He’s One!

I can’t believe it, can you?  Wow.  One year ago this week we were still wondering how this birth was going to happen.  Natural labor?  Induction?  C-section?  Well, if you were around back then you may recall we opted, for safety reasons, for the c-section as heartbreaking as that was for me.

So one year ago today we checked in to the hospital and only a few hours later we discovered that our little one was an Elias Robert and not a Hosannah Claire putting to rest the whole “is it a boy or girl” question.  He was big and healthy and has been a joy ever since.

We were meant to have a birthday party for him today but Gabe puked yesterday.  While he seemed to recover completely after a good nap (and a corn dog for dinner, what kind of crazy person eats a corn dog the same day they’ve thrown up – yuck!) I didn’t want to risk getting any guests sick so we rescheduled for next week.

Instead I got to have a fasting blood draw this morning – yippee!  Then we went out for breakfast and did a little shopping.  After we got home the sun had come out so I took a few pictures of my birthday boy.

He would, not surprisingly, have nothing to do with sitting still for a picture so most of my shots are of his backside as he crawls away.  Elias is not one to sit still for anything.  He does love to drive a toy car and make vroom noises.  He loves to be bounced on your lap and dangled upside down.  He loves to figure out ways to escape around a baby and sneak a handful of cat food.  And oh how we love him!

Edited to add:

We had a fun time at dinner.  Elias got his first taste of pasta and Rob made a fantastic dessert in lieu of cake.  In fact, I might have like it better than cake.  We sang Happy Birthday to Elias which he thought was hilarious for some reason.  Then we played outside to burn off some of those calories.  A great end to my baby’s birthday.

Here’s the videos I got.  Sadly, I’m still getting used to my new camera and hit a button while I was recording our singing and it stopped recording.    So I got two videos of our sing, or attempting to, and one of him enjoying his treat.

Elias Birthday Song from Julie Ross on Vimeo.

Starting the song.

While we were singing I loved to see how much he enjoyed it.  He seemed to immediately recognize we were singing for him, just look at his face, and he kept laughing while he watched Rob bring his treat.  I also love how much the other kids enjoyed singing TO him.

Elias Birthday Song 2 from Julie Ross on Vimeo.

Finishing the song.

 

Elias Eating Cookie from Julie Ross on Vimeo.

Enjoying his treat.

Bringing Home Baby

I got a new camera.  hee hee

I can’t wipe the smile off my face. 

SQUEEL!

Phew!  I’m so glad I got that out.  Getting a new camera has been on my mind for a while.  Not too long ago I started squirreling away little bits of cash, seriously sticking what I could in a Mason jar on my desk like I was twelve and dreaming about my first horse (hey, that’s not a bad idea for that Mason jar now) and thinking it was a looooooong way off. 

But then we had a bit of a windfall and Rob generously encouraged me to use a good portion of it on this:

And while you may not fully understand what you are seeing there (besides a box, a bag and the dashboard of our van) let me reassure you that it is about half a dozen steps up from my current camera.  At least.

I loved my camera (a Nikon D70s if you want to know) but felt like I’d outgrown it. There were some models in between the D70s and D7000 that I could have considered, and did, but the question on my mind was “How soon will I want to upgrade again?”  I think it’s going to be a while now.

I’ve only had it a few days and am entirely pleased.  Utterly.  Totally.  Are there any more words I can use?  Thrilled.  Yep, that too.

Just check this out:

And that was a mistake!  (To explain, I was taking a light reading off her face and discovered that the shutter button on new camera is far more sensitive than the old one – it sure doesn’t take much before… CLICK!) Then I discovered this when I had enlarged the photo on my laptop to see if I wanted to do any sharpening:

That’s me.  In her EYE!  My old camera might have gotten this much detail but never would have allowed me to crop and enlarge it enough to see it like this.  *happy sigh*

And I also love that Zion is getting little freckles on her face.  I just want to kiss them all the time.  *happy sigh*

So I’m really, really happy.  (And I’ve also been super tired lately which is why I haven’t been blogging much.  And with that I’m off to go to bed.)

 

She Dances

She really does.  After only four dance classes Zion had her first recital.  I had no idea when I signed her up that the yearly recital was coming up so soon.  We jumped in to the dance scene with both feet I guess.  Not that Zion has seemed to mind.  She was all smiles waiting for the recital to begin.  (You’ll notice that she has dark streaks in her wig now but not later, we cut them out.  The mom who bought the wigs didn’t know about the streaks, they had to go.)

Taking the stage.  (Which is actually the big gym at the YMCA where we take classes.)

 

She is Big, Blond and Beautiful.

 

In between performances the girls took possession of a racket ball court for pizza and activities.  When I asked later what Zion’s favorite part of the recital was she said “Pizza!  And the not-dancing part.”  I laughed and asked if she liked the dancing part and she said she did so that’s reassuring. 

I did inform her that not every recital has pizza and not-dancing parts just to prepare her for later years.  I’m pretty sure the only reason why the Y provided pizza was because they screwed up ticket sales and were forced to add a second performance.  It was nice of them to feed the girls though. :)

Zion had to show everybody, some people twice, her new glittery pink box that we got to put her new make up in.  I have told her at least a dozen times that the make up is only for recitals.  We’ll see how long that lasts.

 

Afterward I gave her a rose (that Rob was kind enough to go fetch after he and the boys sat through the first performance so that I could stay for the second).  It was hard to get a picture of her with it in it though.  She was, as she often is, almost too flamboyant to capture on film.

 

We arrived at the Y at 3 and left at almost 7:30.  I zoomed us through the McD’s drive through and let her choose a treat.  She picked fries and a strawberry banana smoothie.  Right at the moment I took the picture she had the realization that guzzling a smoothie gives one a nasty frozen headache.  Don’t worry, she survived.

 

Here is a video of the second performance.  It is awful, I’m sorry.  In order to see AT ALL I had to stand on the top row of the bleachers and videotape from over my head.  Not only could I not really see what I was taping but I kept losing my balance.  Though I wish I’d gotten a video of the first performance where things went perfectly this one is funny.  At the end Zion lets her teacher know exactly how she feels about that darn wig.

Untitled from Julie Ross on Vimeo.

Zion Dances.

BIG News!

We got a Big Toy! 

Is that not what you were expecting?  Well, it’s big news for us anyway.  It just made our back yard a whole heckuvalot cooler.  The kids are completely smitten with it, the weather hasn’t been the best since it was put in but we can still hardly get them off it.  It is rather cool I admit.  I tested the slide and the swings.  You know, just to make sure they’re safe.

Even though it looked like this…

…when the guy was installing the thing Gideon and Zion (Gabe was at school) insisted on staying outside to watch, even having their lunch on the patio swing.

I weeded the rose bed for a while…

And I let Elias play in the grass but then it got too cold for us.  About two minutes after the guy finished it started to rain.  Zion had just enough time to go down the slide once and that was it.

But the next day…

…and ever since then the kids and the toy have been nearly inseparable.  And why not?  It has two regular swings and a baby bucket swing and a great slide and picnic table (which can come out) and a hanging bar…

…and binoculars.

The summer is looking a whole lot funner. 

Rosie Update

Rosie is a good dog.  We hit a rough patch for a few days last week.  It wasn’t entirely her fault but it was still frustrating.  She must have got a sour tummy when I switched her food (even though I did it gradually like you’re supposed to) and she kept having accidents in the house.  At frustratingly inconvenient times and in ways that required breaking out our steam cleaner.  Urg! 

She also has proven that she’s not 100% housebroken to begin with (sneaking off to have pee accidents in the other room instead of going to the door).  Also, always at my busiest moments and right when I was thinking “She’s been doing really well, I can probably let her off the leash for a while.”  ERRRRR-wrong!

So poor Rose has been living attached to me by leash or in her crate when I can’t have my attention on her behavior.  Sadly, I can’t just let her outside for any length either because she chews up the kids’ toys.  Once the weather is warmer and our schedule less busy (i.e. when school lets out) I can be outside with her and scold her when she chews on the wrong thing.  She is amazingly responsive to a stern voice.  Rarely do I have to tell her “No” about something more than once – at least when I catch her in the act that is.

She has chosen me as her person and hates when I’m out of her sight.  She really only likes to hang out with other family members if she can still see me.  I hope she relaxes on this a bit once she’s had more time to settle.

While I still suspect she has some Jack Russell Terrier (or as I call them Jack Russell Terrors) she does NOT have a Jack personality at all. She’s my co-couch potato.  The cushion next to my usual spot on the couch is now her place and when I get up she follows me but only to entice me back to the couch.

I’ve been catching her and Towzer in some pretty cute moments lately.  He likes to give her big kisses and they love to play.  Yay!

And today she was most adorable.  Gabe stayed home from school because we’ve been passing around this ridiculous Really Little Cold.  Rosie apparently thought we still needed to get to the bus and WE WERE LATE!  She started frantically jumping up at the baby gate to the laundry room so I opened it for her, she’s never done that before.  Then she scratched at the door to the garage so I opened that too.  Then she dashed around to the side of the van and put her feet up so I opened the door and she jumped in, settled in the back and looked at me like “C’mon, we’re late!”

I had a dickens of a time getting her to come back to me to take her back in the house.  Poor thing was very confused about why we weren’t going to the bus stop.

Yep, she’s a good dog.