Kaden's Food Coma!

After a four day weekend with lots of family and friends to celebrate with, we think it all caught up with our baby Kaden! 

Our activities started Wednesday night when Kaden's grandparents (Ong, Ba Ngoai), auntie Lori (Di Ut) and uncle kyle (Cau Kai) made their way down from Seattle to celebrate with the To family. We stayed up way too late. I think Kaden knew his grandma and grandpa were coming so he wouldn't go to bed. They got in around 10:30pm and so we didn't get to bed until about midnight. 

Thursday was a morning of playing really hard with everyone, making food for dinner and then heading to Joel's sister and brother in law's house (Di, Duong Ba) for dinner at 4pm. The festivities lasted until about 9pm. Eating, playing cards, scrabble, eating, watching Kung Fu Panda and looking through the paper for next day sales! 

Friday: Grandma and Auntie Lori went shopping with Joel in the morning, the guys then went to play basketball and then Lisa took Kaden and grandma and auntie lori to the asian market and to Old Navy for some more shopping. Kaden's grandma CAN SHOP!!! Hhaha!!! 

Saturday: More shopping... we went to Woodburn Outlet Mall and had to drag grandma home. Then off to watch the Civil War Game (OSU vs. U of O). Don't ask who won...Joel is not a happy camper! Kaden played with his cousins and cheered and booed with the rest of them!  

Sunday: we went to church and had an amazing lunch with some friends at our house. Kaden played and laughed so hard this weekend and we think it all caught up to him. He was eating dinner at 6:15 (normally he goes to bed around 7:30pm.) And all of sudden mid bite, Kaden fell asleep. He has NEVER done that before. He's never just fallen asleep playing or crawling or anything. He's always let us know he's tired, we hold him and he falls asleep. We were laughing pretty hard and he didn't even budge. We think it all caught up with him and he decided he needed to rest! That, or he had TOO much TURKEY!!! Hhaha!!! :-)  

Hope you had a great thanksgiving! We are constantly in awe of this little child God has blessed us with and how much joy he brings us! Hope you enjoy this little video of him falling asleep while eating!!! We are still laughing at how funny he was! Happy Thanksgiving!!! (belated!)

Home Made Baby Food

One thing that mommy and daddy like to do together is make baby's food. ;^)

Some of the advantages of making your own baby food is:

1. You Know What's In It
2. It's Cost Effective
3. It's Fresh
4. It's Organic
5. More Variety
6. It's Fun

On the menu tonight were peas, (they were neon green) yam, and sweet potatoes. In the past we have made pears, apples, yams, green beans, carrots, and avocados. So far Kaden's favorite seems to be the yams avocados, and pears. 

We will cook up the veggies and then blend them up. We have a Braun Wand food processor and we use the attachment to puree the veggies into nice baby food consistency. Then we take the mixture and plop it into ice cube trays most of the trays we used were Rubbermaid. Drop those in the freezer then when they are frozen pop the little cubes into nicely labeled "Ziplock" bags. (wow we should put adds on the side of this blog for all the product placement going on in this entry.)

When baby is ready to eat we take out some frozen treat and put them in a bowl. Microwave for a few seconds to melt it and then add a little hot water. Then we add some cereal in to thicken it up.

Kaden  has been eating so much lately. The other day he ate two cubes of green beans and two cubes of pears. When we started a month ago he barely finished one cube. The transition from milk to solids has also brought on the same transitions in the diapers if you know what we mean. ;^P

So this concludes Joel and Lisa's baby cooking segment, we are glad you joined us and hope you come again for more adventures in parenting.

If you have a chance check out Joel's new blog RaisingDaddy. We'll leave you with a cute video of the effects of eating too many solids for Kaden. 

Silent Night... Holy Night...

As many of you know Kaden is very advanced in a lot of areas. Hitting his "milestones" earlier than what the books say. EXCEPT for sleeping through the night. We have so many friends' kids that have been sleeping through the night since they were three months old. The books say that a child SHOULD be sleeping through the night by six months. We tried every trick... and nothing seemed to get him out of his waking every three hours thinking he's STARVING! Hehhee!!! 

Last night was a good sign! Kaden "slept" through the night. He went six hours straight sleep from 8 pm-2 am. Woke up to eat and I put him back in his crib...and he woke up. We usually pick him back up cause he cries and get him back to sleep. BUT this time around... he sat up in his crib, stood up, sat down... talked talked talked. Then laid down and fell asleep! He has NEVER put himself to sleep like that before. I wish we had one of those night vision cameras set up. Then the boy didn't wake up until 7 AM! I think he might have slept longer than that if we didn't get up and were getting ready for the day. This is a very good sign... and hopefully it keeps up! :-) 

7 Months!!!

Kaden is now seven months old! Joel has been working on some video stuff for our keepsakes and he started with us in the hospital and Kaden's birth. It's wild to see pictures of him that small. Every day Kaden's personality comes out more and more. It's fun to explore things with him, new tastes, smells, touches, sights. He loves boxes and bags: the sounds they make when he does different things to them. He loves food: he's definitely a To. He eats everything-peas, green beans, carrots, yams, avocados, pears, apples, bananas, all types of baby cereals. He's learning how to use his pincher fingers to pick up snacks. Our favorite time right now is when he wakes up in the morning and is in such a playful mood. We lay in bed and play peek a boo with the covers...and he just laughs and laughs and laughs! It's so fun! (Especially when momma gets to stay in bed for a long time and not have to get up and go to work). This happens in the morning and right before bed time. Kaden gets the giggles and it's just so fun to play with him at this age. He's pretty technologically savvy... we have been video chatting with aunties, uncles, grandmas and friends... he loves to see himself on the computer!!! He's kinda weary of the phone still... I think he likes the fact that he can see someone through the computer and can't see them on through the phone. :-) Some fun seven month facts: Crawling, pulling himself up on things, taking a few steps holding on to stuff, eating solids, weighs over 18lbs, length of more than 26 inches, nicknames: chubbahwub, chubbabah, bubbah. Says dada and some other nonsense... loves his froggy! Loves you! 

Kaden Says His 1st Words!!! "Dadda"

Once again the boy amazes us with his tricks. 

Today Kaden clearly said Dadda many times.

Pretty soon he will be able to chat with his older 

cousins, who can gab with the best of them.

Professional Crawler

Kaden has picked up crawling very quickly and wants to move on to 

standing and walking. He has begun to pull himself up on chairs, sofas, and Mommy and Daddy's pant legs.

We'll get more footage of him standing soon. 

Kaden's First Hair Cut!

Kaden got his first hair cut on Saturday! We ate breakfast at our favorite-est place and Lisa's hairdresser's store is next door... so, we went over to say hi and asked if there was anything she could do with his long strands of hair and his "comb over". She went immediately to it! And chopped chopped chopped it off... and made a little faux hawk! SO CUTE! He was so good! It helped that Lisa's hairdresser was really fast too! Anyways... Kaden got a new hairdo!  

Kaden's Crib!!

The Three Amigos!

Kaden-7 months, Paker-2 months, Jonah-3 weeks 

The boys are destined to be best buds! They got the boy band look down and are on their way to making mucho mula for their parents!!! hahah!!! We will see who becomes the bully or instigators and who will be the followers... All we know is that it is going to be fun for them to have friends this close in age. They sure grow fast too... Kaden used to fit that outfit Jonah is wearing! It seems like a long time ago when Kaden was that small... but it also just feels like yesterday! Time sure flies with little ones... embrace each day... it goes way too quickly!  

Crawling... Standing...

We can't get a good video of the boy crawling... every time we pull out the camera he gets in the sitting position and poses that way!!! Hhahaa! He's way too trained! :-) Kaden has picked up crawling and gets around pretty fast! He is following us from room to room. It's funny the things we notice now that aren't really child proof... or unclean that is down at his level. He loves these bins we have for recycling! A little man after our GREEN hearts!!! :-) So, we figured he would just crawl around for a bit... but it seems like he wants to always be in the upright position. He basically crawls to get to a place where he can pull himself up. Soon he will probably want to walk about holding on to things. Kaden is very advanced and learns so fast! We are trying to teach him boundaries and what is acceptable to play with and what is not (ie. the lamp cord, shoes, our MACS!). Anyways, you can see his brain trying to figure things out. We are teaching him how to wave hi and bye to people... and sometimes he will be sitting playing and start staring at his hand and making it wave... it's very cute! Soon we will capture the crawling before he moves on to the next stage!!! :-) But here are some other cute pics of him! Much love!!!