Uploading the Camera

I finally unloaded my camera. Sadly, I didn't take any pictures of Thanksgiving or of Sienna and her cousin Lilly playing :( But I took some cute ones of Sienna and Riley:

Wearing Mommy's socks

Cute tonguey smile

Sienna jumping

Sitting in the chair I got for her room

Wearing her 'Mary Thing' (pronounced Mary Sing)

In the jumperoo

Eating baby food (he's had applesauce, pears, avocado, sweet potato, banana, squash and mango)

Our Christmas tree :)

Trick or Treat!

I feel like we didn't do very much for Halloween this year. I bought a pumpkin but we didn't carve it yet! At the last minute Ryan and I tried to get supplies to make caramel apples and they were all sold out. Darn it! But we did dress the kids up and take them "trick or treating" to Ryan's work. It was quick, easy and warm to do it that way :) And Sienna got a LOT of candy!

After the kids were in bed, Ryan and I drank hot spiced cider and watched "Psycho". It wasn't the best Halloween. Next year I'll have to put more effort and preparation into it!

Here she is- all decked out as "Dorsey" (Dorothy). I had her calling me Auntie Em while we played yesterday.

And here is our little monster. People kept asking if he was supposed to be cookie monster. He's just a little Riley monster :) Cute!

What's going on?

Something is just not right here. Look at these pictures of Sienna and Riley, both 4 months old:

RILEY

SIENNA

RILEY

SIENNA

Riley's weight: 12 lb 10 oz

Sienna's weight: 15 lbs 14 oz

Sienna was sitting up without toppling. Riley is not. What happened? Is my milk less creamy now? Is Riley just not an eater? Can I blame such a significant difference on Riley having a "bad" latch? I hate having this problem!

4 Months/2 years 5 months old

My little Riley boy. At 4 months he is 12 lbs 10 oz, and 25.5 inches long. He has slipped from the 30th percentile in his weight to the 10th. The doctor thought that he might have thrush so we've been taking medicine and hopefully he'll start gaining.

He is very interested in grabbing and playing with anything within his reach. That includes his feet, toys, books, his binky, my clothes, the keyboard, food (if I'm trying to eat while holding him), etc... He likes to play so much that it's a major distraction during feeding (this might be one cause of his dropping weight). If he hears anything going on-I'm talking me sneezing of all things, or the TV or Sienna or the phone-he stops eating to listen and often refuses to finish the meal. It's very frustrating. I've gotten to the point that I lock myself in the bedroom with Sienna on the other side of the door trying to get in, in order to feed him!

He no longer likes to stay in his swaddle and somehow always gets at least one arm out. Even though I wrap him as tight as possible. He could have a future as an escape artist if he keeps it up.

He still hasn't mastered rolling over. About a month ago he rolled over from his tummy to his back 5 times in a row and I thought he had it, but now he seems content just to stay on his tummy, propped up on his elbows, looking around.

He still wakes up about 2 times a night, goes down to bed around 6 and is up around 7.

He went through a phase a few weeks ago where he was blowing bubbles all the time (hasn't done it much lately).

We are working on building up his tummy muscles. As of right now, he can't sit up. If I try and prop him with a pillow or something, he topples forward and ends up on his tummy.

He is a very easy going baby, hardly ever crying or fussing, and is very quick to smile. We feel very blessed to have this sweetheart in our family!

My two and a half year old!

Sienna is almost 2 and a half! I can't believe how grown up she is getting! She is potty trained/potty training (she still wears diapers while she sleeps and still uses her little potty instead of the big toilet, although once in awhile she opts to sit on the big one!)

Another funny quirk about Sienna is that she can’t stand to have things in her room that don’t belong. Once she started crying hysterically after we had put her to bed. Ryan went in to check on her after a few minutes and she pointed to his keys (which were on the floor) and said, “Take them out!” After which she went happily to sleep. She has done this a number of times since.

For awhile Sienna has "said" the prayer (by which I mean, she repeated the words we gave her) but recently she has started putting her own spin on things.

This is what I told her to say/This is what she actually said:

Bless Daddy to get home safely tonight/Bless Daddy to ride his bicycle

Please help me to be obedient/Please help me to be sweet to Jesus

Please help me to sleep good tonight/Please help me to go to sleep, and not cry

Today when Sienna woke up from her nap she was crying and told me, "I want my momma, and my dadda". I told her that Daddy was at work, but that we could call him if she wanted. When she had him on the phone she said, "Daddy, I tooted." It was very funny at the time.

My Favorite Things

My favorite things of all are always going to be my kids and my hubby. So that's what you get to see :)

Sienna, getting one of our Wii remotes out of the basket...very sneaky

Sienna during conference. She was running around stealing popcorn from everyone else's bowls. Also, she was "sharing" hers with them (whether they liked it, or not)

Riley and Ryan. Does Riley look a little worried? I can't say I blame him

Portrait taken of Riley today. He is so darn cute! I can say that about my own, right?

Sienna and Riley together. The only way to get her to smile for me (naturally, not that crazy, toothy fake smile) is to tell her to say, "Boo" and then scream when she says it. A trick I learned at my Photo by You workshop!

Sweet face

One of Sienna's favorite things to do is to jump on my bed. Her favorite time to do it? When I'm trying to feed Riley. He doesn't like it much.

And last but not least, Sienna on her potty. She is learning and is doing really well. I just don't know how to take her to the next level (i.e. from going on the potty chair to going on the REAL potty. Also, when will she not need me to remind her to wipe every time, or to wash her hands? And when will she be comfortable pooping without first walking around the house for 30 minutes like she's in horrible pain and then finally letting it out?)

Sienna's reaction to Lovey Bear "pooping" on his potty. (A tootsie roll) She just couldn't believe it!

Picture Perfect

This past Saturday I went to a photography workshop called "Photo by You". I learned the basics of shooting in manual mode on my camera (the one I've had for 4 years now and have always shot in auto mode...). It was surprisingly simple and in just a few hours I felt like I could start shooting manual (although it's going to take a lot of practice and time before I'm "good" at it). Here are some photos I took today with my new camera.

Can I just say, I have beautiful children! And the last picture is of our dinner tonight, beef bulgogi. It's a Korean dish and it was really yummy! Here is the recipe:

2 lb beef top sirloin, thinly sliced

4 cloves garlic, minced

½ Asian pear or ¼ kiwi—peeled, cored and minced (not optional. This acts as a meat tenderizer.)

4 green onions, thinly sliced

½ cup soy sauce

4 Tbsp sugar

2 Tbsp sesame oil

4 Tbsp rice wine or Korean cooking wine

1 Tbsp sesame seeds

1 tsp minced fresh ginger or 1/8 tsp ginger powder

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper

In a large Ziploc bag, combine beef with all other ingredients. Seal and refrigerate for 2 hours. Preheat grill pan over medium heat. Brush oil over grill pan, and add beef. Cook, turning to brown evenly, until done.

Serve with rice, wrapped in romaine lettuce leaves (much like a taco shell).

Comparison

I just looked up Sienna's size as a baby out of curiosity. At her two month check up she weighed 13 lbs 9 oz. At his, Riley weighed 11 lbs even. At birth they were both 7 lb 9 oz.

Is it a girl thing? Are girls just destined from birth to be fatter???

I'm a Good Mom....Really!

This morning I went to institute class with Sienna and Riley in tow. When the class was about halfway over, I could smell that Sienna had a stinky diaper, so I took her out into the hallway, just outside the classroom so that I could still hear the teacher ( the door was open). As I was removing her diaper, Sienna said (not quietly), “I have a penis.”

I think this came from our little discussion about Riley’s little “fishy”, and I don’t think that anyone heard her, but I can’t be sure. It’s funny to think what the other mom’s would think of me if they did hear. (Not knowing us and about our little talk recently about penis's and vaginas.)

Out of the mouth of my babe...

This morning right after Sienna woke up and was still in bed, Ryan asked her if she wanted to "go watch the BYU Cougars" with him. She said in a very excited voice, "Yeah! Let's go watch the....(sorta long pause).....cucumbers!"

I gave Riley a bath yesterday, and as usual, Sienna pulled a chair over and climbed up to "help". She watched for a minute and then asked me (while pointing at Riley's junk) "Is that a little fishy?"

Needless to say we had a little discussion about the difference between boy and girl anatomy. I did get a kick out of her question, though.

What I Loved this Week

There were so many things I loved in the last few weeks. I'm just going to lay it all out there!

I love finding awesome things out by the dumpster, in the "free for all" area! This week I went to take out the trash and returned with this sweet little kitchen. It needed a good cleaning, and had no accessories, but as you can see, we already had those! I had some fun setting it all up for Sienna to find the next morning. When she woke up, she came out of her bedroom and walked right past it. I told her to come back and even though she was facing it, she still didn't notice! Once I pointed it out, she stared at it for a few seconds and then immediately started to play. I always wanted one of these when I was little!

I love checking on Sienna during the night/naptime and finding her bed strewn with books. For some reason, she really loves this children's Book of Mormon.

And in the morning when I go to get Sienna up, she usually has a pile of books she's working on. I really love that she loves to "read"!

We went camping for the first time since having kids! We were a little nervous, but we didn't need to be! Sienna had a great little adventure sleeping in a tent, and has asked a few times if we're going to go again! Ryan made sure that our tent had a separate room to put her in...I think it made all the difference!

As part of the camping trip, we went boating. It was a lot of fun! Especially when we were able to ride on a tube pulled behind the boat!

Riley continues to be so cute! I love his chubby cheeks!

I had to practically force Sienna to don this little princessy dress. Who ever heard of a little girl not wanting to play with dress ups? Once she got past putting it on, she was a very happy girl and enjoyed our little "Princess Party", especially when she was served m&m's in a goblet, and when Daddy came home and danced with her.

This guy is beginning to swat at toys when they are held within his reach!

Making and playing with play dough was a lot of fun. Sienna made a mommy and a baby snake!

Some other things I loved this week:

• Last night during scripture time, Ryan was reading about Nephi building a boat and stated that Heavenly Father could do anything! He could tell that Sienna was not paying attention, so he asked her, "Sienna, who can do anything?" She looked at him and said, "He wants to build a rocket ship!" It wasn't even an answer to the question he had asked but it had us rolling on the ground!
• I was doing laundry yesterday, and had my roll of laundry quarters out on the bedside table. When I came back from putting my first load in downstairs, the roll was gone. I went into Sienna's room just in time to see her putting the last coin into her piggy bank. (Luckily there weren't that many left.) I thought it was funny and just let her have them.
• Yesterday after changing Sienna's diaper, I threw the used one across the room and into the trash. She must have liked what she saw because she said, "Good job throwing it, Momma!"