Team Anders

Throwback! (1 week old) Hard to believe one year has already passed since our little  Easton was born ...and what a blessed year it's been! We are so fortunate to have a healthy, happy, vibrant, loving, sweet and smart little boy to call our son. He's lucky to have had the opportunity to meet all four of his grandparents - and have a great-grandmother following all his milestones from her computer back in Illinois (how awesome is that?!). Over the past year we've celebrated many milestones...some big, some small but ALL super thrilling to good 'ole Mom & Dad. We had planned to do a little get-together with some friends on Saturday but postponed it to this coming weekend so we decided to do a little family celebration on Sunday afternoon. He got a little better at unwrapping presents since Christmas but not much... Partial success! Thanks Mike & Emily :) A drum from Joey & Catie - he's a big fan already A fun book from G...

Today I picked Easton up from daycare and as we were putting his shoes on and about ready to head out for the day I decided to stand him up and see how his balance was coming along...ba BAM he took about 8 steps to me! So exciting...our baby's walking!!! So in true stalker-mom fashion I rushed home (rush being a relative term - I drove at the 15 mph base speed limit), did not pass go, did not take my jacket off, and immediately fired up the camera (video below). Here's the result... if at first you don't succeed...just do it for Daddy :)

Five full work days sure makes for a long week, sheesh! Coming back from Thanksgiving is always tough - but here are a few things that helped me power through the week... #1.  Authorization to blast my Christmas music!!!! Jace (a.k.a and to be referred to during the entire month of December as bah humbug (BH)) has a pretty strict December 1st Christmas music start policy so I am so very joyful once the 1st rolls around. The X-mas tunes make me feel connected to my family and I look forward to breaking them out every year (I'd easily play them all year long). I can close my eyes and remember the cold Illinois winter and walking into the house to see our festive tree covered in lights and ornaments from both Jeff's and my adventures in school art projects. The fireplace is crackling, my Dad is rockin' his Santa hat and watching "A Charlie Brown Christmas" with Jeff and Mom's baking some cookies she bought from the latest school fundraiser (like mother, lik...

What do you get when you take two adults, one infant and a dog on a 48-hour Thanksgiving trip to Minneapolis? One amazingly great time with family (and a very exhausted set of parents today)! I took over 200 photos over the weekend so I'll let a few of the pictures tell our story... (click here if you want to look at the rest) Rae was a late addition to the travel roster - Jace is teaching her how to use the moving walkway @ 0430 Thanksgiving morning We landed and made a beeline to Casa de McChesney... what a beautiful day...it was 60 degrees!! Auntie Sherry couldn't wait to get her hands on little E... and he couldn't wait to get his hands on Uncle Wayne's nose! Wayne and Easton share a birthday - 4/16!!! Easton also got to meet his 2nd cousin, Jake during this trip! Jake's a senior at St. Thomas - wow did that go fast... Can't leave out the  sweet reunion between Kosmo and Rae Our only Thanksgiving photo as a family ...