More Visitors

With all the recent snow a snowman decided to come visit the house.


Here Landen shows Mike what he can do with his hands.


Mike and Julie's good friend John was in town for business and thought he would stop by to say hello to Landen.


Aunt Jenny wanted to stop by and give Landen his Valentine's day present. It may be cliche but we still like to tell Landen his future is so bright he's got to wear shades.

Weekends

Landen tries to stay busy on the weekends.

Sometimes Landen stays entertained by playing with toys in his bouncy.


Grandma W is also known to visit on occasion. Here she is making Elmo talk to him.


After his last visit to Paradise Pizza, Landen thought we should go there again with our friends Joel and Nichole. At this rate Pizza will undoubtedly become his favorite food.


With their own little one on the way Joel has become more comfortable with the idea of holding babies. Landen proves to Joel that he doesn't bite.

Safe to go out

Now that Landen is a little older he is ready to go out and conquer the world. Of course living in Iowa, the term conquering the world in the Winter means going out to a restaurant and to the mall (baby steps).

Landen is excited to learn of the family's lunch plans.


Here Landen is having his first meal at a local restaurant "Paradise Pizza". While he's sleeping in this picture, earlier he did find the energy to flirt with the waitress enough to get the family a choice booth.


Here Landen is having dinner at the Jordan Creek food court. Landen loves to people watch at the mall. Some day Landen will graduate to a sippy cup like Jack.


In this picture Landen is hanging out with Anakarina. Adam, Anakarina's daddy says, "stay back little guy".


Proving that the mall is a local hotspot, we ran into Jimmy P and family on the way out. It seems like just yesterday their little girl was Landen's age.

Great Grandma Trap went back to Ohio

Great Grandma Trap started feeling much better after she left the nursing home and decided it was time to go back home to Ohio. Before she left we all had a family dinner together.

Here the girls pose for a picture. (We see which side of the family Julie gets the whole closing her eyes for pictures thing)


Uncle Rob makes the smart choice by using a cloth over his shoulder after seeing Landen drool all over Aunt Jenny's sweatshirt.


Here Landen finds out he may not see Great Grandma Trap until May.

Chinese New Year

Chinese New Year is the most important of the traditional Chinese holidays, it is sometimes called the Lunar New Year. This is Landen’s first Chinese New Year, the year of the rat. For Chinese New Year’s eve we celebrated having a dinner of hot pot with Grandma and Grandpa C.

Chinese Hot Pot at the Garndma and Grandpa C’s generally consists of a skillet or hot pot at the center of the dining table, while the hot pot is kept hot, ingredients are placed on top and are cooked at the table. Our hot pot dishes included thinly sliced meats (steak, pork, chicken), seafood (shrimp, scallops), mushrooms, yams, tofu, and rice cakes. The cooked food is then eaten with a dipping sauce. Hot Pot is always a nice meal in the winter since it tends to keep you warm and the meal is slowed down so you can enjoy the company of family.

There are two general varieties of hot pot the more typical type of hot pot is where everything is cooked in a soup, for the one we partake in everything is cooked on a hot skillet along with bacon. If you wonder which is tastier ask yourself would I rather have a boiled shrimp or one that has been cooking on a skillet with bacon.

Spending time with Grandpa C.

Here Landen is hungry for Julie's shirt.

Red envelopes or red packets (Known as 'Hong Bao') are often presented at social and family gatherings such as Chinese weddings or on holidays such as Chinese New Year. The red color of the envelope symbolizes good luck. Here Landen is holding his first red envelope.

While he may be dreaming of a new toy or onesie this most likely will be going towards his college fund.

Landen's Activities

Here are some pictures of Landen that we like but don't necessarily have set events associated with them. Unfortunately we do not yet have any of Landen playing Ultimate frisbee.

Here Landen is found watching his favorite NFL team (The Browns)


Some may wonder how we know Landen's favorite team is the Browns. Here he is holding his Browns plushy.


Of course Landen also enjoys hanging out in his bouncy seat.


Here Landen is trying to play some video games.


When he tires of all his other activities at times he just likes to veg out.


Don't worry he is not really playing video games and watching TV all day, sometimes he likes to pretend he is E.T. and hide in his toys.

More Friends

The doc's orders were to stay out of malls and public places for the first two months. Landen has still had plenty of opportunities to meet everyone though.

Here Adam and Liza came to visit him in the hospital. Soon Landen will meet Adam and Liza's children Jack and Anakarina. Anakarina was born just a few days after Landen and is still in Liza's tummy here.


Joel and Nichole came to visit us next. Joel was scared to hold Landen so we have no pictures of him with Landen. Joel will have to get over this phobia soon, since they will have a little one of their own in July. Landen is excited that he'll be able to have a little friend to beat up.


Over Christmas Tyler and Dana braved the bad weather to see Landen. They brought him a cute coat that is like a bear costume.


Here Landen is with Justin and and Mishi. During this visit Justin and Mike decided it was their mission to finish off a whole container of cheese popcorn sold by the boy scouts. Since in this picture Landen does not have orange cheese dust all over him it is fair to say the girls held him most of the time.


Chuong and Jaleen stopped by on their way back to Denver from Jaleen's parent's place.


Here Josh, Kennedy, Mike, and Landen are hanging out (thats how they roll). Kennedy is Landen's first little friend.

Christmas Holidays

Being born so close to the holidays allowed Landen to see his family quite often. Luckily (or unluckily at 3:30 in the morning) this means that he enjoys being held by everyone.

Christmas with the W's - Bill, Debbie, Jenny, and Rob are headed to Ohio so as is our tradition we did Christmas before they left. Landen at a month old already had more presents than anyone else, he can't wait until next year when he'll stay awake.


Our Christmas Card Photo - It only took 36 pictures to get this one where the four of us look OK. For his three month pictures we will definitely be using a professional instead.


Christmas - Jules, Landen and I had our present opening on Christmas morning.




Later Grandma and Grandpa C came over for a Christmas lunch and more present opening.


When Gandma and Grandpa W came back from Ohio they brought a new friend to visit.

Great Grandma Trap came all the way from Ohio to visit our littlest angel. Unfortunately while she was here great grandma got a little sick and had to spend a few weeks at the hospital and nursing home. Landen had the opportunity to visit her a few times at the nursing home and is glad that she is back at Grandma and Grandpa W's house feeling and looking much better.

Thanksgiving and Settling into Home

Landen's first day home is actually Thankgiving day. We even had the whole family and Turkey at our house. Luckily no cooking or clean up was required on Julie, Landen, or my parts. Unfortunately with all the activity very few pictures were taken. Here is one of Landen and and another of the great flowers and plants friends and family sent.





Landen also got the opportunity to meet the original baby of the household, Riley. Riley is a Jack Russell and Rat terrier mix, he is Mike's first dog, loves frisbee and is used to all the attention in the household. We were a little worried that Riley may not play nice with Landen. I guess we need not have worried, I think the pictures speak better than words.

Landen meets his Aunt and Uncle

Jenny and Rob also came by to meet Landen. Finally Landen got the chance to meet his aunt who he has been hearing at all the Brown's games.

Landen meets the Grandparents

One of the nice things about living in Iowa is that both sets of grandparents and Julie's sister and brother-in-law are close by. Both sets of grandparents stopped by first. Being the first grandchild everyone was anxious for a little visit. Grandpa C was even the first one on the scene.