FIRST BIRTHDAY!! :D

Today Rowan Charles Newton Godsiff is ONE YEAR OLD!!!

Yesterday was his first halloween. I carved him a pumpkin with an R and a star :) Then we put a little blinking light inside. He liked it a lot.

Later on he wore his first halloween costume, an ewok from star wars. We played at home for a while then went to our church's trunk-or-treat event where people volunteer to park their cars and hand out candy from their decorated trunks.

While we were there we met another slightly larger star wars hero, Chewbacca!

And here is the smiley birthday boy enjoying a breakfast of blueberry pancakes with bananas on his BIRTHDAY! Hooray Rowan! Way to be ONE!!

Our first family pumpkin picking

My boys are feeling much better :) Rowan had a tough time with naps today but nevertheless we decided it was a good day to take him to the pumpkin patch for the first time. And it was :D I took a LOT of pictures. Here is a rather condensed version of our pumpkin patch fun, enjoy!

Before heading out we read one of Rowan's favorite books, "Plumply, Dumply Pumpkin" along with Peter the tiger (named for the little tiger in the book)

As I said it was a beautiful day.

Rowan was kinda sleepy when we got there so I don't think I got any pictures of him looking at the camera. But he's still cute!
His dad isn't bad looking either ;)

I don't know if you can tell but Rowan is pointing here. Almost like he's encouraging Logan, "That way Dad! Let's go over there!"

Rowan approves Logan's choice of pumpkin.

We each got a big one then found a little baby one for our little big guy :)

The pumpkin patch we went to is only maaaybe two miles from our house but by the time we got home Rowan was out like a light.

I kinda wish Rowan would've been more awake but I think he had a fun time. There were a lot of things to see and point at, not to mention he got a couple tastes of the fine pumpkin patch dirt :) yummy... and he just loves being outside. All in all I think it was a good first pumpkin patch experience.
Pumpkin carving will have to wait for another day but I'll be sure to post a couple pictures of that adventure too.

sicky update

Rowan is getting much better. As long as I don't try to give him too much too fast he is keeping things down great. Logan on the other hand called me from work yesterday to let me know that he was now throwing up. So now I've got two boys operating at less than 100% :P Logan slept from 6pm until about 7:15am so he's feeling alright. Breakfast this morning is toast, marmite, and ginger ale for Logan and apple juice, cheerios, and a bit of banana for Rowan. I think we'll be just fine :)

No more baths!

At least not for a couple days I hope.

Last night just before bed Logan, Rowan, and I were hanging out and reading books in the living room when Rowan came down with something of a stomach bug and puked everything he'd had since breakfast. It was really weird for us because he's never been sick like this and we weren't quite sure what to do except wait 'till he was done and clean him up. He threw up a few times last night and kept retching and dry heaving almost all night. We gave him a couple baths last night and one this morning after he threw up in our bed and we've changed his clothes (and our own) Then we went out and bought a car! No really, we bought a car for Logan so he wouldn't have to drive the gas-guzzling beast of a bronco that he had. As much as he loved having a big burly vehicle I think he's going to like his forester even better. Hooray good gas millage!

It's late now. Rowan is asleep. I think he's doing okay... but I'm overall I'm pretty unsure of myself and how I can help my baby get better. I am fairly certain I could handle such an illness in a toddler and sure that I'd be fine if he were school aged but a little baby is such a bundle of mystery with no language to speak of (get it? to speak of! :D ... maybe not) I'm tired. At least tonight he is not retching.

Here are a few bath pictures. Because he's sooooooooooooo cute in his birthday suit!
(11 days almost to the minute until his birth MOMENT!)








And one picture not in the bath but from today when he was feeling better :)

he wasn't really that squinty, it was the flash's fault, but he was smiley, giggling and having a lot of fun hiding and popping out from behind the bathroom curtain.

Guess what

That's right! He's walking!



He doesn't go terribly far and he falls down a bit but in the last couple days he's just taken off! Four days ago he would only go maaaybe four steps between me and the couch or whatever. I guess something just clicked :)

Rowan is 11 months and 1 day old!

Hooray 11 months baby! :D For any of you unfamiliar with the tradition I'll explain. In my family the day a baby turns 11 months you take them to get professional pictures done. 11 months is sort of a "just right" age when the kid is big but still under a year so still "officially" a baby. So yesterday accompanied by his gramma and cousins Wyatt, Genevieve, and Danika I took my still "officially baby" boy to a photographer for fancy pictures. He did really really well and smiled adorably for so many I had the worst time trying to choose between them. Luckily the thought of Logan's probable reaction to coming home to stacks upon stacks of photos costing several hundred dollars kept my purse strings tight ;) I finally did narrow it down though, I chose three poses to mark this special day in my little bubby's life. My mom took some pictures of the pictures so everyone could get to see. The color and quality aren't spectacular but that's the way it goes. I don't think it matters that much. Nothing could diminish his cuteness and charm :D

The top one is my favorite

(the other two are also favorites also but that one is just a bit more favorite)

my sister the soon to be sailor

Rowan and I made an impromptu visit to Portland on Monday to hang out with Krystle on her last day as a civilian. We abandoned Logan for a night but I'm glad we got to do it :)

Here we are outside her recruiters' office

The day before Logan went off to basic training mom, Cherise and I took him to starbucks and hung out then took him to his hotel. I thought it would be fun to create a tradition so here we are in the Barnes and Noble starbucks with Cameron. Below is a silly moment in front of her hotel, one of the last silly moments Krystle will have... for a few weeks at least.

The morning of her swearing in Rowan and I went with Mom and Dad to spend some time with her at MEPS. Rowan liked the game room best. He's was sitting at the only game that didn't have to do with shooting. Who would've thought that a military processing station would have so many first person shooters eh? nutty.

Green for visitor, white for enlistee.

It was interesting to sit in the waiting room and observe the soon to be sailors, soldiers, and airmen knowing a bit of the world they're going into. I had to just shake my head at a few of them, they seemed to be the type that were the bees knees in high school and I suspected may be in for a rude awakening once they got to boot camp or basic training. I think that's probably what happens to most kids when the first join the military. Especially the younger ones.

I think Krystle will do absolutely wonderful. I'm glad she's finally there and doing it :) I can't wait to hear how she's doing. I hope I get a chance to write to her soon.

Poor little guy

This is Rowan this morning in his new kung fu panda jammies. The night before last he had a bit of a high temperature (about 100-101) not too bad so I just gave him some watered down juice and put him to bed. Yesterday morning he still felt warm and he was acting a bit fussier and tired than normal. I took his temperature at lunchtime and it was 102.2 under his arm which is actually about 103.

I called the advice nurse at madigan and she directed me to a walk-in clinic in Lacey because there weren't any walk-in appointments at our regular doctor. The clinic was nice, everyone was helpful and we were seen quickly. Rowan had a temp of 102 when we got there and when the doctor looked in his ears she discovered that he has a double ear infection. So now he's on a low dose amoxocilin for the next ten days which he likes :) I think it's berry flavored.


He's doing pretty well considering his ailment. He's playing toys and crawling around. The only signs today that he isn't 100% are a warm forehead and a bit more fussiness and sleepiness than normal. He woke up at 7 this morning then took a nap at 8:30 until about 10:40 (normally his morning nap is about 45 minutes) I'm glad that he isn't totally miserable. I hope he's all better soon.

ha HA take that confusing laptop!

I still haven't gotten my pictures onto this new laptop but thanks to Courtney's camera I have pictures from the last week of my baby doing what he does best, being cute :D







Gotta love that toothy smile, dirt-covered face, and smiley eyes. I certainly do.

boo mosquitos... hooray new laptop!

I don't like mosquitos. I keep having weird reactions to bites. It used to be that I'd get a bite and there would be an itchy but relatively ignorable little round bump. Now if I get a bite it grows and may spread into a shape more like antarctica or australia, gets warm to the touch and swells like a bruise for a few days. It's so weird! Granted the less I scratch the more it behaves and remains small and round but they still tend to be a bit warm and swell... maybe it's because I had a baby. Pregnancy is craaazy.

In other news we got a new laptop! It's white and light, it has all it's keys and best of all it turns on! Our other four or five year old lappy called it quits the other day. We'd been living with it's lack of lefthand ctrl, function, righthand alt, and loose Q keys for a while (courtesy of our old cat Chaos and our new son Rowan) and conceded to having it plugged in all the time or face a ten minute battery life. For what we needed it worked fine, we could edit and store plenty of pictures and browse the internet just fine. Unfortunately as I said it croaked. The couple days ago Logan was internetting and it just turned itself off for good. So we shopped and compared and researched and yesterday we purchased a fancypants new sony laptop. I still have to figure out exactly how to put pictures on but when I do I will show you a few from the first half of our NZ adventure. Because I found the card :) Until then avoid mosquitos.





You should probably avoid mosquitos after that as well.

Let's just change the rule to always avoid mosquitos.

New Zealand

Hooray! Logan found the cord! Unfortunately NOW I've misplaced the sd card with the first half of the trip on it. Though maybe that isn't that unfortunate because there are about 500 pictures on the first half and twice as much on the second. With only two thirds to pick from it was a lot easier to give you a small sample of our wonderul New Zealand adventure. Enjoy!

Logan and Rowan exploring a path off of a rest area

Playing on a jeep at the Wellington zoo

Enjoying the tv cart in the hotel room in Wellington

Father and son acting tough for the camera

Rowan and uncle Ty walking to Te Papa (the national museum)

Happy boys near Waiouru

Checkin out a big bug with great uncle Steve

Family potrait at the beach

Cutie in headphones

That was a good joke mom!

12 hour flights fly when you're sound asleep

Home again :)

As I said it was a great trip :) maybe when I find the card with the first half I'll post a few more pictures. We'll see.

Rowan was a bit late for his 9 month check-up but he didn't need any shots so it wasn't a big deal. He had a bit of a runny nose when we went but other than that he's healthy and happy :) he weighs 23lbs 13oz (10.8kg) and is 30.5in (77.47cm) long.

lost lost lost

I can't find the cord! I have a cord that connects my camera to my computer so that I can transfer pictures. Unfortunately my cord eludes me. So I'll just stick to text.

Since we've been home Rowan has started to crawl! He would move himself around in sort of an army crawl, dragging himself along the ground but before last week he hadn't crawled on his hands and knees. Well now he does and he is enjoying being able to move himself faster and further than ever. He also likes to "cruise" which is holding onto furniture and sidestepping to move around the room. He even sidestepped while leaning on the wall! It reminded me of spiderman. He is so cute.

Last weekend we went to Cherise and Kiel's wedding. It was looooovely and my boys did really good. Logan drove through the night after work to be there and took care of Rowan while I did the bridesmaid thing. Even though Rowan wasn't feeling 100% (he had a little cold) he was a champ and behaved then slept. He handled driving home well also. I know I was pretty tired of travelling. Don't get me wrong, I am SO glad that we could all be there for Cherise's wedding and we had a wonderful time. But after flying halfway across the world and driving all over the north island of NZ driving the last leg home (a six hour drive across Washington) was nearly the last straw. I was so happy that we cleaned up the house before we left because it was really nice just to come home and relax.

This week we've just been taking it easy. The newly wed Wadners got to hang out for a bit which was super fun. I'm glad that Kiel gets to be our sister-in-law ;) welcome to the wider Hilman clan buddy!

In other news I have decided to find as many different finger foods for my little guy that I can. When his cold was in full swing he just wanted to breastfeed. He's eating more food now but seems pretty unimpressed by baby food. However cheerios, puffs and peas are apparently great. So starting today I'm going to be on a search for good finger foods for a growly almost 10 month old who likes to feed himself. (I say growly because he likes to make a growling noise. It's not angry at all, I think he just wants to be a dinosaur or a bear or something. It's really cute)
Any advice on finding good foods for growing boys would be warmly accepted :D I'll try to find that cord soon so I can show off how big and accomplished and cute my baby is getting to be.

home again home again

Yes that's right we're home! We arrived home to the U.S. yesterday evening and spent the night at my parents' house in Portland. We handed out some gifts and watched the opening ceremonies of the olympics (pretty much my favorite part) and they didn't disappoint :) With the exception of the parade of nations. The camera looooved the U.S. team, granted we are in the U.S. watching U.S. media but after waiting through 188 countries to see the New Zealand team I was not at all impressed when they got a whole ten seconds of air time. I believe the announcer said, "Next is New Zealand... and as the kiwis walk in we go to break" yeah... dumb television timing. Anyway, we went to bed a bit late and got up the same but it was alright. Our alarm clock is a bit off of his normal schedule, and by "a bit" I mean it's totally gone. It'll probably be a few days until we're straightened out. Which is fine :)

I think I took about 1200 pictures and probably over half of them on the second half of the trip after we thought we forgot the charger for the video camera. We found it on our last day in the country hiding in the bottom of my suitcase. The best parts that were missed because of my lack of picture taking were Logan's aunt and uncle's house in Napier and the army museum in Waiouru. Sorry guys... but that's how it goes sometimes. I guess we'll just HAVE to go back ;) shucks. I'd post pictures now but Rowan is so tired he's sort of whining and crying at the same time and he giggles everytime I look at him. I'm pretty sure this is the baby version of three in the morning tired. Poor little guy, I know he's tired but it's so funny I can't help but laugh a little.

I really should go though. So, pictures later. The trip was great. Rowan did great the whole time. And now we're going to bed.