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Monday, January 7, 2008

McGarry Family Christmas (December 19)


I'm so far behind, I can't even talk about what we did this weekend! I was just going to skip all the stuff about our trip, but I think I will be sad later if I don't have it there to remember in later years. So, time for a trip back!

We celebrate Christmas with my family on December 19th as it was the only day we could all be together. We were very excited to have Uncle Mike with us on leave from San Diego. William hasn't seen Uncle Mike since he was 3 months old! We usually celebrate Christmas together after Christmas, so it was a little different, but good to be together. We had a dinner of calzones and then opened presents. Will was much more interested in the tree, the wrapping paper, and the plastic garbage bag than the presents - but we still enjoyed watching him play with the toys once they were unwrapped!


Helping Uncle Mike pass out the presents


It looks like he has some presents to open, but really he wants to play with the Christmas tree


More Christmas tree admiring


Showing Aunt Megan our new car!

More cars!

Helping Grandma

A Drum!

Playing Peek-a-boo with Uncle Mike

More cars!

Reading a new book with Grandma

Uncle Mike trying to read Will's new book


Grandpa showing us how not to use a plastic bag. Oh yeah, and trying NOT to smell Will's diaper! Yuck!

Reading with Grandma


Giving his new car some love!

Yeah! Mama got a jogging stroller!

The Makings of A Christmas Card

Here are some of the "options" from the McGarry Christmas card photo shoot. This was never our favorite part of the Christmas tradition, but it sure is fun to look back at the pictures from previous years!


So, the way it worked is by putting the camera on a "tripod" of carefully balanced toys including a wagon, board books, duplos, and a puzzle to capture the family. The camera timer was used by remote - which helped to capture some of these lovely images.


Boys in green, girls in red!


The Winner! And the picture my parents sent out.

The best family picture we had in front of the tree.

Thursday, January 3, 2008

Cutest thing ever

I am really truly planning on putting up our Christmas pictures and stuff soon. I was just putting William down for a nap. I was holding him and arranging the blankets in the crib and getting things ready while he was snuggled on my shoulder when he took his hand and gently patted my back twice and said "mama". I patted him twice back and he did it again. Several time, in fact. Then, I thought it was best that I put him down before he cuted me out of his nap entirely.

Monday, December 31, 2007

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year! We arrived safely home this evening. We are all glad to be home and a little sad that our time with family is over. Check back over the next few days. I have lots of updates : Christmas pictures, Christmas pictures, Christmas pictures, anniversary celebrations, etc. I'm trying to keep this short, so I won't be reflecting on how far we've come or think too much about how this time last year John pointed out my first belly stretch mark to me.

I'll close with this thought: I'm so glad I'm not pregnant this New Year! It was hard work being so pregnant over the holiday. It was so much more fun to be down on the floor and chasing my baby around than....this:




[picture coming...or not]


Happy New Year! Weee! Off to celebrate. I think we are going to stay up until midnight playing games or unpacking! Wow!

Wednesday, December 26, 2007

11 Months Old



William is 11 months old today. We did some pictures and hung around trying to recuperate after this flu bug we all caught over Christmas. Although we are all feeling better, none of us feel great yet. I'll upload the pictures of him later along with some Christmas pictures. For now, I'll leave you with what William typed to us on the keyboard earlier:



Nrfftfff cffffffffffffffffff fc ffffvc b nc cdx xv vvvvvvvvvvvvccccccc0063



I'm not sure what it means.....
____________________________________________________________________
The 11 Month Photo Shoot


Finding the right toy to help William hold still for more than 0.35768785631465 seconds. He is totally in love with Grandpa and Grandma's nativity set. We had to keep a close eye on him with it so pieces of it didn't go missing! Here he is checking the Baby Jesus out.



Whoa! Blown away by the flash!


Examining Baby Jesus. Somehow that seems like that might be wrong/bad to say...sorry God!


Smiling for Mama...and yes, that is Baby Jesus now in William's mouth.


I love this expression!


Trying to crawl off the chair

Thoughtful baby - also highlights his nose scratch. Where did the scratch come from? Not sure....

Surprise!


All done! With the pictures, at least. Baby Jesus is still on duty it appears...

Thursday, December 20, 2007

Our Christmas Card

We're leaving for Rochester this afternoon. Have a merry Christmas everyone!






Is 2007 already over? Where did the time go? It is so hard to know where to begin - I don’t think I could begin to put everything in one short letter! So, here are the highlights from this year for each of us.

At the beginning of 2007, we welcomed our son, William August Heidt into our family. As William has accounted for many of the changes in our lives this year, we will start with him. William was born on January 26, 2007 in Chesterfield, Missouri. As expected, he turned our whole world upside down for the first few weeks. After some adjustment, we found ourselves with a laid back, sweet little boy who is intensely curious about the world around him. It is incredible when we look back how much he has already grown and learned this year. It seems like everyday he is able to do more things by himself and getting a little bit bigger. His current interests include anything he can get his hands on and learning how to walk.

John continues to work at Boeing as a structural analyst for the F-15 program and has picked up a second job with the title “Daddy”. Both of his jobs keep him busy and challenged in many ways. John has also been working hard at home with a number of different home improvement projects including finishing our basement. We are getting closer to completing this project, but work has slowed down considerably since the arrival of William. We hope to be priming and installing flooring sometime early in the new year. Hopefully by the time we write this letter next year, we can call this project done. We’ll see how that works out.

Kelly arranged to take a leave of absence from teaching this year to stay home with William. She is really enjoying being able to spend lots of time watching him grow and learn everyday. In the spring we will have to make a final decision about her going back to teaching for the following school year. No decision has been made, although lots of different possibilities have been discussed including selling the house and moving to Tahiti. Although free time is a little harder to come by, Kelly continues to find time to quilt, read, run and practice her photography skills on one of the most photographed children ever.

Our first babies, Mango and Mudd have adjusted well to our newest arrival. They both are quite tolerant of the noise and chaos William creates in their world. Both cats allow William to “pet” them while supervised, but neither seeks him out for companionship yet. They both lost a little weight since William started crawling after them, although we are quite certain neither one of them intended to become more active. Their biggest accomplishment this year is successfully finding ways to scale the unfinished wall in our basement to eat our insulation on more than one occasion.

Although we have slowed things down, we still love to travel and enjoy the outdoors together. A great deal more planning is required when adventuring with a baby, but it is still possible. William has turned out be a pretty adventurous guy as well as a flexible traveler. In just eleven months, he has traveled to six different states including a big trip to the east coast for Kelly’s cousin’s wedding in Rhode Island over Thanksgiving. We also made a trip to North Dakota this summer to visit Kelly’s Grandparent in Grand Forks and John’s relatives in the Bismarck area. There have been multiple hiking adventures locally with our hiking friends and a few on our own as well.

We hope this holiday season finds you both happy and healthy! Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

John, Kelly & William Heidt



Wednesday, December 19, 2007

Our Pride and Joy

As you will see below, William has learned a new....skill. I can't tell you how proud we are of him!







PS This new talent actually showed up about 2 weeks ago - it has just taken us this long to capture it with a camera....