First day of school!

Monte and I dropped Isabella off this morning for her very first day of preschool. Don't let the picture deceive you, she was not very happy! She has been excited about starting preschool up until the last couple of days, she got really nervous. She cried last night and this morning because I couldn't go with her. She was crying a little bit when we left, but as we were leaving I saw her teacher giving her a hug. I felt so bad, and was worried about how she was doing. We really like her teacher, we know her from church, and she's been teaching preschool for 27 years. She had told us last week that we should send a picture of our family with Isabella to keep at school. She also said that if it didn't work out, she would call us to come get her and we would just try again another time. Not long after I got home this morning her teacher called with good news. She said she was doing great, talking up a storm, and adjusting better than most! *Huge sigh of relief* Her teacher wondered if she was in gymnastics because she recognised another little girl, and was playing really well with her. I'm so glad she is in gymnastics so that she knows some other kids. There is also one other little boy in her class that she knows from my Mom's group / Bible Study. I am so thankful that the teacher took time to call and let me know how she is doing! I was nervous for her because she's never done anything like this, except for gymnastics, but I always stay and watch her there. We're sending her 3 days a week instead of the 4 that it is offered - Mon, Tues, Thurs, and it's from 8:00 - 11:30. Jaymes naps almost that whole time, so now I am going to have to adjust to actually having some free time during the day! The possibilities are endless, I think I'm going to try and get as much prep work for supper done that I can do ahead of time, clean, hopefully get back on a workout routine, and maybe I'll have more time to update the blog!

The teacher asked that each child bring their favorite stuffed animal on the first day. She's all about Clifford right now!

Happy birthday, baby boy!

I really cannot believe it's been a year already (on Aug. 12)! I love this little boy to pieces, and I wonder if he gets tired of me kissing him all day long! :) He is a huge Mama's boy, which is new to me, as Isabella has never been much of a Mama's girl, she's all about her daddy. He's always learning new things, and I wonder if he'll be an early talker like Isabella. He's already following in her footsteps, as he says some words, and has been slow in his physical milestones like her (they both didn't start crawling until 9 and a half months, and she didn't start walking until 14 and a half months). He speed crawls all over the place, and is not one bit close to walking. He has said MaMa and DaDa for a long time now (6 months), although of course he had no idea what MaMa and DaDa meant back then, but I'm pretty sure he does now. He also says All Done ("Ahhh Da"), bye bye ("ba ba" while he waves), and no no. I can officially say that his first sentence was "No no Da Da" to Monte last week! I had just told him no no, and I guess he was trying to pass the blame! He loves to imitate, he especially loves to imitate whatever his sister is doing. She loves to act like a puppy, and so you will often times find Jaymes crawling around, panting like a puppy! He and his sister are best buds (I realize that is subject to change at some point!) she is such a good sister to him, and always looking out for him. She is also a huge help to me when it comes to taking care of him. She doesn't like to be away from him, and is always asking me when he's going to get up whenever he is napping. He is still a great sleeper, and is just now finally graduating from baby food to some table food, now that his choking issues are starting to resolve.

He has his 12 month checkup on Friday. He did just get weighed two weeks ago because of his choking/ eating issues, so I do know that he weighs a little over 19 pounds. He's in mostly 6-9 month clothes (shirts and shorts), but wears 12 month for pants, and I'm not sure how long he is, but he seems tall.

We hosted two parties for each of our families this past weekend, along with my brothers wife and their 4 kids staying with us for a few days. It is safe to say that he had a great first birthday, which was farm themed.

Grandma brought a DQ ice cream cake for his party on Saturday, yum!





Digging into the presents.






Awesome fire truck from the grandparents.

I made the cake for his party with my family on Sunday.

Let me at it!

All of my parents' grandkids were here, even my tiny, brand new nephew!

More presents!

Silly cousins, pretending to be flowers.

Enjoying the beautiful day! I decided I love having a kid with a summer birthday!

Enjoying the water park the next day.

Crawling!

Jaymes officially started crawling this past week while we were staying at my parents. He was the exact same age as Isabella was when she first crawled. Nothing is safe anymore! :) He's also very quickly learning the word "no", and is just as sensitive as his sister. Now when I say "no" I have two kids bawling - Jaymes, simply because he's sensitive, and Isabella because she feels TERRIBLE for Jaymes, and can't stand to see him cry! She told me tonight that she doesn't want to cry when Jaymes cries, but she just can't help it because she feels so bad for him.

9 months

We're coming off of one of our busiest weeks ever, and I should be in bed, but instead. . . I blog. :) I have all sorts of blog posts about what we've been up to, running through my head, hopefully I'll actually get them typed up. I know I owe some of you emails, too (I haven't forgotten!).

My sweet boy is actually 9 and a half months now. I took his 9 month pictures yesterday. I have a skinny, tall, gigantic headed baby! He is in the 20th percentile for weight (18 pounds 1 oz.), 70th percentile for height (28 and 1/2 inches), and 94th percentile for head size! He is in 6-9 month clothes, and it appears he will be for a while yet. The pediatrician asked if he is eating okay, and he definitely loves his food, he just doesn't eat too much at a time. He only drinks 3 and a half to 4 ounce bottles and has two meals of baby food a day. He LOVES to feed himself Ger.ber puffs (and Isabella likes sneaking one or two off his high chair tray)!

He still has some lingering effects from his bad acid reflux (which is a thousand times better). He tends to choke really bad at times, which is terribly scary! I couldn't even count how many times we've had to do the "flip him over and pound his back" thing. He still has a breathing monitor in his crib.

Due to his acid reflux, whenever he would sit up, he would spit up terribly (because of the pressure that put on his sphincter valve between the stomach and esophagus). We didn't want him spitting up and choking, so we just never made him sit up. Because of that he never sat up until around 8 months, which is very late. The pediatrician thought everything was fine, but wanted him checked out by Birth to Three. I also felt like things were okay, but had a very nervous feeling about the situation as well. The Birth to Three lady came this past week, and assured me that he is completely fine and normal, and that as I had suspected, he was slow in sitting up because we just never put him in that position because of the AR. She was more concerned about his choking / not breathing episodes and is going to come back again in 6 months to make sure he has grown out of that.


He waves bye bye, says MaMa and DaDa, has a pretty fierce fake cough, and clicks his tongue back at us if we do it. After seeing how well baby sign language worked with Isabella, I've also been doing it with him. He doesn't do any signs back at me yet, but I can tell that he knows what I mean.



He's been scooting around on his back (it looks crazy!) since a little before 6 months, to get wherever he wants (usually closer to his sister). About a week ago he started crawling backwards a little, so I assume the actual crawling won't be too far away. Almost every baby in my and Monte's family is a very late crawler (10-11 months) and walker!




He still loves and needs his sleep. He takes 2 to 3 good naps a day, and sleeps around 11 and a half hours straight at night. My only complaint is that no matter what time he goes to bed, he almost always wakes up around 5:30 in the morning, 6:00 if we're lucky! So after experimenting with different bed times to see if he would sleep in later (which he didn't) he goes to bed for the night around 6:00, and with Isabella going to bed at 7:00, Monte and I always have our evenings alone together, which is nice.


His hair is completely wild and curly, but I love it. Pictures don't do it justice as to how curly it really is. He is SO much fun, and I absolutely adore having a little boy. It's hard to believe he's only been around for 9 months, it seems like he's always been part of our family.

Jaymes update

Jaymes had his 6 month checkup on February 11th. It's hard to believe in just another week he'll be 7 months, I'm not quite sure where the time has gone! His checkup went well, he was 16 pounds (40th percentile) and 26 and 1/4 inches long (55th percentile). He's starting to seem long and thin, and is losing his chunky baby fat rolls that were so cute. He is rolling from both front to back, and back to front, and doesn't stay put when put down on the floor on a blanket, he likes to scoot around. He doesn't have any teeth yet, and I will be surprised if he gets any soon. Isabella didn't get her first tooth until she was 2 weeks shy of her first birthday. I can't believe it, but he still loves to be swaddled (he can't roll while he's swaddled)! I just this past week had to get out the 6-9 month clothes, and need to get most of his 3-6 month clothes packed away. He started eating solids about 6 weeks ago, and loves them! He wasn't big on rice cereal, though, once he tried oatmeal, so he no longer has rice cereal. He has one meal a day of oatmeal, a fruit, and a vegetable. So far he's liked all the fruits and vegetables. He is still going to bed around 5:30 or 6:00 in the evening, then sleeping 11-12 hours straight until around 5:00, when he gets changed and eats. I then put him back to bed, and he usually sleeps until around 7:00. Sometimes it takes him awhile to fall back to sleep, and he lays in his crib cooing away, it's so cute! I love baby coos! He usually takes 3 good naps a day. His favorite person BY FAR is his big sister! He is completely enamored with her, and she loves that she makes him laugh so much. She's come a long way since Jaymes first came home, and she had some jealousy/adjustment issues that were very sad for me because she was very sad. She is great entertainment for him, because all we have to do is set him down by where she is playing, and he is completely occupied with watching her play.

His acid reflux has gotten SO much better, and I am so glad that the worst of that is behind us (I hope!). He's even been off of his meds for it for about 6 weeks now. He loves his Jumperoo and sitting in his high chair with toys on the tray, and he really loves his mobile, oh, and looking at himself in mirrors! He is a happy little boy, and we are so in love with him! He LOVES his blanky, and has to have it to fall asleep, so we let him have it, keep checking on him, then when he has fallen asleep we take it away.

Unfortunately at 3 and a half months we had to put Jaymes on formula. He was having such a hard time with my milk - bad tummy issues and couldn't hardly keep any of it down. I tried giving up SO many things in my diet, including dairy, and nothing seemed to help. Oddly enough, my mom had this same problem with me! He and I had been through so much, he was a terrible nurser (my kids are HORRIBLE nursers), I pumped some from the beginning, and at first we had to feed him with a syringe for awhile, then I thought he was doing better, but realized after many yield checks he was only getting ONE ounce in one hour, but when he had a bottle he would take 4 ounces (and still does only take 4 ounces). No wonder he was hungry all. the. time. Anyway there were other issues, too, with nursing and his reflux so I decided to pump pretty much exclusively, and was committed to doing it for the first year. So when we had to switch to formula I was devastated. Some women family members acted like it was no big deal to switch to formula and actually laughed when I said I was really sad about it, that really hurt. They obviously had no idea what that bond is like. It took a while, but I now realize this is what's best for Jaymes, and am completely fine with the decision. It turns out that it was the lactose in my milk that he couldn't handle, and a woman produces a certain kind of lactose in her milk whether she is having dairy or not. Because of the whole situation, and the formula he needs, insurance is paying for his formula, which is great! I hesitated to blog about this before because I know there are a lot of formula haters out there. :) Anyway, on to some pictures . . .

He didn't start taking a paci until about 3 months, I was so glad when he did! He doesn't get it too often (mostly to fall asleep, or when we travel and are out and about) but I'm really glad that he takes one now!

Birthday Girl

November 2nd marked Isabella's 4th birthday, I can't believe my sweet baby girl is 4! She's had a couple of birthday celebrations, with one more yet to come with my family.

Here's my attempt at a Dora cake.

Celebrating with Monte's family.

This is what she saw first thing on her birthday morning - a Dora tablecloth, Dora balloon, Dora plate and cup, and presents waiting for her!

She's been REALLY wanting a coffee maker for her kitchen for the last year, she was thrilled to finally get one.

Magnetic wooden dolls, today's version of old fashioned paper dolls.

My mom came out to spend a couple of days with us, she offered to stay home with Jaymes while we did something special with Isabella on her birthday. She wanted to go the park and the zoo, and Applebees to eat. We made it to the park at the zoo, but unfortunately the zoo was just closing when we got there because they're on winter hours now. Thankfully, she didn't seem to mind.

Ending the day with a DQ ice cream cake brought by grandma!

First Haircut

On Monday morning, I took Isabella to get her first haircut. My mom has trimmed her hair once, and I've trimmed it once, but she's never had a professional cut before. She thought it was really neat to get her hair cut, she was just chatting away with the beautician the whole time! After the haircut, my mother-in-law came down for the day to join us for a day of shopping. It was SO much fun. Isabella just walked beside grandma and held her hand the whole time. At one point a lady came up to us, and started chatting with Isabella. Then, as were were leaving the mall, the same lady came and told Isabella since she was such a good girl, she had something for her. She gave her a magnetic Nativity set. How sweet - a random, sincerely nice person.

More Birthday Fun

On Monday, the actual birthday, Isabella had lots of fun! My sister and her kids were staying with us for a couple days after the party, so Isabella had loads of fun with her cousin, Rachel. Isabella and I recently discovered the play area at Menards, of all places! Actually, I've always known about it, I've just never been one to let her play anywhere like that because of my germaphobe tendancies. I have to say, though, I've gotten much better about things like that, I just make sure to have hand sanitizing wipes with me at ALL times. :) When it comes down to it, after so many weeks of gloomy, cold weather, it's great for both her and I! So we let the girls play there for a while, then we went to McDonald's for a birthday lunch. Of course McDonald's is the child's favorite place to eat, and we eat there all too frequently. She and I have our "dates" there whenever we go to the 'city' to run errands, which is about once every week or week and half. But this time it was her birthday, and she was with her cousin, and she got to get a happy meal with a My Little Pony in it. Oh, the excitement!! She told me while we were eating, "Mommy, this is SO excellent, it's just the best surprise ever!"

When Monte got home that evening, we told her she could open her presents from us, but she didn't want to! Nothing surprises us anymore, I guess. She kept saying, she didn't want to open any presents. Also, if we ever take her to the toy aisle/toy store to pick anything out, she absolutely does not want anything! I guess she's just a browser, and I hope that lasts! Anyway, we finally gave her the presents the next day, and once she saw them, she was excited. I think part of it was that she was having so much fun playing with her cousin the day before, that she didn't want to stop to open presents.

Playing at Menards.

This picture cracks me up.

Our very nice, and very generous neighbors gave her this tea set (they also gave her a huge bag of Hershey's kisses and a big bag of cookies for Halloween)!

Her Little People tree house from us.

Third Birthday Party

We celebrated Isabella's birthday with my family this past Sunday. My whole family was able to come, which made it such a special day! It means so much to us, because everyone had to drive so far. My brother and his family (with 3 little kids) drove a total of 8 hours that day! The weather was actually nice, so the kids got a chance to play outside for awhile. I made meatballs, cheesy potatoes, spinich penne salad, beer bread, fruit salad, and apples with a homemade caramel dip for dinner. Isabella was SO excited about her cake. I made her a Nemo cake. One night, about 3 months ago, Monte was flipping through the channels, and the movie, "Finding Nemo" was on. Up until that point she hadn't had much interest in TV, but she fell in love with Nemo! Now she'll watch just about anything, her new favorites are Dora and Diego. We usually limit her TV viewing to 2 shows per day, otherwise there's no telling how much the girl would watch.

I thought the cake turned out pretty good. I'll have one more chance to make it this weekend, when we get together with Monte's family.

We made treat bags for her cousins, each one had a Nemo yo-yo, Nemo sticker, and Nemo fruit snacks.

Looking so grown up!

Her new shopping cart from Grandma and Grandpa. Every morning for about a month she would ask me, "Mommy, do I not have a shopping cart?" I took that as a hint she wanted one. :)

I'm three!