Thanksgiving and Santa

So you have probably heard by now that the Billings Southeast went to Illinois for Thanksgiving. We drove all night on the way there and on the way back to avoid the crying child factor. We had such a great time. It was great to see Penny's place and visit with her.

I must admit, this month has been all about Griffin, as far as the blog is concerned. With a birthday, a minor surgery, and being center stage at Penny's, it seems to be all about him. The spotlight will fall on our sweet Olive soon. Although, there will be another Griffin focused post when I get his birthday photos.

Griffin with Aunt Penny feeding the birds.

Griffin on a pony named Geronimo.



Griffin on the Ranger.



Olive looking over her shoulder wondering where that ferocious bark came from.


Back home Griffin got to see Santa at the local library and ask for a Christmas gift.

Griffin's Big Day (Not his Birthday)

This is a brief chronicle of the adventures of Griffin and the Billings Family.

Early in the morning we got up to drive to Atlanta. Griffin needed to have a large dark mole removed from his right jaw line. Here he is clinging to his rented Wall-E video before the drive.


Here he is waking up from the anesthetic. When Griffin was put under Mollie was told that he was the best behaved and that she did the best coaching of anyone else that had come in that day. He woke up a little groggy but a pop-sickle and a few animal crackers later he was as good as new; almost as if nothing happened at all.


At the hospital there was a giant 8ft. x 20ft. movie screen that had ocean shots on it. There were buttons Griffin could push that would play different movies shorts. He was very entertained.


Back home again. Here he is with his PJs' and his Wall-E glasses. In the end I think Mollie and I were more worked-up about the whole "surgery" than Griffin ever was.


...and I could not call this an official "Billings Southeast" post without including a picture of the ever beautiful/cute Olive June.

Leading Up To Halloween

Here are some pictures from when Grandma Karen Mora came out to visit. Prior to Halloween we went to a pumpkin patch, as you can see. We had a really good time with Karen and we are counting the days until we can see her, and everyone else at Christmas.

These days Olive really likes her exer-saucer and she has just started to eat rice cereal. More photos coming soon...

Growing, Growing, Growing

It is so amazing how Olive is growing. Four months goes very fast. There is something about the second time around, everything seems to be moving so much faster. She is starting to do "tummy time" as you can see above. I included pictures of this especially for Grandma Kathy. She is also sitting in her Bumbo and playing with toys. She, like Griffin, is very expressive as you can see from all the pictures. I thought this last picture was funny because they are both making funny faces.

We look forward to seeing Grandma Karen this Monday. Also, we are already anticipating having time at Christmas to visit all the San Diegans. We are all very excited.

She was ready for her close-up

We have not forgotten about you regular Blog viewers. Here are a couple photos to hold you over. We are anticipating a visits by Karen Mora in mid-October. We hope everyone is doing well.

Olive In Dresses

Oh, Olive you are so cute in your dresses. You are like a dress-up doll. The green dress is from Grandma Kathy and Olive wore it to church last Sunday. The last picture is of an assisted sit up while wearing a dress.

We are looking forward to a visit from Grandma Karen and possible, from our friends, Amber and Emily. Everyone else we will try to see at Christmas.

Reinhardt Visit

Here are some photos from the Reinhardt visit. We had such a great time together. The one of all of us together is from another concert down the street from our house. It was "Blues" music on a beautiful day; go figure. We also have the highly unusual photo of Mama, Daddy, Griffin, and Olive in the same photo. I hope all of you enjoy these photos.

Happy Baby

Yes, she is a happy and smiley baby. We also have some of Griffin's antics too. This weekend we began potty training. More information to come.

The last picture makes his daddy proud.

More Olive 2

Here are some more picture of Olive, who is getting more and more expressive. There is also a picture of Griffin eating some chocolate moose that Mollie was making.

This week we have had the privileged of having the Reinhardt's visit us here in Georgia. We have had a really great time being with them and I hope they have been as blessed, as we have been, by their visit. I will try to retrieve some photos from the visit, but it may take awhile.

In other news, we have officially purchased our tickets to visit San Diego this Christmas. So watch out, the Billings South-East will be in the Encinitas area this Holiday Season. We are so excited to see everyone and to show off Olive too.

Olive's First Concert

Recently the whole family attended a concert at the Ashford Manor, which is a B&B down the street from our house. We loaded up the wagon, walked a while, met some friends and had a blast. Though we were little hot, see the picture of sweaty Griffin, we had a really great time listening to an awesome Latin Jazz band called Grogus.

There is also some other pictures of Olive and a friend's baby boy named Eddy. They were born days apart. We also have a picture of smiling olive in here infamous bouncy chair.

We are very excited to see the Reinhardts' next week. What an amazing blessing.