Playground fun...

One of the things that I do actually really like about Louisiana is the weather (for the most part). Here are a few pictures from early November. Yes, it was warm enough to wear shorts...and a muscle shirt.

Happy Halloween!

I'll admit that were very lazy when it came to Hank's costume this past Halloween. We bought Batman and skeleton pajamas from Old Navy. We considered it a smart purchase since they could be used both as costumes and as pajamas for the rest of the winter. We didn't take Hank trick-or-treating, but we did participate in some of the Halloween activities around post.

At the Halloween party at Daddy's work

That looks like one grumpy Batman

At the post housing "pumpkin patch"

He finally decided that the 10th pumpkin that he picked up was the winner :)

On Halloween, we sent him to daycare/school in his skeleton outfit. I planned on taking a picture of him when I picked him up, but the costume didn't make it that long due to a diaper malfunction.

Yay!!! We can now move on to November!

Race for the Cure

After running consistently for 3-5 days per week for the last 9 months, I finally signed up for a 5K at the end of October. Bill agreed to run it also, and I had planned on pushing Hank in the jogging stroller.  I think Bill took pitty on me since I was 12 weeks pregnant and decided that he would push Hank. I love running with Hank, but the hills definitely get tougher as he grows bigger and there were several decent hills in this 5K. I'm proud to say that I finished in 25 minutes flat. Bill and Hank waited for me at the halfway point so we could finish together, and all the bystanders cheered for Hank for being the 1st-place baby.

Exhausted after the race...

It's hard work being the 1st place baby

Hanging out in Alexandria after the race

Mini-vacay...without the kid!!!

In early October, Bill and I took a mini-vacation to the J.W. Mariott resort hotel in San Antonio, Texas. My mom came down and stayed with Hank. I guess you could kind of call it a little honeymoon since we didn't actually go on a honeymoon after we got married. I forgot to take pictures so here are the total of 5 pictures that I have on my phone from our 3 days in  San Antonio.

Salsa, guacamole, and pita chips - eating, eating, and more eating was one of the big themes of this trip

More food

Napping by the pool

At the Alamo

One of the several beers that Bill got to enjoy on our trip. I was probably about 10 weeks pregnant at the time so I had to stick to the virgin pina coladas.

Haircut #3

The first haircut was a breeze. Of course I was naive and thought that we were golden for all the haircuts to follow. I was so wrong. The second haircut was a nightmare. From the moment that the cover-up was around his neck, Hank was hysterical. Needless to say, his haircut looked terrible, and I was sure that this experience was so traumatizing that I would never get him to sit for a haircut for at least the next 5 years. Here's the one picture I have of that haircut:

That haircut quickly grew out, and it was time for haircut #3. I did my research this time and found a place that had a car barber chair. I came prepared with plenty of snacks to include grapes, raisins, and goldfish and Hank's favorite stuffed puppy dog. We opted to simply change his clothes after the haircut instead of using the cover-up. He may have swallowed a few hairs while snacking and his puppy dog ended up covered in hair, but it was well worth it. This haircut turned out much better.

Before

During - hugging his puppy and stuffing raisins in his mouth

After

Christmas Card Pictures

I was on top of it last fall and wasted no time getting our Christmas card pictures done. I set up a time with Herald Photography, and we met on a Sunday afternoon in late October at a little park here on Fort Polk. It took Hank a little time to warm-up to everything (probably because I should have woken him up from his nap a little earlier), but she managed to get some great pictures (with the help of a lot of goldfish crackers). Here are a few of my favorites:

Ok...maybe more than a few....

Oh...and...surprise!!!

Updates coming soon!!!

Catching up...Let's go back to October...

October! Yikes!! I'm way behind. In my defense, my blogging computer, our iMac, has been under construction for about 3 months now. Don't bring this up to my husband. It's a very sore subject. He continues to say this was one of our worst purchases and that he still can't believe that I was able to talk him into buying a Mac! Anyway, the sound stopped working a while back but we just dealt with it. Since we were nearing the end of the warranty, we planned a trip to Houston, Texas (3 hours away) to take it in to the closest Apple store. This was back in early November. The Apple "genius" on the phone failed to mention that there was an authorized Apple repair location only 1.5 hours away, but whatever, I enjoy visiting Houston (I'm sure the good shopping and good food has absolutely nothing to do with that!). We actually had to leave the computer in Houston, and fortunately one of Bill's soldiers who is from that area was able to pick it up for us over Thanksgiving. They replaced the logic board, but they must have replaced it with a damaged one because our computer still didn't work when we got home. The sound worked, but every time we opened a program, the computer went into failover mode and shut down. In December we took it to the closer repair shop, and one month later we finally have a working computer. Yay!! (because I really do love this computer, despite my husband's complaining)

So anyway, back in October we took Hank to a local pumpkin patch. I think his favorite part was throwing the pumpkins (while calling them "balls").

Not so sure about the cornfield maze...

Rearranging all the pumpkins..and throwing a few..or a lot...

Stay tuned...I will try to catch up!