Updates on Life in the Sturm Home

Well we knew with our genetics that we were likely to have a stubborn child, but when it came to walking we really thought Caleb's stubbornness would lead him to crawl for the rest of his life! Around 9 months old he was excited to hold hands and walk with people and cruised all over the place. For whatever reason, that changed and he became very stubborn when it came to walking. If anyone would try to hold his hands and stand him up, he'd kick his feet out until you just sat him back down. We knew this would be the first of many things that we couldn't make him do until he was good and ready to show an interest in it! Anyhow, after months of resisting, he finally showed and interest again and is now officially a walker. He stills spends plenty of time crawling around and has a hard time standing himself up if there isn't something to hold onto, but once he's up he goes and goes!

Aside from the excitement of walking, we've had a few other events here and there at home. With the nice weather, we've enjoyed getting outside to go for walks and just play in the fresh air. Caleb enjoys his new slide and climber from Grandpa and Grandma Sturm, but when playing with it we discovered something he really doesn't like...grass! I guess we forgot that this little guy had never really played in the grass before, so he just didn't know what to think of it. He's finally getting a little more used to it and hopefully by Summer he'll have gotten over his fear.
We are also very excited to say that we are no longer washing bottles on a nightly basis...Caleb has graduated to sippy cups for good. We were really worried that he wasn't drinking as much when he took the sippy cup, but he seems to be getting what he needs. It's so hard to know how much is enough when it comes to drinking, eating, and so forth. We added one more item to our list of home improvements last week...new windows! We are so excited to have these new windows and really look forward to the difference we'll see next Winter. The installers put them all in last Monday and on Monday night we got all of the window treatments back up. While we were busy doing that, Caleb discovered a new favorite pastime...tissue boxes! This was the cause for a major babyproofing effort this past weekend. We know there are still many more things for him to get into, but hopefully we've put away some of the more tempting things! The final bit of fun worth mentioning was last Friday when we headed back to Joliet to watch Jacob, Cassie, and Bryce. Keith and Kerri (their parents) went out for the evening, so we had the joy of watching the kids. Tyler always has so much fun and manages to keep up so well with their energy level. It was fun to watch Caleb interact with the kids. He and Bryce are only a few months apart and will definitely grow to be good buddies as time goes on. For now, there friendship seems to consist of stealing books out of each other's hands and trying to sneak sips from each other's sippy cup when nobody is watching. We've definitely got some work to do with these guys! We hope everyone reading this is doing well and enjoying the beginning of warmer weather, longer days, and plenty of sunshine. Even the rain doesn't seem so bad when you know that it's followed by green grass and all kinds of plants coming back to life!

Easter Weekend

We got back yesterday from a fun, four day trip to Carmi for Easter. On Thursday, we left right after school and made a stop in Champaign to visit my sister. We had dinner and gave Caleb his bath there before heading on the road again. As soon as we left, it was Caleb's bedtime, so he fell asleep right away and stayed asleep for the final three hours of the trip.

When we finally made it to Carmi it was fairly late, so we unpacked and went to bed right away. The next day, we had fun hanging out and enjoying the day with family. Grandpa Ron was home from work, so he got some quality time with Caleb all day. We went to visit Grandma Sue a couple times at work so she wouldn't miss out on too many smiles and hugs. We left Caleb at home with his grandparents that afternoon and drove an hour to Evansville to do a little bit of shopping. It's a long drive (well, for anyone used to driving just a few minutes to the nearest mall) so it helped that we could just keep Caleb at home and not worry about his napping, eating, etc.

After we got back, Caleb got to open his Easter gifts a couple days early. It was a good thing he did because he loved the fun toys he got and spent most of the weekend playing with them. Grandpa Ron and Grandma Sue always seem to find such fun and interesting toys!
On Saturday the weather was nice, so we had Caleb's great-grandma over for a walk in the afternoon. They both enjoyed the fresh air and it made for a nice, long nap that afternoon for the little guy. After napping, the rest of the family came over for a yummy Easter dinner. We enjoyed seeing everyone since it's not often that we get to spend time with this part of the family.
On Sunday, Tyler and I went to church in the morning while Caleb stayed home with Grandpa and Grandma. When we got back, we headed to the farm. This was Caleb's first time there and he took in a lot of new sites. He got a view of one of Uncle Randy's huge tractors while sitting on his grandpa's lap. We also took him to the field where the cows are at and he loved looking at them and mooing (even though they didn't moo back). I'm sure this is the first of many trips to the farm. Caleb will probably cherish the times he gets to go down there and visit. It's a little boy's dream come true to have all that cool stuff to look at and ride in.
We spent the rest of Easter Sunday hanging out and relaxing. Kalyn left in the afternoon to head back to Eastern so it ended up just being the five of us. We had a huge dinner again and Caleb ate like a champ. This was quite a change from the last time his grandparents saw him when he was sick with the flu and didn't eat much of anything. They were pretty amazed and the appetite this little guy has! After dinner it was time for one last bath in the makeshift bathtub. There are two showers at Grandpa and Grandma's house, but no bathtub. After the first night of attempting to have Daddy shower with Caleb we decided to try to improvise and make our own bathtub (which Caleb seemed to like more than showering). After his bath, he played with his grandparents for a little while and then said goodnight and goodbye to Grandpa Ron (he was going to work the next morning).
On our last morning, we went to visit Great Grandma Ann again to see her and say goodbye. Caleb had fun playing with all her Easter eggs and also found a little pig that he enjoyed carrying around and saying "woof-woof" with (I guess we better work on those animal sounds).

After a nap in the morning and lunch, we packed up the car and got ready to leave. It was really hard to say bye to Grandma Sue. After spending more quality time together than we've had in a long time, Caleb really grew attached and so did Grandma. After hugs and kisses we headed back home and had an easy ride. We didn't know how Caleb would handle the trip since he slept most of the way down. He did a great job though and even managed to take a solid afternoon nap for part of the trip.

Overall, it was a great weekend and we are so glad we got four days to spend down there. It was nice to come home though and I am especially looking forward to a few days of quality Mommy and Caleb time before Spring Break is over. After that, we have six more weeks until a whole summer together...yay!!!