The "Do" and "Happy"

Braelyn says lots of words now, and actually knows what the mean, for the most part.  Over Thanksgiving break she discovered Daddy's iPad from school.  She loves it and calls it the "Do".  I'm not certain why, my best guess is that I turn it on for her and ask her what she wants to do (not every time, to my recollection, I did that once, and it's been the "do" ever since).  Luckily we have Nate's old iPhone that we've been using as an iPod that's just a smaller "do" when Daddy's is at school.  Nate put some free baby apps on it and that's what she plays with.  All the apps are similar, they are based on a song (Twinkle, twinkle, ABCs, etc) and there's one that is a "phone"...I kind of think that's hilarious because it has "apps" like texting and a keypad...she can do that on the iPhone itself, but I suppose it doesn't make noise.  Anyway, her favorite is "Happy" which is the song If You're Happy and You Know It.  I had to buy the song because she loved it so much and after one verse it asks you to buy it or you have to start over and I got tired of continually starting it over for her.  She also likes playing with my phone and even accidentally called Aunt Becky from it.

Over Thanksgiving "Mama" came to visit...Grandma and Grandpa Bartels.  She's been asking for Mama ever since.  We had fun, though Braelyn was a bit under the weather, I think.  She had some stomach issues and now has a runny nose she's recovering from.

We put up the Christmas decorations and she is pretty fascinated with the tree, we always have to have the lights on.  She loves kissing one angel ornament and there is one with a puppy and one with a kitty that she can reach that she likes.  We have three ornaments that make sounds and she often asks to be lifted up to push the buttons.

Thankfully at her 18 month appointment she gained 2 pounds and grew a bit.  Her BMI is in the 2nd percentile because she's tall and skinny.

Three more weeks of school and then Christmas break!  We are looking forward to flying to Nebraska and seeing both our families while there. 

More Pictures

Here's some pictures of what Braelyn's been up to over the past few days.  The first is her "art" book.  I happened to have a sketch book lying around and it has now become her scribble book.  She scribbles with pen, pencil, and we introduced colored pencil today.  She also paints in it with our bingo daubers.  That's dangerous.  We also bought her some color wonder markers and paper (the markers only color on that paper).  She likes it, but we also found that she likes to bite the tips of the markers off.  Oh well.  And we bought some sidewalk chalk for her to use outside.

 

Here we are in our swimming suit trying to swim on a blustery 70 degree day.  Crazy girl.  We need to throw out the pool as it has a crack that makes it leak.

 

You'll have to excuse the nudity.  This is Braelyn's favorite outfit and she loves to try on Mommy's shoes.  She actually walks in them better than I do, probably. 

Finally, she picked out this outfit the other day after I did her laundry (well, not ALL the outfit).  I can almost never wash this outfit because whenever she sees it she has to put on at least the pants part of it.  It's a tank top either dress or really long shirt with bloomers underneath.  It was way too cold for that on this day, so I made her wear the only pair of leggings we have (soccer ball print with ruffles on the bottom) and a jacket.

We also went to the pumpkin patch last Saturday to pick out pumpkins.  Nate took a picture or two, so I'll have to post it once I get motivated enough to get pictures off the camera and onto my computer.  The pumpkin patch is at Gilcrease Orchard, where you can also pick your own apples and vegetables, so we got some granny smith apples along with our two pumpkins.  I made an apple pie.

We will carve one pumpkin and she'll get to finger paint the other, probably this weekend since we have a three day weekend (yay, Nevada Day!).  We decided since we don't really plan on taking her trick-or-treating (she doesn't need the candy), we aren't going to do a costume, just a halloween shirt.  We are getting out the cooler weather clothes today and I had to go buy her some long sleeve pajamas.  We didn't have any in 12 month size, which she's still wearing.  We did put her in some pants she wore last winter and they were pretty high water, so we may need to size up in those for length (though they were 6-12 month, not 9-12 month, so maybe that makes a difference?).  We go to the doctor again on Nov 2nd for her 18 month appointment and shots.

Nate's last regular season game is today, thank goodness.  Playoffs start next week and they made it to playoffs (they are 2nd? in league.  I don't know for sure.)  The home game last week was an exciting one...there was a "fight"...a player from the other team tried to fight our players, who just stood there and walked away, so not a big deal, except their JV team rushed the field.  It was too bad because that ended the game and it was tied, with the 1st place team in league.  Nate was sad they couldn't finish the game because they would have had a free kick they could have scored on, potentially and it was the last 2-4 minutes of the game, and if they would have won they would have been 1st in league.  Oh well. 

Pictures

Nate took these...the one with the hat is at Target, and no, we do not own a sparkly pink beret, nor do we want one. :)

It's been a while...

Yes, it's been a while since my last post.  I guess we aren't taking so many pictures anymore...that and it's a pain in the butt to upload them to my computer.  Things are going well.  I'm teaching every other day for full days this year and it is WONDERFUL!  I love having the whole day at school and I love having the whole day with Braelyn.  Braelyn has lots of fun at Autumn's, sometimes she isn't too eager to go home when I pick her up.  In fact, yesterday Autumn was gone to be with her father on the anniversary of her brother's death and we had a friend watch Braelyn...she cried when I carried her out of the house!  She had lots of fun crawling up and down the stairs at their house.  We went to the first half of the football game last night and all she wanted to do was go up and down the stairs on the bleachers, so we didn't stay too long.

Nate is super busy with soccer.  This week I was pretty much a single parent as he had late practice every day except one and the one day he had a game that went very late as well.  Ug.  Oh well.  We went to go see him one afternoon and brought him some treats from a German bakery we found.

Braelyn's eating a bit more.  She mostly likes snacks.  Her favorites that she almost never refuses and actually goes and gets for me are macaroni and cheese, peanut butter, and strawberries.  She also loves sweets and chips (just like mommy), which we try to keep away from her.

She says a few more words...hi (though not often), stinky ("sti")...that one's when she has a poopy diaper.  I think there's some others.  She repeated "eggs" to me the other morning.

The above are pictures of Braelyn after swimming.  She HAS to have the towel wrapped around her like a cape.  Braelyn loves water and being naked/in a swimsuit.  To the point where she goes outside and tries to pull off her clothes to play in the water.  I'm thinking we'll get her a water/sand table for Christmas.  She also really loves to climb or try to climb stuff.  We are in full-fledged toddler mode.  Into everything, mad when I won't let her get into things.  She is tallish (average for her age, but taller than some of the other babies at school her age), but skinny.  I'm guessing I'll get yelled at by the doctor at her 18 month appointment next month since she won't have gained much weight.

Summer fun

I haven't posted in a while!  We've been busy.  We got some Groupons or Living Social deals to Red Rock Station and Aliante Station to stay for a few days so we went and had fun.  Braelyn loved the pools.  Hopefully I'll get some pictures up.  We had fun alternating playing Bingo after Braelyn went to sleep. ;)  Now we are just working on some home improvements with the time we have left until school starts

Braelyn had her 15 month appointment in July.  She grew two inches in height but gained only 2 ounces in weight from 12 months.  She's a busy girl though and hasn't been into eating food a whole lot.  She's since started eating quite a bit with hot dogs being a favorite.  A close second are the dog jerky treats, which we are trying to discourage.  We thought maybe we need to get some beef jerky for some Braelyn treats, but we'll see.  She's very into her book of animals lately.  She says meow, duck, and can sniff like a rabbit.  She also tells Hunter to sit quite a bit, which he doesn't follow.  She can say Daddy and says "all done" or just "done", though it could also be "gone", not sure which.  She does hand motions with it that Nate does for all gone, so I'm not sure.  She uses it for done though, especially when taking a bath.

Braelyn is really into playing with water.  She can drink from the hose without getting completely wet and she loves to step and play in the large water dish we have outside for Hunter.  She likes being up high too, on the counter, on the raised bed in our backyard, or even on top of the refrigerator.  She takes hold of my finger and drags me to whatever she wants to do/get.  We've got one more molar to go and all four canines and then hopefully we'll be done with teeth for a while!

It will be interesting starting daycare and school again.  She doesn't remember Autumn when we see her at church, so I'm sure there will be some adjusting again.  I'm looking forward to working every other day!

5x7 Folded Card

Lovely Branches Green 5x7 folded card

Shutterfly custom Valentines Day and Mother's Day cards.

View the entire collection of cards.

Random pictures from the ipod

Here are some pictures... One of them is from today...she had a good eating day and she obviously likes chocolate more than her father! We got her a big girl car seat a while back which there is a picture of too.

Vacation time!

Before I start on our grand California vacation, I just noticed that the blog had 23 views today.  I don't really think that 23 people read this, so I'm a bit astounded by that.  Maybe they just come on and leave.  I don't know how that's tabulated.  Anyway, shocking.

So we went to California.  I have a love/hate relationship with that.  I love that there's so much to do there that is neat.  I love the weather.  I hate the drive.  I hate the traffic (yes, those are almost the same thing).  I hate the amount of people there.  We took this trip a bit last minute because Nate found tickets to an LA Galaxy game on Living Social and this was the only date (Father's day) that the game didn't start at 7:30pm.  Also, since he's a student at Concordia Irvine right now he gets discounted tickets to Sea World and Universal Studios, so we decided to take advantage of that before he's no longer a student there.  I was dreading the trip, and it turned out OK.

Word to the wise, Nate gets road rage when there's traffic and tries to use his cruise control even when there's a bajillion cars on the road and he's going to have to keep quitting cruise control every 5 seconds.  This is why I typically drive to/in California.

We got to the soccer game late because of the traffic on the way to LA.  What we saw of it was great.  It was fun, not bad being outside, and I got to see David Beckham and Landon Donovan, which was kind of neat.  It would have been way more fun to see them up close.

Braelyn at the soccer game (after it was over)

David Beckham

Father's Day picture!

The next day we went to Universal Studios.  I don't care for Universal Studios that much.  Nate had never been, so I figured he shouldn't feel like he's missing out.  Thank goodness we didn't pay full price for the tickets because it's basically a bunch of photo ops and shows.  There are a few rides, but since Nate doesn't like any fun rides, he didn't go on any of them.  I went on The Mummy ride, which wasn't that exciting anyway, so it was kind of a bust.  Braelyn did have fun with the female Woody the Woodpecker (I have no idea what her name is) and got a little scared by Curious George.  She also did not care for the Studio Tour tram ride (all the fun parts were too scary because the tram jerked around so much), but she did like the animal show, but got upset because she wanted to pet the dogs.  I will say that Universal has excellent customer service.  They also are excellent at providing for their guests with lots of misting fans and shade.  Way better than Disneyland and Sea World.

At Universal, I think after the female woodpecker meeting

This was at the children's play area at Universal.  Funny face!

Watching the animal show.

That last picture of the Universal sign...this guy asked us to take his picture with his wife or girlfriend or whoever she was by the sign.  So then we asked him to take our picture.  Seriously, three times he took the picture of ONLY the sign, not us.  We could have done that ourselves.  Thanks buddy.

The next day we trekked to San Diego to go to Sea World.  I've also been there before, but Nate hasn't and it was really great.  However, all the shows are now "shows" as in great production values.  It's nice, but I kind of liked it when the animals just show you all the tricks they can do and we don't have to have lots of Cirque du Soliel type stuff with it.  Braelyn loved the aquarium parts where she could stand and touch the glass.  She wasn't too impressed with the shows.  In fact, she actually fell asleep (I don't know how) during the actual Cirque show they have--meaning it's a show that only features acrobats, no animals.  It was good, and pretty neat since it was actually on the edge of the ocean.  It got cold there in the evening!

At the sea turtle exhibit, Braelyn's favorite

Touching sea stars at the tide pool exhibit

The Cirque show set

The last day before we went home Nate insisted upon taking Braelyn to the beach so she could experience the ocean.  She doesn't care too much for sand in general (she's been in a couple of sandboxes) but she liked walking on the beach on the part where there was wet sand.  She wasn't in love with the water part of the ocean (just got her feet and legs wet), but she was OK with it after a while.

She's walking well, still a bit clumsy and trips over lots of stuff, but that's to be expected.  She's into shoes a lot more.  She still doesn't eat much, but she is getting all four molars and I think even a canine so I'm sure her mouth doesn't feel really good right now.  She's "talking" a lot more too, but I can't understand much of it, though I think she tries to say bye and woof.  She also knows that if I say food is hot that she should blow on it.  And, she certainly knows how to express that she wants something!

And she's off...

Braelyn is officially a walker!  She can stand up on her own (without holding onto anything) and she walks around a bit...still not super confident with it, but she does well.  She LOVES holding onto a hand and walking around in circles.  It's her favorite.  Nate took a video on his phone of her walking, but I can't upload it here...yet.  Maybe at some point I'll be able to.  I also thought I posted some pictures from my ipod yesterday but apparently not.  I'll have to try again soon.

13 months and counting

Braelyn is on the move and having lots of adventures.  So I figured it was about time to update everyone and share more pictures.  We've had a stressful week...on Monday I was told that I will have to be full time next year, so we agonized over the decision making of whether I would stay teaching or quit and stay home.  Then the other part time math teacher who was told the same thing pitched the idea of both of us taking only 3 classes next year so the school could combine the other half of our positions for a full time teacher.  The school took her idea, so next year I will still be part time.  I'm not sure what will happen after that, I know our CEO wants to eliminate part time positions as much as possible, they only did this because they felt bad for dropping this decision on us with three weeks left in the school year.  So we will see, but it's a relief that I can still work but also still be around a lot for Braelyn...though she's really happy at Autumn's too!

Braelyn is getting ready to be walking...she's taken a few steps at a time.  I think she's gotten to the point where she wants to walk but isn't quite ready to do it all the time.  I think our floor tiles have something to do with that.  She did walk across her room from Nate to me this morning.  She has doubled the amount of teeth she has to a total of 8.  She was doing better with eating but that's gone back downhill lately.  On Mother's Day she ate an entire hot dog for dinner, but hasn't repeated that appetite since.  She has started sleeping a bit better.  Some nights she only wakes once, so hopefully she'll just keep improving in that area.  I think we'll have to get a new car seat soon.  She's nowhere near the weight limit for the infant one, but she's getting too tall for it, I think.  She's also babbling a lot more and said mama the other day when I was reading her a book that had that word with a picture of a mom holding a baby.  Don't know if she really meant it or if she was just babbling since she doesn't call for me.  She does say dada too, but again, she doesn't really call for Nate or say it to Nate yet.

Over Mother's Day weekend we went to stay near Zion National Park.  We got a deal through Living Social for a "resort" on the East side of Zion, which we didn't research where it was beforehand and we would have planned things differently if we knew we had to drive through the entire park to get there.  Oh well.  We had fun and we didn't realize when we planned it that it was over Mother's Day so it turned out to be a nice little vacation to celebrate.  Here's some pictures...

I have no idea what these two are from or why she's only wearing a diaper.  But you can see her getting to standing, I guess.  Thought they were cute.

 Braelyn and Daddy by the river in Zion.

Braelyn getting her feet wet.

She fell asleep with her baby while we hiked for a bit on a paved trail.  People thought it was pretty funny when they looked in the stroller and saw two babies.

Family picture in Zion.  Braelyn is pointing at the camera.  She loves to point at things, even if she doesn't actually want or know what she is pointing at.

Here's our cabin at the "resort".  It was actually pretty nice.

Braelyn and Daddy swimming in the pool at the resort.  She actually liked it quite a bit even though the pool was quite chilly.  She had lots of fun.

She also had lots of fun when we miniature golfed at the resort.  She thought the golf balls and holes were hilarious.

Can you see that I smashed a muffin in the carpet our last morning in the cabin?  Yay.  She did actually start eating more food on our trip.

She also really enjoyed swinging at the playground at our resort.

The roosters crowing at the resort.

One of the two tunnels we went through four times while driving back and forth in Zion National Park.  This one was pretty neat inside.

We stopped at the Cracker Barrel for lunch in St. George, Utah on the way back to Vegas and Braelyn found this "chair" and thought it was cool.  We went ahead and bought what is really a plant stand for her because it was on clearance for only $9.  Now to get her to stop climbing on it and to learn how to actually sit on it. :)

First birthday!

Well, Braelyn's first birthday weekend started off rather bad...Saturday we had to take Nate's car in for it's second battery since February.  And we had to take Howie back to the adoption place we got him from.  He had been a little aggressive toward Braelyn before, so we'd always been a bit nervous about having him around her.  However, the final decision was made because he got in a fight with Hunter which left them both a bit bloody, so we knew that this was not the best place for him and it was best for our family that he go.  The adoption place we got him from requests that you don't find the dog a new home, but you give them back to them.  So we did that.  I feel really bad that we had to do that, but I'm sure it was the right decision.
Here's one last picture of all our "children". :)

After lunch we went to go get her 12 month pictures taken at JC Penneys.  We hadn't gone to this particular location before and apparently they are much busier than the one we usually go to.  We had to wait about an hour for her pictures past the time we were supposed to go, but at least she smiled for some of them and we got a family picture which no one will ever see where we are all happy, but I look like a freak (perhaps that's my normal look, right Christian??).  We got a couple of really cute ones that family will be getting...

Today was her birthday and possibly her best day in the church nursery yet!  She still cried when I left, but she actually got down and played with the other kids.  Then she took a nap on the way home and was still napping after we got home.  We had hamburgers, potato salad, baked beans, jello, and peas for lunch (Braelyn "had" all that, but didn't actually eat much of it...she enjoyed playing with it) and then Braelyn had her cake.  We got her a individual sized "Nothing Bundt Cake" carrot cake with cream cheese frosting.  I don't exactly know why Nate wanted to get that cake instead of me making one, but oh well.  It is really good cake.  I think it was his excuse to get a white chocolate raspberry one for himself.  

This is what Braelyn thought of lunch.

 Braelyn trying to touch the birthday candle.

 Eating some cake.

 Smashing some cake.

 Getting ready to dive in face first (no that is not all that is left of the cake, we took away at least half of it and she didn't even actually eat this part).

"Eating" the cake off the tray.

 All of her birthday presents.

 Her favorite present, a musical remote.

 Dancing to the music.

 An outfit from the Grandparents Hagge.

 A toy from Mommy and Daddy.

 This was a hilarious face.  On this toy, you can put balls through a hole on top.  Braelyn kept putting her hand through the hole and trying to get the balls out that way, which of course she couldn't...she had the biggest surprised face while trying to do that.