smarty pants

ok, i just got a huge kick out of this. like pretty much most babies, they love anything you're wearing - necklaces, earrings, and even glasses. i thought i'd give him the chance to have my glasses. wonder if it made him dizzy with that prescription :) his tongue was sticking out right before this. would have made an even better picture. anyway, i loved it. 

Sleeping Miracle

This book has been an absolute life saver.
Ever since bringing Kort home from the hospital, we've been rocking and bouncing him to sleep. We even got an exercise ball to work our (ok, mostly mine) gluts out at the same time and not kill our back standing up. It had gotten to the point where we couldn't take it anymore and needed Kort to fall asleep on his own and not in our arms because once he was dead asleep, we'd put him down in his crib and he would wake right back up. It was driving me crazy with the night wakings.

So this lady in our ward was telling Clay about this book. We had previously just talked to the Pediatrician about getting him to sleep better and this was somewhat the same thing she had talked about, but obviously more in detail and depth.

I found the book at the public library the next day and read as much as I could to start Kort on it that night.  To sum it up, what you do is put your baby in the crib drowsy.  Stay next to the bedside and just comfort him every now and then (pat, sshhh, etc.) and eventually they'll fall asleep. What you're doing is getting rid of their crutch to fall asleep (his was bouncing).  That's the basis of it.

Night one: took 1.5 hours and I even had to pick him up a little and then quickly put him down and pat him to sleep.
Night two: 45 minutes, same as above.
Night three, four, etc.: about 20 minutes or so and he even fell asleep without me having to pick him up! I have NEVER seen him just lay down and fall asleep. I was in heaven!

Now, a mistake I had been making.  She says if the baby stands up, gently put them back down and encourage them to lay down. Then if he gets back up, don't fight it. Well, I wouldn't let him get back up and would put my hands by the sides so he couldn't get up. It worked...for a while.
I realized there would be no way that I could leave the room and have him fall asleep on his own. Plus, it was starting to take longer for him to fall asleep again.  So I decided to start all over and make sure I was consistent on what she was saying.

Night one re-do: 20 minutes
Night two re-do: 15 minutes
Night three re-do: 6 minutes
MIRACLE!!!
That was just last night. He's even becoming more drowsy at night compared to always being "awake" and squirmy. The rest of the method goes on to moving away from the crib and comforting them with sshhing them with eventually moving out of the room, etc.

I wish I had this book a LONG time ago. I definitely recommend it. It's no crying out type, which some say works for them, but not for me. I haven't read a whole bunch of other sleeping books, and I know most books have some good things but not the whole book, but I will say this whole book WORKS!!! Kort has been sleeping through the night for quite some time now! From 8:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m. although he has an annoying wake up at 5:30 a.m. and I have to put him back to sleep until 7:00 (that will end soon though, hopefully).  Here's to a better night's rest (cross your fingers)!

the bob master

(this bob is the most amazing stroller. guess i haven't used many others, but i'll put a word in for it and hopefully convince my brother in law that he needs to get one since his wife does work at rei afterall ;)

This is what consists of my days, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Two cute babies. Putting up with our jogs. Clara is an absolute doll. She loves anything you do to make her laugh. This just might have to be an arranged marriage. ;) ha ha Her mom, Jenna, and I have been jogging those days. Jenna kicks my butt into gear. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't be losing this extra baby weight. :) Thanks Kort. :) She's been training for a 10k and it's been my goal this year to at least do my first 5k. Yes, pathetic I know, that I haven't even done one of those my whole life when I've been so active with sports and what not. I guess that's what marriage and babies do to you. This is a good excuse to get ready for one. Which, I think I'm ready to hit one up this weekend in Nauvoo, Illinois!!! I'll let you know if I survive.

standing tall

Kort is always going into the kitchen and pulling himself up on the chairs. That was one of the reasons we tried to block it off. He's been pulling himself up when the dishwasher is open, but I don't have the camera by me when he's doing that and I don't dare leave to get it afraid he'll grab one of the knives or something.

The top one I caught lately. He had actually taken a step over that toy to where it shows him. He pulled himself up on the toy to his left and then changed to the other one. I don't know how he did it. Then he loves the paper shredder to stand up to and even things lower than shoulder height he'll still stand up, like his carseat.  He has been grabbing onto the bottom of my pants and pulling himself up that way also. He's got way too much courage to do all this, but I guess that's the way you learn!

the munchkin is mobile

I've been trying to get a good enough video of Kort crawling and this is all you're going to get for a while ;) ha ha If you look closely, you can see 4 different types of crawling. 

1. on his hands and knees.

2. hands, one knee, and one foot. 

3. hands and feet

4. army style

(the little musical you hear is a card that our friends gave us that kort just lights up every time we play it for him. sorry if it's inappropriate for your ears;) 
he is getting into everything now! we tried putting an extra shower curtain rod with a blanket over it to block off our kitchen entrance (it's bigger than a door entry) but after a week of trying to get things figured out, he crawled through the blanket. we're thinking he's going to be walking, or taking a couple of steps, before we move out of this place in a couple of months. he's pulling himself up onto anything even if it's stable or not, which has caused some falls :( i'm catching random places of him doing that and i'll post pictures here soon.

Mower County Fair

Clay had fun editing the tire photo and it's become one of my favorites!


We only made it to the fair for a couple of hours before Kort started getting grumpy, but we had fun playing around on the tractors taking pictures, obviously.


Our fair food: fried cheese curds (aka mozzarella sticks), fried s'mores, and ribs on a stick (our favorite!).
I'm glad I at least made it to a fair this year, in hopes to make up for the years missed at the Cassia County Fair, in which I will be missing the maple bars, dutch oven, scones, commercial building, and everything else :) ha ha Hope all you Cassians have a blast this week!

p.s. It's also my sister's 10 year High School reunion!! Ahh! Looks like fun :) Watch for them at the rodeo!

washington to minnesota

time here in our new place has already been going by fast! i am behind on posting about our driving adventure to get here. not many pictures taken, but i'll just sum up the trip.

we woke up early the 5th of july thinking we would get out on the road by 1:00. well, you can never underestimate all the odds and ends that you have and trying to get it packed. luckily, we had some help from the missionaries and some friends from church help pack the truck. that part didn't take too long. however, our landlord is a clean freak and we wanted every penny of our deposit back so we were cleaning everything. we really only had the downstairs to clean (the living room, 1/2 bath, and kitchen). but that dang kitchen....it was already 3:00 and we set a goal to leave by 5:00 now. out of the blue our friend stops by after work to say good-bye if we were still there. she was an angel! she helped clean the kitchen and then her husband stopped by also (who had been helping clay all morning long) and we finally got everything cleaned and left the place to get on the road at 6:30. we can't thank everyone enough who helped us move! well, we got to a place that was 2 hours away, 4 hours later, thanks to traffic so we found a hotel and got some sleep. the one thing that was great is that kort slept through the night!!! ok, moving on to make this short. 

day 1 - stayed in ellensburg, wa.

day 2 - on the road through coeur d'alene, id, bozeman, mt and stayed just outside butte, mt? i forget. 

 the picture above looked so much better in real life. the sun rays were just spectacular with this sunset!

and clay decided to give kort some beef jerky to use instead of his teething ring. he sure did love that stuff and got super mad when he'd lose it.

 day 3 - got a late start but got through montana, wyoming, and got to rapid city, sd. we got there early enough to make a trip to mount rushmore!!!

 (washington, jefferson, roosevelt, lincoln - sadly, i didn't know the 2 middle ones until i read the info)

 all the state flags with the lit mount rushmore! it was awesome!

 the badlands! you would have never expected to see this with all the flat, prairie land around you.

 day 4 - exit south dakota, enter minnesota! these turbines are everywhere! guess we can expect lots of wind :)

our lovely cabin in the truck. we definitely got a diesel truck this time. we got a gas guzzler with our move to washington and died/overheated on every hill/pass going 10 mph. i don't think we hit lower than 40 with this thing through the hills! 

i just hope we never have to move like this again :S we will hire packers and movers if i have anything to do with it ;) a short plane ride here would have satisfied me enough instead of 1600 miles driving.