Shawn and Lisa

Our dear friends Shawn and Lisa were here to visit this past weekend. They live in Texas, way too far away, and it is always so wonderful to see them. We love you guys!

Jayden and Shawn were fast friends!


And one of all of us!

bath time

Eli loves loves loves bath time. We have started bathing him separately from Jayden as Jayden is needing a later bedtime these days. Eli loves having the tub all to himself, and the one on one time with Mommy.



oh could he BE any sweeter?

swimming

We headed out to my Aunt and Uncle's house on Sunday for a family together. My cousin, Paul, is in the Air Force and spent the last year in Turkey while his wife, daughter, and son stayed in Arizona. He is back now (hallelujah for them surviving his time away!) and they were all in town before heading off to Wichita Falls, TX, his new assignment. My aunt and uncle have a pool and jacuzzi and the jacuzzi was warm enough for the boys.

Eli LOVED it!
Dan went in with the boys. So fun!

Here's me with Paul and my other cousin Corey.

letter to Jayden

I have started and stopped, started and erased, and then started and stopped this letter many times. This letter to my firstborn, my sweet sweet Jayden boy. But tonight I was reading my friend Andrea's blog and her letter to her "twinks" who turned 2 today (happy birthday, sweet ones!) and I was inspired to finish it.

Jayden, it is so hard to believe that two years have passed since you came into the world. I remember how wide your eyes were, how you stayed awake for a full hour after being born, taking everything in. Not much has changed since then. You have such a zeal for life, for people, for the things around you. You are enthusiastic about the seemingly smallest things. But, to you, they are big deals. The "man" who trims the trees in our neighborhood, the trash trucks on Friday morning, Eli, playing on the floor with Mommy Daddy or Stephanie. All of these you love with wild abandon.

You also love people. I chuckled at your 2 year check-up. On the list of milestones you may have accomplished is "can name 3 or 4 friends." Jayden boy, you know the name of every single one of Daddy's co-workers, all the kids at church, our next door neighbors, Mommy's friends, Daddy's friends. You are social, and want to love everyone. One of our biggest challenges has been getting to express your love less...uummm...lovingly. Hee hee. Your daddy and I love watching you engage people already. You are charming, loving, and full of antics for everyone you encounter.

There are so many things I want to remember about this time. You pat the floor next to you and say, "Play, play" and we know you want us to sit with you and play, with anything and everything. When I go to get you from your nap you say, "Eli, Eli, play, play, bed." I put Eli in the crib with you and you both just burst into hysterical laughter. We sing "God We Thank You" before dinner and then you bow your head and whisper and then say "amen." I love that you pray already. Just this morning you said, "Dear Jesus, please help. amen. hannah." You were trying to pray for our friend Hannah who was having a rough day. My heart melted at your tender spirit. You jabber a mile a minute about everything. When we go anywhere in the car, I hear "Mommy, mommy" from the back and I say, "What, Jayden?" and you tell me something. Then I hear, "Mommy, mommy" again and this repeats over and over the whole drive. You now will say to me, "Mommy, hold me." Oh how i love those words. You still love to snuggle, and will wrap your arms around me and lay your head on my shoulder and sigh, "Mommy...."

My sweet wonderful miracle boy, you are loved beyond what you can imagine. Your daddy and I delight in you. In your sweet spirit, in your passionate heart, in your toddler antics. We fall more in love with you everyday. We are so thankful Jesus gave you to us to raise, and that we have the privilege of being your parents. These past two years have been so filled with joy because of your life. We love you sweet boy.

boys on the go

We went to Douglas Park this last weekend. At this park there is a great play area and a pond where you can feed ducks. Plus lots of room to run. Jayden was in heaven. Here are my three boys, on the go, Jayden in the lead.

On this same trip we had a celebrity sighting. For L.A, this isn't a huge deal. The weird thing, though, was that we saw paparazzi photographing them (and their children) from the bushes and then chasing them down the street when they left. In all my years of living in L.A., I have never seen paparazzi following anyone like that. Craziness! I would NOT want to be famous, that's for sure.

the sweetness that is Eli

I just cannot take enough pictures of our sweet little Eli boy! He is so precious and just makes my heart so happy.




And yes he has his finger in his mouth in all three shots. Poor sweet boy is teething. :(

Jayden's Big Day

On Jayden's actual birthday, we took the boys to Traveltown, a train museum nearby. It has old historic "choo-choos" to check out plus a mini train that you can ride around the park/museum twice for only 2.50 a person! Jayden loved it.

On one of the historic trains

Riding the train. So beautiful.

A cute picture Dan took while the birthday boy ate lunch

Playing with the toy "choo-choo'' in the gift shop


Later that night, he enjoyed one of the leftover cupcakes from his party, complete with birthday singing.



We had a great day celebrating our boy!

big boy car seat!

We recently moved Eli from his infant seat to a convertible seat (still facing backwards, of course). He LOVES it and has fallen asleep in it twice, after not sleeping in his infant seat since February! :)

Check it out!


And one of both the boys in their new seats (we recently got Jayden a bigger seat, too)


Oh and yes I know that the AAP just recently released a thing about keeping kids backwards as long as possible but after talking with our pediatrician we are comfortable leaving Jayden forward facing. But Eli will remain backwards for quite awhile after his 1st birthday! :)

2 year check up

This last Friday, we headed down to the OC for Jayden's 2 year check up with Dr. Ball.

Here are the stats:

26 pounds (46th percentile)
34.5 inches tall (74th percentile)

So, again, tall and skinny!

We had a great visit with our absolute favorite pediatrician EVER. He was so so so good with Jayden, who has recently developed quite a fear of the doctor's office. It made us realize once again why we are so willing to make the drive to see Dr. Ball. He has such a good way about him, and really makes us feel cared for and important. Anyway...here are some pics we snapped.

Jayden in the waiting room with my mom, who came down with us because she had never met Dr. Ball.

Normally Jayden screams through every part of his exam at the office. This time, though, Dr. Ball gave him his own stethoscope and he was quite enthralled.

Dr. Ball trying to make Jayden's ear check sound fun. Hee hee. :)

And one of the three boys. Jayden wasn't too excited about the pic.

Thanks, Dr. Ball, for a great visit with you and for all your help the last two years in caring for this little one. You are a blessing to us! :)

party party party

We had Jayden's birthday party yesterday. He had a blast!

The most important part, the cake, out on the table, and ready to go!

We rented a bounce house for our little bouncing boy!! He loved it!

Sweet Jacob diving into his cupcake!

Auriel came (!!) and had a good time playing with Eli

Jayden loves, loves, loves guitars so we I made him a guitar cake

Here's the birthday boy eating his cake!


Two old friends...of ours, and of each other. Jenny and Scot. We all go way back.. :)

Opening presents

Oma and Papa got him a drum, complete with drumsticks. He was SO excited

And one final picture of the birthday boy. Stephanie got him a fireman towel. He loves it!

Jayden is 2

I made a video montage of Jayden's first 2 years. Its A LOT to squish into one video so its a bit long. For all you Jayden fans out there, enjoy!! :)


P.S. Birthday pictures to come later on tonight! :)

mmm...salad!!

So today I am borrowing a page from MckMama's book and posting a picture of my lunch!!! This is one of my favorite salads. It is made with: organic baby greens, corn, black beans, chicken cooked in bbq sauce, and garnished with shredded cheddar cheese. Throw on some Catalina salad dressing (or ranch) and BAM you have a TASTY, flavorful, healthy lunch.

Before the dressing

And then after

sick boy :(

Poor little Jayden boy has been coughing for a couple weeks now. We saw the doctor on Wednesday, who said his lungs were clear and there wasn't much to do. But his cough has been getting worse and worse and worse. So last night he was running a fever of 101 so we paged the doctor who said to bring him in first thing this morning. So we did.

Turns out he has an ear infection and needs to be doing his breathing treatments with the nebulizer every four hours. And she added a new med to his nebulizer. Poor little guy! But at least he'll be well by his birthday, which is good news! :)

And just because he's SO stinking cute, here's a recent picture of our tantruming, tenacious, terrific, totally charming, toddling tike.

matching jammies

So you would think that by now I would have bought the boys some matching outfits. But alas I have not. Well that's not true. We got one set before Eli was born but he outgrew them before my sleep deprived brain remembered we had them. ANYWAY....I was at Costco the other day and saw these jammies and the boys just HAD to have them. Here's them showing off their "Irish twin" outfits. :)


And my absolute fave of the bunch we shot.

Jayden boy!

Jayden loves to be outside and LOVES the hose. Hee hee.

10 months

I am a few days behind on this but Eli is now ten months old! Wow! I seriously cannot believe how close we are getting to his first birthday. The first few months of his life seemed to never end. Sleepless nights, so much puke I have no words to describe it, and lots and lots of crying! But the past few have FLOWN by. I feel like the time with my sweet baby is slipping through my fingers, and he will soon be toddling/running around the house with his brother. For those of you who don't know Eli, he is just the SWEETEST little boy. Full of cuddles and smiles, and just so precious. I treasure our mommy and Eli snuggles, and the way he loves for me to just carry him around on my hip.

Anyway, what is he up to these days?
*crawling, pulling up, and cruising.
*working on standing on his own. he'll stand on his own for a couple seconds but that's all.
*just today he started clapping
*he plays "so big" and "peek a boo"
*still breastfeeding, which makes me really happy. i have now made it longer than i did with Jayden. so one year here we come! :)
*eating lots of table food. and let me emphasize LOTS. :) this boy loves to eat.
*in 9 or 12 month clothing. his insane growth has slowed a bit but he is filling out most of the 12 month stuff now.
*he has two teeth..the two bottom ones. seems like the top ones might be on their way. we'll see.
*eli is mellow, mellow, mellow. the difference between him and Jayden is amazing.

Here are some shots from the morning of this ten month "birthday."


and this is from Friday, after we took the boys to the beach

sick, sick, and more sick

For you faithful blog readers, you will remember when our whole family got sick at Thanksgiving.

Well these past few days have brought a toned down version of that adventure with the stomach flu.

It all started on Saturday when Jayden coughed a little and then threw up. Now, our little man tends to have a very active gag reflex so the "cough and puke" is nothing new around here. But it happened twice that day. Saturday night he didn't want dinner. Sunday morning he didn't really want to eat either. Sunday afternoon Eli woke up from his nap and promptly threw up everywhere...many times. Since then, Eli has vomited more times than I can count, we have changed his crib sheet approximately 5,476,289 times (yes, I'm exaggerating, but when you've been cleaning up puke for three days, you need SOMETHING right?), I have changed more diarrhea filled diapers than I care to imagine or count, and the poor guy has just been miserable. As if that wasn't enough, Jayden has been lethargic and not eating and kicked in with the diarrhea today. Stephanie also contracted the illness and has missed two days of school. Daddy got it yesterday, in the midst of studying for finals, and my dad got it today. Thankfully, my mom and I have escaped thus far. Praise The Lord. A full revisiting of the Thanksgiving misery is more than I could bear.

And just so there is some fun cuteness in this post, here's a picture of Eli doing "so big" a few days ago!


Isn't he awesome? Oh, and he'll be 10 months old on Friday! Can you believe it?

sunshine!

I love taking pictures of the boys outside in the sunshine. Such amazing lighting to catch their sweet faces on film.

On this particular day, Jayden and Eli were playing on the slide. Jayden was up top making Eli laugh and Eli was loving every minute of it.





"Ummm...Mom, I was wondering...how on earth did I get this stinking cute?"

Hannah (and Lyndsay!)

Our dear friends Hannah and Lyndsay came to visit us last week. Unfortunately I didn't have an opportunity to snap a picture of Lynds but here's one of Hannah and Eli. Both the girls were big hits with Jayden and he talked about them for three straight days.

Hannah and Lynds are the kind of friends that have become like family. We love them dearly! :)