Ian's 27th birthday

Sean's brother and I are only a few months apart, and last weekend we celebrated his birthday! We went to Osaka on Center Street in Provo for sushi. I was SUPER excited because it was my first time having sushi since getting pregnant/having a baby, and it was soooo delish! We had a lot of fun sitting in the little room on the floor. If you haven't done that, you should try it :)

Birthday boy and his family: Ian, Eve, and Becca

Our cute little family :)

Becca and Carly

Jenna

Eve said, "I want to be in another picture!"

Sean put Mason to sleep and then decided to take a little cat nap while we were waiting for the check.

Some of the decorations

Eve the walrus

The group. Dinner was delicious and the company was entertaining!

Confession: Baby Clothes

Baby clothes have got to be the cutest thing on the planet. Seriously. Who doesn't love looking through the many, many, many different outfits for little boys and girls? Apparently I'm addicted. My sister-in-law, mother-in-law and I went to Target last night because I needed some new pants and pajamas for Mason. We probably spent a good hour looking through all the little baby clothes, and then the toddler clothes too (for our niece, Eve). Pretty sure if I had a million dollars, I would spend it all on baby clothes. But then where would I keep them? (It is safe to say I would also spend a lot of money on new clothes for Sean and me as well. And then probably for niece Eve too. Some of those dresses were, well… I wish they came in my size too. So cute.) It's a good thing we had a boy first, otherwise we would go broke from me buying all of the cute little girl outfits. And we aren't paying rent right now, so that is saying something…

Anyway, here's what Mason ended up with after my little escapade last night: two new jackets, 5 new pairs of sweatpants, some long sleeve white onesies (I put them under his short sleeve onesies that are too cute to pack away), and 8 new sleepers, most are fleece. I may have gone a little overboard. I'm a sucker for the ones that have little faces on the feet. And the raccoon one has little ears too!!

Oh, and when I got home, I pulled out the next size of pajamas to see what we had. Yeah, we already had like 5 pairs in the 3-6/6 month size. Oops. Hopefully they last us at least through March or so...

Superhero Mason

I wanted to do a quick post of a few things that we have been up to! Well, mostly what Mason has been up to. Love my little monkey!

Sean and I went to a soccer game of one of the girls in our old ward. I taught her primary class for 8 months and I secretly wish she was my daughter, or cousin, or niece, or something related to me. She is an amazing, crazy, hyper, fun, and caring girl! Not to mention a fantastic soccer player/goalie!

I was eating breakfast and catching up on blogging this morning, and Mason was happily playing in his
"turret". This is the most amazing toy! Anyway, I turned around to find his bib like this:

 Super hero Mason!

And in other news, Mason learned a new trick! He has been trying to sit up on his own for a couple of months now, literally. Last night, I  was talking to my in-laws about how we needed to borrow a Bumbo so that Mason could practice sitting up. Then I decided to help Mason sit up and play, and before I knew it, he was sitting on his own! He would reach for a toy and fall over, forgetting that he had to work to stay sitting up, so I would help him get back up. He was so proud of himself! And it wasn't a fluke, he sat up on his own again this morning. Now we just need to work on the rolling over.

Check out the full video on my Facebook here: https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?v=10152079533203690&set=vb.507553689&type=2&theater. 

PS Rachel, we were watching the appendices on The Hobbit (extended version) while we were doing this. You were there in spirit obvi...

Mason: 3-4 months

I totally forgot to do a 3 month post. I was so busy with going back to work part time, packing and cleaning that I just decided to wait until Mason turned 4 months and do them together.

Mason at 3 months:
Likes
- the baby swing. Unless he's hungry but that's reasonable.
- smiling and talking to us. Works best when he has eaten or after he poops.
- his plastic keys. They are usually the only toy that will keep him entertained for longer than 3 minutes.

Dislikes
- grape flavored medicine. Learned that after 3 days of him throwing up after I gave him medicine. No fun. Cherry all the way.
- the pacifier
- being buckled into his carseat.

Here are some pictures from his third month!

Mason Month 4:
Likes
- trying to sit all by himself. He has succeeded a few times for a couple seconds
- the exersaucer. We borrowed it from a friend and he LOVES it! It entertains him for up to half an hour or more sometimes. So great!
- Holding onto thumbs and standing up. He wants to move so bad.
- He actually doesn't mind tummy time all that much as long as it is only for a few minutes, and if there is a toy or a play mat in front/below him. He often rolls over from this position as well. So funny!
- Funny noises: if you imitate the squirrel from Sword and the Stone, or sound like Donald Duck or other random noises, it is a good way to get him to laugh!
- Watching TV. He loves the moving lights

Dislikes
- being sad. He tries so hard not to get fussy, and you can tell he is trying to say, "I'm sorry I'm fussy but I need something so figure it out!"
- The swing. I rarely got him to hang out in that thing starting a few weeks ago so we packed it up and gave it back to my brother in law. Good thing, because they have a baby on the way!
- Being swaddled. But it is the best way to get him to sleep. Sometimes I'll swaddle him and hold him facing out watching the TV to get him to sleep. Usually it works haha
- Not being able to crawl. He tries so hard and doesn't really get anywhere and it makes him mad
- When the sun is in his eyes in the car. But he also hates staring at the sun shade thing on his car seat so I'm gonna have to figure something out haha

Other notables
- rolling over more often now. He scrunches up into a ball on his tummy and will end up on his back. It's pretty funny because he will usually do it when no one is watching
- blowing raspberries like crazy! It was his favorite way to talk for about a week, now he mixes it up with baby babbling and it is adorable
- When he is in the exersaucer thing, he can actually support his weight for a second or two, without leaning against the sides. Also, his coordination has improved so much since we have had that thing, it is so fun to watch!
- FINALLY on a pretty consistent schedule. Most nights he is sleeping 6-8 hours. Once he wakes up, he plays for about 30-45 minutes (generally) and then eats and then will go back to sleep. He is usually up for about 1.5-2 hours at a time.

We moved in with Sean's parents a couple weeks ago, which has been great to share the day-to-day milestones with them :) Babies bring so much joy! Here are some fun pictures from the last month. He has started smiling and laughing so much more, it is great!

Trying to sit up on his own!

My dad says I should enter this in a photo contest. Who knows where I can do that?

Aunt Jenny came for a visit!

Aunt Jenna with her niece and nephew!

Cousin Michael! They are about 3 weeks apart. Michael is much chubbier and Mason is much taller haha

Loves his fingers in his mouth

We sent a few pictures to Uncle Tim for his birthday! He is currently serving in Waterville, Maine

"Okay guys, here's the plan…"

That is the face of pure joy!

We love our Mason boy and are having so much fun with him as he continues to learn and grow!

Thankful Thursday

It's been a while since I've done one of these too! I usually do a post every day in November of things I am grateful for, but since I've been doing this most of the year I think I'm just going to (try to) keep this up :) So here we go:

- I'm so thankful for eternal families and that I know we can be together after this life.
- Thankful for Sean and the hard worker he is. He is doing so well in school and is working so hard to be able to support our family.
- Thankful for a healthy, happy baby boy! He has brought so much joy to our lives and I cannot imagine my life without him now. Also grateful that we finally got him to "easy baby" status, because there was a stretch in there where he definitely wasn't...
- Thankful for the warmer weather this year. When we did the majority of our moving last week, it was warm enough outside to be helpful. Any colder and it would have sucked moving boxes and bookcases everywhere.

Halloween 2013

It's no secret that I really don't like Halloween. All the candy (which is a HUGE temptation for me), the pressure to find an awesome costume, annoying teenagers coming to the door that are obviously too old to trick-or-treat... yeah. But this year I have a kid. And while I may hate it, what if he really, really, really loves Halloween when he is older? What if I hadn't dressed him up and he hated me forever, appalled that his own mother wouldn't take advantage of the fact that I can dress him up however I wanted? (Careful Mason, don't make that wish or you may be dressed up as a bee next year... complete with a girls' leotard - just like your Grandpa Jones when he was a kid.)

So Sean and I talked about it, and came up with a few costume ideas for our baldy baby. We thought about doing Charlie Brown (which would have been fairly easy since my cousin Jenna dressed her baby up as Charlie Brown a few years ago). We considered Christopher Robin and buying Mason a little Pooh Bear to hold, but he doesn't have enough hair. We then thought of Harold, from Harold and the Purple Crayon. It was one of Sean's favorite books when he was a wee lad, so it was perfect! We found a very light colored sleeper, taped a crayon to his chest, and went to my work trick or treat. When we got home the sleeper was soaked through with spit (I have a very drooly baby on my hands) so I changed him and then immediately slapped myself. How could I not document my baby's first Halloween?! So finally I got him back into his costume and snapped a few pictures. Love my baldy!

This is Mason at our ward Fall party. Cutest little scarecrow around!

Las Vegas November 2013

Why hello blogging world! It's been a while since I've posted. I've been so busy lately... I went back to work part time for a month and then we moved out of our apartment and in with Sean's parents to save some money while Sean finishes his undergrad... but now I'm a stay-at-home mom who should have ALL the time in the world to blog, right? Right? Haha I know that won't be the case, but I should have more spare time than last month.

So because we moved out, there was sadly no room for Blaze. The yard isn't fenced. So Blaze, Mason, and I, along with Sean's sister (Jenna) drove to Vegas to meet my parents so they could take him to their house for the next few months. Blaze actually did way better this car trip than ever before (and he is usually pretty good) so that was great. Jenna and I had a fun time talking and laughing. The only catastrophe was when we got to the hotel and Blaze was SO excited to get out of the car, he stepped on Mason's stomach while we were trying to get him out of the carseat. He was fine after a few seconds of being held though, so no harm done. Here are a few pictures of the trip.

Blaze and Mason sleeping away in the backseat. It was really sweet :)

For the last month and a half, Mason has been sleeping in this little rocker chair we borrowed from a neighbor. But the pack n' play took up less room in the car so I decided to try it out. He slept great! (Side note, when we got back and put him in the chair thing again, he would slide down to where his feet were over the edge of the chair. So until we get his crib set up, hopefully this weekend, he is in the pack n' play again. Which he doesn't seem to mind.)

My little buddy. We sent this to Daddy at breakfast. 

It was a quick trip, but it was so great to see my parents for a few hours. They LOVED seeing Mason! Especially since he has grown up so much in the last couple of months, since they last saw him. He is so chatty and much stronger. But I will post his update this weekend :)