SNOW!!

Yes! That is correct! We are getting snow in Houston, Texas the DAY before we leave for a trip up north to NY City to try and see some snow. Hey, at least we are getting used to the cold weather before we go. Bryson loved it. He kept looking around at the flakes coming down.

Thanksgiving

We spent thanksgiving in Birmingham with Kristi family. Things couldn't have been better except for an Auburn win. We were so busy we didn't take alot of pictures. Here is a great one of Bryson and his cousin Micah with their moms.

1st Santa Claus

Bryson got to meet his very first Santa Claus a couple of weeks ago. He is in that "amazement phase" so he just laughed and giggled at Santa.

Vote!

Make sure you get out there tomorrow and vote. I did!!!

Halloween---Events

We celebrated Halloween a little late this year. Bryson had a school parade Friday so I decided to take him with me afterwards and let Kristi go back to work. So Bryson and I went home and carved his pumpkin and got the candy ready to go. I received a call around 5pm from Kristi letting me know she had been in an accident and was in a great deal of pain. So I packed Bryson up thinking what a miracle it was that I had him with me and he wasn't in the car. When I got there she was still in the car and was not in any shape to move. She had been hit from behind (by a 16 year old) while stopped and it was so hard that it pushed her into the car in front of her and dented the front car''s bumper as well. She had to be taken to the hospital as a precaution and is really sore now. Both the cop and I think this is going to come back as totalled vehicle so I guess the best we can hope for is that I will get a little out of it and get a new car.

So what was Bryson for Halloween?AUBIE! We figured by next year he will be telling US what he wants to be so we used this year for his mother and father's obsession. These are pictures from his "school's" Halloween carnival.

Here is Bryson's first pumpkin! No, I am not the artist in the family so I cheated and used the Internet for the design.

West Virginia Game

We took Bryson to his first Auburn football game. What better way than to take him to a road game. It wasn't much of a game but still had a great time before hand and an awesome time up in Pittsburgh for the weekend.

As we were walking through the Auburn tailgate we came across a person who had a collection of tigers. What do you do when you find this?

Use it as a photo opportunity! This was about the only time Bryson was in full view with his outfit. The rest of the time it was below 40 and he was in jackets and blankets.

"Hey are you going to share any of that with me?" See how the passy just dropped right out of his mouth at the sound of a cold one being popped.

We unfortunately had quite a hard time getting to the game. We were to leave Houston Wed night at 7pm but we didn't end up leaving until Thurs at 1am. We got into Pittsburgh at 4:45am and had just enough time to crash for a couple of hours before driving an hour south to Morgantown. Bryson was a trooper but was never able to recover from that first night. So luckily we brought the sling carrier and he spent most of the time bundled up asleep being carried around. He just asked to be woken up when we got somewhere. We also got a local sandwich in Pittsburgh I had heard about and saw on TV (thanks to my addiction to the food channel). They take two slices of Italian bread and put a meat of choice (I got a Philly Cheese Steak) then they load it up with homemade cole slaw and fries!! It was actually really good and even had a little miner beer (a local brew) with which to wash it down.

School Halloween

Here are some pictures of Bryson at his day care. They have been doing Halloween activities all week.

This was Kristi and Bryson drawing a pumpkin.

" But Mom I just want to EAT the marker!!!

Bryson's fist completed "Master Piece". Notice all the chew marks around the paper! That was his contribution to the "Master Piece". Mom did the green dots.

I love my baby pumpkin. I will hold it, love it, hug it, and talk to it.

Fruit

Bryson has made it through most of the vegetables that are offered in baby foods and he loves them all. So the next logical step is to let Bryson try some fruit. We figured we would start with the vegetables since it was given he would like fruit. WRONG!!!!! He won't touch bananas. He let's it go in and then spits them right back out at you and says "Nope. Try again". He will now eat applesauce but he gives you some pretty weird looks when he first starts out the feeding. So I guess my little man is a veggie man. He must get the drama side from his mom!

First Tooth-Teeth

Well, last weekend Bryson was acting really weird. He was super happy on Saturday and, considering Auburn was getting beat pretty badly by Arkansas, I didn't see anything fun about the day. Then on Sunday he was whinny all day and Monday was the same. So I asked Kristi if she had checked to see if he had a tooth coming in? During one of her visits to the daycare she checked and yeap he sure did but it wasn't just one but TWO! So here is the fantastic picture of Bryson's two front teeth!!

Halloween Package

Bryson received a "Halloween Package" from his Aunt Pam in Florida. It contained a cute outfit and a book, "Five Little Pumpkins", that he loves! While we were doing our Halloween Photo Shoot he became very curious of his sisters Gracie and Cinder. However, they let it be known that they still do not like him even though he loves them so much! It could have something to do with the fact of his constant squeezing and pulling fists full of hair out!

Feeding Time

Bryson is starting to really get a feel for the spectrum of food that is out there. And not to live down his last name he is enjoying them all. He is even to the point were he sees the spoon and lunges for it knowing what it is. Which is a good thing------

See look at me I am eating all my carrots. Making my eyes strong and making sure mom doesn't lose any on the carpet. This was close to the end and you will notice how clean even his tray is.

And this is when mom is to slow and Bryson is in feeding frenzy mode. Notice his - man I am full but why are you guys staring and laughing at me.

Hey I ate all my food why are you guys just standing around fighting over who is going to pick me up.

6.5 Months

Well I am a little late posting this. Bryson got his 6 month set of shots and got all his data. He was 17lbs and 25.5 inches. Bryson's eyes are doing better. He is using them together alot more so the patching is helping. We still aren't sure what the final plan will be. We will be patching until December and then reevaluate. He has no problem looking down at things or watching Baby Einstein it is only when he is try to see things far away or when he is looking up. Of course this probably means he will be skipping the crawling phase. There are several ideas that his eye doctor is thinking of but right now she is letting the natural course take effect. As you can see below we had a hard time getting him to forget about the football and look up. He knows what is important.

Be Warned!

Bryson has let us know that if we want to leave him for a second we better make sure there is nothing within reach or else it will be picked-up. Normally it is straight to the mouth but when you are ready for bed and fall asleep before it makes it to your mouth who knows were it will go!! This is what mom found when she came back from getting a diaper from across the room.

Pool Time

With the seas a little rough due to "Gustav" we headed over to San Destin for a little pool time with Kristi's family. This was Bryson's first time in water other than a bath. As you will see, he didn't mind it all! He actually fell asleep in the float after a little bit. This was Dad doing his best to smile since he got crazy-burned the day before in the Bay. Needless to say, he was not feeling too hot for a couple days and it took three peelings to get over it.

Ok mom, you hold on to me. I am just going to sit back and relax for a little while.

A little love from Gustav

Well, even though "Gustav" made landfall just west of New Orleans, it still let us know all the way in Florida how powerful Hurricanes can be.

Typical view out the back of our bay house in Fort Walton.

Here is what we woke up to on Labor Day.

We wanted to make sure Bryson got at least a little water time with "Gustav".

HURRICANE IKE!!!

Ok, so we made it through IKE. We are very fortunate as we had no house damage and only lost power for just under 12 hours. Many around us had to go at least three days and some are still without power. Friday, as the storm was coming in, we went ahead and put Bryson down about an hour earlier than we normally do so that we could make sure the house was secure. We had his nite time music playing on his CD player using batteries (8 C batteries I might add!!!) and had him in his pack-n-play on the first floor in our master bath. THIS CHILD DID NOT WAKE UP UNTIL 8 AM THE NEXT MORNING!!! Mom and Dad were up every 15-30 mins making sure that we hadn't lost our chimney or a window. But in the end it was alot of noise and a downed tree.

We have been helping some of our friends by clearing their yards and driveways of trees and debris. My office finally has power but has no water (which means no A/C). But hey, we are still there trying to make them a buck or two.

I will try to pick up were I left off last week sometime during the next couple of days.

1st Auburn Game

Bryson got to get all dressed up for his first Auburn game. He was happy to learn, however, that he was going to stay and play with his monkey friend and go on a walk instead of going to the sports bar with mom and dad to watch the tigers play.

Poor Bryson

This is what happens when you have bad parents who look away while your two grandmothers have you!

Baptism Reception

Point Washington UMC let us use their Fellowship Hall to have a little party with cake after the ceremony.

Bryson's Baptism

Kristi and I have been trying to figure out the best way and place to accomplish the task of getting all our family in one place to celebrate Bryson's Baptism. As things would have it, we were able to choose a small church in Destin, FL. My mom frequents this little church whenever she is in town and was able to take Kristi there earlier this summer. As it turns out a lot of family was going to be in town visiting and others where able to come down for the celebration so it all worked out very well. I am sure Bryson appreciated everyone as much as we did. The show of support and love was trememdous. Thank you to all who came out and helped us celebrate this important event in Bryson's life.

Notice in the last picture, Bryson is patting Pastor Tim's face after getting "sprinkled" with holy water. You can tell by mom's face that she thought that was cute!