Holiday Times

Because we broke our Mac (kind of), a lot of my pictures that I have been wanting to post are being held hostage. I tried to unhostagize--note...I like to make up words--them today, but there are so many that it will take awhile of loading and unloading the jump drive to transfer them all to this computer. Meanwhile, I have some pictures of our holiday festivities.

This is the finished product of Ekitzel and I spending ten hours baking. We made sugar cookies, toffee, winter bark (chocolate and peanuts) and chocolate peppermint cookies dipped in white chocolate. Those final cookies, Ekitzel really made, and although they were time consuming they rocked my world. Alyse baked with us and made peanut butter cookies with the Hershey's kisses on top.


Alyse and I went down to Provo to drop off some goodies. Here we are with Kristen and her little boy Luke. If you're confused...I'm holding Luke and Kristen has Kyle.


This is Evan sitting in our living room after we put all our Christmas lights up. Alyse gave us a little tree and I hung Kyle's toys on it to make up for the fact that I don't really have ornaments here in Utah. Evan hung lights around our windows and I put lights over the bookcase and around Kyle's swing. We like it so much, we are keeping them up until probably February when we move.


We had a chance to go see Chris and Teresa in Provo before they left. I wanted to get a picture of their daughter Halle with Kyle. But as soon as she saw the camera she came right over and started with all sorts of excited noises. Kyle's on the floor in the background. Halle is just so cute, I couldn't help but post this picture. I especially love her whale spout hair-do.



For Christmas Kyle got this overhead gym thing--we didn't wrap it or do any of that, and I used it before Christmas. It was one of my good finds at my new favorite store Kid to Kid. It only cost me $7 and the ears on the butterfly even squeak. He is not the biggest fan yet. But he does love that mirror (or any mirror) which is next to him. He is also wrapped up in the cutest little starfish blanket that Alyse made for us.



There are other pictures of Kyle with Santa, the family, friends with Kyle, baby legs, Kid to Kid finds, the cute outfits we got him for Christmas time, and shaving Evan's hair on Christmas day.
Hopefully when we get into non-Holiday months like August and September I'll finally be able to catch up on blogging with all the pictures I want. :) One can hope.

The Days

The days here have been filled with cough decongestant, antibiotics, aspirin, Tylenol, Excedrin, cough suppressant, and cough syrup. Evan has been sick since the day after Thanksgiving. It's been pretty miserable for all of us. He's still been working both jobs and in his little time off we've done all the normal holiday things--he's a very good husband and father. But with the sickness (Kyle and I've had a few bad days ourselves--today being one of them) and getting Christmas decoration up, cards sent, gifts bought and wrapped, goodies made, and guests hosted, it has left little time to post all of the pictures and stories I've collected. Many pardons.

Then the other day, we had an accident. The computer was bumped off the edge of the coffee table. It has taken several spills without incident. However, this one broke something related to the screen being attached to the computer. I know, I'm real technical. The warranty ran out the 5th of December this year. That's the way it always goes, right? So we will take it to see how much it costs to fix, but it hasn't happened yet in all the Christmas festivities. Luckily, we have my laptop, but the pictures are mostly on the other computer. So I have very few to post, until we get them off the broken Mac.

I would like to share with you the video of Kyle's first really "playing" incident. Notice that at the end, he sees the camera and stops interacting. He just stares at the camera when he knows it's there. Hence, it has been rather difficult to get a good picture of him smiling. At least, I don't have to worry about getting pictures with him looking at the camera. This video has been to China and around. It has caused many smiles and giggles. I could watch it over and over. Please enjoy. Along with our best wishes for the holidays--where ever our friends and family may be.

Date Night

Shortly before Thanksgiving, Mammy (Evan's mom has asked to be referred to by this horrible name--as if we live in the South and sip mint juleps on our veranda every evening in our rockers looking over the fields), asked if we would like a date night. She hadn't watched Kyle since the 1st of November. We agreed.

We had no plans made. But the Saturday after Thanksgiving, we dropped Kyle off and went in search of our friends. We headed to William's and Sonoma at Trolley Square to see if Bri was working. She wasn't, but we did park next to our twin car--we took a picture.


After we wandered around the mall--everything was either under construction or very expensive--we dropped by and saw Bri and John briefly. Then through sheer luck, we were blessed to see Amy's beautiful apartment and new couch and watch Iron Man with her and Elliott. It was a late night, but very pleasant.

When we went to pick up Kyle, he was sound asleep on the floor of Grandfather and Mammy's room, but we heard that the dog had eaten half of one of his burp clothes. Milo, the dog, is very big into the taste of spit up and I've caught her multiple times licking at a used burp cloth or Kyle's clothing. Although, I was suprised that she actually ate this much cloth...



Don't worry Dad found the piece later after it passed through her system--so we know she's okay ; ) He generously offered it back to us--but I was satisfied without it. We have plenty of others.

Sick Dreams

Evan is notorious for being able to comfort me, hold a discussion, or change Kyle's diapers all while asleep. Going along with that is when he talks in his sleep about his dreams. One time after Evan and I had watched the movie, "The King of Kong: A Fist Full of Quarters" about middle-aged men trying to obtain the world record for the old arcade Donkey Kong game, (everyone should see it---so funny) Evan told me he needed to reboot and proceeded to make bee,boo,beep sounds as he rebooted. Priceless two o'clock in the morning interaction.

Evan has been sick now for seventeen days and we have seen the doctor twice with no success. It actually seems to be getting worse. But, back to the point, he is on a lot of medicine, which makes his dreams even more strange and silly.

Last night as I was falling asleep, Evan began to freak out next to me. He started to say, "It's slipping...I can't hold on...Someone help me...they're only a millimeter in size..." I thought maybe he was dreaming about dropping Kyle (which has happened), and I kept asking, "who?"

When he finally answered, it was priceless. Evan finally said, "little baby jazz musicians." I rolled around laughing for several minutes. Then I hear Evan say, "I just heard myself say that." He started to explain and then stopped and said, "No, that doesn't work either." I made sure he was awake and then we both drifted off to sleep with smiles on our faces---little baby jazz musicians. Priceless.

P.S. I could make a Mastercard commercial that involved buying a bed and sheets and such, the husband in the commercial could being having a dream and say little baby jazz musicians. The tag line would be, "Sweet Dreams: Priceless." This is probably ridiculous to everyone else, but very funny to me.

3 Months

My baby is three months today (and for a shout out to Nolan, he's been on his mission for a year). That is right--3 whole months of everyday goodness. He can coo, makes all sorts of noises, smiles, grasps, stand with little support, balance on his tummy by lifting his whole upper and lower body simultaneously, and as of this morning.....(wait for it) rolls over.

I went to put him back down after his 5 o'clock feeding this morning. Lifted my hands off his side and he flipped to his back. As quick as could be. Evan got up and we turned on the lights and tried to get him to re-create the miracle. Alas, no such luck yet.

I have comparison pictures, but iPhoto is being a butt. I have no real good pictures of his smiling because it is so hard to capture, but I do have one of his lower lip pout (iPhoto is holding it hostage--here's a pretty good one). I will try to get video of the roll over once he is being more consistant.

Pretty good picture, if it wasn't blurry. The iPhone sometimes comes in handy...



Look at that lower lip action....



I'm a proud momma....

Thanksgiving--Long Overdue

I know that it has been a long time, but frankly, I got tired after posting so many blog entries in one night (I knew that my mom was going to read my blog on Thanksgiving--she doesn't have access to a computer often). It is also a pain in the butt to upload pictures on this, and to get them from the camera to the computer is more effort than I often want to spend. I know, make fun of how lazy I am....

The day before Thanksgiving, my sister-in-law, Sarah, who is married to the second eldest boy in our family, Kelly, had a lay-over in Salt Lake on her way to see Kelly in Denver for Thanksgiving. Kelly was being trained in Kansas for his six month deployment to Afghanistan. My sister, Heidi, and I had never met her. So we went to a really skeezy Denny's-ish restaurant out by the airport for some breakfast. Evan was hard at work, but I brought Kyle.

This is Aunt Sarah and Kyle...anyone who is skinnier than me (which is everyone), he looks at curiously.


Then on Thanksgiving, Kyle did some standing on Daddy's tummy while I got us ready to go. It is his favorite position now and if you don't let him stand when he wants to--he'll cry.





This is a close up of his premie onesie ( a little short in the arms, but it fits everywhere else). Walmart only had premie and 3 months (which might as well have been 9 years for how big it was on him).


This is his afternoon nap at the grandparent's house, comfortably between Aunt Avery and Daddy.





This is a close up of him naping. Notice the fist in the mouth, he won't take his pacifier to sleep anymore.



Later there was more sleeping with Daddy (all this before we even had dinner)...



The day after Thanksgiving we also hung out at the grandparent's with the great-grandparents and played games. This is laughing and smiling with Aunt Zoie...



This is with Aunt Avery...he is not short on love...



This is with Grandma and Aunt Avery....


I have an awesome cool picture of the line outside Target at 5:45am when we went shopping on the day after Thanksgiving. So I'll post it later.

Baby Etiquette

So I have a bone to pick with society. When did it become unacceptable for babies to cry? When did it become acceptable for everyone and anyone to make comments on my parenting? This rant has been building for the twelve weeks that Kyle has been here. Although we all say things and make mistakes--if I know you and love you, I am not talking about you....promise.

Last night, Evan and I were at our church building talking to other people in our ward. Evan was holding Kyle and he was wrapped in a blanket. Kyle was obviously very content, and on his way to sleep. A woman (that we have never met) asked how old he was and said she wanted to see him. She came close and then started to stroke his head....what, the? As most of you know, I am not fond of strangers or small talk. If you've seen me with people interested in Kyle, you know that I allow Evan or someone else to answer the questions, unless I'm alone. After she had stroked his head, she said, "I just wanted to see if he was cold, because it's cold in here."

It's not your baby, lady! If he was cold--he would cry. She then proceeded to tell us she has a two-year-old (which, obviously, makes her a better parent and more knowledgeable than me--right?) and I should enjoy them while they are little. Why do people talk bad about their children? I love two-year-olds, it is my favorite age. They are fun, adventurous, cuddly, cranky, and they throw fits. I do not mind crying or fit throwing. You can miss having newborns, but why say bad things about your own children--real unconditional love.

Which brings me to my next point, babies cry. It is okay. It helps their lungs and development, and they need to have at least one good cry a day. If Kyle is crying, I do not need you to tell me you think he needs his diaper changed, has a burp, a tummy ache, wants to be swaddled or needs to eat. Don't tell me about how you parented your children (decades ago) better. I do a mental checklist and know if his physical needs are taken care of. Here are some reasons he might cry when you hold him: maybe...you smell. Maybe...you are ugly to look at. Maybe...his nose itches and he can't reach it. Maybe...he wants down. Maybe...he has a bad taste in his mouth, or a craving. Maybe...he has a headache. Maybe...with his baby intuition, he knows you have a bad personality. It could be anything (although some of these are exaggerations--unfortunately).

If you don't want to hold him while he cries---hand him back. I have spent almost all my time with him in the last twelve weeks, not you. And for the record, in case you missed it and it is not clear by who is lactating, I am his mother. (Although, Evan is not lactating, he is his father).

Some mothers (and fathers) do not like to hear their child cry. That is fine. It isn't Evan and I, and never has been. We chose to sleep train him at 7 weeks, like the doctor suggested. He has slept 6-8 hours a night since he was 8 weeks because of it. I've always allowed him to cry himself to sleep in his crib. I still do. I put him down at naps and allow the same thing. It doesn't bother me. Now, please understand, I am not letting him scream for hours, but two minutes or so--I'm okay with it. If you aren't, do it differently. I love to cuddle him and rock him (although we do not have a rocking chair). Kyle doesn't like to be put down during the day--so I hold him all day (in a sling, if I need my hands) unless I am taking a shower.

If the child is growing and developing, you are a good parent. I'll do what is right for me and you do what is right for you. Just don't tell me what to do, especially if you don't know me. And for the record, don't touch my kid if you don't know me. Rude. As a society, we need to teach etiquette, especially for how to deal with other people's children.

I love taking Kyle and going to work with Evan at the Alzheimer facility. The residents love Kyle. No one cares when Kyle cries. Most just ooh and aah over him and exclaim how precious and cute he is. They'll tell me about their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. I'll see them poke their neighbors across the room and point to Kyle and say, "see the baby." It makes them happy. No one tells me how to parent. They just appreciate him as he is and me as I am with him.