Christmas 2015

We had a lot of fun this Christmas!

We started the holiday with an evening at the temple visitors' center.  I was performing there as part of a choir so Aaron brought the kids and my parents came too.  It was a kind of rainy evening, but it was still so beautiful there and I, of course, had fun singing in the concert.  Because there were two performances, my parents were kind enough to take the kids back to their house after the first show while Aaron stayed with me for the second.  We were able to spend the night back at our house without the kids and finished up packing and loading the car for Christmas at Grandma and Kookoopa's house before heading out first thing in the morning.

So on Christmas Eve we arrived to find our kids having a blast without us and by brother's family had arrived too.  The weather was so nice that we went out for a walk! So much for a white Christmas!  By the end of the day my sister's family had arrived as well.  My other brother wasn't there since he was spending the holiday with his wife's family in Texas.

Christmas morning was lots of fun with so many of us there together.  We all received some great gifts!

And on Boxing Day we got to go see the new Star Wars movie!  That was super fun too.  We all loved it!

It was a really great holiday week.  Merry Christmas!

Ten months

Brandon is ten months old!  In the last month he has made some major physical developments. 

While we were at my parents' house for Thanksgiving, Brandon started clapping! He would just sit in his high chair and clap at us. He looked so proud of himself. 

He can stand up without support! He's been standing up and walking while holding on to furniture for quite a while but now he can stand on his own!  This first happened when we were at church waiting for a meeting to start and Brandon was playing with my keys, standing in front of me. I had my hands under his armpits and I realized that he wasn't actually using me as support so I just let go and he continued standing there. He was so distracted by the keys that he didn't even notice right away what was happening. Since then he has taken a mini step without support, and has even bent over to pick up a toy and was almost able to stand back up on his own. He's a pretty fast crawler though so I'm not sure he'll really start walking until he thinks it's more efficient than crawling, but I think he's almost there!

We've had to make some alterations to Brandon's diet this month because of constipation issues, but he's still a great eater. He loves his finger foods and most of the baby food we give him too. We need to start working with him a little more on mastering the sippy cup, but he does well with it as long as we're helping him. 

We sure love our little guy and love watching him grow.

New things for Brandon this month:

 Standing up without support

Clapping

Waving

9 Months Old

It's strange to think that Brandon has been with us in the world for as long as he was growing in my belly.  I love this kid so much.

This month Brandon had his first Halloween!  I bought his costume a year ago and it's what inspired the whole family costume theme.  He was super cute so people gave us candy "for the baby" even though he was obviously too young to eat it.

He is not a picky eater at all!  We have given him a pretty wide range of foods now (still mostly puree, except for his puffs/wagon wheels/misc snacky foods that he eats regularly) and he does great with everything.  He eats everything we put in front of him.  I went into this with the intention that I would make all of his baby food like I did when Andrew was this age but really, pouches are so easy!  I didn't totally fail though, I have made Brandon several homemade purees but I've also been able to find some amazing deals on baby food pouches so I don't feel quite as bad :)

Brandon got his first haircut!  Aaron had been asking me to do it for a few months and I finally agreed that his hair really was getting in his face.  I was sad to see the cute baby hair go but it really does look better now.  I think we'll still have quite a while between haircuts for a while though- now that it's been evened out it shouldn't get so scraggly as it grows.

He is starting to show interest in a lot more than just whatever toy is closest.  He likes to head over to the play kitchen now and get out either the play food to chew on or the pots and pans to bang together.  He has also adopted the dining room as his personal jungle gym.  Now that I have painted my new kitchen chairs, the dining chairs are back where they go and Brandon has a great time crawling and climbing between the legs of the chairs and table.  One time I even found that he had brought a ball over there and was essentially chasing it around.  He was suspended on the rungs at the bottom of a chair when I found him, reaching for the ball he had swatted just out of reach.

I love seeing his little personality come out as he grows.  He and Andrew are definitely brothers and yet they are totally unique little people.

New things this month:

Halloween

Pouches

First Haircut