Gracie is 6 months!

SIX months old! Seriously?! I can't believe she is already halfway to a year! Time has flown by with this little girl, but at the same time I still feel like she is a tiny baby (because she really is).

Here are her stats from her 6 month appointment: 

11 lbs 12 oz (1%)

23.5 Inches (1%)

Head Circumference 16.3 in (20%)

-Wearing 3-6 month clothes, although most of those are a bit big and some 0-3 month still fit!

She is just one tiny little girl holding up a quite large head for her body. At least she is on the charts and we are happy about that! The Dr. said that she looks good. Although she is small, she is still eating and happy and that is what is important. I suspect she will be a little girl with a fiery but sweet personality her whole life. 

For Christmas Gracie got this adorable little Kewpie doll from Grandma. As babies my mom and I both looked like Kewpie dolls so she is following suit. Following tradition Gracie had to have a Kewpie doll of her own.

Some milestones from this month are:

Starting solid foods- Not a fan at all. She wouldn't ever take cereal but I thought veggies would be different. I was wrong. I basically have to shove the spoon into her mouth and push down her tongue. If I actually do get it in there she ends up spitting it all back at me...all over my clothes. It's pretty awesome. I'm hoping she gets over this soon. 

Takes a bottle- This was probably one of my favorite milestones form this month although one of the most frustrating. Gracie took a bottle when she was a few weeks old really easy so I didn't worry about keeping up on giving her one because it was just easier to nurse her. Turns out I really should have given it to her more because when I wanted to start giving her an extra bottle before bed with rice cereal in it she completely detested it, even if it was just breast milk. In desperation to get her to sleep better I decided to buckle down and go through a day of awfulness to get her to finally give in. I didn't nurse her all day and just tried a whole bunch of different bottles to see which one she would take. It was funny because I totally expected the worst and it really wasn't that bad. Even though she only took whatever came out of the bottle from chewing on the nipple every feeding she still slept through her naps and acted happy all day. This girl apparently doesn't need food to be happy and content. However, at 3:00 in the afternoon I guess she decided she was hungry enough to give in. I borrowed a "MAM" brand bottle from a friend and it was the winner. I can't believe how many different types of bottles and nipples there are! Glad we found one that worked. Unfortunately it didn't help much with the sleeping...

Sleep- Goes to bed around 8:00 pm then wakes up somewhere between 1:00 am-4:00 am. This is getting really old but I hate having her cry it out since I she is such a little girl and probably needs the extra feeding. Hoping this stage will be over soon because I'm pretty sure she can go longer than she does. Also, still doesn't like to be held and snuggled to sleep. She much prefers her bed or car seat. Thus why we take pictures whenever she falls asleep else where.

Exploring her world- This month she found her toes and has been really into putting everything into her mouth to figure out what it is. She is a constant drooler and very often goes through 2-3 outfits a day if I forget to put on her waterproof bibs.

Muscles- I swear this little girl is going to be a gymnast someday. Don't underestimate her petiteness. This girl is STRONG! She locks in those legs and can be as stiff as a board. You can lift her up and hold her out horizontal and she will stick straight out. She loves to stand so her exersaucer and jumparoo are her two favorite places, although she does love being a part of it all when she is hanging out with me in the kitchen. I would not be surprised if she went straight to walking with these tough legs. I can't get her to stay on her tummy long so crawling may be out of the question.

Shaping her head- I mentioned in Gracie's 4 month post that she most likely had something called torticolis that was causing her to have a flat head on one side. I started doing exercises with her on my own and then made an appointment with the physical therapist to see how bad it really was. It turned out that she had limited mobility with her neck on one side and most definitely had a lopsided head and her ears were uneven as a result. There was a 14mm difference between one side of her head from the other. Most people opt to get a corrective helmet for their babies when there is a 10mm or more difference. About 3mm difference is normal since most of us don't have completely perfect shaped heads. When I heard this I was SO glad that I decided to bring her in despite my Dr. telling us that it wasn't that bad and nothing to worry about. Although it doesn't cause any kind of brain damage it definitely is something that will stick with her for the rest of her life and can easily be corrected if caught early.
           Because she is growing so slowly the physical therapist was pretty convinced that we could make it better by positioning. If that didn't work we would have to look into getting a corrective helmet. They gave me long tube socks filled with rice and showed me how to position her to be on the side that she was not used to sleeping on to even out her head. Seemed easy enough and I wasn't so sure it was going to work, but I was surprised a month later when I took her in and she had made so much progress! She went from a 14mm difference to a 9mm difference in just one month! She still looked lopsided but I could tell there was a lot of progress. We will continue to go position her whenever she is laying down and have monthly appointments with the physical therapist to see her progress. At least until we know that it is going to continue to progress in the direction we are hoping. I'm so glad we don't have to look into getting a super expensive corrective helmet. I'm glad that she is such a little girl making this an easy fix with positioning. They also said that it will get better as she starts to sit up a little bit more and not be on her back so much. She still can not sit up on her own.

We love this little girl to pieces and although things are slow moving with her I can't help but be a little bit grateful because it allows me to enjoy her being tiny just a little bit longer. It goes way too quickly!

Christmas Day

Things that stayed still on Christmas day so that I could take a picture...

Our beautiful tree...

Gracie's goods from Santa...

Jack's goods from Santa...

Haken's goods from Santa...

The room the way Santa left it...

Jack...He didn't move from this spot all day...

I think he liked his present from Santa or something... 

Merry Christmas from the Anderson's!

We are going electronic with our newsletter this year. 

We hope you have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Christmas Eve

On Christmas Eve we surprised my parents by coming for the day and staying for the party that night. My mom was super surprised and so excited when she saw us. We had decided that we would surprise her a few weeks before Christmas and I did a really good job of keeping my mouth sealed even when she dropped off our Christmas pajamas for Christmas Eve thinking that we wouldn't be there for the party. We usually like to spend Christmas Eve at our own house and make a big dinner but we decided to move that to Christmas Day. Christmas Eve is also my dad's birthday so it was a fun birthday surprise for him. 

We hung out with them all day and played with cousins. That evening Haken, Taylor, and Jack put on a program for everyone. It included Taylor singing a "Karate song," Haken singing "Jingle Bells" (in Spanish, with the help of Aunt Cheri), and Jack singing "once there was a snowman." We also read our  new Christmas book "The pajama elves" and the pajama elves even dropped of pajamas on Grandma's doorstep! 

We drove home (on scary snowy roads) just in time to get to bed before Santa got to our house.

Jack is 2!

This little boy turned two on December 13th!

Two years seems like such a short time to me. When my brothers went on their missions two years just seemed to fly by! Although our two years with Jack have flown by I feel like he has always been a part of our family.  We had a pretty low key day for his birthday. He wasn't feel well and had a cold (again). He had a terrible cold over Thanksgiving and I am wondering if maybe this was just an extension of that cold. He took it in stride though and still managed to enjoy his birthday even though he felt yucky. We waited until after dinner and then Jack opened up his present from us.

He wasn't really sure about his present at first. I think he didn't really realize that it was for him. We got him a semi truck and I have to say that it was the most stupidly packaged toy in the world. It took Shad about an hour to get that dumb thing out. He even had to borrow a special screwdriver from our neighbors because he didn't have one that would fit just right. Try and get a two year old to wait that long! Once we got it out he just laid on the floor and played with it like this. You could tell that he didn't feel well.

  

I think we nailed it on the head with this gift though. Just look at his little face admiring all of the details.

After presents he took a bath and that made him feel much better.

Today Grandma and grandpa came and celebrated Jack's birthday with us after church. Grandma made this super cute snowman cake. The frosting set up a bit too much and turned into a hard shell but it still tasted yummy. Ignore the hole in his side, I was trying to see how hard it really was, apparently not as hard as I thought. :(

Jack's favorite gift was a little ambulance from aunt Jenni. It made LOTS of noise and it didn't leave his side for at least two straight days. Thanks aunt Jenni! He also got a much needed new car seat from Grandma and Grandpa.

Loving grandma's cake

Gracie liked the plate more than the cake

Happy birthday to my sweet Jack! You bring so much light into our home and I couldn't imagine our house without your funny, adorable personality. You bring happiness to everyone you meet and everyone loves you from the instant they meet you. So excited to see you grow up to a funny little boy!

Mommy Vacation

When I became a mom I knew it would be a 24 hour job. I was not surprised when I had to give up most all of my free time to take care of my kids and husband. I love it, despite the sacrifices I have had to make. Some of my hobbies and projects have taken a back burner, while others have really flourished since becoming a mom. Luckily most of my hobbies (cooking, sewing, organizing) tie in nicely with taking care of my family. However, I think every mom deserves a break from the most demanding job in the world. Because I live where I work, the only way to really take a break was to get away from it all. Here's a little background as to why I chose to vacation where I did...

My SIL Nicole and I developed a unique relationship when she came to live with us for a summer when Haken was a year old. Her husband was finishing up school and they were kind of in limbo for a few months until they moved to Arizona. That summer we became "Sister Wives" and did everything together. Yes, we did get frustrated with each other more than once but after that summer we became the best of friends. I guess you could say that our relationship "went through the fire." Living with someone for an extended period of time definitely tests your relationship and we came out better for it, so I guess that must mean it is going to last. I constantly think that maybe I married Shad for my sister in laws. They are all such amazing women and we get along so well.

So, after that background story, you will know why I booked a plane ticket to Arizona to spend a week with her free of kids (or at least the two that don't rely on my milk supply right now). Nicole and I had talked about visiting each other like this many times but it just didn't seem practical to me...until they started doing cheap flights to Arizona back in September. When I saw that you could fly down there for $120 roundtrip, I knew I had to make it a priority to go. I made a little money making curtains and decided it was now or never. I really second guessed myself a few times thinking about how selfish I would be doing this, but after a really hard day with the kids I pushed the "Book it" button and never looked back. 

It was a great relaxing vacation. We didn't do much, or go anywhere, but we didn't have to. The fact is that I didn't have kids needing me every two seconds. It was a little refreshing not to hear "mommy" 100 times a day. Actually I did, but I wasn't the mommy, and that was the important part. I love my boys, and by the end of the week I was missing hearing their little voices saying "mommy," but the break was nice. It may not be something that I get to do all of the time but I am grateful for all of the people who did my job during the week (my friends, mom, and Shad) so that I could have a little "mommy vacation." 

*It was also really nice to be able to give my little girl some undivided attention and be reminded what it is like to have just one child again.

Waiting for our plane. She did awesome on the plane and won
 the hearts of every person on there. Can you blame them?

You wouldn't know that these two are only about 3 months apart

The girls 

I wasn't the greatest picture taker. I wish I would have gotten some of Nicole and I. My only excuse is that I was on vacation...I guess that included a vacation from photographer as well.

The last night I borrowed a car and made my way down to Tucson to visit my brother and SIL. They took us to an AMAZING crazy nice Mexican restaurant in downtown Tucson called "Cafe Poco Cosa".  They have 12 different plates you can choose from that are different every night. If you want to be adventurous you can let the chef pic three entrees that go well together and be surprised. I decided to  do that and I was not disappointed at all. Highly recommend this restaurant if you are every in that area. We also saw former senator Gabby Giffords eating while we were there. The plates looked too pretty to eat. I had to take a picture.

Megan's plate

My plate

We went back to their place, completely stuffed, and spent a nice evening laughing our heads off chatting. I sure do miss having them close to us all of the time. They felt bad that they didn't have a crib for Gracie to sleep in, but we made due with what they had, a trunk that Megan found at a yard sale (a.k.a Autie Megan's Pack-n-play). Megan thought I was kidding, but it worked out perfect for my little baby doll.

I know she looks freaked out, but she was really just super tired.

The entire week was fabulous! I came back rejuvenated and ready to take on my mommy role again.  I would do it every year...although Shad says I should never leave them again. Maybe next time all of the SIL's can go a vacation together without any kids or responsibilities!

Fossil Hunting

Over the summer Haken has become a little geologist. He is constantly collecting rocks with his friend Chloe, putting them into categories, inspecting them, painting them. Frankly, we have run out of places to put them! I have to confess that when he is not looking sometimes I throw them out the door into our yard. I am surprised when a few days later he asks me where this "certain" rock is. I can't believe that he really remembers them all.

Well one day a student brought into the seminary a rock that was printed with a fossil that looks like some kind of reptile skin imprint. We looked online and can only figure that it is actually a fossil of dinosaur skin. Shad knew that Haken would LOVE this so he asked the student where she got it and they went  hiking in the hills of Honeyville in search of dinosaur skin. They went with another teacher and his kids who are also interested in rocks. 

They actually went two different times...The first time they didn't actually find anything, although Haken doesn't know that. After they searched for a few hours finding nothing Shad's friend decided to just break off a piece of the rock that the student had given him and place it somewhere so he could find it. It was so sweet! I think he knew that if Haken didn't find anything his heart would be broken. Haken was so excited when he found an awesome dinosaur fossil just sitting there on a rock next to the path all by himself.

The second time they went hiking they had a little better information as to where to search and actually did find some great fossils. Not only did they find more dinosaur skin, but they also found some really cool trilobites as well. 

I love that my sweet Haken is so into exploring and figuring things out. He really has such a curious mind and is always learning new things without me even pushing him at all. 

I also love that my husband is such an amazing father and will spend half of his Saturday (2 Saturday's actually) hiking up a hill on an expedition for a 5-yr-old. He is a great photographer too and got some amazing shots while they were hiking up the mountain. The fall colors were gorgeous!

On the mountain they found these building ruins and an abandoned mine.
The workers could have stayed here while working in the mine?