Paul's 15 Month Accomplishments

This post is just to remind you that we're still here and we're still obsessed our little Pauliewog. 

At 15.5 months, Paul is definitely a toddler now. He has all his teeth except his 2 year molars. He's walking, running, climbing, opening, braking, laughing, screaming (*shudder* he just started this one), and talking!

He almost talks as much as a girl! His pediatrician said he's an early talker for a boy. Beside all the English-sounding babble, here are some real words in Paul's current vocabulary (since I know you're all dying to know) :

Mama

Dada

Up

No

Nummy

Ersss (yes)

Push

Bar (he's so obsessed with Larabars that he's learned to say this word perfectly with the correct "R" sound and all)

Door (also means "open", again, with a perfect "R")

Chair 

Gar (car)

Guck ( 3 meanings:  it could be a truck, that he or something is stuck, or it's also used as "yuck")

Beya-ba (belly button)

Beday (body)

baba (bubble)

Hi / bye (all the time to anyone and anything very loudly!)

More

Mook (milk)

Moosh (juice) 

Nack (snack)

Bub (poop)

Uh-oh

Awtttt (hot)

Eye 

Neck

Ay ay (light)

Rice

Me (we're hoping this means "please"...)

Mess (he loves to make them)

Bush

Bird

Guy (sky or airplane)

Dore (store)

Go go

Shoe

Gock (sock or clock)

Bik (bike)

Wahw (wall)

Bahw (ball or Paul)

Bock (block or tower)

Gaing (train? or again?)

Book

Wow!

Meh (Cat "mew")

Woof Woof 

Moo (cow)

Buh-buh (chicken)

Ooo (owl)

Oo-aah -eeh  (monkey)

Bey (pray)

Jich (church)

Jishish (Jesus)

Buck (bug)

Mana (banana)

Rash (trash)

Wee-oh (wheel)

A-wee (away - as in cleaning up)

Who will ever read that huge list up there? Me! So I'm keeping it in my blog. 

Paul is as happy and confident as he appears in this photo. He owns the world and what a fun and silly place it is!

Sunday best. What a charmer!

Paul was a raccoon for Halloween. (Thanks, mom, for the costume!)

What's the opposite of claustrophobic? Because that's what Paul is. I always find him wedged in the smallest crevasses of the apartment. 

Yep. He got in there all on his own.

Another favorite pastime of his is stacking things. Anything!

He sneaked those out of the fridge when my back was turned and created a condiment tower.

(I helped with this book tower.)

Ready for the Christmas snow! Have a wonderful Thanksgiving everyone!

I write as if I have a huge blog following or something. Ha!

Idaho Falls - Pool and Farm

We were able to go to Rexburg Idaho to see my lovely eldest sister be sealed to her sweetheart JC. (More on the wedding in a later post.... maybe, if I get around to it.)

Twelve. Hours. Of. Driving.

I was totally prepared for screams from Paul. It was going to happen. No question. Not only that, it was going to happen while we were crammed in the very back row of  an eleven passenger van filled with family and friends.

Miraculously, incredibly, unbelievably, Paul was actually happy the entire way there! Are you amazed? I still am.

He earned a fun trip to the hotel's pool with daddy.







After all the wedding hullabaloo, we got to see some real farm animals at my grandparents' farm and Reese's dairy in Idaho Falls.

Paul was a bit overwhelmed with the experience. Put yourself in his shoes. What if all your life a "horse" was that cute little cartoon in your board book that said "neigh!". The real thing by comparison would be a huge, smelly, scary mammoth! Every animal took some getting used to.



Paul wasn't so sure about sitting on that huge animal.


Goats are a more friendly size for Paul.


I think the pigs were his favorite.






Paul got some real cow licks on his head!


Paul started to worry the cow would eat what little hair he had.


Chillin' with grandma before the trip back home.


I wish I could say Paul did as well on the way back, but being sick and teething while strapped to a car seat for twelve hours was not too fun for him. My favorite was when he could sleep.



Paul's getting so big and he sure babbles a lot for a boy! ;) We love him like crazy!

Surprise Teaching Assignment

Blair suggested we go to church early for ward choir this morning. It’s always great to be at church an hour early; you have time to prepare yourself for the sacrament meeting and you can fill your head and heart with beautiful hymns in choir - just time to relax and feel the spirit. Haha! Not today.

Kourtney, another ward missionary, came up to me and said, “so I hear you’re teaching the lesson in Gospel Principles today...”.  My brain instantly conducted a violent search through all past conversations that might have contained the word “teach”. My stomach seized as I remembered our ward mission leader casually asking if I could possibly teach on Sunday as I was leaving the building last week. Gah! He was serious! I gasped and covered my mouth. Blair laughed, so Paul did too. Kourtney added, “well have fun preparing the lesson. If you need help with Paul while you teach, I’ll be happy to do it.” I thanked her and got to work looking for some scriptures and a manual. This was the one week I didn’t bring them.

I looked at the clock - forty-five minutes to whip something up before sacrament meeting. Blair downloaded the Gospel Principles manual onto his phone and began flipping through the lessons until one caught my attention. Fortunately for me, we haven’t been following a schedule so I could choose any lesson I wanted. Naturally, I chose the longest one titled "The Life of Jesus Christ". I borrowed some paper and a pen form the ward clerk and dove into the text.

I came into Sacrament meeting feeling - if not confident - comfortable. I had scribbled a bullet-pointed list of things I wanted to discuss in my lesson as well as some thoughts, scripture references and questions. Before the opening song, I was told that we had more investigators than usual today and to “gear the lesson in their direction”. I responded as casually as my acting skills allowed, “okay, no problem”.

As usual, I spent the last half of sacrament meeting wandering the halls behind Paul, who was stomping about aimlessly without any obligations or worries. (Occasionally a particular closet or trashcan would worry him, to which he would voice his loud disapproval, with much arm gesticulation and head shakes.) When we wandered close to the library I asked for a stack of Gospel Principles Manuals. (We were really going to need them considering half of my lesson plan involved taking turns reading from that manual.) She only had three copies. I took ‘em and ran.. er... waddled behind Paul.

I had left the diaper bag as well as my lesson materials on the bench with Blair. I just trusted he’d bring them to me after the closing prayer, which he did - all except the papers with my precious notes. He had thought they were blank pieces of paper, but I told him they had my notes and I needed them. People were already settling into their seats as Blair returned three minutes later to tell me they were gone! Someone must have thrown my notes away, and he couldn’t find them in any garbage can! “It’s okay” I told myself, “I’m sure I can remember most of it.” I’ll just listen to the Spirit.

That’s when Paul started whining.

I calmly introduced myself, while Paul stood at my knees, head thrown back in a red, slimy wail of utter despair. We were all crammed in a tiny classroom and tried to ignore the screams that were painfully reverberating into our ears. Kourtney had the diaper bag of goodies she was shaking in hopes of luring the little precious peach. No luck. 

Finally, the ward mission leader had to take Paul out of the room and everyone watched the heart-wrenching scene of mother and child being torn apart. Soon silence returned and so did everyone’s attention - back on me, the one without a lesson.

I’m sure it went well. That’s what I tell myself, anyway. There’s no way of knowing for sure. My brain went into prepare-for-humiliation mode, where it completely shuts off the short-term memory from retaining any events that have a high potential of becoming painfully embarrassing. Thus I have no recollection of that second hour at church. Nobody said anything, so I’m hoping that means no false doctrine was taught. Let’s just hope my ward mission leader has learned to think twice before asking me to teach again. If there is a next time, I guess I'll write it down in my planner.

Amnesia

I think Blair got amnesia. Sort of...

A couple of weeks ago, some awesome friends from our ward let us join them for a ride on their motor boat on the Willammette. (Paul's favorite part of the whole outing was the pizza dinner.)

After speeding, chatting, and eating, they let Blair try out the wake board. It took him a few tries to get up but he caught on pretty quickly once he was standing. After riding safely for about 5 minutes, from the boat I saw a smile sweep across Blair's face. I knew immediately what he was thinking. He was going to try to jump the wake! Sure enough, I watched him bare down before lifting into the air off the wake's edge. Before I had time to mentally congratulate my brave, manly husband for successfully jumping on a wake board, he was making a sharp face plant into the water. Arms and legs flailed while quickly being swallowed by the splatter of white spray. We circled the boat around, and he pulled himself back in the boat, seemingly unharmed.

He hit his head harder than we thought.

Later on, as we were gently pulled behind the boat as a happy little family in two sea biscuits, Blair surprised me by asking, "How did we get out here? Did we drive to the river?" Blair couldn't remember anything from that day. It was as if his short term memory was erased.  He encouraged me to ask him questions about our trip so he could force the memories back into his noggin. I asked him things like, "do you remember what we ate for dinner?", "where did we park", "what are the names of the people in the boat?" "what did you do just before this?".

When it was time to go home, we thanked our friends for a wonderful time and Blair added under his breath, "I think we had fun... were we good company?"

Blair's memory slowly improved over time, but he was pretty sore for a few days. What a strange experience! I'm glad he's okay. :)

Paul's accomplishments - month 12

Paul is becoming quite the little clown. He loves making us laugh!

Some new things he's doing:

• Pointing out trucks (and any loud objects outside) while saying "guck!" 
• Folding his arms for prayer
• Pointing to things and enthusiastically saying "ooOOOoo! Wook!" (Look)
• Feeding himself with a spoon
• Mixing imaginary food with a spoon or a stick and "feeding" anyone nearby while rubbing his tummy and saying "yum yum yum"
• Shaking his head "no" when he's about to do something he shouldn't 
• He walks when we ask him to. It's till just a trick in his mind, not a mode of transportation.
• Pointing to dogs and "woofing". His "woofs" are quite impressive.
• Pointing to pictures of Jesus and saying "Deeeek"
• Pointing to clocks and saying "di dock di dock di dock"
• Pulling his books of the shelf and saying "gook"

... So basically, anything that requires pointing and making the "K" sound he's an expert at. He still says mama, dada, num num, dog, and he learned "go! go!" from his cousin James who came to visit. Blair and I think he's one smart cookie! :)

At the water park.

Here he is demonstrating the proper position for an Italian pas de chat. He must be the son of a dancer. ;)



He's putting the keys in his truck. He's determined to stick the key in that little hole just like he saw daddy do.



He can feed himself with a spoon! We're still working on aim. :)

Paul's growth (1 year)

Babies get bigger.

In one year, Paul went from this...


...to this.


I love this little guy so much!

First steps!

Paul always times things perfectly. He was born on his due date, he lost his umbilical cord exactly a week later, he got his first teeth on the day he turned 6 months and he's been following the exact averages on the development charts all along the way. 

Keeping with the trend, he chose to surprise us with his first steps on his first birthday! He also seems to choose the times when we're with a lot of family; we happened to be at my parents' house when this happened. He's such a good baby. :)

Even though we celebrated his birthday on Saturday, his real birthday was on Sunday (July 1st). He was waiting for the real thing. ;)

Paul's first birthday

I had invited Blair's and my family for an outdoor birthday party on Saturday because, hey, Paul's birthday's in the Summer! But alas, Oregon's true colors did manifest themselves with, surprise surprise, rain rain rain.

Undeterred, we had a blast squeezing everyone into our little apartment to celebrate.

I thought for sure Paul, being the champion eater that he is, would love shoveling fistfuls of birthday cake into his mouth, but he surprised us.

He sat there, smiling, for about 3-5 minutes before finally taking a bite. Once he tasted it, he got busy!



Paul needed a bit of help opening his presents, but it didn't take him long to realize that this was all about him! He was eating up the attention more than the cake.







His cousins loved helping him play with his new toys!



It was a lot of fun having everyone over to help us celebrate Paul's golden birthday! Paul had a great time too, which is awesome! (It's kind of hit and miss with babies.) I think he'll be even more excited for next year's birthday. :)

Lincoln City Getaway! (just the two of us)

On the 25th and 26th of June, Paul had his first "sleep-over" at grandma and grandpa's house without mommy and daddy. In other words, Blair and I got to spend some alone-together time at the beach this week! ;) 

It. Was. Wonderful!!!



We stayed at the Looking Glass Inn in Lincoln City, right on the bay. (Notice my new shirt I bought at the outlet mall. Yes, we actually went shopping! Gasp!)

Blair and I laughed when we first saw our room. It was spacious and comfortable... AND it had a jacuzzi tub right in the middle of the floor! I tried to capture the exposedness of it all in a picture, but it was hard to get a good angle. (Work it, Blair. )

 I guess that counter was the extend of privacy the architects dubbed necessary. I was trying to imagine someone washing dishes in that kitchen area while somebody else was taking a bath. How romantic...(?)

Here's the view from our window. Yes, there's a parking lot, but look back there! It's the bay!


Not to sound overly positive or anything, but the weather really was perfect. It was warm enough for short sleeves and flip flops for the whole two days we were there with the most pleasant breeze. Not to mention, we had beautiful billows of clouds between sun breaks.

Blair's really good at taking the good ol' arms-length pictures.

A nice fellow with a black poodle insisted that he take a pictures of us "two love birds". We gladly complied.



When you're out of town without a baby, of course you have to eat out at delicious restaurants. We did not want to break tradition and decided to dine at the Blackfish Cafe. I got a salmon caesar salad and Blair got some sword fish. We switched dishes about halfway through our meal and concluded we liked both of them a lot!


My creepy-happy face.

Blair's sword fish.

Looks good! (The fish doesn't look too bad either.)

Gotta get dessert! (raspberry... cream... cake... something or other... yummmmm!)

We rented the movie Hugo that night and enjoyed not having to put Paul to bed. The movie was alright, but we would have liked it a lot more if it were shorter. They dragged it on for ever!


In the morning we went for a barefoot run along the beach. Yes, we actually did run barefoot along the beach during out romantic getaway. And, no, we were not able to take pictures of that activity. You  try running with a camera. After our run, we skipped rocks into the bay. Well, I helped find smooth rocks and watched as Blair skipped them. 


Look at this awesome rock Blair found. It has a hole in the shape of a heart! The other awesome finds are mine.



 After checking out of our room, we walked along the shops, bought some books, chocolate, and a gift for my mom. Not wanting the magic to end too soon, we stopped at a Crazy Sushi for a tasty lunch.*

After lunch, we watched Brave in the theater which happened to be right next to the sushi place. I think the last movie I saw in theaters was Harry Potter. It had been a while!

Getting away together was so incredibly fun! It's times like this that I'm reminded - yet again - of how much I love Blair. I can't get enough of him! How did I get so lucky?



*Notice the foods we've been choosing work with our new, healthy lifestyle change. I know I know, "what about the raspberry dessert"? That was an intentional splurge for a special occasion. Other than those occasional treats, we're sticking with this way of eating and loving it!