"Just One of the Many Reasons my Dad is so Rad" by: Owen Tidmore

HE PASSED THE BAR!! Way to go Daddy! We are proud of you!

Silly Little Monkey...

Poor Owen had a touch of a tummy bug this weekend that was going around school. But, you would have never known he was sick unless you saw him vomit. He would vomit on the go, and be perfectly happy to be doing it. He never missed a beat. Then Saturday night he got a high fever. Fun. Now that is finally gone, and I think everyone is OK now.

Halloween was fun, although we didn't have as many Trick-or-Treaters as we wanted, or as many as we prepared for, so now we are stuck with tons of candy. We need to get rid of it so we don't eat it. We didn't do the Trick-or-Treating thing this year as we think Owen is too young to start that yet (plus he was under the weather). But we did get in costume and hand out candy, and then have a couple friends over for a scary movie later that night.

The day of Halloween and the day before, were spent watching our classic Halloween movies/shows. Hocus Pocus is great...we watch it EVERY year and we love it in all of it's cheesy glory. We also watched "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown", and of course one of the best episodes of How I Met Your Mother - the "Slutty Pumpkin" episode. (no, it is not dirty, it is funny)

Now it is November and the Halloween decor will be put away. We got this great inflatable on clearance for our front yard that was a huge hit...everyone that came to our house to get candy stopped and took pictures with it. We will definitely put it up again next year. As I am sure everyone knows, October through December is my favorite time of year...and now I can add January to that because Owen's birthday is the end of January. (can I just take a second to address the fact that he will be a YEAR old in 82 days???)

I was talking to my sister-in-law earlier, and she reminded me that I need to update my blog and that my sister is out blogging me these days. Well, I cannot let that happen. Thanks for the reminder Wendy. As we were talking, we realized that her son Will (Owen's cousin who is 2 1/2 months old) is almost as big as Owen. :-) Granted, Owen is a tiny boy. A "petite flower" as my sister calls him. So really, it is not difficult for any baby to beat Owen in weight. :-) But, Will sure is cute with his chubby cheeks...We can't wait to meet him at Thanksgiving. (Owen actually has TWO cousins named Will. Will Tidmore, and Will Laurence. Will L. was born in August, so he will be known as Will #1, and Will T. was born in September, so he will be known as Will #2.)

We met Will #2 when we went to Abilene for ACU's homecoming 2 weekends ago. He is still tiny as he is only a month and a half old. But, he is cute nonetheless.

Alright, now for the main attraction...PICTURES! And there are many.

Ridglea and Us at AkO Homecoming breakfast

LeighAnn and Owen

Pitiful sick Owen

Trying to get food down him any way we can!

All 4 Tidmore kiddos

Owen LOVED the swing at Uncle Taylor and Aunt Heather's house!

More fuzzy evidence.

Just a cute one.

He LOVES to chew on his socks.

I was a nurse or doctor. Take your pick. I wore scrubs.

Daddy's costume was a guy riding an Ostrich. :-)

Peek A Boo!!

Owen and cousin Will (#1) had matching pumpkin shirts! Thanks Bopba!

Pumpkins

Well, this post isn't really about pumpkins, but I couldn't think of a better title. :-)

Owen will be 9 months old on Friday. I can't believe it. He made some new friends from the church we have been going to on Sun. mornings. We went over to Luc's parents house for dinner with them and Ryan's parents last Friday. :-) It was fun. Ryan was born 2 weeks before Owen, and Luc was born 3 weeks after Owen - so they are pretty much the same age and it is fun to watch them play together. If I get a picture of it from Noelle (Luc's mom) I will post it.

Owen is days away from walking. I have been saying that for a LONG time...but it is true, I can't believe he isn't walking yet. He still has no teeth, but I think he is working on the two front bottom teeth (and has been for a while, those suckers must be having a hard time).

He is such a funny boy. He makes the funniest noises. I like to hear him talking to himself, it cracks me up...he gets louder and louder, and then he whispers. :-) So cute. He does the sign language for "milk", but I haven't seen him do any other signs. Although, we haven't really been trying as hard as I wish we had.

Ok, here are some pictures now!

Owen's first bath in the actual tub.

Owen's first teething biscuit.

A friend lent us this little car. Owen LOVES it.


Little Drummer Boy

Notice his crossed ankles. ALWAYS crossed.
sweetest face
He loves his mommy.

Being silly with daddy at the pumpkin patch

SO FUNNY!! He is totally asleep, but was smiling and laughing.

So cute

Love this picture.

LET'S GO DODGERS!!

So...my sister pointed out that I have neglected to mention "my" Dodgers on the blog. Well, I don't know how it got past me, but we are following, and we are so bummed that we aren't in L.A. right now! We are watching game one with the the Phillies, and my boys are about to lose. BUT, that's ok...we have 6 more games in this series. CHECK THAT: the Dodgers just lost Game 1 to the stinking Phillies.

I better start wearing my Dodger gear every day.

LET'S GO DODGERS!

"I love L.A.....We love it!"

Dang...

Ok, so, enough pity party. (thanks everyone for the positive words) Last week was rough on several accounts, and I had 10,000 people coming at me (not just on the blog) about Owen's sleep habits...so I was on overload. Anyhow...moving on...

Owen had a really good week at school this week! He didn't cry, and he played and smiled most of the day! :-) He only goes twice a week, but it is getting better.

His two front teeth on the bottom are starting to show a tiny bit through his gums. Who knows how long they will take to come up, but they are there!

He is standing all the time now. SCARY!! :-) It is super cute...but he is growing too fast. He is going to be the tiniest walking boy too soon. Seriously, it is just around the corner. I can't believe it.

QUESTION: he seems to be getting over baby food. He just isn't as interested. He really likes yogurt, so that is his new favorite. He likes to feed himself, but besides Cheerios and Puffs I am not sure what else I can let him feed himself since he has no teeth. Any thoughts? What about pasta? I wasn't sure about it because it doesn't really dissolve. I don't know. Give me some ideas.

Ok, now what all the family wants to see (and I am sure others do too)...PICTURES!!

Done

I have written several blogs in the last 10 minutes, but I deleted them. I am upset, and I don't want to write something I will regret.

For that reason, I won't be asking for advice regarding my son's sleep habits on this blog anymore. It is a sensitive subject for me, and I am not going to feel like less of a mother regarding that subject anymore.

For the record: (for anonymous) - I never thought or said that Owen would one day learn not to need me. Yes, that is unrealistic, and I never thought that for a moment, regardless of what you might think. We have tried many things to get him sleeping through the night (which he actually did until he was 5 months old), and none of them have worked. So please don't accuse me of not doing anything about it up to this point. And you really have no idea what goes on here to tell me that the "longer it goes on" the more I am teaching him that he needs me to go back to sleep. The next time you comment, whomever you are , please keep your assumptions of how you believe we are doing things wrong out of it - because you really have no idea. I believe a do a pretty darn good job, and I refuse to feel like I am somehow failing my son because he will not sleep through the night despite our best efforts.

Our efforts will continue, and somehow Owen will sleep. But, I won't blog about it.

That is all I will say about it.

UPDATE: here I am feeling sad and like a failure, and I just realized that Owen is 8 months old today.

...

It is 11:09 PM. Owen went to bed about 8:00. He has already been up twice.

I really don't understand how letting him cry when we put him to bed will make him stop waking up 500 times a night. Can someone explain this??

Growing

Well, Owen is getting so big. I can't believe it. On Wednesday he will be 8 months old. That means only 4 months until his first birthday. It will be so fun to watch him eat cake for the first time. I know that he will fully commit to a huge mess. We will have to do it in the backyard with a hose handy. :-)

Here are a few things about Owen these days:

~ He crawls so fast. I turn my head for one second and he is on the other side of the room. He follows me around the entire house.
~He is pulling up on things and cruising along the couch.
~The other day we CAUGHT HIM STANDING IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FLOOR WITH NOTHING AROUND HIM TO HOLD ON TO. He will be walking too soon.
~He says "mama" and "dada"
~He enjoys spitting. :-)
~He bounces ALL the time.
~His new stance is kneeling on one knee with the other foot flat on the ground.
~ He can't get enough of playing with water bottles. Forget toys...water bottles are where it's at!
~ He enjoys playing with his fridge farm, even though he can't really make the matches and what not. He likes to eat the animals and push the buttons.
~ He started eating YoBaby yogurt and LOVES it.
~ He is still a bity guy. A little over a week ago at the doctor he weighed 15.8 pounds. 5th percentile, but Doc assures us he is healthy and good to go!
~ He isn't that big into eating. He doesn't like to take time out of his busy schedule to eat. If we can distract him and keep him entertained while he eats then he will usually eat it all. When we go to school on Mon/Wed mornings, I put him in the front pack and feed him while he is in it. He will eat it all that way too. Of course, he might have it all over his face when it is all said and done since I can't see his mouth. :-)
~ He isn't big into sleeping either. Still. I have tried everything. (short of letting him cry...we tried that a couple times and we couldn't last past 5 minutes, that just isn't for me). He sleeps in his crib for 4 or 5 hours max, then he wakes up and will not sleep in his crib for more than 1 or 2 hours after that. Sometimes he sleeps decently in the bed with us, but I don't sleep that great then. Grr. Oh well. I'll sleep in 24 years when all our kids are out of the house. (can you guess by that number of years how many kids we want??) So, I'll be almost 52 when I get to sleep again. A reason to look forward to my 50's I suppose. :-)
~ Owen is very attached to me, and that makes school and MOPS very difficult. School is getting easier since we go 2 days a week, but MOPS will take FOREVER because we only go there 2 times a month. I wish I could say that I love MOPS. But, I don't yet. Most of the women are at least 10 years older than me (I am the youngest, I think the closest to my age is 32 ish), so we don't really have a ton in common. I feel out of place there. I told Travis I would give it one or two more tries, and if I still don't love it I won't go back.
~ I wanted to take Owen to Gymboree for a class or two, but it costs $72 a month (unless you want to take an art class, then it is eighty something a month), for one class (45 minutes) a week!! If you want to do 2 classes, it is another $72/month for the second class. INSANE. That is a complete rip off...especially since you aren't dropping your kid off for someone else to do the class with them, but you stay with your kid the entire time - so you are in charge of them. The "teachers" don't have to control them or wrangle them. I don't get it.

Ok, so those became less about Owen and more about my gripes as the list went on. :-) I will post pics soon, and a video of Owen standing up!!

Tired...

I had written a long post that I was going to add pictures to and post it, but I waited too long and now alot of the information in that post is irrelevant.

Anyway, I am tired. Owen is precious, and I am tired. He had his first cold this weekend. Thankfully it seems to have run it's course rather quickly, and I chalk that up to breastfeeding! :-) Last Tuesday we started MOPS. Owen had a rough time in his class, and I was called out halfway through the meeting to get him. Poor kid. Wednesday was the first day of school for both of us, and that was equally rough for Owen. Today at school he had a better time, and I think maybe last week was rough because he wasn't feeling great. Thursday we went to San Antonio and put Owen in the pool for the first time, shortly after he had a full blown cold. :-(

Owen is fully crawling all over the place. He is so fast. He is also pulling up on everything. He wants to walk so bad. I'd like him to wait a while on that, but I'd almost be willing to put money on him walking by 10 months.

He really wants to eat table food. Any suggestions on what to give him?

Here are some pictures. (WARNING: LOTS OF PICTURES AHEAD!)

Owen and Daddy make a Land of Pillows sometimes

We took Leah's idea and made a ball pit out of our baby pool!! Owen LOVES it!

AND THIS IS HOW WE FOUND OWEN A LITTLE WHILE AGO....

He was crawling around, next thing we new he was standing up! AHGGG!!