Dear Mr. Sandman,

I'm sure you work hard around the world each day to help people get to sleep, and I'm sure you're usually pretty good at your job. But we seem to have a little problem in this house.

I think each night when you come over to sprinkle your sleep dust you've been skipping the kids and just getting Dan and me. They both wake up several times a night and just want to talk, play, or cry at us. The only thing I can think is that you've been giving us all their sleep dust plus our own. We're so exhausted all the time (obviously from a sleep dust overdose) while the kids seem to be wide awake all night long when they should be sleepy. I know we've been turning out the nightlight in our room more often, so if the mix-up is simply because it's too dark just let me know. I'd be more than happy to leave on every light in the house for you if it meant the kids sleeping well.

Sorry to have to bring this complaint to your attention. I hope this problem can be resolved soon so that we can be friends again in the near future.

Most sincerely,
Me

P.S.
Just so you know, I don't hold you totally responsible for last night's bad sleep since both kids have colds. I don't want you to think I blame you for everything.

Thankful Thursday

1. Times when Matty helps. He can be a stubborn mule when he wants to be and only does what he wants to, but other times he can be a real sweetheart and extremely helpful. Today I started to strip down Jossy on the changing table after she had a blow out when I noticed that the wipes were gone. I yelled for Matty to get them quickly from the living room and he did it right away. I was very thankful I didn't have to drag a naked, pooed on baby through the apartment to get them.

2. Television. I don't watch nearly as much as I used to (which is a good thing,) but I still feel grateful to be able to sit back and veg at the end of a hard day when I need it.

3. Visiting Teachers. I'm thankful to have 2 visiting teachers right now whom I totally love and greatly look forward to their visits each month. Sometimes you just don't click with the people assigned to you, but I love mine right now! They are wonderful women and good friends. (Now watch, because I said this they'll be taken away from me!!)

4. Going to the temple with my husband. It is so rare that we get to go together to a session. We typically have one person go while the other watches the kids and then switch. So when my mom came over and babysat last Saturday so that we could go together, it was a real treat! I've missed being able to go with my sweetheart.

5. My bishop. He has helped Dan and I through some hard trials in life over the last several years. When we recently asked him for some advice on a difficult decision, he once again gave us some inspired help. I'm so thankful for his love and kindness towards us.

Growing Up

I don't know who gave my little girl permission to grow up, but it sure wasn't me. It all just seems to be going by so quickly! It's probably because she's hitting so many milestones at once lately.

She's almost mastered the sippy cup, though she still occassionally drinks too much and chokes on it a little.

She prefers to be outside of her walker rather than in to eat the cheerios on her tray. She climbs on anything with no fear (despite numerous bumps and bruises.)

I sure love this little face, even if it is growing up too fast.

Randomness

I know I haven't blogged much the last few weeks. There's been a lot going on around here and getting the chance to just sit and type has been rare. (Even now I have a little boy climbing on and off my lap.)

I totally missed my blogaversary last week. I've thoroughly enjoyed blogging this past year. It's seriously been a great outlet for me and a wonderful way to keep in touch with friends. It's crazy to me that my second post was about our ultrasound and now here I sit with a7.5-month-old who is a super speedy crawler already and pulls herself up to a stand on everything. It's amazing how much can change in a year!!

Anyway, back to the present. I have a few pictures to share of the last few weeks just for fun.

Jossy makes the funniest face where she scrunches up her nose and squints her eyes. Sometimes she does it when she smiles and loves it when we make the same face back to her. She's full of silly faces.
Now that's she's crawling, we've had some interesting wardrobe malfunctions. I'm not even sure how she did this one since the onsie fits pretty snugly on her.
People are always telling me they can't believe how much hair she has. We thought we'd try to take some pictures to truly capture it. (Plus, she loves being thrown into the air.)
Matty and I were a little bored last Friday, so in the morning we drove all the way to Krispy Kreme just to watch the donuts get made on the conveyer belt. (And to eat some, of course!) Then we had fun back home trying to get Jossy to crawl through a tunnel. She'd put herself partway in then sit back on her bum outside the tunnel. She did that over and over and only finally crawled through when I stuck myself halfway inside. She thought the whole thing was hilarious.
That afternoon, Matty wanted to play with a 1,000 piece puzzle we have. Um, no! So we went to Walmart just to get him one of his own. He's always had those easy wood puzzles, but we got him something more complicated. It's 35 pieces and within 24 hours he was doing it completely by himself!
We've had the TV on a little less around here and the radio on a little more. Matty's become quite the little dancer. It's so funny to watch him rock out. (I don't know where he picked up the tongue thing. I promise Dan and I don't dance like that.)
Just yesterday one of my sisters was over at our apartment and I happened to mention that I have no clue how to do baby girl's hair. (I'm so afraid of pulling it out or hurting Jossy!) She was kind enough to show me how to just do a little ponytail on top. Turns out, my elastics didn't have enough give and that's why I couldn't do anything well! She uses orthodontic bands (the little rubber bands that go on braces,) and they work great! Jossy looked so cute!

I guess that's about it for now. Thanks for checking in on us! :)

Vroom Vroom!!

Dan had Monday off work, so we all went to the last day of the Utah Auto Expo. I had printed off coupons but totally forgot to grab them on the way out, so we had to pay full price. (Darn it!)

Jossy took a nap for the whole 2 hours we were there, which made the experience a little more enjoyable. Matty loved climbing in and out of the cars. He almost always wanted to sit in the back and have either Dan or I "pretend to drive." We only got him to sit in the driver's seat once or twice, silly kid. He'd also FREAK out if some stranger got in the car while he was in there even if Dan and I were standing right next to his door.

Matty driving. One of the few times he got behind the wheel.

My man looks good in a convertible!!

Matty, the race car driver

Dan looking wistfully at the Spider, his favorite of the day,
as he got out.
(Who needs to buy a house anyway??)
Matty sized!!
Matty's favorite of the day. He calls it the Huggy Buggy car.
Totally practical for a family with two kids, right?

It was fun to have some family time. :) Unfortunately, we weren't able to stay long enough to check out the really cool, unusual cars near the front because we had somewhere we needed to be. But Dan and I were both done with climbing in and out of cars by then anyway. Matty would've stayed forever.

Thankful Thursday

It's not like me to go a full week with no posts, but things have been a little insane around here. I'm mentally and physically drained with little sleep the last few nights, so here's a quick list just so I can say I did one:

1. My cell phone got fixed!! It was literally falling apart at the hinges. I had to use a rubberband just to keep it together enough to stop dropping my calls. I went into my wireless provider yesterday to look at a new phone, but the girl behind the counter was able to give me a new SIM card and fix my phone in minutes, all for free!! Yay for saving money right now!!!

2. The Auto Expo. I'll post pictures soon, but we went as a family to the expo on Monday for a few hours, and Matty had a blast. I love getting out and creating fun memories as a family.

3. Calculators. Make my life easier.

Thankful Thursday

This past week has been a tough one between the stomach flu invading our house, a baby trying desperately to cut some teeth, and the rebellious 3-year-old who seems to have moved in. A moment to reflect and feel some gratitude will be good for me.

1. Jossy crawling. Yeah, it's becoming a pain real fast to baby proof everything again, not to mention try to keep her away from her brother whom she likes to crawl on (causing him to get really upset.) But I feel very thankful to have a little girl who is hitting these developmental milestones.

2. Dan's birthday cake. Mmmmmmm!

3. My two best friends today. Their names are Ben and Jerry. Have you met them?

4. My husband gave me porn. Okay, I know that sounds horrible, but hear me out!! Tiburon had this post on her blog about the book Porn For Women. (It involves things like men doing chores without being asked and stuff like that. Nothing bad!!) I had showed the post to Dan last night and we had a good laugh. So this morning Dan made the bed (well, pulled up the covers but I'm not being picky) and said he was giving me porn. As a joke I said next time he should do it with his shirt off. I had to run to the store tonight to pick up my two best friends (see #3) and when I got home Dan was doing the dishes without his shirt. LOL

5. Matty going to sleep early. I can't even begin to describe how difficult the last few days have been with him. I'm just super thankful that we've put him to bed early the last two nights and he's actually fallen asleep by 7 and 7:30. It's let me have a little more of a break at night after fighting him all day long.

On the Move

Someone learned a new skill yesterday.

And someone improved even more today.



(Poor girl was slowed down by the saggy jammies.)



Want to know what we used to motivate her for this video?

The remote control, of course.

Tiny Twinkle Toes

The amazingly talented and creative Sandi showed me how to make a little tutu for just $5. My first attempt was a total bust, but the second one turned out much better. After I finished it, I got Jossy to try it on for a few minutes and quickly grabbed the camera. (She wasn't in the best mood, so I didn't even take the time to get the wrinkles out of my backdrop.)



I don't want anyone to be fooled into thinking she liked it. This shows her true feelings for her new accessory better:


I'll try to get some cuter pictures another day. Perhaps doing them not so close to naptime would be a good start. :)

Greetings From the White House!

I'm so happy that our birth greeting for Jossy from the White House came today!! I had requested one for Matty soon after he was born and almost forgot to do one for Jossy. It had to be requested and processed while President Bush was still in office since he was the president when she was born. I think I finally got around to requesting one back in November, and if I had waited one more week it might've been too late. Whew!

If you want to know more about how to do this for your future children, go to this website. But don't bother trying it until Obama takes over since they won't honor any new requests with how little time Bush has left in office.

The greeting comes with your child's name handwritten in calligraphy on the envelope and the White House raised seal on the card. Just a fun little thing for the baby book. :)

The Good, the Bad & the Ugly

The last 3 nights Jossy has decided to sleep a little better. I don't know where that sleep switch was on her, but something must have triggered it. 3 nights ago she only woke up twice, the next night only ONCE, and last night it was three times (but one of those times she was awoken because Matty was crying so loudly from a nightmare.) Her sleeping better is definitely GOOD! *

The BAD part was that the night that she only woke up once, I was up sick with a stomach flu after feeding her at 3 AM, so I didn't get to enjoy the good night's sleep I could've had. :(

The UGLY part was the next morning. I still wasn't feeling well and asked Dan to stay home from work to help out with the kids. Good thing he did! Within the next 15 minutes Jossy was puking all over our bed and Matty had diarrhea which got all over the floor and his pj's. YUCK!! Poor Dan had to take care of all 3 of us all day long. And trust me, it was a looooooong day!

Thankfully, we're all on the mend now and just crossing our fingers that poor Dan doesn't catch it himself. Today is his birthday, and we had plans for a night out (with a sitter lined up and everything!) but getting the flu kind of threw a wrench into those plans. We'll just have to celebrate another night.



*I guess I should've knocked on wood after typing this last night because both kids had a horrible night and Jossy seems to still be sick. One step forward, two steps back.

Thankful Thursday

I've been doing Thankful Thursdays for so long now, sometimes it's hard to come up with new things that I haven't mentioned before. Hmmmm, let me think. . . .

1. Mortgage rates. We've been looking for a house for almost 2 years, and I must say I'm pretty happy with the rates available right now.

2. Visiting the temple with my family. I really enjoyed the tour we took of the Draper temple this week. That trip has given us some wonderful opportunities to teach Matty more about temples and how we can be together forever.

3. Our MP3 player. Yes, we're a little behind the times in this house. (Actually, it's more like I have a hard time spending money on things that I don't really need.) But we finally got an MP3 player for Christmas, and I'm thoroughly enjoying it. We have some cheap little speakers for it, too. Matty loves to turn them on and have us all dancing together to the music. It's led to some fun family memories.

4. Sweet weirdness. Matty told me out of nowhere this week, "Mom, I love your cute bum!" I didn't know what to say but, "Uh. . . thanks Matty." I was trying not to laugh too hard. He hears us say that to his sister and him as we get them in the tub each day, so I don't have to wonder where he got it from. (Sorry, but my kids do have the cutest bums!)

5. Matty doesn't know how to upload to the Internet. . . yet. VERY thankful for this. (Word from the wise: don't give a 3-year-old a camera to keep him occupied so you can take a quick shower.)

6. The delete button on a digital camera. See #5.

7. Snuggles from my kids. Makes any day better.


If you're not already, go ahead and try Thankful Thursday on YOUR blog! Spread the gratitude. :)

Why I'm the Best!

The candy and junk in the house from the holiday season is finally gone!! But don't worry, I didn't let my family have too much of it. I wouldn't even think of being so rude as to risk their health like that! I'm so selfless that I decided to sacrifice my own waistline and dispose of much of it myself as quickly as possible. I know, I know, it was just so thoughtful of me to do that for them. Maybe they'll return the favor and lose the pounds for me that I gained while I was so busy thinking of them.

I'm just the best wife and mommy! :)

The Results Are In . . .

Our pediatrician asked us to bring Jossy in during the first week of January for a weight check. If you recall, she had lost weight between her 4 mo. and 6 mo. appointments, so he wanted to see if we could get it back to a reasonable number. She was at 13 lbs exactly at the beginning of December, and the doctor wanted her at 14 lbs by now.

As I placed her on the scale today, I held my breath just praying for a 14. Alas, this is what I saw:



She was so close!!! The pediatrician came and told me that it was good enough and I didn't need to worry about it. (He knows me too well.) I let him know that she actually had a stomach bug for about a week and a half where she had diarrhea like 6 times a day. (It was awful!) Given all that, he thinks she's doing great and we don't need to go back in until her regular 9 mo. appointment. Wahoo! Guess we'll just keep shoveling in that baby food and see if we can't get her a little chubbier. (Man, don't I wish I had that problem?! lol)

The Draper Temple

My dad works as an architect for the LDS church in the temple department. Because of this, he and his family were invited to an early VIP tour of the Draper Temple tonight. My dad couldn't go because of another commitment, but Dan and I were able to take the kids.

Matty went with us to the Rexburg, Idaho Temple tour a year ago, so he kind of remembered what this was all about. He was very reverent and attentive inside. When asked as we were leaving what his favorite part of the temple was he pointed to a round chair. :) Dan's favorite part was the Celestial Room with it's super tall and beautiful ceiling. If I had to guess Jossy's favorite part I'd say it was just being warm after being out in the freezing cold. I liked the Bride's Room as well as the large Sealing Room. It was seriously the largest Sealing Room I've ever seen and probably fits about 60 guests.

We had a special moment as a family as we all stood in front of one of the two facing mirrors in that Sealing Room and looked at our reflections go on and on. I remembered standing in a similar room in the Salt Lake Temple the day Dan and I were married and being told that those mirrors were like looking backwards to our ancestors and forward to our eternal posterity. And there we were tonight, standing in front of those mirrors with the beginning of our posterity held in our arms. The Spirit touched my heart, and I felt very grateful for our little family.

As we left, Matty said he wanted to go see another temple and pointed to a picture of the Alberta, Canada one on display. I told him if he saved his money and paid for us all to go, we'd be happy to take him there someday. :) Unfortunately, he wanted to go NOW. Not easy to explain to a 3-year-old that we just can't do that tonight.


(If you are near the Salt Lake area and would like to attend the public open house for the Draper Temple, just visit this link to reserve your tickets. The open house runs from January 15th- March 14th. )

Moving On Up!

Matty had his first official day in primary today! We've been trying really hard to prepare him for when he would no longer be able to play in nursery, which is one of his FAVORITE things. We let him know he wouldn't be playing with toys in class anymore, but he'd always be able to come home and play with them. He knew he'd have friends going with him to "the big kids' class," and I think that helped, too. That is until a few of those friends started crying after being taken to primary. Then Matty wasn't so sure, but he hung in there and did great! (Or so I'm told.) I think once going to primary becomes the regular thing instead of something new, he'll do even better.

I'm so proud of him. It's really hard to believe my little baby boy is out of nursery! It's amazing how it feels like it's taken forever to get to this point, and yet at the same time it feels like it happened in the blink of an eye.

Chew Toys

We can afford to buy our children teething toys, but for some reason they both have preferred something less expensive:

Nothing like a yummy sock!

I guess I really gave birth to puppies, not children.

New Year's Celebrations

We ended up at my parents' home for New Year's. We didn't plan on that, but we were driving back from Idaho and the kids I couldn't handle another hour in the car, so we stopped over for the night. Jossy and Matty had fun staying up way too late.
After getting them in bed, my family made their annual New Year's Eve candy fondant which we then dip in chocolate New Year's Day. This year marks the 40th year since my parents started making them! We miss years here and there. I didn't really want to participate since it hurts your hands and arms so badly and takes 30-60 minutes of pulling, but I was roped into it since they needed another person. Here's what it's like as you're pulling it:

Then New Year's Day we dipped them. Matty got to do it for the first time.

I think Matty did a great job for his first time!!
Always the best part:
The chocolates are very yummy, but man they're a lot of work!!

I think that catches me up on the holidays. Now just to get the tree packed away and get the kids back on schedule...

7 Months, Baby!

We interrupt this avalanche of holiday pictures (yes, there are more to come) to bring you the number of the day:Today Jossy is 7 months old!

This month has brought a lot of changes for Jossy. She loves baby food now (as long as it's not rice cereal). If she sees a container of Gerber Puffs or Cheerios, she flips out until you give some to her. She's really started babbling but she's most talkative when she's eating. She's a little daredevil and loves to be upside down, tossed into the air, or eaten by Monster Mommy. Jossy is CONSTANTLY moving which makes keeping her calm long enough to nurse a real challenge. She just can't keep those little legs still! She's still very close to crawling but doesn't really need to because she can get into pretty much anything she wants with her spinning and rolling.

Can't wait to see what new changes come this month!

Just an example of her little flexibility show
she's constantly putting on for us.