Ode to Cocoa Puffs

I need to give a little shout out to my fabulous sister and her child rearing genius. First a little background- I have been trying to get Davis to eat food for about 6 months now... any kind of food- baby food, cereal, veggies, fruit, etc, but it was not going so well. Usually the best I could do would be one or two bites before his jaw clamped shut like a medievil fortress. Well, that was until my genius sister came along to save the day. While in San Diego, Crystal said something like, "well, no wonder he's not eating yet, look at all of that boring baby food you are trying to feed him. I wouldn't want to eat that either. Give him something good like cocoa puffs, I bet he'd eat that." I laughed to myself thinking of course that wouldn't work because nothing else had, but why not give it a try? My desparation to get my child to eat was long past the point where I cared if he ate sugared cereal... as long as he would put something in his mouth. So, we did a little experiment and gave him a cocoa puff. To my surprise and delight, when he put it in his mouth, it did not come back out, and (gasp) he even reached for more! So my love affair with cocoa puffs began. He started popping those things in his mouth like an eight year old in a candy store. I really didn't care about the sugar because at least he was getting a fair share of vitamins and minerals as well. But, little did I know that his love of cocoa puffs would lead to his love for other food as well. We took baby steps... we went from cocoa puffs to trix, and from there to some biscuits and crackers....well here we are a few weeks later, and he will eat peas, brocolli, fruit, bread, just about anything I put on his plate. He still resists things I try to feed him from a spoon, but not as much as before. Anyway, thanks to Crystal and the miracle of cocoa puffs, my little guy is turning into a good little eater. So, thank you Crystal, and thank you cocoa puffs!
Here is a cute picture of Davis in the bath (which he needs more often since he is frequently covered in food these days)

San Diego Girls Trip

I got to sneak away to San Diego last week to play with the girls and the kids for a few days. It's always fun to see my mom, Crystal, and my highly entertaining niece and nephew, but this time, we had a very fun addition with Crystal's sister in law, Jessie. We had lots of laughs, like when the missionaries showed up unannounced and were greeted at the door by Crystal in her bikini and came in to see Jess dancing in the pool... good times. Though some of the most memorable moments occurred while driving around in our borrowed oldsmobile, a.k.a. "the pimp-mobile," we also had fun days at the beach, the pool, and sea world. The weather was beautiful, as always, and it felt great to finally get some sun! While we were there, we also got to celebrate John-kai's graduation from law school - woo hoo!! If you're not overloaded on pictures after this post, Crystal and Jessie have some more pictures from the trip on their blogs.

At the Cove in La Jolla


Hanging out at Sea World


Davis got to touch a sting ray


Beautiful couple! John-kai and Meg at JK's graduation lunch


Congrats to the grad


Davis' first beach experience


Elle LOVED the beach and had so much fun with her aunt Jessie


Max... not lovin it so much


I could not get this kid to look at the camera, so this is the best shot I could get with him


Three little monkeys sittin on a bed


Group hug!


cute kisses


Crystal and Jess went to see Wicked in LA and brought back these cute shirts




Davis and aunt Crystal


Max loves his grandma!


Grandma loves Davis

Spring FINALLY made it's way to Utah... sort of

I've been meaning to post some spring pictures for the past few weeks, and now that I finally am getting around to doing that... it's raining again. I don't know if it's just me, but I feel like spring came to Utah a little late this year. We had a lot of cold April days when I just wanted to get outside and play, but the weather seems to be cooperating with my plans a little better now. It finally warmed up enough that the flowers started blooming, so a few weeks ago, I went to the Thanksgiving Point gardens with some of Bryson's family. I have been wanting to go to their tulip festival for years, and I was not let down. It was a beautiful walk.

This week's pictures

Not much has been going on around here. Davis and I have been sick, so we've just been hanging out. I thought I'd post a few pictures from the past week.



My cute little froggy


This tongue is ALWAYS hanging out


Playoff season is officially upon us. Bryson is a HUGE Lakers fan, so this is mandatory attire. (It is not so popular here in Utah, but I think that makes him even more set on wearing it).


This would be Davis trying to tell you how he feels about non-Lakers fans

Crawling

Davis is getting much better at crawling, and I think I can officially say that he has progressed from a scootch to a crawl. I am going to try to figure out how to post a video on here, but in the meantime, here are some action shots. (Plus one or two other pics).

Here he is reaping the rewards of his efforts after crawling to the edge of the bed in pursuit of his toy


Another one of his new tricks is this pucker face... he was doing it all night


Here he is showing off a bit... doing one of his more complicated moves


This one is for all the ladies


He is getting ready for his big race... we think he can take the short kid next door


I wanted to include one or two bath shots... don't worry, they are all PG. (and in case you are wondering, yes, he does have a rash on his neck)


"oh mom, not another picture."

Fablehaven 3 Launch Party

My brother in law's new book came out last week. It is the third one in the Fablehaven series, and this one is called Grip of the Shadow Plague. It is my favorite one so far, and I highly recommend the whole series to any of you who haven't read it. If you like books along the lines of Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia, etc, you will love his books! Anyway, they had a launch party for the new book on friday night, and it was a lot of fun. There were over 3,000 people there, including Sheri Dew and one of President Hinckley's daughters. Bryson got to perform with his old Divine Comedy group, and some of his family dressed up as characters from the books. They were there until about 11 or 12 at night, taking pictures with kids and signing autographs while people waited in line to get Brandon's autograph. I forgot to take pictures of the stage, which was awesome, but I still got some fun pictures from the night. I thought some of you might enjoy seeing a few shots.

Hooray for Carrots!!!

I realized it's been about a month since I've posted pictures of Davis, so it's about time for some recent pictures.
These first few are of Davis and his daddy playing with his train. It shoots out balls and does all sorts of things that an 8 month old baby finds fascinating.

He's such a sweet little guy, always smiling for mom.


This is Davis' version of multi-tasking.


Action shot!


I love this cute face!



These next pictures represent a HUGE success for our family... hence the title of the post. For most babies, who like to eat food, this wouldn't be very exciting... but Davis ate some carrots!!!!! This is probably the most exciting news I've had in weeks. Davis is the easiest baby, so I really have no room to complain, but getting him to eat food has been such a struggle. He LOVES to nurse and does a great job at that, but if you try to put anything else in his mouth, he will show you who is boss. He has developed amazing techniques of keeping his mouth locked shut as tightly as possible, blowing out food instead of taking it in, swatting it away with his hands at just the right moment to send it flying across the room, etc, etc. Anyway, tonight we had a break through. He actually ate carrots... sort of. He seemed to be okay with the spoon entering his mouth and was actually helping the process along by taking something similar to a bite. He ended up very messy (which you can't completely see because he's wearing red), but I was thrilled!