The Baylor Family Blog

Matt has had the opportunity to take care of Eli a little more often than usual while I’ve been working or out doing other things. So on a recent Daddy-Eli day, they went to the park and Matt captured this shot of Eli which I love! Its been so fun to see the excitement Eli has when he sees his daddy, and to see the creative ways Matt plays with Eli and challenges him to learn new things!

I had the pleasure of celebrating another year of my husband’s life on Tuesday!! Thanks to a dear friend watching Eli, Matt and I had an evening out at the Melting Pot! We enjoyed Swiss cheese fondue, followed by a tropical salad, then a signature selection of meat and veggies, and finally topped off with cookies-n-cream chocolate fondue for dessert! Yum, yum, yum! We hadn’t anticipated eating for three hours, so we opted out of heading to the movie theater to watch Prince Caspian. We’ll do that another day. We are getting too old and can’t stay out too late anymore ! One of my favorite parts of the evening was surprising Matt with the new 2 GB Ipod Shuffle that he’s been wanting! We were hoping to stop by the store after dinner, but as dinner kept stretching longer and longer, we weren’t sure we’d make it before the store closed. And I watched Matt getting a little more disappointed as the night went on. Little did he know I already had bought it for him with some of his birthday money and some coupons! And the disappointment vanished and he’s been smiling ever since!!

Lastly, I was surprised the first time it happened, but Eli loves being in his crib. He cries when he wakes up, but as soon as I walk in his room, he is happy as a peach and wants to play in his crib. Sometimes he’ll run back and forth, other times he’ll play with his stuffed animals. And other times he’ll reach as far as his little arms will let him and try and pull other things into the crib to play with. Due to that last one, I’ve been re-arranging things a little bit in his room to prevent certain things from visiting his crib, like the trash can Though we do have our off-days, he is turning into a good sleeper and following a routine!

Lest you think our little boy is always happy, I wanted to show you this picture…

I don’t have a whole lot to say, but I wanted to post some pictures! Eli is as busy as ever, constantly on the go! As you’ll see from a picture down below, Eli finally did discover the drawer beneath the stove that has all the baking pans. He sees it as his personal mission to spread pots, pans, and measuring spoons and cups all over the house to make cooking a little more challenging for his mama! He is still doing pretty well on small bites of table food. Some days are better than others. He was doing fairly well on the sippy cup, but now has a cold and pretty much doesn’t want anything to do with it now. So we are back on the bottle again, but hopefully temporarily. We are anxiously awaiting his cold to improve as he gets super clingy and cranky when he is sick. So that’s the inside scoop on Eli…enjoy the pictures!

Here are some pictures of the rare moments when Eli is still. He must be pondering some very deep things…

I wonder why bark is brown?

Until my mommy lets me go play outside again, I’ll sit here and look out the door and dream about being outside again.

So here’s a sequence of pictures that shows Eli’s excitement about going to the park…

The playground is in sight! “Daddy, Mommy! I want to go play!” says Eli in using his baby grunts and squeals.

Unable to keep up with our youngster, we trail behind. We’ll teach him to look both ways before he crosses the sidewalk another day!

Eli made it to the playground. Now the difficult decision…what to do first. Of course, Eli isn’t one to slow down while he decides!

Like many times before, the swings win out and Eli is filled with glee as he swings back in forth!

I think we’ll be spending a lot of time at the playground this summer! Thank goodness its just a walk down the street from our house!!

Wow! Mother’s Day 2008…my second year to celebrate Mother’s Day, and what a special day it has been with my handsome husband and little boy! They surprised me with a card that daddy helped Eli make and some fun things to pamper myself with! We made waffles for breakfast before I ran off to church for nursery duty! When I got home, the three of us went to the store and came home with a new camera!! So after Eli got his afternoon nap in, we headed off for a walk to the park…and a lovely opportunity to try out our new camera!! Matt is busy making dinner, that we are hoping to enjoy while Eli is sneaking in another nap! So happy Mother’s Day to all you mamas out there!! And here are some of my favorite pictures of me and my boy on Mother’s Day 2008!

There are a lot of things that Eli does that crack us up. Lately, he has been putting his blankey over his head and walking around the room blindly until he runs into something or trips and falls down. Then he stands up and repeats the process. Why he enjoys that so much, I’ll never know. But its quite entertaining to watch!

Another thing Eli has been doing lately is walking up to either Matt or I and leaning over and putting his head on the ground. It took a few times of wondering if he was going crazy before we realized what he was doing. He loves to do somersaults, but needs some help. So this is his way of asking for help to do a somersault! So Matt and I can spend long stretches of time flipping him over, and then he’ll come back and repeat the whole thing again. The more somersaults he does, the more dizzy he becomes, and the harder it is for him to walk back to us and put his head on the floor again! He’s full of giggles, and we enjoy laughing with him! So here’s some pictures of our baby gymnast…

Beautiful weather always makes Matt and I want to venture outside. So today the three of us ventured over to Red Rock Open Space to check out some of their trails. The trails were well marked, the views were spectacular, and the red rocks were stunning. With Matt’s shoulder still out of commission, I volunteered to carry Eli on the hike. It gave me a little perspective as to the extra weight Matt carries when we go on a hike. It took a handful of adjustments on the pack during the hike before I could stand up straight and not feel like I was about to topple over with every step…but we eventually got it just right!!

Our little guy absolutely LOVES being outside. He screams even when he has to come inside the house after running to the grocery store. He tries to get out any door he can find. So of course, he loved the hike, as well! We let him run around during a break on the hike and he didn’t want any help maneuvering over rocks! He is so independent and adventurous! He tries to eat all the little rocks he can find (and even managed a handful of dirt when I was looking, last week…opps). But Matt and I are thrilled to share our love of being outdoors with Eli

Here’s a few pictures from our hike…

Here I am carrying Eli in his pack when I couldn’t quite stand up straight!

Eli getting all excited on the break during our hike at the thought of running around and playing with rocks and dirt for a little bit!

Eli playing with rocks and dirt…all it takes for hours of fun for this little guy!

Our best attempt at a family photo on the trail…as Eli is trying to run off to play with more rocks and more dirt!!