Sweet Photos

With Ammon out of town I was a little bored, ahem, I mean inspired to take some photos of Kaleb. These are my favorites!

Kaleb's Travels

The other night Ammon and I were at the church building, helping out with the weekly cleaning, so of course, we brought Kaleb. He had a blast chasing us and the vacuum around the entire church. By the time we got home, his poor little feet were a nasty shade of brown. May be the darkest those feet ever get ;-)
Much to our surprise, Kaleb has taken it upon himself to learn to stand all on his own. He's very steady for sometimes minutes at a time, but I tell you, there is no moving those feet to take a stroll. He lands face first before that happens! My favorite moments are when he picks up large items (like a full package of baby wipes) while he's trying to balance on his two little tree trunks. His confidence is phenomenal!

Simple Things

Ammon left Wednesday morning for the Mountain Man Rendezvous. We have a brother in our ward who is in charge of the Trading Post up there, and when he invited Ammon, it was like a little boy in a candy store... or Ammon in a candy store! He has been SOOOOOO excited ever since. He grew out his 'beard' (the poor guy is still part Navajo) for two months and has been talking about it ever since to any man that would listen (men are the only ones who understand). I've tried to be as supportive as possible... usually I tend to rub it in how much I will miss him when he makes plans to be gone for overnight things. It's horrible of me, but apparently it helps get the missing out early cause I have REALLY missed him these last few days. More than usual. Here are a few random things I miss:

1. Perfect blankets. Every night, after our family prayer, Ammon tucks me into bed. It's not the same when you do it yourself.

2. Laughing at me. I don't think I'm all that funny, but when Ammon mimics me or repeats something I say, it is HILARIOUS!!

3. Kaleb's Ni Ni. Kaleb has a bottle before bed every night and he's always so sleepy when he's finished. However, when we wave "Night, Night" to Daddy he gets a big grin and his eyes light up again. Then as we walk away, he tries to keep his eyes on Daddy till we turn the corner. So adorable!!

4. Heavy CARSEAT! It's just understood that if Ammon's around, he carries the carseat full of 22 pound baby... but (insert whine here) I've had to do it!

5. Goosebumps. There's a way that Ammon smiles at me that sends chills up my spine and gives me goosebumps. I think I miss that the most.

Kaleb-9 Months

Kaleb continues to be such a joy in our lives. Now that he is crawling, his personality really shines through. We've actually even started to discipline (and by discipline I mean teach) and it has brought out a lot of his stubborn-ness, but we also have seen some genuine compliance and understanding. It's so exciting to watch his precious little mind work.

At his doctor's appointment, Kaleb was 29 inches and just shy of 22 pounds, which is 75th percentile for his age, so he's finally starting to level out. Thankfully we have yet to find any food he doesn't like and we're even giving him small bites of our meals (baked potatoes, veggies or even Gramma's brisket tonight). Also, Kaleb now officially has six teeth and has been clapping for almost a month (a small but crucial step in development that I took upon myself to teach him.)

I haven't had a good laughing video in awhile so here is a great one. The two things Kaleb likes most are games of Peekaboo and random objects flying through the air (a close third are his silly cousins). Plus, he has this inbred need to knock down towers of boxes... which causes some issues with his older cousins. Anyway, here are some flying objects:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SYnrdTfpu0

Here's a great photo we got after Kaleb's bath one night. He really needs a haircut, but we're waiting until Daddy needs one too so they can go together. I feel this just captures his whole personality, "I'm cool and laidback, but I've got attitude!"

Our 3rd Ammoniversary

February 17th marked our 3rd Ammoniversary, and somehow, my wonderful husband made it all about me. He bought me a dozen roses; we went to a fun romantic comedy and then he whisked me away to the Melting Pot (my favorite restaurant) which he paid for almost entirely with money he got from donating plasma (cuz it aint cheap... The Melting Pot, I mean) All through my pregnancy I had craved cheese fondue, but I never got any... but he made up for it in spades. It was wonderful and very romantic and we had such a blast. Splurging for that one night really helped us forget our troubles for one evening. My fantastic hubby made it all possible! He's so awesome! I still have to do something for him, so check back in the next month (or maybe next anniversary) for that.

Remodeling

Whilst Ammon was helping a family friend remodel a house recently, not only did he obtain some old but fully functional fans, he also acquired a strong desire to remodel our home. Thankfully, we were in need of four fans to put in our kitchen/dining area (which had lights, but no fan) as well as our front room (which has no lighting at all currently). SO, Ammon and my dad began work on the little project of replacing the current light fixtures with ceiling fans. I won't go into the messy details about how our house has proven to constantly be a remodelers nightmare. However, I will mention that my kitchen looked basically like this for a full week:


In the kitchen area, there originally was a flourescent light fixture. The problem with replacing it with a fan was that the people who had put that original fixture up made it so that the entire area it was attached to was ruined. So Ammon had to replace a large section of the ceiling (see below).

Then he had to putty up all the cracks and sand that down to make it more even. None of this would be so bad if we hadn't moved in yet. BUT for those of you who have ever sanded anything, you know that the dust gets EVERYWHERE. Below is a picture of the floor after Ammon had sanded. See all of the fun footprints? The dust ended up all over all of our kitchen appliances, the adjacent carpets and even traveled as far as the guest bathroom.

Anyway, in the long run it was worth it. We have a beautiful (all be it old-fashioned) set of fans in our kitchen/dining room. I'm dreading the day when they decide to get started on the front room. (YEESH!!)

Favorites A to Z

I would have done this sooner, Reed Women, but for some reason the copy/paste function doesn't work on our computer, so I just hadn't gotten to putting everything in till now, so... here you go:


Animal: Almost all, but it has evolved from horses, to tigers, to ducks to bears.


Book: Harry Potter Series, can't pick a favorite


Color: Blue


Dessert: Coldstone's Dark Chocolate Peppermint Ice Cream with White Chocolate Chips


Eat: YES! Unfortunately!


Flower: Red Rose. Although the Sweet Pea is a close second


Game: 10-4, silly card game of strategic chance.


Hobbies: Kaleb, organizing/decorating/cleaning the house, and trying to lose 50 pounds


Idea: Indoor Plumbing


Joke: I'm sure if Brian Regan said it, I would laugh!


Kiss: (Stolen a little from Liz) July 2nd, 2006. My first kiss with Ammon who responded, "That was it?" ... and the romance blossomed from there!!


Love: Motherly, it helps me understand on a very small part how much Heavenly Father must love us.


Music: I don't think I can choose just one, although a song that always brings me comfort is "Consider the Lillies" as sung by Motab.


Number: 7


Old Movie: The old Pride & Prejudice or Clue (if the 80's is old enough)


Place: Disneyland


Quote: "Yoiks, and AWAY!!"


Restaurant: Melting Pot


Sport: See "Eat". Is Taebo a Sport?


Time of Year: Tax Refund Spending Time


Unusual Thing: Ammon doing the "Twiddy" Dance


Vehicle: The interior of a minivan that drives like a Geo Prism and parks itself.


Woman: Mom. For being the sweetest person I know. For teaching us to appreciate the greatest man I know, Dad. For STILL being there ALLL of the TIME to catch us when we fall!


Xtra: Pictures and videos of Kaleb


Yourself: Experiences


Z's hours: 10 pm to 8 am

Learning the Hard Way

While you are pregnant, and after the baby is born, you are constantly bombarded with advice like, "Sleep when the baby sleeps" and "Don't wear dangly earrings" and things like that. However, nobody ever warned me about grape juice! This morning, I dressed Kaleb in a cute little church outfit with a white onesie and white trimmed sweater vest and black chords. SUPER CUTE and SO HANDSOME. Even better, they were all hand-me-downs from his cousins that held up really well... that is until Kaleb got a bottle of grape juice. STUPID MOMMY!! Has Kaleb ever spilled juice like that before? Of course not. Only with grape juice whilst wearing a white top! Well, at least we now have a cute purple-pink top for whenever we have a little girl.

Funny Little Videos

I know I just posted a bunch of things on Kaleb, but we got a series of funny videos of him this week that really crack me up:



Firstly, Just random moaning of Kaleb as he chases the camera. The least funny, but it put us in a wacky mood and set the stage for the next two videos. Plus, he reminds me of a zombie with all the moaning he does:



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BVWNw5yy4Vw



Secondly, Kaleb has been playing peekaboo with us for a while, but now we got a pretty funny video. I just love how involved he is:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YevDGEoHHtI&feature=channel

Best for last, if you've ever seen the movie, "The Holiday" you will recognize Mr. Napkin Head. This one makes me roll on the floor!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ngRlr4Vt_U&feature=channel

My Own Little Miracle

So lately, I've gotten a little bit of the decorator bug. I think it's because Ammon had a temporary job that brought in a little extra money, so of course I feel the need to spend it... on little things that help make our house feel more like a nice home. SO, I focused my attention on fixing up the TV room, since I tend to spend the most time in it and I figured it needed the least amount of work. The theme colors for that room are primarily chocolate brown and baby blue, so I bought some satin, flowers and ribbon to fill giant champagne glasses we got for our wedding (thank you, Jess). I think they turned out pretty nice:



Then I bought a giant picture frame with the intention to put within it a collage of family photos, using the chocolate colored satin and ribbon as a background. However, when I got home, I realized it was smaller than I intended (I wanted 16 x 20 and I got 14 x 18), but nevertheless still usable. THEN I realized that I had a painting of Jesus that I had been wanting to display, but needed to get a new frame for and that the frame that I had just purchased was probably the right size. BUT, I thought to myself, "Aww, man, now I can't use the extra fabric I bought... oh, well." When I "Eyeballed it" it looked perfect. However, when I put it in the frame, I realized the picture was an inch too small... BUT... what if the fabric?... NO, it couldn't match the painting EXACTLY?!?!?! OH, BUT IT DOES!!! That's right, the fabric I bought for the glasses perfectly matches the painting and fills the empty space very nicely. You can see the it in the top part of the picture below. I know this is totally random that I post this, but I thought it was just a fun little miracle for me!