Who does Isaiah look like?

Isaiah is the one in the middle. The people in the other 4 photos will remain a mystery until all the votes are counted. In the event that no one thinks he looks like me, we will have to have a recount.

For voting, put "1" in the comments if you think he looks like the mysterious person in the top left; "2" for top right; "3" for bottom left; "4" for bottom right.

UPDATE:  Trudy wins--she knew that #1 (top left) is Jerel and #4 (bottom right) is me.  FYI #2 is my dad and #3 is my uncle.  A lot of people on my side of the family think he looks like my uncle.  My sister Theresa thought that picture #1 was another picture of Isaiah thrown in as a trick, but no, that's Jerel.  Truthfully aside from his blue eyes he doesn't look a bit like me, he mostly looks like his daddy.

Breaking News!

Look what our microwave did! Jerel put in his leftover beef & broccoli (sans broccoli because we didn't have any) and when he went to get it out this is what the plate looked like. I thought it was very cool and started taking pictures. Jerel thought it wasn't very cool because it left him with nothing to eat for lunch. I think the coolness of it outweighs the starvation effect. Also I think it's pretty impressive that I bought these cheap clear glass plates at walmart probably 10 years ago and this is the first one to break.

Isaiah and Luke

Luke is the son of one of my visiting teachers. He's about a month younger than Isaiah. My other visiting teacher has a little girl, Laney, who is Isaiah's girlfriend and is about 2 months older than him. So it's pretty much like a pre-nursery class when they come over! It will be fun when they get a little older because we all live in the same neighborhood so I'm sure they'll be able to play together a lot. In the mean time they just lay around together having drooling contests and such.

Our little sleepyhead

This is what Isaiah did when I put him in his bumbo chair to eat the other day. I guess he was just a little too tired!

Isaiah eating solids for the first time

This is out of order but now that I've figured out how to post a video I thought I'd add this one. It's Isaiah eating baby food for the first time. Admitedly it's not all that interesting, but we thought we should document the occasion anyway.

Isaiah rolls over

Here's the video of Isaiah rolling over that I tried to post a while back. As you're watching, the excitement doesn't really kick in for about 30 seconds, but just sit tight because the grand finale is definitely worth the wait!

He's definitely his mama's baby!

He sure loves to eat! We started him on rice cereal about a month ago and after an extended warming-up period he's now decided he loves it. He's figuring out how to swallow it so we can make it much thicker now. His favorite trick though is to get a whole mouthful and then sneeze. When it was runnier it would just leave wet spots on my clothes but now I get little white globs all over me like I've been in the middle of a mashed potato blizzard.

Speaking of blizzards we're having a "Cold Snap" here and I keep telling Jerel I want it to snow and knock out the power. I LOVE it when the power goes out and Jerel just doesn't get the excitement of it. I tell him all the benefits--you get to light candles, wear your coat and scarf inside, play board games, complain about how there's no tv, and laugh at yourself everytime you walk into a room and flip the light switch even though the power's out. Yet he still prefers having electricity.

Isn't he a cutie pie?

Here's Isaiah on his five-month birthday. This is one of his rare happy moments...he has been so cranky lately and cries anytime we put him down. Pretty soon we'll have to rename him Cry-saiah. Even so, we still love him and enjoy him. He's growing again. Now when we put him in the exersaucer his feet reach the ground and he jumps up and down. He's already starting to grow out of some of his 6-month size clothes! Anyway, I put him down to type this blog posting, so guess who's screaming...

You can see more of today's at-home photo shoot here

Who's that?

Isaiah and Jocelyn spent some time getting to know each other. They alternated between staring at each other, sucking on each other's hands, and ignoring each other. Occasionally Mollie would come by and crawl over top of them. It was fun to see them checking each other out.

One of my favorite parts of our trip was going to Leatherby's with Karee & fam.  I love love love Leatherby's.  On the way there Jerel was displaying his true level of maturity by telling Isaac that they have booger-flavored ice cream there.  I asked Isaac if he eats his boogers and he said "No, but my dad does!"

Isaac & Ellie were my little helpers with Isaiah while we were there.  They tend to be a little too rough on their baby sister Jocelyn, but they were gentle with Isaiah and seemed to enjoy helping change diapers and give baths.  (Helping mostly meant just watching, although I did have a good time watching little Ellie try to get a pair of pants onto Isaiah's wiggly legs!)

To see all the pictures from our trip click here

C3PL

On Wednesday Isaiah went to C3PL--Cousins Cooking Class Plus Lunch. The kids made turkeys out of apples, raisins, and marshmallows. Then they decorated the edges of pie crusts for pumpkin pie. Then they used grandpa's homemade bread (I mean really homemade--he even makes his own flour) and tore it into pieces for the stuffing. I thought it was a great idea to have the kids involved in making Thanksgiving dinner and they all had a good time. Oh, by the way, Isaiah didn't actually participate in any of those activities, he just laid on a blanket with Jocelyn. But we'll still count it as his first C3PL.

Taylyn's Party

 Taylyn celebrated his fourth birthday today. There must have been around 30 family members there so he got plenty of attention and lots of presents. He usually warms up to Jerel and I about 5 minutes before we are leaving town...I asked him at the party if I could take a picture of him and he said no. I took this one anyway...I guess he takes after his Uncle Jerel when it comes to enjoying photos.

Little Emmaree

 This morning Jerel and I met Emmaree. We went to Jake & Mandy's ward for her baby blessing and she looked so darling in her white dress. She is their first little girl and I'm guessing Mandy will have lots of fun dolling her up all the time!

Over the river and through the woods...

 ...to grandmother (and grandfather)'s house we go! We left Thursday night around 9pm to drive to Utah for Thanksgiving. Jerel did all the driving (he is not a fan of my ultra-conservative driving style) and with the help of two 5-hour-energy drinks he didn't even fall asleep! Isaiah slept pretty well. We stopped once to feed him in the morning and then made it to see Grandma & Grandpa Atkinson. Karee came by with Isaac, Ellie, and Isaiah's twin cousin Jocelyn. This picture is of Isaiah and Ellie. She's been pretty shy so far but hopefully she'll warm up soon because we've sure had fun with her and Isaac on previous visits! Isaac is getting even smarter--he recited the first Article of Faith for us, and he can spell his name too. My favorite quote for the day was when we were asking Ellie where cows live and someone said "Do cows live in the zoo?" And Ellie said "No. Cows don't live in zoozes."

Rolling Over

Isaiah had his four-month checkup last week. He's now 15.5 pounds and 26 inches--still quite a bit ahead of the curve. The doctor asked me if he rolls over yet and I had to say no. Later that day I told Jerel about it and put Isaiah down on his tummy and he rolled right over. Then he did it 4 or 5 more times so I got it on video. Since that day he has not rolled over at all. Jerel works with him--including demonstrating for him--but no more rolling. Wait, I can't get the video to upload. Try this instead: while looking at the still picture, pick up your computer and turn it upside down in a circle. Then you'll pretty much know what it looked like.

(Bad) Mom of the Year Award

 I think I'm winning for sure...this isn't a great picture, but it's one of those big thumbtack-looking things that attaches an anti-theft ink device thingy to clothes in the stores. Okay, not the best description ever, but you know what I mean. So today I put Isaiah in an outfit a friend gave us when he was born & which he is finally big enough for. We ran lots of errands today and did the regular naps and feedings and such. He fell asleep on the way home from the grocery store so I brought him in in the carseat and set it in the kitchen while I put the groceries away. After about 20 minutes he woke up screaming screaming screaming. I tried to feed him but he wouldn't eat. I sat him up and was patting his back when I noticed that thing in the picture was stuck in his shoulder! I took it right out (even though I watch enough hospital shows to know that if someone is impaled with something the last thing you ever want to do is remove the something) and luckily it hadn't really even broken through the skin, it was just stuck into the top layer I guess. So he has a nice red mark, but no broken skin or need for a rabies shot or anything. As a side note, it makes me wonder if the friends who gave us his outfit actually stole it...

Family Dinner

 When it's not Cereal Night we bring Isaiah in the kitchen with us for dinner. Here he is sitting in his Bumbo seat which is on loan from his cousin Clara...Clara thinks she's all that because she can sit up on her own already...Anyway, Isaiah seems to like the little chair and it lets him be in an upright position so we're hoping that will help with his bald spot from laying down so much! We let him play with his little spoon and we tell him all about how good the food is. I am getting nervous though because Jerel is already talking about how once Isaiah starts eating real food we'll have to eat more vegetables so that he will acquire a taste for them...ugh.

Clara also let us borrow her ExerSaucer. I put Isaiah in it and he was encirlced by bright, fun, interesting toys and he proceeded to stare intently at his own hands. After a few more times he seems to be more interested in the toys, mostly the ones he can reach to put in his mouth. Thanks cousin Clara for letting us borrow your toys!

Isaiah's Cute Little Laugh...Again

Since the first video was such a hit I thought we should definitely do a sequel.

Halloween

 Before I got married I had great ideas for Halloween costumes once I had a family. For example, one year I would be Dorothy, my husband would be the tin man, and the kids would be a scarecrow, lion, toto, munchkins, etc. Then another year I would be Frauline Maria, my husband would the The Captain, and our kids would wear little jumpers made out of curtains just like the von Trapp children. But then I married Jerel who prefers to turn off the lights and pretend he's not home on Halloween. Life is full of compromises, right? Instead of trying to force Jerel to dress up I settled for just spending his money getting Isaiah dressed up. I decided to make the costume instead of buying one because first of all it seemed like it would be cheaper and second of all it seemed like it would somehow mean I was a great mother. Well, it definitely wasn't cheaper, and I don't know that forcing your kid to wear something he detests really makes you a great mother, but we did it anyway.

Isaiah was a darling little elephant and even though Jerel thinks he doesn't care, I know he will always remember it. How do I know this? Because an elephant never forgets! I tried to get his pictures done in the costume but he screamed the whole time. So then I tried to have Rick do some when I was up in Bremerton but he screamed the whole time again. Oh well. Jerel & I took him to the ward Trunk-or-Treat and he behaved really well and looked so great that if there had been a costume contest he would've won for sure!

Anyway, I spent so much effort on the silly costume and then he hated it so much (I think it had something to do with the headpiece cutting off his airway or something) that I have already purchased a costume for him for next year. I figure if he isn't going to appreciate it I won't bother putting so much effort into it. I'm not sure why I didn't think of that before. Also, no matter how many siblings Isaiah ends up having, they will all be elephants on their first Halloween.

Here are some more pictures. The little girl in the cow costume is Isaiah's girlfriend Laney. More Pics

Birthday Breakfast

 When we were kids my mom always took us out to eat for our birthday (one year she took me to a restaurant and I ordered fruit loops for dinner. I was 15), so in keeping with that tradition she took me, Rick, & Josh out for breakfast. Cooper & Isaiah came along and we had a great time!

To see all the pictures of my trip to Bremerton, go here

Off to the Emerald City!

 No, not the one in the Wizard of Oz. Rick & his boys joined Isaiah & me for a day trip to Seattle. We went over on the ferry and the boys did their reading homework on the way there, which seemed mean except for the fact that they were allowed to skip school just to go to Seattle with me. When we got there we walked up to Pike's Place Market and looked at all the great little shops. We even bought Isaiah a tie-dyed romper that is just darling. I will save Jerel the effort of logging in to the blog by stating right now that Jerel thinks it is hideous. I'll post a picture later so you can decide for yourself. After Pike's Place we found a really neat restaurant to eat in. It is actually a restaurant/pub so I guess now Isaiah has officially been to a bar. After lunch we headed back to the ferry for the trip home. We had a good time and Asher & Mason fought over who got to carry Isaiah in the baby bjorn and push him in the stroller, so that took care of my fears of having to lug him around all day! They are great cousins for Isaiah and played with him and just generally kept him happy. I'm thinking of having them move in!

The ferry ride was good for me...next summer we are going on a cruise courtesy of my grandma and I am pretty much convinced that Isaiah is going to somehow fall off the ship into the ocean, so this was a good way to ease myself into the baby-on-a-boat situation.

The night before we had a Rick-Josh-Mandy birthday party at Theresa's house and it was lots of fun. We had a potluck dinner and I made rolls to bring. I used Jerel's mom's recipe and I thought it was for 2 dozen rolls so that's how many I cut the dough into. It must actually be for 4 dozen or something because my 2 dozen were the biggest rolls on earth! Jerel suggested we could take just one of them and feed the entire starving population of Africa...Oh well, they still tasted good. I got several hand-turned wooden crochet hooks, some great yarn, and gift cards to JoAnn's to buy more yarn so I was delighted with all of that!

Matchy-matchy Cousins

 Isaiah bought a special present for his cousin Clara. He has a onesie that says "Say hello to Mr. Adorable" and he got her one that says "Say hello to Miss Wonderful." Of course she crossed her arms in the picture so you can't tell how much they are cute little twin-stars, but I promise it was adorable...and wonderful! Isaiah is 3 months old and Clara is 8 months old but Clara is only 1 1/2 pounds bigger than Isaiah! What a little chunker we have!

Clara was in a very sharing mood as well and she is letting Isaiah borrow her Exersaucer and her Bumbo chair. He is enjoying both of those, and Jerel & I are enjoying not spending $100 on them!

I'm a hat-making fool!

 This week I spent a few days up in Bremerton. Before I went Theresa asked me to make a new hat & scarf set for Monroe because the one I made him last year was getting too small. I love to crochet and have made myself lots of scarves, but I almost never wear them because I'm always hot, so I was excited to do it for her. Plus I love to make things for people and have them actually use it. Then I decided that I wanted to make a set for Eve too so she'd have accessories to match her new winter coat. And if I was going to make them for the two of them I couldn't leave out Clara. Then I heard we were having a birthday party for Rick & me & Josh while I was there so I made hats for them too. Monroe & Clara's hats both turned out too small so I'll be making new ones for them, but they still looked cute!

Now I'm working on an extra-special hat for Theresa. She has a gigantic noggin and always has to buy men's hats so they'll fit, so I am making a really girly one for her. I ran out of yarn & had to order more online so she didn't get her hat with everyone else, but it'll be worth the wait!

Video of Isaiah's Cute Little Laugh

Okay, I'm trying to figure out how to put video from my iPod on the blog. This is a bit advanced for me so let me know how it works out!

Birthday, Part Two

 Friday night my friend Stephanie brought over homemade cinnamon rolls. We baked them in the morning and there is just nothing better than cinnamon rolls for breakfast on your birthday!

Saturday night Jerel had church so a bunch of us girls got together. Someone brought a cake and they sang happy birthday and we all had a good time hanging out. Isaiah was really good which made it a low-stress night for me, so that was wonderful! It is always fun hanging out with the girls. You get to find out who has to wax their husband's back and who is mad at her husband for not putting his laundry in the hamper and whose husband refuses to buy feminine hygiene products. Fortunately for me Jerel doesn't fall into the first two categories. Category three, he has told me, is something he would only do in an extreme emergency situation. I asked him for an example of such a situation and he said "I can't think of anything that would qualify." At least he is honest about it!

Best. Birthday. Ever

 On Friday we went to Red Robin for my birthday and Jerel just begged to have a picture taken so I grudgingly complied. Or, more accurately, I snuck in my camera and waited until dessert to have someone take our picture because that way I didn't have to eat a whole meal with Jerel annoyed with me, just dessert. Isaiah came to dinner with us too and was very well behaved.

One of my birthday presents was that Jerel changed all the diapers on Saturday. Now I know Isaiah totally has my back because he had an enormous blow-out and I laughed and laughed while Jerel worked on changing it, "How am I supposed to get this onesie off without getting poo in his hair." Then when he was just about done he peed all over himself. Isaiah, not Jerel. Nice work Isaiah!

Jerel got me a new iPod Nano for my birthday. I have had my old one for a few years now and LOVE it. I took it with me to the hospital when we had Isaiah so I'd have calm music to listen to (as a side note, now whenever I hear the calm music we listened to it reminds me of horrible labor pains) and I remember bringing it home, but I can't find it anywhere. Jerel and I both looked and looked and it's just disappeared. I used to bring it to Primary and my class would listen to music at the end of class while they waited for their parents. They asked about it and I told them it was lost and one little girl said "Oh, well all you have to do is pray and Heavenly Father will help you find it." A great suggestion, but when it didn't work Jerel offered to buy me a new one for my birthday. I am fairly certain that now that I have a new one I will find the old one is a perfectly obvious place.

The new ipod takes video so I'm going to try to get smart and figure out how to post a video on the blog. Isaiah has started laughing and I think it's pretty cute. Almost as cute as the things Jerel is willing to do to make him laugh!

Sleeping like a (weird) baby

 When my little sister came to visit a couple months ago she brought her then 4-month-old with her. Whenever she put her down for a nap she gave the baby something to cover her face with because otherwise she wouldn't fall asleep. Uh, weeeeeird-O! Fast forward two months and meet Isaiah who will no longer fall asleep unless he has something covering his face. He will be screaming his head off and you can lay a blanket over his face and he quiets right down, it's the weirdest thing! Anyway, Jerel is afraid Isaiah will suffocate under a blanket (although I do remove it once he's asleep) so the other night I found my eye mask and we used that instead.

PS--if you read my previous post about silly things you can buy for babies, I just checked online and there are several places where you can buy eye masks made just for infants, which actually seems like a great idea to me. Somewhere out there is a mom with a kid wearing a helmet wondering why anyone would ever want an eye mask for their baby. If you're really bored check out www.babylilac.com and see their assortment of $20 eye masks. (Note that the eye mask Isaiah is wearing is one I got free on an airplane.)

Isaiah's head gear

 Isaiah was born with special radar that detects when I am trying to eat and makes him start crying. Usually I end up holding him while we eat, but this time it was Jerel's turn. He wanted to make sure Isaiah was protected from anything landing on his head so he put a burp cloth on his head. He looked like a little Arab boy wearing a keffiyeh. Except that he's white and most keffiyehs don't have nursery prints on them. Other than that though you would totally have thought he was middle eastern.

Along those same lines I was looking through a baby magazine the other day and saw that they sell helmets for babies. I can see two cases where it would be legitimate to put a helmet on a baby: 1--if you are riding a bicycle or something and have the baby in a carrier. 2--if you baby has some sort of seizures or other medical condition where they are likely to sustain a head injury. That's it. There are really no other reasons. And yet you can buy ThudGuard to protect a perfectly healthy kid who happens to be learning to walk. As the ad explains, "the head is an important part of the human anatomy..." True, but since there are many other important parts of the human anatomy I am going to hold off on purchasing one until they come out with the full-body version.

That's not fun.

I love Snickers. I love chocolate, I love chewy, I love crunchy, I love peanuts. Snickers has them all. I remember in Junior High we had some sort of assembly encouraging abstinence and they gave us each a Snickers bar because (at least this was the slogan back in the day): Snickers satifies the urge. But that is not the point of my posting. My point is that it makes absolutely no sense to take a delicious candy bar, shrink it down to a miniscule size--so small you barely get a taste--and then call it "fun size." I have so much experience with candy bars that I am practically an expert and I'm here to say that I find a King size snickers bar MUCH more fun than the fun size. The fun size is almost offensive. It's like the penny of candy bars--so tiny you can't do anything with it unless you have a whole bagful.

In other news, I was delighted to see a Verizon FIOS commercial today explaining that now whenever we DVR something we can play it back from our DVR players in up to 6 other rooms...because, you know, SO many people have televisions in 7 rooms of the house.

I better go, it's going to take me a while to convice Jerel he should go to the store to buy the truly fun size snickers for me...

A Lazy Saturday

 
Isaiah and Jerel watched the BYU football game together on Saturday. You can tell Isaiah was really into it. We enjoyed a lazy Saturday. Good thing too because Sunday has turned out to be a Cranky Baby Day. And the fact that he required 4 diaper changes during church made it a Cranky Daddy Day as well.

Speaking of church, today the dreaded--but inevitable--question came up during my class. "Sister Atkinson, how did that baby get out of your tummy anyway?" I suggested she ask her mom about that and quickly pulled out their coloring sheets as a distraction. But then the worst possible revelation came: there was another girl in the class who knew (approximately) how babies get out of a woman's tummy and she started explaining it while I was frantically handing out coloring sheets and markers. Why is it that the over-educated children are always the loud ones? It's never the quiet kid in the corner who knows about babies' exit routes from the body, it's always the noisy ones who take it upon themselves to educate the rest of the world. I'm sure this conversation happened in several minivans today, "What did you learn in church today" "Oh, Sister Atkinson taught us that babies come out of your . . . "

In other news, we got a new microwave this week. The old one gave us 8 good years before giving up the ghost Monday afternoon. With six months worth of leftovers in the fridge we had to replace it the same day. I realize I'm grasping at straws here, trying to come up with non-baby things for the blog, so I guess I'll just throw in the towel on this one.

A non-Isaiah related post

I've been trying to come up with something unrelated to the baby so that our blog wouldn't become completely boring. I mean it's interesting to me--sometimes when Isaiah is asleep I turn on the blog just to watch the slideshow of pictures of him--but I realize it may not be quite as exciting for other people. Anyway this is the best I can offer:

On Sunday we ran out of lesson material in our kids' sunday school class (5 and 6 year olds). I suggested they each take a turn and tell us a story about Jesus. They did a pretty good job, although they do mix up the details sometimes. One little girl always tells about Jesus praying in Gethsemane and explains very carefully how his disciples were supposed to stay awake, but since they fell asleep it made Jesus bleed all over the place, even from his armpits. Anyway, another girl was telling us about Jesus dying on the cross and she told the story pretty well including this line "and then the bad guys came and nailed Jesus to the cross and they took away all his clothes. Except for his panties, they let him keep his panties." Those kids crack me up! (Of course I don't think either of these stories are funny in their actual facts, just in the interpretive retellings by the kids).

Two-month checkup

 Today we took Isaiah in for his two-month checkup. He now weighs in at 12 1/2 pounds and he's officially hit the 2-foot mark ("2-foot" meaning 24 inches. He's had 2 feet all along). If I remember correctly his height is 85th percentile and his weight is 65th. His head is below 50th percentile now, which Jerel immediately assumed means he will not be smart because there won't be room for a good brain. Of course Jerel was already worried about that since he's been trying to teach Isaiah how to count to ten for a full month now with no noticeable results...He is also trying to teach him how to tie a tie. Apparently Isaiah's preference is the Single Windsor knot in case anyone was wondering.

The poor baby got his vaccinations today. It was the last thing they did before we left and I decided to sit in the back seat with him for the drive home. We'd forgotten his pacifier and I knew he would scream the whole way home. Truth be told, I sat in the back next to him and held his hand while he slept peacefully. I guess the shots traumatized me more than him.

Isaiah's Baby Blessing

 
Here is a picture of Isaiah and his dad before his blessing on Sunday. It was nice to have a day set aside to express our gratitude for having Isaiah in our family and also for Isaiah to receive a special blessing. Jerel performed the blessing with Isaiah surrounded by both grandfathers, five uncles, and our bishop. Jerel gave a sweet blessing and baby Isaiah didn't even cry. I was also glad that Jerel didn't do one of those ridiculous 10-minute long show off the baby displays...Traditionally after the father blesses the baby, he sort of holds it up for the congregation to see. I'm fine with that, but sometimes the dads think their kids are super cute and hold it up there for-evvvvv-er until they think they've heard enough oohs and ahhs. I'm not really sure why it bugs me. But Jerel just did a quick "here is he" and then came back to sit down. Perfect. Also, I've been planning for several months what Jerel should wear on the baby blessing day. (We had a precious white outfit for Isaiah but everyone else just wears whatever). I had the ideal outfit selected but then I decided that would be rude or silly or something for me to tell my husband what to wear. Plus it might lead to the whole argument where Jerel says boys don't wear "outfits" even if it is a matching set that came together. Anyway, I must have been thinking really loud about what I secretly wanted him to wear because that's what he put on--even the tie I had selected!

Cousins

 17 of our 20 nieces and nephews were here this weekend. Here's the rundown on ages & quantities: 1 each of age 12, 10, 9, 8, and 7. 2 of age 5. 1 age 4. 3 age 3. 2 age 2. 1 age 15 months. 2 age 6 months. 1 age 2 months. We have three more who couldn't come and next summer when my sister gets married we'll add one more--her fiance's son--bringing us to 21. And now, I think for the first time since we got married, there are no more currently on the way (that we know of). It was kind of noisy at our house this weekend!