De-De-De and other chatter

Here are some clips of Ben talking. He chatters constantly. You will also see him roll over a few times.

Group Pic

This is a pic from Fran's camera of all of us after supper Monday.

Talking with MV

MV just turned two. She is very smart and funny. Here are a few things she told us while we were visiting.

• She points out all stop signs while in the car -- "red octogon." Did you know that a stop sign is an octogon?
• She didn't like Jim holding Ben. She said, "John baby. John hold Ben."
• Ben has excema. You may have noticed in some of the pics that his stomach has red spots. She told us, "Ben has rash."
• Fran told her to be gentle around Ben. According to MV that means, "Don't hit."
• She was playing with a baby doll. When she walked by Ben she looked at him and said, "Real baby."

End of Summer

We made good use of the last days of summer by going to the beach. We drove to Destin Friday and spent a long weekend with Jim and Fran. We got back around 5 this evening.

We had a really good time. We spent a lot of time at the beach. Ben did well. He got a little fussy when he was sleepy, but was able to nap on a blanket under the umbrella. Saturday we stayed 6 hours which was a little too long for Ben. Sunday we just went for a couple of hours in the afternoon. Monday, Fran, Ben and I spent a couple of hours at the outlets before going to the beach for the afternoon. Monday night we went out to eat and it was a disaster. Ben didn't fall asleep in the car like I had planned. Instead he SCREAMED. He was unhappy the entire time we were in the restaurant and John and I ate in shifts. That was our fault, though. We shouldn't have expected a five month old to be able to do so much in one day.


None of us got sunburned. You'll notice in the pics that John applied Ben's sunscreen. I have a tendency to miss spots on myself that result in weird burned places. This trip I have a red spot on my right knee.

I, of course, took lots of pics. Below is a slideshow of some of them. There are way too many to post individually.

Another Week

I finally got a picture of Ben's two new teeth -- if you look really closely you can kind of see the white of his teeth. Below is a picture of my first attempt to take a picture of his teeth. He refused.



One morning this week, when I went to get Ben out of bed the toe of his footy pajamas was soaking wet. At first I thought his diaper had mysteriously leaked on his foot. Then I realized that he had been laying in bed sucking his foot.



What do you expect me to do with this book? Read it or . . .



eat it?

A Week

Ben and I are finally at home for a weekend. We've been on the road for the past three weeks -- to my parents, to John's parents, back to my parents. We actually ate lunch with the Elders three Sundays in a row. They may experience Ben withdrawals tomorrow. I told Mama that we had visited them in June, July, August, and September. Don't even think about seeing us in October. We would see them again around Thanksgiving.

I haven't taken any pictures this week. Ben is cutting his two front bottom teeth. I don't think they are quite in far enough to get much of a picture. He was fussy on Monday, but I'm not sure if that was from his teeth or just tired from being in the car so many hours Saturday and Sunday.

Yesterday, I gave him some banana baby food for the first time thinking it would be a special treat for eating his green beans. He seemed to think bananas were worse than green beans. He grunted and clamped his mouth shut when I tried to put another spoonful in his mouth. I may try giving him another bite this afternoon.

Saturday was Will and Danielle's wedding. I packed my camera, but forgot to check whether my battery was charged. I took two pictures and then it died. Here are the two pictures -- Daddy and Ben and Zac and Ben. The third picture is from our weekend at the Elders. If you read Fran's blog, you've already seen it. She took this pic.

Green Bean Report

Today I tried feeding Ben sweet peas. He liked those better than the green beans. He actually swallowed them. After he ate half a jar of sweet peas, I gave him a couple of spoonfuls of green beans. He swallowed those, too, although he did make an ugly face at the first mouthful. Maybe he will grow to like green beans.

What's worse than carrots?

GREEN BEANS!! I gave Ben green beans for the first time today. Up until this morning, he had only eaten yellow veggies -- carrots, squash, and sweet potatoes. Here are a pic and a video that show what he thought of green beans.

Weekend with MV

One of the reasons Jim and Fran were in Jackson this weekend was to celebrate MV's 2nd birthday with the family. Here is a pic of John, Ben and MV at her birthday party at Mimi's. MV loves John. You can tell by her attire that MV wanted to wear and play with all her gifts immediately. If you want to see the pics where she has icing smeared all over her face, Fran should be posting those soon at http://www.elderjf.blogspot.com.



Here are a couple of other pics from the weekend that the Elders took.