December Happenings

December is always a busy month. Our house is all decorated inside and out as well as our Christmas trees. We have our nice tree when you walk in and a small tree for the kids to decorate with their things. Dawson loves having his own tree to be in charge of. I hope he doesn't mind sharing it as Jane gets older!
We have decorated gingerbread (graham cracker) houses with the Daw family. Jane enjoyed eating 2 crackers while the other kids worked. We also attended Cascade Christmas. Well, Jane was left with Brad's parents so we could actually enjoy the show. It was so much fun.
Jane went into the Doctor for a check up and weighs 18lbs6oz and is 29inches long. Her cousin, Lea, has been coming over twice a week for a couple hours. It's been so much fun playing with her. Jane has been off the bottle since her 1st birthday. The first couple days were tough but she has adjusted. She did get rather upset when she saw Lea with a bottle and needed some mommy time and fell asleep. We had done so well with her pacifiers. She has rotated through 4 different ones and we haven't lost any. Someone since her 1st birthday we have manged to lost ALL of them! I don't know if it's because she is more mobile and hides them well or if somehow she spits it out when we are out and about and I don't notice it. Needless to say it was frustrating trying to find the pacifiers and now she just has 1 that we are hopefully NOT going to lose....well at least for another 6 months when I attempt to take it away from her.
Dawson is doing excellent in school. He really has been enjoying learning how to play the recorder. He practices it ALL the time after school. I like hearing him play but after about the 20th time of the same song in one afternoon it does start to drive me crazy. Dawson is still an amazing big brother. He has such a loving sweet spirit. I don't know how I got so lucky! He still loves to snuggle up with me, holds my hand in public and will run up and hug me at school (most of the time) when I am there. I know it won't last much longer so I am trying to enjoy it as much as possible.
The rest of this month is going to go by so fast! We are looking forward to a wonderful holiday season spent with family and friends.

Thanksgiving

We spent Thanksgiving at my (Betsy's) parents house on the coast. It was a small gathering for us but very nice. We didn't have Dawson this year-he was with his dad which always bums us out a bit. We missed his sweet spirit. Jane somewhat enjoyed her first real Thanksgiving dinner. She LOVED the pumpkin pie and for her birthday party with my family she had a slice of that instead of cake. I figured it counted as a vegetable for the day :) Jane had so much fun playing with her cousin, Iris. It'll be fun once Jane can walk and keep up with her! She did check out her smaller cousins Josie and Isabelle but wasn't too sure about them. What we really loved about Thanksgiving is thinking about all we have to be grateful for. We are so blessed. I am most thankful that for that opportunity to be a mom to my children. It is the greatest blessing I have been given. We were also thankful that Brad got a whole week off work to hang out with us!

What fun-Jane is ONE!

I know, I know! Where did the last year go? I can hardly believe that Jane is already one. Her birthday was Sunday and being the Sunday before Thanksgiving all the talks at church were on gratitude. I just kept thinking how grateful I am for a beautiful and healthy family. Jane has brought us much joy and has been such a blessing.
She woke up on her birthday in a great mood. She was in a great mood all day until bedtime when I wasn't going to give her a bottle. I did break down and give her a bottle to help her go to sleep. She wasn't so happy today (the day after her birthday) since she hasn't had a bottle all day. She takes her sippy cup and just throws it and screams. I hope that this only lasts a couple days and then she will be fine.
We had a small party for Jane Sunday night. We had Brad's parents, his sister and her family, and Mary and her family over for tacos, cake, and presents. I think dinner turned out great. The funfetti cupcakes are always a huge hit with the kids and I attempted to make a chocolate butterfly cake for Jane. It turned out ok but slightly possessed looking. Oh-well, I tried. She did get butterfly shaped ice cream though. I couldn't mess that up with a cookie cutter! Jane LOVED her chocolate cake and spent forever eating it. She went straight into the bath after wards. Jane also really enjoyed opening up her fabulous presents. She wasn't sure about it at first but by the end was loving it. She had so much fun playing with all her new toys and her cousins too!

This is what the big 1 year old is up too:

*Stands alone
*Crawls so fast (especially if you are chasing her)
*Loves to sing and listen to music
*Laughs like crazy-mostly at her brother
*Pretends to read
*Eating more table foods--hates when I feed her baby food
*No more bottles (hopefully!)
*No weight/length check as of recently
*Takes a 2 hour nap most days
*Sleeps from 9:30-7 with one wake up for some milk or a pacifier
*Has 3 (almost 4) teeth
*Wears clothing sizes anywhere between 6months and 18months (depends on what it is.)
*Has developed some stranger anxiety
*Can get in and out of her swing and bouncy chair (both low to the ground)
*Loves her blanket at nap time and still wants to be rocked to sleep
*Overall Jane is a very happy little girl

The pumpkin patch and Halloween

I figure I should blog about Halloween and the pumpkin patch before Thanksgiving! Time is flying by. We did our annual trip out to Hawe's Farm with Mary and her family. It's always still so warm so in our pictures we are still wearing summer clothes. Dawson always has a blast and Jane enjoyed it this year too. Dawson picked out pumpkins for everyone in the family. We only carved two. Dawson carved a warewolf and we carved Jane a butterfly. Jane was a butterfly (of course!) and Dawson was a skeleton/ninja. He put together 2 old costumes we had and made up a new one so we didn't have to buy another one. I was happy about that!
The night before Halloween we had our annual chili cook off/trunk-or-treat at church. This was the first year since Brad and I have been married that we actually went. It was so much fun and although it was raining the kids loved seeing the church classrooms decorated and just walking in a large circle collecting their goodies. We also spent a couple hours at the annual school carnival. Dawson had fun as did Natalie and Cora but not any of us adults or babies. We might just take them all out to do something else next year. Too many long lines and after 2 hours and 10 pieces of candy and a cupcake it just wasn't worth it.
On Halloween night it was sprinkling and cold so Jane didn't go out. Dawson went out with Mary and her family because Brad was sick and I was taking care of Jane, their son Asher, and Brad. We didn't have as many trick or treaters as usual which we were okay with.
All in all we had a fantastic Halloween once again!

Sweet baby (11 month old!) Jane

Where did this last month go!? Jane has been keeping me busy as has Dawson. Jane had her 11 month birthday yesterday. She is changing and growing every day. I am still thankful that I have been able to be a stay at home mom to her and take care of her full time.

What's new with Sweet Baby Jane:

*Is trying to "mark it" during pat-a-cake
*Attempts dancing
*Can get around SO fast--no walking yet thankfully!
*Has cut 2 teeth-one on bottom and one on top but they aren't visible when she smiles yet.
*Sleeps through the night (except when those teeth are bugging her!)
*Takes usually one long (2 hour) and one short nap a day.
*Wants to be rocked to sleep and loves her blanket on her head when going to sleep.
*Still only drinks 4-6oz at a time every 2 hours.
*Loves cookies but no other food really. She eats graham cookies, sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies (all things she finds on the floor from other kids) but refuses to eat vegetables-only carrots once in awhile.
*She plays very well independently on her own but doesn't like it if I'm not in the room with her....I'm getting a lot of reading done!
*She tries to talk a lot more
*Does not really like her car seat-hopefully she likes it more when it's forward facing.
*No length/weight check this month because she's a healthy, beautiful, petite baby.
*She is still very nosy and likes to see everything that is going on and wants to be in the middle of it.
*Enjoys playing with kids and gets most excited when Dawson is around and playing with her.
*Has a fond attachment to her pacifier now--will be trying to get rid of that soon!
*Her fine motor skills are really developing and she can pick up the smallest of things (which I find in her mouth daily and she gets mad when I take it out.)
*Enjoys books, and music time
*Loves wooden spoons, one of her favorite toys for the month.

So next month she will be having her first birthday party and I will probably get teary eyed. Where does time go? She was just my little ball of a baby who just rocked and rocked and rocked with me all day. Now she just makes me laugh with her squished up face smile, sloppy kisses and sweet giggles.

10 Month Old Jane

Jane is now 10 months old. She is keeping me very busy and her personality is getting bigger and bigger every day. I'm not sure if that's a good thing or not! She definitely knows what she wants and does all she can to make sure she gets it. She is one spoiled girl.

Here's what is new with Jane:

*Walks along furniture
*Can bend down and pick something up when standing while holding onto something
*Has attempted to climb the stairs a few times
*Puts EVERYTHING into her mouth
*Can clap
*LOVES music--she loves listening to her dads CD when she is upset and in the car.
*Continues to sleep from about 9:30-7:30 at night and wants to be rocked to sleep.
*Most days takes 2 hour naps--sometimes more sometimes less. Mommy loves this time!
*Loves to play with Cora, Asher, and Dawson-really any kid she loves.
*Still doesn't like to each much baby food....usually drinks 4 oz every 2-3 hours STILL.
*Loves to stand up and hang onto anything she can.
*Sits in highchairs when we go out to eat.
*Is now in a big rear facing car seat instead of her infant car seat.
*She is a very happy baby and most of the time mellow.
*Now wears size 3 diapers and mostly 9-12 month clothing.
*Her hair has some curls at the end and I LOVE it.

Dawson's having fun being 8!

Wow! Turning 8 is a HUGE deal around here. Now that Dawson is 8 he was able to join Cub Scouts as a Wolf. He was a little nervous about it but he sure loves it so far! His leaders seem fantastic. I have to say I think he looks absolutely handsome in his scout uniform too!
Dawson has also finally lost his two top front teeth. I was wondering if he was ever going to lose them. He lost his bottom teeth a year ago in July. I hope it doesn't take another 14 months to lose another tooth.
This last weekend Dawson was able to get baptized. In our church we believe the age of accountability of making right choices is 8. So all children once they are 8 are baptized. It was a very special day. We had a pretty busy Saturday leading up to his baptism. Dawson was so happy to have a big family dinner before hand. He got a couple of gifts as well. Brad and I got him his own set of scriptures, Brad's parents gave him a book and a tote for his scriptures, and my parents gave him a baptism blanket. Dawson asked for a baptism blanket from my mom over a year ago. He came up with this idea somehow. He was SO happy to finally get it. The blanket turned out super cute. My mom found the perfect material for it. His baptism meeting only lasted about 40minutes which I thought was perfect. The only real issue was we couldn't get access to a TV/DVD player in the building due to them being all locked up. I had made a slide show of pictures of Dawson from birth until his 8th birthday and had it set to different Children Hymns. We watched it later at home that night. Dawson was just beaming the whole time and took everything very seriously. I am very proud of him and the decisions he is making.

Jane's 9 month check up

Jane went to the Dr. today for her 9 month check up. She's actually 9 1/2 months but it's when I was able to get her in. She is perfectly healthy and petite. She weighs 17lbs even and is 27 1/2 inches long. She is sitting like a pro. She now pulls herself up to a standing position and is trying to let go and scoot along whatever it is she is hanging onto. She crawls everywhere. She gets mad at me when I have to leave the room and chases me crying. She is full of smiles and kisses. I love her so much!

Isn't it Great to be 8?

Dawson turned 8 yesterday. It is such a great birthday because now he gets to prepare for his baptism. He had a weekend full of parting. On Saturday we got up early and had a friend birthday party at the skating rink. Dawson has decided he LOVES roller skating. He had a great time and so did all his friends who showed up. I'm sure the kids would have loved to have skated longer if allowed too.
Saturday afternoon we went to Mary's to swim and hang out with family. My parents were in town as well as Crissy and her kids. She also brought up Lori's daughter, Iris, to spend the day with us. After swimming we had a yummy BBQ. Then lots and lots of presents. Dawson was sharing this party with his cousins, Natalie (9) and Cora (3) since their birthday's are all within 3 days of each other. After presents there was LOTS of cake. We had 3 cakes plus a pan of brownies. Every child deserves their own cake. Dawson stayed up late playing with his toys that night. He was up early Sunday playing as well. My parents got him roller skates for his birthday and he wore them ALL day-except at church although he wanted too.
Monday was Dawson's real birthday so we told him he could decide what we do all day. He decided to just lounge around in pajamas and play with his toys all morning. He got a lego table and a super fast remote control car that he was enjoying For lunch he wanted to go to Olive Garden-we were more than happy to take him. He had a great lunch. He got to order dessert and our waiter sang to him and gave him 3 mints (and a nickel) instead of 1 mint. It made his day! After lunch he wanted to go spend some of his birthday money at Target. He bought a couple more toys and came home to play with those. He then decided he wanted to go swim at Mary's. We swam for a bit and he played with Natalie and invited Natalie over for a bit. We then went to dinner to our favorite Mexican restaurant, Guadalajara, with Brad's parents and Dawson got sung to for a second time. He was glowing! After dinner we came home and he played some more, watched part of a movie, and enjoyed his birthday evening.
He had a great weekend and birthday.

Jane at 9 months

Jane is 9 months old today. Time sure flies! She has changed so much this last month. We are still so in love with her and just love that she is here and a part of our family.
Here is what Jane is up to:
*Crawling (not so good on all 4's yet but in the next week I'm sure she will be.
*Scooting around everywhere-she has figured out that she can leave the family room now which makes my days a little busier.
*Loves to try to play with my computer cord or anything plugged in she can get.
*Babbling
*Gets so excited when she see's someone she recognizes
*Laughs like crazy at Dawson
*Still refuses to eat much of any food and usually still just 4oz of formula every couple of hours. I did give her an 8oz bottle in hopes that she will eat more but it hasn't worked so far.
*Sits up so well on her own.
*Loves playing with all toys-her recent favorites are anything that belongs to Dawson or isn't pink and purple.
*Will watch a cartoon on TV
*Loves to be in the water-bath, pool, lake, etc.
*Still sleeps all night long-9:30-7 usually.
*Wants to have a blanket over her face when she sleeps.
*Has started taking at least one nap for an hour or longer a day as well as her short cat naps.
*Wants to be rocked to sleep-usually be me.
*No Doctor's Appt. this month so not sure how big she is but she is definitely getting bigger. She is almost out of her 6-9 month clothing and size 2 diapers.

I'm sure there is more that has changed or that she is doing. She is changing every single day and she has a mellow yet stubborn personality.

Josie Ann Eldridge is here

My newest niece, Josie Ann, was born August 17th at 11:31pm. She was 7lbs 6oz and 19.5in long. I can't wait to go meet her! She looks absolutely perfect and gorgeous. Way to go Lori and Jayson (and big sister, Iris!)

A 3rd Grader?

I can't believe I have a 3rd grader. Dawson started school on Monday. He LOVES his teacher and really does love school. I think we lucked out again and got another awesome teacher. He just hates waking up so early for school. If school was from 9:30-3 it would be perfect for him. This year he decided that it was embarrassing for him to be walked up on the first day of school. He insisted on just being dropped off. I was a little sad about it-but the fact that his dad was taking him made it a little easier. He did let me pick him up from school so that he wouldn't have to ride the bus. I only have one picture of him on the first day of school and it's still currently on my phone so I won't be posting it :(
We got his STAR test results back from last year. I was pleasantly surprised. He only missed 2 questions on the Math portion-out of the 5 categories he had 100% in 3 of them. On the English portion he did pretty well also. He had one 100% on one of the 5 categories. He was also placed at a reading level 4.

End of Summer Vacation-Santa Cruz/Aptos

Our last summer trip was spent down in the Santa Cruz area. We went with Brad's parents and sister's family. On the drive down we stopped and visited the Jelly Belly Factory for lunch. The line for the tour was over an hour long so we opted out of that. The kids were totally okay with it. We stayed at a house a few blocks from the beach in Aptos. All the kids had a blast playing at the beach. The first day we were there we drove into Monterey to visit the Aquarium. We had lunch there and stopped for some yummy cookies at the Nestle Toll House Shop. The kids went to the beach that night. The coolest thing about this beach were that deals and dolphins were swimming maybe 20-30feet from the shore line. The following day we woke up and went out for breakfast, went strawberry picking (Jane slept through that part), went to the boardwalk-the kids had a BLAST (minus the first ride Dawson had to go on and freaked out about.) Then that evening we went and hung out at Capitola beach and had pizza. The day after that we went on a bike ride through the redwood forest. Beach cruisers are not made for semi graveling roads in the redwoods! Jane enjoyed the bike ride on her new seat that is on my bike. The kids spent the afternoon at the beach once again. It was pretty chilly but Jane had a pop up shade tent and I laid in there with her and stayed out of the cold wind so it wasn't too bad. Our last day there we went to Farmer's Market at Cabrillo College, went shopping, stopped for some pretty yummy cupcakes, and ended the day at the beach again. The kids loved coming back from the beach and warming up in the hot tub at the rental house. We had a really nice time and it was a great get a away before coming back and getting ready for school to start.

8 Month Old Jane

Jane is now 8 months old! Here is what is new with her:
* LOVES to swim. She doesn't even mind going under water for a quick dunk.
* Rolls around the living room.
* Gets on all fours and starts to rock-she will be crawling soon!
* Can sit up on her own for about 2 minutes before toppling over.
* Sleeps really well at night. Usually goes down by 10pm and wakes around 6am then back to sleep after a bottle until 8:30am.
* Recognizes familiar people and gets excited to see them.
* Babbling a lot-put d and a together and will say dada but not in context.
* Starting to eat more baby food...DISLIKES green vegetables.
* Loves to sleep with a blanket over her head.
* Gets jealous when she wants attention and has to share it. (My niece, Cora kept touching her foot when my mom was holding her and Jane would scream until Cora would stop touching her.)
* Has been taking longer naps-usually one for 1 1/2 hours a day and another shorter one.
* Sits at the dinner table in her high chair.
* No height/weight check this month. She is a healthy baby.

Jane at 7 Months

Jane is now 7 months old. She is as sweet as ever. She definitely has a personality. She is happy when all attention is on her.

New things this month:
*Rolling over to get to places (not often but more than she has been.)
*Sitting up on her own
*Plays with bigger toys
*Great with moving her hands around and grabbing what she wants or pushing things away
*Loves to play in her activity center
*Sleeps in her crib in her own room(and has put herself to sleep 3 nights in a row so far!)
*Can actually eat baby food
*Loves to stick her tongue out when smiling
*Has discovered her feet and loves to put them in her mouth
*Loves watching other kids
*No Drs. appt. this month for a weight/length check.

I love that summer is here now and the weather is warmer. Last week I took Jane to swim over at Mary's house. Jane LOVED getting in the floaty and hanging out in the water. Mary's family and my family decided to go out to Whiskeytown Lake with all the kids. We had my nephew, Cruz, here as well. The kids had a blast and we didn't get to stay long enough. I actually enjoyed hanging out at the lake more than I thought I would. It should be a busy summer full of swimming. Dawson is loving swimming and is taking more swim lessons this summer. He is not thrilled about it but we think it is good for him. Plus he needs to do something with some of that energy he has.

SUMMER TIME!

I LOVE summer time. I love not feeling so scheduled, I love sitting out by a pool and watching Dawson swim around and do crazy stunts. I am looking forward to taking Jane swimming this year as well...after all she has 4 really cute swimsuits she needs to use. I bought her one, Mary bought her one, her daddy bought her one, and then her noni bought her one. They are just so cute when they are so tiny.
Dawson is officially done with the 2nd grade. Where did the time go? I am so proud of him. He got a few awards again this year. He had 3rd trimester perfect attendance, a principal's math challenge, and an award for being a good citizen on the school bus. I'm not sure when they started giving out awards for riding the school bus but Dawson seemed happy about it. He had a lot of fun activities go on the last couple weeks of school that I got to help out with. He had a field trip to Turtle Bay Museum, a Spring Fling (each class or grade levels all do a dance performance, and a 2nd grade field day where all the classes just got to run around outside and play with toys and bounce houses. It was a blast!
We celebrated Brad's birthday on Saturday. My parents were in town to do some work on their house. So we had a BBQ with them, Mary's family, and Brad's family. It was a lot of fun. Plus we got to play Apples to Apples one of my favorite group games--I of course didn't even come close to winning but just spending time with the family is what makes it worth it. Brad and I feel so blessed that we have the opportunity to see family as often as we do and we consider our family our closest friends.