In honor of the baby brother

Happy Birthday to my baby brother. 19 years old today! I can't believe it's been so long. But it's been a really fun 19 years. Even if I was only around for 10 of them... In honor of the baby brother, let me share some fun memories.

Dress Up
Alan, the poor boy, was subjected to having two older sisters who took advantage of the fact that they were the only ones he had to play with. Alan would be so anxious to play with us that he would play anything that we wanted if he could just be included. It got to the point where he would come to us and say, "Hey, I'll let you guys dress me up if you want to!" And we would. Pink dress, red hat, and a nice big pink boa. We have the pictures to prove it. And I may just have to upload them in honor of this day...

Doctor
Alan had a funny little brain. When he was little, he used to tell us stories about his "past lives." For example, he'd start out conversation like this: "Well, in my other life, I was an Indian Chief and..." or "In my other life, I was in college and..." The funniest part of it all was that this little 5 year old could support his whole statement with things that made you think he was actually those things. But the funniest was when he was 7 and I had a friend over who had a sore foot (for those interested, it was Lauren). Anyway, Alan comes in with a screwdriver and says, "Let me help you. In my other life I was a doctor, and I know what I'm doing. I just need to take this right here (the screwdriver) and do THIS." And he proceeded to "operate" on Lauren's foot. I don't think it worked, but it sure was cute.

The Donuts
When you grow up in a family of 6, you learn very quickly to fend for yourself. It got so bad that when Mom would get home from the grocery store, we would all rush her with permanent markers to "claim" the food we wanted. And if your name was on something, you got to be the one to eat it. Of course, this didn't last long because it led to WAAAAAY too many fights. And of course, Alan never got anything because he was too small to understand what was going on. Or so we thought. One day, Dad bought a dozen powdered donuts and brought them home. I don't remember if he bought them WITH Alan or FOR Alan, but either way, Alan wanted them all. But Dad told him he had to share. The poor kid didn't like this idea, so when Dad left the room, Alan opened the box and took one bite out of every donut - he figured no one would want "used" food. The best part of the story is that we have a picture of this, too. You should see the poor kid's face. It's covered with powdered sugar and you can see the little bites taken out of each donut. Alan's sitting there holding the box with a little smirk that says, "Okay guys, is this CUTE or am I in TROUBLE? Cause you have the camera, but I'm pretty sure that you aren't too happy with what I did..." I'll have to post this pic, too....

Anyway - Happy Birthday Baby Bro! We love you!!

some may be repeated...

I typed this up for my baby board the other day and thought I'd go ahead and blog it, too even though some of it may be repeat information. I like to have this cyberlog of my baby... So... With no further ado, here's the new edition of "All About Baby B"

He weighs somewhere around 15 lbs (we have to do the you stand on the scale, see what you weigh and then hold baby and take the difference thing), and is 25" long. He's in the 71st/72nd percentile on those. He's a CHUNK - as you can see from any pictures. He's already been mistaken for a 5 month old. Go figure.He's been sleeping through the night for about 2-3 weeks now... But he's still sleeping with us because, well, he's spoiled rotten. I've even tried getting him to take naps in his crib, but he will only sleep for 15-20 minutes there, but if I put him on our bed, he'll sleep for 1 hour - 1.5 hours... He's started having a "lovey" - he likes one of his blankets and will fall asleep "cuddling" with it. It's too cute (and TOTALLY unsafe!). He giggles, coos and loves to "stand" up. He's almost sat up on his own a few times, but his head is still really heavy, so he topples over. If we sit him up at in incline, he tries to sit himself up - he'll acutally pull the upper half of his body up off the pillow! We've started putting him in his Johnny Jump-Up and he's almost getting the hang of it - he LOVES it because he can stand up in it - and we love it because we don't have to sit there and hold him!!!!He responds the MOST to us when we say "I love you" and has even tried to mimic us a few times!! He will also "sing" with us when we sing to him. He really likes the ABCs. He'll sometimes "sing" as many as half of the letters with us. It's adoreable!

Bath time is a fun time - he likes to be a nekkie baby! He cries after bathtime when I try to put his diaper on him. But Daddy usually comes in and distracts him and before he knows it, he's fully dressed. Then it's story time - Brayden LOVES looking at books - it doesn't matter what they are. After story time, he gets a song (or 3) sung to him and then it's off to bed.

He is still spoiled at least weekly by Grandma & Grandpa... Grandma Laura can't go more than a week without thinking that she'll go crazy if she doesn't see her little Brayden. But that's good for us because it usually means (at minimum) a babysitter and a free meal!! I don't feel bad about that, either because Alan still basically lives at home, and Erin's grocery store is my parents' house. So we'll take the handouts, too, thank you very much.If you can't tell, I talking about my baby!!!!! I'm sure there's a lot more to say, but he's fussing from his crib right now, and I'm going to go check on him so Daddy can relax.