Surprise!

Last week Merrick and I took a trip to Oregon to surprise my sister, Becca, and attend her surprise 30th birthday party (she may not be really happy that I am broadcasting her age on here, but oh well). I had not seen Becca's family in a year and therefore they had never met Merrick. It had also been a few months since I had seen my parents and my sister Emily and her son Kai. Jeremy was not able to come so Merrick and I took to the skies on our own. He did really well for his first flight, but was happy to be off the plane when we landed.

Emily and Kai picked us up from the airport and we went straight to Becca's. Becca was so surprised to see us and she said it was the first time in her life she was really surprised (she had no idea that the surprises would keep coming that week). Her boys, Quincy and Colvin, were excited to meet their cousin and Quincy brought him toys and wanted to hold him.

I was terrible about taking pictures while in Oregon. So I apologize in advance for the pictures in this post. Some the the pictures are from a cell phone so the quality is not great and I never even got a picture of Merrick with Becca's family. Instead here is one of my favorite pictures of Becca's family.



Merrick also loved seeing his nana and papa, aunt Emily, and cousin Kai. Kai spent the time obsessively saying "Sarah" and "baby". Here are some pictures from when he asked to hold Merrick.






The actual surprise party went off with out a hitch and once again Becca was actually surprised. It was a cute, spring themed party with lots of yummy food. What does it say about me that the only picture I actually took on my camera during the trip was of the food table at the party?



It was a really fun trip, but Merrick and I were really glad to be home and be back together with Jeremy.

Spring Training

My brother, his wife, and their kiddos are in town from Portland. We were able to spend the day with them yesterday and Merrick got to meet five new family members for the first time. He has started having some stranger anxiety and it took him a few minutes to warm up to the new faces, but once he did we all had a great time. We decided to take advantage of the warm weather and go to a Cubs spring training game.

It was a warm day and Merrick enjoyed sitting in the grass and wearing his hat and his cousin Lauren's sunglasses to block the sun.



Lauren, Julien, and Maude were all so cute with Merrick and wanted to hold him and and make him smile and laugh. It was great to see how he warmed up to them and really seemed to enjoy being with them.




Jeremy also enjoyed his first ever baseball game with his son. I think that is an experience that every new dad looks forward to.



It was a little warm and the kids got a little restless, but all in all it was a great day with the family.

Fun at the Park

I have been wanting to take Merrick to the park and let him try out the swings for a while now, but I have been waiting for a time when Jeremy was home so he could come too. He has been so busy studying that there is very little time for the fun stuff. After his practice test on Saturday morning I declared the rest of the weekend "LSAT free" and we finally made it to the park.

Merrick was not sure about being in the swing by himself, but he looked adorable!





He had more fun swinging on mommy's and daddy's laps. Jeremy and I were facing opposite directions and Jeremy would swing and come in and out of view. Each time he would swing back so that Merrick could see him, Merrick would crack up.




I love both my boys and it was great to get to spend some family time together at the park.

Big Boy

Merrick is growing up so fast! It seems like every day he does something new. I wish that there was some way to slow down time and keep him little forever. Maybe it is because I am in no hurry for him to grow up, but sometimes I feel like I don't encourage him to do things he can do because in my head there is no way the he is old enough to do them.

Case in point...his stroller. Merrick and I frequently take walks around the neighborhood. The weather is nice and it gives us something to do outside the house. He loves these walks. Each time I load him into his car seat and then clip the car seat onto the stroller because in my head he is nowhere near big enough to sit in the stroller on his own. Yesterday it occurred to me that he is basically able to sit on his own so riding upright in the stroller really should not be a problem.

It turns out he can do it just fine and probably has been able to for a while. He is such a big boy. He just needs his mommy to get out of his way and let him do the things he is capable of doing.

On a side note, I am not the only one with this problem. Jeremy was caught of guard by how big Merrick is when he looked at the pictures. He asked where his little baby had gone.

Mommy's Little Helper

When Merrick was first born I had such a hard time getting anything done. Not only was I more tired than I had ever been, but Merrick did not sleep well during the day and did not sleep at all if he was not being held. When he started taking good naps I was able to get so much more done each day. There are still times however that nap time just is not enough time to get it all done.

I have mastered cooking dinner, doing dishes, picking up, and putting away laundry with a baby on my hip. This is one of my favorite pictures of my happy helper taken while he helped me switch the laundry from the washer to the dryer. Just after this picture was taken he decided to pull one of my shirts into his mouth and suck on it...such a big helper.