Summertime in January

I still have more pics from California to post. I think enough for one more post after this one. Just trying to finally get caught up! Plus, family has been asking for them. Anyway, we always stay near the convention center in Anaheim, usually at the Embassy Suites. The rest of the company stays at the Marriot, which is nicer, but we like having the 2 rooms and free breakfast. I'm sure the company doesn't mind us choosing a cheaper hotel, either!

The weather was nice enough to have several pool days while we were there. Josie was obsessed. She loved the pool, especially the jacuzzi. It felt so good to soak up the sun and relax by the pool. It felt even better knowing that back at home, it was in the single digits and was covered by snow from the blizzard.

My mom came to hang out too a couple times. We were even lucky enough to see daddy for a little bit in between working his butt off.

Sunscreen makes for a very sticky (and stylish) hair gel in infants.

He was so fascinated by the water. He had lots of fun splashing and swishing his hands around in it with Grandma.

He makes the cutest faces!

Disneyland

How could we ever visit California without spending some time at the happiest place on earth?!?! Thanks to a good friend from my parents ward who enjoys the NAMM pass Kevin gets him, we are able to go each year. I was especially excited this year because I figured Josie might actually understand some of it, have lots of fun, and actually recognize a few of the characters. (Even though she has only seen maybe 5 Disney movies.)

We made sure to put her down nice and early the night before since she probably would not have a nap all day. She was totally clueless when we excitedly told her where we were going. Our hotel might as well have been Disneyland since she was already having so much fun there.

Pretty much the only crappy thing about the day was that I left my camera battery in the charger at the hotel. I was SO BUMMED. I was seriously irked that I did that, especially since I had to lug around a good size dslr with no battery. So all of these pictures are from my moms camera. It's not quite the same, but they turned out ok. Thanks mom!

Josie would have gone home a happy girl if all she had seen was the Disneyland band. We all know how much Josie loves a good marching band, so I wasn't surprised when she didn't want to stop watching. She kept yelling "A band, a BAND!!," named off all the instruments and started conducting behind the band leader. I took her over to meet him and she thought that was very cool.

Right away we saw some of the characters. Mickey was busy (as always!) so we saw Pluto first. She didn't know who he was so she kept calling him "really big doggy." She liked Really Big Doggy and talked about him for days.

Anytime Josie sees a castle she says "Look! Temple!!" Haha....I guess we taught her well. I explained that this one was a castle. Now she recognizes it on all the Disney movies and stuff. Look how cute daddy and daughter are!

Donny just chilled in the stroller to begin with.

I'm not shy about nursing wherever, so sometimes I just have to make do. Here I am feeding Donny on the Dumbo ride using Kevin's hat for a bit of modesty, haha. I just thought it was a funny picture.

Again, just riding Dumbo over and over and over again would have been enough for Josie. The concept of dozens of rides and things to do was a little overwhelming for her, I think. Each time we would take her to something new that was fun, she would keep wanting to go back to Dumbo. So, we rode it several times.

The carousel was another favorite.

There are only a few Disney characters Josie knows. She doesn't know any of the princesses (we didn't even see any while we were there, anyway), but she LOVES "Toy Story." She was SOO excited to see Buzz. We went on the Buzz ride a couple times, too. She is not smiling much in the pictures, but she was seriously so excited to meet and hug Buzz. She wanted to stay with him all day.

After meeting Buzz, she asked where Woody was and wanted to see Jesse, too. That would've been cool, but we didn't see them. We did go on the other Toy Story ride at California Adventure late in the evening and we all loved that.

We took Josie and sleeping Donny on the Winnie the Pooh ride, too. She liked it ok, but really just wanted to meet the characters. All the characters she met were the best part of her day.

She obviously loves Winnie the Pooh and kept talking about how Pooh pretended to eat some honey.

Awwww........Pooh kisses : )

And Tigger, too!!

Meanwhile, Donny had fallen asleep during a meal......

He met Tigger too, he just doesn't remember.

We also took Josie on the Jungle Tour, the Tiki Room (she still sings that song), the Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean (she still likes to say "Arrrr..." like a pirate, too), the Pinocchio ride, Autopia, and a few others I'm probably forgetting.

We had so much fun!! (It looks kinda like Kevin is holding hands with that random girl, haha...)

Josie and Donny were absolute ANGELS all day!! Even with no nap in an overwhelming place, there were no tantrums or even whines. At the end of the evening when it was late and we were getting ready to leave, Josie was still running around laughing and smiling, happy as ever. Josie is usually really well behaved, but I was still really impressed. As we walked toward the park exit, she ran ahead screaming with laughter and having a grand time. She waved goodbye to the park and told it to "have a nice day."

As soon as we got in the car, Josie said she was hungry. We all got some drive-thru burgers and she heartily ate. Not surprisingly, she fell asleep on the way home. I don't think she has ever been that tired. She is a very light sleeper and wakes at a whisper even if she's exhausted. I was able to carry her in, change her diaper, change her clothes and put her in bed without even a stir. Sooo tired! Ah what a perfect day!!

California Post #1: Santa Ana Zoo

I have a ton of pictures I need to post from our California trip last month. I have still been so busy, so it's taken me forever to post them. I decided I would just divide them into a few posts. These are not in chronological order at all. I am just posting the easiest stuff first.

As always, we went to California for the NAMM show and to visit family. Kevin's convention went well and we had tons of fun with Grandma and Grandpa.

So, we were in California from January 6th through the 20th. It was good we left when we did, cause the biggest blizzard in a decade came through the day after we left. We would have been stuck in Indiana! It was so nice to be in the sun and not under 2-3 feet of snow.

One of the days, we decided to go to the zoo! I haven't been to the Santa Ana zoo since I was a kid, so we thought that might be fun. Turns out, it's kind of a crappy zoo but we had fun anyway. It was mostly monkeys and a few other small animals. Josie had a ton of fun so it was worth it.

Donny was asleep for most of it, but was happy in Grandpa's arms the rest of the time. This was right before he got pink eye. You can see his left eye is a little red. Poor guy. One of my kids always gets pink eye on vacation. I travel with eye meds now.

Hands down, the best part of the zoo was the elephant ride. My mom thinks this may be the same elephant I rode as a kid. We took Josie on it twice. She was not scared at all and was smiling the whole time. She got off and said "Ride Dumbo's mommy again!!!!" Haha.....cute.

The first time was with daddy.

The second time, we took the opportunity to take the best 4 generation shot EVER!!! I mean really, how many 4 generation pictures are taken on an elephant. I was proud of my grandma for doing it. The only thing that would have made it even cooler is if my 99 year old great-grandma (Josie's great-great-grandma) was there to make it 5 generations. She totally would have done it, or at least tried. She's a wild one at 99!

Seeing the monkey's with Grandma.

Snoozing.......

I just love my dad's proud face in this picture. He loves his granddaughter!

Somewhere there is a picture of me on this same turtle!!

Next up: pictures from Disneyland, the swimming pool, and family

6 months already

Quick facts:

*Weight: around 15 pounds according to my scale at home (Josie was nearly 17!!)

*Height: ?? Not sure, but he is pretty long. I think he just grows lengthwise.

I'll get specifics in a couple weeks when he has his 6 month and Josie has her 2 year (yeah, she's been 2 for almost 4 months)

* He is snuggly. Very, very snuggly

* has 2 teeth on bottom that have poked through

* sits up unassisted, but not for long periods and doesn't like doing it

* started scooting backwards on all fours

* loves blowing messy raspberries

* looks nothing like me. When Kev's not around people often ask me if he looks like his father.

* Daddy and Josie are his favorite

* bathtime or showertime with mommy and daddy is his favorite activity

* Not sure how much he wakes at night. 2? 3 times maybe, sometimes more? (see more below)

* takes 1-2 naps. Usually 2, a shorter one in the morning and a long one at the same time as Josie in the afternoon. Sometimes though, he just takes one, long 4 hour nap during Josie's 2 hour nap. It's awesome. Weird for a 6 month old, but awesome.

Baby Donovan is already a half a year old! It's so cool to see him grow and develop, especially his personality and personal quirks. As a whole, I would describe Donny as a sweet, snuggly baby. Maybe meek is the perfect word to describe him. So far he seems more sensitive than Josie and also more snuggly. He has been somewhat of a mysterious baby to me, though. What I mean is, from the beginning, there are things I just didn't expect.

One of those has been his fussy/stuffy nose/sleep problem. Almost since birth, he has seemed to have a stuffy nose and fitful sleep. It seemed like it was part of the reason he was waking so much at night. For a while he was waking every hour or so (sometimes more) and just sleeping fitfully. He would wake up crying and it would be sometimes hard to calm him, almost like when an older child has a nightmare. I could tell he was just not happy at night. It wasn't related to sleeping arrangements, hunger, or attachment issues. We tried him sleeping the swing to help his nose drain, but it didn't help much. He slept slightly better when he slept next to me all night, but not much different between that and any other place. It was a bit tiring, but I was doing ok. I was mostly just sad for him. Fortunately, Josie and he have been napping together so I could take a nap then if I needed.

So, as soon as we arrived in California, something miraculous happened. Donny's nose cleared up and he started sleeping! He slept so much better while we were there. I noticed especially that he would just wake up to eat and not just crying in frustration. Such a relief! So, I am assuming his problem is the cold, dry weather. It gets pretty dry with the heater on all the time and even Josie sleeps with a cup of water. As soon as we got home, we got a good humidifier and it seems to help so far. The last couple nights he has slept 4-5+ hours before waking to nurse. That is a huge improvement from every hour or so.

As far as his personality goes, Donny is pretty mellow and happy. When we were in California (and apparently he was feeling better about the weather) he hardly cried at all, ever. He was just chill and happy. Everyone kept commenting on how sweet, cuddly, and mellow he was. When you see some babies, they are very busy with their arms and legs kicking and flailing all the time. They jump on your lap and are all over the place. Donny is the opposite so far. He mostly is a quiet, still observer. You almost forget he is there sometimes. He can get riled up and likes to kick, flail and jump when he's in the mood, but doesn't do it all the time. He can just sit on your lap or chill in your arms quietly and watch whatever is going on. It's quite nice actually and very sweet. The first photo below is pretty much what he looks like most of the time. Sitting quietly and smiling.

As far as tricks go, he still prefers to be on his belly so as soon as he is put down, he turns over and attempts to scoot towards a toy. He loves to grab faces and try to eat them. Josie can instantly make him smile and he definitely prefers Kevin if he's not hungry. Funny how Josie prefers mommy right now and Donny prefers daddy.

Donny tried his first solid food this last week. Up till then, he was exclusively breastfed. We fed him some avocado first. He loved it and ate quite a bit but it all came back up. The first food to actually stay down was banana. He loved the banana and ate about a third of one. He also loves oatmeal and applesauce. I have some winter squash in the freezer that we will try next. We are skipping out on the whole baby food thing and just giving him table food he can handle. He already has 2 teeth, so hopefully he can chew more things soon. He will still be getting most of his nutrition from breastmilk anyway, so we are just going let him try foods as he is interested. I am glad to have just a little more freedom from leaving him for more than 1-2 hours. So far, when I've had to leave longer than a couple hours, I'd need to leave pumped milk. At around 4 months, he decided bottles were evil. No matter how hungry he was, he refused to take my milk from a bottle. I always thought, well, if he gets hungry enough, he'll eat. Nope. I didn't want to torture him or give him formula so we just stayed close by. Oh, well!

He doesn't take pacifiers either, but loves sucking his thumb. It looks adorable, especially when he does it in his sleep.

Overall, he's just a sweet, happy, snuggly, giggly guy!

Bummed that this one is blurry......

He ADORES Josie. Any attention she will give him, he loves.

Josie's favorite thing lately has been her alphabet flashcards. He likes watching her play.

Especially when she shares with him!!!

Mmmmm.........yummy flashcards......

Josie see's Donny sucking on my fingers all the time. She's thinks it's funny to try too.

Awww........