Grandpa Jim

James enjoyed hanging out with his name-sake this weekend. It was really nice out on Saturday so we went to the park and spent the rest of the weekend eating lots of food and just hanging out.

200 ounces!

I have had a huge stash of breast milk in the freezer from when I was pumping full time before James was nursing. Since I am home with him, I rarely give him bottles so I was afraid all that hard work was going to go to waste. Luckily, I found a local milk bank that takes donations of previously pumped milk that I am able to donate my milk to. I had to fill out a screening form, get clearance from my midwife and James' pediatrician, and go in for a blood test. After all that was cleared, I am able to give them my milk which I will drop off tomorrow at The Mother's Milk Bank at Presbyterian St Luke's Hospital. The website is www.bestfedbabies.org if you are interested. They take the milk and pasteurize it using a gentle heating process that kills viruses and bacteria but preserves a high percentage of the nutrients and immune properties that make breast milk so great. The milk is used for premature infants and other sick babies in NICU's who can't tolerate formula and can't have their own mother's milk. It is sent to recipients all over the country and as well as used locally. I packaged up 200 ounces of the milk tonight and still left us with enough for 14 bottles for James. I feel very thankful that I was able to successfully pump so much before James was nursing and am even more thankful that James now nurses and does not need me to pump anymore! Yay! I am very glad that I will be able to help other babies with my milk, and Tim is happy because now there is a lot more room in our freezer for frozen pizzas and tater tots.
200 ounces of milk packaged into 4 gallon size freezer bags.

Happy Easter!

We came up to Ft Collins this morning and watched Taylor in her first ever Easter egg hunt. We can't wait until next year when James can participate too!

James and Taylor both got spoiled with Easter gifts, I think James got more presents than he did for Christmas! He got a new Ugly Doll and 3 board books from us, an Easter chick from Grandma and Grandpa Fererro that Taylor quickly grabbed, an elephant and swim trunks from Grandma and Grandpa Nichols, and a whole ton of stuff from Aunt Amberly!

After all the excitment of their Easter baskets, both Taylor and James crashed out for a nap while we all ate lunch.

James Boating

You have seen James at the beach and James in the pool, so here are some pictures of James on the boat. Today we went on the boat to a restaurant in Goodland and had lunch with James' Great Grandpa Joe and Jean. On the way back, we had dolphins playing behind the boat.We get back to Denver late tonight and are going up to Ft Collins tomorrow to spend Easter with Steve, Amberly and Taylor. Then on Monday, Tim goes back to work and James is stuck with boring old me all day long. Poor kid. He had one of his best nights of sleep here and then 3 of his worst, so we are hoping it doesn't take him long to get back to his old routine once we get home. We had a great time in Florida, it was a great first family vacation.

James Swimming

James went for a dip in the pool yesterday and today. He seems to enjoy it, so I think I will sign us up for swim lessons for this summer.

Dave is also trying to get Maggie to swim, altough she is not as willing as James to try it out.

We have been having a great time relaxing and enjoying the nice weather. James loves it because he can get away with wearing no clothes most of the time.

When James can find his thumb, he loves to suck on it now. He won't take a pacifier anymore, so we very well may have a thumb sucker on our hands. Hopefully he will give it up sooner than his Aunt Jenny did.

5 Months Old!

Happy 5 months to James! Here are the top 5 things you should know about James on his 5 month birthday (I saw this on Jodi's blog for Ben and thought it was cute)

1. He does not like to walk down the stairs facing out, he gets scared and holds his breath

2. He poops more than any baby. Ever.

3. He has discovered his voice and likes to squeal like a pterodactyl

4. He has started to grab onto toys and his toes (sometimes)

5. He grew eyebrows this month

Happy St Patrick's Day!

James quickly adjusted to Florida time and slept like a dream last night, so we were all much better rested today. We went to the beach this morning with Katie and James' Gabby (great aunt Betsy) and walked down to yet another beach bar and had some drinks and appetizers. Does this sound familiar?

Marco Island probably has the best sea shells I have ever seen, and today one area of the beach was covered in clams. Everytime a wave washed over them, they would open and close their shells and spit water. It looked like they were singing, it was pretty entertaining. We also saw a ton of huge snails that had lost their shells.

We hung out by the pool this afternoon while James napped. Thank goodness James brought more than one green outfit, because he had a major blowout (reason #347 why I love cloth diapers better than disposables, he has NEVER had a blowout in cloth!) and we had to do an outfit change before heading out to the only Irish bar on Marco.

James partied pretty hard and made his Irish Conroy side of the family proud.He is now in bed sleeping and we are hoping for another night like last night! (fingers crossed!)

Our First Day in Marco

James had a very eventful first day in Florida. We went to the beach for a little bit this morning and James got to stick his feet in the water-his first ocean experience. He did not seem to mind it too much. It was super muggy and humid so we didn't stay at the beach for too long.

He wore his swim trunks for the first time which make him look a little bit like Charlie Brown since they go down to his ankles. We also spent some time relaxing by the pool. James napped while I read and Tim studied. The weather was perfect today -about 80 degrees- a nice change from the cold weather in Denver!

This afternoon, we went to our favorite bar on the beach and got some drinks and appetizers and then walked down to the beach to watch the sunset. The last time Tim and I were at that bar I was 6 weeks pregnant with James! It was a great sunset and James got to stick his toes in the water again.

Since I was pregnant the last time we were in Marco, everything that we did we kept imagining coming back and doing it with a baby. It was so much fun today to have James with us on our first vacation as a family of 3. James will have many more trips to Marco that will hopefully give him some wonderful memories growing up!

James and Friends

James got to meet our friend Liana for the first time this week. She was a fan, so was he since Liana has dark hair-his favorite.

Carol and Marley came to visit us tonight. Marley and James are almost the same size now. Marley was a preemie too and she is now 7 1/2 months old. She has discovered her tongue and liked sticking it out at James and pushing him out of the way when we were trying to take their picture. James liked having another baby around and was squealing and babbling to Marley a lot. At one point Marley cried and it freaked James out! He started crying so hard when he heard her cry! How empathetic of him. We leave for Florida tomorrow, and we will be updating the blog frequently, so check back!

Random Stuff

So here are some totally random, yet entertaining pictures. We bought some clothes for James awhile ago for our upcoming trip to Florida so we wanted to try them on to make sure they fit. And what good is having a baby if you can't dress them up for your own entertainment every so often? This is James' impression of his Grandpa Jim on a beach vacation. Who knew they made Hawaiian style one piece suits (no it is not a muu muu) and baby flip flops?

Next is a picture of James cracking up when Tim was singing to him. For whatever reason, he will laugh at pretty much everyone except me lately. I think I may bore him.

And finally, a picture of James and the schnoodle both looking positively chubby after James' bath tonight. I remember when I thought James would never get any baby chub! Now look at him go! We are getting Jax groomed tomorrow so I will post some after pictures. We will see if it makes him look any slimmer (Jax not the baby).

PS: Nothing makes me happier than people who comment on the blog regularly, so keep 'em coming!! Oh and a shout out to James' friend-to-be Baby O'Reilly, coming September '08! Congrats Anne and Sean!

Busy Weekend

We had a fun weekend, but not many pictures to show from it! Our great friends, Laura and Luke drove up from Santa Fe on Friday night. We miss them like crazy and had not seen them for awhile, so it was fun to see them. We hung out with them and Brynne most of the weekend and ate a lot. Laura brings out the best of us food-wise. We also went to Jenna and Dawn's house on Saturday night. Their son, Bennett is 2 1/2 now and so much fun. He has a great personality and it made us so excited to watch James grow up into a little boy. It is amazing how quickly they change. B was running around naked playing with trucks and talking up a storm, we loved it. James crashed at Jenna and Dawn's and took a 4 hour nap! We were afraid he would be a disaster sleeping that night, but he surprised us by sleeping straight through until 6:30 in the morning! He has kind of been a disaster sleep-wise lately so we aren't holding our breath that will continue!

On Sunday we went to the baptism of Audrina, Lacey and Zack's baby. It gave James an excuse to wear his sweater vest, previously shown in his Easter basket photo. Audrina is 7 weeks old with a ton of dark hair. Lacey and Zack make such great parents, we are so glad to know other people with babies around James' age! I forgot to take any pictures of James and Audrina together though! Well, not much else to report, but I want to give a birthday shout out to 2 of our favorite blog readers, Anne and Paula! And also, a shout out to Jordan who sent James the cutest set of pirate baby dishes and silverware!

James doesn't know what to think about crazy Auntie Laura
As you can see, James is still loving sucking on his fists, we are averaging about 3 outfit changes a day from the constant drool.

James' new favorite hobby

Lately James is constantly blowing bubbles, drooling, and sucking on his fists. Lord, I hope this is not the signs of teething. I will be happy if he follows in his cousin's footsteps and doesn't get any teeth until he is a year old. I would also like to give a shout out to my new favorite blog, http://www.55firstdates.com/ Although I can not divulge the true identity of the blogger Patty, it is a hiarious read-especially for those who are single and dating, which I am obviously not, but I still enjoy it. No other real James news, but he has been asleep on my lap for going on 2 hours and I am blogging to pass the time :-) We are having a lazy pajama day today, it is cold and snowy. We are ready for spring!

Weekend Update

We had a great weekend. On Saturday the weather was perfect, it gave us all Spring fever! We went to the art museum, James actually really seemed to like it. He stayed awake the entire time and was looking all around. We also went to Wash Park and enjoyed the weather. True to Colorado in the Spring the nice weather did not last long. On Sunday it snowed most of the day. We hung out around the house napping and playing.

James has started to love laying on the floor on a blanket. Thank goodness someone we know has made him so many! He likes to spin around and will still occasionally roll over. He has even gone from back to tummy a couple of times. Sunday is also bath day. James loves baths now, and has graduated from the newborn hammock that we used to use in his infant bathtub. He mainly likes being naked afterwards, and his enjoyment ends once the clothes go back on. Maybe he will take after his Uncle Thomas and sell rocks door to door naked as a toddler.

And a funny cloth diaper/babyleg picture for Aunt Jenny-or as Tim calls it, James' clown outfit. We watched the Business of Being Born this weekend and it was awesome! I loved it and it made me very excited for Jenny's birth. It was just released on Netflix and I would highly recommend it to anyone who is curious to learn more about homebirth. Lunchmeat should be making an arrival in the next 4-6 weeks or so and we can't wait!

PS...How sad is it that I just figured out how to move the pictures so they don't all show up at the top of the post? I always wondered how Jenny did it on hers.