Oden Adventures

October 3-9, 2014

Ten weeks old!  Just as his big sister is hitting 2.5 years, our tiny man is hitting 2.5 months.  This week of Oliver's life is largely chronicled in my posts about our trip to Oregon, but here's a series of shots I took in Grandma's armchair.  Definitely some of the very cutest pictures of him to date!!  You may have to look at this post in several viewings, as all this cuteness at once may cause your cuteness receptors to overload & malfunction...

 Can you stand it??!!

While we were up in Oregon, our not-so-little-any-more Vianne Rose passed the two-and-a-half mark!  She is still going through a silly/stubborn phase when it comes to taking pictures so this is what I got from her the day of (Oct. 8)...

Vianne says at least 25 funny things a day that we try to record.  She is fiercely navigating her pronouns at the moment:  she usually says 'me' where 'I' belongs, 'we' where 'our' belongs, 'they' where 'them' belongs, and so out comes a whole bunch of adorable constructions like "We're doing it we selves!" and "I'm giving it to they."  She loves to talk about past events and starts many sentences with "Do you remember when...?" (reminiscent of Chris Farley). 

Her favorite number is eleven-teen and her favorite color is white.  She loves going to church and she loves God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit, and Spiderman (usually in that order).  She loves to play in her room with invited guests such as Mama, Daddy, and/or Granma, and has also taken up (sort of) playing Kinect/Xbox games with Daddy.  

She is starting to compose her own songs from bits of conversation, like "I'm not feeling good, I'm not feeling good...", loves to finger paint and color, loves to dance (particularly spinning), loves to do crafts and to help with (the very limited) baking (that goes on in our house).  She's clearly got an artistic soul (her newest medium is colored pencils) and has a burgeoning imagination: most days, either her toys are acting out dramatic scenarios or each of us family members are assigned a persona for the day (I'm usually a nice monster or Grandma or Mummy Pig or Penny from Fireman Sam).  She also likes to reenact events like Mama's birthday or the plane trip to Oregon.

She is still very principled about pretty much anything and finds it unsettling if things don't go as usual or as she's expecting them to.  We try to throw in something unexpected every so often, just to prepare her for real life...;-)  But for the most part, we try to keep the routines in place, and she will certainly let us know if we don't.

She is back to sleeping in her bed from roughly 7 to 7 - hallelujah!  This has helped our home settle down a bit since the birth of Oliver.  She seems to have given up naps altogether but will usually comply with a psuedo-nap-sort-of-quiet-time for an hour or so every afternoon and about one in four days, I can line that up with an Oliver nap, and have a few sweet moments to stare at the television in peace...er, do the dishes...

Her favorite shows of late are (still) Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Doc McStuffins, and more recently Wonder Pets and Strawberry Shortcake.  The Fireman Sam obsession which was ablaze, pardon the pun, over the summer seems to have fizzled (thank God!), although he is still called upon for imaginary fires in the backyard, and Penny (that's me) and Elvis (that's Oliver) help by turning on the hose).

She loves her little brother and is always very sweet with him.  She has never asked if he could go back where he came from, even if she has a few times asked if I could leave him in the swing and come play with her in her room :-).  She calls him all the cutesie names we've given him, which are much cuter coming from her, and loves to hold him and give him snuggles and kisses, and is getting quite adept at getting him to smile and/or calm down.

She is Joy with a capital J and Trouble with a capital T, but is precisely the kind of daughter we need in so many ways.  For every time-out these days there are 20 or so cutenesses :-).  So even though this two thing is very challenging, we thank God for this continuing gift of Vianne Rose. 

Thursday evening, after the excursion to Bauman Farms, V & Bea got artistic...

 ...and Rebekah & Ava & I took Oliver to his first trip to Burgerville.

 On Friday morning, Oliver got to meet Heidi who kindly came to visit us.

 On Friday evening we had a big - my, how our family has grown! - family dinner - everyone from the Richard Gustafson line except for dear Patrick.  Uncle Chris took on both babies at once!

On Saturday morning, I tried to get a picture of Mom with both kids.  This was the best attempt (of 10 or so) to get smiles on everyone...

 The three of us spent the afternoon up at the Blairs' house.  They have great light coming in the front window, which afforded this cute shot of Mr. Awesome...

 The girls (including Caleb & Soraya's daughter Lina) got all dressed up.  Vianne, sporting her princess chic...

 Princess Cousins

 Princess Bea holding Oliver (I'm including all four shots because they're all so dang cute!)

 And one with sweet Margot!

 Saturday evening we got to play with Rebekah & Ava again!

 On Sunday, we went to Two Rivers for church & Oliver got to meet lots of friends.  I got to sing one song with the worship team (I haven't sung publicly for four months!) which was good for my heart & soul, and Vianne stayed in the nursery the whole service!

For the afternoon, Aunt Carol hosted a "Meet The Babies" party in Portland, so the Gustafson extended family could meet the three latest additions, Edmund (7/17/14), Oliver (7/31/14), and Jillian (9/4/14).  Here's our matriarch, the babies' Great Grandma, with Oliver...

 ...which gave me a chance to hold Jillian...

 

 

 ...and with Jillian...

 ...and with Edmund!

 

  And Oliver got lots of lovin' from the rest of the clan.  With Great Uncle Steve...

 ...and Great Aunt Carol...

 ...and cousin Beth...

 ...with cousin Molly...

 

 ...with Aunt Jenny...

 

 ...and cousins Troy & Galen...

 

 Molly & her cousinettes

 Cate, Bea, Vianne, & Margot

 Proud Grandma Carol with Jillian

 The Baby Mamas

 Molly has chickens out back...

 

 

 ...and a fun playhouse...

 

 

 Back at Grandma's for our last evening of the trip...

 ...and then we packed up & headed out on Monday morning...

 I remembered to take pics of Oliver on this flight!

The flights home went very smoothly considering and Vianne continued to be highly entertained with the "special treats" in her backpack, which now included a Doc McStuffins doll from Ava and two little bears & some candies from Grandma!  We made it back to California safe & mostly sound, happy to see our husband/Daddy again!