Yep. the baby is here

I realize it's been quite a while since I've posted, but it turns out that between getting ready for a baby, having a baby, and being a mother of 2, I don't have a lot of spare time.
Morgan Fox is here!!
Here's the skinny:
December 5, 2007 at 9:26 am
7 lbs 12 ounces and 20.5 inches long.
I've also put together some of the photo highlights of the journey we've been on the last month.

Here I am on the morning of the surgery.

They let me hold Morgan for a minute or two before they got her all cleaned up. I didn't get to do this with Joshua, so it was a neat experience.
She didn't care too much for her first bath.
Look! She at least has enough hair to comb. Awesome!!

Joshua gets to meet his little sister for the first time. His shirt says, "I'm bigger than my little sister."


He's not too sure about this whole sister deal.


The last picture for tonight is of Joshua and Morgan with "Santa Claus"


There will be a lot more photos to come, but for now I am tired. I forgot how exhausting it is feeding a baby every 2-3 hours. She does love to eat too!

Merry Christmas to all and to all a good night!!

From the mouth of babes

Three posts in one day! Wowee!

Here are funny things kids have said recently that I think are worth remembering.

In primary, the younger children were asked if you could get baptized when you were older than 8 years old. This confused them a bit because they are used to being told that they will get baptized when they turn 8. One boy raised his hand and said, "I think you can get baptized when you are older than 8 because I went to the baptism of that new lady a few weeks ago and she is WAY older than 8." (We had a convert baptized into our ward a few weeks ago and she is probably in her fifties.)

Ryan's coworker told Ryan this story. Coworker took his 4 year old soon to see a new cartoon move that just recently came out. His son really loved the movie and told his Dad that he really needed to get this movie for him. So as not to disappoint his son, the coworker obtained a screener copy of the movie and they took it with them on a camping trip so the young boy would have something to watch in the car.
As the boy is watching this movie in the car he says to his Dad, "This movie is still in the theaters. I shouldn't be watching it. You had better take it back to the store. "
You have to love a four year old with a strong moral compass.

Favorite TV Quote of the week

It's a bit early to declare a favorite TV quote of the week as the Office hasn't come on yet, but this quote from Heroes has me laughing every time I think of it. Mostly because it didn't really make any sense and if you watch Heroes you know that the speaker is a pretty serious character.

Here it is:
Noah Bennet to Suresh: "You've gone NATIVE!"

Thank You Cards

My two favorite things to blog about are my kids, and crafts. Joshua and I haven't really been doing a whole lot of interesting things recently and my scrapbooking has been for a gift, so I can't really talk about that yet. Therefore I have been pretty quiet on ye olde blog. However I have made some thank you cards for those kind and generous people who have literally showered baby gifts down upon our heads. I've never really made cards before, but I have to say it was quite fun.

Pink and brown is my new favorite color combination and I had some awesome handmade paper that had lots of pink and some pink and brown. Here's a picture of the finished product.

Now I just have to write the actual notes and mail them!!

Happy Veterans-Giving-Shower Day!

This last Saturday a strange confluence events occurred which meant that Veteran's Day, Thanksgiving, and a baby shower for yours truly were all celebrated on the same day. Due to family scheduling conflicts, Thanksgiving with the in-laws was moved up a few weeks. They also decided that the price of admission for a yummy Thanksgiving meal was a baby present for little Morgan. :) Actually it was a surprise shower for me. It was most definitely a surprise. Morgan got some super cute clothes. Yay! Ryan took some pictures of the present opening, so I will have to try and post those sometime.
Here is a picture I found online of this super soft and cozy jacket that Morgan got. If you need one for your own little one, you can click on the picture to go to the Old Navy website. (Thanks for the cute jacket Nanna!)

















Only 21 days left until the baby arrives. Whoa, that's soon! For those currently having to put up with my irritability, constant griping about how much everything hurts, and lack of motivation to do most anything, it's probably not soon enough.
When I was pregnant with Joshua I did a pretty good job of keeping on a good game face, because let's be honest, most people don't actually want to hear how crappy you feel. This time around though, I just don't have it in me. If you get a "fair to middling" response to "How ya feeling," consider it a good day.

Playtopia

Joshua and I went to Playtopia this Wednesday with some other mother's from the ward. Playtopia is a new park in Chandler. It is really big and pretty awesome. I think we are going to have Joshua's 2nd birthday party there. I have some pictures, although not that many are very good pictures of Joshua. A lot of them are just general pictures of the park so I could show everyone. Read the captions to see what the pictures are of.
You can also check out the Playtopia website if you want more info.

Look a-like meter

Who does Joshua look more like? Click Read More to find out ....



I did it a second time with different pictures where you can actually see that Ryan has red hair too. That one said that Joshua looked 6% more like Ryan. I would have posted it but my browser crashed right after I got the results.

Lady with a baby!

So I'm 34 weeks pregnant, but measuring like I'm 38 weeks pregnant. Yikes. Definitely means I feels physically ready to have little Morgan. We had an ultrasound today to check on growth. It was so fun to see the baby. She was very excited to have her picture taken and was squirming all around before and during the ultrasound.
It was funny because the tech was trying to get a profile shot of her and all of a sudden you see this foot pop up. Morgan is apparently measuring so big because she has herself bent in half. She had her foot touching her forehead. I see gymnastics in our future. :)

Anyways, we are never very good about taking "pregnant" pictures of me, so we took a few on Sunday. Here's one of them....

Halloween Costume

It's not even Halloween yet, but Joshua has pretty much worn his costume about all he is going to. Two ward Halloween parties and multiple photo sessions at Grandpa's house. He even borrowed his Cousin Samantha's spider costume for a few pics. So here is our little Pablo the penguin, our little Monster, and a little spider thrown in there too. Plus some of Daddy, Mommy, Grandma, and Grandpa too! Oh and excuse the quality of some of the pics, I tried to spruce a few of them up as best I could in a short amount of time.

Scrapbook party & Blogging Hiatus

I took a bit of a blogging hiatus because the Internet made me mad. More specifically depraved people who spend time trolling the internet looking to feed their sick addictions made me mad. I could go into detail for you, but you are probably having a nice day and don't want to waste time thinking about people and their depravity.

On a happier note, I was also absent from the computer while planning, preparing, and executing my scrapbook party. My S-I-L and three ladies from the ward came over mid-October on a Friday night and scrapbooked for several hours child-free. It was a lot of fun. Here are a few pictures of the night and all the food I made....

Happy Christmas... outfits!

The benefit of having a baby right before Christmas is that I get to plan for Christmas family portraits with our new little one. Yay!
Thanks to my parents and a 15% off coupon at Children's place I have procured the Christmas outfit for little sweet Morgan.

Thanks to my sister, Joshua got an adorable Janie and Jack gray moleskin suit for Christmas last year. It was 12-24 months, but it is really just starting to fit him now. I tried to find a picture of it on the internet, but since it's from last year, no dice. I'm thinking of getting him this tie so he can be all matchy-matchy with Morgan. I wish I had looked for it while we were at the mall today, but it was a mad-house in that store.



Now I just have to figure out what Ryan and I will wear. Hopefully we work out a time with my Dad during his super busy season for him to take our pictures. I guess fancy outfits won't do us much good without a photographer. Details, details.

Joshua & Samantha at the Park

Samantha came over to our house this morning with Grandma and we all went over to the park. It was the same park we had Joshua's 1st birthday party at. The weather was awesome and everyone had a lot of fun. Here are the pictures to prove it!

Big Lots Coupon

As I was reading some of my blogs this morning I saw a link for a Big Lots coupon. Coupons on already heavily discounted merchandise are right up my alley.
So courtesy of Want Not, here is a link for a printable coupon for 20% off your Big Lots purchase. It is good through Oct 13, 2007

http://www.biglots.com/Coupon/BuzzclubCoupon.aspx

I'm sure they would love it if you joined their Buzz Club as well, but that's just up to you.

Organize Your Ribbons on the Cheap

Ever since I got into bow making and adding ribbon to scrapbook pages I have been searching for an effective way to organize my ribbons. There are all sorts of products you can buy and the Internet is full of ideas of ways to organize ribbon.
I actually bought this plastic ribbon organizer that snaps together if you buy multiple.
There were two problems with it though,
1. It was $9.99 (before coupon or sales)
2. A lot of my ribbons spools are too wide to fit into their convenient little dividers.


Here is what I came up with, and it cost about $3.00. :)

Supplies list:
"Caddy Basket" from Hobby Lobby - $1.99
1/4" dowel at Walmart - $0.40
4 dowel caps at Walmart - $1.88 for a bag of 16
Directions -
1. Cut dowel to fit the length of your Caddy and leave about 1 inch on each end for the dowel caps
2. Glue one of the dowel caps onto the end of dowel. The other end needs to stay open to take ribbon spools off and on.
3. Insert the dowel through your caddy and load the ribbon.
4. Slide the other dowel cap onto the other end.
5. Enjoy organized ribbons on the cheap.
Optional - paint/decorate the dowel and dowel caps to have a super crafty looking organizer.

Note: I left the second dowel open so you could get a better visual.

Now I just need to decide on how I want to organize my ribbons.

Changing Table Picture

Finally a picture of the changing table. . .



It's worked out great so far, especially for Ryan. It's several inches taller than the old one, so Ryan can change diapers much more comfortably. I, on the other hand, have to raise my hands up above my head to reach. :) Not quite, but close.

I spent way too much time trying to add a halo around the changing table in photoshop to show how much I really love it. Oh well, maybe next time.

Baby Things

There isn't a lot of things that we need for Baby #2, but we did decide that a double stroller was on the list of must haves. Thankfully my Mom had the same thought because she offered to get us one. I went looking at Babies R Us to find one and discovered that I had a coupon that expired Sunday. So instead of just window shopping and getting ideas, we had to act fast and have my Mom get it on Friday. Here's a picture of it I took in the store. Thanks Mom and Dad!



Also, I have a picture of the changing table, I just need to download it off the camera.

Cousin Capers

Last night Joshua got to play with his cousins while Mommy and Daddy had a nice birthday dinner. Then I went shopping with my S-I-L's so Ryan stayed home with the boys and documented all the fun that took place.





Pictures from Bathtime and playing around


The boys splashing in the bath


Anthony and Joshua is serious debate.

Birthday Celebration Week!

My Birthday was technically Friday, October 5, but it seems like I've been celebrating all week. Last Sunday was a joint b-day party at the in-laws. Tuesday was a joint party for Ryan and I at my Parents house. MMmmmmmmm, prime rib is delicious.

On Friday I treated myself to McDonald's breakfast. Fancy, I know. Friday night we went to the Elder's Quorum Barbecue. I have to admit I wasn't super excited when I found out it conflicted with my birthday and plans to go out for a nice child-free dinner. I did get my "I Support the Priesthood" button for the day though.

Today I get my child-free meal at Texas Roadhouse. We go there about once a year and I always get so excited for it. It is not usually as good as I hyped it up in my head to be, but it definitely is pretty tasty. Thank goodness for our Tivo, so if we aren't in front of the tv for one of the sessions of conference we can watch it later today or tomorrow.

Thanks to everyone that made me feel special on my birthday, it was nice. I felt very loved. I got three different bouquet of flowers. Neato!


Weather report for today: AWESOME!! The high is 82. Yahoo!

Disturbing find of the day

There was a dead scorpion in my washing machine. I had spin cycled it to death apparently.

I can't decide if I would rather believe it got into the washing machine on its own or the more likely truth, which is that it was on the rug I washed when I transported it from Joshua's room to the washing machine. The latter option implies way too many bad thoughts, so maybe I'll convince myself it fell in and just couldn't get back out.
Yeah, that's it!

Winkflash & Snapfish Review

I've recently stepped into the world of submitting my digital pictures online and having them mailed to me. I previously had been using the Costco one hour service, which was convenient but at $0.17 a 4x6 it isn't the best deal in town. One of the blogs I check on a daily basis, BabyCheapskate, posts coupon codes for multiple photo printing sites and so I decided to embark on a test to see where I could find the best deal without sacrificing quality.
So far I have ordered from Snapfish and Winkflash. The photos from Winkflash have arrived. Click the Read More link to see what I thought of their prices, upload utilities, and quality. It is a pretty lengthy review.


Let's start with speed. I ordered my pictures from Snapfish and Winkflash on the same day (09/28). Technically Snapfish was ahead by several hours. Both orders shipped on October 1. I received my Winkflash order on October 3, but have yet to receive the Snapfish order.

Next onto Ease of upload/ordering. Snapfish definitely wins this category. They have an upload utility which installs through the browser and is very easy to use. My only complaint is that you can only upload from one folder at a time, so if your pictures are in multiple places you will have to go through the upload process multiple times.
The other pet peeve is that Snapfish offers a "Select More Photos to Upload" button while the last batch is in the process of uploading. In theory, it works great. In practice, if you haven't selected all the photos to upload by the time the first set finishes, you are redirected away from the page where you were selecting photos to upload. Could result in a lot of wasted time. In fact it did result in a lot of wasted time for me.
On to Winkflash. They have several different options for uploading photos although none are particularly elegant or fast. The Drag/Drop and File Browser options use Java Applets or Active X and both are terribly slow and produce security errors, at least on my machine. I ended up using the "Transporter" which is an application that you download and select the files to upload that way. The application worked well enough but when it came time to upload the photos to Winkflash it took much longer than it should have considering we have High Speed Internet. It would also get about 90% of the way through and encounter some kind of error and restart the uploading process. It took just over an hour to upload 48 pictures. That was choosing the "Fast Upload" option which supposedly compressed the files for faster uploading. Yikes!
The Winkflash shopping cart also gave me some difficulties. I was using their coupon code to get 4x6 prints for $.06. I was also ordering a handful of 5x7 prints. I had my shopping cart all set up and then went to apply the coupon for the cheaper 4x6 prints. The code worked fine but all of the 5x7 prints were automatically removed from my cart. Lame! I was able to add them back in, but had I not been paying attention I could have missed that they had been removed.

Quality - I can only speak to the quality of the Winkflash at this time, but I would say they were just as good as I had been getting at Costco. I typically go through my photos and make any adjustment to color/contrast/lighting/etc myself before I submit for printing. Winkflash has an "Image Enhancement" option which was turned on, but it didn't seem to do much. I had one photo that probably should have had the contrast adjusted and the Image Enhancement option did not do anything. It was my own fault, but beware that your images might not be enhanced quite as advertised.

Now what everyone is interested in... PRICE. Utlizing coupon codes and "new account" freebies I was able to get some good deals between the two sites.
I ended up getting 20 4x6 prints from Snapfish for $1.05 shipped. That was 20 free prints for a new account, and a coupon code to take $0.99 off the cost of shipping. Sales tax was $0.06.
Their shipping is a little complicated to figure out, but they do have a table that you can follow located here: http://www2.snapfish.com/shippingpricingtablespopup
Print Pricing guide here: http://www2.snapfish.com/storeprints

Winkflash has a coupon code advertised on their main page to get 4x6 prints for $0.06 each. They also advertise $0.99 shipping for unlimited 4x6 prints. The two offers can not be used together.
I ended up getting 43 - 4x6's and 4-5x7's for $4.03 with $3.39 in shipping for a total of $7.42. The 5x7 prints were $0.29 and I opted for the $0.06 coupon code. Here are links for shipping costs and a complete pricing guide.
Shipping: http://www.winkflash.com/photo/help/shipping.asp
Print Pricing guide: http://www.winkflash.com/content/pricelist.asp

I realize the price comparison isn't exactly apples to apples, but I ran about 10 different scenarios for the quantity and size of prints I needed and that was the best deal I came up with between the two.

If you have made it this far into the post, congrats. Here is a link to the current coupon codes as posted at Baby Cheapskate. Note that this month Winkflash is offering 100 new prints for new sign-ups. Also be sure to search on your favorite search engine for coupon codes, you never know what you might find.

I plan next to try PEPhoto which boasts $0.08 prints all the time and is having a summer special at $0.06.

Love for the JCP - and little known facts about furniture

Joshua and I decided to hit the mall for an outing. Of course I had some birthday money burning a whole in my pocket as well so shopping did commence.

I found myself a few more maternity tops and a nightgown to use at the hospital. Joshua got a shirt and a pair of jeans. I also got some Christmas gifts knocked off the list while I was at the mall. Woohoo! Morgan even got some onesies and the like from Baby Gap.

I saw lots of cute dresses that I would love to get for Morgan for her Christmas dress. Super cute, but a smidge out of the budget. I will be keeping an eye out for sales at Gymboree and Children's place.

The find of the day however was an awesome changing table from JCPenney. The one that we bought for Joshua is falling apart a lot. This one is more like a real piece of furniture. I'll post some pictures as soon as we can manage to get it in the house.

Here is the little known fact about furniture(at least for budget shoppers.) Real furniture comes assembled. I saw the display piece and figured that the box would fit in my Mom's CRV no problem. I was under the assumption that I would be fitting a box that had the unassembled changing table. Oops, I was wrong. My Mom took time off work to run over and pick up the box, which would not fit. They had to take the table out of the box and even then it took four people to maneuver it into the car. Victory was had though and the nice dock workers, a store manager looking guy, plus my Mom, loaded the changing table. The best part was the price. It was $379.99 full price on sale for $199 at the outlet. The outlet had it on clearance for $149. Yippee! That is 60% off.

More about what has been going on around here later.

At the tot lot..

With the weather being below 90 degrees this afternoon, I decided to take Joshua to the little playground in our neighborhood. It's official title is the "tot lot." He wasn't super excited, but I think that was mostly because there weren't other kids around and Mommy is pretty boring. He did enjoy getting out of the house and the walk over there though. No outing would be complete without the camera, so here are the pictures. One of the pictures is of Joshua blowing a kiss and then clapping for himself afterwards. He is always the first to congratulate himself on a job well done. :)

I came, I saw, I conquered... the Hobby Lobby

I am fairly certain that everyone is just dying to know how my Hobby Lobby shopping extravaganza went. Well let me tell you, it was excellent. Ryan and Joshua are most definitely off the hook in the birthday present category. How I managed to spend $60 when everything was 50% off is a little baffling, but I am ecstatic with all my purchases.
I was going to post a picture of all my spoils, but I figured that someone should be in suspense about what I'm getting for my birthday. My birthday is in just under two weeks, so I will dutifully stay out of everything until then. Then I'll post a picture or two.

In other random news, finding a scorpion on the premises every 6 days is getting annoying. It is also making me very paranoid about this Thursday(that would be the next 6th day). Scorpion season ends in November, so hurry up and get here November. Crazy(cuz I'm pregnant) and scared do not a good combination make.

Happy Birthday Hubby!

Today is Ryan's birthday!! It's a little harder to do something super fun when it's on a Sunday, but we did have a really nice breakfast and then I made one of his favorite dinners. I got him the Office Season 3 which was a special edition that came with a Dwight bobble head, and a Dundie award. That doesn't mean much if you don't watch the show, but it's cool stuff. Joshua got him a movie made by one of the actors from Stargate Atlantis and that has a bunch of other Stargate actors in it. I can't remember the name of it right now, and it was a direct to DVD movie, but it seems like it will be cute.

Ryan wasn't feeling very well today so he and Joshua stayed home from church. It made my life much easier not having to take Joshua, but Joshua did end up missing a really cute activity in nursery. We have a courtyard in the middle of our building and one of the nursery workers took stuffed animals and had them "hidden" all over the courtyard. She said that the kids were going to go on an animal hunt in the jungle. How cute does that sound?

I've spending all my spare time the last few days working on the Instant Imprints of Tempe website. It has been a lot of fun getting back into my technology roots and using some of my skills that had gotten a bit rusty. I'll post a link to it when I get all done or once it is officially hosted somewhere. All the sitting in my computer chair means my feet/legs have swelled to yucky proportions. I retain a lot of water while pregnant and this time around it has been not quite as bad as with Joshua. I think now I know why it was so terrible before. When I was working at ASU, all I did was sit in a chair for 8 hours a day and work at a computer. You heard it here first, work is bad for your health. :)

Here is some other random news/events:
1. We assembled the tricycle we got for Joshua's first birthday. He is still too short to reach the pedals, but he loves pushing it around. He also loves standing on the back while Daddy pushes him around.
2. Joshua can talk like a pirate. He says "argh." It's more like "rrrrr/roar" but he is trying to talk like a pirate.
3. We taught Joshua to blow kisses tonight. It's also very cute. He has a little sound effect that goes with it, but it isn't quite a "mwah" sound.

Tomorrow I am planning a big outing to Hobby Lobby. All of their stickers are 50% off as well as some other awesome scrapbook deals. Hot diggity, I'm excited. I told Ryan he might get off the hook of buying me a birthday present as I do plan to indulge in all the scrappy goodness.

Well goodnight all!!

Couch climber & Party time!

Joshua has never been much of a climber to this point, which we have been pretty grateful for. However last night he finally climbed onto the couch all by himself. The best part of it was seeing his total sense of accomplishment. You could tell he was so pleased with himself. Those sort of moments are really the best part of being a parent.

------Party Time--------
Today we were invited to a Pool Party in Mesa. The Mother-in-law of one of the sweetest gals in my ward offered to throw a party for her grandson and his friends. The home was a little bit far away, but it was just gorgeous. Joshua and I both had a great time. Not too many folks were able to make it, which is a total shame. It was definitely one of the largest and most beautiful homes I have ever been to, that is for sure.
I ended up getting there before everyone else including the guest of honor. The host still had her hair in curlers, but it was okay. She told me I could take Joshua into the casita in the backyard where they had some toys. Well I was thinking that the casita was going to be a small pool house type thing, but I was way off. The casita was a house in it's own right and bigger than my house at 2,200 sq ft. Holy cannoli. They built this house in the back so they would have additional room for children/grandchildren to be able to play in.
They had built a fountain for the children to play in, which was a cross between a fountain and a wading pool. That was definitely Joshua's favorite part of the yard. They also had a swimming pool and jacuzzi. I'm really bummed that I left the camera at home because it would have been some great pictures.
One of the other ladies there made the comment that if she ever got invited back to the house, she would most definitely be coming. I'm with her, it was such a fun time and everyone thoroughly enjoyed themselves.

Flagstaff Pictures

Well we are back from a fun weekend in Flagstaff. The weather was beautiful and the party was so much fun. Joshua did get his very first sunburn, but it isn't too severe and it doesn't seem to cause him any discomfort.
Click "Read More" to see all the pictures. You can also click on each slideshow and it will take you to a bigger version of the show.

Joshua and Anthony at Grandpa Taylor's funeral luncheon



Anthony's cake and present opening.


Pinata whacking



Misc. pictures from the whole weekend. Including the "lock up your daughters" photo shoot.

"Men on a mission"

Today I was checking out the Arizona Republic's website and I saw a headline that I thought was a bit troubling at first. It said, "Mormons exposed by 'Men on a Mission'." I figured someone had written some book or something about how evil us members of the church are or something.
However, I was pleasantly surprised to see that a group of return missionaries are putting out a calendar to raise money for charities in the areas they served. I have to imagine that the pictures probably overstep some modesty boundaries. They also sell apparel on their website and the t-shirts are actually pretty cute. There is one of stick-figure missionaries that says "I heart Mormon boys"

In any case, good for a laugh and I was pleasantly surprised that the article was not what I originally thought it would be.

If you are interested the website is: http://www.menonamissioncalendar.com/
The azcentral article was found here.

New Baby Ticker

I updated the baby countdown, however it is now a little inaccurate. I do only have 83 days left to go(as of today), but I am actually only 27 weeks pregnant. I guess having a c-section at 39 weeks just wasn't something that they accounted for. :)

3 months to go!

We officially have a date and time for Morgan's arrival. Yay! My c-section is scheduled for December 5 at 9am. It seems so much more real now. It seems the 5th day of the month is also a good day for birthdays in my family. My b-day is October 5 and my Grandpa Morgan's birthday was February 5.

My Mom and I also discovered that her grand children's birthdays are forming a pattern. Samantha is February 9, Joshua is January 7, and then Morgan will be December 5. So they are each one month and two days apart. The next grandchild will have to be planned for November 3.

Having the baby at 39 weeks does mean my baby counter is slightly off, maybe I will have to see about setting up a new one.

Sick :(

I had been working on a big post about our Labor Day weekend and the latest baby #2 news, but I have had a horrible migraine the last day and a half. I'm starting to feel better now, so that post should be on the way soon!

Hectic two weeks

I scrapped the post I was writing because there is has been so much going on I couldn't see going into quite so much detail about it all.
We spent labor day weekend with family and friends and that was nice. Lunch with my family, a barbecue with some of Ryan's friends and scrapbooking with my SIL Tiffany. Maybe I'll try and post some of my layouts. We'll see how motivated I get about that.
The rest of the week I spent a day and a half or so with a mondo-migraine. Definitely no bueno.

Over the course of the week Ryan's grandfather's health deteriorated pretty rapidly and he slipped into a coma and ended up passing away early Saturday morning. We were able to go over Friday night and take the family dinner and pay our last respects. Saturday my Mom made dinner for the everyone, so we delivered the meal and spent a good deal of time there as well. Sunday we also went and spent some time with Ryan's family. It's always sad when a family member passes away, but he had been in so much pain you can't help but feel happy for him that he is in a much better place.
There will be a viewing on Wednesday evening and then the funeral will take place on Thursday morning.

Our nephew Anthony was having a birthday party this weekend in Flagstaff, which was decided should still go on. So this weekend we will be headed out of town for a nice party and some cooler weather.

Wow, it's been very busy and also enlightening. Big life events really help you put perspective on what matters in life.

JCPenney Outlet

With my first pregnancy I bought almost all of my maternity clothes from JCPenney outlet. It was nice because they were inexpensive, so I didn't feel as bad about getting several different pieces. This time around the outlet store just hasn't had much in the way of maternity clothes. If you shop online, it's pretty equivalent to Motherhood Maternity prices, so I didn't see much point there.

Well today I hit pay dirt. I haven't really needed much in the way of maternity clothes, but it is nice to feel cute while pregnant. I decided to give JCPenney Outlet another shot. Before hand though I checked out the online store to see if they had any sales going on. They had a free shipping deal and a few things on sale. Well I went to the Outlet and found two of the same shirts I had seen on the website for way less money. One shirt was on sale for $24.99 online and I got it for $7.99 in store. The second shirt was $19.99 online and $7.99 in store. That's a savings of $30. SWEET! It would have been even more drastic if they weren't having a sale online.

Hooray for cute new clothes and good deals!

YouTube greatest hits

Over the course of Joshua's life I have posted about 14 videos up on YouTube to share with family, friends and the world. Well this video in particular has gotten pretty popular, so I thought I would post it here, so everyone can enjoy little Joshua crying right after he was born. It has been watched over 11,000 times and it gets about 100 views a day. I think that is AMAZING!!



If you would rather go to YouTube to watch the video, this is the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BArLP18pgk8

Bug Barrettes

Oh how I do love making new crafts. I decided that I needed some bows/barrettes for my neato bow holder. I hit the interweb and came up with some great free tutorials on how to make bows. I've only tried these bug ones so far, but I think they are uber-cute. Click Read More to see the slideshow. . .



I included a picture of the back of the purple butterflies so you can see how I attached them to the clip.

I need to find a model for my hairbows. Little Mister isn't all that great a candidate. Morgan probably won't have enough hair until she is about 2 to wear any of these, but they are so fun to make.
I also thought I would include the links to the two really awesome websites I have found so far.
The Ribbons Retreat
Girly Things - Free Hair Bow Instructions

Family fun Sunday

Sunday morning I woke up feeling really bad. Maybe all the fun from Saturday, I'm not sure. My sweet husband called me a Primary substitute and I fell back asleep until about 10am. Then about 11:30 am my body decided it was time for another two hour nap. Being pregnant is a lot of hard work, I tell you.

Click the Read More link to hear all about the rest of the day and see the awesome pictures.


Joshua woke up from his nap with the cutest bedhead ever, so we just had to document it.



Then we decided to take up Ryan's mothers gracious offer to feed us Sunday dinner. It was delicious! Plus you can't complain about someone else feeding you and Joshua having lots of entertainment. After dinner Grandma Becky took Joshua and Capper outside to play in the sandbox. What a great time they had. They got absolutely filthy though, so the bath that followed only made sense.



Don't worry, anyone that asked for copies of the pictures will get their hard copies too!

Carousel Saturday

We had a busy weekend and took lots of pictures. Here they are from Saturday.


First we have Samantha and Joshua riding the Carousel at the mall. Little Mister has never been on a carousel before so he was a little unsure, but at least he didn't cry.
After the mall we all went out to dinner and then back to Grandma and Grandpa's to play for awhile. Samantha was so excited we came over because that meant she didn't have to go to bed yet.



While we were at Grandma and Grandpa's house, Ryan asked Samantha's if panties go on your head. She said yes and then started modeling them for us. Too funny!

Hairbow Holder YAY!!

Here is my latest craft adaptation. My sister got a cute hairbow holder for my niece for her birthday. I took a look at it and said, I can do that! I was especially interested in doing it for less than the $35 it cost to buy.

If you want all the gory details and tons of pictures, click the Read More link below. I'm not kidding about LOTS of details!
Here is a photo of my inspiration and the finish product, just for a teaser.




Here's the slideshow with captions of pretty much every step I took. It was actually a lot of fun taking pictures along each step.




Now for the fun part, the cost break down. I'll break it down at full price, then with what I paid using sales/coupons.
Wood sign - $1.99
Metal Handle - $1.99
Mod Podge - $0.70 ($7.00 for the bottle, assuming I used 10%, which I probably used less.)
Scrapbook paper for background- $0.50
Ribbon for handles - $1.60 (4 spools @ $2 each, using 20% of each spool.)
Ribbon to hang bows on - $1.09 ( $3.29 for spool, used 33% of spool.)
Letters- (I used supplies I already had, so I'm not going to add that in.)
TOTAL: $7.87

I'll highlight the sales/coupon price in red so you can see where there is a difference.
Wood sign - $1.99
Metal Handle - $1.99
Mod Podge - $0.42 (40% off coupon)
Scrapbook paper for background- $0.25 (Paper 50% off at Hobby Lobby)
Ribbon for handles - $0.80 (Ribbon 1/2 off at Hobby Lobby)
Ribbon to hang bows on - $0.65 (40% off coupon)
Letters- (I used supplies I already had, so I'm not going to add that in.)
TOTAL: $6.10 That is about 82% OFF OF the $35 RETAIL. YAY!
If I had known from the beginning exactly what supplies I needed, I could have spent even less by utilizing more/different coupons.

If you have made it this far and are interested in making your own, let me know if you have any questions about where I got the supplies/materials or anything else.
Also if you would rather just buy your own, I can get you the link to the original website.

It's STILL a girl!!

Ultrasound #2 was today and things went pretty well. The perinatologist will go over the pictures and give the results to my Doctor. However the tech that did the ultrasound said that I was measuring appropriately and she didn't see anything that wasn't supposed to be there.

We do have a some pictures that they sent home with us but I don't think I am going to post them. One is of our baby girl's female bits, which would just be a little weird. The rest are of the face, but it is hard to make out and slightly creepy since it's just the outline of a little skull.

One cool thing from the ultrasound is that while they were taking the pictures of the face you could see the baby moving her mouth around. That was pretty cool.

One uncool thing from the ultrasound is that the tech decided she wanted me to use the restroom partway through the exam. No big deal except that as I was still putting myself back together she opened the exam room door and just had it standing open. Ummm hello? I don't think the whole office needs to see me wiping goo off my belly with my pants half down.

I am very glad the perinatologist visit is over and things seem to be going well.


Oh and happy 50th post to me!! May there be many more to follow.

I {heart} Hobby Lobby

I love to shop, including just looking around. Well yesterday I found a new and wonderful crafty destination, Hobby Lobby. It's not a new store, but there is only one in AZ and it is Avondale. My visiting teaching appointment got cancelled at the last minute yesterday morning, so Little Mister and I decided to take a field trip out there.

It was like a crafter's Disneyland. I think a lot of my delight came from the fact that it's new to me. They also have a much wider selection than Michael's and Joann, at least in the craft categories that interest me. They had so many products I had never seen before. I also liked that their sales items were 50% off instead of Joann's usual 40% off. They also had a coupon posted on their website for 40% off one item. This was nice because you didn't have to be a part of their mailing list to get this coupon.

I was specifically looking for an unfinished wood sign with wire/metal swirlies coming out of the top. (Not very easy to visualize I realize.) They didn't have that, but they did have an impressive stock of open scrapbook paper and ribbon selection, which I needed for my current project. Both of the latter were 50% off. More on the latest craft project when I finish it. (hopefully tomorrow.)

Ryan thinks my new discovery is great because there is a Best Buy in the same parking lot. Talk about a win:win:win situation.

If you ever are in need of some new crafty inspiration I am so ready for another trip to Hobby Lobby. I'll even drive!

Sew much fun

Well I finally got around to trying that Stuffed Ball pattern I found on RookieMoms. Actually I got the pattern from here. The pattern is to make a tag ball like little babies love so much. I plan on trying out a version with tags, I just wanted to get down sewing the thing first. It's actually a bit trickier than I originally thought. The soccer ball is a pretty big disaster when you look up close, but heck a 19 month old isn't going to care.
The second attempt went much smoother with a bit more forethought and marking.

I'll try adding the "tags" next and perhaps enlarging it a bit. It's only has about a 4 inch diameter right now. Of course I will ever try to acheive the perfect sphere.

Sleeping J'dub

On Sunday mornings, we have to wake J'dub up early so he can take an early nap, and we can get to church on time. This morning hubby decided he'd bring the camera with him to capture how cute our little man is when he is sleeping. These are in the order that they were taken. The first few look like he might be stretching, but that is how he was sleeping.

Baby #2 update

It's been a while since I've said much about the pregnancy, so here is what is going on.

I'm 24 weeks pregnant(on Tuesday), which means no more sleeping on my back. :( I'm feeling the baby move all the time and Ryan has also been able to feel the baby move.

I get a weekly email about the baby's development, so here are some general things going on.
- The baby is now 11 inches long and weighs 1¼ to 1½ pounds.
- Taste buds are also developing, and the lungs are becoming more developed and complex. (Hubby thinks this must be where my recent cravings have come from.)

We have our level 2 ultrasound this Friday, so it will be nice to see the baby again and make sure everything is going well.
At my next Dr appointment we I will do a standard glucose test to make sure I don't have gestational diabetes. The Doctor also said we will probably schedule the C-section. Come the beginning on August we should know the exact date the baby will be born. A little weird to think of that.

We have 99% decided on the name Morgan Fox. For anyone who might not know, those are both family names on my side. This naming process went much more smoothly than the first time around. It's been great. We've been hesitant to start referring to the baby as Morgan, just in case this second ultrasound pops up with some extra anatomy a little baby girl shouldn't have.

Anytime you are curious about how far along I am, there is a pregnancy counter on the top of the blog which says how far along I am and how many days are left.

Email Subscriptions

I'm working on a way for people to subscribe to the blog via email, so they don't have to worry about checking the actual website to see what we are up to.

Over on the right hand side of the page, there is a link to subscribe via email. Click that link, enter your email address and you are well on your way. You will receive an email requesting you to verify that you really want to subscribe to the blog. Follow the instructions in that email and you are officially subscribed.

You will get one email per day if I have posted anything new, or no email if I am slacking.

If you have any feedback for me about this whole subscription thing. Let me know!

Swimming in Grandma's Pool

Grandma got an awesome kid pool on clearance for $10. J'dub and Samantha had a blast playing together and swimming.
Click on the link below to see the slideshow.

Headbands

Here is a picture of the headbands I made my sister Cedar for her birthday. I made two for her and two for Samantha. Here they are modeling the black and white polka dot pattern. I also made these pink retro type headbands as well. I didn't get any pictures of the headband itself, but here is the material. I like it so much, I think I'll have to make a headband for myself.


The pattern for the headband pattern came from: http://www.heatherbaileydesign.com/Headband.html

Little man's vocabulary

Sometimes it doesn't seem like J'dub talks very much, so I thought I would make a list of all things he says. The list is longer than I thought it would be.

• EDIT: Thank you (oops, I forgot his first words on the list)
• EDIT: Bless you. He just started saying that in the last few days. He says it like he is imitating your sneeze, so you get a very emphatic BLESS you.
  
• Mama
• Da (for Daddy)
• No
• Yes (Only sometimes)
  
• Uh-Oh
• Whoa
• Beep Beep (when opening doors, it means get out of the way, the door is opening)
• Whee! (that's what you say when you push anything with wheels around)
  
• Pee Pee - for diaper changes or anatomy
• Pablo - (That means I want to watch Backyardigans. The first line in the opening is, "Hi My name is Pablo.")
• Go, Go. Another Backyardigans reference for the Race Around the World episode
• "ish" - For fish, that one is hit and miss
• Juice
• Cheese (sometimes he says it. Sounds a bit like Juice)
• Shoes
• Ball
  
• Papa (I've only heard him use it once or twice, but he was referring to Grandpa)
• Woof, woof (dogs)
• Hi - but he will only say it when he is talking on one of his play phones.
  

Those aren't necessarily the order in which he learned to say them. Just the order I remembered them in. I'll add more as I think of them.

Crafty ideas

The bug post had a lot to do with my Mom sending me an email teasing me that she already knew the stories and info I was putting in my blog. Well, I hadn't told her that particular gem, so I thought I had better post it.

On to other more interesting/random things.
- The crayon pouch I made was a big hit at the party. YAY for being crafty!
- Joann Etc is having a mondo sale this week/weekend. I can't wait. There have been a few things I have been eying that are now on sale.
- I think I have found my newest sewing projects. Baby booties. Check out these two links with patterns and pictures, (Courtesy of RookieMoms)

1. Martha Stewart Felt Baby Booties
   
2. Bitty Booties

- Another sewing project I would love to try is this stuffed ball, also found at RookieMoms. I love their website. If you are looking for a craft to do, just go to their Crafty category and there are like 76 entries. I'm not sure I'd classify them all as crafts, but still fun to read.

I HATE bugs!

Anyone who knows me very well knows I hate bugs, A LOT. To a pretty sad degree. Certain bugs, like scorpions, go in the extreme phobia category. Dead or alive, I hate bugs.

The past few days have put my bug tolerance to a test.

Story #1 -
On Thursday afternoon I woke up from a nap to see a bee crawling around on hubby's nightstand. Under ideal circumstances, I would leave the room, shove towels under the door so it can't escape the room, and call in back-up. However hubby is allergic to bee stings, therefore no back-up would be arriving EVER.

While I contemplate my options, the bee flew back behind the blinds trying to find it's own escape route. We have a window AC unit to supplement our central air, so I suspect that could have been the point of entry. Anywho, I would love for nothing more to smash said bee with a shoe, however I can't reach him now that he is behind the blinds. Raising the blinds is out of the question as the bee could escape the window area and then fly out of arms reach.

After minutes of watching the bee and pondering my next move, I decide it is an acceptable risk to open the window and see if the bee will fly out. No such luck, the bee gets hopelessly stuck between the window panes.

I'll skip the next few minutes of drama and get skip to the resolution. The bee dies in a pool of windex and is still hopelessly stuck between our window panes.

Story #2 -
This one is much less dramatic, but shows I am making progress in my bug disposal phobia.
I was sweeping the floor after J'dub got some kind of crumbs all over the floor. When I discovered a dead cockroach under the kitchen table. Standard protocol is to avoid said area until back-up can be called in to dispose of carcass. I decided instead to say, to heck with this craziness, I'm taking care of this myself. And I did. Yay for me!

Weekly update

Lots of random things are going on this week.
I had my monthly Doctor appointment this week and got to hear the baby's heartbeat. I love that. Everything is looking good so far according to the Doctor. She also said that at my next appointment, we will probably schedule the c-section. Whoa, that's crazy that we could know the birth-date of our sweet baby girl so soon.

We are also several steps closer to getting our synthetic grass. We are probably going with a company called Synlawn. They have an awesome website, showroom, and low pressure sales people. Hubby and I are going back on Saturday so he can see the samples and we can decide which "grass" we are going with. Even if we buy on Saturday, it will be another month before it is installed. Then J'dub will have a place to play in the backyard. Yay!!

Speaking of Saturday, it is also my Sister's b-day and niece Emily's b-day. (Happy 30th Cedar!) Emily is having a party on Saturday so that should be fun for J'dub. He's not acting like he feels very good, so hopefully we will be better by then. Maybe he's teething again. :(

Jumping Balloon Video

I have added the video of J'dub and Samantha in the jumping balloon.
Click Read More to see the video from my blog. Otherwise you can use the link below to view it at YouTube.
View Video at YouTube

Jumping Balloon

This weekend cousin Samantha came over to play in our Jumping balloon. She has taken quite a fancy to them recently, and we just happen to have one. We set it up in the living room and both Samantha and J'dub had a blast. Little J has never liked it before, so we are so excited. We have a slideshow below of the pictures. If you click on the slideshow you should be able to see a bigger version. I will also post a video on YouTube as soon as I can get it edited. It's a bit better to see the action live!

Crayon Pouch craft from Nested

I came across this site, Nested, which has the cutest sewing project to make. They are crayon pouches. You can alter the instructions easily enough to carry whatever you want. I decided these will be great birthday gifts for my niece and nephew coming up in August. Here is a pic of the ones I have made. My sewing skills could use some improvement, but I can't think of a better way to learn.

Here is a link to the instructions to make your own. INSTRUCTIONS

Ultrasound Picture

As promised, here is the picture of Baby #2. It's a profile shot. Exciting stuff. This time around the ultrasound tech didn't print us off as many or as good of pictures. I'm hoping that the perinatologist will give us some pictures. I will definitely ask for some.

It's a GIRL!!!

Well, we had the ultrasound and are super excited to report that it looks like we will be having a little girl. I'll post one of the ultrasound pictures in a bit.
My Doctor wasn't 100% satisfied with the quality of pictures that they got, so she is sending me to a Perinatologist to have a level 2 ultrasound. That won't be until August 24. There isn't anything particular to be concerned about, the Dr. just wants to be sure she can get a good look at everything.

It was also be a good chance to double check on the babies gender status. We want to make sure she isn't hiding anything from us. :)

I've been doing some baby girl shopping which is so much fun. Trying not to go too overboard though. Both grandma's have already bought her outfits as well. She will be a very well dressed little girl.

My sister bought J'dub a cute shirt from Baby Style. I'm excited for him to be able to wear that once the baby comes.

Warning: Hilarity ahead

A found a website called PlayMyGame via MOMB(Museum of Modern Betas). You upload a picture, crop to fit the person's face and then pick from games, clips, or e-cards. It is a very cool site and crop tool is very advanced. No, I don't have any built up frustration towards my son, he is just cute and fun to use. So you can enjoy, boxing, or throwing rocks and pies at my little boy.

Have fun!

Link: PlayMyGame

Link: PlayMyGame

Link: PlayMyGame

Link: PlayMyGame

Busy bees

I think that the expression, "The lazy days of summer" is an hyperbole. I seem to be busier than ever, although truthfully it does seem to be my social calendar that is ramping up. With family in the teaching profession, summertime is fun-time.

I've been scrapbooking lots which has been lots of fun. I'm trying to get as caught up as possible for Baby #2 comes. With that new arrival I will instantly be put months and months behind.

Playgroup is going to be meeting at my house on Thursday, which should be fun but a little nerve wracking. I am looking forward to an excuse to bust out our inflatable bouncer. J'dub is still too young to use it, so I'm always happy when there are some older kids around.

I have my monthly baby check this Friday. It is always so great to hear the heartbeat on the Doppler. The ultrasound is July 13th. I'm trying not to start a countdown calendar, but I am so excited. I need to know if it is time to go crazy with the pink frilly dresses, or just start combing through J'dubs old clothes. Either way, I can't wait to know the baby's gender.

Vacation Video and pictures

Here are the Vacation photos - click on the picture to go to the Flickr slideshow.




J'dub, Daddy, & Grandpa walking on the beach

My Summer Vacation

Our trip to North Carolina was so much fun. We went with my parents to visit my Mom's side of the family and to go to the beach.
Here is a list of some of the things we did/saw:

• J'dubs first airplane trip
  
• Auntie M's sailboat in SC
• Uncle Frank's band, Muddy Ford, perform
• played Wii for the first time (way too much fun)
• The Atlantic ocean
• The Wright Brothers Memorial in Kitty Hawk
• Bodie Island and Currituck lighthouses
• NC Aquarium
• Swimming in the hotel pool
• hang out at Grandma H's house in Elizabeth City, NC
• Just relaxing and having a good time
• Completed my first big person book since J'dub was born
  

It may sound a little nuts, but I think we will take my parents on all our vacations. It was a lot of fun and they were a HUGE help with J'dub. They even held him most of the plane ride home to keep him entertained.

Video and pictures in the post to follow. . .

And baby makes 4.

Well there has been a dearth of updates but for good reason! We have some news!

We are having another baby!! Yeah! I'm 11.5 weeks along and things are going so well. We heard the babies heartbeat on Monday and that was just wonderful. With J'dub they had trouble finding the heartbeat so we had an ultrasound at this point. With Baby #2 the Dr. was able to find it right away.

Baby #2 is expected on December 11, 2007. As I will most likely be having a repeat c-section, it will probably be the 11th or slightly earlier.

We broke the news to Papa Bear's family by creating a movie poster that had a picture of J'dub wearing a shirt that says, "I'm the big brother!" and advertising the movie, "The Big Brother." We put it in an empty picture frame that has been hanging on the wall and waited for someone to find it. We ended up having to nudge them to look in that general direction as we were losing our patience.

We told my parents on Mother's Day by putting J'dub in a t-shirt that I made for him that said "Big Brother to be." The look on Granny B's face was priceless.

So that is the big news. Now that the cat is out of the bag, I expect to be much more blogative.

Next post.... update on our trip to North Carolina.

J'dub can walk!

Well it finally happened. Our little J'dub has started to walk. He made it all the way across the room. Up until this point he will take 1-2 steps and then get down and start crawling. Well on Friday he made a break for it. His cousin Sambam was sitting in my lap and little J'dub got jealous. So he took off from across the room to rectify the sitation. Later on he walked to Papa Bear as well.
He has only done it at my parents house, so hopefully he can get the hang of it at home and elsewhere.

The day before he turned 15 months old too. Perhaps he felt like it was about time.

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter to everyone. We don't have too much planned for the day. Our church is from 1- 4pm which makes visiting our family rather difficult, but we will be going over to my parents house after church for some yummy easter ham.

Yesterday J'dub went on his very first easter egg hunt. It was a lot of fun. He even got three eggs. Most of the other nursery aged children were much more adept at the whole walking and gathering eggs thing.

Click on the picture below to see all of the Easter Egg hunt photos.

New videos!

We have some new videos for your viewing pleasure. Yay!
J'dub has figured out how to climb up the back of the couch so he can play with the telephone. He can't get onto the couch, but now he is always clawing at us to put him up there so he can be closer to the phone. In the first video you can also hear him say "Hi."

Click on the video to view them larger.

To a better place

Big Grandma has passed on. She passed away on Tuesday night after Grandma Becky put her to bed. We will miss her, but she is no longer suffering and that is a wonderful thing.

The best part about all of this is last Saturday, March 17 all of her children came for a family reunion. It was really great that she got to see everyone together one last time before she passed.
Here is a picture of everyone at the event. She did have one large family.

Click on the picture for a full size image.

J'dub takes a bath

Check out our Flickr slideshow of J'dub in the bath time. Too funny!

Peek-a-boo!

J'dub has taken his peek-a-boo skills to a new level. He can now cover his eyes with his hands and remove them when you say "Peek-a-boo." Before he would maybe cover his face with a blanket or something of the like. We will have to try to get a video of it. It is very cute. Sometimes he covers his ears in the same manner. I'm not quite sure if this is just the pit stop to, "Hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil" or what.

Names have been changed...

You may or may not have noticed that we have changed the names on the blog to aliases to protect against identity theft and other such dangers lurking on the world wide interweb.

I finally have some readers outside of the immediate family/friends circle. Yay! However in this day and time you just have to be darn careful with personal information. So there you have it.

If you think you might appear as a character in this blog and you have a preference for your pseudonym, then by all means let me know. I'll take it under consideration. :)

Oh and if you don't know me personally, welcome to the blog and I hope you continue to visit.

Adventures of Wedgie Head

Daddy thought it would be funny for J'dub to wear his shorts on his head. What is more amazing is that J'dub thought it was funny too. Thus transforming him from a mild mannered infant to Wedgie head. Saving babies and adults alike from uncomfortable wedgies.

**cough, cough** **sniff, sniff**

J'dub and I were too sick to go to Utah. :( We just couldn't risk getting Grandpa B sick. It is sad but we know it is for the best.

Instead we helped Papa Darv put some shelves up at the store and took my car into the shop. Later we will go to the craft store to pick up supplies to make baby Pratt a "welcome to mortality" gift. :)

Happy weekend!

Etsy

Well, I am just a blogging fool tonight.
One of my new favorite blogs, Baby Cheapskate, had a link to Etsy. It is a place to buy and sell handmade goods. A crafty ebay. I love it. Maybe I'll try and sell some goods on there. The previously mentioned baby announcement lasertiles and the like come to mind.
Take a look they have anything and everything you could think of.

Welcome Pratt Alexander Gibson!

My dearest friend Monica just had her baby boy. The name will mostly like be Pratt Alexander Gibson. The birth process was quite an adventure, but everyone is healthy and happy.
Congrats!
We love and miss you in AZ!

J'dub is 14 months old!

Well J'dub is officially fourteen months old. My how time flies. Looks like those 1 year pictures might be turning into 18 month old pictures. :)

He isn't walking quite yet, but he is awfully close. We want him to have that sense of independence, but at the same time we think it is quite a task keeping up with him now.

In the last few weeks J'dub has started doing all sorts of new things like:
- clapping
- doing the actions to "I'm bringing home a baby bumblebee."
- Quacking, baa-ing, and moo-ing. They all sound the exact same, but you know what he is doing.
- Handing over his pacifier when asked. (he still gets to use it at night)
- Tries to unbuckle his high chair when he is done.
- Some crazy new sound with his tongue. He is trying to roll his r's.
- He tries to unlock doors. He got a hold of my keys and was standing by the door trying to insert the key

Updates and things

Well it has been too long since I have posted. We have had a busy week indeed. Lots of work, sickness, and life in general.

Last week Instant Imprints went to a community fair so I was whipping up lots of examples of engraved gives to show. There are so many things you can do with that laser engraver, it is amazing. The latest were birth announcements on ceramic tile, 50th wedding anniversary gifts, and of course the scrapbooking/cardmaking cut-outs. I'll try and take some pictures of the samples I make. I find it endlessly entertaining and perhaps some people might like to see what I am up to.

This Saturday J'dub and I are going to Utah with my parents to visit my Grandpa B and various other family. Papa Bear is staying behind so as not to miss work. We will miss him sorely, but working is good too. It will be J'dub's first time meeting his Great Grandpa so I am very excited for that.

J'dub seems to have a cough and a bit of a runny nose. I hope it is his teething and not a cold.
Speaking of teeth, he is up to 8 now. I discovered the seventh tooth last week and the eighth is right behind.

I also have a cold/allergies and am really hoping that doesn't affect the trip to Utah.

Big Grandma

We have a little bit of sad news. Papa Bear's Grandmother is not in very good health. She spent much of the last week in the hospital and we have learned that she has breast cancer that metastasized into her lungs. She has chosen not to receive treatment and is back at home and seems to be in good spirits. We aren't sure quite how long she has left on this earth, but we sure do love her and look forward to spending as much quality time with her as possible.

Please keep her and her family in your thoughts and prayers.

J'dub playing at G'ma Becky's

Here is a video taken on 2/25/07 of Autumn entertaining J'dub. J'dub loves playing with his cousins.

Posting videos and photos

I have a little housekeeping. From here on out I am going to back-date any video/picture posts to the date they were actually taken. This will keep the front page from being inundated with old videos and pictures.

So.... if you notice on the right side of the page there is a box that says labels. That lists all the different topics I have blogged on. I will put videos under videos and so on. I will also try to post a new announcement that links to the videos.

If that didn't make any sense, it probably isn't that important anyway.

Fun with Picasa

I thought it would be fun to play around posting some photos on the blog, so here we go.
The top picture is Mommy and Joshua playing around the house. Joshua looks oh so dapper in his Janie and Jack duds that Aunt Cedar bought for his birthday. If you can't tell, the hat has fish that match the shirt. We think it will be great beachwear for when we head to NC in May.















G'ma and G'pa B with Samantha and Joshua. Out of about 20 pictures, this is the only one where everyone is looking at the camera. It was quite the ordeal getting a good shot.