our munchkin turns the big 6....

SIX MONTHS OLD!

growth spurt theory: check.
2 weeks ago we made his exersaucer higher, so that he was only on his tip-toes. As you can see, he is now flat-footed! yikes! no wonder he's been eating like a crazy man!




he spends a lot of time in his stroller...he's a good little traveler. in fact, he only goes in the car maybe once or twice a week! it's pretty nice!


for some reason, he likes to ride with one foot sticking straight out. working on his calf muscles...?



BUBBLES!!

=FUN!!

discovering himself in the mirror...apparently he likes what he sees. :) ?????????????????!
chill mom...and give me some space! chew, chew, chew....
monkey toes...

drool, drool, drool...

toys contained: check. G can't fall over: check. mom happy: check!

you talkin' to me?

G-man - we love you so much!

You make us laugh every single day, if not every single hour!

You make us scratch our heads to try to figure you out sometimes, and we love the little glimpses of personality that we can't wait to see develop.

We can't imagine our life without you and you are one of God's greatest blessings to us. Ever!

Happy half-birthday baby boy!

Graham will be celebrating by eating vegetables for the first time!

green bean birthday treat - yum-o. :~)

this-n-that

This is a beautiful building to us! because it is the site of Andrew's first JOB! It is the home of Citizen's Bank where he will be working on the 22nd floor, taking in-bound calls in a type of call-center. He has another job in the works that would definitely be a much better situation both in pay & hours, so we are still praying that will work out, but in the mean-time, we are accepting this! We thank God for providing and trust him to continue to do so. MANY people have prayed for this, and we thank you for joining us in that request.

our neighborhood

One of our favorite parts in the city is the Strip District. (Isn't as raunchy as it sounds :) It is a beautiful street filled with all kinds of markets & shops. The produce & meat selection is awesome, with better prices than I paid at Wal-mart!

Life has been pretty crazy busy since we've gotten here just with getting our home settled and also getting adjusted to our new community and beginning to be a part of our new church. We are loving it. The church group here is small {so far }, but it is a very tight-knot group and there is a BIG vision. There is much to do in the city of Pittsburgh as we looks towards how we are going to spread the Gospel. Right now, everyone is getting to know their neighbors, co-workers, and those who they most frequently come in contact with, be it the barber, barista, or bank teller. Pray that we would be faithful in our witness.

we all recently went to a pirates game. this stadium has one of the best city views I've seen!

they won in the FOURTEENTH inning, however, we left in the 9th to relieve our baby-sitter. I'm glad we didn't try to stay. :)

graham gets to spend lots of time with his friend Claire! They mostly just stare at each other right now. :)

g-man report...
We faced our first crisis in quite a while the past 2 weeks. it was called GROWTH SPURT. He decided that what he was getting from me was not near enough, so all of a sudden we were scrambling to also give him formula and feed him more & more & more & more... it's been quite stressful to know how much he should eat and when, etc...our perfectly smooth routine flew right out the window. :) It's slowly starting to calm down and hopefully we're getting past the worst of it! whew. it was exhausting!
He is getting very active and when we get him after a sleep, we never know what crazy position he is going to be in! he manages to scoot all around or even ends up on his belly.

but besides the crazy little life interruption, he is just our favorite baby in all the world! he is so happy all the time and we love to laugh and play with him! (we also realized we've only taken one picture of him since we've moved here. GASP!) we'll have to fix that. back to documenting his life hour by hour soon. :)

REAL pics!

For anyone who may not have heard yet...Picture People is offering a FREE picture package for the summer. The offer expires on July 25th, so act fast! http://www.picturepeople.com/promotion/email/summer_2009/sfr2_landing2.html

We were thrilled to have our first professional family pics for us & Graham. They took some adorable ones of G-man. I wish I could have gotten them all!

Picture People does not have a sitting fee, so the free package is actually completely free! (you can only get one pose) We just COULD NOT resist the 2nd pic!

FaVoRiTe!!!

******************

here are some of the other poses that we loved as well!

some tidbits

Here is my happy little traveler, who praise God, was a great little trooper during our 9 hour trip!
We made 2 stops to eat & let him get out and stretch a little. He slept probably about 4 hours of the trip & otherwise played with his toys. He got fussy a couple of time right before our stops, but I can't complain at all!

And here are some pics of our 1st floor (the only floor that's pretty close to normal at this point!)

kitchen...

the card table is currently serving as my "stove"! We haven't had a chance to get one yet. I do have a plug-in skillet & a camping stove, so it's amazing what you can actually make between those two. The only thing I really miss is my oven, but I can use my friend's anytime I would need to, so it's actually not as big a deal as I thought it was going to be. :)

thanking the Lord for providing a free fridge for us!

I don't think we could have done without that!

Living Room...

yep, blue carpet and all! The color is not too horrible. It doesn't really match, but I guess I've learned to ignore it. :) The thing that annoys me most about it is that is shows EVERY little speck that falls on it! I currently want to vacuum about twice a day! Hopefully we'll be able to get a large tan area rug that will cover most of the living room and then I won't have to worry about it looking speckled all the time!

And the G-man update...

took the plunge and started him on a little cereal! He's doing pretty good and swallowing it down pretty well. Though he is more interested in chewing on his spoon & bib right now! He can't figure out his bib & it kind of drives him a little crazy. :)

Lots to share about our new city, neighborhood, church, people we are meeting, etc...But I guess that will have to wait for now!

We are currently getting internet in one window of our 3rd floor, so it's not the most convenient, but we sure are thankful as it beats going to the corner coffee shop every day! We are going to wait to get our internet hooked up until Andrew gets his job - hopefully soon!

He has been out pounding the streets, applying online, and putting as much time as possible into his searching. So we are praying that God will provide soon!

We certainly already miss our beach friends, but are thankful to be here and enjoying our new & different life!

Welcome Home

I don't have a lot of time and boy, I sure have a lot to do...but here is a quick update!

-> We arrived safely. Many of you prayed specifically that Graham would travel well and not torture his mother out of boredom. prayers answered!! He did beautifully. I couldn't have asked more of him. We stopped twice and made the trip in about 9 hours. He was fussy maybe 10-15 minutes out of the whole trip, so praise God!

-> Andrew actually arrived ahead of us and my house was full of people & stuff by the time I got to see it! The house is wonderful, it is perfect for our needs and we thank God for it.

-> Also thanking God for the 2 separate groups of friends that helped us load & unload. They worked tirelessly and we certainly worked them all To. The. Bone. We moved from a 3-floor house to a 4-floor house - it doesn't get worse than that. :) Everyone was VERY kind to us.

-> We found out we actually live in Little Italy. How quaint is that?!! We love our little neighborhood and have met several of our neighbors who have all been so sweet. Our landlords, who live behind us, have also been wonderful!

-> So lots of unpacking to do! Our house looks like a war zone. We're starting with the living room, than hitting the kitchen tomorrow, and will work slowly upstairs after that!

-> Please continue to pray as Andrew starts some serious job-searching. Having an income would sure be a nice little bonus. :)


Thanks everyone for your love, help, & support!
We had a wonderful last week in VaBeach and a lot of special memories. We are thrilled with our new home & city and many new memories to come.
Hope to have some pics soon!