First, Kenzie is 11 months old today! :) She's getting so incredibly big, but more and more adorable every day. She says, "Ha!" for "Hi", "Da" for "Dog", "Dada" for almost everything else (including Mama.). She took her first steps on Friday night! She walked 2 steps to me from Tyler, then I aimed her back at Tyler and she got too excited and crawled to him. Then walked 2 steps back to me! I wish I had it on camera, but I was just glad that Tyler & I both got to witness her first steps! We are so excited for her first birthday party which is coming up next month.
Tyler started an internship 2 weeks ago with the State Legislation. He has been working hard for them! He seems to be enjoying it mostly though. Unfortunately, during his first week he got pretty sick and had to stay home for a few days, but he's mostly better now. Tyler is training for a marathon that he is signed up for. The marathon is in April and he is getting pretty nervous. I am so proud of him though! :) He's such an inspiration to me.
Kenzie got sick last week too- and is still working on getting over it. She was sick for about 8 days- then we took her to the doctor and he told us that she had a bronchial infection. He gave us some antibiotics for it, and that has seemed to help. He also told us to give her solid foods, but no bottle for a while because it would just make her worse. That was a glimpse into the near future. It hasn't been bad, just weird. We normally put her to bed using her formula, but the last few days we've been using apple juice, or water. It's so crazy to think that within 1 month- she won't be on formula anymore at all. And, I'm sure she'll be walking well. Wow. Where did the time go? I mean, wasn't I just in the hospital with her welcoming her to the world, and to my family? I look back at pictures and videos of her over the last 11 months and almost can't remember before she smiled, or giggled, or rolled over, or crawled, etc. She learns so fast. It amazes me. She knows that a Monkey says "Ooo ooo ooo" except she improvises the sound a little. Her's sounds more like "uh uh uh". She also uses that sound for dogs, and every other animal she sees. It's adorable. When I ask her what a baby says, she says "Dada". She makes my day! She's learned how to click with her mouth, how to do raspberries with her mouth, etc. She has also learned how to climb the stairs. She rolls over during every diaper change- which makes it now a 2 person job when she's on her changing table. She's rolled over during them for a while, but it used to be easier to get her to stay put (ie: give her a toy...) But not anymore. Oh, she also hugs her toys a lot. If you hand her a stuffed animal (her bear, or giraffe are her favorites), she'll squeeze it really close to her. She sleeps with the bear in her crib, and I quite frequently see her hugging it, or with her arm over it when I go to wake her up. This morning was funny- she was awake when I went in to get her- standing up in her crib like she often is. She heard the doorknob move, and yelled "HAAAAAA!" (meaning hi) at me the second she saw me. It was ADORABLE! Oh man, I love that baby.

And on to my sister's baby- Laurie/Mike had their baby on January 3rd. His name is Gabriel Michael Edsberg. He was 7 pounds 4 ounces, and 18 inches long (which we think was wrong because he measured 20.5" a couple of days later.). He is so stinkin' cute. Dark brown hair, blue eyes (for now- we'll see if they stay that way). He looks a lot like Mike, but still looks like Laurie too- a very cute mix. I haven't been able to see them much though. I saw Gabriel the day he was born, and then 2 weeks later. But, I haven't seen him since. :( It's hard to get over there, and since Kenzie's been sick- we haven't been able to have them over here as planned either. We DO NOT want to chance getting that cute boy sick. It is miserable! It's hard enough when their a little older, but 1 month is just way to young to be sick!! Laurie is the cutest little mommy! She loves Gabriel so much already! :) Love you sis! I look forward to getting to know my sweet new nephew more as he grows. Apparently- he has now started smiling. Yay! It just gets funner from here! :)




Oh, and Christmas...forgot to post about that too....wow. I missed a lot. Well, Christmas was great- mostly due to our wonderful families. We started out the morning at our house, opened all of our presents, and lots of clothes for Kenzie. Along with a fun play table that she loves! Then we went to my Mom's for breakfast, then opened presents. I got a cookbook- which has LOTS of recipes that sounds really good. And some money. Tyler got some money as well, and something else- but I can't remember what. Kenzie was sleeping there- so I had to open her presents for her. But she got lots of cute toys from Grandma! After that, it was off to my Dad & Pat's house. We did a light lunch, and saw lots of family there too. My Grandma, Aunt/Uncle & 2 cousins were there along with Mikey/Alanna & Laurie/Mike. We all exchanged gifts, and Kenzie got even more clothing, and lots of toys. (which we had to buy a toy box for afterwards. otherwise- our house would have looked like a toy tornado hit it!). Then it was off to Tyler's mom's house. We did dinner there, and exchanged gifts with Zach/Lindsey. Kenzie got some blocks from them- which she loves. Kenzie had opened her gifts from Grandma at our house that morning (a bunch of 18 month clothing because she was growing out of all of her 12 month clothes...yeah, she was only 9 months old...crazy tall child! Ha.). Overall, I think that Kenzie's first Chrismas was a success! I love that we took a bunch of pictures (check out my facebook- I don't feel like posting them all here.), and a long video on our camcorder. :)
Oh, and Tyler has taken a bunch of cute pictures of her since Christmas- I won't post all of them, but here are a few.












































