What a cutie!!

I just can't get enough of this face!

oh no! we're in trouble!!

Dieter can roll over!!!

Dieter's First Christmas

Dieter loves the Christmas tree and all the lights. 

 Christmas morning before we unwrapped presents.  I love the look on Dieter's face!

 Santa brought blocks for Dieter (or are they for Wes?!)

Dieter and Daddy building with the blocks 

 Giant giraffe with our little Dieter bug

 Dieter loves his sock monkey!!

Tired from a couple of days of fun festivities



book 25 of 25

I did it...I reached my goal of 25 books this year!!  In all honesty, I reached it a few books ago.  I read several pregnancy, breastfeeding, and infant books this year.  I just didn't put them on the blog because I really didn't want to go into depth about what I liked about certain parts of pregnancy, breastfeeding, etc.  SO, here it is the last book of 2012 (maybe...I'm reading a book right now that I just might finish before year end). 
I'm a little late reading this book.  It was all the rage in 2007-2009  The author, Randy Pausch, was diagnosed in 2007 with pancreatic cancer and was given only  months to live.  He was a professor at Carnegie Mellon and they invited him to do a presentation at their "last lecture" series.  It is basically their way of letting a retiring professor give a sumation of life, teaching, etc.  Pausch's wife didn't want him to do it at first because she wanted him to spend every waking minute with their little family of 3 small children.  So to change her mind, he made the lecture about what he wanted his kids to know about him and the attributes he hoped they would hang onto.  It's a great reminder that life is precious even if one is not diagnosed to die within six months or a year.  He encourages his audience to live life to its fullest, be honest, and to chase childhood dreams.  Randy Pausch passed away in July 2008.  His kids and wife are lucky to have this lecture to remind them of him.

baby, it's cold outside...

We've got a lot of rain coming our way just in time for Christmas.  Dieter is ready and he looks so cute in his winter get-up!

Citrus Season

Oh how we love the citrus season!!  We have been anticipating the harvest of our citrus this year.  Last year our trees did not yeild any fruit.  This year our trees are filled!  We have delicious navel oranges (they taste better than candy and oh so juicy!) and these beautiful lemons. 

The Opp Boys

I love these boys! (even if one of them is drooly)

baby blue eyes

jeepers creepers this little boy has beautiful peepers!

the stockings were hung...

I'm not a seamstress, yet I decided it would be fun to make stockings.  I suppose because my mom made stockings for all of her children, I feel like that is the motherly thing to do!  I googled for a stocking pattern and I saw some stockings with big polka dots on them and decided that was the route I wanted to go.  Wes did not want polka dots on his stocking...he just wanted a plain jane stocking...that's what he got.  I want to put our names on the stockings (probably embroider them), but that may have to happen next year.  I was lucky to get these done in time for the Christmas season.  On pinterest I found an idea to hang the stockings.  Instead of getting stocking hangers for all the stockings, just get two (which we already had...the christmas trees on the mantle) and then get a curtain rod and put it on the two stocking hangers. And voila you can hang as many stockings as you need to with only two stocking hangers.  You can see the curtain rod idea a little better here.

book 24 of 25

This is a nice, quick read.  It was picked for our September book club.  I was busy giving birth and thus did not attend book club that month.  I wanted to read this book however, because I heard it was good.  I was not disappointed.  The story is told in short stories/chapters.  It is about the life of a young latina girl growing up in Chicago, in a neighborhood that is, well, not the nicest.  She describes those people on her street who she grows up with and how they shape her life and who she will become.  I would recommend this book.  Also, I'm almost done with my goal of 25 books for the year!!!

3 Months

Three months!!!  I cannot believe we have had this little guy for three months.  First off, we love this little shirt he is wearing.  Our friends we visited in St. Petersburg Russia sent this to us.  I'm not sure what it says, as it is in Russian.  At three months, Dieter is developing so quickly.  He is cooing and laughing more.  Lately, he has been experimenting with how loudly he can make his voice.  When he yawns, he is very dramatic and lets out a sigh to let us know he is sleepy!  He sleeps so well (which mommy and daddy appreciate greatly).  Most nights he sleeps 6 hours or more.  The other day he slept for 9!  He loves bath time.  He weighs just over 15 pounds and is about 26 inches.  Oh, how smitten we are by this little guy!

It's Christmas Time!!

We had cooking group last night and the theme was White Christmas.  I found these Melting Oreo Snowmen and thought they would be perfect.  My snowmen didn't turn out as cute as the picture.  They started looking creepy and a little Halloweeny so I turned them into snowglobes.  Either way, they tasted good.  They are super sweet and rich...one should not eat more than one a day.  Merry Christmas!

book 23 of 25

If you have ever wanted to climb Mt. Everest, don't read this book!  I have never wanted to climb Everest before and after reading this, I really don't want to climb it.  The author of the book is a journalist who was sent by Outside Magazine to do an article on the comercialization of Mt. Everest.  He took a year to get ready and then picked and paid a guide to take him to the summit.  Other people were also part of his group that were led by the said paid guide.  Some were experienced in different aspects of mountaineering (high altitude hiking, etc) others were not.  Those that were not were basically just rich enough to make the trek.  They summitted in May 1996.  They day the author made it to the top was a surreal day for him.  He accomplished something he wanted to do from an early age and he also witnessed the death of many he hiked with.  12 people died that day.  The book is the story of how the disaster happened.

a gift....

 

Oh how we love this boy!!  He is definately a gift to us this year!  We are so excited for Christmas.  Though Dieter has no idea what is going on, he loves the lights on the Christmas tree.  Let the Christmas Season begin!

weekend in SF

congratulations!  you found your way over from my other blog jennyopp.blogspot.com. 
On the Friday after Thanksgiving we went to San Francisco.  Our first stop was the Museum of Modern Art.  This was Dieter's first museum and he was great!

After a late lunch of Chinese served Dim Sum style we went back to our hotel to get Dieter ready to walk along the Embarcadero.  We walked all the way to Pier 39.  He fell asleep before we hit Pier 1 across the street from our hotel!

At Pier 39 he was amazed to see so many things... the water, the sea lions and all the crazy people.

I love his look of amazement!

The next morning we slept in.  Our friends from AZ (Ryan and Nichole Lowe and their kids) were in SF so we went to meet up with them for lunch.  Before doing so we stopped at Alamo Square for a photo op with the row of Victorian Houses.  Yes, we are in the park where the Full House intro was filmed

 

After lunch with the Lowe's we went to Golden Gate Park.  Ryan and his son are huge Florida gator fans so they went back to their hotel to watch the game.  Nichole and Kate came with us to the Japanese Flower Garden and the de Young museum.

Kate is adorable and was practicing her Buddha poses on the tall bridge.

Dieter got museumed out.  Here we are at the de Young look out tower.  The views are amazing!