Peter: Twelfth Month (January)

Above: This is one of Peter's favorite faces to make. A cute little sniffing sound goes along with it.

Above: Eating is messy business. Oh, and Pete, sorry about your bangs...that is my bad.

Above: Look at those cute chubby legs! Pete loves to go upside down and look through his legs.

Above: Playing with one of his Christmas presents.

Above: Look at this cute guy!

Above: Pete loves play time with Daddy.

Above: Making his favorite face with Daddy.

Above: Playing with his Sesame Street toys from Christmas.

Above: Visits from Nammy are the best!

Above: Nammy is so silly!

Above: Peter loves to play in our closet.

Above: Freshly bathed and ready for a ride on his pony.

Above: I just love this outfit on Peter.

Above: Pete loves to play on the stairs at Nammy's house.

Above: Look at that cute guy hanging onto Daddy's toes.

Above: My adventure loving guy loving every minute of play time with Daddy.

Above: This guy loves life!

Above: Scripture study time.

Above: Pete loves reading with Daddy.

Above: In fact, any time with Daddy is the best.

Above: We celebrated Pete's first birthday. You can check my post on his birthday to hear more about it. You can find that here.

Above: Peter really did NOT like it when people sang "Happy Birthday" to him.

Above: Peter did love the balloons I blew up for him to play with on his birthday morning though.

Above: This little guy of mine loves his silky tags on his special blue blankie. He loves to rub it against his face to comfort him. 

Above: Opening presents from Mimi and Papa.

Above: This guy loves playing in forts and mom gets to build a lot of them for him.

Above: He also loves clapping...though his aim is sometimes a little off.

Above: What a trooper! Those band-aids are from his shots for his 1 year well visit, but he's still in a super great mood. I love this little guy.

Doctor's Appointments, Shots, and Fevers

Peter had his 12 month doctor's appointment the day after his birthday. The appointment went well. Peter's a big little guy (95th percentile for height, 75th percentile for weight, and 50th percentile for head circumference...what a weird measurement for doctors to care about, in my opinion).

I noticed only about 20 minutes before his appointment that he had a little runny nose. I thought "I sure hope he didn't catch that cold from Mimi and Papa." He had a rough night's sleep the night before, but I attributed it to teething.

You could tell the shots really hurt him. He started crying really hard upon impact. Poor guy. He calmed down pretty quickly though and he was a sweetheart the rest of the day.



Peter's cute little leg with the painful little shots (those little shots that caused sooooo much trouble).

However, poor Pete got a double whammy. He DID get the cold from Mimi and Papa and then he also got a fever from his shots. He slept poorly on Wednesday night and Thursday night. The fever didn't appear for a couple of days. But on Friday night, he was having a REALLY hard time sleeping. Finally at about 11 p.m., I went in to help him (again) and he was literally burning up. I took his temperature and it was 105.4 degrees. Scary. I called the doctor's office and left a message for the doctor on call. Jeremiah went up to get his dad so they could give him a blessing, but apparently, his dad was completely passed out, so he brought his mom down instead. We had to give Peter a cold bath. That was hard. It made me so sad to see him so uncomfortable and so unhappy in that cold water. Plus, a fever that high is just plain scary. I almost started crying, but one of the things I've noticed as a mom is that you tend not to cry as much as you would have without a child present. There's some kind of inner strength or mother's intuition that kicks in and tells you that it won't do anybody any good if you start crying. I knew that if I started crying while Peter was unhappy in the tub, it would only worry him more.

Jeremiah gave him a father's blessing and I could tell that it helped to calm Peter quite a bit.

The cool bath helped to break his fever. It slowly started to go down after that. However, he was then VERY awake and decided he wanted to play until about 1 a.m. At that point, he finally went back to bed. Only to get another fever (104.2 degrees this time) at 6 a.m. He proceeded to get fevers on and off until Saturday night. Oh, and did I mention that during this time Jeremiah was also suffering from a kidney stone (I believe his 9th or 10th one in the past 4 years)? Lovely!

Peter is finally starting to get over his cold and it took a couple of days, but Jeremiah finally passed the last of his kidney stones (I think he actually had a couple this time because it usually only lasts a day and this time, it lasted three days).

It has been an exhausting week and a half. I hate those first signs of sickness in your baby. Because you just know you're in for a tough week. The worst thing about when a child is sick is that the thing they need the most is sleep and that is the thing that is the hardest for them to get because they are so uncomfortable when they're sick. Also, when your sick baby doesn't get sleep, YOU don't get sleep either. You obviously can't just let them cry themselves back to sleep when they're not feeling well. So, I have been super sleep deprived over the past week and a half.

Then, of course, it's a double whammy when you have a sick baby and a sick husband. It was a miracle I didn't get sick. A couple times, I thought I had a sore throat and I was worried that I had caught what Peter had. But I was either able to stave it off with fluids, or it was a false alarm.

Plus, when Peter is sick, he wants to spend the majority of the time cuddled up with me on my lap (which I love). But as a result, I didn't get out of my pajamas much over the past few days.

I also hate it how even when your baby is better, it takes a few days for them to "relearn" how to sleep. For instance, last night, I KNOW Peter was feeling fine. But he still woke up inconsolable at 3:45 a.m. I proceeded to go in and out trying to find ways to comfort him at least five times between 3:45 a.m. and 5 a.m. I finally had to let him cry himself back to sleep at that point because I'd already emptied my bag of comfort tricks on him and none of them had worked. Not to mention the fact that I was just plain exhausted from sleep deprivation.

So, thank goodness Peter is feeling better. Though it sure stinks that Jeremiah caught the cold from Peter that I had somehow avoided. I hope I can avoid catching it from Jeremiah!

But do any of you guys out there have tips for improving sleep when your child is sick?

Peter's First Birthday

I'm a little late getting this up here, but last Tuesday, January 19th, Peter turned one year old (at 12:35 a.m., if you want to be exact).

We had two mini birthday celebrations for him--nothing too big or fancy. We celebrated with my Mom and family on Sunday and celebrated with Jeremiah's parents and brother on Tuesday.

I learned that we had not sufficiently prepped Peter on birthday traditions. He was NOT prepared. :)



A picture of the cupcakes--Teddy Grahams having a day at the beach. Oh, and fruit by the foot on a cupcake--dee-licious!

On Sunday, we went straight from church (we now have 1 p.m. church and we're all still trying to adjust to it) to my Mom's house for dinner. Because of church, Peter didn't get a full afternoon nap. He also overslept during his morning nap, so we didn't have time to give him his usual sit-down lunch. As a result, by the time we got to my Mom's house, Peter was both tired and hungry. My Mom's kitchen is a little small, so she moved the table into the front room so that there would be enough space for everyone. As soon as we walked in the door, Peter freaked out because the dining room was completely empty and he wasn't expecting it. It scared him. So, he started crying. :)

We hurried as quickly as we could to get dinner started and he calmed down somewhat once he got a full belly (mashed potatoes are one of his particular favorites). My sister was planning on joining us, but she had some last minute things to take care of down at BYU before coming up. She begged us to save the birthday cake and singing to Peter until she got there. I was, of course, happy to wait for her, but in hindsight, it really would have been better to just sing to Peter and give him his cupcake while we were all sitting down to dinner.

Anyway, we finished dinner and got Peter cleaned up. He was still visibly exhausted, but we took him downstairs to give him his presents. I would have thought that Christmas was enough of a rehearsal for him, but I guess he forgot about unwrapping presents in the past month. While we helped him unwrap his gift, he got freaked out by the noise that the wrapping paper made (Peter is a little guy who does NOT like surprises). So, he started crying. :)



Above: Peter with the offending wrapping paper and his cool new dumptruck riding toy.



Above: Peter finally calm enough to appreciate his presents.

We got him calmed down enough to somewhat enjoy his presents (though it wasn't until the next day when we were playing with them at home that he fully appreciated them). At that point, Emily arrived, so we prepared for birthday cake and singing.

We put Peter back in his booster seat (which did not make him happy). He doesn't like his booster seat, for one, and he was also still full from dinner and didn't want any food at that point in time. We turned out the lights and lit a candle shaped like the number one (we didn't put it on the cupcakes since they were too small to hold the candle). Then we blew out the candle and turned the lights back on. The mistake we made was that we gave him the cupcake to eat while everyone else just watched him and waited for his reaction. He got freaked out that none of the rest of us were eating and because everyone else was standing and he was the only one sitting. So, he started crying. :) Then, he chucked his cupcake on the ground.



Above: Peter NOT enjoying the tradition of birthday cake.



Above: Peter enjoying the tradition of birthday cake even less than in the other picture.

Poor guy.

So, we rushed him home and speedily got him ready for bed (I think we put him down at 7 p.m. when usually he goes to bed at 8 or 8:30 p.m.).

On Tuesday, for his actual birthday, we covered the floor with 15 colored balloons that were nearly as big as he is. When we got him out of bed that morning, we let him take a little time to take it all in. He had the sweetest look of wonder on his face as he looked at those balloons. Then he got comfortable and started playing with them and had sooo much fun. Jeremiah then headed off to work (we decided to save birthday gifts for the evening so his family could join in).



Above: The pictures didn't capture this the way the video did (or would have).

After Peter's first nap, Peter and I went to Costa Vida where we met my Mom for lunch. Peter has been out to eat a few times before, but I realized that the other times were at places and times that weren't nearly as busy. We got to Costa Vida during the bustle of the lunch hour. Peter LOVED it. He kept looking back and forth. You could see him trying to "work it out" (as my brother puts it). You could see him looking at the new place and the new people. He had such a good time. Then of course, with grandma there, it put the icing on the cake for him.

Jeremiah had to go to a networking event for his MBA program at Westminster in the evening, so I was on my own to get dinner ready (I cook for my in-laws). Peter HATES it when I cook. He wants to see what I'm doing. The only way that can happen is if I put him the baby carrier, but that has its challenges because Peter is 24 lbs now and he has a long reach. So, it makes me tired and I have to be careful because he likes to grab things. So, I went upstairs to finish dinner up (it was a crock pot meal. I love slow cookers. Bless the person who invented them. That person had young mothers in mind). Peter was playing in the kitchen, but that's hard because it isn't baby proofed, so cooking takes three times as long when I do it with him because I have to keep him away from all the cupboards (for instance, he loves to open the cupboard under the sink and we all know what a danger zone THAT is for kids, and he was trying to open another cupboard and throw glass baking dishes on the ground).

I finally had to put him back downstairs in his play pen and put Sesame Street on to keep him entertained. I know you shouldn't let kids watch too much TV, but it is absolutely necessary at times--especially when you have a son who is as energetic and busy as mine is.

My sweet sister, Emily, called and decided to come up from BYU to visit me and Peter for his birthday. I was so glad. I was actually feeling a little lonely. I wanted to spend Peter's birthday with family. Jeremiah's mom usually has clients on Tuesdays (she's a therapist), but this Tuesday, she was sick and in bed. Jeremiah's dad got home really late. And, as I mentioned before, Jeremiah was at the networking event until 7 p.m.

Emily arrived shortly after I finished preparing dinner. She went and got some food to eat while I finished feeding Peter and then she watched Peter for me while I ate. Then Jeremiah showed up and got dinner for himself.

After Sunday's experience, I had hoped to find another alternative to doing cake and presents long after dinner had finished. I suggested doing cake and presents at breakfast time instead, but Jeremiah said his family couldn't do it at that time. So, we ended up doing cake and presents at 8 p.m. As I already learned from Sunday's experiences, the combination of a tired Peter, presents, and cake was not a good thing. But it was the only option, so what can you do?



Above: Peter's Birthday Cake "Teddy Graham Picnic at the Beach"

We started singing Happy Birthday to Peter and before the first line of the song was finished, Peter burst into tears. I think it scared him (plus, it was basically his bedtime). He isn't used to a whole group of people singing to him (plus, I think Jeremiah's family sings less than mine does). He also got scared by some of his presents (just as he had on Sunday). He did calm down enough to somewhat appreciate his gifts. But again, it wasn't until the next day that he was able to fully appreciate his gifts. :) Sadly, we didn't get any pictures of this because we were focused on getting a video of it.



Above: Peter somewhat appreciating his gifts from Mimi and Papa.



Above: Peter calmed down and enjoying time with his family.

Poor little guy! I'll do a better job of preparing him for birthday traditions next year! And next year, the timing will be ALL about him! If cake works better during dinner, that's what we'll do!

Oh, and on a sidenote, I taped his little adventure with the balloons in the morning and his crying over his birthday cake that night (it was sad, but sooo adorable) and for some reason, my video camera decided not to tape those two events. It almost broke my heart! I was so sad that the camera didn't capture those two events. He was so sweet! I'll just have to keep those memories in my heart and mind instead.

So, there you have it. Peter's first birthday!

Daddy's Boy

Peter is definitely a "daddy's boy." He gets worked up to a tizzie whenever Jeremiah comes home. If Jeremiah doesn't go straight to him and pick him up when he gets home (for instance, if he decides to set down his bag first, hang up a coat, go to the bathroom, etc.), the following happens:

First, when Peter sees Jeremiah, he will start to grunt (for lack of a better word) and huff and puff with his whole body moving up and down while he smiles excitedly.

Second, if Jeremiah walks past him, he will stamp his foot.

Third, if Jeremiah doesn't come and get him after that, he will double over, put his face in the carpet (with his bum in the air) and sob into the floor.

Peter is really quite mild-mannered at home during the day with me. But when daddy comes home, another Pete takes over!

But when he does get his quality "daddy time," look how sweet he can be:

Family Scripture Study--Pete Style

I don't know if anyone else's family scripture study echoes mine, but one of three versions of scripture study happens every night.

Version 1: Peter actually sits on our lap and lets us read the scriptures to him. (this is the rarest version)

Version 2: Peter walks all over the place while we read the scriptures to him from afar. (This is the most common version of scripture study)

Version 3: (pictured here) We follow Peter around with the scriptures while we read to him. (This only happens when we are feeling particularly energetic)















Just as a note for the picture above, Peter has a strange fascination with the bookmark for the scriptures. He has torn it to pieces in his efforts to obtain it. I guess it's a good thing I only used an old scrap of paper for the bookmark (unlike the cherished heirlooms that comprise all my other bookmarks...yeah, right). Oh, and dig that cheesy smile on my face!

So, can anyone else sympathize with my family scripture study experiences?

Happy New Year's!

I won't make this long (especially since my Christmas blog was a novel).

Just a word on 2009 and 2010.

Without being cliche, the best way to describe 2009 is to quote Dickens: "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times."

2009 was one of the best years of my life and one of the hardest.

Obviously, the joy that has come into my life because of Peter basically trumps any trial I have ever experienced.

Though, I will say that those first six weeks of being a mom were baby boot camp. Talk about rough! What an adjustment! I only hope that breast feeding works better with baby #2 than with baby #1 (meaning, it didn't work with Peter at all--despite 3 lactation consultants).

2009 was rough (understatement) because Jeremiah got laid off and we had to move into his parent's basement. I won't even go into how difficult that has been for us.

2009 also brought Jeremiah a new job and the opportunity to go back to school for his MBA in business.

2009 was amazingly wonderful because I have seen the Lord's hand in my life and I have seen Him "deliver us by degrees" as was stated in Brother Whitney's conference talk (October 2009).

I won't go into details on the good and bad (there's too much to list--on both sides). But I have learned so much this year. Whoo boy, and I still have a lot more to learn.

I have great hopes for 2010. It can only get better from here on out! Who knows who will be joining us in the years to come?

As for New Year's Eve, it was so much fun. We simply relaxed all day long. Then we went to my Mom's house for dinner (it is a tradition to have Chinese food and play games). We played Beatles Rock Band (soooo much fun). Peter was surprisingly mellow that night. He sat on my lap the entire time we played Beatles Rock Band. He was so sweet. Instead of toasting the New Year's at midnight, as usual, we toasted at 8 p.m. so we could get Peter home and to bed. We got Peter to bed, and relaxed while we watched t.v. Jeremiah fell asleep and I woke him up at midnight for a New Year's kiss.

The perfect New Year's Eve. It must be leading up to the perfect new year!



Peter being uncharacteristically mellow (above)



Peter calmly enjoying the family playing Beatles Rock Band.

The Best Christmas I Have Ever Had

I know this is a bit late (it took me awhile to remember to upload my pictures), but I thought I would take a minute and talk about Christmas.

I blogged ASAP about Thanksgiving because I was frustrated and needed to vent (as you will notice, there are no pictures in my Thanksgiving blog).

I mentioned in that Thanksgiving blog that I thought that the holidays had good years and hard years due to nap schedules. I take it back. Despite Peter's nap schedule, this was the best Christmas I have ever had. It was busy, yes, but it was the best.

One of my mom's traditions was that she would always surprise us with a stuffed animal on Christmas Eve morning. It was fun to have a new toy to play with all day before the toys we got on Christmas morning. It always made the day magical for us. It built up the anticipation and we had so much fun playing together with our new stuffed animals. So, I got a stuffed animal for Peter too. He was really cute with it and seemed to enjoy it a lot. He hadn't had a new toy in quite awhile, so I think it was a fun surprise for him.





On Christmas Eve, we spent the evening with the Washburn family. We had a lovely and super easy dinner (consisting of a Honey Baked ham and turkey breast, and store-prepared goodies such as crackers and cheeseball, shrimp and cocktail sauce, fruit, veggies, etc.). Then we read the Christmas story in Luke 2 and some Christmas-themed stories that Mike and Debra have saved over the years. Peter was super hard to contain during that time (he doesn't like to sit still and just listen to stories--especially when they don't have pictures). He's definitely a busy boy. We also played some Christmas songs on their chime set.



I have decided that babies are the greatest thing ever when you're tired and want to bow out gracefully and early. We left the Washburn family gathering (as did everyone else who had kids) at about 8 p.m. so that we could put Peter to bed. We put Peter in his new pair of Christmas pajamas (also a tradition I had growing up--we would always get a new pair of pajamas to wear to sleep on Christmas Eve).

I was wondering how we would deal with presents the next day with Peter's sleep schedule, but it worked perfectly.

Peter woke up early--at 7 a.m. on Christmas morning. That gave us enough time to show him his present from Santa. I don't think I have ever seen him so excited when he saw a new toy before. Santa doesn't wrap his present at our house. The only presents that get wrapped are the ones that mom and dad give. But we covered the present from Santa with a blanket so Peter could pull it off. He was so excited. We got the cutest video of him with it. It just made my morning. THIS is what holidays are all about. I felt so much love for him. It made me so happy to give him a present that gave him so much joy. I would do anything for that little guy.











I am in the Primary Presidency and I had the blessing of doing Sharing Time this month. In my Christmas Sharing Time, I taught about the gifts that Jesus gives to us and the gifts that we can give back to Him. I tell you, Peter is the greatest gift the Lord could ever have given to me and I am going to have a doozy of a time finding a gift to give back to Him that even comes close.

So, Christmas morning was very nice. We had enough time to play with Peter's toy from Santa before heading off to my Dad's house to spend Christmas morning. We got there at 8:30 a.m. as planned and scheduled and everyone came downstairs to join us by 9 a.m. (yeah, schedules don't always work out). We opened gifts there and had a lovely time. Peter didn't really grasp the idea of opening presents, but once they were open, he definitely enjoyed them. He got many adorable toys. His two favorites from Grandma and Grandpa Mackay would have to be the Sesame Street toy (it has doors and you push a button and Sesame Street characters come out of the doors and sing their signature songs) and a dump truck riding toy (that wasn't his favorite then because it was in a box and it definitely required some assembly). In fact, he loved his Sesame Street toy so much that we had to set it on top of the dump truck toy in order to get him to go over and open it.





We left at 10 a.m. so that Peter could take a nap. We were easily able to transport our sleeping little guy from his car seat to his crib.

Jeremiah and I opened our gifts to each other while Peter slept. Pete woke up around noon and we fed him lunch and then went upstairs to exchange gifts with Mimi and Papa Washburn. They were still getting ready, so there was some delay before we were able to exchange gifts. However, we had a lovely time with them as well.

In addition to other things, we gave each set of grandparents some pictures of Peter. What a cutie!



It did take a little longer than expected with Mimi and Papa, so we had less time than expected for Peter to open his gifts from us. We only had about 15 minutes and it was pretty rushed. Plus, by that time, Peter was getting a little overwhelmed with all of the new presents and toys. So, after 15 minutes of opening our gifts and playing with them very hurriedly, Peter was off for his second nap.







Jeremiah and I simply relaxed while Peter slept. Soooo nice.

When Peter woke up, we gave him a bath (where he got to play with his new cool bath toys from Grandma and Grandpa Mackay) and got him dressed and headed off to my Mom's house to celebrate Christmas Day (evening). We celebrated with some fun finger foods and then opened more presents. By this point, Peter was OVER new toys. They weren't very exciting to him anymore. He was really overwhelmed. But no worries, in the following weeks, he has come to love those toys just as much as the others.

Our evening at my Mom's house turned out to be very quiet and relaxing. My brothers and sisters went to a movie with my Dad (evening movies are definitely a thing of the past for me--unless we have a babysitter, it just doesn't happen! I haven't seen a movie in the theaters since May. I saw "Up" and that was the first movie I had seen in the theaters since I was eight months pregnant!). I believe that Niel's sons had left to spend time with other family. We Skyped my brother, Nephi, and sister-in-law, Shandie (as well as their adorable little girl, Maddie), in Texas to wish them a Merry Christmas.

But after everyone cleared out, it was just me, Jeremiah, Peter, Mom, and Niel. We spent the evening playing in my Mom's basement. Peter charmed us all by waving goodbye (for the first time other than to me or Jeremiah) to Grandpa Niel as he crawled up the stairs. It was so cute. :)





Then, we drove home and put Peter to bed and watched a movie while we cuddled together on the couch.

Christmas is just going to get better. Who knows? Maybe we'll have another little one to share Christmas with in 2010! And no, I'm not pregnant. That wasn't an announcement...just a possibility!