Joe's Visit

Yesterday Daniel's dad Joe came to visit us and see the baby for the first time. It was such an unexpected visit too. He called Daniel on Saturday night and told him he wanted to come up to see us and go to church with us. He's staying in LA right now working on a construction job so he woke up at 4:30 a.m. to get here on time.



Joe thought John was so cute in his little white shirt and tie we put him in for church. Joe held him all through sacrament and John slept the whole time....oh sure when someone else holds him during sacrament he's good but when I hold him he fusses!
Joe definitely thought he was the cutest thing in the world. When he first saw him he said, "Wow, he's so solid!" ...I'm pretty sure he meant he's a big kid!


On Friday Daniel and I went on a fabulous date to Albertsons! Ok, ok so we just went grocery shopping but it was the first time we actually got to spent some time together so it felt like a date. Anyway, while we were there they had "Buy 1 get 1 Free" turkeys. Since Thanksgiving is coming up we decided to get a turkey...but what to do with the other one??...hmmm... We decided to get the two turkeys and practice on one now so by the time Thankgiving rolls around we would have the best turkey on the block!
We didn't realize until after we got home that one of the turkeys was the same weight as John! We took John in for his 1 month check up and he weighed 12lbs 8oz. Such a big boy! So with the help of Daniel's favorite program (photoshop) he created this masterpiece!! That's my boy!...and my other boy :)
The dinner turned out pretty good. We invited a new couple from our ward over for dinner and they said it tasted good. Not too bad for my first time cooking an entire thanksgiving dinner by myself! The couple that came over were really nice. They just got married about 2 months ago and the girl Alison is in the music department at UCSB with Daniel and plays the flute. Her husband Bryce is going to a local school in Santa Barbara for photography. I became instand friends with Alison because I found out she loves to crochet! Plus her husband does photography which as most of you know I absolutely love so we had a lot of fun getting to know them.

It was great seeing Joe and having the baby meet his grandpa. It was too bad Lavesi (Joe's wife/Daniel's stepmom) couldn't come too. She's such a fun lady. We're still trying to get to everyone so John can finally meet his family!

Voting

Can I just get up on a soap box for a second.... The last few days have been pretty crazy in a political sense. We just finished having what I think was the biggest most controversial election I've ever been alive for. I don't ever remember a time where SO many people have had so much to say concerning politics, and rightfully so. I believe every single person has the right to their own opinions. They have the right to think and vote in whatever way they feel best suites them. A major problem I'm seeing right now is when I hear people say "Oh, I'm not much for politics so I didn't vote, BUT I think...blah blah blah". I've had friends and family both who have done this and personally I think it's disrespectful for anyone to sit there and complain about how horrible a person will be in office, or how they think it's awful that a proposition or something passed or something didn't pass when they're not even willing to vote. That would be like me going to a potluck dinner and saying "Oh, I'm not much for making food, so I didn't bring anything BUT I think this dinner is terrible...blah blah blah"

...Ok maybe that analogy was a bit of a stretch but seriously, I don't think it's right for people to attack other people's points of view when they're not even willing to give their supporting vote on whatever side they think is right. I was extremely sad this year because I wasn't able to vote. I wanted to vote but I was stupid enough to procrastinate requesting a mail-in vote from Utah. (I couldn't get registered in California because I didn't yet have a Cali drivers license and I wasn't physically in Utah to be able to vote. I was registered in the state of Utah but because I wasn't there I couldn't vote...it's kind of hard to explain) Anyway with the move and then the baby I didn't get everything figured out in time. Does that mean I'm not allowed to have my own strong opinions about how the elections went? Heavens no. I'm allowed to think whatever I want about Obama and McCain and Proposition 8 and all of the other issues and people that were voted on. However, does it mean that I should be expressing those opinions to everyone and their dog and putting people down that think differently than I do? Absolutely not. I think it's disrespectful for anyone to do that no matter who they are. Unfortunitely I've seen a lot of people do this very thing which is sad.

Alright I feel better. Mainly I was just venting to get all of that off my chest. Kuddos to all of you who voted... I salute you!

Scariest Experience Ever!

Yesterday I was home by myself with the baby and I decided I wanted to go for a walk down to our garden plot and plant some flowers Daniel bought for me. I forgot to bring in the stroller from the car so I put John in the swing and ran outside as fast as I could to get the stroller. I usually don't leave him by himself but he was sound asleep and it was really windy outside and I knew I couldn't carry a baby and get a stroller out of the trunk of my car with ease. So I ran to my car and grabbed the stroller and came right back. I picked up my mail and walked back inside my house. I looked over at the swing and John wasn't there. My heart sank as I dropped everything and ran over to the swing. My first thought was that he had fallen out of the swing while I was gone, but no...my baby was no where in sight! I froze in panic and almost started screaming my head off when I heard Daniel upstairs say "Sweetie I'm home and I have the baby" I burst into tears and started sobbing and shaking uncontrollably. I grabbed John from Daniel and held on to him for dear life! What had happened was in the 45 sec. I spent grabbing the stroller from my trunk Daniel had come home for dinner on his bike from the opposite direction and we barely missed each other. When he walked into the house he saw the baby in the swing but didn't see me anywhere so he picked up the baby and walked upstairs to find me thinking I had just gone to the bathroom or was cleaning my bedroom or something. Right then I walked in the door and noticed my baby was gone. Just those few seconds from finding an empty swing to hearing Daniel's voice seemed like an eternity and were by far the most petrifying moments of my life.

So everything is fine...we're all safe and healthy but that sure takes the prize for being my scariest experience ever!!

Uncle Sean and Auntie Ayla!

On Halloween night 2 of Daniel's best friends came up from LA to visit us. We had such a fun time hanging out with them. We ate tons of food (the good kind and a lot of junk!) and we also left the baby with our neighbor and walked over to the campus along the main hang out street called Del Playa (DP) and saw all the crazys out and about!! I'm not kidding you it was like walking through the streets of Sodom and Gomorrah. There were thousands and thousands of drunk hardly dressed college students all over the place. I think they estimate every year having over 50,000 people go through that area on Halloween. The traffic to get there was terrible and every single cop in Santa Barbara was on duty that night. It was an amazing event to see. I was so happy to have my husband right there with me, especially when a guy wearing literally nothing but chaps and drunk as a skunk came up to me and tried to chat me up. Daniel took a short video of the scene on his camera but he's at school right now so I'll update this post later with the film footage so you all can get a taste of what it was like. All of us had fun together but I sure am grateful for my downstairs neighbor for offering to take the baby that night because I would have freaked out and gone home if we had him with us.

Anyway, Halloween was really fun this year...especially because we were able to spend it with friends. This is Sean holding John with his awesome Indiana Jones hat on!

Ayla tried to make a "mummy" costume, but by the time she was finished it just looked like she had got lost in the dryer! hehehe

We messed up John's hair and put a scar on his head to be Harry Potter but this picture is so dark you can't really see how incredibly cute his hair was....it really was SO cute.

Happy Halloween!

Wow it's already Halloween! It's crazy how fast time goes. My little guy is already 4 weeks old and I myself have already lost 30 pounds from the 42 I gained over the course of my pregnancy...hurray for breastfeeding!! Only 12 to go to get to my pre-pregnancy weight.

Today should be really fun. My mom bought me a bubble fog machine for my birthday that is seriously cool. We had a lot of fun playing with it when my nephew Tau was here and now again today we get to play with it. We're planning on setting it up on our top balcony so the bubbles of fog can fall down onto the trick-or-treaters when they come. I'm way excited to see if it works. Living here in a student family apartment building we're planning on getting a bunch of trick-or-treaters. This is my very first year I get to stay home and entertain trick-or-treaters all night. I really am looking forward to it.

Daniel's two best friends Ayla and Shawn are coming to visit us later on tonight so we're planning on hanging out with them and eating lots of junk food!!

Have a GREAT Halloween everyone! :)

Daniel's Mom and Brother

This is Daniel's mom who came out for a visit. It's funny because she was the first person to hold the baby besides Daniel and I (and the people at the hospital but they don't count!) It was weird for me to give my baby up to someone for the first time.

This is Daniel's big brother John. So here we have big John and little John!

It's so funny how different John and Daniel to me. I thought this was a cute picture because of how little John is looking at Daniel. That kid sure knows who his daddy is!

My Cousin Tau

Tau was so cute with John the whole time they were here.

At first Tau was super jelous of John and anyone that wanted to hold him. He didn't understand why he wasn't getting the attention so he clung to his mommy and wouldn't let her touch John without him there.
Then my mom had a brilliant idea to let Tau hold John and teach him that he was just a little baby.
At first he wasn't quite sure what to do...
But then John started sucking on his face and Tau thought it was hillarious!
After that he did not want to let John go. To him it was his baby and he became super protective of him.
Tau became like this if anyone tried to mess with his baby!!So even though Tau tried to force feed John a fig newton when we weren't looking he still protected that kid with his life! They are both so funny and I'm sure later on in life they will find ways to get into trouble together with Logan as well. The three musketeers!