Cousin Bonding Time

My sister, Talina, and I got the coolest Christmas presents this year from my Mom.  Thanksgiving Point passes for our families.  Now that the babies are a bit bigger, and the weather is nice, we went today to go activate our memberships.  Unfortunately, pseudo-hurricane-force winds kept us from our original plan of going to the Farm area to check out baby animals, but we had a blast going to the Dinosaur Museum with the kiddos.

Bailey cracks me up around Owen -- these two are gonna be SO much fun to watch grow up together!

Here's our Bailey Boo hanging out in our frontroom . . . Annie & Ellie found her this hat, and insisted she wear it.

Two Months

On March 1st (due to the lack of a Feb. 30th, my baby boy turned 2 months old. 
Already?!

Out of all my kids, he seems the most 'newborn-ish' for the longest amount of time.  He still seems to spend all of his time eating, then being cute and happy for a few minutes, then being angry at the feeling of tiredness, then sleeping.  When he's awake and alert, he's so adorable and happy.  But then it's not long before he's fussy and crying and wanting to go back to sleep.  He also seems to be the 'floppiest' still -- he just wants to lie around in my arms (or my lap, he LOVES lying in my lap while I'm sitting cross legged), and unlike his other siblings, doesn't want to be held up in standing, or even sitting, position for very long.  Add to that he has a little cousin only two and a half months older, who practically came out of the womb as a two month old (she was the smiliest, most alert, bright eyed newborn I have EVER seen.  She never seemed floppy or sleepy, it's like she was just up and ready to go since birth) . . . and Owen just seems so young to me.  Which isn't a bad thing by any means, I like having my sleepy newborn.  (Less thrilled by the fussy, overly tired, crying thing -- but, you take the good with the bad.)   He doesn't cry anywhere near what Annie did, but he's fussier than Isaac was . . . I am now convinced though that I was just never destined to have a laid back, chill baby.  :-)  

Now for the two month stats:

Weight:  11.9 lbs. (55%)

Height: 23.62" (75%)

And the shocker --

Head: 15.4" (26%)
(Although I think this was possibly measured a bit smaller, and at his last appointment he was 37%).

That is miles away from my other kids.  I remember Ellie at times having a 90%+ head circumference and being 2% in weight.  Greg and I used to joke that we didn't know how our kids didn't look like bobble heads, since all three older ones have always been higher than 85% on the charts (Isaac was 98% at his 18 month appointment.)  

I think Owen will be the Talina of our family.  (My family will get that.)

And just for fun, to compare to his big (and I do mean BIG) brother:

Isaac at this age:

Weight: 14.66 lbs. (96%)

Height: 66%

So Owen was taller, but Isaac was much heftier.  (Seriously, over 14 and a half pounds at only TWO MONTHS old?!  Ellie was 13lbs. 9oz. at SIX MONTHS old.)  The funny thing about Isaac was that he actually looked thinner than the girls at this age -- who both had chipmunk cheeks and chunky thighs.  Isaac didn't look like he had any 'extra' weight on him, he was just so freakingly solid.  Of course, all my kids shoot up on the charts for the first four months.  Then they stop growing for awhile, maybe getting a bit taller and putting on a bit of weight, but the spend the next 8 months slowing dropping back down the charts.  Our gigantic baby, Isaac, had slimmed down to less than 21 pounds at a year old, at 19% on the charts, and at just over 29" was at 29% on the charts.  But now at a year and a half, he's quickly climbing the charts again.   I find it so interesting that all three older kids, despite being very different sizes and weights from each other, followed very, very similar growth patterns.  

And lastly, some pictures from the day he turned 'two months old'.  I'd taken Ellie and Isaac to the doctors, so Aunt Talina and cousin Bailey came over to play with Owen and Annie.

Countdown

Feels like life is on a bit of a 'countdown'.  Somedays that countdown seems to be the countdown 'til Christmas, and sometimes it feels like the countdown to the baby.  At least we know the date on the first one! :-)

This last couple days have been more focused on Christmas, with a trip to the mall to get my niece Bailey's first pictures with Santa.  Here she is with my sister, Talina:

I am really loving having my sister be a stay-at-home Mom with me.  Especially with her living just over a mile away from me.  It's fun having someone to run errands with me, and having someone to hang out with at home.  It's just so uber-comfortable with it being my sister -- we sit around and talk, sometimes I vacuum or do dishes while we talk, sometimes she checks her email while Bailey naps in the swing and I'm changing Isaac, sometimes she plays with the kids while I run out and shovel the snow off the steps before Annie gets home, and sometimes we both fall asleep on my couches while watching cartoons with the kids.  Yeah, social interactions doesn't usually doesn't get much more comfortable than that.  :-)
(This will probably further hinder my social life though, as I don't even feel the need to change out of my pajamas to have her come over, and I don't think I've ever fallen asleep on the couch while talking to a non-related friend.)  :-)

Monday night we also had our annual Christmas Party with Greg's extended family.  The kids had fun getting to hang out with Grandma and Grandpa, and taking in all the Christmas festivities. 

 

Isaac loved watching the train go around and around the tree.  He loved the tree too.

 Isaac and Grandma enjoying the nativity set. 

 Ellie was pretty wired (shocking, I know.)  This is how she posed for pictures.

 Isaac showing off one of his classic 'grump' faces.  He was pretty grumpy when we first got there, but totally warmed up and was dancing and playing and having a blast once he settled in.

 The kids sitting with Grandma on the couch during the White Elephant exchange.

Where I had Ellie choose one of the gifts we'd brought, just to be on the safe side :-)

Stories Mixed with Pictures

To warn you, this is gonna be a bunch of short stories about the kids or the holidays (most pilfered from my Facebook statuses over the last week) mixed with random pictures from the last little bit . . . 

First, an original Annie story.  Annie came upstairs tonight, was shedding her clothes as she walked down the hall into her room, and hollered over her shoulder, "Dad said to go upstairs and get changed into pajamas before we did ANYTHING else."  Then she stopped.  Walked slowly to the door of my bedroom and added thoughtfully, "Although, that wouldn't really be possible.  I mean, you can't do nothing.  Just walking up the stairs, breathing, walking to my room . . . that's all doing something."  She thought for a second, then happily added, "I think he meant before we did anything like PLAY," and skipped off happily to her room to follow her Dad's instructions to the best of her ability. 

First pictures are gonna be from Thanksgiving.  There's a bunch here (About every couple months, I throw together simple collages on 8.5x11" prints that I send my little brother, Cody, in Uruguay.  So, there are all those collages for him).  Thanksgiving was a ton of fun.  We had it at my Mom's house this year, and the kids loved seeing everyone.  Even if Mr. Grumpy Pants (i.e., Isaac, the moody toddler) spent half the time glaring people down.  My Grandma asked me what was wrong with him that he doesn't like people.  :-)  I tried to explain it's just a phase, and that he's actually quite warm with people, but is awfully suspicious of my family, since they tend to do evil stuff like babysit him.  With Mom GONE.  Who can blame him for giving them the stink eye.  They're monsters.  :-)

Usually it'd be the day after Thanksgiving that'd kick off the Christmas season around here.  But we started decorating the weekend before.  Greg was initially mildly opposed, possibly using words like 'sacrilege',  while I countered with words like, '8 months pregnant with your child', and I won the debate.  :-)  I want to get things up so we can enjoy the holiday season before things get more hectic, and because I have every intention of putting away all things Christmas on December 26th, since I'll be a week from my due date, and I do NOT want to come home from the hospital with a newborn and still have Christmas decorations to put away!  So, Christmas goes up one week early so we can take it down one we early.  Greg couldn't argue with my flawless logic.  Or hormones.  The kids LOVE having the tree up, and we spent Monday evening decorating it.  For Family Home Evening, we had the girls put the ornaments on the Christmas tree -- for each ornament each person put on, they named something they were thankful for. It was so amazingly sweet and cute. The girls came up with literally dozens of blessings in their lives (Ellie's got a bit repetitive at the end, and often included Annie), and they'd hug each other and gush every time they mentioned each other . . . it was so sweet!  The one that amused us the most was Ellie's, "I'm thankful for Mom can give me blessings when I'm sick." Annie's eyebrows arched, and was all, "You mean Dad?" "Nope, Mom." Then the next ornament, "I'm thankful for Annie can give me blessings when I'm sick." "Dad?!" "Nope, Annie." She never did mention Dad giving her blessings . . . :-)
Thanksgiving night the girls got their Christmas Dresses for the year (to wear the next morning for their cousin Bailey's baby blessing that we were having early Friday morning . . . so we tried to get some family 'Christmas Card-ish' pictures taken that morning . . .

(The bottom corner pictures are from the Mall, where Annie's Grandma, Grandpa and Aunt Andrea took them on Wednesday night. The girls had a sleep over with them on 'Thanksgiving Eve', since Aunt Andrea was only in town for another day or so . . . they have not stopped talking about it since!)

Oh, and since those last pictures included Santa, I should add an exchange between Ellie and I from last week here:
Me: "Ellie, what do you want for Christmas?"

Ellie: "Bubble gum!"

Annie: "You can't just ask for gum, Ellie." Exasperated sigh.

Ellie: "I KNOW ANNIE! STOP TALKING SO I CAN TALK TO MOM!"

Ellie, again: "Gum, with, like, Santa on it."

Me: "Well Ellie, we'll ask Santa to put gum in your stocking, but what else do you want?"
Ellie: Thinking hard, then lighting up, "Oooh! Presents!"

Me: "OK, what kind of presents?"

Ellie: "Lots of presents!"
Me: "OK, but Ellie, what kind of presents."

Ellie: "The kind you open!"


She is not being as helpful as she thinks she is . . .
(Both girls asked for nothing but gum for a couple weeks . . . Annie is now asking for roller skates as well.  And maybe some lip gloss.)


So, after our little photo shoot at home on Friday morning, we headed to my sister's Church for her Baby Bailey's blessing.  (Usually such things are traditionally held on a Sunday, during Sacrament Meeting . . . but, a huge part of my brother-in-law, David's, family had been able to come into town for Thanksgiving and Friday, so they scheduled it for a Friday morning to accommodate the most schedules.)  It was really fun though, all getting together in the chapel for the blessing, then going back to my Mom's house for brunch and hanging out for a couple hours.  My kids have seen SO much family lately -- with Aunt Andrea (Greg's sister) in town, and hanging out with Greg's parents, grandma, all my family together for the holidays.  They have LOVED it.  They've gotten so used to seeing everyone, that they now ask first thing every morning if we're going to see Grandma Ruth or Aunt Star or Grandma Verla or Aunt Andrea or Grandma Karine . . . or whomever it is they're convinced they should get to see that day.  Good things we have a whole month of the holidays ahead of us!

The kids were SO excited when they woke up a week or so ago (or whenever that was!) to a bunch of snow in the backyard.  For the first time of the season we busted out all the gloves, snow boots and ski suits and got everyone dressed to go outside (except Mom, who stayed in where it was warm and dry, and did dishes and cleaned the kitchen.  With nobody pulling on her pant leg.)  I think it was a first -- the kids stayed outside FAR longer than it took to get them dressed to go out!  They had so much fun (although Isaac took a good long while to warm up to the cold snow -- but sledding, and being pulled around in a sled, finally got him smiling.)  Greg would load all three kids in the sled, pull them all around our huge backyard, up the small hill at the back, and they'd come sliding down together.  It was hilarious.  And from the looks of it, exhausting.  Greg came in after awhile and said, "Wow, pulling 90 lbs. around in a sled for awhile is quite a work out!  I told him I'd been watching, and decided if I go overdue again this time, I'm gonna go out and try it, 'cause I'm convinced that would put me into labor.

The girls finished their soccer season.  Annie really seemed to enjoy it.  Ellie screamed and cried and whined and had to have her hand held the first three games.  So, for the last three, we gave up and let her not even show up.  So, of course, hours after what would have been her last game, she asked, "Hey, why didn't we go to soccer today?  I wanted to play!"  I don't believe her. 

Lastly, a couple Isaac stories:
Isaac's sentences are ever growing . . . today instead of just saying 'Gee tales' (for Veggie Tales) he exclaimed, "Bob from Gee Tales!" Then tonight while brushing his teeth, "Oh no! Drop teeth brush!" when he dropped his tooth brush. (He then proceeded to walk around the room, throwing down the tooth brush and exclaiming, "Oh no!  Dropped!")

A few days ago, the girls were telling jokes in the van on the way to Grandma and Grandpa's house . . . at one point, Isaac chimed in. "Naw, naw?" (Knock, knock). At first I just repeated "Knock, knock," back to him, 'til I realized he was getting frustrated with me, so the next time he said knock, knock, I responded appropriately with, "Who's there?" He happily squealed, "ME!" and proceeded to laugh uproariously at his own joke. I have a comedic genius 16 month old on my hands! :-)

Latest Pictures

So, I'm playing catch up on my pictures.

A few weeks ago, we went to our Ward's talent show, which was a lot of fun.  But the best part, especially according to the kids, was running around on the stage afterwards.  They could not possibly have had more fun!

Then the biggest thing that's happened around here, was the birth of my newest niece, Bailey.  The girls had just finished their first indoor soccer practice when it was time to go meet the new baby.

 Isaac was not so sure how he felt about this whole baby thing.

 Man, I love this kid!

 Ellie wanted to try swaddling Annie up in a blanket, like baby Bailey was swaddled.

Then this Monday night we went to my Mom & Dad's house for Family Home Evening, where we carved pumpkins, made 'bloody eyeballs' (powdered sugar donuts with a red life saver in the middle, and red frosting blood shot lines), and tried on random Halloween costumes.

Here's Ellie as a pumpkin.

The girls got to try on some of their Uncle Cody's old costumes.

Ellie and Annie as roman soldiers..

 Annie as a cavewoman and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.

 Isaac checking out baby Bailey.  And pretty little Bailey on my lap.

 Isaac liked the caveman bone -- mainly to hit things with.  Good news, he only hit the one week old baby one time.  This bodes really well for our household in another 10 weeks or so.  :-)