty rare! We are starting to get back into a routine, well atleast in the mornings, which is wonderful! He will usually wake up at 6 am and then I will feed him and he will go back down until 8:30 am and then he will wake up and we will hang out until about 9:30 or 10ish and he will go back down for a good 2- 3 hour nap!

He still eats about every 2 hours and still exclusively gets breastmilk. Like I said before his doctor said that they new recommendations are for babies to stay on breastmilk or formula until 6 months. So I am in no hurry to get him on solids as he is still CLEARLY growing and is satisfied with breastmilk. Though I can tell he will be ready for solids when we start him because he watches us eat and even tries to grab for our food sometimes. But that will come soon enough, which means I need to get my booty in gear bc I want to make a bunch of his food!

We are hosting our first Thanksgiving tomorrow! I am so excited! We are having my parents, my unclebrother, sister in law, and nephew (and hunny!), my uncle, and Steph's dad! I was super nervous about cooking my first turkey so we were looking into getting a fryer, bc I have heard it is super yummy, so we ended up getting an infared fryer! It seems pretty fool proof and if it is anything like our infared grill they turkey should b amazing!

Then later on in the day we are heading over to Mike's cousin's in Roseville for dinner with his aunts, uncles, and cousins! It will be fun to bring Zeke there and for him to see everyone again! It will be a busy day, so I am hoping he naps well so he is a good boy all day! And I need to remember to take lots of pictures!

Hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving with your family and friends! We have had such an amazing year and we truly have so much to be thankful for! We are so blessed! To all of our family out there that we will not see on Thanksgiving...we miss you and love you all and can't wait to see you again soon!

Proud Uncle & Aunt here!

We have been so blessed to be uncle and aunt to 3 awesome kids and now we get to make it 4! We are excited to announce that Tessa Jolie Bemis joined the world on October 31st! Mama and baby are doing great! Mike got to skype with them last week, but I unfortunately was not home, I was so bummed! We can't believe we have to wait until next year sometime to meet her, I just want to snuggle her! (Photos courtesy/stolen from Carrie's FB page!)

Little Miss Tessa!

Big Sister Carlie & Little Sister Tessa

I have to share my favorite story about Carlie, this is also stolen from Carrie's blog!

(A little preface to the story, they are stationed in S. Korea right now bc Joe, Mike's brother, is in the Air Force. Before this they were in Italy.)
"The other day when we were waiting in line to go through the gate to come on base a car from behind us zipped through the gate in a different lane. Carlie asked why we couldn’t go through in that lane and I explained that you could only use that side if you were Korean and she goes, “Oh yeah, we are Italian.”

I totally love it! She is just too cute! I seriously tell everyone that story!

The other weekend Mike headed up north to go to one of Ellie's swim meets. (I was bummed that I couldn't go, but we figured it would be best not to take Z, since pool areas get so loud and we didn't want a repeat of the Twins game!) We are so proud of her because she has been doing awesome in her races! I believe this is only her second year swimming and she is finishing first in a lot of her races and she has also started to swim on the high school team too and she is coming in 4th and even 3rd against them! She is really loving swimming and we are so happy that she has found something that she enjoys so much and is SO good at! Though Mike wasn't surprised as I guess their family has quite the history of swimmers in it!
I have a video of one of her races from when Mike went to watch, that I will post soon (its just on his phone and its a rare moment that I can grab it and do anyting with it)!
Also, Jeb sent us a picture of her report card! She did awesome! She got all As and one A- or B, I can't remember. We told her to step up her game on that class! lol! just kidding! We are so proud of her!
Can't forget about our lil Tobuddy! He is rocking out 3 months old, growing in length like crazy! Him and Z are total opposites! Gotta love it! Our friends Gene & Shawna gave passed on the nicknames Thunder & Lightening from their boys to T & Z! So fitting! We get to see Toby & family pretty frequently, almost every weekend! This last weekend we went to the Kalahari Resort at Wisc Dells! The boys got to go swimming for the first time! How fun! Photos to come soon (hopefully)! (photo stolen from Steph's blog!)

Tobuddy!

Next up: Zeke's 5 month blog (hopefully soon!)

Baby Yoga!

I have been looking for a place to do baby yoga with Ezekiel and the only places I could find, they only had classes on days that I was working. So I tried googling it again yesterday and found Blooma in Edina and they hv BYOB (bring your own baby) Yoga every day at 11! So I made a reservation for today!
It was so great! It was everything I had hoped it would b! There were about 20 mama and babies in the class, it was so fun to be around a bunch of other mommies! There were so welcoming and carefree! They understand if u r running late our need to leave early, or if u need to do a diaper change or feed, or if ur baby cries. It was so nice bc everyone understands where u r in ur life right now!
Zeke absolutly loved it! He loved seeing all the other babies, he loved all the baby exercises, and doing some of the moves with me! And it wore him out, so he napped super well today!
We will def b going again! It was such a great experience, I can't speak highly enough about it!

And the results are in...

Drumroll please...

Ezekiel measured in at a grand total of

17 pounds 15 ounces (95%)

26 inches (85%)

I knew we had a chubo on our hands but I didn't think he would even be 17 pounds and he is almost 18 pounds! Daddy keeps on speaking big, thick, strong, fast, and quick on him...we obviously have the big, thick, and strong part down. Now we just wait on the fast and quick part, maybe that can develop later in life :-) not sure I want a quick toddler crawling and then running around! :-) I guess it would keep me in shape!


Until next time!

4 months old!

Our little man, Ezekiel James, turned 4 months old on Friday the 14th. I feel like I say this every time I do an update, but I have to say it again! I CANNOT believe that my beautiful little boy is 4 months old already! He continues to light up our lives and fill our hearts with an unspeakable amount of joy!

Remember this little guy!

Take 1

Take 2

And 3rd times a charm!

I know I slacked on his 3 month update, so I have a lot of fill you in on! But I'll try not to make this too long! (Ok, I lied, it's long, but there are a lot of pictures and videos!)

As you saw in his 3 month pictures he is bumbo-ing now! And he is a rockstar at it and he totally loves it and I do to! I put him in it and set him on the counter (even tho your not supposed to put them on elevated surfaces) in the kitchen and he watches me as I do stuff! So when I am cooking dinner, or doing dishes, ect I talk to him and tell him what I am doing (so he can take notes for his future chores)!

We are still a rockstar at tummy time! I am doing my best to be more diligent about doing it with him, as we were slacking for a while because his neck was so strong. But then it dawned on me that we need to do tummy time so we keep rolling over and learn to crawl! Duh, me! He is really enjoying it and is lasting longer and longer every day! He rolls over from his stomach to his back, but he doesn't do it very often, so I know we need to keep on doing our tummy time so we master it! Check out this video of Ezekiel doing tummy time on our YouTube link.

Things have been a bit rocky for us in the sleeping department, when he hit his 3 month growth spurt we went from sleeping through the night to waking up 4 times one night, 2 times a couple of nights, and once a night since :-( It's really not that bad, but I know he can sleep through the night because he did it for so long! But he does sleep for 6-8 hours at a time, so it's not like its every 2 or 4 hours or anything. Most moms that I talk to say that I should give him a bottle with some cereal in it, but I am unsure about it, so I am waiting to talk to his pediatritian on Tuesday and see what he says. They now say that its best for them to get breast milk up until 6 months and I read that they don't get full by the amount of calories that they intake, they get full by the volume that they intake. So if this is true, adding cereal to their last feeding really wouldn't do anything. Though I know there are many moms out there that would beg to differ. So we will see what the doc says and see how things go!

Naptime with his new blanket that Great Grandma made him!

Another big milestone was that 2 weeks ago we had a teething episode! Though no teeth cut through there was some definet movement going on, along with some unfortunate discomfort. Thankfully it only lasted a week and he was easily soothed by some different teething techniques that we used.

And of course, his hands are in his mouth like crazy (so it's a good thing he perfected getting them in his mouth last month! Check out the early stages of him learning to do it and also chatting away!) and he is drooling like a faucet! And he has also been sucking on his thumb and actually finger lately too. He is taking after his mama with sucking on his finger, that's what I used to do, actually I used to suck on my finger upside down. He is such a happy baby, so when he is fussing it is always for a reason and when you meet his needs he is good to go and returns back to his happy little self!

Finding our hands!

He is also loving his jumperoo! He can just touch the tips of his toes to the floor, so we will put a little something under so he can jump a little better. It's was so fun to see him learn cause and effect, i.e. when I push this button it plays music, he is a pro at working all the toys on his jumper! Here is another video, spending time in his jumperoo.

We have had a fun time seeing family and friends over the past couple months as well! Great Uncle Mark came to visit again!

 We get to see Darek, Steph, Tobiah, and Hunny quite a bit too.

Zeke playing with Toby

We went to the pumpkin patch with Grandpa & Grandma Bear and our friends Jamie and Jodi and their kidos, Gabe and Addie. (I am hoping to blog about our fun day there soon!)

He is no longer coming to work with me, we have gotten so busy and he is awake more now so I just couldn't manage both anymore. So he hangs out either with, grandpa bear, grandma bear, or Auntie Steppy! I know for most moms its so hard to leave their babies to go back to work, but it was actually kind of a relief for me, because then I could just focus on work when I am there and not feel like I am short changing Zeke or my work responsibilites. And knowing he is in good and trusted hands is always helpful!

He also had his first trip to LifeTime on Wednesday, he had his workout gear on, his UnderArmer onsie, sweatpants, hoodie, and sneakers (socks that look like sneakers). He did really well! You can drop him off in the childcare area for 2 hours, they don't do diapers though, so they page you over the loud speaker if you need to come back. He made it an hour and 45 minutes and then was just in need of a diaper change, but I was done with my workout anyways, so it worked out perfect! It was so nice to get back into the gym!

Last weekend we had our first weekend away from our little man. We had a business conference in Louisville, KY to go to, so he stayed at Darek & Steph's house with Steph's parents, Dana and Kayla. They also graciously watched Jaxon Bear as well, so it was a super fun cousins weekend! So Dana and Kayla had both Tobes and Zeke and Hunny and Jaxon Bear (Brodie stayed at Mike's cousin Jeff's house), so they definitely stayed busy! It really was not as hard as I thought it would be to leave him (again I think knowing that he was in good hands was huge!), though by the time Sunday came, I was definitely so happy to see him again! It was really nice actually to have a weekend away, spend some quality time with Mike, we roomed with Darek & Steph, so it was fun to hang out with them and all of our other friends too! I know some moms may think that it was too early for me to leave him, but I would have to disagree! Like they always say, you miss your baby more than your baby misses you and I think it is important to keep up all the other areas of your life (which I have been working hard to do). Balance is key! I am a mom now and I absolutely love it, but I am also still a wife, a sister, a daughter, a friend, an employee, a business associate. I can't let all those other areas of my life diminish just because we had a baby. (Ok I am totally on my soapbox now!) Not to sound insensitive, but Ezekiel is a new, wonderful, and huge part of my life, but he is not my life. God is first in my life, then Mike, then our kidos. I know some people have that backwards, but if you make your kids your life then what do you have when they grow up and have their own life? Like I said I am still trying to find balance in this because it is easy to make them your world! And honestly, he is just as perfect and normal as he was before we left! Ok, I am done now!

He has also started doing this...we call it motorboat mouth! It's so cute, though its so messy because he spits all over himself when he does it! Guess I shouldn't complain, I am sure the messes will only get worse as he grows up! :-p 

He still loves walks, being read to, watching football and baseball, and VeggieTales, being sang to, ect. His mohawk is starting to get thin :-( but his hair has continued to grow in since he has started to loose his hair, so I don't think he will ever be a bald baby. I feel like this is such a modge podge of info, but I am trying to get it done before another week...or month passes!!! He has his doctors appt on Tuesday, so I will post and update of his stats after that!

I will leave you with a few pics of Ezekiel discovering and playing outside in the leaves!

 

Blowing kisses good-bye!