A Giffin gene?

With all the "BIG" talk regarding Ethan, we stumbled across another big baby. Jon's brother,  Mike, has three boys. All with similar growth patterns as our boys. Here is a picture of his eldest son, Giff, at 7 weeks and a picture of Ethan today at 4 1/2 months. Holy! Is all I have to say. Now Giff is 15 y/o and has not slowed down one bit, much taller now than wide :). Just thought this was interesting. With these 100+ percentile babies and larger than life heads, must be something with these wonderful Giffins!

Ethan's first food!

Rice cereal and he ate it all like a champ!

Ethan's 4 month checkup!

Ethan had his 4 month checkup today. When the nurses saw him they all laughed and pinched his rolls. Everything checked out great and he is now ready for rice cereal then on to veggies. So, here are the measurements;

Height - 26" - 75th percentile
Weight - 21 lbs 2 oz - 100th percentile
Head - 17 3/4" - 100th percentile

We have a big boy. He measured bigger than Graham on everything but height. Can't wait for you all to get to squeeze him!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Hope everyone had a great thanksgiving. We are so thankful to have family away from family. We all wish we could be together but with the distance we all live, sometimes it isn't possible. But, that is why there is Christmas :)

Anyway, we had several friends and their families come celebrate Thanksgiving. Everyone lives away from their families so we all came together to create our family away from family. We had 10 adults, 7 toddlers and 2 infants. It was crazy fun! Each family brought food and we all came together and had a wonderful evening.

Today, Graham and I decorated the Christmas tree. He loved it!! It is so fun to see a kids decoration again, all ornaments at the bottom. I can rememeber my nieces when they were young doing that. Good moments!!

Now, on to Christmas! We hope to see you all, we will be home for Christmas, December 23 - 29 (I think). Half on the coast and half in Jackson. Love to you all!! XOXO

Our feast!

A Thanksgiving miracle! All kids sat together and ate. We were all so stunned, we stood there for a while before we realized we all needed to eat while they were doing so well! HA

Our Little Indian Turkeys! I made hate for all the kids and these were Ethan and Nora's. We couldn't decide if the hats were Indian or Turkey feathers.

So, we didn't get a picture of all the adults eating together because it never happened. As soon as we all got our food and sat down, the kids were done. So, rotation it was. One parent ate while the other tended to the kids. HA!

Ethan just chilled watching all the craziness!

Finally dessert! Cheers!!

A wonderful night with wonderful people!

And what do you do the day after? You decorate the Christmas tree!

He loved it so much! He has already gone to the chimney and yelled for "Ho Ho Ho" AKA Santa, to come down!

Look who is 4 months!!

Ethan is 4 months old! We will have his 4 month check up next week and i will update with weight and all then. Hope everyone has a great turkey day!!

Roasting over the fire with friends!

Tonight, we invited Graham's best friend, Andrew and his parents over to roast hotdogs and marshmallows. Good time with goo friends!

Fun camping and a cute brother picture

Pajama party!

 We took the boys to the property this week to camp out for the first time there. It was kind of a test to see if it would work and it went really well! Graham had a blast helping Papa plant trees, fly a kite with mamma, cook over the fire and gaze up at the stars. Ethan was so relaxed he slept most of the time. We will be doing this a lot more for sure! What a blast.

Playing on the tractor, his favorite!

cooking hotdogs over the fire

sitting by the fire before going to bed!

Our kinda Halloween!

It was awful weather Halloween night! But, our neighbors had all the kids over for appetizers and trick or treating at the doors in their home. We had the youngest kids there and Graham got a little overwhelmed with all the older kids getting candy so our pictures are not great. We came home after and Graham had more fun giving candy to the trick or treaters than trick or treating! So, I say it was a success!

The San Marcos children!

Trick or treating indoors!

Getting a little help from a friend!

Graham's masterpiece!

Pumpkin carving party!

Our friends, Beau and Jennifer, invited us and a few others over to carve pumpkins and celebrate Halloween. This was Graham's first realization of dressing up. He loved his costume, Dwight Yoakum, but everyone else freaked him out. He cried for the first hour until I convinced him his friend was a funny dancing skeleton. We all eventually relaxed and had a great time! Happy Halloween! Hope the weather is good for you all, suppose to be really nasty here.

getting started

what I did most of the time!

Graham helping? lol

All the kids!

Farmer Mandy with pumpkin Ethan and Dwight Yoakum Graham with his drummer Jon

Our finished product, ours is the top.

3 month old Ethan! Plus E n G comparrison

Ethan 3 months

Graham 3 months

I have to say, they look related but, they have their own looks!

Smokey Mountains!

The Great Smokey Mountains! Atop Clingmans dome!

This past weekend, we went to the Smokey Mountains with our wonderful friends, Peter, Julie, Asger and Nora. Yes, we went to the mountains with 4 adults, 2 toddlers and 2 infants. CRAZY!!! But, the kids actually did exceptional. Not sure if we have told you all but Peter, Julie and the kids will be returning to Denmark soon so, we are squeezing all our Giffin/Week time in as much as possible. Oh how we will miss them!!

Well, on this adventure, we went hiking each day and tried to have adult play time at night. And of course the boys started playing with each other and being cute 30 minutes before we all headed home. It was a great trip and beautiful weather. Oh and did I mention the entire country was at the Smokey's too. Not sure if it was the shutdown or the beautiful leaves changing. Traffic was crazy. But it was all worth it! Enjoyed it so much! We love you Week clan!!

Ready for relaxation and a little love!

Pappa and Ethan relaxing

The great hike up up up to Clingmans dome

Hard work! We got a lot of encouraging looks and comments from those walking down as we were walking up.

We did it! Super strong!!

Next day hike to Laurel Falls!

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time for some fun at the cabin! Ethan and Nora experiencing bubbles!

Graham jumped right in!

Jam session with asger and graham

And on the last day, these two got really cute outside! Here they are screaming together!

Week/Giffin vacation 2013!!