Photo shoot by Gary

While we were in Chicago, Gary took some great pictures of Hannah Gray in the studio he has set up in the basement. He really got some great pictures- thanks Gary!

Chicago!

Last weekend we flew to Chi-town to see the Illinois Petros and meet baby Audrey.Even Annie drove to Chicago to surprise us. We had such a great weekend! The cousins all had such a great time together.  It included a trip to the zoo which was such a fun place. It was a great smaller zoo that had awesome exhibits and was super easy to get around with little ones. Here are some pictures from the weekend.

Gray and the polar bears

Here you can see 

that Hannah Gray found some "handles"...

Here are the Petro cousins on the Merry Go Round. Hannah Gray 

was FREAKED out. I think all the animals moving really bothered her. So I put her b/t Grant and Norah and that didn't help either, but it made a cute picture! :)

Our flight leaving Chicago was delayed a little over an hour which put our flight right smack during bedtime. Hannah Gray did great, but she refuses to sleep if she's being held. So Daddy made an emergency run to the bookstore and came back with another Eric Carle, "Brown Bear Brown Bear" which was probably the best spent 7 bucks in a LONG time.

sleepin' baby

Every night before Ethan and I head to bed, we check in on Hannah Gray. And just about every night we're extremely amused by her sleeping position. So we decided to take pictures a few nights in a row to try and capture it. We did three nights in a row, then we were out of town and had some camera issues. So we'll resume it again this week. I guess it should also be noting as to how she starts out the night. We put her down every night in the middle of the crib with her head towards her mobile so she's looking at it. And this is what we get a few hours later...

learning from Daddy

Last weekend, Ethan started to teach Hannah Gray one of his favorite pastimes...

"Look at me daddy, am I doing a good job?"

10 months (a little late)

Here are Hannah Gray's 10 month photos. I'm getting less and less every month b/c it's getting so much harder to keep her in one spot, let alone with Tanner too! (for whatever reason, her face picture keeps rotating once it goes on the blog- sorry I tried)

bedtime reading

Hannah Gray loves her books, or maybe she loves turning their pages even more. She's recently begun to "love" on people, toys, Tanner, etc. She tucks her little head in and it almost seems like a head butt, but she leaves it there for a second so you can totally tell she's snuggling and trying to love on you. Anyway, we have this bedtime book and it's a different baby animal and it's parent on each page. I noticed this "loving" while we were reading this book, but only on the page where it was the puppy and the deer. She would turn through all the pages and only do it to these two animals. So last night I had Ethan come up with the video camera to check it out. Turns out she decided to love on many more animals!! (Sorry about the background noise- the neighbor was working in the yard with a weed wacker and our windows were open!)

a little help here!

So Hannah Gray is grabbing onto just about anything to try and pull herself up, including Tanner. Tanner always manages to be close by when we're playing on the floor. So yesterday, Gray would scoot on over to him, grab the hair/skin on the top of his back and start pulling! I kept grabbing her hand with one hand, trying to pet Tanner with the other and tell him "good boy" for being so passive. Then I'd quickly try to scratch his back where Gray just about pulled his hair out. He never even flinched. I think she had enough hair so close to the skin that it didn't really bother him. Here's a picture though; it's part of the act just b/c I'd end up jumping in to save Tanner before I could get a good shot of her really supporting herself with him.

Fun in the Petro house!

Ethan and I have been concerned as to what to do once Hannah Gray outgrows her jumper seat. She LOVES that thing and will bounce whenever she's being held. Ethan was checking out craigslist the other day and found the perfect idea- a mini trampoline! So two nights ago, Hannah Gray played in her new big girl bouncer for the first time. She enjoyed it, although I'm not sure that she knew what to think about it yet. We think it will be fun to make it into a little ball pit too. Notice the look off sheer excitement in the first picture. :)

On the move!

She cracks me up, she's ALL over the place. In fact, Ethan told me this story the other day. I think he "forgot" to tell me :). I was running an errand (actually going to pick Jen Mott up from a team dinner up near Baltimore), so Ethan was at home getting dinner going so we could eat when we got home. So he set Hannah Gray up with a slew of toys. Then he heard Tanner's crate in the bathroom rattle. He looked around, saw Tanner and thought, "what in the world?"... So he ran into the bathroom and Hannah Gray was IN Tanner's crate. Now she makes a beline there whenever she has the chance! Here are some action shots of her in motion. The binkie is now left in the crib only, but it's still a great motivator... :) Notice the excitment when she sees it and the determination on her face as she reaches. She's too much. 

Cruisin'!

This last Saturday, Hannah Gray pulled herself up for the first time. We have a little play garden on our front porch (courtesy of the Davis crew) and she loves to use the door to pull herself up (I'll get some pictures of her in there this week). Then on Wednesday, she started to cruise her way around in there as well as inside her pack 'n play. She loves it when we stand her up in the pack 'n play or let her hold onto the ottoman in the family room. Here are some pictures from yesterday standing like a big girl (she would NOT let go of the fish or the balls she's holding onto. She even held onto them through dinner).

I thought her little jeans and crocs looked so cute and her jeans looked so much like a big girl. It cracked me up, so I had to include a picture of her from behind. 

Company

Last weekend we were able to spend time with our dear friends Jen Mott and Katie Farr. Jen was in town with Cincinnati's Women's Lacrosse team b/c they were playing Georgetown. There are many girls on the team with family in the Maryland area so the coaches let the girls stay with family and friends while they were here. So Katie joined us for the game then we had dinner and hit the town! The weather was beautiful, so it was really the first night we've been here where there was a lot of activity down there. Fun times!

JCrew Girl

I'm standing!

These are actually from a couple weeks ago, but I wondered what Hannah Gray would do if I stood her up next to the ottoman. She stood there so proud of herself and looked like such a big girl! Around the same time she also enjoyed her first teething biscuit-what a mess! And she discovered one of daddy's magazines on the couch. She's learned to turn all the pages in her books, so she sat down with the magazine and was looking through it just like Ethan would! It was too cute.

Easter weekend con'd