Merry Christmas Eve!

The red marks on Owen's forehead are from him sleeping on his stomach/hands during his nap.  Don't tell the SIDS police!

This is the result of Brian getting up in the middle of the night to watch the Seahawks game!

JJ wasn't actually sleeping, but he was feeling a little left out, so was pretending to sleep.

Chomp!

JJ "borrowing" Owen's new super soft blanket and teddy bear : )

We are very ready for Christmas in this house!  JJ has been incredibly patient about not asking to open presents, so we let him open one early, which were from my Aunt Rosalee.  He got some really fun new slippers, which he loves.  He was even good about not asking to open more because he was so excited for his slippers and Owen's new blanket!  

A few days ago JJ and I were discussing the True meaning of Christmas and here was our conversation:

Me - JJ, we celebrate Christmas because it's the celebration of Jesus birth.

JJ - Ok

Me - We get presents as part of that celebration, for His birthday.

JJ - (really excited)  Yay!  Is Jesus going to come open presents with me?!?!

Me - No, Jesus won't be here.

JJ - Ok.

Me - Well, actually, Jesus is always here.  He's always in our hearts.

JJ - Ok.  Can we play PlayDough?

Me - Yes, sweetie.

I really think someone should write a book about explaining Christmas to kids for dummies!  I'm sure he didn't really understand, but at least we're talking about it : )

Michael, Krista, and Tristan were supposed to be here a few hours ago, but their flight was delayed, so Brian's on his way to get them now.  Hopefully they don't run into Santa on their way home!

Merry Christmas!

4 Months Old.

Ahhh!  That baby has huge cheeks!  What does his mom feed him?!?

Owen is now 4 months old.  Crazy!  He had his well visit doctor appointment today and is doing pretty well.  Unfortunately his skin is getting pretty bad, so the doctor gave us cream for his eczema, so that should help.  The doctor also gave us Zantac (for reflux), which will hopefully help with his frequent and uncomfortable spitting up and waking up so much at night.  Other than those two things, he looks good and is definitely growing and thriving!

We really like the pediatrician on base because he's straight forward, listens to our concerns, he has three young children so he understands us, and most of all because he's a Christian and goes to our church!  Today at the appointment, he brought up that we could start feeding Owen solid foods.  I said that I didn't really want to start yet, mainly because it's such a pain to do.  Then he talked about how the rest of the world starts around 4 months and doesn't stress out as much as Americans do.  He said if Owen seemed interested, we could just feed him whatever we were eating and mash it up really well.  He said that we don't have to make him separate food and we DON'T have to start with rice cereal!  We can start with whatever we want and the only restrictions until he is one are honey and cows milk.  Since his main calories are still from breast milk, he said it shouldn't be stressful, it should be fun.  I'm waaaay more excited now!  He's such a lucky baby to be here in Italy and now he doesn't even have to eat disgusting rice cereal!  Maybe we'll start him out with spaghetti : )

Owen takes really short naps all day and has been sleeping poorly at night, which is hard.  He also wants to be held almost all day.  He likes to be rocked to sleep and held for naps.  I had been working on making him sleep only in his bed for naps and not rocking him at night.  Brian and I have talked a lot about it though and especially after the horrific tragedy last week, we've decided that if our baby likes to be rocked and sung to sleep, then we will snuggle him tighter and longer.  We are so grateful to God for our two beautiful boys.  

Christmastime.

Christmas is in full swing at our house.  We bought a fake tree this year since real ones here are extremely expensive and hard to come by : (  It's not too horrible, but I definitely miss the fresh tree smell.  Brian wrapped some presents last weekend and put them under the tree, which may have been a little early since now JJ asks to open them every day.  Luckily we can just tell him that he can't open them until Tristan gets here, so now he knows that if Tristan's not here, then it's not time yet.  Michael, Krista, and Tristan get here in 12 days and we're soooooooooo excited!!!  It will be a much less lonely Christmas than last year.

Troublesome Threes.

JJ loves to type on the computer and Brian's convinced that he's writing top secret code.

First, I'd like to sincerely apologize for yesterday's post.  I wrote it right after JJ's pooping "incident," when I was upset and frustrated.  I was going to delete it, but Brian said to leave it because it was honest and shows what we're going through right now.  So, I'm very sorry for the severe over share : )

So moving on, these pictures aren't really representative of JJ's attitude these days.  Everyone talks about the "terrible twos" and really, JJ wasn't too bad.  Yes, he had the tantrums and sometimes wouldn't listen, but looking back, he definitely was not a terrible two-year-old.  This three-year-old stage though is driving me and Brian a little crazy!  He's extremely demanding and wants to do EVERYTHING by himself.  I get screamed at by him multiple times a day, "I can do it by myself"!  Now that he pees in the potty, he won't let us in the bathroom when he goes to the bathroom.  He always wants to put on his clothes himself, even if it's on backwards.  He wants to get his own food out of the pantry.  His teacher told me that he wouldn't let her help him with scissors because he said he could do it himself because, "that's what big boys do" which is pretty much his mantra these days.  He's always saying, "this is what big boys do."  I guess he's just trying to prove that he's not a baby, but it gets pretty exhausting.  

This morning, JJ woke up and wanted to go downstairs at 6:04 am, which Brian and I thought was waaaay too early.  Brian told him this and JJ yelled at him and said, "you're not my friend" which is also one of his favorite sayings these days when he doesn't like what you tell him.  Later, Brian was deemed JJ's friend again, but I wasn't because I told him he couldn't open the car door while we were driving down the freeway.

We definitely have a very stubborn and spirited kid on our hands.  We can't wait for him to grow out of this phase of yelling at us and demanding things, if he ever does!  I tell Owen a lot, "listen to your brother, this is how you will not talk to me when you're three"!   

Potty Trained?!

My mom sent the boys their first matching outfits : )  I love it!

These pictures obviously don't have anything to do with the title of this post, but I thought they were just cute pictures.  So JJ is finally potty trained, more or less.  I realized a few weeks ago that he kept coming home from school with a dry pull-up and they never changed him, so I decided it was time to wear underwear.  Sure enough, he hasn't had an accident at school and his only "accidents" at home have been intentional, i.e. I'm feeding Owen and distracted and he tells me, "I'm peeing on the floor."  Nice.  Now, he's potty trained for pee, but pooping is a whole different story.  

For some reason he'd rather poop in his pants than in the toilet.  It's sooooo gross!  He either just goes in his pants or waits until nap time and goes in his pull-up, which he still wears to bed.  I won't tell you about how just now he started yelling during his nap that he'd pooped and I go upstairs to his room to find poop all over his bed.  I asked him what happened and he said he put his hand in it and then rubbed it all over the bed to get it off his hands.  I won't tell you about how there was sooooo much since he'd been holding it for days so that it was up his back because no pull-up could possibly hold that much poop.  I won't tell you about how disgusting it was because my mom hates poop talk and would be horrified if I posted about this online.

Instead, I'll tell you about Owen just rolled over a few days ago!  He had been "working" on it all day and then when JJ came home from school he was talking and Owen just rolled over to see him!  It was really cute.  He rolled from back to front and he hasn't done it since then though because he quickly figured out that if he does, then he's stuck on his stomach.  He has started scooting around a little on his back, so we'll see if he ever rolls again : )  There, mom.  Is that a better story than talking about poop?!  : )

Happy Thanksgiving.

Brian cook ALL the food while the boys and I relaxed.  What a great guy : )

Wow, look at all that food.

Wait, I don't get any of it?!?

They obviously don't celebrate Thanksgiving in Italy, but Brian had the day off since he's technically still an American : )  We had a nice relaxing day and ate way too much.  I think next year we'll go away for the long weekend, but this year it was nice to just spend time together at home.

JJ is very into imaginary play these days.  He loves to play Super Heroes, cars, and "guys" as Krista calls it (playing with the action figures).  He's at the age that some kids get imaginary friends; he doesn't have a friend, but he has imaginary kitty cats!  He makes them a nest, carries them around, feeds them, and puts them to sleep.  It's really cute.  Brian did accidentally sit on them the other day though and got in a lot of trouble for that!  So, on Thanksgiving when we asked JJ what he was thankful for he said, "his kitty cats, Mommy, Daddy, and Owen."  He made me cry : )

3 Months Old.

Owen turned 3-months-old yesterday and it has been a very productive 3 months.  He's gained about 5 pounds and grown about 1/2 a foot!  He recently went through another growth spurt, so it will be interesting to see how big he really is at the doctor's appointment next month.  He's starting to hold on to toys and be more awake during the day, which is fun.  He will only nap while being held though, so that's not as fun.  It's fine on JJ's school days, but harder on days that he's home.  Hopefully he'll grow out of this phase soon.  We can't have 2 kids that don't sleep!