new trick

random, but you have to watch. It's just 6 sec. this came out of no where, so i had to get it on video.

and this is a quick 2 sec one.

Hallelujah!

Isaac slept through the night last night!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9 hours in a row w/o a peep!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I had pumped at work so I could get my hair done after work and Steven stuffed Isaac with that milk. Steven looked over and Isaac had fallen asleep on the carpet while Kath and Kim or something was on. Steven took him up to his pack 'n play and he stayed asleep! When I got home at the end of The Office, Isaac woke up. I fed him a little more, then he didn't wake up 'til 6:30!!!!! Steven and I both asked each other if we had heard him in the middle of the night. Dylan, on the other hand, had started crying and Steven just said "calm down, it's okay, go back to sleep" or something like that. (It's too hard to remember details of the middle of the night.) Dylan went right back to sleep. I think Dylan gets night mares occasionally.

Anyway, so I guess letting Isaac cry for over an hour a couple of times the night before paid off. I was actually deep in sleep and Steven had asked if I was going to go in and feed him or if he should pat his back or something and Steven swears I said I was going to get up. I don't remember this. All I remember is hearing him cry and hearing Steven get up so I was relieved and went back to sleep. I still have a cold and am so exhausted and groggy. I was mad when I found out in the morning that my baby had been screaming and Steven couldn't sleep b/c he was sad for Isaac. Isaac is still a little sick too so he probably felt so sad. Steven thought that I had decided to do the tough love routine and hadn't let Steven in on my plan. Steven said he thought "wow, it's harder than I thought, I can't believe Tiffany's really doing this." Poor Isaac was happy in the morning, so I guess it wasn't too traumatizing for the little guy. He's 10 months and 10 days, it's about time!

Keep your fingers crossed for tonight b/c my mom's going to watch them for a while b/c it's Steven's Christmas party. We'll still pick up the kids since Isaac's too hard to predict.

Kiss

This is 28 sec long. Feel free to keep doing something else 'til the end. He finally does the silly kiss face. I like it. He was doing it repeatedly, but then was distracted, of course. He does this when I'm feeding him something some times.

This one's just 6 sec long.

My mom hates wrestling

Dylan loves to play-wrestle. He'll tell Steven "You Batman, I'm Spiderman . . . RAAAAAAAA." We took him to see my brother, Jonathan, wrestle. He's the guy with the really white legs. My brothers, Matt and Martin, wrestled in high school too. Matt even did boxing for a while. This is always what my mom's face looks like. Either this, or covered with both hands. She was holding Isaac, so that's why only one hand is covering her eyes.

Dear Santa

It's Isaac's 1st Christmas, so he needs his Santa picture. I really liked the peppermint trees this year. Santa was so nice. Not creepy at all. He seemed like the nicest man ever. There was one family visiting with him when we got there. Dylan could see how nice Santa was, but had no intention of sitting on his lap. On the way there, he said "I just want to say hi to Santa. I don't want to sit on his lap." And that's just what he did. He gave Santa a high five. Santa gave him and Isaac each a little Christmas rubber ducky. I love that! Much better than a mini candy cane. I respected Dylan's wishes especially since the cost of pictures has doubled since the Easter bunny. Isaac wasn't so lucky. Look closer, did you see he kicked his shoe off when he was kicking and screaming? It was instant. If you buy some pictures, you can take a picture with your own camera. That's all I needed. Just this snapshot for the memory. I hope he'll forget all about it. He has done this scaredy screaming for a couple of other men.

I gave the picture I bought to my Grandma because she has a picture of all of her grandkids on Santa's lap hanging on her tree each year. ___________________________________________

Dylan wrote santa instead. He thought I said Santa was going to GET HIM or something at first and was worried when I asked what he wanted Santa to get him. Then he said that he did want presents. He wants scary toys and bad guys. He plays with Jake and Brent's wrestling figures, so I'm pretty sure that's what he wants. He and the other Dylan mailed their letters together.

Last year one of Santa's elves wrote Dylan back. I hope he does this year too!

November Wedding

Steven's cousin, Harloff, got married to Bessie the day after Thanksgiving. They told/invited us via text message 6 days before. Luckily we had the day off!

Isaac, Dylan, and Harloff and Bessie's son and ring bearer, Raphael

Dylan liked the calimari, see it on his finger? Steven had the idea to decorate the car, but had me act like the best man and do the decorating while once we ordered our yummy food from Charlie's.

Congratulations Harloff, Bessie, Raphael, and baby!

10 Months old

Dear Isaac, You attempt to walk more than you try to crawl, but still get tipsy and end up crawling some. You can stand up all by yourself. You don't need to pull up on anything. You figured it out. You like toys and can put blocks in a giraffe toy (for peek-a-blocks).

You can clap, dance, shake your head, and even repeat "mama" all on command. I think you will want to be a drummer or something. You love drumming and dance at even a hint of music. You were dancing before you could walk, and now that you can walk, your dancing is even better. You get low and bounce with your legs and not just your head and neck. Your smile is the cutest.

You play peek-a-boo with anyone who will smile with you.

You are afraid of adult males even if you should know them. So far, it's been Rob Szasz, Uncle Andre, Grandpa Beckman, and Santa (today). You have warmed up to the first three and we have a great picture of the last guy.

You don't eat much baby food still. Your main nutrition is still nursing. It just looks like you eat everything in sight.

You do SO much better at nights. In fact, last night you slept from 8:30-2:30. I checked on you a couple of times because that is not like you at ALL. 6 hours - I think that's a reccord. It was so hard for me to go to sleep (so I stayed up) because I expected you to wake up. I start missing you when it's been a couple of hours.

You and Dylan just got runny noses, maybe from Malia and Noah, but who knows. I found the humidifier and had it on high last night. Maybe you liked that white noise. I also propped up the legs of your pack 'n play with some books because you had a hard time breathing through your nose the night before. (You were crying and uncomfortable and were up most of the night.) You do sleep in that pack 'n play instead of in my bed now. That's your main milestone for this past month. I go in there about every 2 hours to feed you. It's easier for me to have you in our bed, but it was getting out of control. Daddy couldn't sleep and you didn't take naps by yourself well. You finally stopped your tantrums that could last for over an hour with you standing screaming as loud as you could in a big sweaty upset pitiful mess. This has been harder than potty training Dylan, and you're still getting up too much. I do like going in there to hold you. You're so sweet. I love that you need me. I love that I calm you down as soon as I pick you up. I'm doing what I should have done all along. I rock you in our Costa Rica rocking chair with the boppy pillow. I have just a night light. I should put on lullubys, but I left the CD player at our old church b/c we were using it so it's kinda donated to the youth now. So I sing to you. I sing the 3 verses of "Deliver us" from "The Prince of Egypt" DVD. You've been getting Christmas carols too, of course. You fall asleep in my lap before I'm done with our last alone time of the evening. It's so dumb, but I'm now a little sad that you'll go down on your side sleepily and happily. I know you wake up when I let go and are aware that you're going back to sleep without me. I should be jumping for joy that I don't have to trick you and sneak away. You're growing up I guess.

You're so sweet and I want to be able to cuddle and squish you and smooch your kissable cheeks every single day forever.

My Little Cute Face

For some reason, I call you "Cute Face" some times. Sometimes you say "I not cute." When I ask again you smile and say "Yes I cute." You know it.

You are pretty much all grown up already. I can talk to you just like I would talk to any adult. You understand everything or ask me to clarify if not.

You like school. I think 2 days/week is perfect. I just wish I could be there with you, but that would kinda defeat the main purpose of you going. When I was asking you about what you were thankful for, you started repeating a prayer that you must have learned at school.

"Rabbits and bunnies

Birds that sing,

Thank you God for everything.

Amen."

You kind of sing it and it's catchy. When we pray before a meal, if I ask you to say the prayer, you repeat it. You clasp your fingers too. I've taught you to fold your arms, but as long as you're reverent and cute. I'm loving it.

You get out of bed by yourself w/o asking. That's good because your diaper is usually dry over night. We could put pull ups on but you and Isaac wear the same size 4 diapers. You have had a total of 3 accidents since you were potty trained a couple of months ago. One was that first day, one was at a park with Corrie and you told her you weren't wet. Last week you just didn't make it even though you were on the way to the potty. I think that's pretty good.

You like "bad cartoons." I'm too sleepy to really know what Dad puts on for you. You wake up before I do and watch TV downstairs until I get up. It's a good transition from asking if you can get up out of bed. That would wake us all up. Now you get up and dressed by yourself and wait for Daddy downstairs.

You sing songs now. You have a couple of Christmas songs that you've learned at school and I've taught you some. You start out by saying the last word in each phrase then add on more and more of the lyrics.

You know what Spanish I know. You asked what I was eating last night and I said "helado." You said "I want ice cream too, Mommy." I had to share. Your Spanish-speaking family needs to babysit more maybe:)

You really work on pronunciation now. You used to say something like "Ya-sos" for dinosaurs but now slowly say "Dye---no--sow--wus." You used to say "i-gik" for Isaac but now say it perfectly when you think about it. You still slip and say it the old way but you catch yourself and slow down.

You still like your green blanket. We've told you that you won't be able to suck your thumb when you're 3. Malia's already 3 so it's going to be too soon for you.

You like to go outside to ride your tricycle and to swing. You're a good helper in the yard. You put the branches in the trash and even picked up the oranges that the squirrels had tasted and dropped from one of our trees.

You're a good helper. You whine but I can still reason with you. You still let me hold you and are so fun to play with. You love rough housing with boys bigger than you like your uncles, the Szazs's, Darren, and Daddy. You know not to hit me and are really protective of Isaac. I like how you reason with him too. You are pretty good about getting him an alternate toy before retrieving the one he has that you want.

Happy Thanksgiving

I'm so lucky that Steven's mom and my mom live in the same county. It's a good thing for holidays. We usually go to one house for lunch then the other for dinner. We don't have to alternate holidays. This year we actually combined our two families at my mom's house so we just had one big meal. My dad still wasn't here, but we'll see him for Christmas.

Steven brought his famous sweet potato pie. I made frog eye salad, green bean caserole, and buttermilk pies. I actually cooked late Tuesday night because I would be busy Wednesday and had the Turkey Trot Thanksgiving morning.


This is before everybody got there. This is the kid table. (Where my mom and Don sat too.)
We had about 25 people and did more than just eat. Socializing,
Jumping,
Ping Pong,

Driving, Piano,

This and running around tables and the house were favorites.Happy Birthday, Juliane! We actually put one candle per age on her cake.

As if we needed any more desert!

My grandma made all of these pies and sugar free banana bread for Nana. Well, I made the two buttermilk pies on the right.

We got other pies and cakes as the day went on.

Besides my family and my health and the health of my family, I'm really thankful for my job. I'm so glad that Steven and I are employed. I really like what I do too.

Nativities

I like nativities. When we were first married, I was sad that I didn't even have one, so I started getting some. Now I have a lot. I think I have quantity now, so I need quality some day. Dylan was having fun unwrapping them and placing them up on our entertainment center.

It was too hot for hot chocolate. In fact, it was too hot for the boys to wear clothes. We don't want to turn on the air conditioner at Christmas time.