Just for fun. . .

Here's a video for Auntie Dana. JJ loves to watch videos of himself also!

Misc updates. . .

Notice tired eyes due to refusal to afternoon nap, full cheeks due to lots of dinner, excessive drool on his shirt and my pants where he had been standing due to 4th top tooth coming through!

JJ's been chugging along, developing nicely : ) His fourth top tooth is going to pop through any minute now which equals 4 top teeth in 1 month! Maybe now he'll start sleeping! I know, I sound like a broken record!

He hasn't started completely standing on his own yet, but that should also happen any minute. I think he has a little performance anxiety because whenever I try and make him do it, he won't. Then this morning, when he thought I wasn't looking, I saw him standing near the couch with two toys in his hands, just standing on his own! When my parents were here, I got him this little grocery cart to push around, I thought it was appropriate since Brian and I did meet in a grocery store : ) Before that, he'd had a car for quite awhile, but it was too fast for him to walk with, so I got him the grocery cart which is a little more stable and slower. Within about 10 minutes of playing with that, he started walking with it around the entire house, and then he started walking with the faster car too! He seems to be enjoying both.

He's still a big eater. Not sure if he's currently going through a growth spurt, but today he ate a lot - see below -

Breakfast - 8 oz bottle, yogurt, raspberries

I thought it would be a good idea to mix some fresh raspberries with his yogurt, but with every bite, he spit out the raspberry, looked at it, then put it back in his mouth!

Lunch - 4 tablespoons green beans, 4 tablespoons corn, 1 banana

2 PM snack - 8 oz bottle

4:30 PM snack - 8 oz bottle

Dinner - 1 avocado, 1 banana, lots of cheese (and I mean LOTS!), yogurt, yogurt melts

Bedtime snack - 4 oz bottle

The kid truly is eating me out of house and home!

I've been exposing JJ to lots of different types of music, but still his favorite "song" to "dance" to is Brian's ring tone!

Waving and Clapping!

As promised, above is a video of JJ waving. Also, JJ started something new this morning. . . clapping! It's so fun when he does something new. I almost forgot clapping was a new trick he would be doing soon!

Brian left yesterday morning and we still don't know if he'll be back in 3 weeks or 8 months. Since none of you seem to have any helpful connections, I guess we'll just have to wait and see : ( It's really stressful, but I know we'll get through it.

Enjoy the video!

Baptism weekend. . .

He was very serious after being baptized

JJ plotting his take over of Tristan and his toys

We had a very busy weekend last weekend. Brian's dad came in to town on Friday and we ran errands all day Saturday, including Brian and his dad going to the ship to take the 500 pound bell down! Saturday evening, my mom and dad and Michael, Krista, and Tristan all came down too. Then Sunday was JJ's baptism. It was on Brian's ship and JJ was baptized using water put into the bell of the ship. It's a really old tradition and we thought it would be appropriate for us. JJ's name will be engraved in the bell for him to come back and look at when he's older. I'm sure it will be a fun thing for us as parents to torture him with when he doesn't want to go look at the bell anymore! It was a great day with lots of friends and family there to support us and JJ.

Tristan seemed to do better with JJ and I think JJ is now just silently plotting how to dominate Tristan and his toys! Tristan ended up getting a sprained ankle on Sunday evening while jumping from the couch into Michael's arms. As you can see from the last photo, JJ was very concerned for him. I think that someday they will be great little buddies.

July has been a pretty eventful month. Since the beginning of July, JJ has gotten 3 upper teeth and the fourth looks like it will come through soon. He has become a horrible sleeper again, but I'm guessing the teeth are the culprit, once again. I think the most fun development happened last weekend. . . he started waving! When I picked him up last Friday from the woman who watches him during the day, he just reached his arm up and waved goodbye! I'm not a crier, but I couldn't help it! He's just becoming such a little human! It's so cute when he just takes his little hand and waves to you. I'll try and post a video soon so everyone can enjoy it : )

My parents were in LA this week with Michael, Krista, and Tristan and they head back down here today. It will be nice to have them back for the weekend. I have today and tomorrow off so it will be nice to spend time with them. Brian is leaving tomorrow for either 3 weeks or 8 months. As of yesterday, we still don't know how long he'll be gone. The Navy is being very inconsiderate and not telling them yet if they'll be coming back and if they do, we don't know for how long. Hopefully we'll know before they leave tomorrow.

If any of you have a connection to the Secretary of Defense, can you please send him an email asking about Brian's schedule!??! We would appreciate it : )

No rest for the wicked. . .

JJ has been sleeping a little better at night. He doesn't come to bed with us until about 3 AM every morning and this is normally the first time he wakes up. If we were "stronger" we could probably let him cry and maybe he wouldn't need to come to bed with us at all, but we're too tired to deal with that right now. Last night was a pretty typical night, he had 2 decent naps during the day, and didn't come to bed with us too early. Around 3:30 AM though, he decided it would be a good time to start "talking" and playing in bed with us. I gave him a bottle at about 4:15 AM thinking this might trick him into going back to sleep, however, he only fell for it for about 5 minutes before he woke up crying. Finally, at 5 AM, he fell back to sleep. Then, at 6:30 AM, he woke up happy as if he'd slept the whole night! He had a good day as if nothing ever happened last night! All the pictures above are from today and look how happy he is! Brian's on duty tonight, so he'll get a full night's sleep. Not fair! Hopefully JJ will sleep well for me tonight.

Nikki (our cat) scratched JJ's face tonight. JJ got her cornered beneath the dining room table and before I could get to them, she hissed and then scratched him. Brian immediately said we should get rid of her, but I did some research and found some "claw caps." Hopefully they work because JJ really loves her and I hope that one day they'll live happily together : )

FGA - CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. I'm guess this was all Grandpa ever knew : )

Another fun weekend. . .

We got to enjoy a nice weekend. Yesterday we went to lunch and then JJ refused to take an afternoon nap and screamed and cried in his crib for about 45 minutes. We finally decided it just wasn't a day for napping, so we ran some errands and JJ of course fell asleep after being in the car for about three minutes. We then met up with our friends, Chris and Renee and their 3-year-old daughter Ashley, at the park. They came back to our house when it starting getting a little cold and JJ had a great time harassing another 3-year-old other than Tristan! He really likes other kids, but they don't seem to like him as much : (

Today was nice and calm also, with some more errands completed and a short afternoon nap for JJ after only 20 minutes of screaming before falling asleep. At least it was some progress! Something exciting did happen this evening. . . we were talking to my parents on Skype, JJ had pulled himself onto a toy, then he lifted both hands up and was completely standing on his own, he took a step and then leaned on to the couch! It was probably an unintentional step, but it was really exciting for all of us! The countdown is now on since Brian is leaving in a few weeks and will be gone for three weeks. I really just don't want JJ to start walking while he's gone.

Eating Healthy. . .

Our first CSA box and flowers JJ got me!

Brian's on duty tonight, so I let JJ pick out what he wanted to do after I got off work. To my surprise, he wanted to go to the Farmers Market! He said that since he's always eating fresh fruits and vegetables, he wants us to start eating more also. We had a nice time walking around and of course everyone loved him. I signed up for our local CSA program and will be picking up fresh, organic fruits and vegetables every week now. It won't be enough to feed him, but definitely enough for the adults : )

While we were there, a woman let her Beagle size dog jump all over him in the stroller. I was trying to get the dog down, but it's hard to protect your baby and wrangle someone else's dog. After what seemed like forever, the dog finally decided JJ wasn't going to share his snacks and he got down. The woman just laughed and said, "oh, you should have seen earlier when he went up some woman's dress." Now, I know I'm not a dog person, but come on! Don't let your dog up someone's dress and attack an unknown baby on the same night!

In case you're keeping track, yes, we had another earthquake this week. I think we'll be living on an island soon!