Good times were had by all.

Just want to share my newest, favorite Korben memory to date. Last night when I was putting him to bed I was giving him his bottle and he decided he didn't want to drink anymore. He was just laying on me making that "singing" sound that he does when he is sleepy. So, I started patting his mouth (I used to call this making "Indian sounds", but I'm sure that isn't politically correct to say anymore). He thought this was hilarious. He would hold a note out until he'd crack up laughing and then do it again. After a couple minutes of this, I had tears rolling down my face from laughing so hard. I stopped, thinking we'd had all the fun we were going to have with that little trick. Well, he quickly grabbed my hand and started patting it on his mouth for me to do it again. It was the most PRECIOUS thing ever! I told Aaron about it last night, so he tried it with him this morning. He did it all again, just as I had told him! Aaron thought it was the funniest thing he'd ever seen.

Some of you can expect to be getting your own copy of one of these pictures in the mail soon! Here are the pictures we took in an attempt to get one good one for our Christmas card. It was more difficult than it looks, I can assure you. Thank you, Sarah Hobbs, for taking these pictures at the church for us with such short notice. Thank you, Brittany Molder, for saying "Poop" a hundred times to make Korben smile.


This is not the picture we chose for our Christmas card, but I adore the expression on Korben's face. We rarely get a picture of him without his mouth wide open and smiling, so this was a different look for him.
























We really like this picture, even though it is not the one we chose for the Christmas card. It is probably the best picture we got of Korben that day.


























Here's a funny one for you, Julie. He would fit in the Rodgers' family portrait perfectly.

























"Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night."

























After the votes were counted, this is the picture we chose for the Christmas card.



























Tonight at church, we (the youth group) had a tacky Christmas sweater party. I apologize for the quality of these pictures below, but you get the drift. We were tacky. It was so much fun. I love love love to dress up in crazy ways. My favorite days in school were always "mix and match" days. I was trying on my outfit this morning and Aaron suggested that I wear white pants because that would make my vest stand out more (he actually said that it would make it "pop"...wow) He is such a mess. The pants were way too big, so I kinda looked like MC Hammer. I have on two jingle bell earrings that were ornaments as of 8:30 this morning. They are snowmen that say "Kristen" and "Aaron." I thought Korben was going to pull them right out of my ears he was so excited about them. Aaron was showing me what he was going to wear to the party this morning, and he lovingly looked at the shirt and said, "Somebody put a lot of work into this." We wore our tacky sweaters with pride. We know that they were once AWESOME!



























Poor Korben. He doesn't stand a chance with us.

























Christmas is in a week, y'all! Get excited.

All he wants for Christmas are his two front teeth.

We spent the weekend at my mom's house because we had our annual Cunningham Christmas party on Saturday. It was great to visit with all of the family members we love so much, but rarely get to see. We were so proud to show off our baby. The party started RIGHT at his nap time, but he never fussed. He was such a good boy.

One of the best parts of my weekend was going on a date with my husband. We saw a couple movies and ate some great sushi all in one evening. Thanks so much, Mom, for taking care of Korben so we could have our first date in months!

Here is the long awaited picture of Korben's two bottom teeth (In case you didn't know, you can click the picture to enlarge). Aren't they precious? These first appeared to be breaking through his gums on November 9th, and as you can see, they are still tiny. I had no idea they would take this long to fully come up. His top teeth have to be coming in soon! He is always rubbing his top gum with his thumb. "All he wants for Christmas are his two front teeth..."

























Got a cute story for you. This morning I was dressing Korben for church. I pulled a sweater over his head, and as soon as his head popped out he looked at me with the biggest smile and said "Hey!" It made my day!!

9 month check-up

I just got home from taking Korben to his 9 month check up. Everything was great. He weighs 22 pounds and he is 30 inches. I found out he weighs more than 75% of 9 month olds, and he is taller than 95% of 9 month olds.

Dr. Beene was not concerned with the fact that he wasn't crawling, but she was surprised. We put his blanket on the floor so she could watch him move. She watched the way he goes from the sitting up position to all-fours. She watched him rock back and forth on his kness. She watched him try to pull up on the table. She watched him standing holding onto a chair. She, like me, knows that he is "on the verge" and knows he is going to be running circles around us in no time.

He babbled the whole time we were there, like he was trying to tell her what has been going on in his life. She said she was "very impressed with his verbal skills." HaHa. I like the way that is worded. In school I was called an "excessive talker." I think I would have preferred my teachers to say "Kristen Cunningham has some impressive verbal skills." Sounds so much better.

He had his second flu shot today. No tears. Praise the Lord. He had no vaccinations at this appointment, which was nice, but I hear he has to get 4 shots at his 12 month appointment. The nurse said that the 12 month shots sting more than the others, and she will probably have to ask my permission to give him a sucker. No problemo!

So, thats my report on our healthy 9 month old little boy. Now I'm going to get caught up on some ironing while Korben is still napping. Fun times.

A day in the life of our 9 month old (almost)

Tomorrow we are going to see Dr. Beene for Korben's 9 month check up. It will just so happen to be Korben's actual 9 month birthday as well! My baby is growing up so fast, and its hard to fathom how soon he will turn one year old.

I recognize that it is not normally a good thing to have to take your baby to the doctor, but I've always liked taking him for check ups. They are fun because he well, happy, and showing off for everyone who works at the clinic. Dr. Beene and I just sit and visit about all of the things Korben is doing. I've been thinking the past couple days about what she would probably want to know, which got me in the mood to update my blog. This may seem like a boring blog entry (Sorry, I don't have any photos or videos to post), but I'm sure that one day I will want to look back and know exactly what my 9 month old was doing (or not doing).

Saying: DaDa, Daddy, Hi, Hey, Hi/Hey DaDa, MaMa (rarely, and accidentally)

Drinking: Four 8 oz. bottles of soy formula a day. One when he wakes up, one 3 hours later, one 3 hours after that, and one before he goes to bed. I know that he will be transitioning off of the bottle in about 3 months, so I am working on introducing the sippy cup. Its a slow progress. He doesn't even hold his own bottle yet, so this sippy cup is not appealing to him at all. He actually does really well when I let him sip out of a real cup. Maybe we can skip the sippy cup all together( and make an even bigger mess wherever we go)? Who knows?

Eating: Right now he is eating a bowl of oatmeal for breakfast, with a baby jar of some sort of fruit. He also eats cheerios, which he can feed himself. At lunch he eats a jar of vegetables and feeds himself torn up pieces of toast. At dinner he eats another jar of vegetables and/or fruit and something he can feed himself (cheerios, toast, or small pieces of pasta.) He is doing so much better at eating things without gagging. For a while, every time I put anything in his mouth he would choke. He has had a lot of practice with his cheerios, and now successfully gets almost every one of them in his mouth, and never chokes (lets keep it that way, Korben! Momma's heart stops everytime you choke/gag/cough profusely/etc.).

Doing: He sits up and plays with his toys for a long, long time. He loves to have a big basket of toys in front of him and unload each toy, one by one. He will thoroughly examine each toy until he is tired of it, put it down, and get the next toy from the basket. He will do this until the basket is empty. Then he usually tries to "pull up" on the empty basket which never works out for him. From the sitting position he will lunge forward on his hands and knees to get something. He will appear to be in crawling position, but once he gets what he wants, he goes back to the sitting on his knees. His crawling is slowly progressing, but these lunges I speak of seem to be happening more often. He is becoming a lot more daring and ambitious. If he is sitting on my lap on the couch, he will throw his body to the other end of the couch to reach something off of the side table. It doesn't matter what it is, he just wants it. He loves for me to hold his arms while he jumps on the bed. He loves to hear someone whistle. If he is sitting near anything he can pull up on, he will pull up into the standing position. However, he has yet to be able to sit up from the laying position, so he is still not pulling up or standing in his crib. I expect it every time I go in his room, though.

Sleeping: God has blessed us with the best sleeping baby ever. He goes to bed around 5-5:30 every night, and wakes up between 7 and 7:30 every morning. He usually takes 3, one hour naps a day, but recently he has had some days where he takes 2, one and a half hour naps. I think this is the sleep pattern where we are heading. The only sleeping issue we are having lately is that he will sometimes wake up in the middle of the night screaming because he has flipped over to his belly and he can't figure out how to roll back over. I know he does know how to roll over, I see him do it all the time. I guess he's just not thinking so clearly in the middle night...I can understand that. As soon as I roll him over, he is off to sleep again. I don't run in there instantly because I want to see if he will do it himself. I sure don't want him to think that he has a new trick for me to come into his room whenever he wants me. We told someone about this happening and he said "Its like he wakes up in the middle of the night thinking the mattress is attacking him." Well said.

Developing: He has two bottom teeth, but they are still tiny. He has been rubbing his thumb on his top gum for the past week, especially on the sides (where the canine/vampire teeth would come in) so I'm wondering if those will be his next teeth.
His hair is really growing and somewhat wavy. It has now finally grown back to be longer than it was when he was born. We can't go anywhere without compliments on his hair!
He is in size 5 shoes, size 4 diapers, and wearing 18-24 month clothes.
He went though a stage when he was 3-4 months old when he sucked his thumb whenever he was sleepy. I would always try to put him to sleep with a pacifier to encourage him not to suck his thumb. I thought he had kicked this habit, but I have started noticing the past couple of weeks that he sucks his thumb when he is sleepy, or seems to be having teething pain. I went in his room to check on him while he was napping today and he was asleep with his thumb in his mouth. I put him to bed with a pacifier, but he must have lost it and found his thumb quickly. He may have never stopped doing this. I guess he has plenty of time during his 14 hour nights of sleep to nurture a habit without me knowing. Hey, maybe that's why he sleeps so well?

Can I just say that this is my favorite stage yet??? I guess they have all been my favorite in their own way, but MAN he is fun right now! Aaron and I just can't get enough of him. I can tell that it is harder for Aaron to leave in the mornings (he probably kisses him goodbye 200 times), and he is always so thrilled to get home and see him. I guess the new "Hey DaDa" thing doesn't hurt either.

I will post tomorrow about how the 9 month check up went!

Thanksgiving

Friday the 21st of November, Korben and I headed to my mom's house. It had been almost 6 weeks since we had seen each other, and I was very homesick! On Saturday, Kim came in from Tennessee and stayed through Monday. We had such a wonderful time together. We spent time visiting with my grandmother, having many messy meals (Korben tried Biter Biscuits for the first time), watching old home videos, going to church, and visiting with family. It went so fast! Korben loved his Aunt Kimmie. It had been 3 months since they had seen each other! Korben was in love with Kim's dog, Melody. Three times in a row, when Melody walked in to the room, Korben said "HI" to her. I wouldn't have believed my ears, but mom and Kim heard it too. Of course, he hasn't said it since! We also appreciated Melody being a vacuum cleaner for all the cheerios Korben dropped. We sure did miss her after she left. "DaDa" was the phrase of the weekend. He said it over and over. We had just heard him say it for the first time from his crib on Tuesday (the 18th) morning. On Sunday night he realized he could blow raspberries on the leather couch. He would bend down and make the "noise" that it makes when you blow on the couch, and lean his head up and say "DaDa." This went on for several minutes. It was hilarious. His daddy came in late Tuesday night after finishing up the Thanksgiving Blessings service at our church. I don't think Korben said "DaDa" once on Wednesday...Aaron said it was because he didn't have to, his "DaDa" was with him and he didn't have to call for him! Good point.



First Biter Biscuit. He loved it, of course.




















Me, Korben, and Mema.


























Korben and Melody smooching.




















Mom, Korben and me before church.


























Kim, Korben and me before church.




















Korben loving on his big cousin, Carson.




















Kim was about to go home. Sad.




















Korben was giving her a goodbye hug.




















Getting acquainted with Santa.




















He wasn't scared at all. He was very amused with the "tricks up his sleeve." So amused that it was hard to get him to look up and pose. We have some professional pictures that I will post later.




















We saw this cute rocking horse in Dillards. You can see from my expression that I couldn't wait to get Korben on a horse.
























We drove to Heber Springs on Thursday morning to have Thanksgiving with Aaron's parents and Dustin. My mom followed us there in a separate car. I started out riding with her, but after being on the road about 15 minutes, Aaron asked me to get in his car in the back seat with Korben and block the sun out of his eyes. The sun was incredibly bright that day, and since Korben's car seat is still in the reversed position there was no way for him to escape it. So, I held up a box for 45 minutes. Aaron turned around and took this picture saying, "we're making memories!"


























We had the most incredible meal! No weight watcher points were counted that day, or the day after, or the day after that! Julie surprised us with an appetizer of "Pumpkin Soup." We will be eating that in Heaven, I'm sure, and it will be calorie free! Until then, pumpkin soup will have to be eaten in small, small portions! We had such a great time with Don, Julie, and Dustin. Not just eating (even though that's always a big part of our fun), but we also watched movies, played games, and did lots of playing with Korben. I guess we were having too much fun to take pictures. The only ones taken are on Don's camera, and I will post them as soon as I get them. I'm so glad Christmas is just a few weeks away because I'm ready to do it all over again.
Korben really wasn't himself most of the time we were home. He had rosy cheeks on most mornings, with a low-grade fever. I blamed that, and his fussiness on teething because he is still working on getting those two bottom teeth to come in. On Saturday he ended up with a rash all over his legs. It turned out to be Fifths disease that caused the fever, upper respiratory infection, and the rash. Poor baby. He has either been dealing with the complications of teething, or getting over some sort of sickness for a solid month now. I think he is much better today, although, he is still acting like his teeth are really hurting. They are so cute though. The two little white spots on his gums already change his appearance. I can't wait to get a good picture of two little teeth so I can post it on the blog.

People were so kind to think of us on Thanksgiving, being the first major holiday without Dad. I appreciate all the messages I received with those of you saying you were praying for me. I heard the phone ring all morning on Thanksgiving, with people calling my mom. It means so much to know that people care about us. Speaking for me, Thanksgiving didn't feel much more difficult than any regular day. The past two Thanksgivings have been terrible. Dad was sick and miserable on both, and the whole time we were thinking "Is this the last?" Someone sent me a message saying "I know its hard to be thankful this year." Well, as much as I missed Dad this Thanksgiving, I was truly thankful to know that he is no longer suffering. I know for a 100% fact that my dad is with the Lord. I know he is experiencing things that our brains aren't meant to understand this side of Heaven. I know he is waiting on us to join him. I am thankful for Jesus who gives us the choice of eternal life. I am thankful that my dad knew He was the only way. I can't imagine living this life, thinking it ended at death. God has a big picture that we can not see yet. Some would say, how tragic for a baby to be born just moments before his Grandfather went to Heaven. I say, what better blessing could God have given to help us cope? Holding Korben at that time made me feel closer to God than ever. There were many times I just held him and cried over losing my dad. In a strange way, just by cuddling my newborn baby, I always felt like God was cuddling me. God's way is perfect, even if we don't understand it...and for that I am thankful.

I could write for hours about all of the things we are thankful for everyday. I am so grateful for my husband. Marriage just keeps getting better. I love how we continue to grow closer to the Lord and closer to each other. Aaron wakes up, thrilled to go to work. He loves his job and everyone he works for and with. I wake up, thrilled to be a stay at home mom. I wish everyone could see all of the precious, new things Korben does everyday. I am just so in love with him, and I am so blessed to get to absorb everything he does everyday. We love our families so much. They sometime seem so far away, but it could be a LOT worse. A couple hours away is not much at all, and we are grateful for that. We are grateful for the health of our families. We know that anything can change in a second, and we don't want to take a single healthy day for granted.

I can't write this without asking for prayer. A couple in our church, Emily and Phillip Marsh have a 7 month old son named Collin who is in the nursery with Korben. Collin was just diagnosed with AML Leukemia, and he has just started chemotherapy at Children's hospital. I can't even think about this situation without crying. I can't imagine how terrified they are right now. Please pray with us for HEALING of sweet Collin Marsh. This is just one situation of how our lives can change in the matter of a second.

Thank you for reading this. I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. "Count your blessings, name them one by one..."

Crawling...backwards?

Up until the past couple days Korben has shown no interest in crawling. He has interest in so many things, but crawling has just not been one of those. We were so excited on Sunday when we noticed him getting his bottom off the ground for the first time. We thought, "hey, thats progress." Now all of a sudden, he seems really determined to go somewhere, but can't seem to get anywhere but backwards. You will see in the video that he doesn't cover a lot of ground, but this is still a big milestone for him!

In this video you will also get to hear just a LITTLE bit of the babbling he has been doing lately. I've been telling Aaron that since Monday he has these little jabbering sessions that are just hilarious. Well, he did not know what I meant by that until last night when he was giving Korben a bath. All of a sudden, Aaron yells from the bathroom "Do you hear him talking???" I was like, YES...thats what I've been telling you! Its so cute. I was JUST playing this video off of YouTube and Korben looked up from playing with his toys and started responding to the "Korben language" he heard from the videos. HE knows what he is saying.

He gets unhappy at the end of this crawling session. Sorry to be cruel and post that for the world to see, but I couldn't figure out how to edit this. Again, I'm learning as I go with this stuff!

"Life with the Rodgers" IT IS!

I want to thank Elizabeth Hammon for the awesome advice. She helped me fix all the issues I mentioned in my last post in about 10 seconds. Now I just need to notify everyone that the name has changed, and we're in business!

Calling all blog experts:

I have started to feel bad about naming this blog "korbenrodgers.blogspot.com." Lord willing, we would like to have future children, and I regret naming this blog just after Korben. I did it impulsively, not thinking this would be something I would keep up with over the years. I hope no one is getting any ideas...We're not planning on having another child for a long time. I just want my blog to be in order when we do. I just checked and "TheRodgersFamily" is taken, however, I just created the blog, "LifewiththeRodgers.blogspot.com."

I know I have a lot of blog experts that read my blog, so if there is any advice you have, please comment on this. Here is my dilemma. I'm ready to switch to my new blog at any time, but is there any way I can take my posts from my old blog to my new blog so they can all be on the same site? I have used my blog as a baby book for the past two months and I would hate for those entries to be on an abandoned site all alone.

Also, has anyone ever printed out their blog entries? I have a paranoia with technology that one day blogspot will disappear and I will lose all of my entries?

Any Advice?

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

As I promised, here are some pictures (and videos!) of our Christmas decorations! Please know that we have a lot more we want to do such as...get a real tree skirt, tastefully hide cords, and hang stockings...but this is a SNEAK peek! Korben was just looking too irresistibly cute this morning in his Christmas pajamas to wait any longer to take pictures of him with the decorations. So, here they are!

Where's Waldo?





















































Mistletoe. Korben's new favorite toy in the house. He has to ring the bell every time we walk by.





























Videos:




Korben's new squinting trick. I like to think that he is winking at me with both eyes.

Girl Weekend/ Boy Weekend

I had the opportunity this past weekend to attend my first "Women of Faith" conference with about thirty ladies from our church. First of all, I just want to give a shout out to my amazing husband for making this trip possible. Aaron did not bat an eye at staying home with Korben for two days. He fully embraced my instruction sheets, and was very enthusiastic about their "man time" together. I am well aware that most husbands would not be willing to do this with an eight month old, and I am blessed beyond measure. Every time I would call and check in, he would say don't worry about us, we're great, enjoy your time away, and you deserve it! How sweet is he? He seemed as excited for me to get away as I was, and he never made me feel guilty. I know Korben will greatly benefit from being raised by a man like this.

When I walked in the door Saturday night I heard Christmas music playing...then I noticed mistletoe hanging in the doorway...THEN I noticed lights and garland on the mantle! It was so pretty I almost cried! Aaron said that he and Korben saw a commercial that Lowe's was having a Christmas sale so they wanted to surprise me! Well, this fully got me in the Christmas spirit, so we picked out our first Christmas tree after church on Sunday. It is the biggest thing I have ever seen. I knew we had twelve foot ceilings, so a nine foot tree seemed appropriate. I had NO IDEA a nine foot tree would be so big. It pretty much lights up the whole house. We re-arranged the furniture in the living room to fully accommodate the tree. We are crazy about Christmas, so we don't mind the fact that it is over the top.

So, back to the Women of Faith conference. The speakers and music were fantastic. The laughter and worship did good for my soul. However, my favorite part of the weekend was just the fellowship with other ladies. There were people on the trip I had never met that I had the opportunity to get to know, as well as people that I already knew I loved that I was able to get to know better. I love being around people that model "what I want to be". You can only hope when you are around people like that, they will rub off on you. I hope some of these ladies rubbed off on me somehow.

A mother of a student in our youth group was on the trip. She and I had actually never met. We started talking and she said, "I've been wanting to tell you that I've been praying for you ever since Jeff announced you and Aaron were coming to our church." I expressed my gratitude. She said, "I want you to understand, it was God who kept laying you on my heart." "So I don't tell you that I was praying for you for you to think I'm a really neat person, I'm telling you this so you know how much God loves you." That taught me so much. So often we think when someone pops in our head to pray for that it is OUR idea, and we tell people "I've been praying for you" hoping that will make them feel special that we thought of them. But it is GOD who lays people on our hearts. It definitely makes me feel loved that God would lay me on the heart of so many people just to tell me that he loves me through others.

I will post pictures of our Christmas decorations and Korben soon. The latest Korben news is that he has two bottom teeth! They have broken through the gums, but they are not yet big enough to see when he smiles. I promise I will post a picture as soon as they are.

Baby's first Branson trip!

Thursday afternoon we loaded up the car and headed to Branson for a three day trip. The first night was a little bit rough for all of us. We allowed Korben to go to sleep with no noise in the room which punished us for the rest of the night. For every time we rolled over and the sheets made a noise, Korben would startle and wake up...meaning, we all woke up A LOT. I had even put blankets around the porta-crib so he couldn't look at us. Well, to my surprise, there was one time in the middle of the night when I happened to wake up and I looked over at his crib to see that he had not only moved the barrier blanket, but he was wide-awake, STARING at me. As soon as I made eye contact with him, he gave me the biggest grin ever. I had to laugh out loud. It was really sweet...although, a tad bit creepy. :-) We learned our lesson. On nights two and three, Korben had a loud TV on when he went to sleep and we all slept soundly!

Big news: Korben said "MaMa" for the first time on Friday morning. I have only ever heard him say sounds that start with "B." Like, "Buh' and "Boo." Well, Thursday night, I told Aaron, I think I am hearing an "M" sound...like, "Ma." On Friday morning I was feeding him fruit in the high chair and at least three times he said "MaMa." The first time I thought I was just hearing things, the second time Aaron said "HE JUST SAID MAMA", and I know he did it one more time for good measure. Ha. We haven't heard it since, but stay tuned for an update on Korben's verbiage. Another thing to report...I think I see a glimmer of something white on Korben's lower gum. I may just be imagining things, but sooner or later he will surely get a tooth!

After a fun day of shopping at the Tanger outlets, we met up with Don, Julie, and Dustin for a late dinner at Waxy O' Shea's Irish Pub at the Branson Landing. Fantastic food! Korben slept through the entire meal, and live band, which I have to admit, was a nice little break for mom and dad.

On Saturday, if you had told me it was -30 degrees, I would have believed you. It was absolutely FREEZING. This was the day we had planned to go to Silver Dollar City. We were doing some shopping that morning (assuming we were going to go to silver dollar city in the afternoon) and I opted to buy Korben something even warmer to wear to brave the cold. Check out his pictures in his one-piece, fleece outfit. He even wore his big poofy coat on top of that, so the poor little eskimo didn't have a chance at moving his arms. He looked so helpless in the stroller...but at least he was as warm as we possibly could have gotten him!

So, we headed off to Silver Dollar City, and we were motioned by the parking attendants at the park to keep driving. We pass all over silver dollar city's overflow parking lots, and drive almost five miles until we find a parking lot that isn't packed. We are already thinking at this point that it wouldn't be fun to be at the park if it was that crowded anyway. Well, then we stepped out of the car, and our choice was solidified. It was EVEN colder. Nothing about being in an overly populated theme park or freezing to death (all of this- with a baby) sounded fun to ANYONE, so we loaded back up in the car.

It was totally meant to be because we ended up having a fantastic time at the Branson Landing, and we ate at the most fantastic restarant, "Cantina Laredo." It was gourmet Mexican food, and absolutely amazing!

Saturday night, Julie was kind enough to stay in the hotel with Korben while Don, Dustin, Aaron, and I drove through the light display at Shepherd of the Hills. We pretty much laughed for two hours straight. I could never explain all the crazy jokes that went on in that car, but at the time, everything was funny. For many reasons, we are now in the Christmas spirit!

We had our last wonderful meal on Sunday at lunch at the Outback (not the chain restaurant- this one is even better). Korben attacked an alligator for our protection. He used the "kill with kindness" approach. See pictures below.

To say the least, we made lots of great memories, and had a wonderful"first mini-vacation" with our son!




Our great little traveler. This is my view of him when I would peak behind the seat:
































Our little "blue bear" in his warm new outfit:


































Action shot:























Family pictures at the Landing. The Christmas decorations were beautiful!















































Our little one, taking one for the team, and protecting us from the gator:





























I'm sorry to say that these are the ONLY pictures we took! My camera never left my purse, but thanks to Aaron and his iPhone we got these great shots.

Oh I wish I were an Oscar Meyer Weiner...

We had the privilege of celebrating Halloween early tonight at our youth costume party at church. It was so much fun!! Aaron and I have been so excited about debuting our little hot dog. We already had the Ketchup and Mustard costumes, and I tried to think of what Korben could be to go with us...so, I started looking up "baby hot dog costume" on the internet back in the summer, and this is what I found...

We're better!

I'm happy to report that we are feeling much better than the last time I posted! I felt 100% better by Monday after several doses of Mucinex. Love that stuff. I'm just now thinking Korben is better. Last night was the first night that I didn't hear him cough all night, and his runny nose seems to be better. I hope his ear infection is better, only time will tell. I've taken a few cute pictures of him the past couple days that I wanted to post. His favorite thing to do right now is stand up while holding on to something. Here are some pictures of him standing up against the back door, staring into the back yard. He was so entertained.




























He was so proud of himself!






















He looks like he is trying to introduce himself to the neighbors in the picture below:






















Cold weather is here, and it was time for Korben to get his first coat. I bought it for him last night, and we tried it on him this morning. We thought he looked so cute in it! (Don't worry, we do put plan to put pants on him when we take him out in the cold!)



























Below is a picture I took accidentally. I actually ended up liking the picture because it shows just how beautiful his blue eyes are.

Buried in Kleenexes.

Korben and I are sick. It started with Korben on Wednesday with a runny nose. I didn't think much of it until the nasty cough started on Thursday. By Friday there was a fever, and he started doing something funny with his eyes (like squinting and rolling them). We went to the doctor on Friday and as it turns out he has his first ear infection. She thinks the cold symptoms are just viral, but she put him on an antibiotic for the ear infection. She said if his other symptoms were bacterial the antibiotic would clear it up. So, that makes me feel better. He doesn't seem much better yet. His nose is still running, and he is coughing a lot. We hear him all night in his sleep just coughing away. I had already ruled out going to church today because he is not fit to take to the nursery, and then I woke up sick. It is very common for me to get sick in the fall and spring because of my allergies, but I normally do not have sinus pressure like this. I feel like I was punched in the face. My nose, eye sockets, and cheek bones feel bruised. Its very strange. I wish we were at church today. We already missed Wednesday night because my car wouldn't start. I really hate missing church. I'll be honest, there was a time in my life when I actually liked a sick day home from church. I know that's terrible, but it is true. I am the complete opposite now. I look forward to Wednesdays and Sundays and I hate to miss. I'm so thankful our pastor's sermons are on the internet, because I hate missing what he is going to say. Lord willing, Korben will be better by Wednesday and we will be able to go to church then. Wednesday night we are having our youth costume party. The Rodgers' family's costumes are ready to go. Korben just tried his on yesterday and he looked so cute. Stay tuned...I will post pictures this week. Hopefully by then we will not be buried in Kleenexes.

Pictures: some old...some new.

The first five pictures were taken on 9/7/08 when mom came to Fort Smith for the weekend so I could go to a youth lock-in. The rest were taken on 10/10/08 (Korben's 7 month birthday), while I was staying at her house. He got to meet his 18 month old cousin, Bailey for the first time. As you will see, they loved each other. I also included pictures of Korben's favorite toy in the world. He loves the musical instruments...he beats them to death every morning! And the last couple pictures are from Arkadelphia's homecoming game. Notice that Korben is wearing his very first OBU hoodie.