4 Months

 Collin is 4 months old now and getting so big. He had a doctor's appointment this morning and he weighs 15lbs, 6oz and he's 25 inches long. He's between the 50th and 75th percentile for everything and growing perfectly. He also had shots at this appointment, and hardly even reacted! I was amazed. 

I had to take some pictures of what his hair looks like right now. It sticks straight up, even when I try to flatten it. And it's all the same length so people always ask me if I cut it. But nope, he just has a natural little crew cut.

A picture of Rob and Collin on a day when they happened to be wearing almost the same thing.

Holidays Part 2

 For Christmas, we drove to Salt Lake to spend it with my parents.  Even though we've said many times that we never want to make that drive in the winter again, the trip was well worth it, and the roads were even clear for us most of the way. We were nervous about the long trip with Collin, but he did a lot better than we expected. When he was awake, he was most entertained by a box of Mike & Ikes.  He loved the sound when I shook them and stared for a long time. He slept most of the way, then surprisingly slept well that night also! He is the best baby.

He got another box in his stocking for the ride home.

Reuben and Katie were in Salt Lake and Liz came for a couple of days with her kids. The day after we arrived, we went to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir's Christmas concert to see my dad sing, along with David Archuleta. We really enjoyed it! Dane and Bridget Smith came along and it was great to catch up with them, as always.

After the concert

Collin and Grandpa after the concert

We went back to Temple Square the next night with my family to look at the light displays. Collin loved looking at the lights! (Although he definitely got tired of being in that infant carrier for so long).

I like this picture with the temple in the background

Mesmerized by the lights

We also went to Thanksgiving Point to look at the lights display, took some walks, did some shopping, lots of relaxing, and definitely lots of eating Christmas treats (my mom's sugar cookies are the best in the world, and I've been obsessed with shrimp ever since my dad grilled us some). It was really good to spend Christmas with my family. Collin got some toys that he is starting to show interest in. Our gift to ourselves was a camcorder, and we love it. I always love watching home videos and we decided it was important to make our own.

Cute in his 1st Christmas outfit

We got dressed up and took some family pictures while we were there. We were intending to send out delayed Christmas cards with pictures, but I guess that just didn't happen. Maybe next year :) Collin was adorable in his little fancy outfit.

He is such a happy, smiley boy!

     While we were there, my dad made Collin laugh hard for the first time! He'd had really short beginnings of laughs before, but his grandpa just cracked him up.
     Another exciting thing was that Collin's eye suddenly got better. He'd had a blocked tear duct in his left eye, so ever since he was 3 weeks old, it was constantly gunky and watery. We had to clean his eye out and massage his duct several times a day. (If you look at the picture above, you can see gunk underneath). As soon as we got to Salt Lake, it got much worse, we assumed because his eyes watered more in the dry climate (maybe). Then, the day he turned 3 months old, he woke up with no gunk, and there hasn't been any since! We're pretty happy about that.
     We made it back to Portland before New Year's. We went to our ward party, which ended at 8, and barely made it to midnight to watch the ball drop.
     Since then, Rob has started his 2nd quarter of school. It's nice to get back into a good routine. We recently got new church callings- Rob teaches Sunday School for 12-13 year olds, and I am an Activity Days leader with the 8-11 year old girls. We're excited for 2011!

Holidays Part 1

We've been meaning to blog for a while now, but things have been pretty busy. Now we have lots to catch up on! We'll start where we left off in November.

The 23rd was my 24th birthday. It was a really good day. First of all, Portland got a slight dusting of snow that morning (the only snow we've seen here so far). Here is what it looked like from our window that day: 

Hardly anything. . . but since we live in Portland, schools were canceled and even Rob's school was delayed 2 hours! It was a birthday miracle. Rob took Collin and let me sleep in while he cleaned up the apartment a little and cooked me a delicious breakfast of an omelet and toast. Then, when he left for school, Collin and I headed to the gym where I had a good workout but did not step on the scale, as a gift to myself :) (another little gift was not checking our bank account that day! haha) Then we came home and relaxed until Rob came home with dinner. We had meatloaf and mashed potatoes from Costco which were delicious. A little later, we had some friends come over for cake and games.

I really wanted a Costco cake because they are my favorite, so we justified getting one with the plan of bringing the leftovers to Rob's family when we went for Thanksgiving. I had a caterpillar cake!

My birthday present was a new camera which has been well used already. It was a really fun and relaxing day for me and Rob did a good job of making me feel special. And Collin was a happy boy and gave me lots of smiles!

For Thanksgiving, we headed to Kennewick to have dinner at Cory and Minnie's house. Tiffanie and Amber were there with their families as well. We were nervous about making a road trip and sleeping away from home with a baby, but Collin did great. He slept through all of the car rides and he loved seeing new faces and watching all the excitement.

Funny sleep smile on the way

Exciting game of Quelf

Keanu really wanted to hold his baby cousin

Collin and Keira

Our handsome driver

The weekend after Thanksgiving, on December 5th, was Collin's blessing day. Rob gave him a blessing and Collin's uncle Rob Hamilton stood in, along with friends of ours Nathan Anderson, Mark Brandt, and Rich King. It was very special and luckily, Collin slept through it. He looked handsome in his white outfit, although he was not a fan of it as we were dressing him in it.

A nice picture of the 4 of us.

Here are a few more pictures of Collin at around 2 months:

He loves his daddy

Stay tuned for Part 2 of our Holiday blogs!

Big Smiles

Collin will be 2 months old on Tuesday. He's growing so fast and he changes every day. He gives us big smiles all the time, mostly in the mornings. He especially loves getting kisses. He makes cute noises when he's happy and thinks his parents are hilarious, obviously. Because they are.
I am one of those moms who takes a billion pictures of my baby at a time, in the same position, and I still think each one is the cutest ever. So, here are some smiles I've caught on camera!

Rob took this picture when he was only 3 weeks old

He even smiles when he sleeps. I love waking up to this cutie!!

 For some reason, I think his yawning pictures are super cute too.

Here are a few more of our favorite recent pictures.

He was the cutest little pumpkin for Halloween! We went to our ward trunk-or-treat and Collin slept through everything.

He loves his mommy

Uncle Jeff came into town and Collin got to meet him.

Hanging out with daddy

He looks so chubby in this picture.

Such a big boy in his bumbo!

Collin LOVES bathtime. Even if he is really cranky, he is immediately calm when his bath starts. He has never smiled during a bath though . . . we think he is too busy concentrating on how good the water feels.

 I know our blog is basically just pictures of our baby these days, but that's what everyone expected, right? Rob is really busy with school still, and spends a lot of time studying. We will be glad when he finally gets a break. I have been busy with taking care of Collin and going to lots of appointments all the time, it seems. I also joined a gym here and even though I was super nervous about leaving Collin at the childcare center there, it has worked out great and I can usually plan it so he sleeps the whole time. Also, I can check on him a lot. :) I am loving being a stay at home mom. I don't think we have anything else exciting going on, but we'll try to keep the blog updated a little better!