Another Leah moment

Every morning I feed Dallin and then bring him in with me to get Leah out of her crib.  I lay them both on the floor of Leah's room side by side so they can interact with each other while I change Leah's diaper and clothes.  As soon as Leah is dressed and ready to go, she is off and running while I get Dallin changed and ready.  One Sunday morning as I was changing him, I heard Leah in Dallin's room making a noise she makes whenever she is urgently trying to communicate with us.  I don't even know how to describe it here except that it involves her nose and what I believe may be the epiglottis.  Anyway, she was very persistently making this noise and it was getting louder and louder, sounding more and more urgent, so I finally left Dallin half-dressed to go see what she was up to.  I found her like this:

She had found a treasure trove of Dallin's pacifiers underneath his crib and had crawled under there to grab them, but couldn't figure out how to crawl back out.  Crazy kiddo :)

(After taking the pictures, I did finally offer my assistance to get her out from under the crib)

Precious Moments

Before I get too behind with all of the pictures that I'm sure I'll be taking (or I better be taking!) over Christmas, I wanted to share a few small moments from life lately here in our little corner of the world.  Days (and nights!) continue to be busy, busy, busy, often leaving us feeling like we don't have much time to pause and catch a breath.  We were recently trying to remember the last time we sat down and watched an entire movie...and we honestly couldn't remember.  We think there may have been one or two when Dallin was around a month old, but, again, we can't remember.  So somehow these two little kiddos manage to keep us on our toes round the clock, and they certainly wear us out, but we love it. We have our moments (especially when we're particularly sleep-deprived), but we wouldn't have life any other way.  We're grateful for the exhaustion because it comes from the privilege of caring for two very beautiful, special little souls.

One night as we were getting Leah ready for bed, Dave and I got preoccupied with a conversation we were having and suddenly realized Leah was no longer in the room with us.  We called for her - no answer.  We looked all over the upstairs - no Leah.  We heard something downstairs and found her as seen below, typing away very excitedly, very happily on Dave's computer, something that is normally off limits and kept out of reach, but had been temporarily moved to accommodate visitors.  She couldn't believe her luck that the computer was at such easy access and she was going to take advantage of that as much as possible!



We also have this on video...she would type for a bit, then pause to point and talk to the screen (all of this with an amazing amount of enthusiasm).  At one point, she went to the chair behind her and picked up the mouse you see below to bring it over with the computer.  We let her continue playing like this for a few more minutes before bringing her fun to end before bed.

A very, very rare moment: Leah fell asleep in the car after spending a few hours getting family pictures taken.

Helping around the house: Leah stayed close by both me and Dave as we rearranged a lot of furniture in the house.

Sometimes she would join right in and help, grunts, groans and all!  I really could feel her putting her back into it - surprisingly, she really was a help in moving this bookshelf!

Waiting to be taken out of her crib (she will often play for quite awhile in her crib either before going to sleep or when waking up...or sometimes she'll just play away her entire naptime without sleeping at all, at which point we call it "quiet time".  I really wish I had a video camera in there to see what she is doing)

Just before bedtime: I love these pajamas my mom sent for Leah

Lest you think we've forgotten about him, here's our sweet boy!  He's 5 and a half months old, and is slowly getting better at sleeping and napping.  He has good and bad days, but for the last week or so he has been taking pretty good naps every day.  I'm not holding my breath, but it sure looks hopeful!

 He is SUCH a happy little guy, content (for the most part) to watch his sister in all her hurrying around.  He eats up any attention we give him and gives such excited squeals when we pick him up and hug him.  He loves being roughed up a lot more than Leah ever did and seems older and older every day.  He has recently started rice cereal - he wasn't sure what he thought of it at first, but the last couple days has been more excited about it.  I guess I'll be giving a more thorough description of him in a couple weeks when he turns 6 months, but I didn't want this post to be all about Leah.  We love this little bug, too! He is such a joy to have in our family, and we all love him!

Chilling with Dad as he prepares for Family Home Evening:

Coming up....Thanksgiving!

Bonus day!

Dallin took TWO solid naps today!!  Dare I hope that he'll grow out of the "3 15 minute cat naps a day" schedule???  We've got Christmas vacation around the corner, so that will blow away any consistent sleep pattern he may be falling into now...but we can still celebrate today, can't we???

Short (hopefully) hiatus

My computer recently called it quits so until further notice, I'll be taking a blogging break due to limited access to my photos. Hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving!

Our Family Fall Activity :)

Last weekend we joined Dave outside while he raked up all the fallen leaves.  Leah was fascinated by the whole process and just stood there and watched for the first ten minutes or so, giving an amazed "oooooh" every once in awhile.  Then she decided to sit in the leaves:

Then she decided she didn't like how they felt

She began following Dave back and forth between the pile of leaves and the trash can...until he accidentally dumped a bunch of leaves on her, at which point she decided to stay farther away from the action.

She also had a lot of fun following him down the road to dump the leaves for the city to come pick up.

Dallin and I sat and watched the whole thing.

I feel like fall is just breezing past, and can't believe that Thanksgiving is here.  We are leaving in 3 minutes (or are supposed to) for the airport to join Dave's family in Boston for the holiday and are so excited to be with them soon.  We are so thankful for the many changes that our lives have undergone in the last two years - it's been a bit of a whirlwind and most days I feel like I don't have time to catch my breath, but the busy-ness is part of the blessing (even if it isn't always easy).  Happy Thanksgiving...I hope you have a wonderful holiday!

This little bug of mine...

Dallin is four months.  I think I'm supposed to say "I can't believe he's already 4 months!" but I feel like, "He's only just now turning 4 months??!"

For one thing, he's a big boy...we'll get his official stats on Thursday for his 4 month check-up, but he's quickly catching up to Leah in weight.  It's time to start looking for a new car seat for him because he'll have grown out of the Graco Snugride before too long.  He wears mostly 6-9 month clothes, but even some of those are getting kind of snug on him, so he wears some 12 month clothes (funny, because Leah also wears some 12 month clothes).  He also wears the same size diapers as Leah, which makes purchasing and carrying around diapers easy because I don't have to worry about two different sizes.

We love Dallin so much.  He's such a loveable little cutie and he LOVES to cuddle...if he could that's what he'd do all day.  Nothing makes him happier than kisses and hugs (really, it's adorable the way he grins in response to affection).  He has a HUGE open-mouth grin and he soaks up attention from anyone who will give it.  He's also very tolerant of love from Leah...she loves to lie on top of him and just hug, hug, hug him - it's never seemed to bother him so we let her do it.  

The two things he struggles with the most lately: car rides and naps - or any falling asleep process.  He DOES NOT like to ride in the car, especially if it's at night.  Sometimes he'll do okay during the day, but if you want to go somewhere at night, pretty much count on him crying the whole time.  Loudly.  Luckily, Leah has learned to completely ignore his wails in the car, so we're only dealing with one crying baby, not two.  I'm HOPING HOPING HOPING he grows out of this. Soon.  Leah had a little trouble around 2-4 months with car rides (particularly at night) but nothing like Dallin.  

As for the sleeping issue...I've spent quite awhile at this computer trying to figure out how to briefly describe the problems we're having with his sleeping, but can't succeed to my satisfaction, so let's just say I have tried a score of different strategies that have gotten me nowhere, and I'm feeling a little discouraged (and very, very, very tired).  I will say that he has been sleeping 11-12 hours at night for nearly a month now...let's just hope we can figure out his sleep during the day as well.  

(You may wonder why I'm so tired if he is giving me so much sleep at night...my best answer is two-fold: two babies under the age of two is very tiring when there are little to no breaks during the day, and because he is struggling so much with naps during the day, I get very, very little done and so I'm trying to squeeze things in after he goes to bed at night).

Once again, no "official" four month pictures, but here he is the morning he turned 4 months, relaxing on our bed after his breakfast.  I feel bad that he's so serious in all these pictures, because he's a very smiley little guy.  I'll make sure to get more happy shots some other time.  

We love you so much, Dal-pal!

Melissa's Visit Part 2

On Melissa's last full day with us, we decided to drive out to the monuments again.  Melissa had been to DC before, but that was before the WWII memorial (and, obviously, before the MLK memorial was built since that was just completed last December).

I don't think to put my sunglasses on very often, so Leah was fascinated with seeing me in them (and naturally wanted to try them out herself).

Melissa, me and Dallin with the Jefferson Memorial in the background

The whole family by the side of the tidal basin

The fall colors were beautiful!

Leah was itching to get out of that stroller and run free 

The impressive MLK memorial

Doin' a little jig

Not sure how well Leah complied with that last rule... 

I'm free!!!!

Leah loved Melissa...we all loved having her with us for a few days and we miss her!!

Melissa's visit, part 1

One of my best friends from high school came to visit us for a few days this weekend...and those few days were NOT enough!  Melissa was the perfect guest to have...she was so much fun to talk to and reminisce with, she was patient with the hectic activity at our house, and she was amazing to step in and help out wherever she could (particularly when she unexpectedly had to make our entire Sunday dinner...thanks, Melissa!).  We loved having her here, and I was very sad when she had to go.

In between the chaos that we sometimes refer to as Leah and Dallin, we managed to fit in a little sight-seeing here and there.

First sight: ANNAPOLIS!  We chose to go here the day Dave had to work since we go here almost any time someone comes to visit...it's one of our favorites :)  We didn't do a whole lot here besides walk around a little bit, but that's pretty much all we ever do in Annapolis.  We also didn't take very many pictures, but here are a couple (courtesy of Melissa!).

I love this little crooked house

Annapolis has lots of cute little Inns/B&B's like this one

Second sight: FORT MCHENRY.  I was incredibly disappointed to find that, though I remembered my camera on this one, I did not remember to take the card back out of the computer from my last upload and put it back in the camera...so, once again, these pictures are courtesy of Melissa.

I did not realize until recently that we lived so close to the place where the "Star Spangled Banner" was written.  We began our time at the Fort listening to a "Ranger" (basically a tour guide), but Leah only lasted about 40 minutes with him, so moved off on our own to tour the fort and then ended the day watching a video about the significance of the sight.  The coolest part about the video was at the end when they began to play the National Anthem and the movie screen then raised up to reveal a huge window that looked out on the Fort and the American flag waving proudly.  It was very moving (even for a mother worn out from chasing a toddler and who was anxious to leave instead of watch the video).

Dallin did really well in the stroller (he usually prefers to be held more than anything) 

Leah kept getting in the middle of the tour group and grabbing random people's legs, so I pulled her away for a little bit to give everyone a break 

Inside the fort

This replica was the exact same size as the original flag that was waving when Francis Scott Key wrote the song (I think that's what he said...Leah made it a little tough to concentrate...so don't quote me on that one.  If I have the chance to verify that is true I'll erase this disclaimer)

That's a proud little girl walking along the whole path all on her own!

"Oh, just a second guys!  All that running around makes me thirsty!"