Our Blog

Ok, so I haven’t blogged in months.  I seriously doubt anyone has even noticed, but I’m strangely feeling guilty by not blogging.

Where are we now?  Well, a truckload of diapers and wipes and a ton of bottles later, Dixon is now just about 6 months old.  He just started eating solid foods.  Whoever knew that rice cereal could be such an exciting adventure?  He lunges at the stuff like there was nothing else better in the world to eat.  Actually, we’re pretty sure that if we let him eat spaghetti, he’d find a way to gum it down his toothless mouth too.  He seems to always be hungry.

He’s got a 6-month old well-baby check up on April 13th (yup, Friday the 13th!) and we’re thinking he’ll be about 20-1/2 lbs at that appointment.  He hasn’t gained much weight since his 4-month appointment, I guess it’s about that time that babies start to plateau anyway.  Hey, I’m plenty fine with it, I think my arms are going to fall out of my shoulders sometimes, he’s quite the solid chunk to hold!  I love it though, he’s so kissable, huggable, laughs so much and gosh darn it, he’s just so cute!  We’re collecting a lot of good blackmail-able photos and videos too.

The adoption was finalized on March 19th, hooray!  We received an official certificate in the mail last week and celebrated with Subway sandwiches (kind of lame, I know…but the sandwich was delicious!).

Michael Tang turned 3 yesterday.   We went over to wish him a happy birthday, have some cake, pie & ice cream (awesome that his b-day is so close to Thanksgiving for a plethora of treat selections!) and then Andrew practiced adjusting us on his special table as well.  Fun family times!

He’s grown out of all his newborn size clothing, width and lengthwise.  Dixon has an appointment in December for a check-up.  2 weeks ago he was 10 lbs on the dot.  We can’t complain, he’s a very pleasant and good-tempered little one.

Dixon is so cute that he’s knocking the socks off of every single person he’s ever come in contact with.  We are so thankful for this precious gift.

Watching a baby sleep is like watching a campfire.  There’s not much happening, but you can’t help stare at it anyway.

On Tuesday, Dixon weighed 8 lbs 3 oz.  OnThursday he weighed 8 lbs 9 oz…wow!  He is definitely growing fast…although you wouldn’t think it to look at him since all he does is sleep, sleep, sleep.  That’s his job though, sleep and grow.  Love you little bug!

Yesterday Dixon met his pediatrician for the first time.  Without his diaper on, he weighed in at 8 lbs 3 oz.  Yup, he’s already getting bigger!  He’s drinking on average between 3-4 oz at every feeding and he’s just thriving.  Yesterday the car battery completely pooted out as I was getting ready to leave the house, so we borrowed a car (thanks to my friend and neighbor) so Dixon could make it to his appointment…even though we were late (sadly, we became one of “those” patients).   Of course I bought a new battery at Les Schwab on the way home. Steve’s dad picked him up from work and both Nana and Gramps came by because of course they couldn’t pass by an opportunity to see Dixon again, he is so very loved!

On October 8, 2011, James Dixon Barker was brought into the world.  7 lbs 7oz and 21 inches long.  Through the miracle of adoption, our most special birth parents chose us to be the parents of this perfect, beautiful little boy.  He is cute as a bug and we are in love with this little guy.  We’re so excited to watch Dixon grow and learn.

Yes, I know.  I’ve overloaded the blog post for the month.  Maybe I should be better and spread it out a bit more, but there you have it, we’re still alive and well.  So, I’m pretty convinced that there’s not  much that compares with the payoff of bottling fruit to last the whole year.  Last year I bottled a whole lotta pears.  This year I did pears and peaches.  They’re so pretty, I just like to look at them.   (I have nowhere else to store them than in the laundry room…just focus on the bottles, not the clutter around them!)

We spent several days with the Steed family in Round Rock (and Austin) Texas.  We brought a cold spell with us, the weather dropped down to the 90s for our visit (uh, cold spell…yes…).  A plethora of activities kept us busy and happy!  Michele & Steve went walking in the mornings with the little girls while I ran out and back on the Brushy Creek Trail.

On Wednsday, we picked up Jason from work in Austin and went to Wahoo’s for fish tacos.  Ruby was more happy to eat the black beans off my plate than the ones set before her…yum!

On Thursday we were at Athenian Bar & Grill with Ruby anxiously looking up to our plates, wondering when she could get her hands on that good stuff too!  We also went to visit a small part of one of the museums downtown that had a cool staircase.

On Friday, we drove down to Austin and rented a canoe and a double kayak for a ride down the river just by downtown Austin…sorry, don’t remember which river, but it’s pretty!

We were so thirsty from our water activities that we stopped at Jack-in-the-Box for $1 mix-your-own-drinks…the cups being as big as Sophie’s entire torso.

Football weekend started out at the Round Rock high school.  The Round Rock Dragons hosted the game and Cam was a part of the half-time entertainment in the Marching Band who were really great!  Cam is somewhere in the cluster of band members to the right.  The Dragons barely lost their game to the away team, too bad.

Michele & Michelle…cheering on the team!

Football Saturday!  In the morning, Steve & Jason stayed home to watch football on TV while Michele, Megan & I went to the movies to see ‘The Help’ (and it was so good that I actually cried a couple of times…ME, crying in a movie!!!  so it must really have been good if I cried, right?).   We met up with the rest of the family at Rudy’s for great BBQ…SO YUM!!!  Then we dropped off the kids back home and headed down to Austin to the BYU vs. TX college football game.

In the morning, I’d been on facebook with Matt Christensen and had mentioned trying to meet up somewhere at half-time, but then he and his brothers were driving and I never checked back online.  So, when Jeff Christensen called out Steve’s name as we were going around the concourse, it was a lucky run-in!  We probably haven’t seen Jeff, Tom or Matt Christensen since 2005 so it was great to catch up with them.

Really a lot of pomp and circumstance to this TX showing…definitely everything is done bigger (and may I really even say better) in this area.  I was amazed at the enthusiasm of the fans, even as TX was down for the entire first half of the game, they cheered like they were ahead the whole game.  The rest of us may have something to learn from that.  BYU lost by one point…not such a good 2nd half.  Too bad.

It’s us in TX!

Sunday morning, just playing with Ruby as everyone gets ready for church

On Monday it got back up to 102F.  We went out to lunch at Logan’s Grill, then topped off our appetites with some fantastic shaved ice.  Jason also got some Round Rock Donuts to take back home for the kids in school.

Can’t wait to go back to visit the Steeds again one day, we always have a grand ol’ time with them and they are such great hosts to us, THANKS SO MUCH STEEDS!!!!

So about a month ago, we went to visit the Steeds in Texas…and what a fun time it was (thanks Steeds!).  They are such an awesome family and we can’t wait to see them again!  One of the many highlights of our trip was to see the BYU vs UT football game in Austin.  Our seats (although very, very high up for Michele) were excellent.  The game was excellent, but the final score wasn’t so excellent for our alma mater (Jason was a happy camper though…yes, we had a orange-bleeding Longhorn amongst our party).

I’ll tell you one thing though, the band is impressive and they sure do know how to put on an interesting halftime show.  The fans are excellent too, something BYU fans in a home crowd could learn a little more from I will even venture to say!  Good times, good times…

Luckily we ran into Steve and Michele’s cousins (Jeff, Tom & Matt Christensen) whom we haven’t seen in ages, grew to catch up with them after so long.

…more about our TEXAS trip to come!