Mariel's cousin!

Mariel found out in December that she has a cousin who is just a week older than her! His name is Brandon and he lives in Colorado. They got to meet during the week that Gramma Sells family came for the funeral. They had a blast playing together, and actually, Mariel learned to stand up in her playpen during these pictures. She was watching Brandon and learned how!!!

 

Early morning...can't sleep!

It's almost 2 in the morning, and I can't sleep. Eric, Mariel and I all have bad colds. My mind is racing and I keep running this list of things to do in my head... aGH! This was one of the things on my "list" so maybe I'll sleep a little better. Anyway, enjoy some late night entertainment and the pictures. The bath picture is from a few weeks ago. The bib picture is well... Xmas of course. We developed a couple rolls of pictures finally... and there was OLD stuff on there. I'll throw up a few more on here so you can see how much she's changed... I never realized how much of a little chubby Mariel used to be! She's really growing!!

 

Just to let you know...

I just wanted to let you know that we have pictures of Mariel, recent ones, but they are on our 35mm camera. We're developing the film this week and will have some to put on the blog. My digital camera's battery is KAPUT! so I have to get a new one... which is part of the reason why I haven't been getting pictures on the blog lately.
We've been doing a lot of video taping too, so hopefully one weekend soon, we'll get some tapes and send out some copies!
Also, we can't wait to see Grandma and Grandpa! (Wes & Susan) They are coming out to Oregon for Mariel's first birthday, March 24! We're planning a birthday party, with the works, and I'm so excited... can't wait!

More from Sears... (this one is my FAVORITE!!)

These are quite possibly my most favorite pictures of Mariel... these were taken the weekend after Thanksgiving. She had a cold at the time, but she did so well.

Christmas 2005 ( a little late!)

We had this taken at Sears, and Mariel was SO good during the pictures! She kept wanting to stick her hands in her mouth ( she was teething pretty heavily) and so if you look closely on some of these pictures you'll see a little 'sheen' to Mariel's hands! :)

Monthly Update

Hi everyone, just an update! Was talking to my grandma tonight and realized that again, it's been a months since I've updated the blog. Where does the time go? I go to work each day, come home, Mariel naps, I clean house, Eric comes home from work, we have dinner, Mariel plays and then takes a bath and goes to bed, then Eric and I catch up on the day with a little chat or watch some TV and relax, then boom@!#! It's bedtime (9:00) and I have to get up at 5:45 and start it all over again. Weekend comes and it's full of getting all the things done that we couldn't do in during the week! Wow, it's crazy how time flies by.
Mariel is now 10 months old and on New Years Day... actually that morning, she started CRAWLING!! At last! Now she's a machine filled with Energizer batteries and does nothing but play, crawl, play, crawl, stand up ... oops! fell on her bottom... and then crawling off to another toy again. She's becoming little miss independence too. Eating foods on her own, and learning how to use the sippy cup. She's saying words like "done" and "da da" and such too! She knows where "noses" and "eyes" and "toes" are... it's awesome!

Anyway, to the good stuff, I wasn't going to show these until after everyone got their pictures but Oma hasn't seen a Mariel update or picture in quite awhile now so I don't want to hold out any longer. So to all family back at home... you're Christmas gifts are coming and extremely late, and these pictures will just give you a hint at what you're getting! Enjoy!!!!

Mariel's First Christmas!

Mariel had a BLAST playing with her new toys! She is currently taking apart Lego Blocks and discussing with Daddy how she make an even bigger mess of the front room...
Thank you everyone for all the toys, clothes, bears, and other gifts for Mariel! She is having a great Christmas...

LOVE TO ALL OF YOU and MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Eric " Post Surgery"...

(Eric's going to hate me for this... but I wanted you to see the progress...)
Dec 20th... the big day. Here's Eric... post surgery on Dec 22. He looks even better than this today (23rd). His face is getting less swollen and his tongue is actually looking like a tongue again. He can talk for the most part, and is partaking of some sherbert as I sit here! Wish him luck!

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Take a look at the bottom of that tree!!! Then take a long look at the cute baby that is the recipient of a majority of those presents!! HOLY COW!!! I don't think we'll get through them before Mariel's morning nap!

Thank you so much to all of you that sent gifts for us...

Here it is at last! Grandpa Wes has been working SO hard on getting this finished for Mariel. It's a beautiful high chair made of Walnut? (hope that's right Dad...). Anyway, he spent a lot of time on it, and we're going to enjoy using it as Mariel gets older. Thanks so much Grandpa!

Christmas has come!

Embarrassment...I'm so ashamed that it has been a month already since I last posted anything to the site. We have been so busy with so many things that it seems the time is just flying by!
Here it is, Mariel's first Christmas and WE ARE SO EXCITED! I could hardly contain myself tonight... I was almost going to let Mariel open just one present... but Eric said no way. I guess I have to be the adult now :(. So Mariel sits patiently waiting to rip into one of those shiny things under the tree. At least 20 times a day I have to whisk her away from the tree. She's a quick one these days! She's now learned to pull herself into a standing position in her crib, in her playpen, well.. just about anywhere where she can get a good grip. She hasn't started full on crawling yet, still doing the "commando" style crawl.
Anyway, we have had a really busy two weeks. Gramma Pursell passed away on December 8th, and so we were down in Grants Pass attending her funeral. It went well, and Gramma Sell would have been SO happy to see that all of Eric's family came together. Some hadn't seen eachother in up to 40 years!!!
After our tricky return over the snow blown mountain pass, we went to work for a day. Tuesday, the 20th, Eric had facial surgery. He spent one night in ICU, and then another night in a private suite in Hotel St.Charles Hospital.
You'll see his picture after this post. He's doing great now, but still has a sore throat. This is to be expected considering the amount of diggin around the surgeons did to him. He is sans tonsils, sans soft pallette, sans ability to swallow very well. He's eating lots of soup and finally moved onto mashed potatoes tonight! Yippee!
Anyway, he's getting a little better each day... so lets just hope that the breathing ability is better after all the healing is done!

Anyway, here it is, the night before the night before Xmas, and I'm catching up the last few weeks. Mariel's been her amazing cute little self, but has developed a touch of a cold. She's getting her two top front teeth in and so a combonation of not feeling well combined with teething is making for a little fussy baby at times. Overall though, she is as cute as ever. She's waving to EVERYTHING she sees and is recognizing... and sometimes I swear to it... she's saying Mamma and Dadda (to the appropriate person!).

Enjoy the couple pics and I hope you all have a TERRIFIC Christmas!!!

Just an update!

Just wanted to pop in and give an update! Mariel is now learning to crawl, yeah! She's starting to scoot forward a little on her arms and legs, but still can't seem to get that little Buddha belly off the ground. :)
She's learning to click her tongue, holds her own bottle now, and is putting toys in and out of things. She's eating Cheerios, and after last week we're going to avoid apricots for awhile. They gave a nasty bought of diaper rash, one that we hope will NOT be repeated.

She's doing great and Eric was playing on the floor with her, so I snapped a quick shot!

Swim Class

Here's Mariel in a moment of utter bliss. She LOVES the water!!! She especially notices the cute lifeguards that keep walking by to check on her... he he he.

Swimmers, Paddlers and Floaters...

Mariel is swimming! I wasn't sure how many of you knew or not, but we are enrolled in a swim class full of playing and splashing and singing songs! There are all girls in the class, and one little one even has the same swimsuit as Mariel.
She loves the water and loves to watch water come out of the squirting fish. She's gone underwater twice and done great both times.

No other flower could smell as sweet!

Mariel dressed up as the cutest flower! We started out Halloween getting dressed up in orange and black for the day, and then Mariel got into costume! We visited Janet, Paul and Nikoa (family friends) and then visited George Franklet Sr. (Uncle George's Dad) at the hospital. It made him as well as Judy (his wife) and Aunt Amanda and Uncle George smile! The nurses huddled around to laugh and giggle with Mariel and she even brought some smiles to other patients that were able to sneak a peek at her! Later, we visited Heather and Grace for a minute just to say "hi".
Mariel scored a TON of candy (to be consumed by Daddy and Mommy at a later date) and had a great time. We had only ONE trick-or-treater... so we ended up with lots of leftover chocolate... ah shucks :).

Anyway, hope everyone had a fun filled Halloween!!! 

HAPPY HALLOWEEN ! ! ! October 31, 2005

Moorey wishes everyone... a Happy Halloween!!! 

What are those things falling down on me?

 

Watching the leaves falling from the Crabapple tree! 

Playing with the leaves... (don't worry we washed her up good after doing this, and no... she didn't eat any leaves). Eric was standing next to her, out of view, making sure that those leaves didn't end up in her mouth!