Christmas Week

Christmas has come and gone again, and I sorta feel like saying "we survived!" Partly because we were not deathly ill this year like we have been the last few(I had a cold but nothing major). And partly because of all the running around to the many festivities. Christmas eve we were at Mom & Dad B's for the traditional dinner, music, and Santa letter. This year we added a nativity to the program that was unintentionally hilarious. At least it was unintentional on the kids part, but I think Thad and Jacob(who played the innkeeper, two shepherds, and the donkey) hammed it up on purpose. Of course I did not take pictures, but I do have some of Christmas morning at our house.
We drug Andi out of bed at 6 (luckily Sammy had already eaten and gone back to sleep). She did not want to get up. Even after I carried her down the hall to the tree she just laid on the floor stretching and whining. After a few minutes though she saw the chest of dress up clothes and got excited about presents and being awake.



She had to try on all the jewelry before she could move onto another gift, but her favorite of the morning was the Nerf gun that she could actually load and shoot herself. She flipped out when she opened that one. I do't have pictures yet of her playing with her gun, but here is one of her playing with Daddy's new long range Nerf sniper rifle, complete with scope and those tri-pod leg thingy's.
We were at my parents house by 7 am and did the present thing with them. Then had a great breakfast and raided our stockings, or as Andi called it, Candy sock. Then we headed to Thad's parents for present at 11, and from there to my granparents for dinner, and finally home around 6 in the evening. In all the running around I missed Bobby's phone call!
Sammy was very cooperative the whole day and mostly slept through the present opening parts, which I loved because we were able to open gifts with Andi and not have to try to do it all one-handed ;)
Friday things slowed down a little but we did go to Rosemary's with the Bulkeley gang and to the park. Then dinner at my parents because my mom's family was getting into town for the Crowley Christmas which happened on Saturday. And all of these events are why I feel like saying "we survived!"
Sam had his 2 month check up today and his first round of shots. He did really well for the shots and only cried untill I picked him up. He is 23 inches long and 13 lbs which puts him in about the 85%.

5 years and counting

Saturday Thad and I celebrated our 5 yr anniversary. Nothing super exciting, just dinner and a movie, but it was soooo nice to go out just the two of us. Thad also surprised me this year with REAL jewelry. He gave it to me early because Andi spoiled the surprise. He came home from work monday and said he had some Christmas shopping to finish and took Andi with him. I guess he wanted a girls perspective because he let her make the final decision between two things. Of course the first thing she says when she came home was "Hey momma, we got you heart necklace." Completely disregarding the whole secret and surprise conversation she and Thad had on the way home ;) I remember when 5 years seemed like forever and even waiting the whole year for Christmas to roll around again took so so long. But the last 5 years have flown by so quickly I can hardly believe it. For those who complain that i never post pics of myself here are a couple comparison shots.

5 years ago in the good ol King Henry courtyard

Yesterday in the good ol living room

Ugh! And now we see why I don't post pictures. I still have baby weight to loose, I need a tan, and I need my long hair back I think.
Anyway, other events of the week. We went Christmas caroling with my family and some friends for FHE and Andi thought it was the greatest thing ever. We had our ward Christmas party on friday night which was nice. And we are officially 100% done with christmas prep. Everything is wrapped and ready to go.
Sammy gets a new cast Wednesday morning, so we'll get to see how he is progressing. Last time the Dr seemed impressed so we hope he continues that way. Here are a couple of cute shots from the week. Enjoy, and Merry Christmas to everyone!

Thad thinks he's going for the cookie. . . I think pacifier

This was his cute Sunday before Christmas church outfit. Of course he wore pants, but this was after his nap at home. I made a big deal of coordinating outfits for church and then failed to get a picture of it. Don't worry we were stinkin cute in our red and black.


He broke out into a big smile and we almost caught it. This is it fading away, but we should get some good smile pics soon, he does it a lot now.

Picture Fiasco

So I decided this year we would get a good picture of the kids and send it out as our Christmas Card. So last week we dressed them in coordinating outfits, curled And's hair and attempted a little photo shoot. It was dumb! Andi would not quit squirming and Sammy did the usual peaceful sweet face until we'd snap a picture. Here's a sampling and the fiasco.



This is the only one I think turned out semi-decently. . . but it's not edited yet.


After this disaster I decided there would be no Christmas card this year. I didn't want one of all 4 of us because that would mean finding coordinating outfits in our closets for all of us, and lets face it, I still have quite a bit of baby-weight to get rid of, so I really didn't want to do a picture. But Thad talked me into trying a whole family one because then we'd be able to hold the kids and make them look nice. So here are the results of that attempt.

Only one of these has been edited yet, can you tell which one ?


Sunday was Sammy's Blessing day and we were lucky enough to have both our parents, two sets of grandparents and a couple of siblings there to share in the day. Of course I did not remember to bring my camera, but don't worry Mom B is always prepared and took pictures, I just don't have copies yet. Here is the one we managed to take before we went to church of Sammy on his big day.Same outfit as the Christmas pictures I know, but it's stinkin cute!

Other than that I can't believe that Sammy will be 6 weeks old tomorrow. It really seems like we just brought him home. Thankfully though he decided that 5 weeks old was a great time to start sleeping through the night. I didn't want to mention it before and jinx it, but he's done it for a week straight now. We put him down between 9 and 9:30 and he wakes up at 6. Babywise is magic! Plus he's just a very good peaceful baby and he'd probably sleep all day too if I let him.
The shopping part of Christmas is totally done. Now we are just finishing up a couple of projects and we will be completely done with 2 weeks to spare! The cards are one of those projects but if you don't get one do not assume we snubbed you, I probably just didn't get them out ;)

Christmas is Coming!

It has been very very foggy the last week, which for me means it's Christmas! I know most people think of a white Christmas as snow, but growing up in Bakersfield where it snows maybe an inch every 10 years, a white Christmas for me means fog. So I've had the itch to get decorations out since the fog set in last week but I held out till Dec 1. Being a Monday night I thought it was a perfect FHE activity to set up our tree. The tree process was a little different this year as Andi is old/big enough to help. So we let her decorate it (which ended up being 20 balls crammed in a 1 ft square of the tree) and then when she went to bed we re-decorated.

This is how Thad decorated Andi while I was "fluffing" the branches.

I was really surprised by how high she could reach on the tree.


Her "Butidul" Section. (that's beautiful for those who do not speak toddler)

This is how Sammy participated in the activity.

the cast

It has been a bit of an eventful week. We took Sam in for a consult on his foot and before we left the office he was in a cast. That's right 4 weeks old exactly and he got his first cast. I say first because we have to go back every 2 weeks for the next 3 months to get the cast changed, not because I expect him to be breaking bones during his childhood(right). He is doing really well and it doesn't seem to bug him much, except I can definitely tell when he's trying to curl his legs up under him, he gets so frustrated that that one won't go.

This kid is really hard to get a good picture of. He is laying peacefully and just looking at you so you grab the camera and before you can take a picture he's pulling a face like this. I took 10 pictures in the space of a few minutes and they pretty much all turned out to be variations on this. Lame. He really can be cute sometime ;)

Wednesday night Thad actually went with me to see twilight. I have to admit that I broke out into a stupid smile the minute Edward came on screen and I think it pretty much stayed the whole movie. Not that I think Rob Pattinson is super good looking(to be honest I always pictures Joe Black when I was reading the book), but because it was Edward and Bella in real life. Sorta. You know what I mean. Anyway, I was really excited to have Thad share in my twilight fun since he refuses to read the books(or any book for that matter) just so we could talk about it. But now of course I am kinda wishing I hadn't let him see it because it's been "if I were a vampire you wouldn't care" and "if Edward said that you'd laugh", and constant mocking remarks. What was I expecting though right?
Thursday of course was thanksgiving and we had two dinners again. And now Thad has the rest of the long weekend off. yay!
My big accomplishment of the week though would probably that I got 80% of my Christmas shopping done. On-line of course! I love shopping on-line. Going to any store these days is pretty insane and reall annoying so yay for internet shopping ;)

cute moment

Today I was out in the garage switching laundry around, in a huge rush, because I had left Sammy laying on Andi's bed. Normally if I leave him laying somewhere unattended for more than 3 seconds she is in his face and hovering over him and trying to bounce him. So I rushed back to her room and I was really surprised to find them like this.



This is actually amazing for several reasons. First of all she is not attempting to harm him in any way, and second because she was sharing her blanky with him. She became super protective of blanky when we brought Sam home and we have not been allowed to have it anywhere near him, on penalty of huge tantrum throwing.


I just liked this one because he is looking right at me and I think focusing somewhat.

2 weeks old

I can't believe another week has gone by already! Sammy is still the best baby ever. He is sleeping from 9 p.m. to 9 a.m. with only 1 feeding in between. I tried for a couple of days to wake him at 6 am just to stay on schedule, but he'd nurse for like 2 seconds and be out. So I gave up and technically 9 is still on schedule, he is just skipping a feeding. But I promise I'm not complaining, it's fabulous. And I feel like life is pretty much back to normal. We've been grocery shopping, to Dr's appointments, clothes shopping for Andi, and all with 2 kids in tow. I'm feeling pretty good about that.
We are supposed to be hearing from UCLA today about bringing Sammy in to the pediatric ortho. I finally did some research about clubbed foot and how they treat it. It's seems like it's going to be a busy rough couple of weeks for the little guy, especially having to drive down to LA for every appointment, but we are hoping we'll get the process started in the next week or so.
Anyway, here's another fun comparison photo. Sammy and Thad, ya think we have another clone?

This last week has been really long and really short all at the same time. Sammy is doing really well. He's totally cooperative with the schedule we put him on, except the part where it takes a full 30 minutes to really wake him up. This kid can sleep! Which is fabulous as well because I am only having to wake up once a night to feed him.
We did the whole Halloween thing with Andi this year. Well sort of. We had planned to go to the ward party but Andi already had a bad cold and we didn't want her out getting sicker. So we decided Thad would take her around the block trick-or-treating and call it good. So we got her tinkerbell costume on, and she burst in to tears and ran to the bathroom saying she needed to throw up! So we got the costume off and got her some 7-up and she laid on the floor for a while. Grandma B came over and showed her video of her cousins trick-or-treating and that convinced her to walk down to my parents house at least. Of course, once she saw another group of kids and all the candy, she was totally up for a complete lap around the block. This is the only picture we got of her in the costume. She refused to stand up and wouldn't take any other pictures.

Other than that, we had my Grandmas 75th birthday party with a lot of family in town. Sammy also had his first Dr's appointment Monday and he's already gained 3 oz. Also I think they measured him wrong in the hospital or something becuase the Dr's office says he is 22 inches long and I know he didn't grow over 2 inches in 5 days. Sammy right foot is a little twisted. The Dr said he thinks it might be a clubbed foot or something of that sort so they are sending us to an orthopedic surgeon to have his foot looked at. Hopefully it's something they can fix sooner than later. Here are a couple cute pictures from the week.


Here's an interesting little comparison we made with a picture from Andi's 1st week and one of Sammy. A small resemblance no?

He's Here!

After the longest day ever, Samuel Brent Bulkeley made his appearance at 11:59 p.m. on October 29th. Weighing in at 7 lbs 8 oz, 19 3/4 inches he looks very much like Andi did, so I am going to predict that soon everyone will be saying how much they look alike ;) I'd go into more detail about the whole experience, but for some of you that's over sharing, and let's be honest, I'm really tired and the story could take a while. So here are some pictures instead.

This is Andi visiting us Wednesday night, not sure why after the entire day away there was still no baby sammy to be seen.


First moments together


Close up, he was really alert and curious right away.


Andi holding Sammy. She was pretty sure no one else was allowed to hold him but her.




This is just one I forgot to post with our pumpkin pictures and I love it so much I had to post it anyway.

The Great Pumpkin

If Charlie Brown and the gang ever really got to see the great pumpkin, this is what they would have seen.


There are a couple of fruit stands on the 126 that Thad passes every day to and from work, and this year he stopped in and brought home an 86 lb pumpkin. Needless to say Andi has been very excited to make it into a jack-O-lantern. Here are some before, during, and afters of the process.




In case you were wondering, yes that is a cord sticking out of the back of the pumpkin, because Thad though a candle just wouldn't do it justice. So he took apart a lamp and that is a 75 watt bulb lighting up the block. Andi's little pumpkin however has the traditional candle lighting it, which is why it looks blank ;)

Ridiculous!

Okay, so here goes yet another pregnancy tirade, but I think this one is more justified than any I've posted yet. Last night about 8 I started having regular contractions, real ones, not the braxton hicks I've been having for weeks. By 10 they were coming every 4 minutes. By 3 am they were coming every 2 minutes and stayed that way till we went in at 4. Seriously, clockwork, every 2 minutes, and there was no mistaking these for anything other than real labor. So we go in and literally the minute they hook me up to the monitors they stop. Completely. So we sit there for an hour and a half to see if they come back, but oh no, they didn't! Are you kidding me!?!?!?! How do you go from hard contractions every 2 minutes to nothing?!?!?!? This has officially been the most ridiculous night of my life and I'm so irritated and sleep deprived about it I can hardly see straight(but honestly that's probably the lack of sleep more than anything).

Nosey Strangers

I'm not an overly social person, especially when it comes to people I don't know, like people you see at the grocery store for example. And I have never understood how or why Thad manages to strike up conversations with people everywhere we go. I also have never understood why people are so presumptuous when it comes to pregnant ladies. Just because you can tell I'm pregnant does not make it any of your business crazy strangers at the store!
So today I'm at the store with my mom and Andi who have wandered off somewhere else and this random guy walks buy and asks when I'm due, and what I'm having, and if I have any other kids and what her name is. I answered politely but what I was really thinking was. . . .

Stranger: So you are expecting!
me: yes captain obvious
S: When are you due?
Me: Do I know you?!
S: Is this your first?
Me: Not really any of your business
S: Girl or boy?
Me : refer to previous answer
S: What's her name?
Me: Like I want to give a total stranger information like that!

Seriously, I need to have this baby already, so I can stop wanting to throw things at people in the grocery store.

This just made me laugh so I had to share. Andi was at my Grandma's yesterday while I had a Dr's appointment. When I picked her up to leave Grandma said "see you later alligator." She always says this and Andi always mumbles something I don't understand and walks away. Well Today she made herself very clear and when Grandma said that Andi's response was "I'm not alligator, I'm Andi!" with the best indignant scowl on her face I wish I had a camera with me.

There are things Andi does that we know for sure came from me, and things that definitely came from Thad. Here's a Thad thing, I bet you can guess what's in the bowl.

Yup. . . Ice cream.

Alter Ego

Sometimes I think Andi really does have an alter ego. Last night we had a really nice family home evening lesson about temples. She was paying attention and loved coloring her temple picture. This morning even, she wanted to look at more temples and pick out all the Angel Moroni's she could see and tell me about our lesson last night. That's this Andi and it is exciting to me when she makes an appearance. She makes me feel like I'm doing my job as a mother.

But most of the time I have this Andi.

I still Love this Andi, but this personality is the sassy daredevil. The one who just jumped OFF of my parents trampoline because she wanted to fly. And who not 2 minutes later about ripped her legs in half playing on Bradons skateboard. She had one leg on and it went one way while the other leg stayed in place and she did a nice center split on the patio. This Andi frequently stomps her foot and turns her nose up in the air at me when she is being stubborn, and says "Momma I too busy, you do it" when I ask her to pick up her toys. This is the one I have staring competitions with at the dinner table because she refuses to swallow her mouthful of food, and the one who tells me "We don't color on fingers, just paper" and then shows me her hand covered in marker. When I've had enough sleep this Andi makes me laugh A LOT, but when I'm tired, like today, it feels like this Andi will be the death of me.