Growing Fast

Pictures of Gabriel: top to botton, left to right.
Right before Argentina lost to Uruguay in copa america play, 4th of july, and shopping the day before the 4th (first time ever sitting up in shopping cart!), playing with a fake dog at old navy, singing at church, and sitting up all by himself for the first time (daddy peaked through the door at the same instant he was sitting up!)

Gabriel I can't believe how fast you are growing! I know each parent must think that same thing as they watch their children grow, but honestly it is amazing to see how much you have really grown these past 8 months. You are such a fast learner too. I remember about a month ago, when your mommy and I were watching another little baby at church sit all by himself on the floor on his blanket, and we said to ourselves, "man that would be cool if Gabriel could do that", well about two days later you had perfected it. However that wasn't enough for you, you have to always be doing something new, something different, and so now you have learned in honestly about 3 days time how to go from being on your little tummy to sitting down and it appears to be no effort for you. Again I repeat, that isn't enough for you though. So today you decided to stand up all by yourself in your crib, however you must have been too excited because you tossed yourself right on out of there, and when mommy heard you fall she came running and picked you up...poor little guy, you must have been so scared. However, now that we lowered your crib down, now you can stand up all you want, and I am sure that in no time you will be walking and running all over the place! You are such a big, sweet, and special boy, and we love you more every single day!

Mommy and Daddy

Come What May, and Love It

So, it's been months since Belem and I were able to go out on a date. Yeah, we have gone out with Gabriel every now and then, but we hadn't been able to go out just the two of us for a while, so this past wed when we finally had the chance, thanks to her mom coming and watching Gabriel at our place, we were very excited! Someone had recently gave Belem a gift card to Olive Garden, and so our plan was a simple one...go eat using the gift card, then to go see a movie perhaps. So, we got to Olive Garden, and everything was great, we ordered, and of course I changed quite a bit of things on my plate so, and added extra things. Belem ordered a decent sized meal as well. Our waitress was very nice and helpful, infact she was so good I had already decided I would leave her a good tip...that was until the check came. The check itself wasn't bad, we knew that we had the gift card and that would cover the majority of the meal, the problem was that we had gone over by 11 dollars. Ok, so what's the problem...as I went to pay, oops, no card! That's right, no debit card, no cash, no checks, no nothing! NADA! I didn't know what to do...I was so worried and embarrassed. I was sure that they would make us stay and wash dishes or something to pay off what we owed. However we were very blessed, and the manager came and told us not to worry, and let us go with out paying anything. We were so relieved. Well to be honest it was more me being relieved. I have to say how grateful I am to Belem, for staying so calm, and happy throughout the whole thing. I think that she might have been smiling ever since we realized we didn't have any way to pay. She made me think about a talk we once read one night a few years back. It was a talk by Joseph B. Wirthlin, his last before he passed entitled "Come What May, and Love it". He talked about learning to live with the challenges we face is life, and learning to handle them well. He shared an example of taking a trip with his nine member family, and how they took a wrong time and how they didn't realize it until after two hours later. They didn't get angry, they laughed. He said, "We laughed, and as a result, anger and resentment rarely resulted. Our laughter created cherished memories for us." That was exactly what happened to us, thanks to Belem's positive outlook and laughter, we laughed, and laughed, and joked about how we should have ordered more food. And, because of that I think we had one of the greatest dates we have ever had, and all we did was eat for free, and instead of a movie, we went and bought a snow cone that we payed for with the spare change we had laying around in the car. So, we were able to sit and talk, and just be together, alone. It was one of my favorite nights of all time, and it's all thanks to Belem!