We Love Fall

Jason and I have recently decided that we LOVE fall! It is our favorite time of year. We especially love the beginning of fall...the weather is still warm, but not as hot. We get to eat fresh salsa from our garden, and fresh corn from the Gruber’s garden. Peaches are in season! We could eat those things for all meals everyday and be completely satisfied! The holidays are just around the corner....and the leaves turn beautiful colors! We love taking drives up the canyon, and it is especially fun when you are surrounded by gorgeous reds, yellows, and oranges. This year was particularly gorgeous! If you got a chance to drive up Provo Canyon last month....you know exactly what I mean. I’ve never seen it so pretty!

Here are some pictures from our Sunday afternoon drive:
(Ignore the sad power lines in some of the shots)

And not that it has to be fall to go to Texas Roadhouse...but it does taste especially good when it gets a little chilly outside...wouldn’t you agree? Thanks to a birthday gift card from Karl, we took Charlie to Texas Roadhouse for the first time in late September. Charlie was asleep in his carseat at first until we had about three different “birthday tables” right by us get their special “Texas Roadhouse Birthday” specials! So loud! Even above the volume that Texas Roadhouse usually is! Yep, they were sure to wake him up and he was sure to bawl...but we made it through, taking turns eating and holding him. Always worth it!

Love, love, LOVE Fall!

Charlie's Third Month

Charlie has really become more and more enjoyable! It seems like once he hit two months, he didn’t want to fuss as much and wanted to be more of a happy boy...which means more of a happy momma.

In this third month of Charlie’s life, he became a lot more reactive and I could tell that his smiles were reactions, not just gas. Mornings were his best time of day. When I would go pick him up from his crib in the morning, he would be all smiles! Heart-melting! We finally started to hear some baby cooing...but still not a whole lot.  Charlie was a great night sleeper! We moved our way up from putting him to bed by 11, to putting him to bed by 9 and he would still sleep until 7 in the morning. We continued our bedtime routine: bath at the sink, swaddle him up in two blankets (a swaddler and a Swaddle Me...the one with the velcro that looks like a straight jacket...they rock!!), nurse him to sleep, and then place him in the crib for the night. Maybe once or twice a week he would wake up once in the night for a feeding, but most of the time he sleeping right on through the night! We were thrilled! His day naps got a little better as well...most being about 30 minutes, rather than the 15-30 minute naps the month before. He especially loved (and still loves) naps in his swing while being cuddly in his big white blanket from Aunt Annette. Both of those things are must-haves around this house. 

Charlie started sucking on his hands A LOT! It was so cute to watch him discover his hands and realize that it was a great way to pass the time. He also started to make a lot of bubbles that would pool at his lips. Good old Mr. Bubbles. By this point, his baby acne had cleared up quite a bit, and his face was looking pretty good. Finally, some cute, smooth, chubby cheeks.

Charlie continued to grow, giving us some fatter thighs to squeeze. His neck was also getting stronger and stronger. For the most part, we could hold him without having to support his neck. Charlie had his two month check-up, which includes getting several shots. It was heart-breaking to see my little boy screaming with pain on the doctor’s table. We made sure to give him plenty of tylenol the rest of the day. I must say he did a lot better the following days than I was expecting. We have a strong little man. Here are his two month measurements:


Length: 24.2 inches - 75%
Weight: 12 lbs 12 oz - 50%
Head Circumference: 40.7 cm - 50%

While we were there, the doctor prescribed some medicine that Charlie could take to help with his gas. Based on the symptoms (like being fussy and arching of the back), Dr. Whiting guessed that Charlie had been dealing with some silent reflux. Silent reflux is basically where some of the acid of the stomach goes up into the esophagus because of an undeveloped sphincter that holds the food in, but doesn’t go quite as high to the point of spitting up a lot (as would be an indicator of acid reflux). We have been so lucky that Charlie hardly spits up! So a couple of weeks after the appointment we started giving Charlie Ranitidine. Charlie HATED taking it! It must have tasted really bad (it smelled awful)! We had to give it to him twice a day, and each time we basically had to force it down his throat. After about two weeks of this, without a real noticeable difference (he was becoming less fussy anyways), we stopped torturing him with the stuff.

The very last week before he turned three months, he came down with his first cold. He had a crazy stuffy nose. His breathing sounded horrible and it would wake him up and make him gag at times. So sad! We would use an aspirator to clear his nose, and he HATED that too. So basically every morning and night we were forcing an aspirator into his nose and forcing some disgusting medicine down his throat...he would just bawl and bawl! We felt like terrible parents. Not happy times. 

But here are some pictures of the happier times:

 

Halo time with Daddy

Gone fishin' with Daddy:

What a ham!...or Hambino as Jason likes to say...

Living It Up

We had some fun outings in the first part of September. Three come to mind:

First, we had our monthly date night with Kerstin, Jed, Alisha, and Nate. This month we wanted to take advantage of the nice weather so we decided to have a little BBQ up the canyon. We drove up Big Cottonwood Canyon and found a little picnic area with one of those standing grills. It was a “bring your own meat” kind of a picnic, while we brought salad, chips, fruit, and dessert to share. We lit up the coals and grilled our delicious dinners. We brought some big juicy steaks from Walmart and seasoned them with Montreal flavored spices...and the were delicious! Cooked just right and so juicy! It’s always fun to meet up with this good bunch of old high school friends. Jason and I enjoyed the BBQ so much that the next weekend we took the left over coals and had our own little family BBQ at Canyon Glen Park (where we got engaged). We are totally going to do more of those next summer/fall! Bring on the grilled steak, BBQ chicken, grilled corn, and banana boats!

Jason, Charlie, and I also met up with the Gruber clan for the Annual Utah State Fair. It was a very hot day this year, but always lots of fun things to see and eat. This year, Nancy submitted some of her sunflowers for the competition...and she won first place!! She definitely had the tallest flowers there! Go Nancy!

Jason and I got our own little date night when my Aunt Erin offered to tend Charlie. We quickly took her up on the offer. We dropped Charlie off at their place (in Taylorsville) and headed to the Jordan River Temple. The Jordan River Temple is particularly special to me because it was “my temple” growing up...it was where I first went to do baptisms for the dead and it is where I went to receive my endowments. Jason and I did an endowment session and then went to Olive Garden for dinner (thank you gift card). Apparently, it wasn’t Charlie’s night...he just bawled and bawled pretty much all night while Aunt Erin tended him. She tried taking him to a high school football game, but he just wasn’t having it. Grandma Arbon told my dad later, “That boy has a good set of lungs on him!” Sorry, Erin! Thanks again for watching him and for being willing to do it again!

A Labor-less Labor Day

The day after Charlie’s blessing was Labor Day, and I was so excited that Jason was able to take the day off. It wasn’t until mid-morning until we spontaneously decided to take advantage of the good weather and head to Park City for the afternoon. Park City is always beautiful and has an element of fun and excitement.

We “strolled” along the shops...we hoped Charlie would enjoy his stroller a little bit more, but we ended up carrying him a lot of the time. I was surprised at the number of restaurants on main street! I swear the number has recently boomed. There were so many that we wanted to try out...but given our time limitation (some didn’t open until five) and baby limitation, we couldn’t pass up going to the good old Mainstreet Pizza and Noodle. Love that place! And lucky for us, Charlie was asleep in his stroller for the entire meal! Yipee!

On our way home, Jason had the idea of stopping to fish on the middle Provo. The weather was great and we had the baby carrier, so I agreed to the plan. Once we parked and before we got out to fish, I decided it would be a good time to nurse Charlie while in the car in the back seat. While nursing him, Charlie let out a few good “fluffs”...and by that I mean gigantic farts! I knew his diaper could not be pretty after the sound of those...but I continued to nurse him. I continued to bring my hand to his diaper to check for any wetness and didn’t notice any. A few minutes later when I went for another touch-check, my hand came back drenched in baby poop! I immediately exclaimed, “Ah!!! Help me!” Jason turned around from the front seat and burst out in laughter. Charlie’s poop was oozing down from his diaper, dripping down onto my shorts and then puddling on the seat beneath me. I continued to shout, “Help me! Help me!” Jason quickly came around to the back seat and carefully lifted Charlie from my lap. But at that point we just looked at each other and started laughing again. Jason said, “I don’t even know what to do!!” We have had countless blow-outs with this little fellow, but none before or since have been quite as big or quite as dramatic! After we finished soaking him with wet wipes, changing his clothes, and cleaning him up...we continued on our fishing adventure (crusty poop-shorts and all). 

We didn’t have too much luck at first, but towards the end before we left for the day, we each caught a fish...Jason catching two. Charlie was pretty good in his baby carrier. We ended up draping a thin blanket over his head and body to protect him from the sun, and he fell asleep. So that was pretty nice...and pretty hilarious looking.

The traffic on the way home through Provo Canyon was horrible! But all in all, we had such a fun day!

A Blessed Day

I admit...I’m a little psycho. Charlie was coming of age to receive his baby blessing and it was causing me great anxiety. Not because of the blessing itself...I was so excited for that part and I knew Jason would do a great job, but it was the after-party that I was worried about. I remember going to my nieces blessing last September and already getting anxious for when I would have to host a baby blessing party one day. Little did I know it would be exactly a year later that I would be doing it. Labor Day Weekend, September 2nd. It’s not that I don’t like family and friend gatherings, and it’s not that I didn’t want it to be a special day...I’m not really sure how to explain it. I guess it is because the insecure perfectionist side of me comes out. I would want everything to be just right, but I wouldn’t know how to make it that way. And with so little experience in hosting these kinds of things, I didn’t have the confidence that experience and knowledge would bring. Up until about a week before the selected date we were still debating whether or not we would have a gathering after the blessing itself. We knew that our apartment was way too small to host even more than six people. We didn’t have a yard that we could go outside to. Our parents houses were about 20 minutes away, and both had already been pretty busy with other family matters.

Finally, we decided on having the gathering at a nearby park and prayed it would be good weather. The morning of the big event came, and the weather couldn’t have been nicer! We felt so blessed. It was nice and sunny...not a cloud in the sky (which was especially a relief since the night before had a nasty storm including large hail balls!!).

Jason gave a beautiful blessing and we were surrounded by many loved ones. With 9 AM church, we met at Discovery (Manila) Park for a brunch right after sacrament (well, and after pictures of course). We had a lay out of yummy breakfast type goodies (thank you Costco!): muffins, donut holes, bagels and cream cheese, fresh peaches, grapes, watermelon, and orange juice.

Thanks, Amy, for taking these great pictures!

Charlie was so cute in his blessing outfit (Uncle Bryan's outfit)! 

He looked like a little orchestra conductor! So adorable!

And some shots at the park:

I could not be happier with how everything turned out...thanks to a lot of spontaneous help setting up from the family! The rest of the day I just felt so relieved, relaxed, and content. Charlie was given blessings of a great and righteous life. One down...and how many more to go?