Deep in the Heart

The Howards headed to Dallas last week to visit Christi's family and had a great time! Claire did great on her first plane ride. She didn't get too fussy on the way up or down, she just decided to have a diaper worthy of a wardrobe malfunction. The funniest sight to see was the tag-team diaper change in the back of the plane!

Let's get this baby off the ground!

On Friday we finally gave Jon a drive-by tour of downtown Dallas which included lunch at the downtown El Fenix Mexican restaurant, pictures in front of the Convention Center with the longhorns sculptures, and a drive by the grassy knoll.


That night everyone gathered at Aunt Nancy's house for dinner and "Claire time". She was such a trooper and was so well behaved the whole weekend. She loved meeting all of the family!

The next day we went bowling with all the kids and Uncle Chris met up for a quick visit. We also got our second dose of Mexican food at a local El Fenix. Jon filled up on 5 tamales this time! Then we took a drive out to the country to Uncle Pat and Aunt Jane's for dinner. Pat did an awesome job smoking some chickens in his barrel smoker.

To round out our eating tour of Texas, we went to lunch at the new Harbour development on Lake Ray Hubbard in Rockwall. They had lots of fun shops including a tobacco store called En Fuego. Jon decided to play a joke on Christi by purchasing a mini cigar and giving it to Claire to play with. Let's just say she wasn't amused. That night Aunt Nancy made a wonderful home cooked Sunday dinner. Claire got some great quality time with Nana that night and the pictures turned out so cute.

In all, the whirlwind weekend was a success. Claire (and Jon & Christi) had a wonderful visit with everyone and enjoyed the taste of nice warm weather. Good thing we got our flight out just before the major storm grounded all flights the next day!

Here's a slide show of all the pictures we took. Enjoy!

Playdates & Potpourri

Sorry it's been so long since we've blogged..but here we go. The last few weeks have been tons of fun with Claire. We've had a few playdates and Claire was even awake for most of them. First we had a big group playdate with some of mommy's friends from VT and all of their older kids at Darcy and Rodney's beautiful home. Claire can't wait until she's big enough to run around with all of them. Rodney is a professional photographer and took lots of great shots that afternoon. Check a couple of them out!

Then we had a playdate with Claudia and Darren's new baby Sofia. She is just 3 weeks younger than Claire, but is oh so teeny! They had fun holding hands and arm wrestling. Christi and Claudia had fun swapping mommy battle scars!

We also had another playdate this past week with Ella and Erika. Ella was very intrigued by Claire's crying and why those sounds were coming from someone/thing other than her. Ella has become so cute and smiley!

Claire also had new visitors this month. Mommy's friends Kim and Trissie came to meet her. She can't wait to meet Trissie's baby Teagan in a few weeks! We hosted Trissie's baby shower this weekend and it was a great time. Teagan is set with all of her new gear!

Claire also had lunch with Grandma and Granny this week. She always loves to see them. See how cute she looks when Granny pinches her cheeks!

Claire turned 2 months old today. She is getting cuter by the day (at least that's what mommy and daddy think!) She has really started to smile and interact with us. She's also starting to roll onto her side and is pushing up during tummy time. She scoots with her feet on the changing table, so we have to start being careful she doesn't scoot away when we aren't looking. She also picked up a new trick from her friend Ella...sucking her thumb. Hopefully she doesn't do it for as long as mommy did as a kid. Breaking the habit is hard for a 3rd grader! We had her 2 month doctor's appointment this past week and Claire is a whopping 12 lbs 7 ounces and 23.5 inches long. That's 90th percentile for our little chubbs, but the rolls and cheeks are so cute! She got her next round of vaccinations and was a little cranky for a day afterwards but is feeling better now.

Next week the Howards travel to Dallas to visit Christi's family. We are looking forward to Claire's first airplane ride (sort of?!) and getting to meet new relatives. We are also going to try and show Jon a little of the city. He's been there 4 or 5 times now and still hasn't seen downtown! We'll post pictures when we get back.