48 Weeks

Nixon is 48 weeks! He's such a ham, but he can be so ornery! He has the best wrinkled nose, big mouth smile, and I just love his slobbery kisses! I'm sure he must be teething because he is drooling like a St. Bernard!

He also hit 11 months!

Here are his unofficial 11 month stats:

Weight: 20 lbs

What is he doing at 11 months?

-Pulling up on everything and started to stand on his own for a few seconds at a time

-Walks well with a walker

-Ate with a spoon (by himself) for the first time and it was a success

-He's stopped putting everything directly in his mouth.. finally!

-He loves being in the stroller and going on walks

-He has a scream that should probably break glass

-He LOVES playing peek-a-boo. He'll pull something over his face, pull it back down, screech and flash his two teeth grin. It'll make anyone's day!

Myrtle Beach part 2

The second day we were there, the weather was beautiful so we took full advantage of it and spent our day outside in the sun, both at the beach and in the pools!

Nixon was so interested in the sand. Surprisingly, the sand only went in his mouth a few times, although, most of it got in while he was trying to get it out.

 Emmett had a blast running all over the beach! It was almost impossible to get a picture of him! Luckily, we got a couple, but he couldn't be stopped.

The sky was such a gorgeous blue, and with the stark white building, I just couldn't resist! It looked so regal! This was definitely the most beautiful of all of the days.

Myrtle Beach part 1

We had the opportunity to take a weekend trip down to Myrtle Beach with Ethan's sister and brother-in-law Jessica and Eric, as well as their little guy Emmett. Eric's family have a timeshare and needed to use up some points. They offered it to Jessica and Eric, which they then extended to us to come.

Jessica and I packed up the kids in the car on Wednesday and drove down, and the guys would drive down Friday after work/school. We got in around 3:00pm and got all of our stuff in the room. Our view was incredible, which made sitting on the balcony even sweeter!

The two little boys also enjoyed the view!

Because their dads weren't there, we decided to let them know they were missed!

The weather wasn't perfect, but it was nice enough to walk the beach for a couple miles and the boys had a great time. We walked down to the pier and I was able to get this shot. I kind of want to blow in up and put it in our future house. It most likely won't happen, but if I ever get the itch, I have the picture now!

Nixon didn't do great in the car on the drive down, but he sure crashed on the walk. Little did we know this would would be a trend for the weekend (he had a bit of a rough time). 

47 Weeks

Nixon is cruising! It's amazing how fast he went from army crawling, to crawling, to speed crawling! I swear, if he knows I'm going to take him away from something he's wanting, he bolts! This also poses a problem because of how fast he can crawl upstairs now. The other day I had him in the den downstairs and I went upstairs to grab something real quick. By the time I was coming back down, there he was at the top of the stairs beaming with pride! Luckily, he comes back down almost as well as he goes up. 

(This was a different time)

He has been feeding himself a lot more these days and he loves it! He loves to squish it between his fingers and then shove it all in his mouth. His hands are also little traps for all sorts of things: Chex, Cheerios, paper, twigs/leaves (as shown in his weekly picture this week). Sometimes it'll be 30 minutes after we've been somewhere, but there in his little tight grip is his little treasure. If only we could find a money farm to go to!!!

Beautiful day calls for a walk

The other day was absolutely beautiful!! I had these two little guys again, so after morning naps and lunch, we headed out to the neighborhood. This neighborhood is actually fantastic for going on walks. There are lots of different streets, uphill, downhill-the whole shibang. 

We were also joined by my gorgeous friend Rylee, which made the day even better. We've had so much fun getting to know her and her husband better and can wait for some more fun outings together!

46 Weeks

How is it that in six weeks we'll have a one year old?? This kid is always on the move. He's definitely realized that crawling is much more efficient than his previous army crawling he was doing. It takes about three times as long to get his weekly picture now, which makes it less and less appealing. He's rolling away, crawling, crying-you name it, that's what he'd rather be doing than taking a picture.

This stage, although sometimes infuriating, is SO much fun. He's learning all the time, and definitely enjoys feeding himself. This kid has one of the biggest mouths and stuffs his entire fist, along with all the food he can hold, in it. It's pretty entertaining to watch. It's almost as if he's proud of the amount of food he can put in. As well you should be buddy, be proud!

Two little friends

These two have gotten to spend some time together with consignment season going on.

They have a little bit of a love/hate relationship. Nixon is so loud and up in Emmett's (my nephew) grill, which causes Emmett to avoid him at most costs. On the other hand, Emmett is in the stage of swinging and throwing objects, which tends to end with someone (Nixon) getting whopped because he's in Emmett's personal space. Other than that, these two are starting to play better together and it's fun watching them.

45 Weeks

Nixon woke up yesterday morning at 5:45am. That RARELY happens so it really threw me off. I went and got him and brought him back to bed with us. He was so stinking cute I couldn't even be mad that he wasn't going back to sleep. He was cooing and blabbing while going back and forth between Ethan and I giving kisses. He didn't go back to sleep until about 9:00am. Luckily, both Ethan and I were able to take a bit of a nap while he took a nap. We sure love him.

Spring break

Ethan had Spring break this past week and it was so fun having him home! We didn't do anything big or extravagant, but we were able to spend time with our little family.

On Monday, we finally finished painting the office. It was a little bittersweet, mostly sweet that we finally finished, but I'll miss going and working together with him. We haven't had many opportunities of working together like that, and we really enjoyed our time together. We were also able to watch The Bachelor again with our friends, Rylee & Jesse Esselman.

On Thursday, we decided that we wanted to take some time and go to the outlet mall here. We got out of the car and set a budget for the day. We ended up each getting one thing that we really liked and finished under budget! We had already allocated that money to shopping, so we figured we'd take the rest and hit up Smash Burger. It has a little sentimental value to us because that's where we went to dinner when we went to the ASU v. U of A football game while I lived in Mesa. Just as I remembered the burgers were absolutely fantastic and the fries were the perfect pair. It definitely hit the spot!

Saturday morning I had a women's conference to attend for church. It was a beautiful production, all based on the theme of "Daughter of a King." I was able to be in an all women's choir that sang a gorgeous medley arrangement of the songs, "I Know that My Savior Loves Me," and "I know that My redeemer lives." That evening we FINALLY went and saw The Mockingjay Part 1 at the cheap theater with the Esselmens. It. Was. Awesome! I'm so excited for part 2 to come out in November. Neither of us read the books, so seeing the moving actually has surprises for us!

I think this Spring break is just what we needed! I think the more time I spend together with my little family, the more I realize how blessed I truly am. So many times this week we would be hanging out in our bed with Nixon going back and forth, giving each one of us kisses, and I just thought, "This is what makes me truly happy."

Ten months

At ten months this boy, like I said before, is giving us a run for our money, but he is so dang at the same time! It's fun to watch him grown and learn and to develop his personality each day.

Here are his unofficial 10 month stats:
Height: 30in
Weight: 18 lbs

What is he doing at 10 months?
-He is officially crawling
-He stopped nursing at about 9.5 months
-He loves to play Patty Cake (and throws his arms up when it's time to throw it in the oven!)
-He gives the best open mouth besitos (kisses)

-He screams like a pterodactyl anytime he's around food

-He's been a bit of a beast when it comes to his sleeping schedule, but we're hoping that'll even out soon

He is the cutest and sweetest boy out there and we're so lucky he's our! We love you Nixon boy! 

44 Weeks

Don't let that sweet little smile fool you! This boy has sure given us a run for our money already this week. Ever since he was sick he has not been himself. Last night we had our friends Rylee and Jesse over to watch "The Bachelor." We put Nixon down about 8:30 PM and he was hysterical. I decided to give him the benefit of the doubt and went to calm him down. I brought him back to the living room with us, assuming that maybe he just wasn't tired enough. about 30 minutes later Ethan put him back down. For the next hour he screamed at decibels I've never heard before, at least from him. He finally fell asleep at about 10:00.

I felt so bad that I went into his room to give him a kiss and let him know that I loved him (yes, he was sleeping but I know he heard me). He was still whimpering and I could tell that he was completely hoarse. 

At about 11:45, I went back into his room to make sure he had a blanket over him. Right as I started walking out the door, he woke up crying. I knew it was my fault he woke up so I snuggled him for a few minutes and gave him a little bottle and made my way back out. He cried for a little bit but eventually went down for the night. 

I'm hoping this ends real quick! I don't know how much longer I can handle this. It's funny how I never really realized how different Nixon is, until he started being more like an average baby that whines and cries!