Sleeping

Confession time: I'm obsessed with a sleeping Declan. He's just so sweet and cute and funny! Well, the funny has come later in life for him, but he's always been sweet and cute! :) My favorite part of him are his palms. They're warm and soft....I love it!!! I'm also constantly checking on him at night after he goes to bed, just looking at him, making sure he's breathing. And if I hear the slightest noise that sounds off, I'm up and running to him....like he's still a newborn! I know I'm not alone with this, right Trevor?! Right! :)

So about this funny business.....Dec really gets into some silly positions when he's asleep. Well, I think they're silly! :) And I end up taking a thousand pictures and posting them here....um, I mean 37 pictures. (Yes, there are that many here. Is that too many? Not for me! I love pictures!!) Here is my catalogue of Sleeping Declan Pictures! I'll start with the classic ones from his younger days.

One day old!

2 weeks old....

This one makes me think of Gizmo, the Mogwai. It's like Dec's saying "Bright light, bright light!"


3 weeks old
"I'm too sexy for my crib"


4 weeks
This is what I was talking about: so sweet and cute!


almost 6 weeks old
This is his Great Grandma Spice look! :)


6 weeks old


7 weeks old
Put your hands where I can see them!


Snuggle time with Daddy


almost 11 weeks old
And he's found his thumb!


4 months old
There goes the Mogwai thing again...


5 months old
This was the first time Jake let me borrow his nice, fancy camera, and these were in that first shoot I did.....which I haven't blogged....yet. :)

still 5 months old

Oh, you know it!

He looks like he's doing a jig, or clicking his heels like a Leprechaun.

7 months old

He started rolling onto his stomach about this time....really freaked me out! I have video of it too, we tried turning him onto his back, but to no avail....he would just flip back. It was actually really funny!

10 1/2 months old

I just thought his body position looked so funny here....

And when I looked away to see the last picture on the camera, and then looked back at him, he looked like this:

15 months old

This really scared me and made me laugh at the same time! How ridiculous is this kid!

I did move him, so he wouldn't break his leg trying to turn in his sleep, but a couple weeks later, it happened again...

And this is what happened when I moved him...back to the safety position!

After that, he just liked sticking his feet out of the crib....I couldn't stop him!

After lunch one day, he asked to watch Signing Times before going down for a nap. I obliged, sat him down in his chair, and went about cleaning up after lunch. When I went to get him for his nap, I found him like this. Poor guy was tuckered out!

Here is a series with his bear. Bear ends up in the oddest of places! Awesome!

As a pillow...

As a blanket...

As a shield...

As a body pillow...

As just something to cuddle...

And as an airbag.

This was on the way home from Disneyland for my birthday. How adorable is this kid!

He made this pose a lot in his ultrasound pictures, which was quite fitting: his name means "Man of Prayer"

On the plane ride to Texas in November....a blog you will see hopefully soon!

So thanks for sticking through all those pictures. I hope you enjoyed them as I much as I do!! Thank you and Goodnight! :)

Then and Now: Boppy Edition

5 weeks and 3 days old

1 year, 5 weeks and 3 days old!

Yup! These pictures were taken a year apart exactly! I didn't realize it until I was putting this post together today. Fun stuff! :) What a HUGE difference a year makes!

June 20th, 2008

June 20th, 2009

I'm pretty sure there won't be a repeat this year....unless it's of Abby. But she'll probably still be sitting comfortably with me.....who won't be sitting comfortably.....

Christmas 2009

I love this picture. It's not at all in focus, but I just think it's so precious!!

So I know this is over a month late, but.....

Anyway, we stuck to our normal Christmas traditions this year: Christmas Eve with the Gill Family, Christmas morning with our little family, and Christmas night with the Allan Family. I always love seeing Declan play with his cousins, he LOVES them all so much. And I'm always saying "he needs to see them more!" Perhaps that can be a New Years resolution....what? It's February? Ok, it can be a New Month resolution! :)

Ethan and Bella tearing into their gifts.

Such a beautiful girl!

Helping Dec open presents. Trev, thanks for telling me to look up. The ones where I'm looking down.....not so pretty! :)

Cheeseball!

So Ethan got a "Thomas the Tank Engine" book. Declan caught a glimpse of it, and then none of his presents mattered. All he wanted was the "choo choo".....I had no idea he had gotten so attached to Thomas.....uh....hmmm.....

Declan's first Elmo. An Original Tickle Me Elmo!

Our annual Cracker Crown picture.

What cute pj'd cousins!!!

After a rearrange, Ethan took Declan's hand! So sweet!

And Dec put his arm around Bella...

Um....and began choking her....?

And finished with a good tackle. Or steam roller. Did I say he loves his cousins? :)

Christmas morning. We got D a computer since he was always trying to use ours. He started playing with it right away, and it was SOOOO adorable!!

Now I bet you're wondering why I put a picture of Danny and Grace (yes, that's Grace with the monkey head on) dressed up as the Man in the Yellow Hat and Curious George. Well, the answer is three-fold:

1. Danny has always loved Curious George. He was sick a lot as a kid, even went into the hospital several times, and George was integral in getting him through that time. So what better way to pay tribute than to dress up as the two main characters for Halloween! (2005, by the way....that's pre-kids.)

2. To show you how awesome and dedicated my brother and sister-in-law are when it comes to Halloween costumes!! During their lives together they have been El Nino and La Nina (grey sweats with cotton balls attached, sombreros, a mustache for Danny, and squirt bottles to "rain" on people), Daisy's (green sweats with GIANT flowers head pieces. Danny got an award at work called the Daisy award....thus...the costumes.), Penguins, and Chickens. Grace is so amazingly creative and has made the costumes each year, including the paper mache George head you see her sporting in this photo. Seriously. Dedication!

3. (The reason that ties this all in, and yet shows what a very random tangent this is) Hopie put a "Man in the Yellow Hat" hat on at Christmas. Yup. That's it. :)

The kids and Danny playing the Ladybug Game.

Uncle Danny! Did you turn it into a drinking game?!?! :)

WOOO! Declan wins!!

Ok, I put this picture in because I was so amazed at how my son ate that night. I'm thinking this is after his first serving, but his plate looked the same after a SECOND piece of lasagna! That is a true miracle for Declan. Seriously Randy, it goes against nature...it is from God! :)

Sadly, that's all I got from the night. Once dinner was over and we started on presents, I wasn't real "on" with the camera. I was opening a lot of D's presents, so I didn't have time to take pictures. I assure you though, fun times were had!

Thank you Families for all the gifts! It is fun to see Declan play with his new toys, read his new books, and cuddle his big Frog! Yeah, Dec got a big frog stuffed animal that is "life size"....for him. He wasn't as big a fan when it came out of the bag, but now he LOVES it! And so do Trevor and I! Seriously, that thing is great to cuddle! :)

I leave you with our Christmas Card display. We totally felt the love this year, and I want to say thank you to everyone who sent us a card! Yours was (and still is) lovingly displayed! :) If yours seems a little buried.......then send it later next year! I learned the later you send a card, the more prime spot it gets! :)

(Yes, that is our card in there too.....and a picture of Jack Allan.....and a picture of me, Chantel, Bri and Megan from 1998.)