Daddy Is Coming Home!!!

As exciting as the headline seems it's actually very bittersweet. Jake's dad, Britt, found out he has stage 4 lung cancer this week so the Marines are actually being really great and are gonna get Jake home for the holidays to be with his family. He'll be in Nebraska for about 2 weeks on leave and then he'll be back stationed here in North Carolina after that. They considered sending him back to Iraq after his leave in Nebraska, to finish up his tour, but thankfully they decided against that! It was starting to seem like March was never gonna get here. So anyways, as excited as we all are to have Jake home 3 months early we all just wish the circumstances were better.

Cruz and I will be coming to Nebraska on Monday and then Jake should get there Christmas Eve or Christmas Day. We hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas!!!

Can you tell by the picture that Cruz and I are very excited for Jake to be home?:)

9 month check up

Cruz had his 9 month check up today, he's a healthy little boy. He weighed 22lbs and was 29 1/4" tall. He's in the 75th percentile for weight and between the 75th and 90th percentile for height. He's gained 4 pounds in the last 3 months and grew 2 1/4".

Yesterday Cruz and Eve exchanged Christmas presents so I have a few photos of them opening the gifts. Cruz was more interested in eating the wrapped presents then unwrapping them!

Well some exciting news for us is we are to the half way mark in the deployment. Jake doesn't have a for sure date to come home yet but we're at least half way done, yay! Cruz & I will be back in Nebraska a week from today and will be there till January 5th, we can't wait to see everyone!

9 months

Cruz is 9 months old today. It was a rainy day here so I dressed him up in his Christmas outfit and we took some photos. Happy Birthday Cruz! O and I noticed tonight he has a top tooth coming in so that makes 3 teeth, yay!

Santa

I took Cruz to see Santa today. He did really well with him and didn't cry until the crazy lady taking the pictures made some weird loud noise to get his attention. Needless to say the picture she took he looks scared to death in but I did get these two other shots with my camera that turned out better.

Army Crawling

Here's a quick video of Cruzer doing his army crawl.

Thanksgiving

Well we got back to North Carolina last night. We had a really nice trip home and will be heading back again on the 22nd for two weeks over Christmas! Everyone definitely said Cruz had grown since they last saw him and I got a lot of comments like "wow he's a big boy" or "gosh he doesn't miss a meal huh":) He goes in for his 9 month check up on the 15th so I'm anxious to see how much he's grown in the last 3 months. He did start army crawling the day before Thanksgiving so hopefully once he gets more mobile he'll lose some of that baby fat!

I really didn't take many pictures when I was home this time for some reason so here are a few. My mom and I tried to take Cruz to see Santa on Tuesday but I guess Santa doesn't work at the Fremont mall on Monday, Tuesday or Wednesday's. Hopefully I'll have time to get him to see Santa here in North Carolina!




Cruz & I, Tim, Erin & Ava and Steve & Leah (Jake went to high school with Tim & Steve)






Kenna & Cruz







Uncle Mick







Great Grandma Sawyer








Uncle Heath






Michael & Cruz







Aunt Katie helping Cruz finish Thanksgiving dinner and Great Grandpa Keller watching closely!

Funny Blocks

So I bought Cruz these blocks today at Target and when we got home he thought they were just hilarious! We probably played for a half hour like this and he was laughing so hard the entire time. I've never seen him laugh so much!

We are heading back to Nebraska tomorrow, we get in around 10:30 in the morning! I hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving and hopefully we'll get to see some of you!

DaDa

Cruz said his first word Friday night... Dada. Now everything is dadadada. I caught some video of it tonight... He also is starting to pull himself up to things. He can't quite get up to his feet but he'll pull himself up from his butt to his knees. Still no crawling...

Five

I caught some video this morning of Cruz giving me fives. We've been working on this for awhile and now he'll finally do it on command! He also gives kisses now but I haven't been able to catch it on tape yet. Now we need to work on clapping and waving!

Veterans Day, 8 Month Birthday and the Aquarium

Well today was Veterans Day and Cruz also turned 8 months old today. We decided to take trip to the aquarium since they were having free admission today for Veterans Day. Adam, Andrea and Eve joined us and even though it was extremely busy we still had a good time. Here's a few pictures from the aquarium and then a mix of some of him trying to crawl after we got home. He's so close and tries so hard but just can't get it:)

Elmo

Well Cruz officially loves Elmo. I recorded a couple days of Sesame Street for him and if I have it on he won't really pay much attention but the minute Elmo comes on he's glued to the tv laughing and talking away. Then Andrea let me borrow Eve's "Elmo's World" DVD, which is what he's watching in the video below, and he loves it! Guess we'll be getting him some Elmo DVD's for Christmas this year:)

Well it took Cruz all week to get switched back over to normal time after the time change on Sunday so that was fun, ha! He's back to sleeping from around 8pm to 8am thank goodness! We've been trying to get out an enjoy the nice weather while it's still here. He loves it outside and seems to be a little cranky if we're stuck inside all day! Luckily the North Carolina winters aren't too cold so hopefully we can at least still get out to walk Tucker every day. I've been trying to give him more and more table food which he of course loves. He's never turned down food or not liked something and he would eat and eat all day if I'd let him. He's now to the point if I try and eat in front of him he whines or sometime screams if he doesn't get a bite too. The crawling business is still in the works, he gets around the whole room by rolling over, turning in circles, kinda scooting around or crawling backwards but just can't seem to get where he wants to go since he can't crawl forwards. We are still talking to Jake every night on the webcam which has been great. Jake has been gone for two months now so the time is still going pretty fast. Cruz and I will be in Nebraska for 6 days over Thanksgiving. We're ready to come home and see everyone!

Below are a few pictures from this weekend. He loves anything that spins so he figured out last night that if he turns his dump truck over he can spin the wheels! I think he spent at least a half hour just spinning the tires, funny kid. Hope everyone has a great week!

Another tooth...

Cruz had another tooth pop through this morning. So now he has both of his bottom two teeth. He's getting closer and closer to crawling every day. He still gets up on his hands and knees and rocks back and forth but just can't figure out how to move forward yet. Here's a few recent pictures...

Supporting the Huskers yesterday in his new outfit from Grandpa and Grandma Walkenhorst!

Happy Hallween!!!

Happy Boy

Here's a couple of shots of Cruz from today. He's starting to move around more and he spends a lot of time on his tummy now. He can go backwards and turn in a complete circle but he just can't figure out how to move forwards. In the past couple of days he's gotten up on his knees and rocked back and forth and I thought for sure he'd take off and then he just plops down on his stomach and never goes anywhere.

Anyways here's our happy boy... and like Jake pointed out to me, his hair really looks red in these pictures with the lighting. Maybe if he'd grow some hair we'd know what color it's really gonna be!

Laughing

I finally got Cruz on video laughing. He does this all the time but it's kinda hard to catch on tape when I'm the only one here! If your watching this at work make sure you turn down your volume because it's kind of loud. And I know I sound really stupid in the video but hey it's what makes him laugh:)

Our Little Froggy

Well our trip to Nebraska was great and now we're back in North Carolina. Tucker was sure excited to see us and Cruz is now absolutely fascinated by Tucker. Before we left he could care less if Tucker was around but now he's all about Tucker. As soon as he can crawl Tucker is never gonna be able to get away from him!

I bought Cruz this cute little frog towel when we were back in Nebraska so I had to post a few pictures! It was great to see everyone when we were home and sorry to everyone we missed. We'll be home again for Thanksgiving and Christmas so hopefully we'll be able to squeeze time in for everyone in one of those two visits.

Pumpkin Patch

Well we spent the day at the Pumpkin Patch today. Both Cruz and Makenna were very good. It was a little chilly this morning as you can see in the picture of Cruz with his stocking hat on but then it got really nice out as the day went on. Cruz loved to pet the animals and would get a huge smile when he got to touch them. Here's a few pictures from the day...

Nebraska visit so far

Well we made it back to Nebraska on Thursday and the plane ride actually went really well. I wanted to post a few pictures I've taken so far. Cruz has really enjoyed getting spoiled by everyone! We're planning on going to the Pumpkin Patch on Wednesday so I'm sure I'll post more pictures then....



Aunt Katie & Cruz







Cruz loves to just sit and watch Makenna







Watching football with Grandpa







Aunt Heather & Cruz







Cruz & his cousins Trenton & Michael







Uncle Josh & Cruz








Makenna & Cruz playing






Makenna & Cruz playing again







Makenna feeding Cruz