Half Brown, Half White…

Jay is in love with all kinds of bah, bah! (balls) But he is most partial to basketballs:

A few nights ago, I went in to put Rose in bed, and this is how I found Jay. That would be his Brown side coming out. My family all play basketball except me. Jeff never played basketball either. So how did we pass a basketball gene on to our son?

Jay is determined to do a dunk…or even just make a shot! He rarely actually throws the ball at the hoop, though. He seems to think that if he stretches himself UP enough, he’ll be able to drop the ball into the basket. Maybe some day…

And now on to the White part:

OK, this isn’t necessarily a White family trait. But that is white sour cream on the spoon Jay is licking! I don’t know why Jay loves sour cream so much, but last night he wasn’t eating his dinner, so I put a little sour cream on it, and vamoosh! he chowed it down. So I let him lick the spoon.

Nothing like a nice… nose-ful of sour cream?

As Jay would say, “mmmm, tatey!” (in other words: mmm, tasty!)

Who’s Who, Part Two

Can you tell?

 

 

 

OK, the order is: Rose, Jay, Rose, Jay. I must confess, now that I put these pictures next to each other, Rose and Jay don’t really look as similar as I thought they did when I started! Oh well, they’re still both MINE!! (and Jeff’s, of course)

Rose steals the show

First: I LOVE MY BABY GIRL!!!

SECOND: I am thankful for the priesthood and for my FAMILY!

Today was Rose’s baby blessing at church. It was such a happy, tender family moment. Rose was awake and happy as can be all during the blessing. Jeff’s parents and Stephanie and Jasen are in our ward, so of course they were there. My parents and Kyle and Mel got up before 5am and drove 3 hours to make it here in time for church. Rose got up at before 5am too, and didn’t really go to sleep for more than a few minutes until about 10am! So her mommy and half her relatives were all rather sleepy. Now that I’ve taken a refreshing 2 hour nap, I’m ready to reminisce about our day. Hopefully my previous exhaustion doesn’t cloud my memory!

 

Our awkward group picture. At least we’re all in it! (disclaimer: my skirt is askew and slightly rumpled from helping children stay reverent in Primary…)

My sweet little family. Love them.

My amazing kitchen-goddess of a mother cooked us a delicious dinner, and we chowed down on her gourmet, triple-meat meat loaf with special sauce, baked potatoes, peas, peanut butter pie, and banana cream pie. Leslie also contributed: a fluffy angel food cake with strawberries and whipped cream. Like I said, it was a feast. Rose slept through it—amazingly I didn’t have to feed her during my meal time for once!

We had two tables for all 10 of us eating the feast. This is the “kid” table—or should I say the kid-less table (the people who don’t have their own kids). I must say, it was convenient that I took most of these pictures, because let’s face it—a sleep deprived Mama isn’t the most photogenic person out there.

My Dad (Grampa Charley) with half of his grandchildren (the other 2 are far away in Missouri, sadly). Jay’s face got tangled with an thorny rose bush yesterday while we were doing some yard work—that’s why he’s all scratched up. Still, I’d say good looks run in the family!

Rose with her auntie Mel. Since my family was only here for this one day, we played pass-the-baby, a-plenty. Somehow my Mom snuck under the photo-radar and I didn’t get a picture of her with Rose.

Uncle Kyle! Rose was crying so Kyle started talking to her, and she stopped crying to listen to her “unk!” Go Kyle, go.

Ok, for all you Rose-watchers, now it’s on to a plethora of baby pictures. I’m kind of in love with Rose’s big, billowing white dress. It’s a lot to handle while you’re  holding Rose, but it was so much fun to have such a pretty, flooofy, girly dress for her to wear. Her loving, talented Grama Leslie MADE this gorgeous dress—all of it! Beautiful.

I conveniently had these cute little rose bud shoe-socks. I put them over Rose’s giant tights (what kind of size is 0-9 months?) and the socks helped the tights stay on.

The whole dress. She’s my little dolly.

I am so thankful for my darling daughter Rose. When I look back at the nightmarish, puke-y pregnancy and the many discomforts I went through, they are all insignificant in comparison to the enormous reward of this sweet, precious little spirit. I feel so blessed that I get to be her mom! It is very humbling to be in charge of such a tender little person. Being a Mom is the best job ever! 

Family. Happy. Love.

What lies beneath…

For the past few weeks, I have been trying to decide if it’s worth the $170 to get a double jogging stroller. My stroller is my vehicle around this town—everywhere is within walking distance, and I rarely use the car. Experiment #1: I walked to Safeway with Rose in the front-baby carrier and Jay in the stroller. [bulky and awkward]. Jeff has been home most mornings since I started walking, so I’ve been just leaving Rose at home with him for my 20-30 minute strolls with Jay. But this morning, Jeff was gone early. So I got creative…Experiment #2:

How many kids are in this picture?

answer: 2!

I was trying to hold out till I could find a craigslist deal on a double jogging stroller, but I’ve been watching for a month, and everyone seems to think that their old musty strollers are worth just about as much as (or more than) a brand new one! But still I hesitated. Enter: faithful, super-husband. He got on Amazon last night and ordered me a double stroller.WAHOO! Sadly, it did not arrive in time for today’s walk… hence the creative solution.

I was paranoid the whole time we were out that a car would fling a rock into the bottom of the stroller and crack Rose’s skull or something. Thankfully that did not happen, but my anxiousness did spur me on to POWER-walk my little loop.  Rose never even woke up when I transferred her in and out of her little sub-stroller nest!

Good news: we’re all still alive! This is my favorite picture from our little weekly photo shoot (prop up camera, use timer, take 10,000 pictures, keep one) but alas it’s blurry…

Much clearer

It’s amazing how often we Moms tread the fine line between genius and insanity!

How are you feeling today?

Sleepy

Bright-eyed

Talkative [when I use the camera flash, it looks like she has more hair!]

Cheeky. [isn’t it crazy how big a difference the camera angle and position make—her cheeks look so juicy in this one!]

Distressed

Very distressed

Pacified. [we got Rose her first pacifier (aka binky) this week, and she’s about 50/50 for love/hate it right now]

Energetic

Amazed

Happy!?

Rose and I spend lots of time in my recliner. Tonight I was just holding her, basking in her cuteness, and I decided to go overboard with the camera. Can you believe she made all of these faces within 10 minutes?

Now for some motion:

I finally took a little video showcasing Jay’s drinking abilities, sans-sippy cup. There’s something about babies that makes me want to take a million pictures, and something about toddlers that makes me want to take a million videos! I think the older kids get, the harder it is to capture their cuteness in a mere pictures, so I resort to recording.

 

But babies are fun to watch in videos too! Rose seems pretty strong for a 3 week old baby girl, wouldn’t you say?

Can you tell I’m in Mommy-heaven? Yes, some days I feel distressed, and most days I feel sleepy, but most of all I feel happy and so blessed to be The Mom of these two sweet ones.  I love my little cuties!

It’s good to feel needed.

Skills

Jay and Rose are pretty much the smartest, cutest, sweetest kids ever on this whole planet. There’s my biased-mother statement. NOW, here’s some proof so you can agree with me:

Jay randomly has gotten good at using a spoon lately. He also is getting pretty good at drinking out of a normal cup (no lid!). We think he learned how to drink from a big boy cup from nursery at church (or, as he calls it, zzoojry). They give the kids little Dixie cups with a drop of water during snack time. I still haven’t gotten a video of Jay drinking…

…but here’s Rose in action! She can sneeze like a million times in a row. I think it’s quite cute.

My two little sweetfaces. Jay is so tall! Rose always loses her feet in the legs of her footie PJs.

Jay loves Rose more and more every day. When I put her in the bathroom while I shower, (to protect her from Jay’s love), Jay hovers anxiously outside the bathroom door saying “baby! baby! baby!” and he’s so relieved to find that she’s still there when I open the door. Sometimes he even gives her a little kiss on the head. I wish I could be quick enough to get a picture of that!

Last night, Jay realized that I’ve been using a cool fleece Twister blanket as a curtain in his window. I guess he was chilly! (those other 3 blankets weren’t doing the trick) Little problem solver.

This may not count as a skill, but Rose has the sweetest little fuzzy ears ever! It’s hard to see in this picture, but there are long soft little baby hairs on her ear’s edge. Her ears are little apricots.

This picture is a few weeks old (see my prego-belly?) but Jay is also learning how to swing like a big boy. Every now and then he still forgets to hold on, and he falls off. But he’s learning! The other day we stopped at the park after a walk, and he ran over and gave the swing a big push. He didn’t move out of the way in time, though, and it swung back and knocked him to the ground! It was an America’s Funniest Home Videos moment. (too bad I didn’t have my camera!)

 

[I’ll keep this picture small since I donate a portion of my good looks, my abs, and my youthful glow to each child I bear]—here’s what I look like these days: about 2 1/2 weeks un-pregnant. Jeff told me the other day: “you’re looking quite deflated today!” I’ll take that as a compliment. Well, my skills right now include providing Rose with milk-a-plenty, and, as Jeff put it, deflating little by little. Necessity is also requiring me to get better about sacrificing my afternoon free time and taking a nap while Jay does. I am also a pretty accomplished one-handed typer now—this whole post was done one-handed while a hungry Rose was eating. [by the way, I love using her name as a noun]

As for Jeff, I already dedicated a whole post to his fantastic fatherly skills.

And now for one last video of Jay. (it’s 3 weeks old—note my large belly).

After all of this, I’m sure you agree that we White Things have some serious SKILLS!

Cinnamon-a-licious

Yes, I made these big beauties. I have been wanting cinnamon rolls for MONTHS now, and I finally got up my courage to make them this week. Can you believe that I make bread 2-3 times a week, but I’ve never ever made cinnamon rolls before? So, I called my Mom for inspiration. Good news: they were easier to make than I thought they would be!

Proof of yumminess. Sadly, these cinnamon rolls weren’t perfect. They weren’t gooey enough for me. So, I coated them in a heavenly glaze, and it helped with the dryness. We shared the love with a few family members, because sadly, 2 1/2 people can’t eat 20 cinnamon rolls before they get stale. Even if they were slightly dry, who can resist a warm bread-y sweet treat?

…not Rose! (indirectly, of course)…

…definitely not Jay!

Jay wasn’t satisfied with the few bites we gave him of our cinnamon rolls. So, he took matters into his own hands: when I left the room,  he climbed up on his box and gouged himself out a treat. I’m just glad that the pan had cooled off by then! I couldn’t bring myself to scold him for his resourcefulness!  (even if he didn’t eat his dinner that night…)

Warmmmmmm cinnammmmmmmmon rolls and hot chocolate = perfect cold day treat. mmmmmmm

The CLAW

Who can resist it? Not Rose!

We have named this baby-hold “the Claw.” Jeff is the master of it because he is always so warm that when he holds Rose in the Claw, it’s only a matter of minutes till she succumbs to the coziness and drops off to sleep.

Every time I see Jeff walking around with Rose in the Claw, I can’t help laughing at Rose’s tranquil facial expression and her little “paws” dangling out.

Clawing it up at the computer. (yes we still have that sweet partially purple desk!) Jeff is such a good Daddy. Jay always hangs out with him when he’s home. They’re buddies, but Jay is pretty good about sharing Dada with Rose every now and then.

love Da da