New Laptop!!

My wonderful husband went out on black friday and stood in line to get me a new laptop! We drove past best buy at 10pm the night of Thanksgiving and there were already 12 tents in line!!! He went around 4:45am during the mass confusion and they were all out of the ones we were wanting so he then waited in line at Office Depot.... and sadly they were all out too. As Brian was walking back to the car he decided to run back into Best Buy to check out if they had any other good deals and amazingly 8 more of the model we were looking for magincally appeared! And then the poor man had to wait in line for a hour just to check out! He's so good to me =)

Giving thanks for our baby girl

On a day to be thankful, it is nice to think about all that we are lucky to have: such supportive and loving families, wonderful friends, a roof over our heads, food on the table, our health, and especially our beautiful baby girl. It has been a year to be thankful for, thats for sure!

We had a great time making dinner, Jeff even pitched in. It was our biggest thanksgiving turn out yet (10 including the baby!). Brian's cousin David even made it home from France! We let Tori play with some mashed potatoes during dinner and later Pam fed her her first baby food (sweat potatoes of course!).

First bites of rice cereal

We had so much fun giving Tori her first meal! She was a little unsure at first but once she got the hang of it she would cry between bites because we weren't feeding her fast enough!

Four months

Tori is getting so big. At her four month appointment she weighed 13 pounds 12 ounces and she's 24 1/2 inches long. Her pediatrician gave us the go ahead to start solid foods =) We're going to give it a try tonight, I can't wait to see her take her first bites!! She's been so interested in food lately. She's always reaching for our dinner plates and she stares at each bite we take. She's also starting to sit when propped up.

Here are a few recent pictures of her playing

Tori and Jordan are best buds. Jordan always has to be right next to the baby and they love to play together. I didn't pose the pictures below, I had Tori sitting on the couch and she put her arm around Jordan!! They're so cute together :)

Our baby girl has found her toes!She is doing so incredibly well. She is so curious and really enjoys playing with her toys and with us. She especially loves touching our faces. She is sleeping more now than she did when she was a newborn. We start the bath bottle book bed routine around 6:30 and she's down for the night before 8 and stays asleep until around 6am. She's such a joy, we are so blessed to have her!

Gorgeous weekend!!

We had such a great weekend! The weather was gorgeous and we had lots of fun. On Saturday we went to the SHG-Chatham playoff football game (For those not familiar with Springfield area schools: these two schools are big rivalries. I went to SHG and Brian went to Chatham HS). SHG won 42-19 =)

We went to the St Louis Zoo on Sunday. Tori loves to pet the puppies, she really seems to enjoy touching their fur (and tugging on Jordan's ears) so we went to the Children's zoo were they can pet animals and there's lots of places to play. Tori petted a snake, guinea pig, and even an alpaca! Then we walked around the big zoo.
Yes, that is a real penguin! He was just chilling out right at the edge of his home. Brian could have touched him! The penguin cove was awesome, you can't get any closer!

We now have a thumb sucker. Its sooo cute to see her all curled up sleeping with her little thumb in her mouth. She's such an angel!!

Daddy's girl

Anyone who has seen Brian and Tori together knows she's got him wrapped around her pinky already. Brian plays with her toes and sings to her all the time. My favorite thing is the other day I caught him singing "Im a Little Teapot" and making her do the motions. :) She was loving it, I think its the cutest thing Ive ever seen. I doubt Brian would let me take a video of that but here's one of them playing on the couch. You can hear her laugh a few times if you listen closely.

Happy Halloween

Tori was a little witch for Halloween. :) I had to work again this year but I made it home for some of the shenanigans. We had lots of trick-or-treaters and G-pa Jim and G-ma Gina brought the kids over for a visit in their costumes. Tori got irritated with her costume pretty quickly so we ended the night with her shirt that has a "little miss cutie" sash on it and the tiara I wore to work :-) She can't wait to trick or treat next year!!

Random note: A few nights before Halloween she held her bottle for the first time!