Fish Lake, Utah

We have a group of friends that come over on Sundays to play nerdy DnD-type games with us, and one of those friends has a family that has a cabin.  And this weekend all those things converged, and we like that.

So we drove down to central Utah to have an Epic Weekend of Nerdiness in a beautiful ol' rustic cabin in the woods.

 Rollin' my dice and feedin' my baby.  Like I do.

 The view from the front porch.

 Jessica helping me get James strapped in for our woodland walk.

(Jesse, Spencer, and Nate in the background, with Tony behind the camera, makes for the whole group.)

 At Penny Rock, with Spencer's excellent hiking attire.

 Pardon my crazy face, but James was cute and snuggly in his carrier that he's way too big for now.

 We love Spencer.  I wish I could remember what he was expounding on.  Probably the qualities of an excellent skipping stone.

 My handsome boys.

 

 Jesse teaching James about Lamb's Ear.  (It's delicious.)

 "That's right, rock.  You better skip, and skip some more."  Or something.

James learned he likes beards.

 Seriously, we love Spencer.

 I don't feel this picture needs an explanation.

 

 Jessica cooked for us the whole weekend, because she's awesome.  Cheesecake pancakes, people.

 View from the loft.

 Nerds.

 Maya, oozing uncomfortableness at having to stand this close to the camera.

Of course, more pictures of the little guy.  James got his first tooth this weekend - or at least that's when I first noticed it, but I've been feeling pretty regularly so it probably poked through while we were there.  I'm irrationally proud of him and that tooth.

And I know the camera settings for all of these pictures are out of whack.  I wasn't too worried about getting things just right, but it is frustrating to know in retrospect what I should have done differently.  But I guess that's what learning is about.

 

 

 My family.  Heart.

Halloween, for real this time

I forgot to post these before the weekend, so here they are now.  Pictures from trick-or-treating on the actual holiday.

Tony and I both laughed when we saw this picture.  It's hard to look happy sometimes, I guess.

Maya was uncontrollably excited to finally be going for a walk (what gives, we are terrible dog-walkers), but she's afraid of the camera so it's almost impossible to get a picture of her face.

The boy was more tired than he'd ever been in his life, I think.  And trick-or-treating was kinda fun, but it ended up being a difficult night.  We passed a yappy dog yard and it really scared James, and the whole rest of the night (and for several days after) he would get startled and cry at even the slightest of sounds.  Needless to say, he's been sleeping in our room a lot lately.

And yes, Tony and I were Hallo-grinches and did not dress up.  That was way too much work.  Although I am disappointed that I never took a picture in my pirate costume with James sitting on my shoulder.

First Halloween

Like I mentioned in my last post, James has started noticing his hands.  After taking his 6 month pictures I had him lying on the bed still and he started doing it, and I managed to get a few shots.  Yay!  This completely steals my heart.

He caught me.

(My bedroom is definitely in WIP mode.  It drives me nuts, but home improvement is hard.)
Here are some pictures of James' halloween costume.  He is a parrot.  I made it myself, using this tutorial as a starting point.  It's not perfect and was done in a rush because I'm a huge procrastinator, but I feel pretty good about how it turned out.

Taken by my mom's iphone because we were at her house.

And here we are together at the stake halloween party.  I was a pirate because OF COURSE I WAS A PIRATE.  I just can't knock the habit.

He must have really been channeling his inner parrot because he made squawking noises all night.  Of course he had ripped off and tried to eat a few of the feathers before we even made it to the party.  I guess he needed to molt. 

And I forgot what else I was going to say.  It's been one of those days.

6 months old

 My baby is 6 months old.  These pictures make me want to cry, and brush the hair out of his eyes.

I got him to smile in this picture by making the "bleh" throw-up sound, which he loves for some reason.

I love these next few.  He's got his business face and his party legs.

I can't tell you how many times I've seen Tony make this exact same face (next picture).

"Mom, I need the camera."

"Fine.  I'll just lay here with my feet and look like daddy."

Pictures of him these days capture his quiet, inquisitive side that's coming out more and more, but what they don't capture is the constant wiggles and the gleeful squealing and the regular squealing and the silliness.  Trust me though, it's all there.

And now, to you my boy.

The word of the day is BIG.  You are just big.  You are tall and round and heavy and the bright spot of the universe.  You weigh 21 dang pounds and wear 12-dang-month-sized clothing with ease.  I honestly think I've pulled something in my shoulder from carrying you around.

You are sweet and sure of yourself.  We haven't had any episodes of stranger danger yet, although a few times you've been disconcerted by a crowd.  Chances are you are a comfortable-in-small-groups person like me and dad.  Usually though, you just smile at everyone, new and familiar.

*You're officially sleeping in your crib at night now, sometimes all night long and sometimes back in our bed by morning.  I don't feel the need to rigidly sleep train you yet, if ever.  I have the feeling we'll figure things out our way.

I don't mind getting up at night when you cry.  Usually when I enter your room I can see you smiling at me from the dark.  You're figuring out the sleep thing; you've never needed to be swaddled, and you're needing less and less me to position you just the right way.  

When we lay down for naptimes you wear yourself out by kicking and looking around.  You play with my hands and touch my face and look out the windows or at the ceiling fan, and then when you're ready to sleep you roll to face me still gripping my fingers.

In fact, you love holding my hands.  When we're nursing you're not settled until your free hand finds my fingers.

You also love your own hands.  Lately you sometimes stop whatever you're doing and just inspect them, turning them over and slowly wiggling your fingers.  It is exactly precious.

The other word of the day is rolling.  You are very good at it.  You roll to your stomach and push up with your hands.  Sometimes you stick your butt up in the air and smoosh your face into the floor.  I think before long you'll be crawling, which is completely ridiculous and you should stop it right now.

Last week you were sick for the first time, and it was hard.  I hated it.  You were restless and your nose ran and you coughed and you had a fever and you cried.  But while that was hard, it was also another reminder to be grateful to be dealing with only a cold.  So many other families have to deal with much, much worse.

We've started you on some solid foods now, and you've seemed to like just about everything we've tried so far.  Rice cereal and oatmeal, bananas, apples, pears.  Prunes, because you NEVER EVER POOP. (Edit: I retract this statement, definitely.)  Grandma even gave you cheerios.  This new 'big kid food' phase scares me because it means you're growing up, and I'm sad.  But at the same time, I'm excited and happy for you.  Motherhood is very confusing.

* I wrote this post on the 18th and didn't get the pictures taken until yesterday, and in that 10 day difference almost everything I said about never sleep training you have been voided.  Suddenly you were waking up crying multiple times a night and just would not stay asleep.  So we tried bringing you back in bed with us most of the night where you still never really settled down and so I would get no sleep.  And after just a few nights of that I sent Tony a text that said: "We're going to sleep train James."
And James is a perfect child.  Because I had decided to do a cry-it-out-with-checks version of sleep training and was prepared for some difficult nights of non-stop screaming, and instead it's like 2 days later and you're putting yourself to sleep in your crib (for nights AND naps) like a seasoned pro.  You're in bed by 6:30 and wake up at 3 to eat, and then sleep again until 6 when we have to wake up for work.  PERFECT.  I love you.  Please don't change again.

All-or-nothing bullhonkey

I've been feeling lately like our culture has this ridiculous all-or-nothing trend, and I don't like it.  Do you know what I'm talking about?  If you can't do, or have, or be something all the way, then don't even try.  Like, if you already know that you can't or won't commit to eating a 100% healthy diet, then resign yourself to eating nothing but junk food.  Isn't that ridiculous?  If you know you're not going to be a marathon runner, then don't bother even going for a jog now and again.  These are all coming out health and fitness, but I'm sure there are other examples you can think of. 

I refute this all-or-nothing notion.  I think it's silly.  You don't have to eat nothing but kale and flax and other healthy-sounding foods (spEE-nok!) all day every day.  But if you remember to eat it sometimes then you're that much healthier than you were before.  Keep your midnight bowls of ice cream, just have an avocado too.  Then maybe eventually you'll do it more and more.

I'm sure this is not a revolutionary idea, but it's been stuck in my brain the last few weeks.

I am not what experts would probably consider a "really healthy person".  I mean, I'm not obese or sickly, but I'm not fit in any sense.  The most exercise i usually give myself is going up and down stairs to do laundry a few times a day.  (Plus the wiggly 20-pound free weight I carry to and from the car.)  But lately I've been trying to be healthier; to think healthier, if you will.  Just small things.  I'm focusing on eating more fruits and vegetables - not necessarily trying to eliminate the crappy things I eat, but by focusing on the healthier foods I end up eliminating some of the less-healthy stuff anyway.  And a new friend is inviting me to go to Jazzercise at the community center once a week with her.  Yes, Jazzercise.  Yes, I've thought about wearing neon legwarmers.  It's fun, and it gets me moving, and I like it. 

And that's my rant.  The end.