Salida Hot Springs

On the 14th of January, we headed over to Salida to splash and play in the hot springs pool. I know I blogged about it before, so I'll save you the details. Alanna and I were just going to hang out by the pool and watch Charlie and Matt swim, but as it turns out, there wasn't any seating next to that end of the pool. Instead, Matt took Charlie swimming, and Alanna and I walked through a few shops downtown. I found a few items and the boys had a blast, so it worked out well in the end.

Charlie's version of jumping into the water: standing close to tne edge of the pool, doing his "jump" (which looks like a deep squat followed by quickly standing up and lifting up one leg, never actually leaving the ground), and then stepping off the edge and into the water. So cute!

After over an hour and a half of swimming, we went out for lunch at a local restaurant and headed home. It was a nice day out and Salida provides some great views of the Collegiate Peaks. Sad that we hadn't been to the hot springs pool for almost a whole year, especially when it's not that far away (70 minutes) and the facility is so nice. We'll have to try to get there a bit more often in the future!

Tummy Time

Sweet baby Alanna having some tummy time on January 18th (11 weeks old). She does really well but doesn't last longer than about 10 minutes. I think she likes the different perspective! I like to put her on a fun blanket or her floor gym so she has something fun to look at. She's not quite at 90 degrees yet so she's still forced to look down, and how boring is that?!Charlie is never too far away when Alanna's laying/playing on the floor. He likes to be right there next to her, which is great, but sometimes he makes me nervous with how close he gets. He IS only 22 1/2 months and I'm not positive that he is completely aware of where and what his body is doing at all times yet. Don't you love his serious look? Hey, at least he's looking.

We were playing a game with Alanna where I would pat her butt and then Charlie would pat her butt. I kissed her head, he kissed her head. I rubbed her back, Charlie rubbed her back.

Can you see the long tuft of hair on the crown of Alanna's head? Charlie had the exact same thing and his never fell out. I'm thinking Alanna's won't fall out either. She is getting a pretty nice bald spot on the back of her head from rubbing on the car seat, bouncy seat, etc. Isn't baby hair so interesting? Some have it, some don't. Some babies come out with adult-looking hairstyles. Some babies are bald until they're 2. It all works out in the end.

It's a...

2 year molar! Charlie's bottom left molar popped through yesterday or today. I've been feeling and looking for them since Christmas, just so I don't miss it when they do decide to come through, but up until tonight had felt nothing. Nothing even looked like it was remotely close to coming through. Tonight, I stuck my finger in the back of Charlie's mouth - quickly, as to not get bitten too hard! - and felt his first 2 year molar back there. I'm pretty sure it came through just today and maybe what gave it away were the four (FOUR!) nasty diapers he had throughout the day today. My lil guy has always been a super easy teether, but I have noticed that occasionally his diapers will reflect that something might going on in his mouth. I'm not saying that it's definitely related, but it might be.

Come to think of it, Charlie has had his fingers in his mouth an awful lot these past few weeks... but he doesn't cry or complain or anything else about it so it could be unrelated. Honestly, don't non-teething 22-month-olds chew on their fingers from time to time? Who knows. Regardless of his diapers and/or finger-chewing thing, Charlie got a new tooth and didn't said boo about it. Go, Charlie!!

Not to be left out...

... Alanna decided to roll from her belly to her back on Friday night (1/20)! Maybe she felt like she had to show off her skills since her big bro accomplished something great the day before?!

Regardless, Alanna rolled! ROLLED. Twice! First to her left and then to her right. I actually caught the second roll on video, too. I'm excited for her, but don't want her to gain too many skills too quickly - she IS still a tiny babe afterall. Slow down, girlie, it's not a race!

Currently, she's sleeping. We've settled into a pretty nice schedule:
wake between 8-9, nursing around 9-9:15
doze on and off for morning naps, sleeping probably a total of 60 minutes
nurse around 12:30ish, followed by swaddling and I lay her down in the bassinet sleepy, but awake (sometimes wide awake and she still puts herself to sleep!)
afternoon nap usually lasts 3ish hours, waking to nurse again around 4:15
somewhere between 5:30 and 6:30, there's often a short nap, but her evening naps are never really scheduled - she just dozes when she needs to
nurse around 7
bath around 8:30-8:45
bedtime snack around 9:15-9:30 and she's off to bed by 9:45, again laying her down sleepy, but awake
she usually starts moving around at 5:30am, but about half the time, I need to get her up to nurse whether she likes it or not :)

I distinctly remember her sleeping 5 hour stretches at 5 weeks (because I was hoping for 6 hour stretches at 6 weeks!), and at 7 weeks was sleeping 6+ hours at a time. Since we got back from MN, Alanna's been sleeping from 9:45-5:30 pretty religiously, getting up for a 30 minute nursing session and going right back to sleep for another few hours. I think 8 hours of straight sleep qualifies for 'sleeping through the night', don't you? Either way, we'll take it!

Currently, it's 4:15 and I hear Alanna waking up from her afternoon nap. Right on schedule!!

Natural Progression

Charlie accomplished quite a goal this week by giving up his pacifier! Strange how it all happened, but on Thursday night about 30 minutes after Charlie went to bed, I looked over and saw his one and only pacifier left on the counter - oops! Completely not on purpose, his pacifier got left there after he took it out of the crib after his nap earlier in the day. Anyway, since he was still doing his normal nighttime talking routine, Matt and I decided to let it go and see what happened. Another 30 minutes went by and by then all talking had ceased. Charlie simply fell asleep without his pacifier.

On Friday morning, I gave him lots of encouragement and praise! Knowing that nap time would be a different situation, I was prepared for a small battle; one that I would inevitably win. Sure enough, there were a few tears at nap time. When I put Charlie in the crib, he was a bit upset anyway because he wanted to keep playing, so the first few tears were because of that. I'm positive that the next ones were due to his desire for the pacifier. After 10 minutes of crying, I went in, picked him up and he snuggled into my shoulder (precious!!). I rubbed his back and tried to transition him back to the crib after a few minutes. I nestled him into his blankets (you didn't think I took those away did you? I'm not THAT mean!!) and rubbed his back for about 5 more minutes before his baby blues eventually drifted shut. He slept an hour and a half and woke up just like he normally would.

And that was it. No tantrums, no up-in-the-night crying, nothing. I was expecting much more of a fight about it. Apparently I underestimated Charlie's ability to give it up! (Maybe next time I'll estimate him. (an Office quote. had to.)) At 22 months to the day, Charlie is no longer using a pacifier. I can't tell you how proud I am of him! There was a short moment when I was consoling him during Friday's nap where I wanted to cave and give it to him; not because he was throwing such a fit about it but because he genuinely looked sad about it. However, at that point, we were commited. And here we are on the other side and doing just fine. Bed time last night went great - not a peep because he was so tired! - and nap time today (Saturday) was just as smooth (not a single peep).

As a reward, we took Charlie out for his first ice cream cone at Dairy Queen last night. Obviously, he's had ice cream before, but last night, we gave him the whole cone (after Matt scooped out some of the ice cream so it was more manageable). He was so excited about it and ate the whole thing, including the leftover ice cream in the dish. I'm not sure that he put it together that we were celebrating that he no longer needed a pacifier, but I made sure to tell him a few times to reinforce how proud I am of him.

No more pacifier. A natural progression of life.

(Second picture from the bottom: Charlie had to take time to wave to the passing cars out the window. :)

(Third picture from the bottom: Matt didn't want Charlie to feel bad having ice cream all over his face, so Matt put some on his face, too. Oh, Matt.)

Christmas Collage 2011

Here are a few quick highlights from our trip back to Minnesota for Christmas.

Johnson Farm Christmas Light Extravaganza, complete with a 5-second picture with Santa and the Mrs. and a bag of peanuts and candies.

Taking advantage of the dusting of snow to take a ride in the sled! K and T didn't even had snowpants along because of the lack of snow - a rarity for MN that late in December!

A surprisingly good shot of the grandkiddies and Grandpa and Grandma. I LOVE that all three boys are wearing argyle sweaters, and we totally didn't coordinate that before hand at all. Sometimes it's uncanny how sisters and mothers think alike.

What a great, big, happy family. What you can't see from the picture is a few of us muttering under our breath, "Hurry up already - the kids are going to lose it!"

Plasma cars for Charlie and K. Sweet!

I give this picture a C+. I have that my sweater is puckering funny in the front... like I'm about to pop the buttons right off of it. I promise it wasn't that tight in person!!

And our great, big, happy Rustand family! It truly is a Christmas miracle every year when we actually get everyone in the same picture... but this year's miracle fell short. J was home with the flu, poor guy!

Grandma and Grandpa, and 8/9ths of the grandkids. Kindof a classic picture with so many little ones; everyone's looking a different direction and only a few are actually smiling. Definite A for effort! And Grandpa got a workout holding Charlie and J!

I'm fairly certain that we'll need to rent out the huge community room at the Y for next year's celebration. Holy chaos, Batman. Even I was over-stimulated by the end of the evening!!

These three stand almost exactly the same height! B is 2 years 4 months, J is 3 years 1 month, and Charlie is 21 months. Hilarious.

Whew. I thought you'd for sure be able to see how hot and sweaty I was in the picture, but it just looks like a Christmas glow. :)

One of my new favorite, FAVORITE pictures. Look at these two handsome boys. I mean, come on. Does it get any cuter than this?!

Our Family Christmas (Alanna's First!)

Our first Christmas as a family of 4! We had a great day together celebrating Christmas and loving on our kids. I made a big noon meal and after the kids woke up from their afternoon naps, we took pictures and opened gifts. We had Papa John's pizza for supper (they recently opened a restaurant in Canon - yay!) and then spent about 30 minutes driving around town looking at Christmas lights. We finished the day with some extra play time (late bedtime!), and Matt and I watched The Grinch. 6 1/2 weeks old. Alanna started smiling at 6 weeks and is flashing her gums a lot more frequently these days!

Charlie's big gift - a vacuum!

Opening his vacuum. Alanna got those cute little bug things that attach together and make a chain. I like that B. brand at Target a lot!

Nothing says Merry Christmas like a large mushroom pizza from Papa John's.

Funny story - I actually got those blocks at a garage sale for $0.50! They were in the original packaging, but the package was dusty so I took them out and washed them up before wrapping them up for Alanna.

My sleepy girl and my Christmas gift from Matt - books of our xanga blog! One is 06-07 and the other is 2008. They are SOOO neat! Matt spent hours upon hours putting them together, and I'm so thankful. They're like Rustand Family yearbooks!

Pound a peg...

A puzzle and aquadoodle fun. Paint with water? Yes, please.

I had the Aquadoodle thing wrapped up to give Charlie as a gift when Alanna was born, but I saved it for Christmas instead. Too bad I was too lazy to re-wrap it in Christmas paper!

Opening my gifts wasn't so much of a surprise... you know, because I told Matt exactly what I wanted. :)

A giant fire truck! It rolls so nicely and Charlie really likes it.

Helping Daddy open new shirts, jeans, and a Seinfeld season.

The fire truck!!

I like when kids sit like this! Charlie's eating an animal cracker, anxiously waiting to open gifts.

Daddy and Alanna

Me and my baby girl!

Baby's First Christmas!! Here's the beginning (actually the end) of the attempted pictures of the kids. Example #1: The smile and bail.

Example #2: I'll smile, but not at the camera.

Example #3: I'll look at the camera, but not smile. (Alanna's thinking, just smile already so we can get this over with!)

Example #4: The all-out laying-on-the-floor protest of picture-taking.

Example #5: Hide your face like me, sis!

Example #6: I'll give you 2.6 seconds to quickly take a picture before it all goes downhill.

Ok, so we didn't get a single family picture with all of us, but I can probably photo shop something together. After the struggle just to get Charlie to cooperate for a few minutes, we decided it just wasn't worth the fight for a family shot. I should have busted out the mini marshmallows as a bribe... why didn't I think of that before?!

Little ladybug's first Christmas was a hit! Though I have to admit, it will be even more fun next year when she's a bit more aware of what's going on. Last year was Charlie's first Christmas, this year was Alanna's first Christmas, and next year will be the first Christmas in three years we WON'T be adding a new baby to the family. :) Things sure have changed in the past few years - blessings that we wouldn't trade for the world.