Merry Christmas

To say that we had a wonderful Christmas would be an understatement. It started early...as Archer is known to be an early riser. At around 6:30, everyone in the house was woken up by the two toothed monster with a grin on his face. It was as if he really knew something exciting was going on. After everyone made their way down stairs, we prepared to watch what Archer would do with all of his gifts. This was his first reaction when we sat him down in front of all of his presents:

I think he looks like a pretty happy little dude. He began to rip into his first gift (which was one of those old school fisher price telephones, you know...the one with a rotary dial? Santa HAD to get it for him...they are awesome!) He was distracted by the paper pretty quickly, so the rest of us took turns opening our gifts. Archer crawled around as we did this, and occasionally would open another one of his gifts. After we all finished with our gifts, we each took turns opening a gift with Archer. He got plenty of fun toys and lots of new clothes. I don't think we could have made a better Christmas for him. I am very much already looking forward to next year...not only because he will have more of a grasp of what is going on but also because he was SO MUCH FUN this year. After opening our stockings, we then loaded up the car and headed to Breckenridge for a fun little day trip. It was SO beautiful. Nick and I cannot wait to go back and actually attempt skiing and or snowboarding. Here are some pictures from the trip:

Oh, and yes...you did read correctly. Archer is crawling...all be it he is crawling BACKWARDS!! We have read that some kids do that and will figure out how to go forward once they get the hang of all of the movements. He may be going backwards, but I can tell you this for sure...he gets to wherever he wants to go! This leads to a VERY exhausted mommy and daddy. Archers furry brothers don't really know what to do either...they try to do what they can to stay out of his reach...but sometimes he gets a hold of their tails or ears. And who knows...walking is probably just around the corner...YIKES!!

Archer's first Christmas Tree!

I know I am sooooo very behind on this blog, but we have had quite the epic week. This week has been full of crying, teething...and a very sick puppy dog Buck. We started the week with little to no sleep, thanks to the beginnings of more teeth starting to try and push through Archer's gums. We still do not see any white yet, but his poor top gums are very bright red and puffy. He has had a rough time with it. As that started to get as under control as we could make it, poor Buck got sick. I will spare you the details of his disease because it.was.gross. Anyhow, after we managed to get Buck back on the mend the rest of the week and weekend went wonderfully. Nick and I went to his squadrons "Festivus" party on Friday night. We had a great time, and it was nice to get to know more of the people and their wives that Nick works with.

Saturday we spent finishing up all of or Christmas decorations. For the first time in my life, we have lights on the house and it is making me feel VERY festive. Nick did a great job putting them out. I will have to take pictures soon since we just completed it this weekend. We have had our tree for about a week now, but as I said I am VERY behind on my blogging. Here is a picture of Archer and Nick picking out the tree:

I will post a picture of the tree later when it is all lit up and beautiful! We are now just counting down the days until Christmas!!

Christmas Pictures

I am not the type of person who quits on a store/company after one bad experience. I try to give whatever location I have just had the bad experience with another chance. Why am I bringing this up? Well, we went yesterday to have Archer's Christmas Pictures taken at JC Penny's. The first time we went to this JC Penny's was for his Halloween pictures. I was very unhappy after I left because I felt like the photographer really didn't take any time to work with Archer. After one or two pictures of him not smiling, she seemed to decide that she didn't even want to attempt to get a smile out of him. This resulted in some not so great Halloween pictures. Even after this experience I decided to go back one more time. This time we had a different photographer and I thought for sure that she might be better. BOY WAS I WRONG. Again, she tried for a few photos but once she was not getting immediate smiles, she stopped trying. I know it is hard to get an eight month old to smile...but those of you who have met Archer know it is just not THAT hard. He is typically a smiley happy dude. But anyhow, this is the best we could do at JC Penny's:

At least he is still super cute. I will be taking more pictures of him in this same outfit to see if I can do any better. Hopefully the much anticipated Christmas card picture will turn out a little better.