BOM-RAT

I know I am going to blow everyone's mind by blogging 2 days in a row, but it is a rare moment where both of my sweet boys are asleep and I am eating lunch at the dining room table (where the computer lives) and felt a spur of the moment update desire. FYI, I intend to start being an "earnest" blogger again in 2014. And I tend to keep my New Years resolutions so, maybe I will be on this more than once a month and tell you more than just Dallin's latest and greatest.

So... BOM-RAT. What's that all about? Let me tell you. It's the abbreviation for "Book of Mormon Read-a-Thon". We are planning one for next Friday with the Young Women in our ward. We will read the entire Book of Mormon in a mere 24 hours. Is it possible? Well, lots of other units have done it and lived to blog it about it later that week so I can only assume it is. I will tell you this much though, right now, it's very daunting to think about.

Here is the thing, it is A LOT more than "just reading" for 24 hours. Let's not even think about the content of what we are reading- that's a whole thing in and of itself. But there is a lot of planning involved in "just reading"for 24 hours. Like a lot of food. I mean, we are talking about teenage girls. Like a lot of activities to keep them us awake. Like a lot of outside help to come and read to them. Like an awesome host family who is willing to turn their house over to a bunch of teenage girls and their crazy leaders for 24 hours. Like a detailed schedule of exactly what we will read at exactly what time and where in what groups. This is all just the tip of the iceberg.

I want to share details with you all, but I just can't right now. It's ALL a big surprise for the girls. And we've got lots of tricks up our sleeves. So stay tuned and I promise to provide the reading schedule (which some of you have asked for), the details of our night, and maybe even some pictures.

Who knows, now that I am back to blogging, you may wish me to be gone sooner than you think!

Dallin- 5 Months

Sweet baby Dallin is 5 months old. He is SUCH a different baby then he was a month ago. He is wide awake, very aware, and becoming very much his own person. He did go to the doctor, so I have some "official" stats to share.

He weighs 16lbs 9.5oz, which is perfectly normal, 50%
He is 26.5" long, 75%

Other "unofficial" facts and stats about him:

He is a great napper. A short nap in the morning around 10, a longer nap after lunch, and then another nap at Grammye's while I teach piano.

He is reconsidering the whole "food" thing. We tried to give it to him right at 4 months and he was not into it at all. Gagging, terrible faces, lots of spitting- it just wasn't working out. Now at 5 months, he is able to get in 2-4 bites each time and enjoys it, so some major maturity is shining through :)

He loves his jumper. He will stay in that thing as long as I need him to (like right now while I upload pictures and write a blog post). The sun on it frustrates him, just like it did Evan. I'm considering writing a review for that thing "WARNING: Sun may cause your babies first case of stress." He also likes to sit in his bumbo and the high chair and still likes laying on the floor and playing with his play mat.

He rolls over, gets up in the little army crawl position, squirms backward, grabs everything, and is just all around a busy boy. Much more curious than his older brother was at this point. He loves to babble/yell; Evan always says "what is he saying, mommy?" And he is very hands on- like his hands have to be on anything he sees i.e. hair, necklaces, clothing, toys, drinks, keys, books... you get the picture.

He is still oh so smiley! He is easy to get to laugh and if you smile at him, expect a smile back. He is almost never fussy- even in the car lately! We still have our car moments but we can definitely make it to Grammye's without a fuss (it's 3 minutes away).

He loves: Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer (song), for Evan to get in his bed and play with him after a nap, Mommy, Grammye, Daddy (in that order), toys, the Nativity book, drooling, the lights from his sound machine, and just life in general.

He is cuddly but very playful. He is loud but can be so sweet and still. He is busy but can be trusted to play on his own for a while. He is cute and cute and cute! We love him to pieces. He is just an awesome little baby.

Dallin- 4 months

This sweetie pie gets cuter everyday- can't you tell! He really does seem to be growing up right before my eyes. He certainly is not a newborn anymore. He's strong and solid. He holds his head up, sits up with support, and loves to be standing up while holding onto your fingers. He has found a love for toys. He plays with the toys on his car seat, including pushing the dog's nose for a song, he loves the toys on his play mat and swing, or you can just hand him a toy or a teether and he's entertained for quite a while. He is still the drool king and has to have a bib on all the time. He now has enough body control that the drooling is only magnified thanks to him constantly chewing his hands or toys. He has been getting up once a night, usually in the 5 o'clock hour which means I just bring him out to couch, feed him a bottle, and then we go back to sleep together until Evan comes and wakes us up around 7. He LOVES his big brother. It's more evident all the time. He watches everything he does and can
immediately be calmed down from mild fussing with Evan's attention. He also now knows who his Daddy is and gives Matt the biggest smiles when he comes home or when he can hear Matt's voice. He is still a Mommy's boy though. He prefers for me to be holding him when we are home, although really he just prefers to be held. He's a great sleeper during the day- especially considering his brother is not always careful to be quiet while we are in the nursery for diaper changes. He still HATES the car. We are doing everything possible to help with that. Other than that his general personality is happy, curious, a little loud when he's talking (which is a lot of the time), and very sweet. Dallin is just joy in a little baby boys body and we love him to infinity and beyond! (Evan is watching Toy Story right now...)

dallin- 3 months

My little baby is already 3 months. In my mind, that marks the end of being a newborn and intrance into infancy. We put away a lot of 0-3 month clothing this month and got out all of his 3-6 month clothes. He is still almost exclusively in 0-3 pants but is only in 3-6 pjs. He still sports both size onesies. He has reverted in his sleep. He was sleeping through the night for a few weeks there in month 2 but now, he consistently gets up once a night, usually in the 3 o'clock hour. He sucks a 6oz bottle dry every 3ish hours throughout the day. He generally takes 3 naps a day. He still HATES to car. As in he screams almost every day the entire trip to Grammye's house... which takes 5 minutes tops. Needless to say, we avoid taking him out as much as we can. But that's sad cause he is SO cute and SO sweet once he is out of that car seat. He smiles all the time now and laughs too, so stinkin' cute. He loves to have his diaper changed-he is all grins during that. He is super drooly. Evan only wore a bib when he was eating but Dallin has got one on almost all the time thanks to his drool. He always has his hands/fingers in his mouth. I hate to think that the little guy is teething but... He loves his big brother and his big brother loves him! Evan loves to squish his cheeks together and make a "fish face" (thanks Grammye for teaching Evan that one) and Dallin doesn't mind one little bit when he does it. Evan also loves to hug and kiss on him and hold his head and Dallin just smiles and looks up at his big brother- it's enough to melt your heart! He plays with toys now all the time. He loves the toys on his car seat and on his play mat. He also likes to look at other toys you will give him. He likes to sit and look at the books we read to Evan. He likes to watch TV with Evan. He loves to be in the baby bjorn. He will sleep forever in that thing, even through a marching band competition. He really is just so sweet. I love those big cheeks and that huge smile that is so easy to get out of him. I love seeing him grow up every day and I love seeing him and Evan interact. I am one blessed lady to have such cute and sweet little boys in my house!

Dallin- 2 months

let's all ignore the fact that this is the first post since March and just pick up in there here and now. don't even worry about those last 5 months...

Dallin is officially 2 months old! This baby... such a sweetie pie. He is the smiliest little man and it's easy to make him smile- just hold him, change him, look at him, anything! He sleeps through the night and has been for a while now. Occasionally he wakes up but it's very rare. He sleeps a lot during the day too, usually up for an hour or two, down for an hour or two. His favorite song is Old MacDonald and he likes you to say "and on his farm he had a Dallin". If he's fussy, singing this version of the song will calm him down almost immediately. Speaking of fussy, he can be a little fussy at times. He's super gassy (and it stinks!) and when his tummy hurts, he's definitely fussy. He also strongly dislikes the carseat, we know this because he is not just fussy but FURIOUS when he's in it for too long. Bless his little heart that kid goes from 0 to furious in no time when he's in the car and it's an all out fit; screaming, sweating to the point of being drenched in minutes, red as a beet... it's very sad. He can be a little fussy too if he's not being held because this boy LOVES to be held. He's certainly a momma's boy right now. He eats 6 ounces about every 3-4 hours. He loves to watch people and likes the lights on his play mat. He grunts and groans and makes the sweetest little baby sounds all the time. He is a tummy sleeper and sleeps with not blanket or anything in his crib because he is so hot natured. Dallin is sweet, cuddly, and beautiful. I cannot believe we ever lived without him. Our family feels so much more complete with him in it. He is adored by all- especially his big brother- and we just feel so blessed to have him as ours. We love you Dallin!

easter bunny!

saturday, evan went to see the easter bunny. he LOVED it!! he had seen the bunny from a distance earlier that week when we went to the mall and really wanted to go see him, but he wasn't dressed for the occasion on that day. so we put on a bright polo saturday morning and took him.

he immediately wanted to just walk up to him and once it was his turn, that's exactly what he did. he held his hand, let the bunny play with ramone (the car he brought), and just couldn't stop looking at him and touching him. i was worried that he wouldn't want to be held by him so i insisted that we wait until they were ready with the camera. well, i was worried for nothing because once we sat him in the bunny's lap we struggled to get him to look at the camera for the picture because he was just smiling up at the bunny and hugging him- he really did love that bunny!

sunday morning he asked to go see the easter bunny again. when we told him that it was sunday so we had to go to nursery and church today and couldn't see the easter bunny again, he fussed. he talked about the easter bunny this morning in the bath tub. i'm telling you, the kid loved the bunny.

this was great if for no other reason than the bunny photo but the fact that we are going to disney next week and plan to meet as many characters as we can makes it that much better! now we know he will like them too!! i can't wait.

kw's shower

as you all know, i spent all last week seriously cleaning my house. i like to think that i keep a pretty clean and tidy house but this was deep cleaning. i did it all in preparation for a wedding shower being held at my home this past saturday for one of my sorority sisters from college. my sister (biological and sorority) is one of her bridesmaids and hosted it with 2 other bridesmaids/sorority sisters. here they all are:

paige, lyndsey, katie w (the bride), and katie n

it was so fun to help them pull it all together. the house looked so pretty- they did a great job with the decorations. there was a lots of yummy food and everything just looked like a perfect little party was about to happen (and it did!)

katie's new last name is going to be hoy and her fiance is in the coast guard so it was "a-hoy" themed with lots of pinks and blues too. the favors were cute little messages in a bottle with candies and a pinwheel (which my katie made). we ate a yummy lunch and they even made boat shaped popsicles for us to all enjoy at the end!

we played some fun games, wrote down date ideas for her, and of course got to see her open all of her loot- she got a lot of great gifts.

it was just a really wonderful day. i am thankful to have been able to play a small role in it and am looking forward to playing piano in her wedding this summer (post baby). i wish i had more occasions to host things at my house! if anyone is looking for a place to have a small party, just come on over (i probably have most of the supplies you need already!)

disney prep

three weeks from today we will be in the magic kingdom! i cannot wait!! first of all, i love disney world. it is the happiest place on earth. but way more important is the fact that this will be evan's first trip there and i am just beside myself with excitement over taking him.

so i wanted him to get excited too and i know the best way to get him to learn anything is through a book. the boy has 4 books completely memorized (insane, i know, he's 19 months old) so i made him a book titled "i'm going to disney" and filled it with pictures of practically everything the magic kingdom has to offer. here is a pic of the front and the back covers:

i felt like i was back in 5th grade making these. i had all the stickers and the paper just in my craft stash from various free-be mailings/scrapbook efforts and i was just putting stickers everywhere! (you can't see the inside covers, they are really sticker-riffic!)

so it started out that i was just going to print out 36 pictures of various things in the magic kingdom that he would especially enjoy. but, in my typical style, nothing can be that simple. so i spent ALL. DAY. MONDAY. making 36 little 4x6 scrapbook pages of everything in the magic kingdom on word. here are some screen shots from my phone of a few of the pages (i will spare you the complete 36)

every page has a complement page in the same color, but i didn't line them up that way when i made them... don't ask. and yes, the book is set up as you would travel around the park. and yes, i did include the princesses, because i plan to use this book for future children and/or future nieces/nephews, hence the lack of personalization in the title. these are just a couple of examples of pages. i downloaded a trillion different fonts for the book and of course, the most time consuming task was finding the pictures i actually wanted to use.

so was the book worth all the effort? well, all morning evan was begging to go to staples (where i had the pages printed) so when i got the email saying it was ready around lunch, we went right away! i cut all of the pages down to size, put them in the book, and handed it straight to him. he LOVES it. his current favorite pages- the railroad ("ride that, ride that") and the mickey mouse page. he keeps saying "go there" and i keep telling him- we are! i am even more excited now that he is excited!