Back in Bangkok

The flight went really well, especially since we were upgraded to business class most of the way! Gretta was a fabulous traveler again, we are so lucky and thankful! We got quite a few comments from the flight attendants and other passengers that she was unbelievable, they were quite impressed and asked if she was like that all the time.

This morning I got stuff unpacked and made a trip to the grocery store, so doing a good job fighting off the jet lag. Usually the afernoon and evening are bad, it hits hard, so hopefully we'll find other things to do around 3 or 4!

We went up to our friend Laura's family cabin a couple weeks ago so thought we should post a few pics from that. Sorry, we've been a little behind on our blogging!

Tom and Josh show her "How to Make Fire"

Who needs a high chair? She's a big girl now.

Riley trying to cuddle Gretta and she is trying to play, she really liked her by the end of the weekend!

Devin and Gretta sharing!

Got to do some snowshoeing, which was part of our last hurrah to winter! We won’t be coming back until the end of May and by then winter should be over.

We’ll try to be better at updating now that we're far away again….

What can we say.....

We've been busy! Here are a few more of Christmas time and then we are moving on since it is January 13 already!

Gretta and Petra meet at last.....we think they really took a liking to eachother and are already planning many mischievous adventures for the future.

Gretta's first ski with Josh, Uncle Jeff, Uncle Joel and Auntie Angelie

Josh and Gretta flying through the snow.

We got a Burley for Christmas. Joel and Gretta agreed it needed to be tried out even if it was without the bike.

Gretta and Petra in their Christmas red dresses.

9 months and counting

Gretta is 9 months old today, time goes quicker every month!

Her latest thing lately is sticking out her tongue, throwing her head back and putting an arm up. We call it her "interpretive dance."

She has learned to feed herself Cheerios and gets a little piggy once in a while by stuffing 3 or 4 in at a time, we've learned to ration better.

Gretta is loving being at home and getting into EVERYTHING. Pulling things off shelves is her favorite. She has also started trying out the stairs, trying to climb from chairs to tables, standing up in her high chair and trying to get out, riding in grocery carts is new to her so she has been testing the boundaries by standing and trying to get out of those as well. Yes, we know they have straps and yes we have started using them.

More to come......

Ridiculously

That is the only way to say how busy we have been being back home. Here are a quick 2 pictures we have from Christmas to tease you and with hopes we'll have more time soon to update and post more pictures. It was a perfectly delightful 1st Christmas with our little gal, however, RIDICULOUSLY busy!

Gretta being very careful with the wrapping paper.....

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year (a little late!)

We're leaving....on a jet plane

We introduced Gretta to tinsel....maybe this bodes well for the Christmas tree! Hopefully she won't like the feel of that either and won't tear it down!

Or maybe she just needed a nap.

Or if its far away that helps....

Christmas in our lobby

Christmas in the mall


Christmas outside! Ahh...bubbles and sunshine...

We're leaving this....

and are going home to something like this!

Looking forward to being home soon!

Firsts....

Josh is in Bangladesh again until next week so its up to us to get ready to go home a week from today!

Right before Josh left, this little tough gal got her first "shiner". It looks worse in person I think. She and I were playing on the floor and her confident self didn't think she needed to hang on to something when she was standing and unfortunately or luckily (not sure which would be worse, the floor or my nose) she face planted onto my nose, we both cried it hurt so bad!! I really thought she might have broke my nose, but all is well.

FIRST TOOTH! Finally!! The first week of December we noticed that it was starting to break through and she doesn't let us look at it so I finally caught her making faces and you can kind of see it, its just barely breaking the skin on the right side.

A woman said to me today "Her eyes are so beautiful, what color do you call that?" I said "Blue", and she repeated "Blue".....I watched her amazement and awe at trying to understand what the color "Blue" was by looking at Gretta's eyes and it was like what she was looking at was something never discovered before!

Note to parents everywhere: The votes are in on most popular toy for babies this year! Gretta gives two thumbs up on this plastic water bottle. She loves to look through it and have others look through it at her, or roll it around on the floor and chase it, or gnaw on the top, or bang it on the table. She is entertained by it in so many ways. It's a very practical, versatile toy and also gives you another use for plastic water bottles before recycling! So throw out that Toys 'R Us catalog and go out and get yourself a water bottle.

*Bonus for parents is that it doesn't play annoying music or cost that much!*

8 months old!

Time flew by since Thanksgiving! Josh got to have pretty much a four day weekend that weekend of Thanksgiving with all the political drama so we had some fun family time. He didn’t have to leave for Bangladesh thanks to the PAD and the airport being closed for a week. Thank goodness we weren’t planning on going anywhere and good thing Josh’s parents got out when they did.

This week, on Friday, we did some Christmas shopping. Josh had the day off as it was a holiday. It was the King’s 81st birthday and Gretta turned 8 months old! We did take pictures that day, but we just haven’t had time to post them until now. She is keeping us more on our toes lately with her new found mobility. She has discovered there are other rooms in our apartment. She was content just crawling around the living room, but now she has found out that when people leave the room, she can follow! She is also still having fun with food. She is starting to like a more solid texture to food, so we got some Cheerios and then we have been giving her little bits and pieces off our plates and these new indulgences have included pasta, ham, eggs, bread, hummus and couscous. All of which have been greeted with much enthusiasm! Her other favorite is applesauce and she will eat pretty much anything mixed with it.

Also, has acquired a taste for paper and thinks it is the funniest thing to eat it.

Ah Ha! I've got it!

When JOSH was "watching" her, she got a chunk and we couldn't find it anywhere so we're pretty sure she swallowed it. She seems to know that she did something wrong by the expression she has, hopefully her first and only "mug" shot.

What we saw a lot of today....she gets sick of the camera sometimes.

Fireworks for the King's birthday celebration (or for Gretta, whichever you prefer to think)

Just in case you thought she was ALWAYS smiling......

We’ll be home in less than 2 weeks now and can’t believe how fast it actually went if we think about it. We are really looking forward to eating some comfort foods we’ve missed, CHRISTMAS COOKIES, seeing friends and family, snow, skiing and wearing cold weather clothes….not necessarily because we like the cold, but we do enjoy snuggling up on the couch with a favorite blanket in our cozy sweaters, with a cup of hot chocolate and the Christmas tree lights and candles as the only lighting in the room.

Now that the drama is over and the airports are open, Josh will be heading to Bangladesh sometime this week but only for a short trip. Then before we know it we'll be heading home!

A little something extra...

Finally got some video of all the things Gretta is doing, so here is a little show for you set to a little music of course!

We are thankful....

On our way to lunch.

Here was what we got to choose from to eat on our Thai Thanksgiving Day, it was a buffet and it was delicious! We got our fill of traditional turkey, potatoes and pumpkin pie, but also got to try some other things that were fantastic as well!

Josh making his choices and Gretta thinking about it.

Mmmmm...first taste of turkey.

Pumpkin soup!

Josh enjoying some oysters....

This year we have many things to be thankful for. We are safe and sound here today and glad we're not stuck at the airport or worse! We are thankful for our families whom we miss very much and wish we could be with! We are thankful for eachother and for our baby girl on her first Thanksgiving.

Despite all the reports of the crisis going on here, we are doing fine! Nothing is going on in the area we live. Josh was scheduled to leave for Bangladesh on Friday (tomorrow for us) but that has obviously been canceled for the time being (not too sad about that!) Hopefully they will have this all cleared up in the next couple of weeks so we can be home for the holidays as planned.

We miss you all very much and hope you all have a very Happy Thanksgiving with family and/or friends, wherever you may be in the world!

HUGS!!