Christmas Day 2008

All E has asking for Hungry, Hungry Hippos all the time and was so excited for Santa to come and bring him his game. That is seriously the only thing he asked for this year. Around 6:00 he came downstairs without waking us up and got his first glance at what Santa brought. My parents' room is downstairs so my mom was the first one of the scene and she said that he was so hilarious! He kept saying, "Santa came! Santa came! Hungry Hippos! Hungry Hippos!" She sent him back upstairs to get us so we could get the cameras going and capture the moment. I just love the excitement in his face! He also had to check out if Santa ate his treats. I'm not sure when Santa switched from eating cookies to eating Doritos, but that's what E wanted to leave out for him. In addition to Hungry, Hungry Hippos, Santa brought E a tent, some comfy PJs, and then some fun treats in his stockings. The tent has been a lot of fun so far and E has already camped out in it a few times. It's really easy to put up and take down so it's perfect! The Hippos tournaments went on all day and continue even now. We seriously play it all the time! Here is my brother, my dad, and Ry getting in on all the action. Later that morning we all opened presents. E was very excited to give Max the present that he picked out for him. Last week I gave him $10 and took him to Target to pick out a toy for his brother. He actually did a good job and picked out a little pop up type toy for Max to enjoy when he's a little older. The theme of Christmas for us this year was emergency preparedness since I have been feeling a little guilty for not having everything that we should need in an emergency. So Ry and I got these really great 72 hour packs that have everything that a person would need to survive. I seriously feel the pressure lifting. Now all we have to do is get our food storage going...sigh...all in time. Nanny and Papa got E the train set from Geo Trax which he is in love with these days. It's quite a fun toy for him to set up and take down and they also go him his favorite movie, Horton Hears a Who, the first movie he ever saw in the movie theater. He watches it as often as I let him.

After presents we had our Christmas dinner. It's our tradition to always have steak and shrimp. Yum! And then on to more playing, napping, and sports watching. We spent the rest of the afternoon playing, napping, and watching sports our usual Christmas activities. That night, on the way home, we stopped by Ry's parents to see them. E got a really fun sleeping bag and lantern to use with his new tent. He seriously loves the whole camping idea which is somewhat ironic since Ry and I hate camping. I guess camping indoors isn't so bad though. Here's E with G'ma and G'pa
So Christmas this year was really fun and it was so great to be able to spend time with our families!

Christmas Eve 2008

I'm finally getting a chance to sit down, upload pictures, and blog about our Christmas. I'm still not completely uploaded yet since I need to get all the software loaded to my computer for my new digital camera! Yeah! So more pictures to come.

A few days before Christmas, E got a package in the mail from Post cereal. I ate a lot of Cocoa Pebble cereal while I was pregnant and they had a giveaway for one of those Dance Dance Revolution pads. All you had to do is send in a couple of bar codes and $5 and Voila! Anyway...it finally came and E has been loving it!
He especially loves the soccer game that they have on the webiste. It's quite funny to watch him get into it.

Christmas Eve started out with Ry's family coming over and making gingerbread houses. It was especially fun since my sister in law's family was visiting from Australia. In this picture it's Aaron (my brother in law), me, Matt (my brother in law), Kendall (my cousin), Molly (my sister in law), Michelle (my sister in law's sister), Teana (my sister in law), and Ben (my nephew)...I hope that all made sense. We all had a lot of fun constucting all sorts of candy creations. I swear Aaron's looked like a fortress of something. E wanted nothing but to eat all the candy which he did and continued to do when everyone left. He would pick candy off his house and sneak away. That little stinker! Grammie came to watch all the fun festivities and E has such a ball with her! He just loves his Grammie!

After gingerbread it was quiet time for the kids while we packed our bags and Christmas presents in the car and got things ready for our next holiday activitiy. That evening we went over to Uncle Jerry and Aunt Tanya's for their Christmas eve party/program. We broke out the chimes and E got a little bit of help from Papa Then it was time for the live nativity. All the kids get a part in the nativity and get to dress up and act it out. This year, E was a wise man and Max was the baby Jesus.
I sang Max the part from "Away in a Manger" that "no crying he makes" so he needed to be nice and quiet during the nativity, but that didn't happen. So we adjusted the Nativity a little and Mary had a "midwife" named Suzy to help him stop crying.
We told E to kneel down when he got to the baby Jesus so this picture was him kneeling. So cute!

After all those fun festivities, we drove down to my parents so we could spend the night there. Before we put E to bed, he set out some treats for Santa and a carrot for Rudolph. He was so excited that Santa was coming that he could hardly contain himself. I love this age! Christmas pictures to come...

3 Months!

Maxwell hit his 3 month mark on the 22nd so I didn't get to record anything due to the holiday festivities. He's starting to come out of the colic so the crying jags aren't so frequent. Glory day! He's smiling and cooing a lot and loves his swing still. He's also started sitting in his bumbo and loves the view. His sleep patterns aren't great, but they have gotten better than before. He wakes up about every 3 hours for the first 6 hours of the night and then he's up every hour after that and is awak by 6 or 7. Why do I have early rising children and children that don't sleep? We've got his appointment set up for his 4 month check up at the end of January and then he'll be able to start solids! Wow! I can't believe it's coming up so fast. I better break out the cuisinart and start my purees!

Personal History: End of Purdue Years

The last year of MBA school, I turned 1 and out sprouted my insanely curly hair that I inherited from my great grandma Munson. I guess I've always had a lot of hair, but it just came in more and more as I got older. My mom would just have to get it wet and wrap it around her finger and it would make perfect little ringlets. My dad called it "wash and wear."
One of my favorite things to do during the day was emptying out drawers. Not only would I empty them, but I would climb in and sit and look at the lovely mess that I made.
Another favorite pastime that I had was playing out on the playground. I loved swinging on the swings and my mom would swing me for so long that I would fall asleep. I also loved going down the slide and I eventually got brave enough to go down by myself. My mom would also bring the stroller out, not to push me, but for me to push around. This is me making the rounds.

Sunday Best

My boys just looked so cute this morning so I had to snag a picture. E was in a funny mood so he gave me a couple of poses.

Personal History: Baby Brittany...continued

So I went along my first 6 months crying like crazy. Then one day something changed and I suddenly stopped crying and became a dream child...except for the fact that I didn't sleep through the night until I was 18 months old.


I was really easy to take anywhere and my parents pretty much did that. We went on trips to Nauvoo and out to Idaho to go see family.

I guess I understand now why my son loves corn dogs. This is me stealing a bite from my Grandpa Call's lunch.

Personal History: Baby Brittany-The First Few Months

None of this is from my memories so I've had to call upon a few people to tell me a little bit about what life was like when I was a baby. I was born on October 8, 1982. My dad had an exam that day and the only way he could get out of it is if he brought the birth announcement from the newspaper that he actually had a child that day. Crazy! My mom had me a' naturel and I was born sometime around 10:30 in the morning.

I was any new mother's worst nightmare. I was completely colicky and could not be consoled for the first 6 months of my life. My mom tried just about any rememdy, holding method, or contraption to get me to be comfortable. I rarely slept and if I did it was in my car seat in the car or in the swing.
I guess I spit up a ton too. My poor mother! My mom also lived away from all her family and her husband was in school full time and as you can tell from the exam example, he was pretty busy. My grandma came out right after I was born for a couple weeks to help my mom out(this is me with my Grandma Call). I think my mom bawled when her mom left.
My parents lived in married student housing at the time so they were living apartment life. This is where we lived for the duration of MBA school.
My mom had to just walk to the floor with me at night so my dad could get enough sleep for school and so everyone that lived around them would too. She told me she used to look out at all the windows in the quad and see all the lights out and think that she was only one in that entire place that was up and how lucky they were to be sleeping. I'm definately sympathetic with my mom these days since I am blessed with a baby just like me.

This is me on my first Christmas. My parents made the trip back out to Idaho for my first Christmas, I was almost 3 months old. Go Boilermakers!

Personal History: The Beginning

Okay, I've really felt prompted to do this for myself and posterity purposes to put in my blog book so here's my attempt at recording my personal history. I'm not really sure how to do this exactly, but I'm going to try.

In The Beginning...My Parents:
My parents both grew up in Rigby, Idaho where they both lived on dairy farms and my dad's family also had a dry farm up by the Snake River.

I think my parents ended up having a geometry class together in high school when my mom was a sophomore and my dad was a senior, but didn't really meet until my dad came over with a friend who was dating my Aunt Debbie. My mom asked him to a girls' choice dance at the end of her sophomore year and they started dating after that. There were so many funny dance pictures to choose from, but I loved this picture. Classic! Oh and you can't forget the photo booth pictures! Don't they look like fun parents? I guess things never change with age. After my dad graduated he was called to serve a mission in Thailand and my mom waited the whole 2 years for him while she went to Ricks. My Dad came home and went to BYU and they got engaged the Christmas after he got home and were married May 30, 1980. After they got married, my mom moved down to Provo and worked as a secretary while my Dad went to school.

He graduated from BYU with his bachelors (my mom was pregnant with me at the time) and got accepted to start MBA school at Purdue in the Fall. I came along at the beginning of MBA school on October 8, 1982...that's where the fun begins...

Jackson

Going to Jackson was so much fun and yet it was so weird to go back. I had forgotten a lot of it but it all immediately came back as we started driving around. I was taking picture like crazy. I lived in Jackson back in 1993-1996 so the last time I was there was 12 years ago and I was only 13 years old! I made a list of all the places I wanted to go see, but I told myself that I wouldn't look at the map so I could see if I remembered how to get around or not. I just kept telling Ryan, "This is so weird, this is so weird." Because a lot of things hadn't changed at all. Here's my old house. The yard doesn't look as nice as it did when we lived there and the color of the house has changed, but the neighborhood hadn't changed a bit. I loved our neighborhood since all the houses were on 1 acre lots. So much room to play!


We had lunch at Brooksie's Barn. Talk about true Southern comfort food. They had everything you could think of fried catfish, hush puppies, collard greens, black eyed peas, chicken and dumplings, pulled pork, fried chicken, mashed potatoes, southern green beans and potatoes, etc. It took me back to those times that we'd stop at a little cafe on the way home from skiing on the Tennessee river and have fried catfish.


Here's my elementary school and the playground. I went to 5th grade here and my brother went to 1st through 3rd grade. My mom used to substitute teach here so I'm sure she has fond memories at our elementary school too.


And here is the middle school I went to for 6th grade and half of 7th grade. Good ol' Tigrett Middle School.

On Sunday we went to my old ward and it was so good to see people there! Jackson is such a transient place that there were a lot of families that have moved away, but there were a few people that have stayed and it was so fun to catch up. I seriously felt like I had gone back in time the whole time I was in Jackson. Things that I had totally forgotten suddenly became so familiar again and I got to see places that I haven't been to in years. I even got to see my good friend Sandra! She came by our hotel and spent the afternoon with us. I loved catching up and remembering old times. I loved how she said it...we're all still similiar to our 13 year old selves, just not quite so perky. Thanks Sandra!!!

Memphis Trip

We just got back from our little "vacation" to Memphis, but I'm not sure if you could really call it a vacation...we tried though. I don't think that now is really the best time to try to take your kids on a trip in the middle of winter. Max isn't the quietest baby and he doesn't sleep well so staying in a hotel, surrounded by sleeping people...not good. Then keeping a 3 year old child cooped up in a hotel room is asking for trouble. If the weather was nicer then we could have gone out on walks or gone to the zoo or something, but it was freezing cold and rained/snowed. What made it all worth it was being able to spend time with Ry and for the opportunity to go back to Jackson.

E loved staying in his "super secret bed" (the pull out bed) and picking out his own breakfast every morning at the continteal breakfast. So much fun! In the evenings we spent time with Ry and went out to dinner together. We tried a lot of the BBQ places and they were very very good, but I think we're all BBQ'd out for a long time. One night we took E to the mall so he could meet Santa and that was hilarious! He told him whole list....hungry hungry hippos (that's it)...and talked to him a little bit and gave the cheesiest grin for their camera. If the pictures weren't $20 then I would have bought it. Our last night we drove around downtown Memphis and got to see all the lights. That was the night that E fell asleep on the car ride to dinner and didn't wake up until 6 o'clock the next morning. That NEVER happens!

So it was great to go on a trip with the hubby and kids and be able to spend time with him while he worked on the road, but it wasn't quite a relaxing trip due to the season of life that we're in right now.

Post about Jackson to come...

My Childhood Memories

I've been thinking a lot lately about my childhood and I think that I should start recording my memories on my blog as my "personal history." Every so often I think I'll do a few posts about my earliest memories and include some fun picutres and what not to include in my annual blog book. This jump on the memories all started when Ry introduced the idea that I come with him on one of his business trips to Memphis so the town I grew up in is only about 1 1/2 hours away. So I pulled out my old journals and started to relive those old days. As child I moved around a lot and I tend to remember things by the place we lived, not necessarily by age. This is the breakdown of how old I was and where we lived:
1982-1984-Age:0-18 months--West Lafayette, Indiana (my dad was getting his MBA at Purdue)
1984-1986: Age 18 months-3 years--Columbus, Ohio
1986-1990: Age 3 years- 7 years (1st grade)--Perrysburg, Ohio
1990-1993: Age 7 years (1st grade)- Age 10 (4th grade)--Hazleton, Pennsylvania
1993-1996: Age 10 (5th grade)- Age 13 (7th grade)--Jackson, Tennessee
1996-1997: Age 13 (7th grade)- Age 14 (8th grade)--Anderson, South Carolina
1997-2001: Age 14 (9th grade)- Age 18 (HS graduate)--Perrysburg, Ohio
After I graduated I went out to BYU, got married, and then we moved out to San Jose, California and now we're down here living in Dallas. Quite a bit of moving for a person. Get ready for some childhood memories and just skip over those posts if they're boring to you. So anyway...I got a chance to visit Jackson, TN this weekend and it was great! More to come...

A Typical Day/Night

During this past conference I was really touched when President Monson talked about enjoying the time of life that we're in and how quickly things change. It really hit me when he talked about how all the little fingerprints that I clean up everyday will someday be gone. So every time I see little fingerprints I tend to cherish them as I wipe them away. Anyway...I want to remember what the "typical" stuff that we do since a lot of times I post about all the fun and interesting things. So here is a typical day in our lives...
5:30- Max is up and gets in bed with me and we sleep a little longer
6:00- E is up and wants a show or breakfast (Ry gets up with him unless he's out of town)
7:00- I'm up and get the baby fed, changed, and put him in his bouncy seat so I can get some things done
-get E breakfast if he hasn't already had it
-put in a load of laundry, unload the dishwasher, clean up something
-check the list of things to do
8:30- Max takes a nap in his swing
-E plays in his toy room, we read books, he watches a show, or he's getting into trouble
-I'm playing with E or getting something done

This is where the day gets unpredictable. The baby takes short naps sometimes and other times his naps are long. You can never tell what it's going to be like. So I try to get some E time in or something done around the house while he's napping. The day is filled with feeding, burping, changing, naps, playing, laughing, time outs, phone calls, reading, tummy time, favorite shows, baths, cleaning, eating, etc. My days are full and my nights are too sometimes, but we're starting to fall into some small form of routine.

E still hasn't been jealous yet and he is very sweet with his brother. He even told me the other day that he wants to go back to the hospital and bring home all the babies. That kind of surprises me, but he really loves his baby brother and I guess he wants more. Yes, my child is wearing shorts in December. He picked this outfit out himself and put it all on by himself. It's part of his summer wardrobe that he's totally grown out of. Whatever floats his boat.

Anyway...Max's sleeping schedule goes a little something like this...
7 or 7:30- down for bed
9:00- I pump and go to bed
11:00 or 12:00- Max is up and Ry feeds him the bottle I pumped (or I'm up if Ry's out of town)
2:00- my turn for feeding and I'll be up the rest of the night
3 or 3:30- he's up again
4:30 or 5:00- he up again
5:30- he's in bed with me and I'm tired
So we get a great 4-5 hour stretch at the beginning of the night and then I'm basically up for the rest of the night with him. What's the deal? It would be perfect if he could do another 4-5 stretch after the 2:00 feeding and that would be awesome! All in time I guess. I can't complain, I usually get to sleep til 1 or 2 so that is soooo nice!

So this is what life is like for us right now with a 3 year old and a 2 month old. Things change so quickly so it's fun to go back and see where we were and how far we've come. So this post is basically just for me, but for other moms out there going through the same thing it might make you feel like there is someone out there experiencing the same sleepless nights and busy days. So for all of you out there...enjoy it!