Arms up!

One of Kai's new moves is when you say "arms up" he does this :)

Peek-a boo! We love Tutu

My mom, aka Tutu has been coming up on Sundays and spending the night. then hanging out with Kai on Mondays. It has been so great. This week was her last Monday with us as after labor day she will be going back to a full time work schedule. WE will miss our Tutu time but we know we will still see her often.

Here are a few highlights from Tutu's visits over the past weeks.

Peek-a-boo!

peek-a-boo from Jenna Hales on Vimeo.

special visit

Last week, Kai had a special visit from his Grandpa and Gee and Gee's parents. It's not everyday Kai gets to meet his great grandparents!

Also, check out grandpa! Holding Kai at a whopping 20lbs! That's a lot of progress since his cycling accident in April. Nice work grandpa!

Where belly laughs come from

Daddy is so funny from Jenna Hales on Vimeo.

Belly Laugh

You know that feeling when you laugh so hard you cry? When you've laughed so hard for so long that it almost hurts? Kai does too :)

Belly Laugh from Jenna Hales on Vimeo.

Goin' for a ride on his new ride

Goin' for a ride from Jenna Hales on Vimeo.

Thanks for the crocs grandpa!

Play Time!

A Fun Weekend at Home

On Saturday we went downtown to the farmers market for a little adventure.

(notice the Craft Mafia posters in the foreground, for Jenna's craft fair the next day!)

Kai loves cruising around in his backpack

Kai and I stopped to look at the river, he loves watching the water.

Then we found some live music!

These guys were pretty good!

That night we watched our first football game and the 49ers won!

Jenna got up and headed out early for her craft show so Kai and I hung out all morning. Here he is getting ready to walk over to the art show.

 Check it out our friends from SF Siobhan and John stopped by!

 and grandpa & cousin Lena!

and our friend Mary!

No snow cone for Kai but he had one in spirit with his matching shirt :)

Nello's cool new hat, he's a mountain goat!

Jenna and her table at the craft show :)

Lena the Unicorn

Mom the Unicorn?!! haha

I think everyone in the world should wear a special hat :)

Kai & Mama

Me & Kai

Kai nibbling on my sunglasses :)

Fun at Grandma & Grandpa's house

Last night we went down to San Anselmo for a feast at grandma & grandpa's house. Kai had a blast exploring all of the new places to crawl and stand. He also loved spending time with his grandparents!

Grandpa showing Kai how the screen door slides...

... and Kai was very excited about it!

Hangin' out with the guys

Kai was very happy about seeing his grandparents!

shhh it is quiet time :)

A few bonus pics of Kai the Explorer and his new puzzle his friends gave him!

ps - thanks for the hat Nello! :)

one step, two step...

First steps (with walker) from Jenna Hales on Vimeo.

Bye-bye in action

bye-bye from Jenna Hales on Vimeo.

9 month check up

Kai had his 9 month doctor visit today and it went great. We switched to a new pediatrician and we LOVE him. He gave Kai a new book, which you can see he loves:

They went through the book together and Dr. H says Kai is at a 12 month old's level with some of his skills! Being able to point with one finger and wave bye-bye, and saying Dada and associating it with Mark (as opposed to just making the sound). He was impressed with all the cool things Kai can do, as are we of course.  

Kai weighs 20 lbs 9.8oz now and has grown to 27 1/4" long! Little man is growin' up :)

Bye-Bye!

My mom aka: Kai's Tutu has been coming up on Sundays and spending the night then spending the entire day on Monday with Kai. It has been so great having her here. It is really helpful to me to have another person around during the day so I can get a few things done that I normally wouldn't be able to do and Kai just LOVES his Tutu.

We are going to be very sad when Tutu has to go back to working full time, but until then we are soaking up the love. Tonight when my mom was leaving Kai waved bye-bye for the first time. It was really cute :) I'll try to get it on film soon, sometimes these new "tricks" come and go for a bit before they stick for good. So they can be illusive especially when the camera comes out. It was so cute seeing his little arm waving away as Tutu said goodbye.

Oh and also as suspected the 4th tooth is out! Popped out the same day as the court date and now they are slowly making there way in so when he smiles you can see a little bit of tooth up top, so cute!

Night time aquarium

Usually Kai would go straight to sleep when we put him in his crib at night, but ever since he's been more mobile and able to move himself around he has been "hanging" out in his crib before falling to sleep. We can usually hear him in there wiggling around, sometimes banging his hand on the side of the crib or talking to himself. He has a little light up aquarium that his grandparents gave him and he loves laying down and looking at it. Tonight we snuck in and snapped a picture. SO cute! Just hanging out checking out the light show :)

I love peas!

A VERY special day

Today has been a wonderful day. This morning we went to the court and finalized Kai's adoption! It's official, yay!! We feel so lucky to be Kai's mom and dad. There aren't really words that can fully express the amount of love and gratitude we feel for Kai's birthparents. And what a life changing experience this whole process has been for us.

Here is a picture from our court date - the judge said cases like ours are the ones he looks forward to the most :) He was very nice.

And as if that wasn't enough, we had another very special experience today, which was seeing Kai's birthparents! They came up for a visit and enjoyed hanging out and playing with Kai. It was the first time we have all seen each other since Kai was born. You could tell Kai had a connection to them which was cool to see. It's such a special relationship and we feel very blessed to be a part of it. We were saying after they left that we feel so lucky to get to know them, without Kai that would have never happened. They are both such good, smart, funny and interesting people. Here's a picture of Kai and his birth father, they were laughing it up. 

I think Kai's birth father put it best when I was telling them how grateful we are, he said that it was wonderful that we were all able to help each other. Kai agrees and is still sleeping off the high from the day... he's been napping for almost 2 hours :)

3rd tooth!

Kai got his third tooth today. It's his top left one. He's been working on it for awhile so this is definitely worth celebrating. I think #4 (the top right) is following right behind. #1 & #2 (bottom middles) came in together too, so maybe that's how he rolls, two teeth per time.

These top teeth have definitely been bothering him and have been a little harder to come through then the bottom ones so I'm hoping he'll have a little relief now that this one has finally popped out. Poor little buddy has been working really hard to get this tooth out. Good job Kai!

Here we are celebrating

and here's one where you can see the teeth. The one on the right hasn't broken through yet but I bet it does in the next day or so. It's funny how they look like little blisters right before they bust out. It'll be fun when they grow in a little more and he has four little teeth when he smiles :) He's already a cutie, but that's going to be off the charts cute. 

Oh and another little note worthy milestone is Kai is now going from crawling to sitting up and he is able to "walk" around furniture after pulling himself up to stand. It's crazy how quickly he learns. It's so fun to watch him figure things out. I'll try to get both of these new moves on video soon :)

I also wanted to take a moment and remember my brother who 31 years ago, when I was 6, left this world at 10 years old. I still miss him, and often think about what life would be like if he were still here.  Especially now having Kai in my life, I have even more compassion and respect for the strength and courage my parents have. What a horrible tragedy to lose a child. We were lucky to have had him in our lives.

Standin' up jam station