Jon and Aubrey McLaughlin

Arizona in August

2012-01-29T14:36:00.000-08:00

Aaron and I flew to Arizona to visit Matthew, Shan and Austin on August 18th, 2011. I am so glad that we were able to visit and we had lots of fun. However, it was REALLY hot and my morning sickness got the best of me for the first time that week. Poor Matthew had surgery while we were down there, but we were able to enjoy his company anyway. It was so much fun watching Austin and Aaron interact. I am glad that they are only 10 months apart and hope they will be great friends. We still had a blast despite the heat and me being sick and made some wonderful memories. Here is a link to Shanna's post on our visit with even better pictures than I have. Some of the fun things we did were:

-Swim at their very nice pool a few times when it wasn't too hot.
-Visit Chuck-E-Cheese's with the boys.
-Visit Sonic during happy hour a couple of times to beat the heat.
-Walk around their really fun mall.
-Play games and watch movies when the boys were in bed.
-Watch the boys play together, they were so cute!
-Visit the Children's Museum in Phoenix*.
*Aaron and I got a flat tire driving back by ourselves from the museum and it was pretty traumatic being stuck on the side of the freeway during the hottest part of the day, with a screaming toddler in the backseat and me fighting my intense nausea. However, this was one of those times when literal angels in human form stopped to help us. A husband and wife stopped and offered to change our tire. The husband happend to be an auto mechanic and he even had a special electric pump in the back of his car to fill up the spare. Remembering their kindness brings tears to my eyes even now!
-Aaron and I also traveled to Mesa one afternoon to visit Carol Nixon (Melissa's Mom). We had so much fun playing at their house. I was able to swim in their pool while Aaron napped and then we went out to dinner at one of our favorite restaurants. It was so fun visiting with Carol and being in the Nixon's home. I have so many fun memories from visiting there when Melissa and I were younger.

Aaron playing in the kids area at the SLC airport. All airports should have these!

Austin in the grocery story at the children's museum. He wasn't too happy about me taking his picture.

I love Austin's silly face in this picture and how you can tell that Aaron is smiling at him from his raised cheeks :).

The boys really liked the remote control helicopter store in the mall.

Aaron at Chuck E' Cheese's.

I think this picture of Shanna and Austin watching the train drive away is so cute. Shanna was about 16 weeks pregnant during our visit and I was about 4 weeks pregnant. (We are anticipating the arrival of Matthew and Shan's little girl any day now!)

Running around in diapers :)

Drinking Jamba Juice to cool down.

Sister Nixon took us out to eat at one of our favorite Mesa restaurants, Tia Rosa's. I love Aaron's face in this picture. I was also happy to see Melissa's grandma. She has such a sharp memory and was telling me things she remembers about Melissa and I from when we were 12 and 15 years old!

Aaron playing in the grocery store area of the children's museum.

Aaron really enjoyed playing with all of the fun toys at the Nixon's house.

I think Aaron and Austin look a little bit alike in the picture above (Aaron on the airplane) and the picture below (Austin on the train).

The phones were the big hit at Sonic.

Austin placing an order at Sonic :).

Happy Day!

2012-01-29T14:26:00.000-08:00

We found out we were pregnant with Baby Declan on August 10th, 2011. I was still less than 4 weeks pregnant but I had begun feeling sick already (still can't believe that's possible) and we decided to go ahead and take a test. I took one of the line tests while Jon was at his morning job and was shocked to see a VERY faint line. Thinking it was a fluke I took another one and saw another faint line. At this point I called Jon to see if he wanted to pick up a digital test on his way home, before he went to his second job. He did so and hurried home. This time we waited in the bathroom together to see the results, just like we did the day we found out we were pregnant with Aaron! Sure enough, the digital test said "PREGNANT" and we shouted for joy!

If you look REALLY closely, you can see a VERY faint pink line :)

This one is much more obvious :)

Summer School

2012-01-29T14:03:00.000-08:00

Because I was busy with my classes from April-August, and because Jon was gone 60+ hours a week with work, Aaron occasionally did his own "school" work while I studied. While I was able to get most of my schoolwork done when he was napping or in bed for the night, I sometimes needed to read, study or work on papers/projects while he was awake. He kept himself busy during these times reading books, drawing/coloring and playing with his new backpack. Aaron sees Jon and I wearing backpacks a lot and he was always trying to carry ours, so we decided to get him one of his own. I think he looks so cute in his backpack! (Pictures from July 2011)

You can often find Aaron just like this - reading to himself. This is still one of his favorite activities and we find him looking at books on the couch, in the rocking chair, on the floor and in his bed. He often says or signs the words he knows and makes the animal or vehicle sounds.

Coloring at his new table with Daddy. (This is an Ikea end tables we got for 8$ and it is a perfect children's table).

Coloring on top of his table.

Hey Mom!

These were Aaron's favorite books at 14 months (and most are still his favorites at 20 months). I took this picture because these were the exact books Aaron and I read together in one sitting before nap time. I just couldn't believe that he had that long of an attention span at only 14 months! Also keep in mind that he had me read a few of these books more than once.

Bye Mommy!

Looking like he's ready for school at 14 months. What a handsome boy!

Summer Fun (Pictures from July 2011)

2012-01-29T13:01:00.000-08:00

We had a great summer! We really missed Jon since he was working 60 hour weeks, part-time in the morning at BYU and from 12-8p.m. Monday through Friday at Ancestry.com. We were grateful that he had good jobs and is such a hard worker, but we still missed him. I (Aubrey) was busy taking Socialization Across Childhood during the Spring Term and American Heritage during the Summer term. Aaron loved the warm weather and we were able to have lots of outdoor fun with family and friends. Some of the fun activities we enjoyed were: Swimming (in our front yard, at Vet Memorial Pool and at Aunt Carrie's), many BBQ's with friends and family, playing in our yard, going on walks and to the park, visiting Thanksgiving Point a lot with family, a weekend getaway to Las Vegas for Jon and I, traveling to Idaho to visit Melissa and family, traveling to Arizona to visit Matthew and family. Here are some pictures of our summer fun.

Our little family at Thanksgiving Point.

Pa, Jon, Aaron and Nonna looking at the fish at Thanksgiving Point.

Aaron loved driving the golf cart around the Thanksgiving Point Garden's with Pa.

Aubrey and Mallory Kate at a family BBQ for Aaron Sturgeon's Birthday.

We LOVED Saturdays because we got to see Jon (other than a few Saturdays he had to work).

Aaron Scott (14 mo), Aunt Carrie and Aaron Aiden (12 mo) at Aaron Aiden's Birthday Party.

Aaron and Nonna, eating pizza at Seven Peaks.

Jon was able to use a vacation day to join us at Seven Peaks!!!

I love how he sleeps with his bum in the air :). Tired out after lots of fun in the sun!

Catching Up

2012-01-29T12:57:00.001-08:00

I finally got around to uploading pictures from my camera onto the computer which means I am now going to attempt to catch-up on some posts from as far back as July. That is when I got pregnant and I started feeling sick during our trip to Arizona in August so it's taken me until my third trimester to get around to doing "real" posts - since most of my posts the last 6 months have been only writing or phone camera pics. Here are some posts I plan to do:

-Summer time fun

-Our Arizona Trip

-Graff Family Thanksgiving

-McLaughlin Family Christmas

-Pregnancy Pictures

-Maybe a few others about Aaron

Our adventures today

2012-01-25T15:19:00.001-08:00

Life is such an adventure with little kids because there is so much that is new and exciting! The city bus picks up and drops of right on our corner, which is very convenient for Jon who takes it to BYU almost daily. Aaron has seen Jon get on the bus many times and often says, "Hi Daddy", when the bus drives by. Today I decided to take Aaron on the bus to visit Jon on campus. Aaron was so excited when I told him we were going to ride the bus! He had to wear his backpack of course, since his Dad always wears a backpack when he goes to school. Waiting outside for the bus was so fun because Aaron was very excited and was naming all of the vehicles that drove by. We even saw a small plane fly by which he was very happy about. He looked so cute sitting in his own seat on the bus and he asked for his Daddy a couple of times on the ride. I assured him that we would see Daddy when we got to BYU. We met Jon in the children's section of the BYU Bookstore for story time. It was pretty awesome because Aaron was the only child at story time today! The lady who led story time asked what kinds of things he liked and tailored the story time to Aaron. She read him a couple books about tractors, trucks and other vehicles and she gave him some stickers that had a bunch of vehicles on them. One book she read, Truckery Rhymes, was super cute and we will probably add it to our collection for Aaron's birthday in May. The lady leading story time was so impressed will all of the things Aaron was able to identify (tractor, truck, car, airplane, boat, bus, horse, train, monkey, the letter A and so on) during story time. We usually go to story time at the library on Thursdays, which Aaron loves, but it is so crowded it was nice to have a change. When it was time to leave Aaron said goodbye to the lady and asked, "Bus, bus?", wanting to ride the bus again right away. He liked waving goodbye to his Dad out the window and I was happy to see Jon for a few minutes today since he won't be home until pretty late tonight. When we got home we went next door to say hello to our friends Elise, Evan and Alex. It was fun to see them and their cool new toys from Christmas. Before coming inside our house Aaron stomped around in the snow for about 20 minutes. It was great because the sun was nice and warm so he didn't have to be bundled up and he loved the sound the crunching snow made. He kept saying "snow, snow" and then stamping off his shoes on the sidewalk. Here are a few pictures from story time, the bus and playing in the snow.

Things I loved about today

2012-01-23T21:55:00.000-08:00

I loved today for a number of reasons. Mainly I loved today because Aaron and I were at home in our cute, warm house together and I love being his Mom. I also loved today because Jon was able to spend a little time with us this evening (which is pretty rare these days) and we love having him with us! Here are some of the other things I loved about today:

-Sleeping in. Aaron slept in today which means that I slept in today! I got up before he did and loved going in to his room as soon as I heard his sweet little voice. He was so happy to see me, jumped out of bed and ran to his door signing "eat."

-Eating breakfast with Aaron while he looked out the window and named all of the vehicles he saw: bus, truck, car, bike. He saw the bus drive by and said, "Bye bus, bye Daddy", since Jon rides the bus to school. I wonder if Aaron thinks Jon is on the bus all day long :).

-Playing with Aaron. I got out some of Aaron's toys that I had kept in his closet for a month or two. It was so fun to see his reaction to them since he thought they were so much cooler after an absence!

-Dancing with Aaron. We turned on Pandora and had a little dance party. It cracks me up how Aaron kicks his little feet, moves his shoulders and hips and spins around to the beat of the music. He also tries to sing along sometimes.

-I also loved today because I got a lot of laundry and the dishes done before lunch time!

-Watching Aaron color and play with stickers. I rolled out a big piece of butcher paper on the floor and gave Aaron markers, crayons and stickers. He had lots of fun and it is fun to see his blossoming creativity.

-Reading to Aaron and having him "read" along. When we read his favorite books like "Chugga-chugga choo-choo", "Goodnight Moon" and "Bubbles Bubbles" he makes comments, says words in the rhyme and signs the words he can't say yet. I love how interactive he is with books!

-Seeing Aaron's reaction to snow. We ran some errands this evening and it was snowing. Aaron was so excited about it! He kept putting his face up toward the sky and smiling so big and saying "rain." I explained that it is snow, but he has seen more rain than snow this winter and still called it rain. He even opened his mouth to try to catch some snow :). His reaction to little things makes the world seem so bright and wonderful!

-Listening to Aaron and Jon laugh during bath time tonight. Jon is so busy this semester that he doesn't get to see Aaron much. This evening he was able to give Aaron a bath and was making Aaron laugh so hard. I love seeing them interact and it made me so happy that they had some fun moments together today.

-Rocking Aaron to sleep. Aaron very rarely lets me rock him to sleep any more. He used to like to be rocked more, but ever since my belly started getting bigger he gets annoyed that he can't curl his legs up. Tonight he was so tired he just wanted me to rock him so he curled his little legs up on top of my pregnant belly. It looked so funny since his little bum was sticking in the air, but apparently it was comfortable enough for him because he soon fell fast asleep. I am always so grateful for moments like that because I love holding my sweet, peaceful, sleeping boy. He seems like the little baby he used to be again and I often wish I could freeze those moments so that I could revisit them whenever I want to.

Sweet Aaron - 20 Months

2012-01-21T20:40:00.000-08:00

It's about time for an Aaron update! Aaron is awesome and he keeps me so busy that I haven't sat down to write much about him lately, but I don't want to forget anything! I honestly go to bed every single night full of gratitude for the privilege of being this sweet little boy's Mommy. Each night as I am getting ready for bed I think back on the day and the wonderful, funny, interesting moments I got to share with him. He is definitely a toddler and has started challenging us somewhat, but for the most part he is a joy. Here are some things I want to remember about Aaron recently:

(Sorry for the lack of photos, I will try to include some soon but I wanted to record this all while he is still in this stage.)

-Aaron says "bye" to everything. This is how he transitions from say the toy store to the car or from bath time to pajama time; "Bye you toys!" "Bye you bath!". For some reason he often says "you" in front of the object and some funny ones are "Bye you milk!", "Bye you show!", etc.

-Aaron loves two of anything. He loves if we both have water, "Two, two, two water!" He really likes matching pairs and counting 1, 2. One funny fact is that if there are two of something he calls one it's actual name and the other one simply becomes "two." For example, my Mom has two dogs named Mae and Kai. He calls them MaeMae and Two. He has his big boy bed which he calls Bed and his pack n' play which he calls Two Bed.

-Aaron still takes an afternoon nap but he has recently begun to fight the occasional nap. This happened even when he was still in his crib and even at my Mom's where he sleeps in a pack n' play. He just randomly decides that it is more fun to stay up and play. He happily stays in his bed and plays there for about two hours! These occasions stress me out since he still VERY much needs his nap, but there is not much I can do about it and he is at least getting quiet time every day.

-Aaron has such a sweet, tender heart. He says sorry frequently and I have never prompted him to do this. If he bumps into someone or drops something he always says, "Sorry!" He pronounces it "Sawyee." :) His nursery teachers say that he is nice to the other kids and he does a good job sharing.

-Aaron started nursery a couple of months ago. He has stayed the full time every time we have left him and seems to be having lots of fun when we pick him up. He usually cries for about 30 seconds really hard when we leave but his teachers say he is happy after that! When we come to pick him up he gets so excited, it is pretty much the best thing ever. In fact, Jon and I always want to be the first out of class so that we can pick him up.

-Aaron really loves the Savior. He loves to look at pictures of Jesus, sing songs about Him and read books about Him. One day when he was supposed to be napping I heard him talking quietly to himself. When I went in to check on him he was sitting on his bed and looked up with his sweet face and said, "Jesus!", pointing to the scripture book he was reading. Sure enough he had opened it to a page with pictures all of the Savior. One evening he gathered together all of his pictures of Jesus and lined them up on his bed. When it was time to go to sleep I let him hold one of them. He gave the picture a kiss and said, "A night Jesus." (He says a-night for good-night).

-Aaron really enjoys story time at the library. I have started taking him to Toddler Time at the Provo library once a week. He gets so excited about the puppets and pays such good attention to all of the songs and stories.

-Aaron loves a lot of people but the people outside of Jon and I that he asks for the most are my Mom, my little sister Selena and his cousin Jace. He lights up when he sees any of them!

-Aaron is very communicative. I can't even count how many words and sentence combinations he says now. I feel like he says new ones every day and he often catches me off guard by saying a word I've never heard him use. My favorite thing in the world about him right now is probably his adorable, "Hello Mommy!" He says this countless times a day. When I go into his room to get him in the morning or after a nap I am greeted with a joyful, "Hello Mommy!" The way he says it makes it seem like I am the most exciting, wonderful person in the world. He will often come find me if I am in a different room than him just to tell me hello and every time he seems just as thrilled to see me.

-Aaron has phased out most of his signs, since he just says the word instead of signing it. However, there are a few words that he usually signs: eat, more, fish, cat, bed and please. He says most of these words too but includes the sign.

-Common phrases and words you will hear Aaron say right now are:

"Here you go Mommy"

"Hello Mommy, Hello Daddy"

"Buzz" (as in Buzz Lightyear)

"What's that?"

"I see you!"

"Where'd he/she/it go?"

"There he/she/it is!" (My favorite is when he hides and I say, "Where's Aaron?" and then he uncovers his face or comes out and says, "There he is!" before I can say it.)
"Bye you (insert object, person, food, etc.)"

"See you soon"

"A night" (Good night)

Favorite toys right now are: Cars, cars, cars, cars, trains, cars, cars, airplanes, cars, cars, blocks, buzz and woody and more cars. Let's just say he LOVES playing with toy cars! He also really likes his Pocoyo stuffed animal and has to have him tucked in next to him at bedtime.

Favorite shows/movies: Pocoyo, Toy Story 2, Barney Sing and Dance and any of the Cars movies.

Favorite foods: Mac n' cheese, string cheese, clementines, smoothies, fruit snacks, pizza, bananas, milk, crackers, beans and rice. He likes lots of different foods but those are foods he will eat pretty much any time he's hungry.

Favorite activities: Playing with my parent's dogs (he adores them!!!), story time at the library, open gym at Arete with his cousins, wrestling with Daddy, putting stickers on paper, playing with cars, playing in the water at bath time or while helping Mommy wash dishes, dancing, reading books, throwing balls and he loves being outside when the weather permits.

-Aaron is starting to want to do more and more things on his own. He often chooses to walk instead of being carried and often wants to do things like walk down our front steps unassisted, which of course terrifies me. He has also started a few other toddler behaviors such as saying "no" and "mine" fairly regularly.

Aaron us such a blessing to Jon and I! We are so lucky to be his parents and love the adventures he takes us on every day.

A New Favorite Quote

2011-12-23T14:28:00.000-08:00

I was reading a talk given by Elder Neil L. Andersen, one of the current Twelve Apostles, during the October 2011 General Conference and I came across this quote which I love. He was quoting a young Christian mother who stated:

“Motherhood is not a hobby, it is a calling. You do not collect children because you find them cuter than stamps. It is not something to do if you can squeeze the time in. It is what God gave you time for.”

I love that. Children are what Heavenly Father gave us time for! I love being a Mom and feel so blessed for the privilege of being able to raise my children in the gospel.

Learning Time Ideas

2011-12-02T19:52:00.000-08:00

I just read a fabulous post on a parenting blog I follow and I wanted to record the reference for later and share it in case any of you Moms are looking for ideas to entertain/teach your little ones. :)

http://www.babywisemom.com/2011/12/how-i-do-it-learning-time.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ChroniclesOfABabywiseMom+%28Chronicles+of+a+Babywise+Mom%29

Jon said he can make these for me!
http://learningdevelopmentactivities.blogspot.com/2011/07/face-out-bookshelves-tutorial.html

The above types of bookshelves are also encouraged in one of my favorite books, The Read-Aloud Handbook by Jim Trelease.

Another WONDERFUL book for parents/teachers, etc. is Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children from Nature-Deficit Disorder by Richard Louv.

Baby #2

2011-12-01T20:31:00.000-08:00

Today was our 20 week ultrasound and it was so fun to see our little guy! Dr. Ludlow performed the ultrasound, he also delivered Aaron 18 months ago, and it was great to see him since I haven't had a visit with him this pregnancy. It was nice to have the doctor performing the ultrasound, as opposed to an ultrasound tech, since he could actually tell us if each of the areas he checked looked healthy. Baby boy was sleeping soundly despite the fact that I had a glass of orange juice ahead of time. His little face was tucked snuggly out of view so we were not able to see a good profile shot, but got some good skeletal shots. The doctor was able to get all of the measurements he needed and the baby looks wonderful! His growth is right on track and his EDD based on measurments was April 20th. My actual due date is still April 21st, so hopefully he will come around that time. Baby's cute hands were up by his face. Below are pictures from our 15 and 20 week ultrasounds. We probably won't see another picture of this little guy until he is born in April!

15 weeks - spine, stomach, head.

15 weeks - best profile the tech could get with the angle he was at.

20 weeks, face and face with arm. Couldn't load the others, will try later.

Alone Time

2011-11-07T11:34:00.000-08:00

Every so often, Aaron needs some alone time. Right now is one of those times, which is why I can write this and he isn't even sleeping. About 30 minutes ago he went into his room and shut the door. I have tried checking on him twice and he immediately runs to the door and closes it. I can hear him playing with his noisy toys, building with legos, playing with his car race track and even tell that he has been looking at books because I just heard the noises one of his books with sound buttons. I think it's so funny and cute that he is just busily playing away in his room and wanted time to himself. It will be interesting when he has to share a room with his baby brother!

Fall

2011-10-25T19:59:00.001-07:00

I am now 14.5 weeks pregnant and feeling exhausted but no longer morning sick very often. We have been enjoying the crisp, fall weather by looking at fun leaves, playing outside with my parents' puppies and my favorite - dressing Aaron in sweater vests :). When it is too cold outdoors we find fun indoor things like coloring, playing with friends and cousins and occasionally riding the scooters and trikes at Toys R Us. Aaron has carefully watched his aunt Selena ride her scooter so he tries to mimic the foot movement but he still can't get them to go. We have also been enjoying lots of soup to keep us warm! I enjoy the fresh fall air and hope we can continue to play outdoors for a little while longer without the excessive winter gear :)

Meet B

2011-10-17T20:08:00.000-07:00

Meet B. Aaron calls his stuffed bear "B" and so I guess that has become his name. As of these last few weeks, you hardly ever see Aaron without B in tow. Aaron sleeps, eats, plays and does everything except take a bath and wash hands (although he has tried) with B. Before Aaron slides down the slide, B goes down and Aaron says "weee" for him. When Aaron eats, B must be sitting right by and Aaron pretends to feed him. Aaron sits B on his car and drives him around the house, reads books to B, colors with B, rides his horse with B and has even tried to brush B's teeth. If Aaron likes someone, he will offer B to them for about 2 seconds, after they have said thank-you and given B a hug, he wants him back. It is so fun to see Aaron's imagination develop!

Aaron pushed B up to his table so that B could color.

B "coloring" at Aaron's table.

Childbirth Questions

2011-10-10T19:38:00.000-07:00

Yes, I have questions about childbirth. Delivering one baby does not an expert make. In fact, after I had Aaron I realized how incredibly unprepared I was for labor! I didn't take a single birthing class, didn't know any breathing techniques, positions to help with contractions... really, I didn't know anything. I naively thought I would just know what to do. Luckily for me, my water broke so they had to admit me immediately and I was able to get my epidural right away. BUT, I know so many women who were in labor for hours and hours before they could be admitted, or who were even sent home to labor more and had to come back later to see if they were dilated enough. So what I've realized is that you have to know HOW to labor, not just plan on all the pain being controlled by medication. Don't get me wrong, I loved the relief provided by my epidura, but the laboring I had to do before receiving it and the two times it wore off really opened my eyes to how little I knew about handling the pain. The thought of having an un-medicated childbirth absolutely terrifies me. Maybe that's because I have such a hard time finding information about preparing for such a birth that is not super extremist and anti-medication-epiduralswillharmyourbaby-ish. However, I have a really strong feeling that I need to prepare better for this labor and delivery and I just don't know where to look. Is there a happy medium? Can you learn about birthing naturally without the extremist opinions so you are prepared just in case? What method is best? There is Lamaze, The Bradley birth method, Hypnobabies, etc, etc, etc. Do you other mothers have experience with any of these? If so, did they help you deal with the pain and have a labor you felt good about (whether or not you opted for pain meds)? Just wondering what direction to look to prepare better for this delivery. I know it is still 6 months away, but it is on my mind and I really feel like I need to be more prepared this time around! Thanks in advance for the insight :)

Journal/Thoughts

2011-10-05T19:00:00.000-07:00

I just posted a few posts I had written as journal entry/thoughts. They may not be very intersting to others, but ever since Jon made a book out of the first year of our blog I have been seeing it more as a way to record our life for our future family. So if you see lots of random journal/thought entry type posts, that's why :).

LOVE

2011-10-05T18:42:00.000-07:00

I love my babies! I am starting to feel more and more of a connection to the tiny life growing inside of me and have that same love I had for Aaron when I was expecting him. It is hard to feel like I am "really" pregnant at the very beginning of pregnancy when I can't see or feel the baby, the risk of miscarriage is so much higher (making it more stressful/scary) and I feel so incredibly sick, exhausted and aweful. I don't know if I am on the tail end of morning sickness (let's hope) but I have been feeling a lot better the last few days and am hoping that the beginning of last week was one last puking hurrah. Anyway, I have recently been feeling so excited about the new little person I'm carrying! I love being a Mom so completely and enjoy my Aaron boy so much. I can't wait to share that love with another child. Recently Aaron has been so hilarious. It seems to be one of his major daily goals to crack me up, and he is very good at it. For example, today in the car I hear, "Mommy?" and turn around to see him with his winter beannie pulled over his face and then he pulls it up revealing a huge expectant grin, like, "I knew this would surprise you!" And it did. I laughed so hard and he repeated it over and over. He is such a happy kid pretty much all the time, it's really amazing. His joy for life is infectious and I am so grateful for his sweet, fun personality.

Today was a good day because:

-I got to hear our baby's heart beat at our 12 week check-up.

-We got to eat dinner and lunch with Jon and spend some time with him!

-I got an A on my second test this week.

-Aaron and I visited with our downstairs neighbors.

-We went to Barnes and Noble as a family.

-I took a cat nap while Aaron napped.

-My nausea didn't lead to worse nausea or throwing up!

-We have the gospel and know that our family is eternal, that makes it a good day :).

-Jeannie sent me a good idea for a Halloween costume.

-I got to chat with Melissa on the phone and they will be living in Utah soon!!!

Triumph Despite Tragedy

2011-10-03T13:48:00.000-07:00

The beautiful, historic Provo Tabernacle is located less than a mile from our home. We were lucky to be able to attend a number of church meetings in the Tabernacle before it was destroyed by a fire last December. The fire was heartbreaking and the loss of such a beautiful piece of history was lamented. As far as we knew, the Tabernacle was being rebuilt to it's original form. Saturday during General Conference our Prophet, President Monson, announced that the Provo Tabernacle was being rebuilt as a second Provo Temple!!! For members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, the temple is the most sacred place on earth. This news made me so happy and I have been thinking about the many messages contained in this situation. The main thing I keep thinking is how the Lord takes something devastating or heartbreaking and turns it into something miraculous and beautiful. From our mortal perspective it can be hard to see how anything good can come from tradgey. Yet, it is often the hardest parts of our lives that build us, refine us and make us into so much more than we realized we could be. I just can't help pondering the symbolism of this situation and how it applies to each of us.

A Duggar Fan

2011-10-02T21:17:00.000-07:00

Just this last year I discovered the show 17 Kids and Counting since it was on Netflix instant play. I hadn't heard much about the Duggar family but I was interested to learn more. I have since come to admire this family so much! I love learning about how they run things with such a big family and raise such happy, well-behaved children who love the Lord. While I know I won't be able to have even a fraction of the amount of children they have, I still feel I can learn a lot from them. I have really enjoyed watching their show and reading their newest book, A Love that Multiplies. I know that people are really critical of this family for how many kids they have, but let's face it, people who want to be critical are going to find something to criticize. Some pass judgement for families who don't have kids, or only have a "small" family or have what they feel are "too-many" kids. I believe that children are a blessing and I also believe that the timing and spacing of children is between a husband, wife and the Lord. We don't know the private lives and struggles of others and it's not our place to determine such an issue. In any case, learning about this family makes me happy. I feel great knowing that there are other Christian families placing family at such a high priority and striving to raise their children to love the Lord. Although we personally plan to have a much smaller family according to our abilities and personal feelings, I have never felt like the Duggars are out to make people feel bad if they don't choose to have as many kids as them. I always feel uplifted when I watch their show or read their book so they are a positive influence for me :).

Date Night!

2011-09-30T22:02:00.000-07:00

Jon and I just got home from an awesome date. He is hurridly submitting some homework so I decided I would blog about our fun date, especially since I always intend to record these things and then forget. Today we traded babysitting with some good friends. They went on an afternoon/evening date while their adorable little boy hung out with us and played with Aaron. Then we put Aaron to bed and Christina hung out at our house while Jon and I went out. We spent the evening at Color Me Mine. I have been wanting to go there since we moved to Provo over 3 years ago, but we just haven't gotten around to it until now. It's this great little place where you can pick a piece of pottery and paint it. They cook & glaze it for you and the finished product is ready to be picked up the following week. There were so many things to choose from but we eventually settled on items. I painted a mug for my upcoming winter cocoa fixes and Jon painted the cutest penguin figurine for Aaron. I will have to post a picture of it when it is complete. The fact that he picked a gift for his little boy and then painted it with such care just made me so grateful to have him as the father of my kids! We had a blast painting and talking and would definitely recommend it for anyone wanting a fun activity. (Look for coupons because you can usually get in for half price). Then we got some dessert and headed home. I love my wonderful husband!

One Happy Toddler

2011-09-29T19:50:00.000-07:00

How did I get such a happy kid? I suppose I was quite the joyful, happy kid so that may account for part of it, and Jon was an easy-going, happy kid too - but really, I think Aaron just came this way. Here is a typical day for Aaron:

Morning- I hear Aaron happily babbling in his crib. I go in and find him talking to his stuffed animals or pointing at a toy he wants to play with in his room. He always greets me with the sweetest grin and seems so excited for another day to play, play, play! When I get him out of his crib he gets right to work playing. I find this hilarious because it sometimes seems like he has an agenda in his head of what he needs to accomplish that day and he has to get to work, or rather, play. We eat breakfast and talk and laugh. Aaron watches a morning cartoon while I try to rest on the couch (this is a pregnancy thing). Then we play, run errands, go outside, read books, visit friends, etc.

Mid-Day- After lunch Aaron asks for his bed. Sometimes he asks to go to bed before lunch because he is worn out. He happily goes down for a nap. He wakes up talking, laughing, babbling, the ususal. Then we play some more and stay busy doing all of our afternoon things.

Evening- We eat dinner and then do our evening routine (bath, pjs, scriptures, books, etc.). Aaron really loves predictability and knows how his day is gonna go, and that's how he likes it. Around 7 he goes to bed. If we haven't put him in bed by then he asks us to. Too funny.

Of course Aaron has meltdown, stubborn, tired, toddler moments - but really, who doesn't? (Toddler or not). There are occasional days when he is sick, teething or just extra fussy and he isn't his happy self. Those are hard, but rare, times. Sometimes he doesn't want to share with other kids or even share his Mom with his Dad. But most days I go to bed marveling at the joyful little person I have been blessed to be able to raise.

On a side note: Aaron recently decided that giving high 5 is the funniest thing ever. Yesterday every time he went down the slide in our yard he would come give me 5, then cover his little mouth and laugh. He covers his mouth when something is extra funny, or extra sad for that matter. It is his way of being a little emphatic.

Ugh.

2011-09-28T21:25:00.000-07:00

Ugh. That's how I feel today. SO sick, SO yucky, wondering how anyone in the world can like something as disgusting as food. I know I should be grateful for all of my blessings, and I am, but I still feel like... ugh. I am grateful that the Zofran helps some. I just keep reminding myself how much MORE I would be throwing up without it. I also keep reminding myself that I am blessed to have the coolest toddler ever. He is such a happy little guy and thankfully he is oblivious to the fact that my house is quite the shambles and there is very little clean laundry to go around. I am also blessed with the most amazing husband who, although he is gone for most of my and Aaron's waking hours, spends what little time he has at home helping out. I admire those people who look back at their pregnancies as beautiful, golden times. Sadly, I don't think I will ever be that person. I must admit that I never felt that way about Aaron's pregnancy and the beautiful, golden time for me was when he came out! I guess I see it like this. I didn't get pregnant to "be" pregnant, I got pregnant to "have" a baby. I am grateful for this tiny miracle growing inside of me and the blessing of being able to conceive, carry and deliver another child. I am grateful for my family, for the gospel, for my husband, for my toddler and for so many other things. I just feel... ugh. Jon keeps reminding me that this will pass and that I won't feel like this forever. I need that reminder especially after a day like today.

16 Month-Old Aaron

2011-09-27T18:49:00.000-07:00

Aaron is now 16 months old. He is such a joy and we are so blessed to have him in our family! He thinks he is pretty big these days and wants to do everything possible on his own.

Aaron had a 16 month check-up last week and here are his stats:

Height: 32.5 in - 75-90th %

Weight: 23 lb 1 oz - 25th %

Head: 48.4 cm - 75-90th %

Aaron is such a busy little guy and it takes a lot of energy to keep him entertained some days. He is also down to one nap a day which leaves a lot more free time to fill with fun and learning. I try to come up with creative ways to keep him guessing. Below are some of the things we have been up to in the last month or so. These pictures are taken with my cell phone so they aren't the best quality.

This great yard-sale deal provides lots of outdoor entertainment.

Aaron is really trying to master the use of utensils and he does a pretty good job. This morning he spent 20+ minutes pouring water from a water bottle onto a spoon and drinking the water off the spoon.

Thanksgiving Point! We have a membership to Thanksgiving Point and we have been visiting it about once a week with different family members. Aaron seems to like Farm Country the best but he also likes the Gardens and the Dinosaur Museum. The new Notion of Motion exhibit in the Dino Museum was a BIG hit!
Ghetto Swimming Pool. I let Aaron "swim" in this tupperware with only a swim diaper on. He loved it!

Daddy Time. Jon is so busy and we don't see much of him these days. I love moments like this when Jon and Aaron get to bond.

This is a tupperware filled with grains (rice, maccaroni). I lay out a sheet and let Aaron dig and pour.

Aaron will sit in one of these 25 cent cars for 20-30 minutes, and I don't even pay for him to ride it. In fact, the few times I have paid, he has been pretty scared.

Reading, Reading, Reading. Aaron used to sit on my lap for long lengths of time while I read him books. Now that he is in the "I have to do everything myself"-stage he doesn't like me to read to him, he likes to read to his stuffed animals instead. This happens at least once a day and it is adorable! He even says the words he knows and looks at his bear to make sure the bear is listening.

His favorite book right now is this Book of Mormon stories book which he calls "Jesus" since it has pictures of the Savior in it.

Visiting Nonna, Pa and Selena. Aaron loves when we go to my parents house. However, this is how he looks when we leave...

Bowling with Pa.

Watching TV with Selena.

Life is Good

2011-09-20T20:53:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since I updated and I have so many thoughts I want to record. I just love being a Mom to Aaron more than I could ever have imagined. That is saying a lot since I have been imagining, dreaming about and planning for motherhood since I was a tiny girl. I literally go to bed every night with a smile on my face from remembering something Aaron did during the day. Some recent favorites...

-He recently started saying, "Yah", in response to pretty much everything and it is so funny! "Aaron, do you want do go outside, eat breakfast, take a bath, etc?" Response, "Yah!", accompanied by an affirmative head shake. Sometimes if it is an unusual question and he is slightly unsure he says, "Uhh, yah!"

-Aaron loves popsicles. They have been a lifesaver with teething and he randomly asks for "buttaballs." That is the closest transcription I can render so I will have ro record it on camera because the way he says it cracks me up every time. The other day he was taking a bath and then out of nowhere looked at me and asked, "A buttaball?" I said, "You want a popsicle?", surprised by the random timing. He said, "Yah!" and proceeded to climb out of the tub dripping wet to go get a popsicle.

-Aaron loves to make me laugh. He will make a funny sound or face or do something silly that makes me laugh. Then he starts laughing and repeats the thing that made me laugh and we go back and forth laughing. Yesterday evening before bed he was being so silly and I laughed so hard that my sides hurt.

-I don't know if I will ever get over that I have a child who ASKS for me to put him in his bed when he is tired. If he wants to take a nap or go to sleep he signs "bed" and often he will sign "bed please." Then when we put him in bed he is so happy he giggles. Yah, I'm lucky. The other day we were shopping for shoes for him. He was getting tired and started to throw a fit so I picked him up to leave. As we were walking out of the store he saw a crib display and tried to jump out of my arms and into the bed signing "bed please, bed please."

-Aaron is such a communicator. He babbles all the time and also says a lot of words for a toddler his age. The other day in my language development I couldn't help making a list of all of his words and signs. He says about 30 words and sings about 30 with 10-15 being words he signs AND says so his vocabulary is around 50. He tries out new words every day but seems to wait until he is really sure about a word to include it in his usual repetiore.

BABY #2 UPDATE:
As for baby #2 everything seems fine and being on Zofran for nausea has helped a TON! I still feel really sick some days but at least I am not throwing up which really helps. Some days are better than others and I am definitely still in the first trimester exhaustion, nausea phase. However, I have decided that it is a little easier going through this the second time because I have tangible proof (ie. Aaron) that it is all worth it! One thing that has been particularly hard for me already is the fact that I am showing soooo soon. I know it's because my first pregnancy destroyed my abs and I didn't exactly rebuild them like I should have. It's also partly because I had a little more "padding" around the middle then I did with Aaron. So I guess I shouldn't be surprised, but I feel like I am as showing as much as I was with Aaron at like 17-18 weeks and I am only 9-10 weeks along. Yikes! My clothes still fit but I can tell I will be in maternity clothes MUCH sooner than I was with Aaron. Oh well :)

Baby #2!

2011-09-07T18:36:00.000-07:00

We are excited to announce that McLaughlin Baby #2 is officially due April 21st, 2012. We were able to see and hear the tiny little heart beat today and it was as miraculous as it was with Aaron. I will have Jon scan the ultrasound photos and I will post them later, but I just wanted to share our joy!

Here are a few answers to common questions I've received from family and friends we've told:

1. Was it planned? YES! We decided for sure in June that it was time to have another baby and we found out we were pregnant the first week of August. Aaron will be just shy of age 2 when this baby is born.
2. How are you feeling? Excited about the baby but AWFUL physically. I didn't think my morning sickness could be any worse than it was with Aaron. I was wrong. I felt sick sooner, at 3 weeks pregnant btw, which I still can't believe. The nausea has been much more intense and I have had many days in the last month when I couldn't keep much of anything down. My doctor prescribed Zofran which I am so grateful for. Extreme nausea and frequent vomiting don't go well with keeping up with a toddler and taking 2 classes on campus.
3. Do you want a boy or girl? Have you thought of any names? As far as whether it's a boy or a girl, we really don't have a preference and we will be happy with either! We seem to talk about names a lot, even when we aren't pregnant, and we agree on very few. Our top, and only, boy name is Declan and our top girl name is Chelsea.

We are so happy to welcome another sweet baby to the earth and into our family!

Mobile Memories

2011-08-03T20:40:00.000-07:00

My phone doesn't have the greatest camera on it, but I still use it frequently to catch cute on-the-spot moments in Aaron's life. Here are a few recent ones, and a couple of not so recent ones for fun!

Bed Head Hair - Aaron awoke from his first nap today with the craziest hair! I thought it was hilarious and sometimes wonder if he sleeps on top of his head. :) August, 2011

Earlier this week I took Aaron to the mall to let him run around since it was raining again. He found a children's show and this cute bench in one of the stores and sat down. Notice his backpack? He was always carrying around some sort of bag and his toys were taking over my diaper bag, so we decided to get him a little backpack of his own. He is pretty proud of it! The little girl sitting next to him was so sweet. She kept leaning over and telling him things. He would just smile and sometimes babble something back to her. August, 2011

We really enjoy swimming at Veteran's Memorial Park. Aaron especially loves the huge slides. Babies can go down them with an adult as long as they wear one of these life jackets. It's amazing how everything in minature is cute, even an orange life jacket. July, 2011
This was when Aaron was about 6 months old. We were waiting in the car for Jon and I let him

out of his car seat. His big, blue eyes amaze me every day! I love how sweet and innocent his little face is.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAH! This is Aaron around 3 weeks of age, when he started smiling. His first smiles were lopsided and he often squished his eyes up like this. He had a cheesy smile even then!

Language Development and 1 Year Pics

2011-07-19T20:52:00.000-07:00

Jeannie took Aaron's amazing one year pictures. I have been marveling at Aaron's language development recently but my post on it is rather long and possibly not that exciting to anyone other than his Mom or Grandma. So I decided I'd make it a little more exciting by including some of the wonderful pictures Jeannie took.

I love human development, which is why it's my major, and probably part of the reason why I am so fascinated by everything my little boy does. Well, that and I'm a Mom so I guess I'm a little biased in how cool I think my child's development is. Aaron is a very communicative child. He babbles constantly and uses words, body language (pointing, mimicking) and signs to express himself.

Aaron signs... a LOT! We started using sign language with Aaron around 6 months, but these last few months he has had what baby signers call, "a signing explosion." He has so many signs and even makes his own up to express a new idea. For example, when he really wants lunch or dinner to be ready he runs over to his high chair and folds his arms, saying in essence, "I'm ready and we always pray before we eat!" He often signs "hat" when he wants to go outside since I always make the poor kid wear a hat outdoors because I am paranoid about his fair skin burning. Some of the other signs he uses regularly are:

"Bath"
"Milk"
"All Done"
"More"
"Eat"
"Hat"
"Toothbrush"
"Book" often when I go in to pick him up from a nap he signs "book please" because he wants to sit in his crib and look at books for about 20 minutes before he is ready to get out. What a funny kid!
"Please" he probably signs please 100+ times a day, seriously. When he REALLY wants something he signs please with both hands, like in the picture above. (We were taking his pictures at the park and he wanted to go play.)
"Flower" I love how he makes a sniffing noise as he sniffs his little fingers as if they were a rose bud.
"Ball" which he also says the word for.
"Shoes" which he tries to say and it comes out "shhh."
"Duck" he flaps his little hand open and shut and it really resembles his sign for "milk" but we know it is "duck" because he simultaneously quacks.
"Dog" the sign we taught him for this is to pat his leg and pant like a dog. He usually just pants and points at the dog he sees.
"Cat/Kitten" he pulls at his little cheek like making whiskers.
"Airplane" is probably my favorite, he makes his hand fly in the air like a plane and makes an airplaine noise.
"Frog" is my other favorite because he sticks his little tounge in and out of his mouth like a frog.
"Fish" which he does when he sees anything swimming (fish, dolphin, jelly fish).
"Water" this is a funny one because he puts his fingers by his mouth and puts his head back like he's drinking.
"Bed/Sleep" he lays his head to the side on one little hand to tell us he wants to go to bed. This usually happens when we are reading books or singing a song before bed and he just wants to go to sleep already.
"Fan" he loves to point to the ceiling fan and twirl his little finger around.
"Potty" every time Jon or I go into the bathroom he signs potty.
"Hair and Brush" he signs these the same by using his hand to show brushing hair.
"Sit down" and "Train" = You wouldn't think that these two items are related, but we teach "sit down" with two fingers sitting on the other two fingers. These same four fingers (index and middle of each hand) rub together to sign train. We know he is signing train as opposed to sit because he says "chchchchch" while signing train.
"Clean" we do this sign when we are cleaning so he knows that its time to put the toys away and not to get more out. We wipe one hand across the other but he just claps his hands together.
"Wash hands" he rubs his little fists together as if washing his hands.
"Telephone" he puts his hand by his ear and says, "Hello?" We didn't teach him this one, he just did what he saw us do with real phones.
"Nose" - he points to his nose or our nose.
"Keys" - he also says this.
Other signs we use with Aaron that he hasn't used back yet, I think it's because they are pretty abstract concepts for a toddler, are "Wait", "Thank You" and "Help." New signs we are working on are "friend", "swing", "play", "music" and "baby."

Along with signing, Aaron says some words or uses sound effects (like animals noises or a car noise) to express an idea. Aaron really likes animals and makes noises for: Cow, Duck, Sheep, Dog, Cougar (he also growls for anything he doesn't know the sound to), Fish, Chicken, Horse.

Words he says or tries to say are: Daddy, Momma, Woah/Ohhh, duck, dog, car, shoes, ball, umum for food, nuhnuh for drink, cracker, Jesus, bubbles, dance, Aubrey (yep, he occasionally calls me Aubrey when are around a large group of family or friends and he hears them calling me Aubrey), tikatoo (for peekaboo), bahpah (for backpack), Papa, Katie, Nu (nose), keys

He also waves hello and goodbye, shakes his head no and yes, points to items he is interested in, laughs when he thinks something is funny, etc, etc. In other words, he figures out a way to get his point across and we usually understand what he is getting at. For example, last Saturday we met my parents at the Thanksgiving Point Gardens for a fun double date and Aaron tagged along. He was dressed in a polo, his nice shorts and his cool Nikes which he is pretty in love with. As soon as he saw my parents he lit up and showed them his shirt by pulling at it. When they told him how handsome he looked he smiled and nodded, then pointed at his shorts and squated down to point at his shoes. He pretty much had a whole conversation about how proud he was of his outfit.

Aaron also understands the majority of what we say. He follows directions very well if we say something like, "Please go throw this in the garbage", "Throw me the ball", "It's time to read books. Please bring Daddy some books to read", "Let's get your shoes on so we can go outside."

I believe that signing is really natural to children because of the fact that even children who aren't taught to sign use body language to express ideas. A toddler shaking his head "no", waving or blowing kisses is using a form of sign language to communicate. Infants and toddlers often point to items they are interested in because they want you to look also. Yesterday we were outside and it started to sprinkle. Aaron pointed to the sky while saying "Ohhh" and I said, "That's rain Aaron" and moved my hands downward like in the song "Itsy Bitsy Spider" to show rain. The next time he felt a few drops he copied me, wanting to communicate about something new that he found fascinating!

****On a side note, I have decided to become an Independent Certified Instructor for the Baby Signs program. I think that signing with babies and toddlers is so beneficial and I really want to help other families who are interested. I am in the process of getting certified and plan to start teach classes in a few months. Check out the Baby Signs website to learn some signs :). http://www.babysigns.com/

Signing Update (8/7/11): Aaron is now at the point where we can show him a new sign a few times and he will repeat it. The amazing thing to me is when I use a sign, not really thinking that he is paying attention, and a few days later I see him using the sign in context. Earlier this week we were walking around an outdoor mall. Aaron stopped to stare at something and then made the sign for "bear" and growled. Outside one of the shops was a big stuffed bear and he was so happy about it, he wanted to tell us. I didn't even know that he knew that sign!

Another thing he started doing this week is signing "potty" every single time he is going potty in his diaper. I often then take him to the bathroom to sit on the potty with his diaper on, then wash his hands (we are just trying to get him to understand the routine). He loves to sit on his potty and always does so as soon as he gets out of the bath. Then he claps for himself! I just think it's great that he already recognizes when he is going potty.

1, 2, 3 POOF

2011-07-15T09:17:00.001-07:00

Sometimes it feels like someone waved a magic wand and Aaron went from this...

(1 Week)

to this... (6 months)

to this... (1 year). In the blink of an eye.

AT LEAST once a day, usually much more often, I take time to stop and just watch him play, explore, discover, grow. He is such a miracle to me and everything new he does seems like the greatest thing ever! I am so blessed to be his Mom.

**Thank you to Jeannie for taking incredible pictures at each of these crossroads.

Our Little Toddler

2011-06-28T21:40:00.000-07:00

These pictures show what a little toddler Aaron has become. He is still a baby in many ways but sometimes I look at him and see a little boy! He is such a joy, we are so blessed to have him in our family.

He still looks like a baby in this one :)

Aaron and his Daddy

2011-06-28T21:20:00.000-07:00

Aaron adores Jon. I don't know how to capture this adoration in words but here is a story that begins to express it...

Since Jon leaves before Aaron wakes up and gets home after he is in bed Monday-Friday, Aaron takes full advantage of his weekends with Jon. He does not let Jon out of his sight. Jon definitely invests the time and effort to make build this relationship and loves little Aaron so much. Saturday morning Jon woke up with Aaron and they played cars and wrestled until it was time for Aaron's nap. When Aaron woke up from his nap I went in the pick him up. He immediately plopped down in his crib, shook his head "No" and said, "Daddy" and signed "Please." Jon came in and Aaron jumped up with a huge smile on his face and reached for his Dad! Moments like this really touch my heart. That afternoon we went for a family hike in the canyon and Aaron fell asleep safe in Jon's arms. To end a wonderful day we spent some time browsing the bookstore and Aaron and Jon hung out in the kids section looking at books and playing with the toys.

My Messy Little Cleaner

2011-06-28T20:35:00.000-07:00

Aaron loves to help me clean (although most of these are pictures of him being messy). He tries to vacuum, loves to sweep, helps me rinse the dishes, washes everything in the house with his wipes and really enjoys bath time and brushing his teeth. However, he is also a BIG mess maker! It's also my fault for letting him feed himself pizza and creamies*, but he gets so messy at every meal and he sometimes needs a pre-bath before his actual bath lol.

*I promise he eats a well-balanced diet, but these just happen to be the messiest foods he's eaten.

Aaron and I visited my old office at International Services and Dr. Settle gave Aaron his first piece of chocolate candy. He made a big mess with it and really enjoyed it :)

With the warm weather we have been enjoying Creamies after dinner and Aaron likes to have his own.
On the walk home from the pool

Pizza is another of the messiest foods!

Welcome Baby Ellie Jean Coleman!

2011-06-28T16:24:00.000-07:00

My best friend Melissa and her husband Aaron welcomed their third baby, Ellie Jean Coleman, to their family on May 9th. Baby Aaron and I were able to catch a ride with some friends up to Rexburg to see baby Ellie the first week of June. I was able to see both of Melissa's other boys within a couple days of them coming home from the hospital, so it was hard for me to wait so long to see baby #3, but I was grateful that we found a ride! Baby Ellie is beautiful, Melissa recovered amazingly well and we had a blast during our visit. Aaron loved playing with Isaac and Sam. He wanted to do everything they did and tried really hard to keep up. I held Ellie every chance possible and had fun visiting with Melissa, as we always do. The first night I was there we put all the kids down and went to the grocery store. You would have thought it was Disneyland seeing how happy we were to be out together, just the two of us. We felt like we were 18 year old roomates again (still can't believe that was 8 years ago). We love you Coleman family!

Beautiful Ellie Jean. Very alert and content.

Jon said, "Every time I called, you were holding Ellie. Did you hold her the whole time?" I sure tried to! Aaron didn't even mind me holding another baby and he even tried to say her name but it came out sounding like, "Owie."

Gotta love those soft cheeks xoxoxox

Big brother Isaac really wanted me to get a picture of Ellie punching him in the face. I did my best.

Melissa and Baby Aaron

Playing with the big boys.

Aaron wanted to ride a bike like the big boys but he had to settle for a riding toy instead.

California - Mid-May

2011-06-28T15:56:00.000-07:00

My Grandmother, Julie Graff, passed away from a massive heart attack in May. Aaron and I rode with my family to California for her funeral and all of my siblings (except for Ben of course) met us there. It was great to see all of my Dad's family and my siblings although the circumstances were less than ideal. The funeral service was beautiful and it made me so grateful for the Gospel of Jesus Christ. After the funeral my family spent a few days at a resort. I spent a lot of time working on a term paper, but we had some fun swimming, visiting and watching Aaron and Austin together. Austin is getting so big and we miss him and his parents a LOT! Aaron did very well on the drive (thanks to a portable DVD player).

Aaron (12 months) and Austin (22 months) reading books.

Mesmerized by the IPad.

This photo cracks me up! Austin slipped just as I took this and it looks like a sweet dance move.
Aaron crawled up on these things at both our hotels.

Shan and I at the park with our boys.

Aaron and Mommy after some sun.

Austin did not want his picture taken, it was nap time.

My beautiful baby. I love that sweet face.

At the funeral. Thank you to my in-laws for sending this beautiful plant.

Aaron LOVES his Aunt Katie. He was attached to her hip most of the trip.

Aaron - June Memories

2011-06-16T21:23:00.001-07:00

Each evening when Jon returns from work, I spend some time recounting to him the hilarious, brilliant, new things that Aaron did that day. And every night I go to sleep smiling or even laughing about something Aaron did. He is such a joy and I can't get over how much I enjoy being his Mom. Here are some things I want to remember:

-Today we went to Jamba Juice and split a smoothie into a regular and kid size cup. While I was ordering, Aaron decided that he was too thirsty to wait. In record time he made his way over to a display of Jamba cups and started attempting to drink out of the first one he grabbed. All of the workers were laughing and it was pretty funny, but I handed the cashier the cup so that she could wash it. As we walked out of the store I turned around to see Aaron walking behind me with a big grin on his face, proudly holding his tiny smoothie and smiling at the man who held the door open for us. It's moments like that when I wish time would just freeze. Watching my tiny, chubby toddler show his emerging independence and yet he is still so much mine. We then went to the bread store for a couple slices of fresh bread. While we were waiting in line the Bruno Mars song, "Just the Way You Are" came on and you should have seen that baby dance! Aaron was twisting, moving his little feet really fast and grooving to the beat. I couldn't stop laughing! The best part about him dancing is that he even says, "Dance, dance, dance".

-Yesterday morning as I studied for my final I put on an episode of "Backyardigans" for Aaron. It was a country western episode where the characters rode horses. After watching for a few minutes Aaron climbed on his rocking horse and rode along to the show. I thought it was so interesting that he clearly understood the correlation since he has recently been uninterested in his rocking horse. I love seeing his imagination emerge!

-Last night when I put Aaron to bed he was laying on my shoulder and I started to say an evening prayer before I laid him down. Without me saying anything, he leaned back, folded his arms and bowed his little head. Moments like that are so tender.

-Today we were at an auto shop waiting on our car. He kept leaning out of his stroller to smile and wave at the other people in the waiting room. One of the gentlemen said, "He is sure in a good mood today!" I replied, "He is in a good mood every day." The man said that I am very lucky and I couldn't agree more!

-Aaron goes around the house making anything he can find into a microphone and then he pretends to sing into it. He has made one using a cup with a ball on top, a cup with a bottle lid on top, an empty bottle, a cylindric block and a brush. He sings and dances and he has some pretty awesome moves for a 13 month old.

-Last night Aaron babbled to himself and his stuffed animals in his crib for almost an entire hour before falling asleep. Today I put him down for his afternoon nap and he happily talked and played in his crib for an hour and a half! I kept thinking he had fallen asleep and then I would hear more talking.

-Today when I dropped Aaron off at the Gold's Gym playroom he was so entranced with the toys that he hardly paid attention when I told him I was going to work out and that I would be back to get him very soon. After saying goodbye and rounding the corner of one of the play area partitions, I heard his little voice say something in his "question" tone and then I heard little running feet. As I turned around I saw him rounding the corner at full speed and I dropped to my knees as he flew into my arms. I gave him a big hug and he cried a little bit but when I came back to pick him up 20 minutes later (yah, I have a hard time leaving him there for much more than 30 minutes) he was busy and happy and they said that he had stopped crying almost immediatley after I left.

Words can not express how much I adore this sweet little boy. I love kissing his chubby cheeks, making him smile, seeing him learn new things every day and spending my days raising him. Nothing could be more rewarding, enriching and fun!

**Pictures to come, still can't find the cord to my camera.

going public

2011-06-08T13:51:00.001-07:00

hey everyone, we are switching back to a public blog. i have been highly unmotivated to update our blog knowing that very few people sign in to read it. we created it to update family and friends about our lives and it really hasn't been serving that purpose. so... i decided that the benefits of changing it to public are worth it and hopefully this will motivate me to keep up with it better.

i will update soon!

Easter Past and Easter Present

2011-04-25T21:54:00.000-07:00

Easter 2008...

...we were engaged!
Easter 2011...

...we are more in love than ever and we have the most adorable, fun, sweet little boy we could have ever imagined!

We love each other and we love Easter! We are so grateful for the Atonement and Resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ, on our behalf. Because of His sacrifice we can be redeemed and we can be a family for eternity.

A few more Spring pictures (we LOVE this season if you can't tell).

Aaron and Mommy at the Thanksgiving Point Tulip Festival - 4.22.11

Aaron is always SO happy to see his Daddy when he comes home from work. (Notice Jon is wearing the same shirt he proposed in :)

Our sweet boy, 11 months old.

We can't get enough of this beautiful weather. We have been spending as much time as possible outdoors as a family.

Happy Easter and Happy Spring!

Our Wonderful Boy - Beginning of 2011

2011-03-21T13:39:00.000-07:00

I am SO behind on posting but I figured an Aaron update was long overdue. Aaron is almost 11 months old, which is so hard to believe, and he is such a joy! I literally wake up every day so excited for another day to be his Mom. Aaron has a very joyful, easygoing personality and he is so bright. He learns new things every day and is constantly amazing Jon and I.

Below are some pictures, movies and facts about Aaron mainly from January and February of 2011. I will post March pictures later :).

The pictures and writing don't exactly correspond but it gives you an overview of our boy recently.

-Aaron drinks out of straws now and he prefers the kid cups with straws as opposed to sippy cups. His favorite drinks are water, smoothies and soy milk.

-Aaron makes the funniest face when he is being silly. He scrunches up his nose and eyes and sort of snorts through his nose. My Mom said I did this exact thing when I was a baby!

-First thing in the morning, after his morning bottle, we put Aaron in his exersaucer while we get ready for the day. We also put on one of his favorite Baby Einstein movies. His favorite is "Baby's First Moves" and he does all the actions with the babies in the movie like "reach", "clap", "shake", "dance", "wave" and so on. He also like the Baby Sign one and he will sign "ball" and other things along with the movie. We use Baby Einstein movies for convenience/entertainment, not education, but I won't complain if he learns a thing or two :).

-Aaron adores both of his parents. He is laughing at something Jon said to him during his bath in the picture below. He is so happy when we are all together and will reach back and forth between us giving us both hugs and then hugging us all together by our necks. We are a happy family!

-Aaron loves to play with balls and cars. He can entertain himself for very long periods of time by throwing a ball and chasing after it or by driving a car around the floor. Last Sunday I had to take his car away in church because he was trying to drive it down the aisle in the chapel. Jon could not stop laughing when I told him why I had taken his car away.

-Aaron walks around everything and uses anything he can push as a walker. This include larger toys, his high chair, laundry baskets, strollers, chairs, boxes, etc. He also crawls super fast everywhere he goes.

-Aaron is on a great schedule. Up about 7 a.m., naps at 9 and 1:30, bedtime at 7. In between we play, read books, go on walks, spend time with family and friends, have meals, bath time, sing and learn!

-Aaron mainly tries to say words that start with the letter D like duck, Dada and dog. He has recently started saying "Uh Oh" and he also says Jesus (JeJuh) when we point to a picture of the Savior or when he hears His name in a song.

-Aaron sleeps with a duck lovey and his stuffed bear and he adores them. He will often spend 15-20 minutes just talking to and playing with these stuffed animals in his crib before falling asleep.

-Aaron starts to dance whenever music comes on. He bounces with his little bum sticking out if he is standing up, waves his arms and shakes his head. It is adorable!

-Aaron likes to bang on pots and pans, shake maracas and listen to music. As you can see by his expression in this picture, he takes it very seriously.

-Aaron still loves to crawl around with things in his mouth like a little puppy :)

-Aaron is starting to sign things such as "all done" and "milk". He also waves, claps, plays "so big", shakes his head, roars like a Cougar and dances on command :). Today after the final session of General Conference we said that Conference was "all done" and Aaron signed, "all done."

-Aaron loves books! He spends large chunks of time pulling all his books off of their shelf and "reading" them to himself. He also loves to be read to.

-I gave Aaron his first hair cut in February. He was a little afraid of the electric razor but it turned out okay.

-Helping Mommy with homework.

-Aaron loves to feed himself and he will eat just about anything. He is such a good eater and consumes a lot of food and formula every day (he recently weaned from nursing and transitioned easily to a bottle).

Jon and I thank our Heavenly Father every single day for the privilege of being Aaron's parents. He has brought more joy to our lives than we could possibly have imagined and we love him so much!

Some cute movies of Aaron:

Tired

2011-03-10T19:06:00.000-08:00

I haven't posted in a while. Life has been wonderful and very busy. These last few weeks Aaron and I went to Idaho and back to spend time with wonderful friends (more on that later), Aaron spent his first couple of nights away from me while I had my gall bladder removed and Jon has been SOOOOO busy with school. Many, many days this last semester he has left for campus at 7:30 and returned some time between 7:30-10:30 p.m. Aaron goes to bed between 7 and 7:30 so this means that Jon often doesn't see him before he is down for the night. My days are always so busy keeping up with Aaron, getting showered and dressed and cleaning the house during his naps, going to the gym, running errands, visiting family and friends, doing homework and so on that by the time the evening comes and I get Aaron in bed I just sort of crash. I often think about blogging at this time of night but I am so exhausted that I usually just read a book, take a bath, watch TV or a movie or visit with Anita (my downstairs neighbor and dear friend). I am by no means claiming to know what single mothers go through, but I sure do admire them!

I promise to get around to posting again soon, but tonight I am and just tired...

Duck, Duck, Baby!

2011-02-22T20:57:00.000-08:00

***Sorry for the delay in posts with pictures or movies. We had to send our camera in to be fixed and finally got it back and started uploading. I have lots of posts to do from Aaron's 7th and 8th Month. He is now 9 months old, WOW!***

Aaron LOVES ducks. In fact, he tries really hard to pronounce the word "duck." He has been practicing it for a while and it sometimes comes out like: "Dut", "Duxxs", "Duh" and every now and then he says the real thing. He loves rubber ducks, stuffed animal ducks, real ducks, duck books, pictures of ducks and he goes to sleep every night and for naps hugging his duck lovey. Here is an adorable movie of him trying to say duck at 8 months:

Early?

2011-02-06T14:36:00.000-08:00

I have been going through some old blog posts and came across THIS one which I wrote when we announced that we were expecting Aaron. All this time I have been thinking that his first due date was May 12th until the doctor changed it to May 8th at his second ultrasound. Actually, his first due date was May 13th and he was born on May 12th. They say that the first ultrasound is the most accurate for predicting due dates and I partly wish our OB hadn't moved our due date back because by the end of my pregnancy feeling like Aaron was late was no fun. The funny thing is that if my due date would have stayed the same, I would have have thought he was early! Next time around I will ask our OB to PLEASE stick with the first estimation.

(No, this isn't an announcement. I just think it's interesting how much our perspective can change our attitudes about things!)

Eclectic Parenting

2011-02-01T22:02:00.001-08:00

I have recently been pondering what you would "call" the parenting philosophy that we espouse in our home and I have come to the conclusion that it would best be called, "Eclectic Parenting."

Eclectic
–adjective
1.
selecting or choosing from various sources.
2.
made up of what is selected from different sources.
3.
not following any one system, as of philosophy, medicine,etc., but selecting and using what are
considered the best elements of all systems.

In other words, I wouldn't say that I am a Babywise Mom, Attachment Parenting Mom, Brazelton Mom, Love and Logic Mom, etc. However, I take principles from various schools of thought and do not think that any of them have ALL the answers.

Attachment Parenting (AP) and Babywise Parenting (BW) are often described as being polar opposites. While I can see how this is possible, I do not like the unkindness and negativity that either group gives to the other. I believe that parents who are loving, consistent, warm and clear about boundaries (authoritative) are parents who will raise securely attached, healthy children. When it comes down to it, my parenting hierarchy is as follows:

1. Revelation and Intuition - This means recorded revelation such as the Bible and Book of Mormon, modern revelation from our Prophet and Apostles and personal revelation. I strongly believe that my work in my family is the most important thing I will do in this life. I know that Heavenly Father wants me to succeed as a wife and mother and that He will direct me to know the best path to achieve this. This is akin to "a mother's intuition" which I believe is the key to understanding so much about our children, their cues and needs. I am grateful for modern day prophets and apostles who have spoken to us recently on topics such as teaching children to learn delayed gratification, listening to our children, being loving and teaching children the gospel through daily activities such as scripture study and Family Home Evening. www.lds.org

2. Developmentally Appropriate Practice - My field of study has strongly influenced my thinking when it comes to raising children. When I hear of any parenting philosophy I have to ask myself if it is a DAP. This is why I agree with some parts of certain philosophies and disagree with others. For example, Babywise 2 suggests that a parent can set a plate of food in front of a young baby and teach them not to grab the food or the plate but to sit with their hands on their lap. While it may in fact be possible to teach this through lots of repetition and unnecessary discipline, I do not believe that it is developmentally appropriate to expect such behavior. Since I don't feel that this is a DAP, I don't follow it although I subscribe to many other BW practices.

3. Family and Individual Needs - If something doesn't feel right for our family or for individual children, I am not going to incorporate it into our family. For example, one principle of Attachment Parenting is co-sleeping. Aaron slept in our room for the first few months of his life so that he was in easy reach when his night feedings were so frequent. However, now when we have to sleep in the same room, such as when we travel, none of us sleeps well. For our family this is not a principle that fits and especially sharing a family bed would, for us, lead to a major lack of sleep for everyone and a lack of closeness as a couple. However, breastfeeding (which is supported by almost every modern parenting philosophy, especially AP) worked very well for our family and it was the choice we felt good about.

4. Temperament - I guess this is similar to individual needs, but it is important enough to have it's own category. I believe that temperament plays a big role in why we do the things we do. We need to be aware of our own temperaments as well as the temperaments of our spouse and children. One reason BW appeals so much to me is because I (and Jon as well) have a temperament that likes organization and structure. While we are far from rigid with Aaron's schedule, I feel much more at peace as a Mom when I have a general idea of how our day will flow. Another example of this would be what AP parents call Baby Wearing. As a fussy newborn Aaron would calm down in his baby Bjorn. He loved being close to me, being secure and being able to look around at the world from that safe position. I enjoy the closeness as well as the convenience since I can have Aaron with me while I clean, shop, go on walks, etc. This has become such a huge part of our day that we have now moved from a Bjorn, which was fabulous and pain free from 8-17 lbs, to an Ergobaby Carrier. This has more positions for older babies such as hip and back carry and goes to heavier sizes.

All in all, I think that parents need to be more understanding of other parents who are truly trying to raise healthy, happy children. Of course neglect and abuse are never excusable but that isn't what these debates are about. I believe that only God has ALL the answers and that it is our responsibility as parents to be informed, prayerful and dedicated to our children.

Going Home

2011-01-24T13:59:00.000-08:00

I love that my parents live in Utah now and that I can go home and see them regularly. Alabama was wonderful and we enjoyed visiting them there, but there is nothing like being able to drive an hour and spend a weekend with them whenever we want to! Over MLK weekend we drove out there Sunday afternoon and spent the evening with them, slept over and went shopping with my Mom and sisters at the Gateway before heading home on Monday. I love that my parents get to see Aaron regularly enough that he knows them and they get to see how much he is changing and growing every week.

I loved seeing Aaron cuddle up to my Dad while he played with his watch. (Cell phone pictures)

Electronics Baby!

2011-01-24T13:47:00.000-08:00

My baby loves electronics. I guess most babies probably do but it never ceases to amaze me how taken he is with them. Last night Jon put a couple of our old cell phones in one of Aaron's toy baskets. This morning I set Aaron in the living room and put a few of his favorite toys out so that I could hurry and get ready. Within a matter of a minute or less he had somehow spotted the phones sitting in his basket, crawled to it, dumped out the contents and grabbed both phones. He hasn't wanted to let go of them all day. We are glad that he has old ones to play with now because early Sunday morning he was playing with my phone and he prank-called our downstairs neighbors.

So proud of himself for finding the phone. Notice the basket in the background that he dumped out.

He even held on to the phone as he pulled himself up and crawled around the living room.

So What Do You DO With That Degree?

2011-01-14T13:37:00.000-08:00

Earlier today I submitted my graduation application through BYU to graduate in August of this year! Ironically, I just received my Associates degree from USU last semester, now that I only have 15 credits left until I earn my BS. My college journey has been long since I have attended 3 Universities and taken many breaks to travel and work.

I am earning a degree in the field of Human Development. My actual degree title is: Family Life: Human Development. At BYU-Idaho it was Child Development, at USU it was Family, Consumer and Human Development - basically all the same degree just different names and a few different requirements.

The funny thing is that very few people have any idea what one learns in this degree. When I tell someone new what Degree I am pursuing I usually hear, "So, what do you DO with that degree?", "Is that like childcare or something?", "Human What?" and so on. I can understand this, since I didn't know much about this degree before I started looking into it at BYU-Idaho, 7 years ago.

The best way I can describe my degree is by relating it to a field people are familiar with such as Psychology. With a degree in Psychology you would learn about Cognitive/Psychological Development and Theory, Cognitive Processes, Abnormal and Normal Cognitive growth and so on. This is one aspect of Human Development, but a degree in Human Development is more broad because you learn about all areas of development across the life span; Cognitive, Biological, Social, Emotional, Language, Moral Development from conception through death. Development is studied in the context of family and society.

What do you DO with this degree? The same thing you would do with any degree. Apply it to your personal and professional life. There are a number of jobs you could get with this degree such as becoming a Child Development Specialist, a Child Life Specialist, a Family Educator and so on.

What will I DO with this degree? The same thing I would do if I earned a degree in any other field - use my knowledge to bless my family and community. I have always wanted to be a stay-at-home Mom and this is the choice I would have made no matter what degree I had chosen.

Here are some of the classes I have taken while earning this degree:

Intro to Child Studies
Child Development
Human Development Across the Lifespan
Development in Infancy and Early Childhood
Development in Middle Childhood
Adolescent Development*
Parenting and Child Guidance
Family Crisis and Intervention
Preschool Methods and Curriculum
Cognitive Development
Human Nutrition
Critical Issues in Family, Consumer and Human Development
Marriage and Family Relations
Family Finance
Intro to Family Processes
Research Methods
Strengthening Marriage and Family
Moral Foundations of Family Life
Socialization Across Childhood*
Advanced Issues in Human Development*
SFL Internship: United Way, Parent Education
(*classes I have yet to take)

Why did I choose this degree? Because I LOVE learning about human development, primarily child development. I took my first Child Development class at BYU-I as a general ed requirement and I couldn't get enough of it. I read the textbook and other suggested reading just for fun and ate it up! I think development in every facet of life is fascinating. I am sure that I will eventually do more in the field of Parent Education, which is an area that I am passionate about. At this phase in my life I just want to put all of my energy into our growing family, into raising healthy children and into helping those around me.

8 Month Old Aaron

2011-01-13T20:40:00.000-08:00

Sadly, I lost my memory card and my camera is currently being fixed and could take up to a month. This means that most of these pictures are from my phone or our really old camera so they are not the greatest quality and I couldn't rotate a few of them. I'm just glad to have some lasting record of the last month.

I can't believe that we are 2/3 of the way through Aaron's first year! I love the age Aaron is at right now. He is just soaking in everything and learning new things every day. Here are some of his new favorite activities and tricks;

Pulling to standing, walking around furniture and pushing boxes and walking behind them. Aaron spends the majority of his waking hours practicing pulling himself to standing. In fact, he even spends the time when he would normally be napping practicing standing and cheerfully babbling/singing in his crib. Here is an example of a normal sequence of events as seen this morning: 1. Pull to standing on play table, hit the blocks together 2. Crawl to the recliner, pull to standing, look at Mom to tell me "good job" 3. Crawl to laundry basket, pull to standing, pull out half of the clean, folded clothes 4. Crawl to TV stand, pull to standing, hit a few things 5. Crawl to ottoman, pull to standing, smile at Mom. This goes on all day and I think it's so cute. Aaron will stand using anything as support - boxes, baskets, suitcases, furniture, people, toys, you name it.

This is when he very first started pulling himself up. On low things like this he also climbs on top and over the other side.

Laundry day.

This one is dark and blurry but I love it because it was one of the first times I found him standing up in his crib in the morning. He was just talking, cooing and smiling and when I walked in he gave me a big smile and reached for me with his little outstretched hand.

So proud.

Trying so hard to get up.

I love this one, not sure how to rotate it in blogger though. Sweet, darling face.

BEING ROCKED!!!!! This is probably the new thing that I am most excited about. Aaron has never really let us rock him. As a newborn he would let us hold him and pat his back, but rocking never seemed to appeal much to him other than in a baby swing. From about 6 weeks on, when he was tired, he just wanted us to lay him in his bed so he could go to sleep. We would try to rock him but he would arch his back and cry louder than if you just laid him in his bed. Recently, Aaron has started to enjoy me rocking him. This makes me so happy! I love cuddling him, rocking him and singing to him until he gets drowsy. Then I lay him in his bed and he falls asleep. Yay!
Babbling. Aaron babbles a lot and says "words" such as "dada", "baba", "nuhnuh", etc. He usually makes the "nuhnuh" sound when he is hungry and the "dada" sound when he sees Jon so we wonder if he knows what it means. Mainly he just seems to know that he can get a great reaction out of Jon when he says "dada" around him.

Aaron loves his Dada! Don't you love how he's holding onto Jon's hair? HAHA!

Eating. Aaron's favorite foods right now are 1. Anything he can feed himself and 2. Yogurt. He will still eat just about everything but he really enjoys feeding himself finger foods.

This is a smile, not a cry. He REALLY likes feeding himself in his high chair. I love our Ikea high chair. It is so simple and easy to clean.

Playing. Aaron has discovered the world of toys. He received some really great toys at Christmas and he has so much fun playing with them. He really likes the new play table from his Great-Grandma McLaughlin and a tunnel to crawl through from his Great-Grandma and Great-Grandpa Graff. He really loves when we stack a tower of blocks for him and he can knock them over. Above all, his favorite toys right now are his rubber duckies and his toy keys.

Aaron's new tunnel. He has figured out how to turn around inside it and will crawl back and forth.

Happy boy, playing with his fun toy from Nonna and Pa (my parents).

This activity table is so great! It has a toy piano, fun activities and it flips over and has Lego-type blocks.

So many choices! I love when he sits like this.

He likes his new basketball hoop from Santa.

Bath time. This is still one of Aaron's favorite parts of the day. He is so happy in the bath and loves to splash the water while sitting up, then lay on his back and kick the water with his feet to splash. He likes playing with rubber ducks, cups and bowls and being read to in the tub.

Taking a bath in my parent's kitchen prep-sink.

He loves playing with cups in the tub. I have to stop him from drinking the water.

Reading Books and Turning Pages. Aaron loves books and he really pays attention to the pictures. He has now figured out how to turn the pages and he often turns to the next one before we can finish the words on the page. His favorite book right now is called, "Chugga-Chugga Choo-Choo." He will let you read it to him over, and over, and over, and over.

I was reading aloud to Aaron while he played and he grabbed a book and copied me. Laying on his back and "reading" it. Jon noticed and snapped a picture.
Aaron's favorite book.

Nodding. Aaron is on a nodding kick. He loves nodding and will nod and smile at someone to get their attention. This is super funny to play with because Jon and I think we are so clever when we say, "Aaron, are we the best parents ever?", etc, and he nods yes.

Crawling. Aaron now does the traditional baby crawl and he is really good at it. He went from his worm type crawl over Christmas break to the hand, knee, hand, knee crawl and he hasn't gone back. He is so funny because it was as if one day he just decided that he wanted to crawl that way and he practiced so hard until he could do it. Jon and I get the impression that Aaron is a very determined child.

Singing and Yelling. If you sing a single note to Aaron he will sing/yell back. These exchanges can go on for long periods of time and he just loves it! He loves music and will nod his head to the rhythm. He has also started doing a little bouncing to the music and it looks like he will be dancing soon.

This video is the best example I have of our singing exchanges. Sorry about my voice. I had a cold and don't sound to great. You kind of get the idea though...

The Green Balloon

2011-01-11T21:24:00.000-08:00

Last week as Aaron and I stood in a grocery checkout line I had a serious reality check. Our cashier was a sweet, grandma-type and she was chatting with one of the young men about the birth of his first child. When he walked away she mentioned to the bagger that the young man had a new baby. In my mind I thought something like, “Me too.” When it was our turn to checkout the woman started smiling and talking to Aaron. She then handed him a green balloon and I tied it to the cart so that he could play with it. He stared at it, then looked at the other balloons tied next to her stand and then at a group of balloons one stand over and finally back to his balloon with a big grin on his face. The cashier said, “He is so smart! He realizes that they are all the same.” I looked down at my “new baby.” There he sat, on his own, in the shopping cart. I had a sudden and somewhat painful realization that he isn’t a “new” baby anymore. Of course he is still a baby, but I somehow keep thinking that I just barely gave birth to him. It is amazing seeing all of his growth and we love seeing how much he is learning every day. However, I sometimes just want time to slow down a little bit. I try to soak in every precious minute and I treasure his babyhood so much. I know that I will love his toddler, childhood and adolescent years too, but I just adore my little baby Aaron so much.

I have also had a hard time recently realizing that weaning is just around the corner. I am very lucky to have had such a positive experience with breastfeeding. Aaron has been a natural at nursing from day one and I have never had a single problem. Breastfeeding just came naturally to both of us and it has been a great bonding experience. I have also felt so blessed to be able to breastfeed and for the nutrition it offers my baby. In reality, I am going to have a more difficult time with weaning Aaron than he is, so I am preparing myself for it now. This evening before Aaron went to bed I nursed him. I usually get super thirsty when he is nursing so I was drinking water while he fed. As soon as he saw the water he sat up, pushed me away and reached for it. Jon went and got him a sippy-cup of water and, instead of wanting to nurse, Aaron laid back in my arms and drank from his cup. Are these moves toward independence as hard, exciting, painful and joyful all at once for you other Mommas?

The Cutest Baby in the World

2011-01-11T20:33:00.000-08:00

These are some of the beautiful 6-month pictures that Jeannie took of Aaron.

I think he was trying to fly away in this picture.

Such blue eyes. From my Dad and Jon's paternal Grandpa.

Spider Man (Baby)

I love him.

This captures some of the joy that Aaron brings to our lives every day.

Sweet little Dopey.

This is his cheesy smile. He often does this smile and then squints his eyes, wrinkles his nose and snort-laughs. It cracks me up every time!

Such a sweet face.

I love those soft, chubby cheeks!

He loves this little dog named Lula. It is from a children's show Jon and I like called Pocoyo.

Aaron is such a joy. I can not express in words how much we love and treasure every moment with this sweet, loving boy. He is such a peaceful, happy, determined baby. At 6 months he was doing a very determined army crawl to move from place to place. This slowly progressed to a worm/body roll crawl and now, at almost 8 months, he does the "traditional" crawl on hands and knees.

Ouch Aaron!

2010-11-23T15:33:00.000-08:00

6 Month Old + 6 New, Sharp Teeth + 1 Hard Bite while Nursing
=
OUCH AARON!

I just thought I would share this hilarious and somewhat related video. (I can't get photos to upload from our camera, hence the recent lack of posting.)

Half A Year!

2010-11-16T12:39:00.000-08:00

Here is some info about Aaron at 6 months. I was waiting to post it until I could get my camera to upload the pictures. In the meantime I lost my memory card with most of the pictures of him from this month on it. Luckily I have the pictures that Jeannie took of Aaron to capture him at this point in time. My camera is now being fixed and will hopefully be back within the month! Here is the post without pictures.

I can hardly believe that my little baby is 6 months old! He is the most enjoyable little person ever and we love him more every day.

6 Month Stats

Length: 28 1/8 inches (90-95%)

Weight: 16 lbs 8 oz (25-50%)

Head Circ: 17.6 in (75%)

-Aaron has 6 teeth. 4 on the top and 2 on the bottom.

-Aaron is such a happy baby! He is so full of laughter, smiles, coos and babbles. Every evening when I put him to bed, I am already looking forward to the next morning when I get to enjoy his sweet presence again.

-Aaron seems to have a pretty independent personality. He likes his interactive time, but it has to be balanced with lots of time where he is free to play and explore on his own. He already wants to do so many things himself and he is only 6 months old! For example, when I am feeding him, he grabs the spoon and puts it in his mouth himself. I hold on to it to help guide it in, but I always have to wrestle it away from his little fist in order to scoop another bite. He also won't allow us to put the sippy cup in his mouth for him. He has to do it himself. In order to distract him from grabbing the spoon out of my hand, I put Gerber puffs on his high chair at meal time. After carefully studying them, he takes his thumb and forefinger and very carefully tries to pick them up using pincer grasp. I find this hilarious and love to watch him do this.

Favorite Music: Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat, "Any Dream Will Do." Yep. That's pretty specific, but that song will keep him happy on car rides about every time. He loves all types of music but will instantly calm down when "Any Dream" starts playing. We think it's super cute.

Favorite Toys: His orange maracas, his soccer rattle and anything with tags that he can chew on (he has a stuffed puppy with two tags on it and that is definitely a favorite).

Favorite Activities: Crawling, moving non-stop and exploring his environment. He also loves to sing songs and read books with Mommy, he still adores bath time and he loves being outdoors as much as possible. He is still in love with the baby bjorn and will spend hours in it. He loves being in the bjorn while I play my dance game on the Wii, clean, shop... pretty much any time. He got tired of his exersaucer for a while but we put it up for a couple of weeks and he is back to loving it.

Favorite People: Of course he adores his Mom and Dad, but he is also very fond of people he sees on a regular basis. Our best friends live in the basement of the house we live in so he sees them almost daily. He squeals with delight when he sees them and especially adores Dean, Jon's best friend. One day at church Dean walked by in the hall and Aaron saw him through the door of the room we were in. He yelled happily and did a full-body, happy dance in my arms. So cute! He also really loves my little sisters, Jon's sister Katie and any other family members he sees frequently.

Favorite Foods: Yes. Aaron loves ALL food. He has eaten everything we have given him so far and we continue to increase the variety of foods we feed him. For his 6-month "birthday" we got a baby food cookbook and we are excited to introduce him to more complex foods such as meats and beans. Although he eats everything, he still seems to prefer squash, sweet potatoes and sweet peas above the rest. He continues to be an amazing nurser and consumes a LOT of milk every day. He nurses about every 3.5 hours during the day and is now eating solids at breakfast, lunch and dinner and also nursing at those meals.

Since I don't have the pictures any more I want to record a written memory of Aaron's half birthday. We celebrated Aaron turning 6 months by having a little party with some family and friends. Those in attendance were: Dean and Anita Clawson, Amanda Gravett, Jared, Jeannie, Jace and Mallory, Katie M, Devin Plowman and of course Jon, Aaron and myself. We just ate dinner, played the Wii and had half cupcakes. I even cut the cupcakes in half and formed them in the shape of a 6 and took a cute picture, but I guess we will just have to imagine it :). This has by far been the best 6 months of our lives!

Going Mobile

2010-11-02T21:49:00.000-07:00

Here is a clip of Aaron's first attempts at crawling at 5 and a half months. This video was taken close to his bedtime so he was moving pretty slowly, but he will pretty much always crawl to reach his soccer rattle. With his army crawl and rolling both directions combine, he can pretty much get anywhere he wants to!

Cute Cousins

2010-10-26T20:50:00.000-07:00

Aaron Scott and Mallory Kate McLaughlin are cousins born three months apart. They have been together a lot this week and it is so much fun seeing them interact now that they are becoming so social. Mallory loves to pat Aaron, sometimes he likes it and sometimes he probably wishes he could crawl like her so he could get away. Mallory thinks it's really funny when Aaron makes loud babbling noises and she laughs and claps her hands for him. Mallory is crawling, and almost walking, and Aaron loves to watch her move all around and is trying to crawl but hasn't quite figured it out. Aaron got his feelings hurt a few times this week when Mally took his toys away. Today I was feeding Aaron his dinner in Mally's Bumbo and I put Mallory in her high chair so that they were both contained. As I sat there talking to and feeding them it suddenly seemed so surreal to me that they have changed so much so quickly! I love these sweet babies and look forward to watching them grow up together and become great friends.

I love these two babies so much. Mallory Kate - 8 months old & Aaron Scott - 5 months old.

Sippy-Cup Buddies - They both really love their sippy cups. They are so adorable!

Halloween Preview and Blog Reminder

2010-10-22T11:54:00.000-07:00

Here is a preview of our Halloween theme. Can you guess what I am going to be? What Jon is going to be? Shanna sewed this for Aaron and it arrived in the mail today. I can not believe that she sewed this without a pattern, just from looking at a few pictures of Dopey! Wow. Thank you Shan!
Also, just a reminder that we are going private starting in November. So if you want to access our blog after that, leave a comment with your email address. If you already have, I received it and will sent you an invite at the start of November.

5 Months Old

2010-10-17T20:27:00.000-07:00

Aaron is 5 months old! He is such a happy, sweet, fun, loving baby. We are so grateful to have him in our lives. Here are a few things about Aaron at 5 months;

-He has one tooth on the bottom, middle of his mouth.

-He LOVES food. So far he eats oatmeal, rice cereal, squash, sweet potatoes, sweet peas, peaches, pears, apples, bananas and prunes. He like everything we have fed him so far!

-Aaron is such a happy baby and is always vocalizing and laughing.

-Aaron loves dropping things intentionally and waiting for us to pick them up for him.

-He loves being outside, going on walks, music, being read to, playing with toys, chewing on anything and sucking on his thumb.

Jon loves teaching Aaron new tricks, like standing up...

He always puts his arm on the arm rest.

This is the face he makes just before giving a HUGE smile...

...like this!

So sweet.

He really loves his bath toys - thank you Lisa!

Don't you love his little "Newsies" hat!

Aaron and Mommy going to church.

I love them.

Aaron and Daddy all ready for church.

We love him so much!

Such Blue Eyes

5 Months Old

Pondering Life

Aaron's New Trick

Conference Weekend

2010-10-17T19:33:00.000-07:00

The first weekend in October is General Conference of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. We are blessed to hear from the Prophet and Apostles and other church leaders. We spent the weekend watching Conference and hanging out with my family. Here are a few pictures of our fun weekend.

Sweet Aaron and Uncle Brian

Aaron smiling at Uncle Dallin

Celebrating Dallin's Birthday

We were at lunch during Aaron's nap time, so he just went to sleep.

I love holding my sleeping baby.

Aaron and Mommy

The gang watching Selena's soccer game.

Elder Graff is Finally Going to Brazil!

2010-10-08T19:13:00.000-07:00

I love my little brother Ben. He is one of the greatest people I know; kind, positive, patient, intelligent, hard working, fun, faithful - pretty much everything a parent hopes their child will be. He is such a happy part of my childhood memories and adult life. Actually, most of my memories begin the day he was born and continue on from there (even though I was only 5 and a half when he was born). We often refer to him as Bena because when Selena was a baby she would call him Beh and we would say, "No, it's Beh-na, Beh-na." Emphasizing the "n" but inadvertently saying "na". She started calling him Bena and it kind of stuck. Right now, however, he is known as Elder Graff.

Ben is serving a full-time mission for our church for two years. He left in April of this year and we won't see him again until April of 2012. Ben was assigned to serve as a missionary in Fortaleza, Brazil and spent a couple of months in the Missionary Training Center learning Portuguese. However, because of visa issues, he was sent to Atlanta in July to serve there until his visa came through. We just found out this evening that his visa finally came and he will be heading to Brazil on Monday!!!! We are so happy and I can only imagine how excited and grateful he is right now. Don't get me wrong, he has not complained about the delay, but we all know that he has been looking forward to sharing the gospel with the people in Brazil and we have been praying hard that this would happen soon. Yeah for Elder Graff, we are so excited for you!!!!

Aaron Recently

2010-10-07T08:33:00.000-07:00

Aaron is usually a very happy baby. Recently, however, he has looked like this a lot...

Aaron has had a very bad cold this last week and I am pretty sure he is cutting teeth (see the close-up of his mouth and let me know if those look like tooth buds to you). Lots of congestion, coughing and crying. We even had to take him to the hospital for a breathing treatment where they sucked a lot of the mucous out of him. He was not happy about it, but it sure helped him a lot. I now have whatever he has and we are both feeling pretty yucky. Now I know why he has been so sad, this is a crappy cold. Today we are laying around and watching TV. Yes, I know, I am letting my 5 month old watch TV - you can judge me if you want to. Just don't tell my Human Development professors, lol. Oh well, my husband is gone for 12-14 hours today and I am feeling too yucky to do much of anything other than feed, diaper and hold my sweet baby. He seems to be feeling much better than yesterday, so I am optimistic that this will pass quickly.

Here are a few pictures of Aaron recently. He is such a joy!

Teeth?

I love his sweet, little face.

Trying to get a little fresh air.

My happy boy in his beloved exersaucer.

You can't tell from the picture, but all of these toys are constantly soaked in slobber.

I love this picture. What a sweet face.

For Freeeeeeeeee?

2010-09-24T13:47:00.000-07:00

We got this awesome convertible car seat (cute baby not included, forgive the fuzzy cell phone picture)...

...by purchasing lots of these diapers!
I love a good deal and I am pretty diligent about finding deals and coupons on baby items since these little bundles can get pricey! My favorite place for great deals on baby items is Babies R' Us. Many people assume that they are overpriced and don't even look there. On some items you can find lower prices, but on baby essentials like diapers and wipes, they have great prices. Pampers diapers are my favorite. They fit Aaron so great and he rarely leaks or has blow-outs. I compared prices on Pampers at all the leading stores like Target and Walmart and Babies R' Us is cheaper. Not only are their diapers less, but I only buy them when they have a gift card promotion. These types of promotions happen every 2 or 3 months and you usually have to buy two boxes and then you receive a gift card. I have received gift cards from 15$-25$ by purchasing diapers and gift cards from 5$-15$ on other items such as baby wipes and toilet paper. Also, for every 9 boxes of diapers I buy, I get the 10th free! The wipes I buy are 50 cents to one dollar cheaper elsewhere, but again, I buy them when I have coupons and have always spent less on wipes by purchasing them there. I often receive coupons in the mail or when I make purchases, for 20% off any one item. So far, here is what I have been able to get, essentially for "free", by using coupons and promotional gift cards.

Gift Cards: I have received $130.00 in gift cards from various promotions. This covers the cost of the following items from Babies R' Us.;

1. This rainforest gym (priced around 60$) which has provided Aaron countless hours of fun and entertainment. 2. This basketball toy (priced at 34.99), which Aaron will be getting for Christmas. When I bought the play mat they were having a Fisher-Price sale where you could get a free toy if you purchased something over 50$ and this is the toy I picked.
3. This awesome convertible car seat(price at 99.99$). I actually got it for 60$ because of sales and coupons and the rest of it was completely paid for in promotional gift cards!

4. A FREE box of Pamper's diapers worth 40+$ after I buy 9 boxes (one box lasts about a month or so and you can only get one free box every 9 months).

5. Also, for every $150 you spend at Babies R' Us they send you a 5$ gift card.

6. Finally, I enter my points into Pamper's Rewards and I am saving them up for one of the fun prizes you can buy with your points :).

My Little Workout Buddy

2010-09-23T10:15:00.001-07:00

This morning while I did Jillian Michael's "30 Day Shred" workout (such a great workout in only 20 minutes) Aaron sat in his swing and just laughed and laughed at me. I'm not sure what he found so funny about my workout, but it was so hilarious watching him giggle at me that it made my exercising super fun and it just flew by. I tried to record a few minutes of him laughing, but I pushed record after I thought I had been recording so I will have to try to capture that another day. I just wanted to record the sweet memory in writing at least. I love my happy, adorable boy! He motivates me in so many ways each and every day to be a better person.

Going Private

2010-09-22T20:33:00.001-07:00

Well friends, the time has come. We are going to make our blog private. Please post your e-mail address (I will make the comments private so that others can not see your address) if you want access to our blog. We promise to post lots of cute pictures of Aaron.

Love,

The McLaughlin Family

Jon, Aubrey and Aaron

Silly Baby

2010-09-22T09:05:00.001-07:00

This morning when I put Aaron down for his morning nap I was exhausted and I decided to take a quick nap on the spare bed in his room. Apparently, Aaron was planning on taking a quick nap too. He went to sleep right away, as did I, but about 25 minutes later I heard some rustling in his crib. I looked over and he was just looking around, but not making any noise. I figured he would start to call for me any minute, which is usually what he does when he wakes up (normally after an hour or two long nap, or so I thought), but he didn't. He just played in his bed for the next 40 minutes! What? It was all I could do to not crack up as I watched him. He just looked around the room, spent a lot of time looking at the saying on his wall and just laid there playing with his blanket, starting at his hands and putting his blanket and his hands in his mouth. I finally decided to peek my head over his crib to see what he would do and he gave me a huge cheesy grin, like, "No nap for me!". Normally while he naps his door is shut and I am busy doing school work, showering, cleaning, etc. so I just assume he is asleep the whole time. Now I wonder how much of that time he is really sleeping. Silly Baby.

(These pictures were taken on my phone, so the quality is not very good, but you get the idea :)

Such a cutie!

You know you are married to a computer nerd when...

2010-09-20T14:10:00.000-07:00

-You have dreams about showing people how to use Mac OS and the new features on Windows 7 and the people in the dream think it's super cool. Yes, I had that dream this week.
-The upcoming premier of the movie "Tron" is on your family calendar and the original "Tron" is next on your Netflix que.
-You know that "Linux" isn't an endangered animal.
-When the Dell employee comes to fix your computer and explains the problem and what they are going to do to fix it, you actually understand. Yes, that also happened this week.
-Your friends call you and then say, "Actually, I had a computer question to ask your husband. The "Geek Squad" had no idea how to help us."
-You own a shirt that says, "Electrical and Computer Engineers Void Warranties", and you think it's funny.
-You currently have 5 working computers in your house.
-When you get together with your best-friend-couple/house-mates (aka. Dean and Anita) the guys start talking about computers and the girls start talking about girl stuff, but the girls actually understand what the guys are talking about. Although we pretend like we don't.

I love my computer-nerd/computer-GENIUS husband!!!

Laughing Cousins

2010-09-19T19:56:00.000-07:00

This evening Jace had Aaron and the rest of us cracking up. I love this little video of these sweet boys laughing together. We think Aaron sounds like a squeaky toy when he laughs sometimes.

Our Sweet 4-Month Old

2010-09-18T20:12:00.000-07:00

I can not express in words how much we enjoy our baby boy every single day. He is such a sweet, happy, fun baby and we love him so much! On September 12th he turned 4 months old. Here are a few things about our darling boy.

4 Month Stats:

LENGTH- 26.5 in - 90th Percentile

WEIGHT- 14.8 lbs - 50th Percentile

Aaron's weight percentile dropped a lot from his 2 month check-up. His pediatrician wasn't worried about it and said that it was probably because he is moving so much and awake so much more, but he did recommend that we start solids.

His first BYU football game! He was all dressed up and ready to go in his cute BYU outfit. We were so excited to see his Aunt Katie cheer at her first football game. The roar of the crowd terrified Aaron and we had to leave after just a few minutes. We are going to try a volleyball game the next time Katie is cheering and hopefully he will enjoy that more.
I love how he puts his hands together likes this :)
Aaron and Mama
Our little family
Aaron adores his Dad. Whenever Jon gets home from work he picks Aaron up and Aaron snuggles right into Jon's shoulder. Jon is such a natural with Aaron.
This is the face Aaron makes when he wants to give you a very slobbery kiss.
Father and son.

I often find them like this, snuggled up and staring at a cell phone, lap top or other electronic device. It makes me laugh.

I love them.

Aaron loves being in his Baby Bjorn carrier, especially outside. He will happily stay in his carrier for hours if we are outside and we spend a lot of time going on walks, watering the grass, etc.

Aaron has a new favorite friend. He loves this little puppy and snuggles it and chews on it when he is in his car seat, in his bed, having tummy time, in his swing... pretty much everywhere except in the bath.

So sweet.

Aaron loves his Momma so much. He lights up at the sight of my face and the sound of my voice. He follows me with his eyes wherever I go and he stares at me very intently when I sing to him. Aaron laughs so hard for me. He still doesn't laugh much for anyone else, but he often gets in a laughing mood for me and all I have to do is say something silly or play peek-a-boo with him and he is all giggles. Best sound ever.
I love my sweet boy.

Aaron is such a happy baby and is always smiling at Jon and I. He still takes a little while to warm up to other people, but he adores the people he sees regularly like our good friends/basement neighbors Dean and Anita, Jon's sister Katie and my parents and sisters.

His first taste of solids! We started Aaron on rice cereal and he did so great eating it. At his 4-month check-up his pediatrician said to start him on other foods and he has tried sweet potatoes and bananas so far. He loves sweet potatoes and eats them like crazy. He is really good at swallowing solids foods, although he makes a mess every time.

I love his expression in this picture!

Happy 4-Months Aaron Boy.

How Quickly We Forget...

2010-09-12T20:49:00.000-07:00

At the start of one Spanish 3 class, my Junior year of high school, the teacher mentioned that she had heard something about "another plane crash." I thought how unfortunate that was, but none of us had any idea what had really transpired and we moved on with our Spanish grammar lesson. After class one of my friends rushed up to me at my locker and asked if I had heard. "About the plane crash?", I asked, wondering why everyone was rushing around in the halls and talking quickly. Was someone crying? "It wasn't just a plane crash," she said, "An airplane flew into one of the twin towers!" My first thought was that she must be joking. I couldn't imagine something like that actually happening. She grabbed my arm and pulled me into the choir room. A large group of students was gathered around a TV with looks of shock and disbelief on their faces. The TV showed an image of a plane flying into one of the World Trade Center towers and then it showed a second plane flying into the adjacent tower. What was going on? How could this happen?

I sat down in shock, trying to process what I had just seen. The image played over and over on the screen. A breaking announcement then came on reporting that another plane had crashed into the Pentagon. This hit me like a wave of nausea. We lived in Northern Virginia at the time and my Dad alternated between working at the Pentagon and an office near D.C. Was he supposed to be at the Pentagon that day? I didn't know. A few people around me began sobbing. Their parents worked at the Pentagon every day and they had no way of knowing whether they were safe or not. Although this was only 9 years ago, few highschoolers had cell phones then and instant contact with our family members was not a possibility.

We continued watching the screen. No teachers taught lessons that afternoon. Who would have listened anyway? Suddenly, the unthinkable happened. First one, then a second tower crumbled to the ground. As they replayed this image over and over, I couldn't help but think about my recent trip to New York City.

Less than two months previous, to celebrate my sixteenth birthday, my parents had taken my best friend Melissa and I to visit New York City. This had been a dream of ours for years and we were thrilled to be there. We stayed at the Marriott hotel positioned at the bottom of the World Trade Center, right between the towers. The first thing we had done upon arriving at the hotel had been to run outside, lay down on the ground and take pictures of the towers from below. Now, less than 2 months later, those towers and the hotel we had slept in were a pile of rubble. Was my Dad alright? Was Melissa's Dad, a commercial airline pilot, flying that day? How could something like this happen?

When I finally arrived home that day I ran into my mothers arms. She told us that my Dad had been in Reston, VA that day but that he wouldn't be home soon because many of the roads were closed. The next thing I did was call Melissa. Her Dad's plane had been grounded, as had all air traffic, but he was fine. We cried together. I remember sitting on my bed shaking a snow globe we had bought that had a replica of the Twin Towers in it.

Such a tragic day in our nation's history. So many lives lost. Yet, we forget so quickly. The world stopped that day, but here we are 9 years later, and September 11th passed without me even realizing what day it was. Yesterday I spent the day attending my little sister's soccer game, playing with my baby, hanging out with my husband, going on a long walk in the sunshine with my sisters and son, rocking my little boy and watching happily as my little sisters ran around outside with some of their friends. At one point in the day I drove by a flag at half mast and wondered what had happened. It wasn't until today, while Jon and I were watching "Dear John", that I remembered what day yesterday had been. There is a scene in the movie when the main character walks out of a class and everyone is running around in chaos. I knew immediately that they were depicting September 11th, 2001.

I just wanted to record this as my way of remembering. I realized that I had never written down where I was that day. I am so grateful for the freedoms we enjoy. I am grateful for this great nation and for those who have sacrificed so much so that I could have a day like yesterday. I will be better about remembering.

Jon and Aaron, aka. "Little Jon"

2010-09-03T11:56:00.000-07:00

The guys Jon works with have named Aaron, "Little Jon", because they all think he looks so much like Jon. I asked Jon's Mom to send me some baby pictures of Jon. Do you think they look alike? :)

Jon and his big brother Jason.

Aaron and Jon's little sister Katie.

Baby Jon with a blanket his grandma made him and fuzzy slippers...

Baby Aaron with a blanket his grandma made him and fuzzy slippers...

This one in particular looks a lot like the first picture of Jon with the fuzzy slippers on.

Baby Aaron

Baby Jon

Other than my blue eyes and a few other feature differences, I look a lot like my Dad!

Aaron loves his Dad!

Aaron's Blessing Day

2010-08-12T12:36:00.001-07:00

Aaron was blessed in our ward on Sunday, August 1st. The blessing was so special and we are very grateful to have this amazing little boy as a member of our eternal family. We felt so loved and supported by the many family members and friends who attended Aaron's blessing and the luncheon afterward.

Motherhood:-An-Eternal-Partnership

2010-08-05T10:27:00.000-07:00

Motherhood:-An-Eternal-Partnership

I love Motherhood.

2010-08-05T10:17:00.000-07:00

I love being a Mommy! Before you have a child people say that you can't imagine how much you will really love your own children. And before you actually have your own children, especially while you are pregnant, you think you really can imagine how much love you will feel toward this little person. But then, when you meet that baby for the first time, and you feel this amazing amount of love, you realize that they were right. And the amazing thing is that I love this little boy more every day! Also, having a baby of my own helps me feel to a greater degree than I understood before, how much Heavenly Father loves His children. As President Joseph F. Smith said, “The love of a true mother comes nearer [to] being like the love of God than any other kind of love” (“The Love of Mother,” Improvement Era, Jan. 1910, 278).

The above post is a beautiful movie that makes me so happy to be a Mommy.

Baby Wise Whisperer

2010-08-03T10:26:00.001-07:00

THIS IS A VERY, VERY LONG POST ON MY EXPERIENCES WITH SLEEP TRAINING, ETC. If you are not interested in this concept, this will bore you, but I wanted to record my experience for journal purposes and for anyone it may help...

I read quite a few "sleep" and parenting books while I was pregnant and found great principles in each of them. Some of the sleep books I read are, "Secrets of the Baby Whisperer", "Happiest Baby on the Block", "The Lull-A-Baby Sleep Plan" and "Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child". These books helped me a lot, but I still hadn't found a concrete plan of action that I felt I could fully embrace. I have drawn bits and pieces of advice from each book and used what worked for Aaron, but it wasn't until I read "On Becoming Baby Wise" that I really felt like I had found something that would work for my baby and our family. The principles in this book, combined with many Baby Whisperer principles, have helped us so much!

Around 3 weeks Aaron started to become very, very fussy. Jon and I had a hard time calming him down during the day, although he has been a great night sleeper from birth and only awoke to eat at night and immediately went back to sleep in his bed. He was so fussy during the majority of the day and it only got worse in the afternoon and evening. When I would lay him down for a nap he would scream and cry but even when I would hold him, swaddle, bounce and carry him in a sling he was often still crying and screaming. I believe strongly in the power of prayer and was praying and searching for something that would help my fussy boy be happy. I had heard tidbits here and there about Baby Wise, but had never heard very much about it and wasn't familiar with it. However, I kept thinking about this book and finally decided to buy it. I was still in the super-exhausted phase when I purchased it, around 3.5 weeks, so I just ordered the audio track online and listened to it on my Ipod. I listened to Baby Wise while I traveled to Alabama when Aaron was 4 weeks old. We had a great trip down south, but he was so fussy while I was down there and when I returned.

When we got back to Utah Aaron was 6 weeks old and I decided that I needed to be more proactive about helping him get better sleep and be more content. The Monday after I returned home I purchased a hard copy of "On Becoming Baby Wise", so that I could reference various parts, and started to implement the principles. Now, don't get me wrong. I do not believe that this is the ultimate source for parenthood, nor do I feel that it is a "cure-all" for everyone. However, the general principles found in this book have helped my little family so much!

Luckily I had already implemented various principles from Baby Whisperer, which really goes hand in hand in many areas with Baby Wise, so Aaron adjusted well to the added structure of Baby Wise principles. From birth Jon and I had worked hard to make sure that Aaron had taken a full feeding and he had naturally put himself on a 2.5 to 3-hour feeding schedule. Occasionally he will eat sooner than this, but those are only during growth spurts and just last a day or two and then he is back to 2.5-3 hour feedings. We had also been doing the "Eat, Activity, Sleep" cycle explained in both Baby Whisperer and Baby Wise. The main thing I hadn't been doing was making sure that Aaron napped in his own bed. He always slept there at night, but during the day he would often nap in his swing, in my arms or in his bouncy chair. The problem with this was that he was not napping soundly. He would fall asleep and then wake up and arch his back and cry so I would bounce him, rock him, etc. He wasn't getting good, deep naps during the day although and this is so important for babies (Healthy Sleep Habits says a LOT about this).

Another thing I wasn't doing was feeding him at generally consistent times. Baby Wise advises setting a time for the first feeding of the day and sticking to this within a 30 minute window. Aaron's first feeding of the day is at 7 a.m. A 30 minute window means that he sometimes eats at 6:45 and other times not until 7:15, but this is always the time we start our day. This helps him organize his day so that his next feeding, which is usually 3 hours later, falls around the same time every day (10 a.m.). Once Aaron started doing this consistently, he began sleeping for longer and longer stretches at night. Aaron now sleeps at the very least for 6+ hours straight or up to 9 hours straight(this has only happened a few times but will hopefully become more regular) without a feeding. Of course his night time sleep is much longer than 6 or 9 hours, but this is the longest he goes without eating. He usually goes to bed around 7:30 or 8 and I do a "Dreamfeed" between 10:30 and 11 p.m. Dreamfeed is something from the Baby Whisperer books. This is where you pick up your baby, feed him, and then place him back in bed. Aaron doesn't even fully wake up during these feedings, but he still nurses a full nurse. After his dreamfeed he sleeps a very long stretch and wakes up some time early in the morning for one more feeding. Then he starts his day around 7 a.m. and the cycle continues. Ideally Aaron will drop the early morning feeding soon and I will eventually drop his dreamfeed.

During the day Aaron goes through a predictable Eat, Activity, Sleep cycle. In the Baby Whisperer she uses the acronym E.A.S.Y. to help parents remember this, with the "Y" representing "You time". Here is a general break-down of each of the cycles as they pertain to Aaron and our family.

Eat:
Right now Aaron nurses and is not supplemented with anything else. Eventually "Eat" will include solids and other liquids, but right now he just breastfeeds. Aaron is a very fast nurser and is done eating in less that 15 minutes. He loves nursing and has always been such a natural breast feeder. I am very grateful that I didn't have any nursing problems with Aaron. After he eats, either Jon or I burps him and he has recently started drooling/spitting up a little milk. Aaron nurses every 2.5-3 hours. The first few feedings of the day are 3 hours apart and the last few are closer together because his naps are shorter in the evening and this fits in more feedings before night time.

Activity:
I try to vary Aaron's activity time to include independent play (on his play mat, in his swing, laying on the floor, in his bouncy chair, tummy time, etc.), outdoor time (we walk around the yard, sit on the porch or go for a walk) and Mommy time/social time (bath time is very social with me talking and singing to him, holding him in my lap and reading books, talking, singing, etc. Social time also includes time with other friends and family members, not just Mommmy or Daddy.). Aaron still can not handle being awake for very long periods of time. He is getting better about being content for longer than an hour, because he can now self-soothe, but he must be getting over-stimulated during this time because he takes long naps best if he is awake for only 50-60 minutes. This awake time includes both Eat and Activity.

Sleep:
Aaron naps great if he has not been over-stimulated or awake for too long during activity time. For example, this morning he woke up at 7:15, ate, played and went back to sleep at 8:05. He slept until his next feeding at 10 a.m. He want back to sleep at 10:50 and slept until 12:55 p.m. He ate, played and went back down at 1:50.

The exception to this cycle are nighttime and dreamfeeds. When I feed Aaron his dreamfeed he does not have an activity period, he goes right back to sleep. The same is true with his early morning feeding.

CIO: One principle from Baby Wise that I was really unsure about was Cry It Out (CIO). The reason Aaron was not napping in his own bed until 6 weeks was because I wasn't ready to let him cry on his own at all. I would pick him up the second he fussed and let him sleep in his swing or being held. He would still cry and fuss until he fell asleep, but I thought I was doing him a favor by helping him calm down. When I finally decided to see how he would do if I let him fall asleep in his bed during the day I was amazed. He cried less falling asleep in his bed then he did while I would hold, rock and bounce him. I had thought he was crying because he wanted to be held but he was actually crying because he wanted to go to sleep! He is a baby who wants to be asleep in his own bed, not in your arms and not in a chair. Aaron now cries SOOOOO much less than he did before. When he is awake he so much happier. He often goes to sleep with very minimal fussing, if any. Sometimes he will protest strongly, but he does this even if you try to rock him to sleep! When he is tired he just wants his bed. It was so hard to hear him cry at first and not run in and "rescue" him. However, I felt very strongly that he needs his sleep and that I was not doing him any favors by depriving him of good, long daytime sleep.

DISCLAIMER: I have not perfected these principles and we still have hard days and awesome days. The thing that has helped me the most in applying Baby Wise as well as Baby Whisperer is THIS blog. It is written by a mother of three and I reference her blog almost daily now. She helped me understand the principles in more concrete, daily application ways.

Another thing I learned that has helped me a lot is that Aaron is very sensitive to high amounts of dairy in my milk. I LOVE dairy and usually eat a lot of dairy products. However, Aaron is more fussy, has tummy troubles, does not sleep well and has more baby acne when I consume large amounts of dairy. I have noticed that I can eat one or two servings of dairy a day, but not lots of milk, cheese, yogurt, etc like I would prefer.

FINALLY, here is a run-down of things I like from the other books I read and things I have implemented from them:

"Secrets of the Baby Whisperer";
-Feeding from one side. I only nurse from one side at a feeding and at the next feeding from the other side. This is supposed to ensure that your baby is getting enough of the calorie dense hind milk. Baby Wise says to feed from both sides, but feeding from one side is what works for Aaron and I.
-E.A.S.Y. Similar to the cycle in Baby Wise, just an easy acronym to remember Eat.Activity.Sleep.You.
-Patting. When I first started letting Aaron put him self to sleep I would help him calm down by patting his back and saying, "Shh", like Tracy says to do in her books. Aaron doesn't need this any more, he puts himself to sleep just great!
-Dreamfeed, which I explained above.

"Happiest Baby on the Block";
-This helped a ton from weeks 3-6 when Aaron was so fussy and I wasn't really ready to get him on a routine. This book mainly has concepts to soothe newborns (0-3) months. The author talks a lot about infants immature neurological systems and inability to self soothe as well as the first three months being like a 4th trimester.
-Swaddle. Aaron was pretty much swaddled non-stop for the first 6 weeks of his life. He was so upset when he wasn't swaddled, other than for very short periods of time. He no longer needs a swaddle and I have only used it a couple times in the last month and a half when he was really, really upset.
-Shhhh and white noise. Saying "shhhh" while Aaron was swaddled and bounced often calmed him down right away. We still use a white noise machine in his room (set to the sound of rain) when he sleeps. When he was really fussy we would also use the vacuum and the noise of it calmed him down immediately.

"The Lull-A-Baby Sleep Plan"
-The WOO. While this contradicts many of the other books, this author believes that there is an ideal Window of Opportunity (WOO) for sleep training which she believes opens between 6 and 9 weeks. While I plan to start from birth with my other children, I didn't really start until 6 weeks with Aaron. I don't think I was ready emotionally or physically. I still wanted to hold him non stop and it takes a lot of energy to stick to a plan of action. At least in the mean time it helped me feel better having read this and feeling that I wasn't failing if I wasn't ready to start a more organized schedule until 6 weeks. In the future I will begin as I mean to go, but I wasn't aware of or ready to start Baby Wise before this point with Aaron and I didn't understand Baby Whisperer as far as application was concerned like I do now.

"Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child"
-This book is very technical in terms of research on the importance of sleep for children. It's a good read for understanding how vital good sleep is for infants and children of all ages. For this purpose it is a must read.

"On Becoming Baby Wise"
-Marriage. Other than everything I mentioned above, one of my favorite concepts from Baby Wise is presented in the first chapter of the book. They strongly affirm the importance and power of a strong husband wife unit. They do not believe in child-centered parenting where they child becomes the center of everything, even displacing the important bond in a marriage. Baby Wise says that no matter how much you love your children, you will not be meeting their basic emotional needs if your children do not know how much you love your spouse. I believe this very strongly. It is so important to maintain a strong husband-wife relationship in order to have a strong family.

AS A FINAL NOTE:

Structure AND Flexibility. It is great to have structure, it helps the parents and it helps the child. However, the point of having a routine is not to bind you down but to free you. Also, Baby Wise wants parents to be flexible and not rigid. This is important to remember. For example, they say that if you are visiting family and they want to hold your baby while he sleeps, let them. Babies are not babies for long and we need to enjoy them and let others enjoy them too. Variation from structure now and then is okay. Children are adaptable and resilient and they will readjust to the daily flow when you are back to life as normal.

Melissa Came!

2010-07-29T09:14:00.000-07:00

My best friend Melissa has been dying to meet baby Aaron since he was born. I was lucky to be able to see both of her boys within their first week of life, but it's been more diffifult for her to make it down to visit since she has two boys and they have been sick frequently these last couple of months. Last Friday she and the boys were able to stop by my parent's house on their way to the airport. It was so great to see them. Isaac and Sam are so cute and getting very big. They had fun playing with the toys my Mom put out for them. Melissa was so happy to be able to finally hold Aaron. I'm excited because they will also be here this weekend for Aaron's baby blessing and Melissa's husband, Aaron, may be able to come down for it too!

2 Years

2010-07-29T07:00:00.000-07:00

On July 19th Jon and I celebrated two amazing years of marriage. These last two years have been wonderful and I am so grateful that I am married to such an incredible man. Jon is my best friend and I love the time we spend together. This last year has been so different from our first year of marriage. The first year it was just the two of us and we didn't have too many worries. I worked full time and Jon went to school so I wasn't stressing with classes, etc, just Jon. This last year I transfered to BYU and we got pregnant! Adding these two wonderful and challenging variables to the mix really caused us to grow as a couple. Jon was so supportive throughout my pregnancy and it was exciting preparing together for the birth of our baby boy. A couple months before our two year anniversary we became parents! This also adds a new level to marriage. It has been challenging deciding together how best to care for our baby and the sleep deprivation puts a whole new twist on things, but two months later we have adjusted very well to our new roles. Of course we expect that there will be ups and downs with parenthood and marriage, but we are so grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ that gives us peace and strength in difficult times. I am so grateful to know that our marriage is eternal and that families are forever. Jon is an incredible man, husband and father and I love being his wife! Happy two years Jon. Here's to many, many more.

P.S. The week of our anniversary we were busy helping my parents move but they were so kind to babysit for us while we went to the movies. It was so fun going on a date with just the two of us! On our anniversary we saw "Despicable Me", which we loved and later in the week we saw "Inception". "Inception" was good, but such a crazy concept. I want to see it again so that I can have some of the lingering questions I was left with answered. Jon's Mom is staying with us while she goes to school for the summer and she has also offered to watch Aaron for us one evening so that we can go to the temple together.

2 Months

2010-07-21T20:56:00.000-07:00

Aaron turned 2 months old on July 12th. I love being a Mom to Aaron! I also really love how much Aaron already resembles Jon in looks and behavior. Aaron really loves me and is all smiles and coos when he sees me. He likes other people too, but he is just so happy and animated when he has my full attention. Jon is the same way, except for the cooing. In a crowd Jon is quiet and reserved but around me Jon is a different man. He is very happy and animated. It makes me feel good that these two guys love my presence so much. Jon is also a deep thinker. He really reflects on things before making a decision. Of course we can only tell about Aaron's personality from watching, but he seems to study everything and often looks like he is thinking so deeply about life. He loves studying the animals on his swing mobile and on his play mat. He stares at me so intently when I sing to him, especially during bath time.

Here are a few more things about Aaron at 2 months:

Weight: 13 lbs 7 oz (90th percentile)
Length: 24 in (90th percentile)
Head Circumference: 41 cm (75th percentile)

-Aaron is so strong. He supports his head really well and always pushes himself up when he is laying on his tummy. He also moves his head around to look at things that interest him, especially his Mommy. The other day I had him sitting up in the rocking chair and I was going back and forth across the living room. He would follow me from one side of the room to the other. It's so cute!

-Aaron has the sweetest smiles and coos, especially for people he sees a lot like Jon and I. He really loves to talk and often seems like he is saying something really important.
-He still loves bath time so much!
-Aaron loves when I sing to him. He calms down and stares at me. His favorite song seems to be "Give Said the Little Stream" because it calms him down the quickest. 2.5 months, now weighing over 14 lbs.

-He loves to suck on his hands but hates ANYTHING else in his mouth. He gags on pacifiers, throws up when we've tried to give him Tylenol or vitamins and hates bottles. Of course he still loves nursing, but other than that and sucking on his hands, he freaks out if you put anything else in his mouth. I think he may have a really strong gag reflex. Funny Story: At his two month check-up they gave him vaccine shots in his legs and an oral vaccine. The nurse gave him the oral vaccine first and he screamed and kept trying to spit it out. She said she had never had a baby protest so strongly to this vaccine. By the time she gave him the shots he was still so mad that she had put something in his mouth that he didn't even seem to notice the shots!

-Aaron is such a boy. So many people comment on how he is already "all boy" and it is really true. This picture of him cracks me up. He tries to hit his toys although he is just barely starting to realize he can grab them.

-Aaron loves his swing and his playmat He looks at his toys and talks to and laughs at them. It makes me so happy.

-Aaron is a great sleeper. He is sleeping long stretches at night now (7-9) hours which I attribute in big part to implementing principles of Babywise and Baby Whisperer around 6 weeks. I just wish I would have started sooner (more on that later).
-Aaron can only handle about an hour of wakeful time right now. After that he starts getting really fussy and goes back down for a nap until his next feeding.

-Aaron loves being outdoors. He is so content when he is outside and we spend time outdoors every day.
-Aaron can roll from his tummy to his back. He has been doing this since he was six weeks old.

Aaron's Newborn Pictures

2010-06-30T09:28:00.000-07:00

When Aaron was 8 and 11 days old, Jeannie took these beautiful pictures of him. To see more of Jeannie's work click here. I can't believe how much he has changed in the last six weeks.

Aaron and Alex

2010-06-28T16:05:00.000-07:00

Today Aaron took pictures with his friend Alex. Alex is our next door neighbor. He was born the day before Aaron and I'm sure they are going to be great friends. The Onesies they are wearing are my favorite and they looked so cute together. I actually have this set of Onesies in size Newborn, 0-3, 3-6 and 6-9 months. That's how much I liked them. It was lucky that I had the next size up. As soon as Elise and Alex came over, Aaron spit up all over his 0-3 month Onesie. I was sure the 3-6 month one would be too big for him, but it fit perfectly.

Here's Aaron smiling.

Aaron was tired out after his photo shoot. I laid him down for some tummy time and he decided to go to sleep instead.

We're Back!

2010-06-28T15:20:00.000-07:00

Aaron and I had so much fun down south! By six weeks of age Aaron has already been in Utah, Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi. Next month he will be going with me to Arizona. He did pretty well on the flights. On the flight there he slept the entire way and didn't make a peep. The flight back was a little more rough. He screamed for the first 15 minutes and then slept for 3 hours and then he screamed at the top of his lungs the last 20 minutes. Everyone finally moved aside to let me exit the plane before them. I felt really bad for them, Aaron has quite the holler. My Dad says he is going to be a singer like his Mom. We were so happy to see Jon at the airport! I had missed him so much. Jon couldn't believe how big Aaron is. Aaron didn't take long to warm back up to his Dad. This picture sequence tells the story perfectly.

"You don't look like my Mom. I think I might cry but I'm not sure."

"Do I know you?"

"Wait, I think I remember that face."

"I know you! Daddy!"

We had such a fun weekend together. On Saturday we went to see Toy Story 3, which I loved and then we went swimming with Jon's family. Aaron freaked out in the water, probably because it's so much colder here than down south. We had a fun Sunday together as well. We had a nice breakfast, went to church, spent time with family and then went on our Sunday evening walk.

Jon tried to take Aaron swimming but he didn't like the cold water and he was tired so it didn't last long. I hope he gets used to Utah weather and enjoys swimming again soon!

Summer Fun

2010-06-18T19:16:00.000-07:00

Aaron and I are still in Alabama having a blast with my family. We miss Jon a LOT but are really enjoying spending time down south with family. We arrived on June 10th and we will be here until the 25th. Here's how we've spent our time so far;

-Swimming, swimming and more swimming. Actually, the first thing we did when we got here from the airport - before we even stopped at the house - was head to the pool and swim! Aaron has liked the pool more every time we've gone.

-Biloxi, Mississippi. The first weekend I was here we headed to Mississippi for a few days. We had a fun time as a family and Aaron did great on the drive to and from. It was so fun to visit the beach, I love seeing the ocean!

-We celebrated my 25th birthday down here and I had a really wonderful birthday. We ate dinner at O'Charley's, a restauraunt down south that I enjoy, and I got a new pair of sneakers. Jon and I are going to celebrate when I get back to Utah.

-Reading! Now that it's summer and things have slowed down a bit, with no assigned reading like I constantly having during the school year, I finally have time to read for FUN. I just finished reading "The Hunger Games" and I'm now reading the sequel. I always go through many, many books during the summer and I'm sure this one will be no different.

-Family time; mainly we've just been enjoying being together and everyone's had fun holding Aaron. My little sisters are great with him and he is adored by his grandparents. We love being here!

Aaron with his Aunt Katie McLaughlin Aaron and his Grandpa McLaughlin

Proud grandparents

My Mom and I

It looks like Aaron is talking to my little sister, Selena, in this picture.

He usually ends up falling asleep in the pool or right after we get out. I think it relaxes him.

Aaron and I at the pool, I love his little swimsuit.

Cross-eyed moment. He is so cute in the water! He is such a long baby.

Aaron is wearing Ariel swim diapers because they were all that was left at the store. I think we will put these pictures in his wedding video.

1 Month

2010-06-08T11:39:00.000-07:00

Aaron will be 1 month old on Saturday! Since I will be at the beach with my family (Aaron and I are flying to Alabama for a couple of weeks on Thursday), I decided to post about him now. This month has flown by for me. I feel like time is going so fast and I want it to slow down just a little. I love my precious baby and can't believe how quickly he is growing and changing. Here are a few things about one month old Aaron.

-Aaron smiles!!! Aaron started smiling at me at 3 weeks. He is super smiley in the mornings when he first wakes up. After his morning feeding I always talk to him for a while and he gives me the biggest, most beautiful smiles. I don't know if there is anything better than the smile of your sweet baby! Jon has seen him smile at me, but Aaron still hasn't smiled for anyone else. I'm sure he will soon.
-Aaron is cuddly. Aaron loves to be held and he is so snuggly and cuddly. We love holding him, although my house isn't as clean as it could be, we are enjoying this precious time that goes so quickly.

-Aaron loves his Mommy and Dad! He definitely knows who we are and it makes us feel so special :).
-Aaron loves to eat. He is so good at nursing and I'm grateful for that. He eats about every three hours, although he will occasionally go 3.5 to 4 hours between feedings.

-Aaron is BIG for his age! Now we know why I was measuring so big my whole pregnancy, I have a much larger than average baby. He is sooo long. At his 2 weeks check-up he was above 100th percentile for length (23 in) and he was 11 lbs 2 oz at the doctor this morning (he had a weird thing going on with his belly button/cord that the doctor had to burn off).

-Aaron is going bald, lol. His hair started falling out last weekend and if you compare the Memorial Day pictures to these pictures, you will see a big difference! I lost all of my hair as a baby too and it came back a different color. I really love Aaron's hair color and hope it comes back the same, but I'm sure he will look adorable with any hair color.
-Aaron loves noise! He loves the sound of my voice and will usually calm down when I talk to him. He also loves the sound of the vacuum cleaner, my hair dryer and especially his white noise machine which is set on the sound of the ocean.

-Aaron is becoming more and more alert. Aaron was pretty alert even his first few days of life, but he is becoming more and more alert and interested in the world. He loves staring at our faces. Whenever Jon holds him he just stares and stares. He also now looks at things around him like the animals on his bouncy chair and the mobile on his new swing. Aaron likes things with contrast, like the outfit he wore to church this Sunday. I had laid it on the side of his changing table while I got him ready and he stared at it for a long time.

-Aaron loves bath time. He is so calm and happy in his bath. I really enjoy this special time of the day, especially when Jon and I give him a bath together. Most evenings we bathe him together and it's such a fun time for our little family. I wash him and Jon rinses him off. We both always want to hold him when he's all cute and cuddly in his towel when we take him out :).

(He thought the giraffe was the best thing on this play gym and he turned his body to stare at it.)

We adore this sweet boy and are so grateful to be his parents!

Memorial Day Weekend

2010-06-03T16:47:00.000-07:00

We had a wonderful Memorial Day weekend! It was so great to have Jon home for three whole days and we had a blast. Here's what we did...
FRIDAY: Aaron and I spent a fun, relaxing afternoon with my Granny and Papa in Lehi. We just hung out, ate lunch, talked and Aaron and I took naps on their couches. I love being able to spend time with them and really appreciated the nap!
-Later that evening Jon, Aaron and I headed to the church for an Un-Birthday Party! It was like a big birthday party for no one in particular, or for everyone I guess. We played birthday games, broke a pinata, had cake decorating contests and exchanged white elephant gifts. We have such a great ward and we really love our friends there. For the cake decorating contest they divided us into 12 groups by birth month. My group consisted of myself and two other ladies. Jon's group consisted of him, our awesome Bishop and another guy. The contrast between our two cakes was hilarious! I wish I had pictures. Our cake was a meticulously made sea turtle and their cake just had some frosting thrown on and a whole bunch of candy poured over the top of it. Jon was holding Aaron while we decorated the cakes and at one point I looked over and Aaron was just contentedly laying on the table. Of course Jon had a hand on him, but it was so funny to me! Jon is such a great, caring, easygoing Dad and I love seeing him with his little boy.
SATURDAY: We just relaxed as a family in the morning, cleaned our house and then went to the mall for some Chick Fil'A for lunch. Then we headed to a wedding reception in Salt Lake for Jon's cousin Cara. We love Cara and wish we had been able to spend more time with her and her husband. It was great to see them though, and the reception was beautiful!
SUNDAY: Sunday we went to church, came home and took naps and then our wonderful friends, Dean and Anita, who also happen to live in the apartment in our basement(such a blessing!) cooked us an amazing lunch/dinner. Afterward we just visited and that evening Jon, Aaron and I went on our traditional Sunday walk.
MONDAY: Monday we met Dallin, Brian and Michelle at one of the nearby parks to hang out. We waded in the fountain, played Frisbee and walked around the park. Then Jon and I went to Applebees for dinner. Dean and Anita had given us a gift card to eat there and we excitedly ordered delicious stakes! Yum! Also, in the evenings over the weekend we watched all of the Star Wars movies. I hadn't seen them and I'd promised Jon that we would watch them, so we did.

Overall, it was a wonderful weekend spent with lots of people we love! We are so blessed. I managed to take a few pictures at the park and the reception.

This is how Aaron spent his time at the park.

Cooling our feet in the fountain. My brothers are hilarious.

Jon is such an amazing Dad

Our little family at Cara's reception.

The beautiful bride. Jon's grandma made her dress!

Aaron's Hands

2010-06-03T16:32:00.000-07:00

I love Aaron's tiny, perfect hands. The funny thing is, he is always posing them in the cutest positions. He loves sucking on his fingers, he did this the instant he was born while the doctor was cleaning him off, and he still does this all the time. He also like resting his head on his hands. My favorite thing is when I'm holding him and he crosses his arms and rests his head on them. Here are a few cute pictures of his poses.

This is how he crosses his arms to lay on them.

He often passes out after a feeding and when I laid him down for a second he put his arms and legs in this funny position.

Resting on his arm. His hair looks really red in this picture.

It's hard to tell, since I took the picture and I was holding him in the carrier, but he just had one little finger in his mouth and he happily stayed like this for a long time.

Precious little fist. I love when he grabs our fingers.

Isn't this the greatest? This picture cracks me up. He did this on his own and he was so content laying this way. He is getting so chubby, I love it!

A Whole New World

2010-06-01T18:03:00.001-07:00

Aaron will be 3 weeks old tomorrow! I can't believe how quickly these last few weeks have flown. He is such a sweet, loveable, cuddly baby and we love him more every day! In just a few short weeks he has had tons of first experiences. Here are some of them:

-First snow storm! That's right, he saw his first snow storm when he was only 12 days old.

-First day of church

-First trip to the mall, to a restaurant and to the park. We've actually done these quite a few times since he's been born. We love going on walks to the park and on rainy days we walk around the mall.

-First bath. He hated sponge baths like this, but now that we bath him in his little tub, he LOVES bath time. He no longer screams the entire time. Instead he looks around like it's the most interesting part of his day... which it probably is.

First outfit- this is the first time he was dressed in a real outfit, when we were on our way home from the hospital. Jon's sister, Katie, gave us this outfit for Christmas. He looks adorable in it! Sadly, I put it on him this morning and he as already grown out of it since it's Newborn size. The pants look like high waters on him now and the sleeves ride up his arm. He is growing so fast!
First car seat ride- this was actually his second car seat ride, but I really like this outfit.

First restaurant trip- We went to lunch with my grandparents before my Mom left. Aaron was only a week old, and I still look 4 months pregnant in this picture. I've realized that pregnancy destroyed my abs and it's going to take some work getting them back!

First BBQ- When Aaron was 9 days old we attended a BBQ for BYU International Services employees. This is where I worked until March.

First hair cut- Aaron was growing a little rat tail, so he got his first hair cut before he was even two weeks old. His hair is still looking reddish blond, but he doesn't have a ton of hair so it's hard to tell for sure sometimes.

First tummy time. Aaron is so strong! Although he's resting in this picture, he loves to hold his head up, especially when he's being held.

Jon and Aubrey McLaughlin

Arizona in August

Happy Day!

Summer School

Summer Fun (Pictures from July 2011)

Catching Up

Our adventures today

Things I loved about today

Sweet Aaron - 20 Months

A New Favorite Quote

Learning Time Ideas

Baby #2

Alone Time

Fall

Meet B

Childbirth Questions

Journal/Thoughts

LOVE

Triumph Despite Tragedy

A Duggar Fan

Date Night!

One Happy Toddler

Ugh.

16 Month-Old Aaron

Life is Good

Baby #2!

Mobile Memories

Language Development and 1 Year Pics

1, 2, 3 *POOF*

Our Little Toddler

Aaron and his Daddy

My Messy Little Cleaner

Welcome Baby Ellie Jean Coleman!

California - Mid-May

Aaron - June Memories

going public

Easter Past and Easter Present

Our Wonderful Boy - Beginning of 2011

Tired

Duck, Duck, Baby!

Early?

Eclectic Parenting

Going Home

Electronics Baby!

So What Do You DO With That Degree?

8 Month Old Aaron

The Green Balloon

The Cutest Baby in the World

Ouch Aaron!

Half A Year!

Going Mobile

Cute Cousins

Halloween Preview and Blog Reminder

5 Months Old

Conference Weekend

Elder Graff is Finally Going to Brazil!

Aaron Recently

For Freeeeeeeeee?

My Little Workout Buddy

Going Private

Silly Baby

You know you are married to a computer nerd when...

Laughing Cousins

Our Sweet 4-Month Old

How Quickly We Forget...

Jon and Aaron, aka. "Little Jon"

Aaron's Blessing Day

Motherhood:-An-Eternal-Partnership

I love Motherhood.

Baby Wise Whisperer

Melissa Came!

2 Years

2 Months

Aaron's Newborn Pictures

Aaron and Alex

We're Back!

Summer Fun

1 Month

Memorial Day Weekend

Aaron's Hands

1, 2, 3 POOF