Farewell Craig

My little brother Craig left on his mission today. We went to visit him down in Provo last night.

It is kind of weird to think little Hazelnut is going to be 2 years old when he gets home.
Poor Bailey is going to miss her Uncle Craig.
I will probably miss him a little bit too. He is going to the northern most island of Japan. Rumor has it that it is freezing cold there. Like lots of snow and 6-8 feet at a time. Hopefully the little Southern California boy makes it back with all his fingers and toes. We love you Craig.

Run Bailey Run

Wanted:

We have a 1 year old escape artist on our hands. We trekked out to University Hospital for Hazel's two week appointment. Hard chairs, a two hour appointment, a couple of crazy kids, and way too much walking and I was pretty much ready to drop dead. And just went I thought we were done and ready to go home, we got the good news that Hazel needed to go to the lab to get her two week blood screening done. Oh joy. So we corralled our kids and started the seemingly endless walk to the lab. Sam hurried ahead to check in and get in line while Bailey and I brought up the rear at our snail pace. A long wait, a few pokes, a little blood, and a lot of screams and a few tears later we were finally done with the hospital and ready to return home.

Sam packaged up the tot while Bailey continued to roam the front of the hospital (the location of the lab). When we were ready to go we called for Bailey to turn around and head over to us. We had parked in the parking garage and needed to walk away from the front revolving doors. Too bad our casino stay in Reno for Thanksgiving introduced Bailey to the fun adventure of revolving glass doors. She was about ten feet ahead of us, gave us a look over her shoulder, and then took off running towards the front doors. Sam, holding Hazel in her car seat with the diaper bag over his shoulder, starts chasing after her. I stood there half laughing half embarrassed because my lovely stitches prevented me from walking normal, let alone chasing after a naughty baby. I watched as Bailey made it into the door and then started laughing out loud as Sam missed it. At first we thought she wouldn't walk fast enough and she would force the door to stop moving, but she just marched right along with the speed of the door. Next we thought she was going to make her way outside and start a new adventure in the street or the concrete staircase. This worry forced Sam to run towards the regular door, still hauling all of his cargo while I sat back and laughed by myself while other people were around and could hear me (awkward). She did not go outside. Instead she just continued to march around in the doors circle. Once again Sam nearly missed making it into her section of the door, but at the last second made it in by the skin of his nose. Bailey was finally captured and dragged back to me. I was using all my will power and every muscle in my body to not pee my pants (I did just have a baby thirteen days earlier) as I laughed at Sam who was dragging the one year old, carrying the car seat, and strapped to the diaper bag.

Can I just add that there were at least 8 adults (hospital staff and people waiting for their valet parked cars) who watched this whole scene play out and did nothing. Pretty sure Bailey and Sam ran by about 6 of them and not a single person helped out. None of them really laughed either. They were probably just judging us and feeling sorry for our poor children.
Note to self. Stop looking at the cute little smile and start focusing on the mischievous glean in those eyes.

Two Weeks...

Height: 20.63 inches - 66.46%

Weight: 8 lbs 0.2 oz. - 41.89%
Head Circumference: 36.8 cm - 72.24%

So far so good.
The little tyke has mastered eating every three hours.
She mainly sleeps in between feedings.
And of course there is plenty of poop after she fills that little tummy of hers.

There are also plenty of gas induced smiles. Even though the toothless grin usually means your going to have to change a diaper, it is cute enough to be worth it. Even if it is 3 am.

Christmas

We started the morning off sleeping in till 9:00 am which was the best Christmas present Sam and I received from our 2 little girls. Then after feedings and diaper changes we trekked on out to the tree where we found this...

Santa and family members were way too good to Bailey this year.

Her initial run was to the plate of cookies. Not to see if Santa had come and eaten them, but rather to see if he had left any for her. Unfortunately he had so we nipped that really quick and pulled out some yogurt for the hungry kid.
And she happily ate till it was gone. Then we moved onto stockings...
It took some coaxing for her to reach in there and find her toys. She found a slinky first and then she was done with her stocking and just wanted to play with it and the rest of her already opened toys.
She got a race car ramp set, a rocking horse from Aunt Pat and Uncle Jim, a baby from Grandma and Grandpa, and some awesome fruit from Uncle David and Aunt Sage and that was all she cared about.
Pretty sure the rest of her presents sat wrapped under the tree and she slowly opened them over the next 4 DAYS! I guess she really likes to extend her holidays.
She played and played and jumped from one thing to the next until Sam started opening his presents. That grabbed her attention really quick...
His favorite hazelnut piroulines. It is a toss up on who loves them more.
I think they're gross. I'll just stick to loving this little hazelnut.
She is so quiet all the time we sometimes forget she is here. The rest of the day was spent relaxing, eating dinner with Aunt Connie and Uncle Brandon, decorating some more sugar cookies and then ending the evening skyping with our families.
Merry Christmas!

Christmas Eve

Christmas Eve was spent being lazy. We sat around the house the entire day watching movies and playing with toys. However, once it got dark we decided to make Santa some freshly baked sugar cookies to ensure that he left us some good presents. Bailey started out interested...

but quickly decided that stealing the cookie cutters and turning them into bracelets was much more fun. Another thing that is fun to do? Grabbing your little sisters arm so you can shake her hand and tell her that it is nice to meet her. Oh boy. Poor Hazel.
Rolling out the stockings, christmas trees, snowmen, candy canes and gingerbread men...

Bailey was definitely on board for the decorating. Mostly because we gave her a little bowl of marshmallows, chocolate chips, m&m's, and smarties to decorate her cookies.

And by decorate her cookies I mean I frosted them and then shoved on the treats and she hurriedly and picked them off so she could eat them and then lick the frosting off those chubby fingers of hers.

That is a smile that is high on sugar. Who doesn't love pumping their 1 year old full of candy and sweets right before you put them to bed?

Poor Santa's cookies were full of Bailey bites, finger pokes, and missing decorations.

Not to mention the plate was shy a few cookies.
Merry Christmas Eve!

Cheerios

Like we don't have enough pictures of this little monster eating...

since we ran out of her usual morning breakfast of yogurt she got a bowl of cheerios.
And I am pretty sure her bowl was bigger than mine
and she ate it all.

Sick Week

Oh boy what a week we had. Bailey contracted some kind of nasty virus. We took her to the doctor after she spent Sunday night with a nasty cough, horrible gurgling breathing noises and a fever. The good news is that after a chest x-ray pneumonia was ruled out, but that meant it was just a virus which means there is nothing you can do but wait it out and try to keep the germs as far away from the newborn as possible. This meant washing hands till they felt dried and cracked and having two different outfits every day. A germ filled Bailey outfit and a germ free Hazel one. Changing clothes a million times a day is the worst.

Bailey got to roam the house excluding our bedroom
and Hazel got to stay in our room for the entire week.
We watched a lot of Toy Story 1,2, and 3 and I am pretty sure Sam will die if he ever has to see Woody or Buzz Lightyear ever again.
We also played with lots of toys and pretty much never changed out of our pajamas.
And of course we did our best to keep the temper tantrums at bay. I thought we had six more months before the terrible twos would start. Luckily the little monster has fully recovered and the remaining three of us managed to escape the sickness altogether. Hallelujah! Maybe one day we will look back on this event and laugh, but I am pretty sure that is years away.