BIG News!!

We have some very exciting news to share; Josh's sister, Jenna, and her boyfriend Kyle are engaged!!! We couldn't be happier for them!! Kyle will make a great addition to the Lange family, it feels like he is already family!! As far as I know, they are planning a wedding for summer/spring of '09. It sounds far away, but I know it will go fast!

As far as our news, not much is new. We had another busy, but really fun weekend! Saturday was spent with lots of little ones. Neil Austin dropped off his 1 year old son, Zeke, at about 8:30 and he spent the day with us. What a wonderful little boy!! He was perfect all day long! He is such a sweet boy. Mom came over to visit and help with the boys. Also, Kelly Wolford and her little girl, Kiley, came over too. It was a really fun afternoon with all the babies!!

Saturday evening was Griffin's first sleepover without mom and dad. He stayed at Grandma Patti's house while Josh and I went out in Albany. We had a lot of fun, maybe even too much! Sunday was spent remembering why we don't go out that late and drink that much anymore :-) It was great to be out again and see everyone though! Also on Sunday, we had our final Christmas celebration for the year. My mom's family got together in Farming. Many of them had not met Griffin yet. It was nice to see everyone again, we don't see that side of the family very often, it's a very big family! My mom is one of 12 kids.

Griffin is changing so much! He's really starting to smile and coo! His new favorite things to do are sitting in his swing looking up at the mobile, and laying under his activity mat looking at all the different toys and lights! He's growing up so fast!! It's sad to think I only have a few more weeks home with him.

One More Christmas to Go!!

This past weekend was very eventful. The weekend began with a little birthday get together at PJ's restaurant in Avon for me. It was a great evening! Josh's entire family, including his Grandma Annette, joined my family, including Grandma and Grandpa Oehrlein and Amy. The food was great and the company was even better! Mom and Dad surprised me with a new Cricut cutter for scrapbooking, I'm very excited to use it. I've got quite a few pictures of Griffin to get started with!

Saturday Josh went icefishing, again. Griffin and I hung out at home, it was too cold to do anything else! In the evening we went to Rice to help celebrate the marriage of Debbie Austin and Jim Wensel. It's always great seeing the Austin's! I no more got in the door and my baby was in the arms of an admirer. I didn't really see him the rest of the night!! Lots of ladies wanted to hold the handsome little boy!

Sunday was my actual birthday, and one of my best to date! The morning was pretty lazy, all four of us laid in bed for a while before getting up for the day. I was surprised with a beautiful necklace from Griffin and a beautiful ring from Josh. Both have Griffin's birth stone in them, they are perfect!!! We went to church in Albany and then to Hillcrest for Josh's Grandpa's Christmas. The afternoon was spent at Grandpa Digger's house with the whole family. It was a really fun time, all three little Lange babies were there - Kiley, 4 months - Easton, 2 months - and Griffin, 6 weeks. We got some great pictures, including a 4 generation picture!

We had a pretty crazy weekend! We've only got one more Christmas get together left. That's right, it's the end of January and we are still going to Christmas'! Josh couldn't be happier!

What's new?

Creating a blog seems to be the thing to do, so better late than never here we go! I just got done reading Rhonda's blog for the first time and I thought it was a great way to keep everyone up to date on what's going on in our lives.

As you know, Josh and I are still adjusting to parenthood. We have been proud parents for just over 5 weeks and have loved every second of it. Okay, maybe not every second - lack of sleep, loud cries, dirty diapers, etc. But it's all so worth it!!!! It's only been a few weeks, but it's hard to imagine our life without Griffin. He truly is a blessing and we thank God every day for this miracle!

Griffin is becoming more and more alert each day. When he was just 3 weeks old, he rolled over from his belly to his back. We thought it was just an accident, but he's done it several times since then! It's amazing to watch him learn and begin interacting with us. Before we know it he'll be walking.

After Christmas, we all enjoyed a week off by going to the cabin up north. (Josh's mom and dad's). The cabin is near Pine River. Josh was able to get some fishing in almost every day. The highlight of his fishing was spearing a 9 pound northern. He also got some snowmobiling in with his dad, and some snowshoeing with me. Josh is back to work now and enjoying the laid back winter hours. He's home most nights by 5:45. It's been great having him home so early compared to his summer hours. He gets to spend a couple hours with Griffin every night.

I continue to love my maternity leave!! I'll return to work March 3. As much as I like my job at the bank, I am really enjoying every minute I get to spend at home being a mom. Griffin and I stay very busy - if we are not running errands or visiting people, we are home with visitors or working on his baby book and keeping up with household chores. We have really enjoyed all of you who have come to visit us!! And we look forward to more visits!! In the last week, I started working out again. The last weeks of my pregnancy I really missed exercising! I started going to yoga again on Monday nights and I started going to Suburban Racquetball Club a couple times a week. So far it hasn't been a problem to find someone to watch Griffin. Thankfully, the Grandma's have been more than happy to watch him for a couple hours!!