In keeping up with Joseph's progress, here are a couple shots of him playing around before bed tonight. It's hard to catch all the action with still photos, but he's kicking like crazy and swinging that rattle around—how fun for him and us!

Today is my birthday, and although it's been a regular Saturday in many ways, I did enjoy getting some phone calls from family and spending the day with Tim and Joseph. Here are a few shots of our little evening celebration, starting with the fabulous orange shrimp dinner prepared by Tim, which we enjoyed while watching Monsters, Inc.

Next, here I am in my birthday pj's (thanks Mom and Dad!) opening my gift from Angie, some lovely Beyond Paradise perfume. Yes, those are conversation hearts on the pj's: "Fax me", "Wow", and "Later" among others. Joseph also has some matching footed pj's, a little too big still, but he's growing fast!

Finally, here's the chocolate cake Tim made me from scratch complete with rainbow sprinkles! The recipe is one his mom used to make for their family, and boy was it good! This cake is actually the result of the second cake-baking experience of the day, but I won't get into that. All in all, it was a great birthday!

Although it's hard to believe, Joseph turned two months old today! He also had his two-month pediatrician visit, complete with five immunization shots! He was already tired by the time the nurse started sticking him, so he was doubly unhappy to be stuck!

Needless to say, he needed lots of extra love and hugs after the traumatic experience (and quite a bit of sleep, too)! He actually let me just snuggle with him for a while after eating, instead of squirming and wriggling to get away like usual!

Just look at that sweet, helpless guy!

Just before bedtime tonight, I found our two sleepy guys already catching some ZZZs together. Pretty cute!

It was a beautiful day outside today! Tim came home a little early from school, so we decided to take another walk around the neighborhood and take some pics along the way! Note all the big, lovely trees in this shot.

All the yards and houses are kept up so nicely and the people are nice, too! We passed a dozen or so people walking by or in cars and they all waved. Of course, I'm sure it helps that we have an exceedingly cute baby (as Hoxie put it) with us.

As usual, Josephus didn't need to do much to get all that attention—he slept most of the way!



Here are a couple shots demonstrating the amazing capabilities of our camera, especially when you consider that I have absolutely no photographic expertise! That Cedar Waxwing was waaayyy up in a tree, and look at the fuzz on those buds!

In these shots, Joseph is taking some of his first swings at the hippo and elephant hanging from his bouncy seat. It must be so exciting to realize that you can actually manipulate the world around you, not just observe it! We took these while watching the news in the evening after Tim got home from school, and speaking of the news, I should mention that the top story for two nights in a row here has revolved around a couple of beavers that were captured and killed for building a dam in Tom's Creek. I think we're going to like living in a small town!

Grandma and Grandpa Allison gave Joseph a cute and very rattly crab rattle for Christmas, and I caught some fun shots of him playing with it this morning. Just look at those big, bright eyes!

Today was our first day back at Church all together since Joseph was born! Everything went really well—it was sort of hard to remember what it was like before we had Joseph. I think we're really going to like being in the Blacksburg Ward—everyone is really friendly and there are lots and lots of other young families.

Speaking of the little sausage, here he is in all his cuteness. It was really amazing to see how big he is compared with all the other little babies at Church, and there are a lot of them! He looked about the same size as the baby twice his age sitting right in front of us!

He was actually quite tired by the time we got home and had little patience for the photo session. We tried not to prolong the agony and got him right off to sleep.

It snowed today! It wasn't the first time it's snowed since we've been here, but it was the first time there was any noticeable build-up on anything. It didn't really stick to the ground, but our doormat collected some!

All that snow made for a fairly cold day, even inside! We had Josephus all bundled up in some fleecy footed pj's and hat—all gifts from his Aunt Jen. What a cutie!

It started out as a very unusual day for Joseph! He slept very little and cried quite a bit, meaning that both Tim and I spent a lot of time rocking and holding him. Sometimes it's just hard to know what else to do, I guess! I'll bet Joseph knew exactly what the matter was, though, and was emphatically trying to tell us!

We finally decided it would do us all some good to get out of the house! We took our first walk around the neighborhood and had a grand time. We admired all the charming houses, listened to the birds, and Joseph finally got some sleep! We had to hurry home when it started raining a little, but that was a blessing in disguise—we had locked ourselves out of the townhouse and Tim had just enough time to jog over to the property manager's office for a spare key before closing time!

It's moving-in day! Tim's actually been moving a lot of boxes and stuff in piecemeal since the ABF trailer arrived on Jan 10, but a bunch of guys from the Blacksburg Ward are here this morning to help lift the heavy stuff, including the piano! We had planned to have a professional piano mover take care of it, but the two big guys above (closest to the piano) said they could lift it by themselves, so why not give it a try? In the end, it took five guys to move it in without too much effort, but it saved us $100!

Despite all the commotion, Joesph managed to sleep, well, like a baby! He fell asleep just before the moving party arrived and didn't wake up again until everyone had gone. What a champion sleeper!

The ABF trailer is empty again and now the real fun of unpacking boxes begins!



Here are a couple more shots of us around the townhouse today: the first shows me on the back porch, and the second shows Joseph and me next to our lovely new dresser/changing table from Grandma Susan and Grandpa Lloyd!

Here are a couple shots of us hanging out in our townhouse—boy, will it be nice when all our furniture gets here!

We're in Blacksburg! We actually arrived the night of Jan 5, way ahead of our ABF trailer! As a welcome gift, the Mechanical Engineering department footed the bill for a four-night stay at this hotel, the brand-new Inn at Virginia Tech. It had a fancy in-hotel restaurant, and since the night of our arrival was also our fourth anniversary, we splurged and ordered dinner via room service! This shot was taken this morning after checking out—we're ready to start living in our townhouse now! It was so nice, though, to have the hotel room available to us for a few days—we were able to get some groceries and clean up the townhouse a bit (including dealing with a washing-machine-related flood) before moving in for good.

Our little Josephus is starting to show some interest in toys! Here he is carrying on a conversation (as his Grandmother Susan put it) with a little froggie rattle—I think he likes the big eyes! He's in a good mood most mornings, and is getting better all the time at demonstrating his cheerfulness with coos and smiles. Sometimes, because of his exuberance and relative lack of expertise, the only "smile" he can get out is a wide-open mouth, but we can still tell what he's trying to say!

It's two days later and we're all doing well on the road—Joseph is an excellent traveler! Although he doesn't seem to particularly like his car seat (i.e. he starts crying every time we put him in it), he also manages to fall asleep almost immediately once the car starts moving. At that point, he usually only pipes up to let us know when he's hungry! This shot was taken during a lunch break for all of us—the "why me?" or "save me!" look he's giving Tim is his typical response to burping.

Tim and I are enjoying the sights along the way—lots and lots of tall trees like the ones at this rest stop so far!



Tim has also been trying to spy out the birds at our stops along the way, and he's caught a few in action! So far, he's mostly seen common birds: chickadees (top shot), titmice, various sparrows (there are actually two in the shot below), and Yellow-rumped Warblers.

Good-bye Austin! Here's our ABF trailer all packed and ready to go the night before our departure, almost entirely thanks to my parents!

We're just about ready to set off! We'll take four days and nights to get there, stopping in Jacksonville, TX; Jackson, MS; Cumming, GA (where we'll visit with some long-time friends of Tim's family); and finally Blacksburg. The entire trip is about 1400 miles long, but we're used to making the 1000-mile trip to Tempe in one day! It'll be nice to take things a little slower, not that we have a choice with a five-week-old!

Speaking of the five-week-old, here he is getting prepped for the big trip!