diaper dip.

For the past two weeks on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings, Eli and I, along with my friend, Kelly, and her beautiful little gal, Ava (7 months), enjoyed a "Diaper Dip" swim class at one of Louisville's YMCA branches. What fun we had with these little swimmers! While Eli and Ava were the youngest of the 6-17 month swimmers, they both thoroughly loved the water, while splashing, "swimming" on their bellies, floating on their backs, and chasing turtle floaties around the shallow end. Eli and I were so thrilled that Andy was able to come during our last class to watch his little swimmer and to of course be the proud photographer. What a special, special time with my little guy!

Before each class, these little swimmers
would "stretch out" on their towels.

Suprisingly, while the indoor thermostat in the pool area read 100 degrees, the water was always colder than we expected. Eli always smiled wide when the water would touch his cute belly!

...Kicking his legs (mermaid style with lots and lots of "bum" action)
and reaching, reaching, reaching with his arms
to get the floating turtle...

Ava was quite the pro at going under the water.

What fun we had! We can't wait until our beach vacation!

Fun on his belly, while sitting up, and laying on his back ...Eli loved these floating fish...

backyard fun.

While we are quite sad that our housing development does not have a fun pool to visit, we decided to "decorate" our backyard with a small, inflatable pool especially for our little swimmer. While Eli is used to a much larger pool at our "Mommy and Me Diaper Dip" swim class, Andy and I were excited to watch his reaction to a pool that was just his size! Eli simply loved the cool water and splashed for days as he explored his new turtle pool, rubber ducky, squirters, and watering can. We can't wait to splish and splash the summer away in our backyard with our little minnow!

cookie monster caleb.

What fun we had this weekend celebrating Caleb's second birthday with his "Cookie Monster" themed party! While Andy and I now know that "life with baby" moves quickly, we can hardly believe that sweet Caleb is TWO! It seems like "just last week" that Andy and I were waiting patiently in the hospital hallway to meet Creed and Whitney's new bundle!

Hot and humid Louisville weather definitely did not deter this birthday boy from enjoying his family and friends, Little Tikes bouncy, tunnels, sprinkler, and especially the abundance of "Cookie Monster blue" sweet goodies!

Eli enjoyed the heat while hanging out with his new buddy Hayden!
Hayden, born at the beginning of November, is such a sweet boy with a face full of smiles!

...a big smile, sweet icing mouth and fingers, wet from douses of a water bottle...
successful party with one happy birthday boy!

...seven hours later...

Seven hours later...Noni arrived at Black Powder Court! Andy, Eli, and I were so excited to welcome my mom to Louisville and our sweet Carmen pup home during the weekend! We are always so thrilled to have visitors and simply cherish the time we have with our family! Eli loved spending time with his Noni and rekindling his friendship (with a little tug of her ear...ouch) with Ms. Carmen. Thanks so much mom for the fun weekend spent with our little guy, eating your favorite Grater's ice cream, fun trips to Target, a sushi dinner, shrimp and pizza lunch, shoe shopping galore, and yummy butterflies! We can't wait to see you soon and are counting down the days until our family vacation!

jump, jump, jump, eli beymer

After days and what seems like weeks of exploration, at last Eli's chubby feet can touch the ground and he can finally begin to use the jumperoo as it was intended...for jumping! The brightly colored jumperoo and all of its gadgets is fast becoming one of our favorite play activities! With each passing day, Eli's jumping becomes more animated and wild. We just love to watch those chunka, chunka legs push off the ground! Thanks so, so much Sandy and Ralphene! Eli is jumping for joy over your sweet shower gift!

six month statistics

This past week, Eli and I ventured to the pediatrician for his 6 month (where did the time go?) well baby check-up. Eli just loves the brightly colored rooms of his pediatrician's office and is simply a wiggly worm from the time he is laid on the table until the time he is redressed. Happy, smiling, and even laughing with and at our doctor, Eli weighed 16 pounds, 10 ounces, and measured 27 1/2 inches long. Our little boy currently has two teeth and is surely working on more...ugg. We feel so blessed to have our healthy, sweet boy!

...six fun facts about Eli at six months...

Eli loves his exersaucer and jumperoo more and more each day. He especially loves to "munch" on the apple in his exersaucer and spin the ball on his jumperoo.

While Eli is not quite sitting up on his own, we have been practicing! Frankly, he shows little to no interest in doing this, unless you catch his attention with flashing lights, music, and other toys to help him forget that he is actually sitting. While he is able to sit tri-pod style, our pediatrician remarked that a baby "this happy and wiggly" simply doesn't have time to just sit still. In our home, Eli would just rather roll and roll and roll.

Our little boy is a fantastic eater and has finally started to even enjoy his morning cereal. He loves all baby food, but especially veggies. Fruits, while he will eat them, make his little lips pucker.

Eli continues to love all things "bath"! We can't get enough of watching our happy baby smile, splash, and submerge himself in the warm water.

No matter if he wakes from a nap happy or not-so-happy, he always has the biggest smile on his sweet face when he sees mama or daddy come to his rescue.

Eli loves his early bedtime! Each night, he is ready for bed at 7:00 pm or at times, even earlier. He generally sleeps from 7:00 pm to 5:20 am (on the dot), wakes to eat and then returns to sleep most usually until 7:00 am. While taking a hiatus from sleeping through the night (perhaps due to those two cute teeth), we are SO HAPPY to report that Eli is back on track with his sleeping, in turn helping us to return to ours.

*****
perhaps I should erase this last comment as to not jinx our little sleeper
...knock on wood...

joining the club

Andy and I recently decided to "join the club" and purchase a COSTCO membership. Because we are simply up to our eyeballs in diapers and wipes, for this alone, we justified a membership to be helpful, not to mention all of the other magical goodies that you can find in this superstore! While at COSTCO, Eli loves to ride in the Baby Bjorn as to see all the hustle and bustle around him. Simple, but fun are our new family trips to COSTCO.

giggle fit

It's always such a happy time for both Eli and I when our garage door goes up and Andy comes home from work! We just love spending the evening together and Eli especially loves, as noted in a previous post, laughing with Daddy. Take a peek at our Eli in his giggle fit with Dad. His little laughs are simply too sweet and we just can't help but laugh right with him. I dare you not to smile...

You might also notice that Eli's hair is still sticking straight up in the back
...we love it...

christmas in june

My mother is always, always on the look out for adorable and unique goodies for Eli (and for me, too). Recently, she emerged from her walk-in-closet with an oh-so-cute bath towel for our little guy to cuddle in following a warm bath. Fearing that Eli might possibly be too big for this particular towel by Christmas, mom gifted it to us 7 months early. Purchased from a specialty store in West Virginia, Eli's new gingham reindeer towel is simply the cutest! Thanks so much, mom! We love celebrating Christmas in June! While Rudolph might be "the most famous reindeer of all," we think that Eli is the cutest!

music to our ears

While we just can't get enough of Eli's precious, precious smiles, we also love hearing him laugh! Many evenings before bath time, Andy loves to entice Eli with "tummy raspberries" in hopes of eliciting the gift of Eli's laughter. Paired with the ticklish vibration and the prickliness of Andy's goatee, Eli's laughter fills our bedroom with happiness and makes our hearts smile. Our sweet boy just loves everything about bath time, and this fun and special time with Dad is no exception!

Take a peek at our little laughing Eli!
We hope it puts a smile on your face as it does ours!