Juke Box Hero

Dad's a rock star (at least, he thinks he is!) and I'm his number one (Guitar Hero) fan!!

Dad's favorite Christmas present!

Merry Christmas!!

I like presents!

Oooh, I wander what this is? Good thing A. Darlene and Jayde are helping me, cause I'm not sure I can get it open by myself.

Let me see, let me see...... Cool, it's some airplanes to play with, just my size.

Ok, I'll just play with the box instead, that's more fun!

My first ear infection

Poor Kellan got his first ear infection while we were home in Ohio for Christmas. It started Sunday night with 102+ fevers. Monday I called the doctors and they recommended we find somewhere to take him. Kellan's Aunt Darlene so kindly called her doctor's office and got us an appt that afternoon. Sure enough, his left ear was infected. We started some antibiotics right away. He just wasn't his usual happy content self. Very clingy to Mom (which I have to admit, I enjoyed the extra snuggles!!). By Christmas morning he was coming around and wanted to play more. We all carried tissues in our pockets for the runny nose faucet!! He was a real trooper the entire trip as we carted him back and forth to families.

Grandparent time

Precious time with the grandparents is what Christmas is all about!! G'pa Burke reading to Kellan as he intently listens, one of his many favorite activities. Another, helping G'ma in the kitchen. Kellan makes a mad crawl dash to the dishwasher or fridge anytime they open. He can hear them open from far away! Kind of like our dog Harmony!

Squirrel watching, another fun activity to fill our day at G'ma's house.

Here we go Brownies....

Daddy was so very excited to go to his first Browns game this year in Cleveland. Kellan didn't share in his enthusiasm. It was a warm 10 degree day with wind gusts of 40mph. Basically, a typical wintry day on the lake. That doesn't stop Daddy and his die-hard Browns friends! Here they are tailgating in their "heated" tent and at the game which they stayed until the clock read 00:00. That's one of their rules, regardless of the score or temperature! And of course both of those were negative. :( Fun was had by all and Daddy was able to catch up with all his buddies. Mommy and Kellan stayed cozy warm and G'ma and G'pas.

Merry Christmas Chuck, This one's for you!!

Meet Mr. Chuck and Mrs. Gail, our very good friends here in VA. Here we are at Greenberry coffee shop one afternoon back in late Sept just catching up with each others lives. Chuck's favorite name for Kellan is "Bebe" and clearly Kellan is pretty happy with that. I owe Chuck an apology for forgetting to blog about our time with them. He's one of our blogspot fans- Thanks Chuckles!! Merry Christmas! XOXO

I like Santa Claus!

Kellan and I made a trip to the mall today to visit Santa and ride the carousel. As you can see, Kellan was not too fond of the moving horses. Wyatt loved it! But Kellan was a very good boy for Santa. I wish I could have bought the pictures of him just looking at Santa, it was too cute. No tears from him!

Bull Run Lights and Carnival

Tim and I wanted to find something with fun holiday spirit to take Kellan to. Well, we had our hearts set on going to the National Zoo to see their annual Zoolights display. That plan didn't work when we couldn't get tickets at the last minute. So, we settled on the Bull Run Festival of Lights. Bull Run park is the historical site of a Civil War battle and every year they turn it into a beautiful 2 1/2 mile drive-thru light show. At the end of the drive they have a carnival filled with games and rides. We didn't take Kellan on the rides, but we did enjoy sitting by the fire making smores. Of course Kellan took part in the eating of those smores!

Leesburg Tree Lighting

We bundled up and walked downtown Leesburg for their annual tree lighting ceremony. Kellan enjoyed his ride despite the cold. We strolled around for a bit, saw Santa and decided we were way too cold to stay. Us Clevelanders have gotten to be such wimps living here in Virginia!

I'm ONE!!

I told you I would update you on my stats. The doctor weighed me, measured me, and gave me 3 shots today. I liked her up until the shot time. So now I'm 22 pounds, 2 oz, that's 50%, and 29.5 inches high, that's also 50%. Mom's always like to throw in those percentiles. I say, who cares, just keep feeding me, I'm growing and hungry!!

O Christmas Tree

Kellan helped pick out our tree this year. We first went to Home Depot b/c we saw an add for them and great prices. Well, we didn't like their set up, so we ended back up at the same place we've gone the last 5 years, Meadow Farms. They have all the trees nicely displayed, a roaring fire going and friendly service. And the smell of all the trees...mmmmm! Now we just need a little snow to make it feel like Christmas is almost here! Should be fun to keep Kellan away from the tree in our living room. Don't worry, more blog updates on that will be coming soon. :)

Turkey Day at the Hayden's

We spent Thanksgiving Day with our good friends, the Hayden's. Chuck and Tim have been friends since working together at Worldcom and traveled together to Europe for work several years ago. Gail's sons Travis and Shawn entertained Kellan. This time he didn't scream the whole night like he did a few months ago when we were at their house for dinner. Kellan was quite the flirt with Gail and Tammy. Kellan gobbled up some turkey and all the fixings. And of course had some pumpkin pie too! Thanks guys for the great dinner! Tim and I thought about last year's Thanksgiving Day and the sweet little boy we brought home from the hospital. We thank God everyday for blessing us with Kellan Patrick!!

My First Year

The Wheels on the Bus...

Driving to Ohio for Kellan's birthday was only 1/2 of our long trip. Friday morning we left Cleveland in a blizzard heading west to Peoria, IL, another 7 hour drive. We were on our way to the Steiner Christmas/Reunion. This is Kellan's G'ma Lanz's family. Most had not yet met Kellan, so it was so fun to introduce him to all his great aunts and uncles, 2nd cousins, 3rd cousins, etc. I'm not so good at the genealogy terms. He met about 100 of them though! We decided it would be more economical and just more fun if we traveled together. So here we are in our rented bus, I mean van. Kellan, his parents, his grandparents, 4 cousins, aunt and uncle. Do you think he had enough attention?! He was a real trooper the whole way. Just a couple melt downs. Maybe from the over stimulation! :)


Kellan is standing up yelling "dada, dada" in his crib when he was supposed to be going night-night. I guess he thought since we were both up and awake, he should be too. It's hard to pack lightly when you have a 1 year old! But Kellan enjoyed his ride on the cart.

Jayde, Devan and Kellan hitch another ride on the way to get their bags.