I'm An Aunt Again!

Dawn and Josh with Xander

Xander J Davis was born on 7-22-11

6 lbs 13 oz

20 1/2 inches

Baby Xander evens things out for me.
I now have 5 nieces and 5 nephews!

Morning Ritual

Every morning I greet Dutch with: "Good morning, Dutchie. How did you sleep? Did you have good dreams?"

This morning Dutch woke me up with: "Mornin', Daddy. How sleep? Good dreams?"

Pretty cute. [And yes, Dutch calls me, his Mama, Daddy.]

A List for Tuesday

5 Things You Might Not Know About Sweet Baby Dane
1. He smiles all the time and has the sweetest smile in the world!
2. When I turn on the light or open the curtain he turns his face toward it. He's like a little sunflower.
3. I can count on one hand the number of hard days or nights that we've had.
4. He gets the hiccups. A lot.
5. His little body is in almost constant motion. Sometimes it wears me out seeing how much he moves!


5 Things You Might Not Know About Dutchie
1. His favorite color is orange (but it might be because it's one of the only colors he can say).
2. Every morning he brings out his train tracks and sets up an elaborate course to play on for the day.
3. He's talking so much more! I can still only understand about 20% of what he says, but at least he's talking.
4. If there are peaches in the house he won't eat any other fruit.
5. When we watch a show he always likes to have a blanket on him, not to keep him warm, but just to snuggle with.


5 Things You Might Not Know About Bo
1. His muzzle and paws are turning gray.
2. He's getting crotchety in his "old" age. His tolerance for shenanigans is much lower than it used to be and he gets annoyed a lot easier.
3. In addition to being blind he is now going deaf. He barks at just about anything, real or not.
4. He prefers people food to dog food.
5. Instead of sleeping at the foot of my side of the bed he now prefers to sleep on the couch (which makes me sad).

My Mama's Super Power

Did you know that my mom has a super power? She has the power to make babies go to sleep. This may not seem like a great gift, but if you've ever had a fussy baby you know that my mom can magically get them to calm down and relax. The picture below is Dane lounging on her, helping her demonstrate her super power.

My Pink Blankie

A long long time ago, I'm not sure how many years, my grandmother made me a pink silky blankie. And I love it. Unfortunately for me, someone else loves it too:

These are just a few examples of the blanket theft that I have to endure on a daily basis. Do you know the last time I got to sleep with my pink blankie? Me neither!

So, coming to the point, who would like to make Dutch his own adult-sized silky blankie? Don't all line up at once now!

Zoo Buddies

Here are some pictures from the zoo day that we took when my sister Heidi was visiting. We had so much fun!

Dutch and Anneke on the wooden horses.

 Lukers on the carousel.

 I love this one because Anneke loved watching her reflection in the mirrors! You can also see Sara and Dutch on the left-hand side.

 This is Heidi standing next to Luke. This picture makes me laugh because it took me like 20 tries to get a good picture of anyone. Most of them ended up like this!

 Marcus on his elephant.

 Sara and Dutch.

Sara has become my "zoo nanny."
I don't ever go to the zoo without her!

My dad and Mo on the bald eagle. I just want to squish her!

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Today my dad became an old old man. He's 60! I love you Daddy!

(P.S. I chose this picture because it shows what an awesome grandpa my dad is and it is also photographic proof of just how crazy my niece Mo's hair is!)

Pictures of the Boys!

Here are my 6 favorite pictures of the boys that were taken last week. Hope you enjoy!

 I like this one because of his scrumptious double-chin!

Look at that face!

 Isn't he so handsome?

 I love his smile.

 Wearing their "Big Brother" and "Little Brother" shirts that Aunt Cari bought them.

A List for Tuesday

5 Things I Need to Blog About

1. Fourth of July
2. Visit to Farm Country at Thanksgiving Point
3. Hogle Zoo
4. Heidi & Co's visit
5. Mama and Daddy's visit

All of these things have happened in the last couple of weeks and I'm WAY behind! I'm glad that I blogged about the baby blessing when I did or I might have forgotten it all!

Dane's 2-Month Well-Baby Visit; Dutch's 3-Year Doctor Appointment

We have a little guy on our hands! Here are a few statistics about our Sweet Baby Dane:

• Weight: 11 lbs 3 oz; this puts him in the 50%
• Length: 22 inches; this puts him in the 10%
• Head circumference: 38 cm; this puts him in the 10%
• He weighs more than Dutch did at this age, but has gained less weight, if that makes sense
• He is shorter than Dutch was at this age too, but his head is the exact same size (Dutch has always had a small head)
• Poor Dane had to get lots of vaccines yesterday. Luckily Chris was with me so I was able to leave the room. I can't handle getting shots and I hate for my boys too, but I know that vaccines are important and don't get me started on the idiots who don't vaccinate.

Now for our Dutch-Boy; my big three year old!

• Weight: 44 lbs 4 oz; this puts him off-the-chart for his age-group
• Height: 42 inches (we had to guess because he wouldn't let the nurse measure him); this puts him off-the-charts for his age-group
• Basically our guy is the size of a 4- or 5-year-old
• He, luckily, did not have to get any vaccines or shots today; which made me very happy
• Dr Lash tentatively diagnosed him with something called Pervasive Developmental Disorder-Not Otherwise Specified (PDD-NOS); it just basically encompasses Dutch's speech difficulties and recognizes he has a few autism symptoms (lack of eye contact, awkward social behavior, etc.)

All in all our boys are doing really well and we feel lucky and blessed. The last few days have been a whirlwind of family fun and I will try to blog about it soon. For now I am going to sleep and recover! ;)

Dane's Baby Blessing

This is how Dane spent most of the day today.

My little fellow is so mellow!

Today was Dane's baby blessing. Chris and I chose to do it today for a couple of reasons: It's a long weekend, and Dutch's birthday is tomorrow. Why not kill two birds with one stone? So a HUGE chunk of family and friends descended on the Singles Ward where my father-in-law is in the Bishopric.

It was an amazing day! There were so many people I loved there and it was a truly overwhelming experience to see so many people who cared about us all in one place. Chris did a beautiful job on the blessing (his mother, who was taking it down in short-hand, scolded him for talking so quickly and using so many big words).

After the blessing our HUGE group of people descended on my in-laws home where we had lunch and cake and celebrated both of my boys. Dutch got to open presents and had so much fun! He also decided, before everyone had even gotten there, that pants were for suckers and took his off. Luckily he got a pair of swim shorts for his birthday that he wanted to put on or he would have been part-naked all day!

Here is a (probably incomplete) list of people who were at the blessing today: 

Chris, Pam, Dutch, Dane

Mama (Beckie), Daddy (Clyde)

Mom (Kellie), Dad (Greg)

Grandma Davis, Grandpa Davis

Grandpa Morgan

Popi, Doreen

Heidi, Marcus, Anneke, Luke, Mallory

Josh, Dawn

Zaque

Machelle, Amy

Aunt Pat

Aunt Cathy, Libby

Matt, Holly, Ashlyn, Savannah

Aunt Marianne

Julianna, Jared, Thomas

Sara, Dallin

Christina

Katherine, Mitchell, Joseph, Annabelle

Samantha, Athena

Hayden, Harper

Clarissa, Cambria

Cat

Julie (who is the only non-family member to be at both Dutch's and Dane's baby blessings)

I was worried we wouldn't have enough food, but I don't think anyone went away hungry! Here are a few more pictures from the day. I'm so sad for those of you who couldn't be here, and so grateful to those that were!

 Popi's and Heidi's shoulders, Jared, Julianna, Daddy

 An awesome shot of Heidi!

 Hayden, Harper (4 days younger than Dane), Josh, Dawn, Grandpa Morgan

 Cat, Julie

 Anneke, Thomas (1 week older than Dane), Lukers

 Athena and Samantha

 Savannah

 Ashlyn

 Christina and Dallin, both caught unawares

 Amy, Zaque (making that face on purpose), Dane

 Dane being held by Uncle Josh

Mama, Heidi

 Marcus, Dane, Joseph

Dutch opening a present, back of Luke's head

Most awesome picture of the day:

Zaque helping Dane pick his nose

Pictures By Dutch

One of Dutch's favorite things to do is to take my camera and photograph the world around him. Lots of these shots are of hands and fingers, of course, but every once in a while he'll take some "good" pictures. The following are from our Davis family vacation to Bear Lake and all were taken by Dutch.

Not bad, huh?