Growing up, up, up!

Recently Steven and I have just marveled at how big William has gotten.  (I'm assuming this will continue to happen throughout our parenting journey...)  But, man!  The other day we both looked at him and couldn't believe how much he has grown!  I believe Steven's exact words were, "Wow.  He's like... a... PERSON now." haha :)

William is quickly showing us his personality and a lot of new tricks to go along with it.

At 5 1/2 months, William:

• sits up on his own (although he tumbles over from time to time!)

• likes to drink water out of a real glass
• loooooves laughing with Daddy!
• likes reading books before bedtime
• really enjoys shower time
• loves going swimming and dunking his head under water!
• likes going for walks at night
• is not afraid of strangers, loves being held by anyone and everyone
• sucks his left thumb to comfort himself
• sleeps A LOT!  (He goes to bed at 7:30 pm and wakes up anytime between 6:30 - 8 am!  He then takes around a 3 hour morning nap and another 2-3 hour afternoon nap!  Steven feels like the kid is never awake.  :)  He must get his good sleeping habits from his momma... and hey, we're not complaining!)
• drools a lot and still spits up a lot too!
• has a really annoying high-pitched scream when he doesn't want to do something anymore!
• gives lots of open-mouthed kisses
• is really wanting to eat food... he gets really cranky when he sees us eating dinner :)

I've been trying to hold him off on any food since I don't want to mess with it on the long plane ride, but it's been really hard since he really shows an interest in it.  Speaking of which, we will be leaving for the States a week from today!!  YAY!!!!  We're so excited to introduce William to all our families and spend some quality time together.  It's gonna be such a fun summer!  We can't wait :)

Here's a few pics to hold the grandparents over until we arrive...

Such a big boy!

Cuddles for mommy, wrestling with daddy!

Reading books before bed

Introduced the sippy cup--he's figured it out!

Mid "annoying high-pitched scream"

Sitting up and proud of it!

Playing with his cute friend, Zion :)

Showing off his skills to Ama via facetime!  I wonder if he'll be confused when he sees her in "3D"? :)

The babysitters are back! 

Eating dinner with Pawn, her daughter and niece

Such a good multi-tasker... sitting AND playing at the same time! :)

Fun videos :)

Just some fun videos that we took today that we thought were entertaining :)

William is learning how to give kisses!  (He lingers a little too long and tries to sneak in the tongue sometimes, so we're working on his kissing etiquette!)

Warning:  If the following picture grosses you out, you should probably skip the next video :)

After a big poop = happy times :)

William giggling with Daddy... melts my heart every time!

Okay, I can't help myself... had to add in a few pics that I've taken this past week. (I promise, I'll be quick!)

 These little piggies went to market... :)

William has so many friends at the market!

 On the way to eat!

Little baby, big market.

 That looks like a guilty face!

Morning kisses :)

"I'm 5 months and I'm pretty darn cool.  And my hands are huge."

Coolest kid on the block!

Morning smiles!  When he's happiest!

I believe they were watching "Top 10 Michael Jordan moments" :)

"Stop takin pics, Mom!"

If that's not a "Lauren mouth", I don't know what is!!! 

Falling in love :)

Okay, seriously... how ADORABLE is this kid?!?!?  At the risk of sounding extremely cheesy, I fall in love with this guy every.single.day.  When I first see him in the morning, my heart just melts and I just want to squeeze, hug, and kiss him all over.  My favorite times with him are before I put him down for naps when he just cuddles into my chest, makes cooing noises and sucks his thumb.  Man, SO CUTE.  I like to sing "Amazing Grace" to him before he goes to sleep and it's quickly become a favorite tradition of ours.  What's even more special is that now William likes to sing along sometimes and I just get such a kick out of it!  Now Steven joins in before bedtime and I often thank God for such precious times with my boys.

Check out the videos of William singin' along!

Don't you just wanna eat him up?!?! :)  Okay, I'll stop now.

Well, it turns out that William never got the chicken pox!  (Or at least we don't think he did...)  I took this picture a couple of days after he had been exposed thinking that it was the start of it,  but it never got any worse... so who knows?!?  

However, even though he didn't get a full blown case of the chicken pox, William did have a fever for an entire week!  I started to get a little worried, so we took him to the doctor to get checked out...

  

 William was a champ.  Turns out we had to go to two doctors, but William didn't cry once.

 What a good big boy!  His pediatrician wasn't too worried since his fever wasn't extremely high, so he gave us some Tylenol and decongestant and sent us home!  

Unfortunately, after William started feeling better, Steven and I came down with the flu for a week!  It kind of stinks being a sick mom!  I don't know how other women do it?!?!  Anyway, once the plague left the Sauder household, we were back in action and havin' fun.

  

 Ama sent William a sun hat, so we had some fun taking some goofy pictures.  Steven thinks William looks ridiculous in that hat, but I just think it's adorable!

 

We also had to say "goodbye" to Pawn as she is now only working for us 2 days a week now.  (I know, none of you feel sorry for me AT ALL.)  But, it was really sad to not have Pawn around every day.  She's been such a great support to all of us in this big transition and William has really grown to love her.  We are so thankful for all her hard work and friendship... we would not have survived these first couple of months without her!

After being cooped up in the house for almost 1.5 weeks, we all needed some fresh air (well, you can't really call it fresh since the pollution is soooo bad here these days!), so Steven decided to take William on a little stroll around the block on the back of his bike.  He has wanted to put William in his bike seat since we've brought him home from the hospital (he tried to put him in it at 2 months, but it didn't work out too well... ha!), so now that William can hold his head up we thought we'd give it another try!

Really, people?

This looks dangerous...

We had to stuff a pillow behind him to make for a snugger fit! :)

Success!  William's first "bike ride"!  He looks ecstatic about it, doesn't he?!?!

Some other cute pics from the past few weeks...

Practicing holding his bottle on his own! :)

Hi mom.

Love that face!

Uh oh.  Threw up on "Teacher Som"!

Chewing on everything these days :)

And last but not least, guess who won the Sauder Family NCAA Basketball Tourney this year?!?!?

William Takashi!!!  Edged out Auntie Kara & Grandma Sauder by 2 points!   Go William!

Relaxing

I always tell myself I am going to do a better job at keeping up this photo blog, but the weeks just fly by too fast!  So, here we are... already past William's 4 month mark and he's getting bigger and stronger every day.

Things over here have been a bit stressful lately, so Steven decided to take us on a little family getaway.  A perk of living in Thailand is 1) the weather is nice all year round and 2) there are hundreds of beautiful, cheap hotels right at your fingertips... especially during low season!  So, this family of 3 happily took a few days to relax, regroup and rejuvenate our souls.

Ahh...

My cutie.

William really taking this relaxing thing seriously.

My little guy loves to say his prayers!  Even by the pool after a long swim :)

Hi mom.

William's favorite activity... swimming with daddy!

Weeeeeee!

What a stud!

 Haha, I love this picture.  Baby William lost in Thailand!

More pool time with dad

Wiliam in our suitcase... always movin'!

Once we got back to Chiang Mai, the fun continued when my good friend, Bonnie, came up to visit us!  Her and her husband, Jon, (along with their two kids) lived in Chiang Mai for a year before moving down to Central Thailand to do church planting.  While they were here learning language, we grew really close with them and quickly developed a deep friendship.  I miss them a lot.  They moved to Central Thailand right before William was born, so Bonnie came to meet William and to hang out with me!  I loved it.  Thanks, Bon, for taking the time to spend such sweet time with me.  Come back soon!

Auntie Bonnie & Marek!

Friends.  God is good.

William looks so Asian next to Marek!

March is usually when the awful heat takes over Chiang Mai... but it hasn't come yet and we're grateful!

Silly boy.

 4 month old pic :)

He's getting so loooooong!

More relaxing :)

Playing with baby William!

Thai school is out for summer break, so Pawn has been bringing her daughter and niece to work.  They loooove playing with William and are actually really great babysitters!  It's nice to have someone to entertain William if I need to get some things done.  HOWEVER, the above picture was taken just 2 hours before Maai (Pawn's daughter) came down with a 102 fever AND red spots all over her body.  Yep, you guessed it.  Maai has chicken pox.  And had been playing with William every day for the last two weeks.  Awesome!  That night William had a 101 temp, so we went to the doctor the next day.  He said William was a little too young to be getting chicken pox, so to watch him closely for the next couple of weeks.  He didn't think the fever was from chicken pox (you usually aren't symptomatic until 10 days after catching it...), so he gave us some baby Tylenol and sent us on our way.  We have an appointment to check in next week... here's hoping our next blog won't be filled of pics of William with the chicken pox!

The relaxing continues.  Poor guy must've been trying to fight off his sickness with sleep.  He slept almost all day for 2 days straight!

Loves to suck his thumb now as he's falling asleep.  Gosh I love him!

Speaking of sleep, here's a video of us trying to keep William asleep last night after we came home from Brett & Liv's house.  It may just be me, but I think it's so funny :)