He's a Food Lover!

It's all gone??!!

So I gave Stratton his first new food besides the rice ceral. He enjoyed a delicious dish of mashed yam. Even without the butter, brown sugar, and marshmallows He loved it. As you can see. The next day when I sat him down to give him cereal, he was really excited and kicking and smiling. Then when the cereal got to his mouth, and he realized it was not the orange goodness he spit it out and gave me this look of horrible disappointment.

Stratton's Classified Ad

SWM enjoys pooping pants and drooling. Likes things that are shiny and or jingle. Seeks SWF to spend nights full of crying, teething, and diaper changes with. Must be able to produce milk on demand. Peek-A-Boo skills are a plus. No smokers, please.

I think this is one of my favorite happy pics of Stratton. He's such a cutie. Perhaps this picture will make someone want to alternate nights with me...

NEW FAVE TOY AND SNACK

strat has become very fond of fringey things. he loves this throw. so for sit-up exercise i prop him up on the couch with a couple of pillows and some fabulous fringe for entertainment. i guess i didn't realize that he was hungry, but a couple of minutes later Strat was nursing on the tips of these two pillows...
THIS ONE IS DELICIOUS!
THIS ONE'S PRETTY GOOD TOO!

first food not made by mom (unless you count the pillows)

The rice cereal went really well. Strat likes it and in between bites, he tries to sit up and lean toward the goodness. Now we just put him in his seat to feed him, but Matt wanted to hold him for moral support. Sorry I didn't flip the last picture, I got in a hurry. At least this way you can give your neck a good stretch.

Strat's Favorite Thing

Ever since he was born, Stratton has really enjoyed having his hair washed. It has become an after bath ritual (so that he doesn't freeze) and he plays in the water and relaxes while I massage his scalp. And then we shave his face...kidding, we don't usually leave razors within reach...

Evil Eyes

I think that if you click on this picture and enlarge it, you get the full effect. For some reason, Stratton's eyes are particularly vulnerable for the photo favorite "red eye" Even with a red-eye-prevention-button, he can manage to look like he's burning holes through people. Like he's doing to Samuel in this pic. I think that Strat's jealous because he can't roll over yet...Or he really, really hates birthdays...

Party Pooper

This was my Dad's 50th birthday party back in October. Strat and I went up to Idaho to surprise him, and it was great! Except that Stratton apparently hates birthdays.

Scubba Stratton

We took Stratton out to the pool for his first time, although I think Amy took him swimming before and didn't have the heart to tell me. As we were getting him ready I found a camo baby bikini that was slightly wet from the pool and freaked out because Amy is always saying how she wants to put bows in his hair and play dress up. I was very relieved to find out it was his cousin's, Addie. Excuse the photo it was taken from Amy's cell phone.

Rubbin' Shoulders with Mike Holmgren

We have a motion activated buzzer at the front of the Gallery so dad and I know when someone has come in so we can greet them. I was painting and noticed a large man standing behind me and acting little suprised because the buzzer hadn't alerted me, I exclaimed "oh, Hi!" not recognizing that it was the head coach of the Seahawks. Mike (we are totally on a first name basis now) starts talking to me like we know each other, and it wasn't until much later in the conversation that I asked what he did for a living. Then he realized that I hadn't known who he was this whole time after all but he just laughed it off. I was able to get his photo but I wasn't able to sell him any art.

Happy Halloween!

Grandpa Sievers trying to put my little pumpkin in the patch
Aunt Liz carving pumpkins with Stratton. We don't often let him play with knives...

Cousin Samuel and Stratton ready for Halloween

Samuel, Stratton, Jaxon

All together at last! Emily's baby Samuel, Stratton, and Melissa's little Jaxon.

A Real Artist!

Today was a great day! Matt sold his first painting. And by "painting" I mean "PAINTINGS" as in plural. Skip and Cory Tribble bought a beautiful sunflower painting and we were super excited. And about a half hour later a local couple came in and bought 3 of Matt's smaller flower paintings. We may not starve after all...

I like to call this "Diaper Bonnet" Matt hates it...

Addie and Stratton

We went to Carter's cabin last weekend with Aubrey and Colman. It was beautiful! Maybe this state isn't as forsaken as I thought...We played games and I made the most amazing banana boat. It was a great mini vacation. Oh yeah, and Col found a monster tarantula, is there no where safe?!

I love to take pictures of the really gross stuff. I think I may have a pic of black/green newborn poo somewhere...anyways, here's some boogers 'n spit.

A good one

A woman gets on a bus with her baby. The bus driver says: “That's the ugliest baby that I've ever seen. Ugh!” The woman goes to the rear of the bus and sits down, fuming. She says to a man next to her: “The driver just insulted me!”
The man says: “You go right up there and tell him off – go ahead, I'll hold your monkey for you.”
I like this cuz our babies will all be pretty hairy...

Non-Labor Days

Over Labor Day weekend, we were able to go camping for a few days with the Barnes fam (and us girls who used to be Barnes)...anyways it was a great canteen filler before heading to Arizona. Nate took us to this great spot in Island Park right on the Buffalo River. It is only accessible by off-road vehicles and crazy men in trucks, so it was our own quiet little heaven (except when the boys were shooting guns...). We had fabulous days of laziness, games, exploring on the mule, great food, and freezing cold baths in the river. Dad even brought a port-a-potty so that 9month pregnant Mel would not have to squat. What a great Dad!
One evening, Matt and Nate decided to drive the mule through the river. They didn't make it very far, but they had fun getting out!

Jaxon comes in last place, but he's still a winner in someone's book!

Yippee!! He's finally here! On Wednesday, The last of this crop of babies was born, bringing to an end a very successful harvest year. Surprisingly the shortest and not surprisingly the skinniest, Jaxon is quite the cutie. I can't wait to get HOME and see him!

The Big Move

Ok, so here we are...Arizona. I think Stratton hates it... When we left Idaho three days ago it was snowing. It is 90 dergees here and the pool is under construction. Not that I'm in any condition to be in a swimming suit. The gallery is beautiful, and we are really excited about it. Excited and prayerful.

In the blue corner, weighing in at 8 pounds 0 ouces-22 inches long with a reach advantage of not quite over his own head, fighting out of Indianapolis Indiana with a perfect record of 1 win and o losses, we bring to you the Dean of Mean, the Unibrow KungPow Killa, Stratton Matthew Siiiiiievers!

This is probably my favorite candid within a posed photo ever. We both look tired and kind of freaky... Amy and I were in the gardens of Versailles and wanted a photo with all this beautiful green back ground, not thinking much of the broken down umbrella stuck in the mud behind us. When we picked our camera back up an old skinny women came out of the woods pulling up her pants and snatching the umbrella. As you can see our background ended up the old woman caught in the middle of a squat.

We were able to see a lot of beautiful art and architecture. When we were feeling rich we would even pay for a audio tour, the problem was that we both have such a different taste for art and there is always so much to see that sharing our one headset was always difficult, so we documented this special occasion where we payed for two!

While we were in Venice they blew these loud air raid sirens that woke us up to warn the shop keepers that the tide was high and covering the streets. But we had no idea what they were until we were knee deep in see water outside of St. Marc's Cathedral. So they shuffled everyone along narrow planks to anywhere you wanted to go but the mixed cultures had different opinions on walking on the left or right side. But by the evening it was dry and by the next day it was perfect for kickin' pigeons.