Merry Christmas 2009

* the front and back of our '09 Christmas card.

FOUR months

It's hard to believe that my baby is a third of the way to one year old. She's no longer an infant anymore and basically runs the show. At four months Jilli is weighing in at 13 lbs. 9.5 oz. (5oth percentile), she is 26 inches long (90th percentile), and her head is in the 50th percentile as well. Even though she's not much of a napper and she only takes about three 15 minute naps all day long, she does sleep great at night, so I'll count my blessings. We gave Jilli-V rice cereal for the first time today and she gobbled up two servings -- the girl was wide-mouthed and could barely control herself the entire time. Jillian seems to attract admirers everywhere we go, but honestly, who couldn't love that face. We are so grateful for this sweet girl and so thankful for her sweet presence in our family.

fabulous & F O U R

Jaxton James turned 4 on Monday. We celebrated by taking 9 buddies to Chick-fil-a for some lunch, army guy cupcakes, ice cream, gifts and playing. As we were leaving the restaurant Jax said, "That party was AWESOME!" -- I'm pretty sure he enjoyed himself.

I took him to the doctor today and as we walked in the office he announced loudly, "Now I am NOT here for a flu shot!" and that was probably my 5th reminder for the day and he continued to give that same reminder to any nurse or doctor that he came in contact with. The poor guy had apparantly had it with shots between the seasonal flu shot and two doses of the H1N1 -- he was not going to let any of us forget. Jaxton weighs 42 lbs. (90th percentile) and is 41 inches tall (75th percentile). He is definitely our big, sweet, sensitive guy.

While Jaxton loves everyone in the family, I have luckily found a very special place in Jaxton's heart. He is so sweet to me and always says such nice things. The other day I was telling him that I had just bought some new pants for me. He replied saying, "Mom, can I see them so that I can say they're beautiful and that you're special?" I think this little guy is going to make one girl very very happy in the future.

Jaxton got to choose what he wanted for his birthday dinner. After much thought he decided on popcorn, hotdogs, and ramen noodles. Birthday wish granted, eat up, big guy!

We are so thankful for our Jaxton and can't wait to see all the wonderful things he accomplishes during his lifetime -- he's oozing with potential to do so much good! We love you Jax -- happy 4th!

Two and a Half

If you ask Beckam how old he is, he'll usually tell you either "5 1/2" or "3 1/2." But, Beckam actually turned 2 1/2 on Tuesday -- totally bittersweet! While on one hand it's sad to see my baby boy grow up, on the other hand he's so fun to watch as he experiences life and learns knew things. He talks and talks all the time and can say anything, but there was a while where his favorite words were "momma," "daddy," "pee pee," & "bum bum" -- put it all together and it doesn't make a very good combo. What's worse is that Beckam would go around chanting these four words over and over and over as loud as he could. When we were in public and he'd start doing it, I'd try to cover it up by saying things like, "No, Beckam, mommy and daddy don't need any PUMPKINS!" People would usually just smile, but I always had to wonder what they were really thinking. Beckam prayed for the first time all by himself a few months back. It was a very lovely prayer that went, "Heny Faer, momma daddy, baby sick, AAAAAAA-men!"

We love our sweet and sassy Beckam and think he's basically the coolest 2 1/2 year old around -- we're pretty sure we'll keep him around and just keep on lovin' on him!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Firsts for Jillian

Changes That Have Come With Having 4 Kids

1. In the chaos of life, I've also become a bit more forgetful. For instance, I drove 25 minutes to church with all four kids by myself and when I got there and started unloading the crew, I realized that I had forgot to put shoes on Beckam. Luckily, his nursery teacher insisted that he was fine and that shoes were only a minor detail and that I shouldn't worry about it (bless you Susan). Fast forward a week or so and now I'm driving Jaxton to preschool with Beckam and Jillian. We arrived at the school and I started unloading the kids when I realized that once again shoes were missing on one of my children. I quickly thought it through and wondered if shoes were really necessary for Jaxton to have for preschool and decided they were, so I had to go inside, explain to the teachers, return home to retrieve his shoes and take him back to school. It's now been a couple of weeks since then and I haven't forgotten anyone else's shoes. PHEW!
2. We had just walked in to the state fair when a man approached us and asked us if we wanted the remainder of his tickets for the rides. We accepted his offer, thanked him and were totally pleased at our luck. We hadn't walked 10 steps when a girl walked up to us and asked if we would like the rest of her tickets. Again we graciously accepted her gift but at this point wondered why out of all the thousands of people there at the fair, why was everyone giving us their tickets (25 total). Was it the fact that Nate was pushing a double stroller, I had a baby strapped to me in a carrier and holding on to a fourth child's hand . . . or unbeknownst to us did we have some kind of pathetic message written across our foreheads? Either way, it saved us $25!

3. In desperation for some extra time, I decided to cut 11 inches of hair off. I must say that waking up and having my hair done in 1 minute flat and not to mention keeping it out of my kids mouths and eyes is a beautiful thing!

4. Mac has given me a new super hero name, which I graciously accepted -- "MEGA MOM!"

5. Late one night I had a friend go on and on about how great Beckam was and how she couldn't see him ever getting in trouble. My instant reply, which even caught me off guard was, "Yeah, except that he eats like an animal and doesn't listen worth a crap." (Apparently it had been one of "those" days.)

Bottom line: While lots of things (from extra forgetfulness to short hair) have changed since the arrival of our fourth child, the truth is that it's our life and we like it! Slowly we are working ourselves into a routine and each day gets a little bit easier. We feel so blessed and grateful for all that we have!

More Fall Festivities

Halloween '09

We LOVE Visitors!

We love when visitors come out and since we've had Jillian three sets of visitors have come and stayed with us. Nate's sister, Summer, came out a couple days after Jillian was born to help us with the boys, my parents came out the end of September, and Nate's mom and brother came out a couple weeks ago. We are now on the countdown for my oldest sister, Kim, and my niece, Ava, to come out in just over a week. I'm so thankful to have family willing to make the trek out to see us.

A Special Day for a Special Girl

I kept the boys busy during the blessing with this -- I thought it turned out cute.

Nate gave Jillian a beautiful blessing this last Sunday. She was wide-eyed through the entire thing, but never let out a peep. When Nate handed her to me when the blessing was through, I was expecting a great mother/daughter moment where Jillian would look at me and grin -- the reality of it was as soon as she was handed to me she puked all over both her and me. Oh well, at least we had some kind of memorable moment.

Since my parents were here over general conference weekend and Nate's mom and brother were here over stake conference weekend, we didn't have any family around last weekend for the blessing -- good thing we can always count on great friends to fill in when family can't be around. We are so grateful for this sweet little girl that Heavenly Father has given us. We think she is so special and holds so much potential to do good.

Miss J is 2 Months Old

Jillian turned 2 months old last Friday and she has been nothing but JOY! She usually will sleep for a stretch of 8 hours at night, wake up to eat, and then go right back down again. She's smiling a lot and seems to recognize faces and voices. Her 2 month stats are 12.1 lbs. (85th percentile), 24 in. (95th percentile), and her head remains in the 50th percentile. She continues to be our "big girl" and we are loving every roll and double chin on her!

Just My Luck

Last Monday I had an IUD put in. Everything went well, that is until the weekend rolled around and I started bleeding quite a bit. I called the doctor and they wanted to see me on Tuesday for an ultrasound. Since Mac and Jaxton were both at school, I only had to take Beckam and Jillian with me. When I got there I found out that no children were allowed in the same room during the ultrasound, so some poor doctor got stuck watching my kids during it. The other down side was that they couldn't find my IUD, so they decided to perform a pelvic exam. Again, no IUD. From there they sent me down to get an x-ray (again no children allowed, so this time a nurse was assigned to babysitting duty). When the midwife looked at the x-ray, it was very obvious that I did indeed have an IUD in me, just not in the right place . . . or anywhere close. Apparently my IUD had gone through me uterian wall and was now in my abdomen. Does this happen a lot? Nope! In fact the nurse had never seen something like this and the midwife said it was very uncommon. My midwife then sent me to a doctor who perfermed another pelvic exam and told me that I was going to need lapriscopic surgery to remove the IUD. Please keep in mind that I still have Jillian and Beckam and that we had left the house at 7:30am and now it was 1:30pm, Jaxton was supposed to have been picked up from preschool at 12:30, and Mac needed to be picked up at 2:30. I called Nate, who quickly left work and picked Jaxton up from school. I also called two good friends, Kristi, who came to the hospital and picked up Jaxton and Beckam, and Chelsea, who picked Mac up from school. From there Nate, Jillian, and I headed over to the O.R. to begin my pre-surgery stuff. At 3:00 I was admitted into the O.R. and at 5:30pm I was headed into surgery. At 6:45pm I came out of surgery and was told that they found my IUD floating in my abodmen and that once it was found, it came out nicely. They also took pictures of my uterus, (hole and all), and said that it had already began to heal. By 8:30pm I was home and exhausted. Lucky for me, my wonderful friend Kristi had cleaned my house from top to bottom, fed my children lunch and dinner, done homework with Mac, and put my kids to bed. I also found that meals had been brought for the next two nights and we already had several people asking what more they could do to help. I am so thankful to these awesome people who are so willing and able to take care of me and my family. Anyway, long story short, if you know me then you know that this would only happen to me. I'm a little sore and I can't lift my boys for two weeks, but other than that we are definitely on the mend. I'm just so happy to have one of the longest days of my life over with -- you can be sure that I will be finding a different form of birth control from here on out.

This & That

Precious . . . enough said.

I overheard Mac having a conversation with our neighbor discussing the reasons why they had each moved from their old homes.

Mac's take on it was : "The reason we had to move into a bigger house is because my mom keeps having people come out of her belly!"

I didn't even try to correct him or make it sound any better because, well, he hit it right on the head.

For our family, we think Jaxton is very musical. The other day he was singing Jillian to sleep and I heard him sing, "Rock a bye baby, rock a bye baby, hope all your dreams come true. Rock a bye baby, rock a bye baby, I won't let anyone get you." I was impressed that he sang it on the fly and that it totally rhymed. Way to go, Jax!

While I don't like my kids to watch too much t.v., I will admit that it does make for a nice mommy break if they will sit down to a show or two. For the first 2 + years of Beckam's life, we couldn't get him to watch any t.v., not even for 10 seconds . . . that is until he discovered the "Wonder Pets," or "Won Pets" as Beckam calls them. His favorite pet is Ming Ming and he loves for you to sing "What's gonna work?" and then he'll follow with a big, "TEAMWORK!"

Our little clan seems to be surviving, thriving, and doing well. Love these little kids and all the joy they bring to my life!

All About Jillian

I can't believe Jillian is over a month old. She is such a sweet little girl and we just can't get enough of her. Her 1 months stats are: 9lbs. 14.5 oz. (75th percentile), 22 in. long (90th percentile), and her head is in the 50th percentile. At her doctor's appointment the physician said she was a "good sized girl" and that she was absolutely perfect -- we agree, especially with the "perfect" part!

Was it REALLY worth it?

One of the grocery stores around here will triple your coupon amount once a month. Well, this past week ended up being one of those times, so I figured out what was going to be the best deals, cut out my coupons (68 of them), loaded Jillian and Beckam in the van and drove 20 minutes to the nearest Harris Teeter grocery store in the pouring rain. Since you can only use 20 coupons at a time, I took my first set in, got my kids situated in the cart (or hanging on the cart in Beckam's case) and ventured off on my treasure hunt. Grocery shopping is never fun, but especially not when you are looking for specific items, while worrying about keeping your 4 week old covered up and away from germs, and keeping tabs on your 2 year old who when you are walking somewhere doesn't want to walk anywhere but when you stop to look at something suddenly feels the great urge to run. Long story short, we made it to the check out counter where the nice cashier began talking to Beckam about how he got his black eye (that's a whole other story). In the meantime Iwas organizing my coupons and running my debit card, while translating toddler language. We got the groceries in the cart, told the workers "bye," stopped for a balloon, and headed outside when I heard someone yell "Ma'am!" Apparently I had forgotten to finish my card transaction and so it's back to the counter to run my card all over again. When that was taken care of we headed to the doors once again and were about to make a run for the car in the rain when again I heard, "Ma'am!" I turned around to find a man following behind me, holding out my keys in his hand. "I wouldn't have got far without those," I said and then thanked him as we headed to the car. At this point I decided that I needed a break, so I put the groceries in the trunk, the kids in the van, and got in the front seat to call Nate. I told him the story and he suggested that I not make another trip back inside and that he'd do the shopping later. But when I got off the phone with Nate I decided that instead of having him make three trips in to the store, the least I could do was make one more go at it. So, I got the kids out of the car and made a run for the store, trying very hard not to be seen by any of the workers who had to chase me down the first time. I made it through the store and got the things that I needed and decided that I'd head to the self-checkout line to assure that I wouldn't see my previous cashier. I ran all my items through, handed my coupons to the attendant, who then had to call for a manager. While we were waiting the previous cashier walked by, patted my shoulder, and said "You're back." Slightly humiliated I replied, "Yes, just trying to save my husband a trip to the store." After about 15 minutes the whole coupon thing was figured out, I loaded my groceries in to the cart, found Beckam and let him choose another balloon as we exited the store. As we headed outside I took a deep breath, feeling slightly relieved that I completed the daunting task, and we made a run (for the last time) through the rain to the van. Just as I opened the trunk I heard an all-too-familiar, "Ma'am!" I looked back at the store doors and saw the attendant holding a bag and yelling, "You forgot your eggs." At this point I wanted to just get in the van and drive away never to return, but instead I put the kids in their seats and ran back to the store to retrieve my eggs. When I got back in the van Jillian was sceaming because now I had WAY exceeded my shopping time limit and it was time to feed her and Beckam was demanding a "fuit sack." Needless to say, we made it home by only making one pit stop to feed the starving infant.

So, was it REALLY worth it? You tell me -- I unloaded 10 bags of groceries and paid under $35. Will I do it again? Maybe at a different Harris Teeter, when it's not raining, with no children, and when my brain is completely intact (so probably not anytime soon).

We Just Can't Get Enough of Her

Here is a slideshow that Rebecca & Dena (with Darling Art) put together of Jillian (and Beckam has a few photos at the end). Turn up your speaker volume because it has a sweet song along with it. Just click on the link below and enjoy!
http://www.darling-art.com/darkroom/share/?client/jillian

Darling Art has done it again!

Rebecca & Dena (with Darling Art) did a photo shoot with Jillian last Wednesday and I couldn't be more thrilled with the results. If you haven't checked their work out yet, you definitely need to! I think they captured Jillian's perfect little face perfectly! Is that not a face anyone could love? Click here to check out more of Miss J's pictures on their blog.

The Others

With the arrival of Jillian I feel like the boys lives have seemed a bit overshadowed. Rest assure, that while it may appear that way, they have not been forgotten. Here's a quick low down on all their latest happenings.

McCade had his first full-day of Kindergarten on the 28th. I worried about him being gone from 7:30am to 2:30pm every day, but I quickly found that all day Kindergarten has been a blessing to our family. Even though Mac is a huge help around the house, just being down one child during the day makes a big difference. Mac is totally loving school and looks forward to the day when his mom will finally allow him to ride the bus (I'm not sure that day will be anytime soon). From day one Mac's teacher dubbed him as "the kid with the coolest hair," which Mac is totally proud of.

Jaxton also started school. He's attending preschool twice a week for four hours each day. Jax wasn't sure how excited he was about going to school, but when the first day arrived, he was surprisingly thrilled to be going. The second day was a little rough, but nothing that some good ole' Play Doh couldn't make better. Today his teacher told me that they began working on letters and sounds and she said that she was so impressed with how smart Jaxton was. I think Jaxton is going to totally enjoy being out and about at school like a big boy.

Beckam is all about his new-found giganitc personality. The way he talks, his expressions, his passion for sports, and everything else just makes us smile. While Beck can say most anything now, his talking reminds us of a caveman. (i.e. "Dad. Play. Ball. Huh.") He can dribble a basketball, throw a baseball, catch a football, and bat with the best of 'em and while he's not a fan of watching T.V., if it's turned on it has to be on a ball game of some sort.

* Just as a side note, Mac told me the other morning that "Jillian gets more beautiful every day!" and Jaxton keeps telling me that he's going to marry her "Because she's a girl, she's cute, and I love her," and Beck just wants to "Hug" her all day long. Isn't it great to only be 2 weeks old and have such an awesome and devoted fan club?

Could She Be More Perfect?

My friend's little sister is working on her photographers portfolio and needed a newborn to photograph -- lucky us! Jillian was wide-eyed through the whole thing but Ashley was able to use some skilled timing and make it look like we had a sleepy girl some of the time. You can check more of Ashley's stuff out here (I highly reccommend her).
On another note, isn't Jillian the sweetest? Have we mentioned that we are totally in love with her?