Boston Lee {8 months old}

Boston is so much fun these days! He is growing so quickly, getting so strong, and doesn't easily hold still anymore. It's a wonderful age and we are all so in love with this sweet boy.

-23 lbs 11 oz (roughly - that was with his clothes on at Ryan's office)

-wears size 4 diapers now

-wearing size 12-18 month clothes

-huge feet!

-loves his bink

-wakes up anywhere from 1 to 4 times at night, which is SO frustrating

-is officially crawling all over the place

-starting to pull himself up to a standing position by holding on to something

-puts everything immediately into his mouth

-gives belly-laughs whenever Logan is bouncing around near him

-already has to put up with overly-tight squeezes from Grace and wrestling/bugging/hitting from Logan

-started saying "Da-da-da-da"

-squeals super loud and high-pitched

-hits his head a whole lot now that he is moving around and standing on his feet or knees

-loves eating table-foods way more than baby food

A few things I want to always remember about this age:

-How he always crosses his ankles (or should I say cankles), whether he is in his carseat, laying on his back, or laying on his tummy.

-How he grunts almost constantly while he crawls around... either that or he is panting excitedly as he crawls as quickly as possible to grab something he knows he isn't supposed to. It's like he's trying to beat me to it!

-How he holds onto thumb when I am holding him on my hip.

-How snuggly he is, even with other people who hold him. He will hide his face in their shoulder and leave it there for a few moments which makes it seem like he is cuddling up for a moment. He also loves to let me hold and rock him before I put him down in his bed. All I have to do is sit in the rocking chair and hand him his swaddle blanket and he immediately cuddles right into me. My favorite!

-He doesn't mind loud noises like my other two always did/do! It's amazing to me. The vacuum doesn't bother him - - in fact he squeals and tries to crawl towards it to grab it when it's on. 

Boston hated avocado when I gave it to him mushed up with a spoon, but he loves it in chunks! He also enjoys fruity yogurt melts, soybeans, roasted squash, cantaloupe, cheerios, veggie straws. He doesn't like most fruits (kiwi, bananas aren't his favorite, oranges, peaches, mangos) which is funny because I'm the same way. I *like* fruit, but I don't love it. I'd rather eat vegetables and savory flavors... he is the same! 

Now that Boston can stand up in his bed, it has really made nighttime frustrating and even more difficult. He wakes up every hour or two throughout each night, stands up in his bed and cries and shrieks until I come in. Sometimes I have been so dang tired and frustrated that I will just lay in bed and watch him whine for me. A few times he has finally gotten so tired out standing there that he will sit back down, sway back and forth out of exhaustion, and eventually bend forward, lay his head down and fall asleep like that all bent in half. haha. Poor kiddo!

Something funny he does is give head bonks. If you put your forehead towards his and say "bonk" he will lean his head in. Doesn't he have the cutest little profile??

This is what he does now: crawls around, finds something to push up onto (a box, a toy, a footstool) and hangs out like that. He is so happy to be left to his own devices, exploring and finding little goodies. He doesn't often play with actual "toys" though. He just wants to play with cords, garbage, stacks of papers, piles of clean clothes, drawers, etc. Anything except his toys.

 Those thighs!!! He is so massive. He really is. Are you going to be a beefy football player one day, baby boy?!

 Boston loves to swing anytime he has the chance!

 Since Boston is now crawling all over the house and is constantly trying to get into something, I have started putting him in his crib for some "quiet time". I just give him his binkie and a couple of board books and he's perfectly content like that for 10 minutes usually. It's awesome!

Twenty-Seventeen

It's a new year! New goals, new plans, new adventures. Ryan and I both decided to get ourselves a planner to keep ourselves organized and on top of things. I have REALLY really struggled ever since I had Boston. I get overwhelmed so easily and often forget important things... I feel like I can barely keep my head above water most days! It makes me feel crazy, which then makes me super mean and unhappy. So our goals this year are to be better about writing things down (plans, expectations, family needs, calling responsibilities) and plan things ahead of time such as date nights, dates with kids individually, projects we want to get done, and family vacations. Life feels like it's speeding up and we sometimes miss out on opportunities by simply not looking ahead. 

My planner is called a "Mormon Mom Planner" and I honestly am in love with it. It has everything I could possibly need! It helps me stay on track and remember things I can't keep in my brain. So pretty much my planner helps me to have almost my whole brain back. :) It's already helped me for these last 2 weeks and I feel so much calmer than I have in many months. I usually end up with lists of all kinds to help me feel on top of things... but then I leave those lists who-knows-where and lose them. So now everything is in one handy-dandy place.

For Christmas, Ryan bought me an awesome new set of Calphalon cookware. I love them! We still had our set from our wedding (over 10 years ago) and they were getting really bad. Now that I've been cooking with the new set for the last 2 weeks I notice that my food tastes different. It's sort of funny actually because I never realized that certain things tasted the way they do because now they taste DIFFERENT... when in actuality it's just that I'm not tasting the old, burned, gross pan. haha. 

We also went to Costco after Christmas and got me a new beautiful Kitchenaide mixer. I am in love. And it's red! My old one fell off the counter 8 years ago WHILE it was mixing bread dough and has never been the same since. The bowl didn't fit correctly and throughout the years the coating on the paddle and dough hook were chipping away. Gross. Anyway, no one died of poisoning yet thankfully, but we finally got a shiny new one that I love. I have the very best man in the world!

It has rained and rained and RAINED some more. We haven't had a lot of chances to be outside and it gets really old really fast. We're thankful for all the rain - believe me! We were in such a bad situation when we moved here 18 months ago. In fact the lake that has our water storage in it got down below 70% in 2015. With all our crazy rain storms this winter so far it is now above 112%!! It's incredible! 

Our backyard had some nice mini-lakes and rivers going on.

See all that water shining in the valley, south of Chico? That's not usually there... There has been lots of flooding all over Northern California.

Between all of the week-long rain storms we usually get a day or two that is sunny and beautiful. I make sure I kick my kids outside on those days so they can run around and get their fill before the next storm. Riding bikes and scootering on our culdesac is our favorite! 

 We had Oliver and Lucy Hanchett over to play and the 4 kids literally played outside for 3 hours. It was awesome and they haven't been able to do that for months!

 Park day with some friends.

All 3 kids fell asleep while we ran a quick errand. It never happens all at once like that.

 Ryan has enjoyed dehydrating fruits these last few months. It's a fun hobby for him. But he has been pining for a jerky gun for months. I always rolled my eyes because just the idea of a "jerky gun" and making our own beef jerky... sounds so gross. But he was set on it! Thankfully his brother Kyle gave him one for his birthday and he's been making pounds and pounds of jerky. And ya know what? It's pretty darn good! His coworker even gave him boar meat and deer meat to try... but after Ryan turned it into jerky he didn't like the taste (too "gamey") and shared the finished product with his coworker.

Grace has lost 5 teeth so far: bottom front, top front, and this new one on the bottom. Poor girl really needs her top teeth to come in! So far there's no sign of them. She did however learn to whistle after losing those top ones. Maybe because there's more ability to get the air out!

 I got to take all 3 of these cuties to Winco while they were still out of school. I was dreading dragging them through such a huge store, with whines that their legs are tired, and fighting over who gets to stand on the front of the cart. But on our way to the store I had a genius idea of a game the kids could play while we walked through the store: an alphabet game! They went through the whole alphabet twice (looking for letters in order, on signs and labels) before we were done, and they had a blast. They were so happy and didn't fight. It was wonderful.

We ALL love our time with daddy at home. He is a magnet and we all find ourselves hovering near wherever he is, and wanting to do whatever he is doing. We are so blessed to have such a great daddy and husband! 

I should also share some exciting news about Ryan. Last week he joined his medical group as a partner! They had asked him last year and finally were serious about going through the process of having him buy in. There was voting to do and paperwork and contracts to sign, so last week it became official. They haven't had a new partner join their group for ten years and we feel very blessed and thankful to be a part of a great group. I'm so proud of my man.

We had some friends over for a game night and it was lots of fun teaching them Word On The Street! Total bummer that the men won though. :(

 Look at these cuties!!! Man, life is good.

A few other 2017 goals we have set for ourselves include:
-pay off my car
-possibly fence off our side yard and make it part of our backyard play space (maybe get a trampoline!)
-explore more outdoor adventures in our area by renting ATVs, kayaks, etc, and do more hiking
-see the Redwoods
-get a financial advisor and make better long-term decisions (we've already met with one we love and are in the process of this)
... and last but not least ...
-yell less at the kids

Waffle Tradition {New Year's Eve}

After the big breakfast party we had on saturday, we rushed right to the baby blessing. After all of that, we had just enough time to go to my mom's and start getting packed up/organized for our trip home. We were so bummed to have to leave the next day since there were still things we didn't get to do and people we didn't get to see or get enough time with. :( But oh well. At least that night we could look forward to a New Year's Eve party with our traditional Waffle-and-Ice-Cream dinner at my mom's! Thomas and Whitney plus Jason and Jacey came over for waffles and to play games. 

Boston was super content in this basket for quite awhile. So funny.

Random shot: Doesn't Boston look a little more like me? (that's me at age 4 years old) 

well... I see it!

2016 brought us this sweet baby boy. I'm sure grateful for him and all that the year gave us. But I look forward to 2017 and all the possibilities and chances for improvement in my life.

 Which one is Claire??? Hm... Seriously that girl is the size of a baby doll. She is the cutest!!

Ryan and I played Make 'n Break with the kids and a few other games throughout the night.

Logan helped teach Elsie how to play Candyland and Twister. It only lasted for a few minutes... maybe when they're both older and have longer attention spans. haha

 Grace was helping Nana prep the waffle dinner in the kitchen.

 

 By 8:30ish it was time to countdown to an "early midnight" so our kiddos could go to bed. My mom provided a bunch of poppers for the kids and they loved it!

Once our big kids were in bed we pulled out snacks and played a few rounds of "Word on the Street". It was so much fun! We played guys vs. girls and I can't even remember who won because it was just too much fun to care. :) I love the play-time we get to have with this crew. Of course we were missing some members of the family but this was definitely a memorable game night.

The next morning (sunday) we got up early and headed west. Our goal was to be up and over Donner Pass by the time the sun was going down, which was also when the snow was supposed to start falling. Well we got to Truckee at 3:30ish so we were right on time... however we didn't anticipate the delay that all the holiday traffic would cause. It was awful! The snow had just barely starting blowing around but we got stuck on I-80 just because of the extra cars. So we ended up sitting at almost a stand-still for 3 whole hours. It took us that long to make it 17 miles where I-80 splits off ont I-70. Craziness! We were going 5mph or sitting still for so long that I ended up getting a crying Boston out of his carseat and sitting in back with him in my arms for awhile, just so he could stand up and get a break from the carseat. The big kids were great though. They watched movies, ate snacks, and were totally happy, so we did just fine. Thankfully Ryan had filled up our gas tank, I had packed lots of things to eat and extra blankets and such, so we were prepared for just about anything... except having a bathroom with us. :(  We finally made it home that night (15 hours after leaving SLC).

View of beautiful (cold) Donner Lake, right as we got slowed down...

 

Since we weren't supposed to be home until Tuesday, we ended up getting Ryan home with us for 2 bonus days. It was wonderful having him around to settle in after our trip, let me grocery shop without the kids, and help take down Christmas stuff, all before he went back to work.

We love getting Christmas cards every year from our loved ones! I tried to hang up all of the ones we got and take a picture of them. We love seeing the faces of everyone we love and miss from all over the US (and some international!).