Our Christmas

We originally thought we would be spending the Christmas in Kenya. We actually thought that the year before also! It didn't work this time, but we were very much at peace about it. We began to look forward to spending Cap's first Christmas at home with the 3 of us. We missed both of our families terribly!!!...But it was nice to have our own family time and even our own family traditions.

Cap turned 41 weeks old on Christmas day! He officially was a day older out of the womb than the time he spent in me!!! For some reason, it just seems significant to note that. In some ways it is hard to believe he is almost 10 months old, in other ways it is not. Our lives are not so busy all the time where time seems to just fly by without notice. I am thankful for that too. It does seem crazy how fast they grow when they are this young and all the new tricks they can accomplish in a small amount of time. Talk about really taking the challenge to learn something new each day!

I also want to note that we had to use a coconut oil type substance for the first time on his diaper region. I don't really think it helped, I think time healed it. We are not sure what it was caused from but it was pretty bad. He hardly has a wet diaper so I have a hard time believing it was a normal diaper rash.

Now on to some pictures.

this is actually a couple of days before Christmas

it was from a friend at work.

this is the first present he ever opened.

he kept getting his hand stuck!!

this was a group of carolers on horse back!!!

came right up to our house, i love it!

this is our Christmas stack and stockings

Bryce and Cap on Christmas morning

Cap stayed in his PJ's until after his first nap

checking all the goodies out

i think it was too early to have this much stimulation,

out of the ordinary for us

he was pretty much hooked on this little wooden walker

for the rest of the day! thanks grammi and papa!

pulling stuff out of his stocking

organic banana puffs and a new water bottle:)

loving the paper

already reading his new book from uncle jer and aunt brittany

likes the dog pic the best i think!

looking at a gift from his dad

a great pic of el capitan

only right he should have a picture of what he's

named after! great idea bryce!

enjoying the mess

this was us letting him heal his diaper rash

though it didn't help much

i don't think he wanted this hat on or something

i can't remember??

he is kind of a fast and careless walker right now,

but he LOVES to walk and insist on it more than crawling

now he is showing his grandparents in texas how

he has been jamming to his new drum and instruments!

we love the music stuff he got from nana!!!

you can almost see my mom's face on the computer,

we skyped that day with both of our families

then that night we had an awesome italian feast

homemade calzones wth 4 different kinds of peppers,

turkey pepperoni, mozzarella and cheddar cheese made with

an italian flavored whole wheat crust, so good!

the boy had some too, only his was with spinach,

sweet potato, and peppers on the same dough sprinkled

with some oregano, he loved it too!

Hope your Christmas was as memorable as ours! Next year, birthday cake for Jesus with my little guy helping me in the kitchen...I can hardly wait!!!

This is the day(s) we found dirt

explore

 

1.

to traverse or range over (a region, area, etc.) for the purpose of discovery.

2.

to look into closely; scrutinize; examine.

3.

to search for; search out.

exploration

 

1.

an act or instance of exploring or investigating; examination.

2.

the investigation of unknown regions.

...expedition, feel, touch, taste, examine, details, sounds, alert, inspect, listens, observant...

These are some of the words that come to mind during my days with Cap. A week ago, we came across dirt. Ahhhh...dirt. We are all about getting dirty outside at my house. O' how he examined it right and left and up and down, right hand, left hand, both hands at the same time. Taste test..check. He loved it. And I loved watching him check it all out. I look forward to the messes we will get in.

We are doing good here. Bryce takes off on an overnighter out in the woods tomorrow. Just him and his thoughts and of course a fishing pole. Glad he's going out. I know he will have a great time.

I think I am taking Christmas stuff down early this year. I am just itching to de-clutter and hit this to-do list that I made today. It will take a month to complete it, so must get started soon.

I am starting to think about making a few changes around here with myself and with our family. I am copying a phrase I like from another blogger whom you can find here http://stardustshoes.blogspot.com/ and calling it Intentional Self Care. I don't know exactly what all needs changing, but I am thinking about it. I will keep you updated.

Okay. On to this cute little guy and his exploration of our backyard.

notice the dirt around the mouth

this was day 2. notice the left leg that is off the ground.

when he is standing barefoot on the grass, he only lets

his right foot be on the ground. it tickles his feet i think!

eating some wild onion! yumm!

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas to your family from ours! Happy Birthday Jesus!

We are enjoying a quieter Christmas this year though we miss all of our family. It is something special to be here with the 3 of us. I hope everyone is enjoying family, community and Life during this season. love, us

Stockings...check

I have been wanting to make stockings for years now. I never really came up with an idea or came across anything inspiring to help my creative juices. Bryce and I could live without stockings, but the idea that Cap would spend his first Christmas without a proper stocking was just inconceivable. After going back and forth and putting a ridiculous amount of thought into it, I had to just go for it. So with no idea in my head I went to the fabric store to check out some goodies. I came home with some fun colors but still no specific idea in mind. Once I started cutting and creating it just kind of came together. I was putting too much thought behind it and I needed to simplify the process and creation. Once I did that, I came up with something simple and symbolic for our family.

This one is for Cap. His letter 'C' is made out of

blue and green buttons. My stocking is blue and

Bryce's is green, so C is half and half of us

The symbol on the toe represents our family.

God being the big white shape, then Bryce,

me, and Cap is the orange button on top.

The 'M' is for mom. Crazy still that I am a mom!

It has a lot of the same symbolism

only mine and Bryce's have an added orange bottom

near the symbol. It represents Cap. I have made

these where it will be easy to add

buttons later on.

Double bonus on Bryce's. The 'D' stands

for Danger and Dad! Outstanding.

So there you have it folks.

Stockings are complete.

This is just a little blue-eyed bonus!

First Snow

We got our first snow several weeks ago. It wasn't anything impressive, but it was sure exciting. Cap didn't know what to think, but he seemed pretty excited about this unknown substance falling from the sky and landing everywhere including on him!

eating snow off dad's hand

this was one of the nights cap was sick

he NEVER falls asleep on us, that's how we

knew he didn't feel good at all!

9 Months

9 months means almost a year. Hmmm. I know there must be many new things Mr. Cap is up to this month. I am going to try to hit a few. Unfortunately, the main thing I think about this month is him being sick and not sleeping. I will come back to that though.

- we pretty much give him a little of what we are eating these days with some obvious 'sweet' exceptions. as good as I think we eat, we might have to get a little better since he wants what we are having.

- he pretty much stopped eating for over 2 weeks may be even 3 weeks this month. that was not stressful at all. hardly nursed, hardly ate food.

- no new teeth

- loves to point with his right hand and tilts his head like he is going to wink at you

- says bye bye and hi a lot

- pulls up on everything and walk from object to object

-we don't think he will ever crawl on all floors. bryce thinks it's because of our hardwood floors. he has always been way more into standing than sitting, and now walking to crawling.

- still loves to open and close everything, but now interested to what's inside.

- anything with a rhythm he will move his body like he's dancing or even sing to, even the sound of the breast pump going.

- likes to ride on his dad's shoulders

- likes to be in the bath but will only stand not sit

- crawls as fast as he can to the top of the slide then goes down on his belly laughing all the way down! must get a video of this one!

- knows his name, mostly by El Cap, not Cap

- says momma, but only in an extremely whiney kind of way

- still blue eyes and strawberry blonde looking hair

- doing great with EC'ing when he's NOT sick!

- starting crying again before naps, not fun

- he also went through a 4 day in a roll spell of waking up in the middle of the night crying. this was before he was sick. the first night i picked him up immediately because of the way we was crying. the second night, we did it again. 3rd and 4th night we didn't and prayed over the room and him before the 5th night. Never woke up after that until he got sick.

- still smiley, but we have had lots of tears this month

- definitely starting to test us in his own little way and cries when he doesn't get what he wants

- also cries at almost EVERY diaper change, has actually done this for at least 4 months. I can't believe he is still doing it though. we don't let him crawl all over the place during diaper changes even though that is what he is screaming about. It might seem silly to some, but it is in these little things that he is testing us to see who is in control of the situation. If we give in now, and let him roam during the diapering process just so he will stop crying and only put it on when he is ready, then we will give into the much bigger life lessons to come. I just don't get what the big deal is. He also screams the entire time he is going to the bathroom on the pot, but not if he goes in his diaper.

- 19.14 lbs

- can't find my sheet to tell you his height and head

So there are some of the many things he is up to right now. He got sick with fever and diarrhea in the middle of the month. On the fourth day I thought he was getting better than it turned into some terrible drainage snot thing. He was having trouble breathing which made it very hard to sleep. When he would try to nurse he would start gagging and have trouble getting milk out because of his symptoms. It was awful! He cried if you just looked at him wrong. He moaned through the night. We finally, after over 8 months, let him sleep with us half way through the night. He was just so miserable. A couple of night I ended up making a pallet on the floor and sleeping with him there so that we could all get a little more sleep. He still isn't back to sleeping through the night even though he is feeling a lot better. He is eating more than he ever has. I think he making up for the 3 weeks with barely any food. To put it in prospective, at 7 months he weighed 20 1/2 pounds and 2 months later he weighed in at 19.14. I knew he was loosing weight I could tell in several ways. The doctor wasn't worried at all. Doesn't really care if he wasn't eating either. The lactation consultants on the other hand were amazed he has only nursed 4 times a day off of 1 side since he was about 10 weeks old. They told me he needs about 32oz a day while the doctor said 16oz. So who knows. We are hoping he starts sleeping better soon because unless your sick your just not getting tata's or us in the middle of the night. Sounds cruel, but helping someone learn how to sleep on their own and get a goods night rest in the long run is too important!

Well, sorry this is late and I haven't posted in awhile. We have been very exhausted this month. Hoping for a better 10 month post!!!! Enjoy the pics, he wasn't very cooperative on these.

my dad's favorite christmas moose

they sent to us, mostly cap:)

like i said, he was a little grumpy!

I have downloaded bunches of pics so more post coming up soon!