April 2011

This week my nana and pa came to town, they took me to my first baseball game.  And they watched me while my mom went to work.  They even took me for a walk downtown and bought me a cute spring outfit!  I got to stay with my babysitter, Brooke, one night when my parents went out with them to a Rod Stewart concert.

My hair is growing pretty fast so my mom thought she would give me a trim.  She told me it was pretty difficult to cut...almost like trying to cut the hairs of a little bobble head without poking its eyes out.

My haircut is not exactly even, but my mom thinks it looks better than it did.  I think next time she tries to cut my hair she will do it when I am sleeping or when I'm laying down relaxed in the bathtub.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love my bunny slippers!

My mom thinks I'm adorable in my nightgown (she sure took enough pictures of me in it).  Happy Easter!

Another day at the beach with our friends, oh how I love the beach! Next time I go my mom plans on putting my toes in the water, I'm not too excited about that, I hear the water is cold in Santa Cruz!

Adalyn's Blessing Day

We blessed Adalyn when she was just over a month old on Sunday January 2nd.  Here are a few pictures that we took of our sweet little angel.

Mommy & Me Swim Class

 A few highlights from our week...

Mom put olive oil on my scalp to get rid of craddle cap while I played with my toys. She thinks it's fun to spike my hair.

Spending the morning at the beach with friends, the last day in March and it was 80 degrees.  We plan to spend many more days at the beach this summer, in the shade of course!

 

 These pictures are from my first swim class.  Mom couldn't resist taking a million pictures of me and my chunky legs. When my dad tells my mom that I'm starving and not getting enough to eat she just reminds him to look at the meat on my bones.  Do I look like I'm deprived of food?

This past week I made a new discovery...my feet!

 These are my friends Elena and Olivia, we met them through our mommy & me yoga class.  They are just a few weeks younger than me.

 I wasn't quite sure what to think of this huge body of water, my mom thought that I would enjoy it because of how much I enjoy taking baths, but she was wrong.  It was nice that it was indoors and that the water was really warm.

 I was a little skeptical about being on my back with nothing underneath me. The teacher was a big scary guy who took me from my mom and put me under the water, going under wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be.

 And if you haven't seen enough pictures of me... here I am eating my rice cereal.

I love my mom and she loves me, we had so much fun playing and laughing together today.

God Grew Tired Of Us

"Winner of both the Grand Jury Prize and the Audience Award at the 2006 Sundance Film Festival, GOD GREW TIRED OF US explores the indomitable spirit of three “Lost Boys” from the Sudan who leave their homeland, triumph over seemingly insurmountable adversities and move to America, where they build active and fulfilling new lives but remain deeply committed to helping the friends and family they have left behind.  Orphaned by a tumultuous civil war and traveling barefoot across the sub-Saharan desert, John Bul Dau, Daniel Abol Pach and Panther Blor were among the 25,000 “Lost Boys” (ages 3 to 13) who fled villages, formed surrogate families and sought refuge from famine, disease, wild animals and attacks from rebel soldiers. Named by a journalist after Peter Pan’s posse of orphans who protected and provided for each other, the “Lost Boys” traveled together for five years and against all odds crossed into the UN’s refugee camp in Kakuma, Kenya. A journey’s end for some, it was only the beginning for John, Daniel and Panther, who along with 3800 other young survivors, were selected to re-settle in the United States."

I watched this movie this week and it made me think of this family of refugees that I volunteered for during college.  It makes me sad that I don't remember their names or even where they were from (Somalia/Kenya?), at the time (2005) they were very new to the United States and didn't speak any English.  I picked them up once a week and took them to the grocery store.

4 months old

I am thoroughly enjoying watching my little girl grow. (Although I do wish she would slow down a bit)  I can't believe she is already 4 months old!  Over the past month she has enjoyed sitting in her bumbo chair and just sitting upright in general (she doesn't really like to be sitting down leaning against pillows she wants to be all the way upright), grabbing toys and usually taking them straight to her mouth, using her pacifier as a toy and putting it in her mouth sideways, upside down and occasionally right side up, entertaining herself in the exersaucer, laughing (she has a new one that sounds like a fake cough), and getting smothered in kisses by her mom.

Her binky is by far her favorite toy

She's started drooling a ton and sometimes just starts screaming (no, not crying, just straight screaming), I'm wondering if I'll be seeing teeth soon?  The doctor told me that 4 months is just a drooly age and that the screaming is most likely her discovering her voice.

In the past week she has decided she likes to stand, holding onto mom's hands of course, I wasn't expecting her to have such good trunk control so soon. (I'm amazed at how quickly these little people grow and progress) I was my mom's earliest walker at 9 months, I'm hoping Adalyn will wait awhile longer than I did.

She will be 17 weeks old this coming Thursday.  We had her 4 month check up last week and here are her stats:

Weight: 15 lbs exactly/ 83rd percentile
Height:  24.5 inches/65th percentile

Her doctor said that we could start giving her rice cereal, fruits and vegetables anytime now.  That night we gave her rice cereal for the first time... it really wasn't that fun. It took her a little while to get how to eat it and most of it ended up on her bib, towards the end she just started getting frustrated and kept throwing her head back.  I had made it really thin, which could have been the problem, so eventually I just ended up feeding it to her through a bottle.  I was hoping that she was maybe going to sleep a little longer after having her rice cereal before bedtime, but it made no difference, so for now I have just decided to give it to her every once in a while.  Since I don't really have any reasons to introduce fruits and veggies, besides for our entertainment, I am going to wait until she is closer to 6 months old.

Trying to get her to smile... the hands always go in front of the mouth.

 Her first San Jose Sharks (Ice Hockey) game.  She did great.  I was impressed with how well the earmuffs worked.

Our Baby Pictures

Looking through some pictures wanting to compare our baby pictures to Adalyn's.  This was all I could find for now... one of Andy and two of me.  I'm still curious to see one of Andy at Adalyn's age.

Visiting Friends in Washington

In the end of January Adalyn (2 months old)  and I went to Washington to visit some friends.  Our first stop was in Everett where we met Jackson (7 months old).  Isn't he handsome! :) He is my friend Katie's son.  Katie and I were mission companions together in Balneario Camboriu, Brazil.  We were companions when I had been out in the field for 6 weeks and she had been out for 3 months.  I'm proud of how we were committed to only speaking Portuguese together, although it would have been easier for us to speak english I know we were blessed for our efforts in learning the language.  I can still remember one of our last p-days together when we had our first conversation in english... :) our conversation lasted for quite some time, and we enjoyed seeing more of each other's personalities.

The adorable owl hats that Katie made

So cute! I loved taking pictures of him going after her bow.  Katie actually showed me how to make bows and made this bow for Adalyn. She has a box full of ribbons and flowers that she had in preparation for her little girl to be born... after finding out from the ultrasound that they were expecting a girl her and her husband were surprised on the baby's birthday with a beautiful baby boy.

Katie and I

Our sleeping babes

Next Adalyn and I went to Bellingham to visit Laura and her family.  Laura and I went to High School together and then I convinced her to move from BYU Idaho to Salt Lake City to attend the University of Utah.  We were roommates the year before I left for Brazil.  

Adalyn and I with Mason and Spencer

Laura and her boys

I had a great time getting to know her cute boys and I enjoyed watching my friend's children interact with Adalyn.  Mason was even sweet enough to share his string cheese with Adalyn. :) I'm glad she didn't try to swallow it.

Thank you Katie & Brett and Laura & David for letting me come visit!