We've Got a New Grandson!

His name is Miles. He arrived on Thursday, September 23 weighing 9 lbs. 8 oz. and almost 22 inches tall! Tori, Ryan and Owen are excited to have him join their family. He is one incredibly cute baby!

I'm really glad that I got to travel to Florida the following Saturday to meet him. Big brother Owen was happy to have a new little brother but was in dire need of lots of attention.

Shortly after my arrival, Ryan's family paid us a visit. We were very thankful for the lunch they brought! I had been at church all morning and hadn't been able to prepare anything.

Sweet and hugable Miles!

I got to spend lots of time with Owen during my stay and loved every minute of it! His bag of plastic balls and giant parachute provided entertainment for one whole morning. Our favorite activity was to make "smoothies". We threw the balls which represented fruit into the center of the parachute. Owen would join them in the center. I would pull up the parachute around Owen and the balls and shake it back and forth to make our "smoothie". He also really liked the parachute "tent" and the picnic he had under it.

We played lots of games. We enjoyed story time and computer games at the library. I took him out to lunch and bought him his favorite chicken nugget kids meal. He drank the apple juice and took a couple of bites of waffle fries before heading to the playground. Luckily he was hungry enough to grab an occasional bite during playtime and actually ended up eating the whole meal!

Miles at five days old!

One rainy day we went to my cousin Becky's house (who amazingly happens to live in the same community). Her son Joseph and Owen (both two years old) had a great time playing with the toys while I enjoyed visiting with my cousin. Later that same day, stir-crazy Owen ran outside to play in the rain. Oh, how he loved it!

Some of the neighbor kids came out to join him.

Owen loves his little brother!

After a very hectic, stress-filled Thursday, Friday dawned bright and beautiful. Owen and I took the opportunity to play at the park on the "yellow" playground....

...and visit the zoo.
First stop was the pool where Owen turned into a fish! I soon discovered that
he is quite the swimmer.

After a quick picnic lunch by the pool, Owen led me to the "playground",

then to the water tank where he held the horseshoe crab for about one second. We traveled from there to the petting zoo which held an unusual collection of critters. There were armadillos, alpacas, giant lizards and goats. Owen bravely "petted" each one.

On our way to find the leapords we saw some black swans and stopped to feed the birds.

We never did get to the leapord cage. There were way too many distractions.

The photo booth was actually a rocket ship in Owen's mind. People would walk by, see some feet dangling beneath the strips and hear "5, 4, 3, 2, 1--Blastoff!"

He rode the train, I thought, for the first time (I found out later that he'd ridden it several times). I was a little disappointed in the sites we saw--some camels and a couple of ostriches--but Owen loved riding that train!

I spotted what looked like a convention of vultures in some treetops--a little unnerving.
Miles was in great form Friday evening.

It was hard to leave him and the rest of his family the next morning. I miss that sweet family. I'm really looking forward to seeing them all again in December!