Three Months Old/Thanksgiving.

Harrison is three months old! Time has flown by!

Much has happened over the last several weeks to update you all about.

Harrison experienced his first plane ride on his way to visit his family in Oregon. The trip to Oregon was great. Harrison still can't stay awake for very long, about an hour out of every three hours, so I think that made Grandma sad because he couldn't stay up and play for long. Next time though! He only got to see the ocean once but he got to see family several times and that was great!

The plane ride was not fun for Harrison, Nathan or me. Harrison loves his crib, a little too much. So much so that he really can't fall asleep in someone's arms so once he ate and played for a bit he then got cranky and because he couldn't be put down on a flat surface he screamed for two hours... Not whiny cry, scream! And we are sure it wasn't his ears. So Nathan and I have decided to drive to California for Christmas. The drive may be long but sanity is more important. Harrison enjoys his car seat while the car is moving so we think it will be an okay trip. We are just praying that the weather cooperates. Feel free to pray with us :)

I am back at work and it's bitter sweet. I don't want to leave when I'm home with him and I miss him while at work but when I'm at work, I enjoy being there. I enjoy being around lots of people and I like being busy helping students. CCU is such a great place to work at, it's like a home away from home. The hardest part though is coming home exhausted! I'm also working a bit from home right now too and those days are even more exhausting! We hardly ever eat out now so the days I'm home I'm cooking, doing laundry, cleaning, playing with Harrison and working. Thanks goodness for good Christmas music!

This week I found out that I will be able to work from home for a few hours a week over the next few months. Come May my boss and I will have to come up with another plan but until May (when my students graduate) I will be working in the office and home. This makes it so that we actually won’t have to take Harrison to daycare and both Nathan and I can spend more time with him. We have also hired our very own NANNY! Lindsi Holm is watching him on Mo

ndays and Wednesdays at our house. She's our Pastor's daughter so we have gotten to know over the last few years. This summer she was a part of our college group. She's in classes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, only, so it's perfect! She's nannied before too. We think Harrison will just love her!

So here are the updates on Harrison:

• He can now lift his head up off of a pillow for ten to five-teen minutes. Unfortunately he isn’t able to lift his head off of the floor as well. We’ll keep at it though. He is crying less so that’s nice.
• Harrison has found his hands and loves sucking on them. This morning was actually the first morning where he woke up at 4am and started talking. He was talking with his hands in his mouth. I went in to give him his pacifier as usual but was shocked to find him happy as a clam, chatting away.
• That’s another change, he’s very chatty now. We will sit him down next to us while we read or are on the computer and he’ll try to get our attention by talking to us.
• He now follows us around the room with his eyes and most of the time he moves his whole head to do so.
• He now enjoys his Baby Bjorn.
• We give Harrison a bath every evening now before bed. We also read to him every morning.
• He notices Bentley a lot more now. He doesn't necessarily like his kisses but he doesn't scream at them either so that's good.
• I have packed up all of his 0-3 month clothes and now he is in 3-6... It's weird though. The sizes are very different for each brand so some of the clothes he fits into are 6-9 months. In Charters he's now in the 6 month size. He's a very long boy. He doesn't fill them out in width but definitely in length. Today I was actually shocked when I put him in his car seat... he only has a few more inches to go and his head will be at the top of it.
• Sunday was his first day in the church nursery and he did fabulously well! He loved their little bouncy seat. He stayed awake the whole time only to fall asleep right after we got home.
• Harrison is still on the three hour schedule. He eats, plays and then sleeps for about an hour and a half every three hours until seven when he finally is put to bed. We wake him up one more time at nine to feed him and then he sleeps until four. We give him his pacifier and then that gets us two more hours until we feed him and start our day at six. At four months he'll move to every four hours with a two hour nap (hopefully).
• He now won't stay swaddled. We still attempt it but his hands get out every time so next week we might try no swaddle at all. We just don't know what nap time routine we can do though to clue him in that it's nap time...
• We have to admit it, Harrison's head is flat! We are using a wedge to get him napping on his side but we still keep him on his back at night. I think all the tummy time is helping too. Hopefully he won't have a funny shaped head for the rest of his life. If he does he can blame it on the doctors and SIDS not us... My doctor would flip if he knew we were using a wedge to get him to sleep on his side.
• We read to him every morning from a Children's Bible story book and he is now staring at the pages! I don't think he has a clue that I'm reading from it but he's at least looking at the pictures now.

Here are a few pictures to share with you all.

This was on our hike around Garden of the Gods in Colorado Springs.

Harrison with his great grandma Ruth. See the resemblance? Those Scandinavian genes never let go.

Harrison with his Aunt Nikole and Uncle Joel. Joel is a baby whisperer by the way.

This is the four generations picture.

Family picture :)

It was a bit too chilly so we were only on the beach for a few minutes.

Since we will be in Denver until the 23rd and it's Harrison's first Christmas we decided to get a real Christmas tree! YAY! I think we will start a Christmas ornament tradition with him too. Maybe with every child, if God gives us more down the road. Then when they get their own house they can have a box of their ornaments. A friend of ours gave us the idea.

Harrison's stalking was a Christmas gift from his great Aunt Charlotte.

Here's a picture of Harrison's tummy time improvement.

Here's just another picture... I can't stop taking them and can't stop sharing them :) Do you think he looks like one of us more than the other?

I had a little fun with the camera :)

Our Christmas cards are on the way!

Love you all!