Congratulations Lisa and Kyle

Next on the list of blog updates is Lisa and Kyle's wedding. The weekend of December 11th-13th Drew and I flew to New York for a wedding at West Point. Lisa and Kyle were married and then we continued the celebration in Manhattan. It was a whirlwind weekend, but so great to catch up with friends I rarely get to see. As an added bonus Collin's grandparents babysat back in Minnesota, so Drew and I had our first real weekend away. Unfortunately Drew was sick for part of the weekend so we didn't get to have as much fun as I would have liked to.Karen and Amanda started the party out with a little scarf-sharing.

Karen and Jason, looking Glamorous.

Amanda and Matt

At the reception we got to catch up with Liz and Joe who just moved to San Francisco.

Drew was able to not be sick long enough to take a photo.

The five of us, all together. Just like old times.

Drew, when he was sick, was not left behind. Lisa made sure to include him in the festivities.

Joe went double fisted as the night went on.

Lisa and Kyle in the cadet chapel after their ceremony. Blurry photo, but you get the idea :)

Exchanging vows

Yes, I suppose I will take you as my husband...

Liz and Amanda and some holiday festivities.

Look at the size of those balls...er...ornaments.

Karen and I, catching up.

Elevator fun.

Before Drew got sick, Amanda was showing him how to have a good time.

Together Again.

We caught up with Lisa's dad, Bob, and his famous tank tops.

Lisa and Karen broke up the jazz hands and the Boone's Farm, for old-time's sake.

We got to see Jason, Karen's boyfriend and high school accomplice of shenanigans.

Lisa and Kyle, the night before the wedding.

A little pre-party drink at the Thayer hotel in West Point

We had such a fun time in West Point, but the real party started in Manhattan....

Iron Man

So, I'm way behind on my blogging. The first of this blogging series is Collin's last visit to the University of Minnesota iron study. Right after Collin was born he began participating in a study about memory and iron. He's a "control" baby, because he has "regular" levels of iron. The study compares babies with typical iron levels, to those babies who were born with very low levels of iron on memory tasks. This time he had to wear an ERP net and watch faces on a screen to determine if he would remember a face he was familiarized with. Here he is getting ready and with the ERP net. I suppose these are the sorts of things that happen when you have two parents heavily vested in research!

A Thanksgiving for a Little Fishy

For Thanksgiving we traveled over the river (Mississippi) and through the woods (rural Wisconsin) to grandma and grandpa Hollman's house. We left in the wee hours of the morning to travel as far as we could while Collin was asleep. At 3 a.m. we huddled into the jeep and started our journey. Luckily, Collin slept for most of the trip with only one stop in the entire 5 hours for a change and feeding. We were unbearably tired when we got there, but Collin was grinning from ear to ear after a perfect 5 hours of additional sleep.
So, since naps were in order, we stayed awake until Collin's first nap and then CRASHED. I remember the rest of the daze as a sort of dreamy, cloud covered haze. Collin and I found a place on the big king size bed, nuzzled in, and spent the day cuddling. I loved it!
That evening we finally woke up and decided to put Collin in the pool after Drew's parents cranked the heat so that is was more like a huge bath than a pool. The first time we visited Milwaukee with him he loved the water, so we thought he might like it again.



We were right on, as Collin enjoyed every minute of his time in the pool. Every night while we were there he had a daily swim and was like a little fish, enjoying and relaxing in the water.

After the swim in the pool we had dinner with Collin's great grandma Hollman and he had such a good time playing with her and grandpa. Every once in awhile we can see a little bit of either of us in Collin and in this first picture, Collin looks tremendously like Drew when he was a baby of the same size.



The following day, Thursday, was Thanksgiving. Collin was bright-eyed and bushy tailed in the morning, ready to meet and great all of the family that would be coming over to visit. He wore his cute little first Thanksgiving outfit.

and played with Great Grandma Montgomery and Great Grandpa Montgomery.

Collin played with Chelle too,

Off camera he met all sorts of other family members, cousins Jamie and Ryan, Great Aunties Jan, Jean, Sandy and Dee, great Uncles Mark and Jon, cousins Miranda, Gavin, and Ed, and even some neighbors, Karen, Jenny and Carrie. Collin also visited with his friend Lilly at Josh and Tracy's where he got to take a little ride on her bumble bee.