Hawaii

First let me say I love my babies . . . maybe too much, as I cried several times while in Hawaii because I was away from them.  Pathetic, I know.  Second, I'd been having a strong desire to go to the place where Dave and I began, so Dave went online and found some tickets that were a steal.  My sister was more than happy to take my babies, as I swore I'd never take Bella on a plane (at least not until she was much older).  So, we went!  What a great time we had!  No diaper bags, getting a good nights sleep, just hanging out without having to give yourself completely for their care.  It was nice!  But 8 days of it was too long, it would've been better to be about 5.  Call me crazy, but I felt naked without my babies.

Anyway, here are a few pictures to commemorate our vacation:

Sunset in Waikiki after I learned how to stand up paddle board (which was awesome!).

Of course we had to hit up the Dole plantation!  I think we made three stops (they were on the way) to get the pineapple ice cream - SO GOOD!

Ahhh, plumerias, the best smell on the planet, gosh I miss that smell.

We went to an authentic Korean restaurant suggested by one of Dave's old mission companions.

When we lived in Hawaii as a married couple, I hated it to be honest.  I hated how hard we had to work at school and our jobs so we didn't get to enjoy it.  I hated being so far from family and not seeing them very often.  But now that I have been away for 5 years (yikes!) I realize that part of my soul belongs there, particularly in the water.  I had to get in the water everyday, I HAD to.  To me Hawaii is kind of like going home, Dave and mine roots.  It definitely recharged my low batteries.  I am glad to be home now (just not glad that we've been dealing with illnesses since).

Crazy couple of days!

Thought I'd post some updates on Grayson as well as some fun adventures we had over the past couple of days :)  I know I haven't put many pictures up of Grayson so here are a few.

Love this picture because it shows my "mommy mark" spit up on my sleeve, gotta love it.  I can't believe how much this little guys spews but is still growing very well.  I love how the tops of his ears kind of stick out, too cute!  Grayson is such a great baby and SO sweet!  He actually likes to be held which is amazing because Bella never did.  So I, of course, eat that up!

I love how Grayson still tucks his feet up under his bumb like a newborn, just absolutely LOVE it!  He is three months old now, crazy how fast those months went.  Babies grow WAY too fast, they should be babies longer :)

So the kids and I met Dave in Newport on Tuesday.  Dave had been there the day before and was at a conference until Wednesday.  Tuesday evening they had a dinner catered in the aquarium!  How cool is that?!  We ate amongst the fishes.  The super ironic thing is that one of the choices for dinner was grilled tuna, I couldn't help but giggle.  We were literally sitting right next to swimming fishies.  Bella LOVED the aquarium.   She especially enjoyed playing in the touch pool with the urchins and star fish.  She just loves playing in water, what kid doesn't?

The next morning Dave had one more meeting to attend and then we had the rest of the day.  We decided to take the kids swimming in the pool.  Both of the kids LOVED it!  It was so much fun and it was even better because the water was so warm.  Bella likes to count to five and then do something fun.  That is what she is doing here with Dave, counting to five then falling into the pool.

Grayson got real tuckered out.  How cute is he?!

After swimming we packed up and headed south.  Dad and Leora met up with us too as they were camping south of Florence.  How many places can you go and drive one hour and pass three lighthouses?!  That was really neat.  The Pacific Hwy 101 is just a beautiful drive.  We stopped at a beach to play but both kids were asleep in the car.  Yes, you heard right, Bella actually fell asleep in the car, this is a whole new phenomenon to us!  So they didn't get out, which was just as well, it was starting to rain and it was pretty cold and windy out there.  We looked for agates on the beach and tried to find some whales.  We did stop at Mo's for some grub.  Bella hates restaurants, I think because she has to sit.  So after she and Dave were done he took her outside, which she loved, of course.  Even though it was raining pretty hard, she doesn't care.

After Mo's we went to Dad and Leora's campsite and hung out for a while.  Bella liked playing outside in the rain and LOVED the puddles.  Good thing I had multiple changes of clothing for her.  We went for a walk with Grandpa and he picked some black huckleberries for us which were yummy and Bella loved them.  She also loved feeding them to Grandpa.  We hung out in the trailer for a while and then headed home, what a fun filled 28 hours!  I'm pooped.

K, Cupcake?

Our sweet little Bella, eating a cupcake :)

Thought it was too cute to pass up :)

We also went to the beach with Dave's parents, it was a lot of fun and Bella had a blast playing in the freezing clear salt water.  Her poor feet were frozen by the time we left and she was soaking, but super happy.

Bono even had fun, he kept lapping up the salt water though.  Too funny!

Elephant what??

Garlic.  Yup, you heard right, Elephant Garlic.  Maybe I am the last one to hear of such a thing, but I found out about it this past weekend and am in awe!  Look how huge it is!  It is the size of a grapefruit!

Yes, this is just one clove of the elephant garlic.  WOAH!

We had kabobs for a family gathering and I only needed to use one of these babies for a quadruple marinade.  It was so dang juicy!

Worth Something

Well, Bella has found a good use for Bono:

It's a good thing Bono lets her do stuff like this!

Favorite sweets

There are a few candies that I just LOVE.  My favorites, sadly, have either been changed or completely removed from production.

These are my FAVORITE, Nestle Caramel Treasures.  I am not a big caramel person, but the caramel inside these babies is just TOO good!  I remember being in 5th grade and there were some other kids selling candy bars for a fundraiser.  Those candy bars had the exact same caramel and were delish!

Sadly these treasures are now made by someone called DeMet's.  SO not the same caramel or chocolate even!  SO SAD!  :( 

Next up are these!  Crispy M&M's . . . mmmmm.  These had little rice crisps in the middle and I could eat these like popcorn!  So yummy.  These also used to be one of my mother's favorites and we would take special trips to the grocery store to pick them up.  Dave and I also would get these as an occasional treat while we were in Hawaii.  Again, these are off the market completely.  Super sad day. 

What are some of your favorites and why?  Hopefully, I will be able to find another favorite soon :)

Sitting Poolside :)

Living it up in a 1 foot deep pool  :)  I was chillin' poolside soakin' up the sun!  This was also Bella's first experience actually holding a popsicle and eating it herself, it was awesome!  Yeah, I know, she is 19 months old and this is the first time I allowed her to do it, I just hate sticky and messes!

Baby Grayson just being cute.

Bella's second experience holding Grayson.  We were THRILLED that she actually wanted to, up to now we've just figured she didn't like him!  She even tried kissing him which is also amazing because she just learned how to kiss, she's always taken kisses, not given them.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

We just love our little Grayson!  He is such a blessing in our lives and we feel so blessed to have this sweet spirit in our home!  I love newborn babies, they really are little angels sent from heaven.

Thank you to Grandma Stockdale for coming and taking care of us for nearly two weeks!  What a major adjustment to go from one baby to two!  It was such a blessing to have the extra help so that I could spend more one on one time with both Grayson and Bella.  Bella has been quite the handful since Grayson's arrival, partly due to teething and partly due to her whole world being changed.  She is coming around though.  We've also had some not so good things go on with Grayson while Grandma was here so it was SUPER great to have her to lean on when we were in a jam!  Thank you Grandma Stockdale, we will never EVER forget your love and generosity!!

Baby Grayson

Here is our sweet Grayson. I was all worried about being a mommy to a boy, but so far, he is just wonderful and I feel SO ABSOLUTELY blessed to have to wonderful babies!! Well, I guess Bella isn't a baby anymore, she is a toddler, but still she is SO much fun. I forgot (not that it has been that long) how much I love little newborns! I used to be scared of them until we were blessed with Bella but now I love 'em!

Dave has been absolutely great in taking care of all of us! Working so hard and getting a lot less sleep than me. He is a great daddy and it is so cute to see him with his children.

Bella has been doing well with him. She recognizes him as a baby and goes up to him and points and says "baby". But we have to tell her to be soft as she wants to pat him a little too hard. Bella just does her own thing, playing and what not. She's never been a huge on getting a lot of attention. She does love having people over and has been in heaven playing with her cousins!

If you cannot tell, I am one happy mamma. I absolutely adore my baby girl (who will always be my baby girl whether she likes it or not) and I cannot believe I have been so blessed with such a sweet baby boy.

Introducing . . .

Grayson Lee Stockdale! Born 6/1/2010, just 29 days early, no big deal, right?! He was 7 lbs 0.5 oz. He is doing fantastic! I feel like I've been hit by a bus, but I am sure that will pass :) Pictures to follow shortly!

Picnic!

My eldest brother Wayne and his family were able to come down to Eugene from Seattle for a visit last weekend! It was WAY great to see them and to meet our new niece Neela :) (pictured above). My sister Debra was able to come down with most of her chilren as well, it was a mini-family reunion! I LOVE GETTING TOGETHER WITH MY FAMILY. We were just missing Greg and Kirk and their families :(

Bella loved playing with all her cousins and as you can see in a moment, they really tuckered her out!

Wayne is a photographer and wanted to take a picture of his HUGELY pregnant sister, so here I am at 35 weeks.

Dad got tired from all the grandkids too! LOL.

Ah, and this was Bella's meltdown . . . she was overly tired and hungry (but wouldn't eat). Dave sat with her in the car while they watched a movie and he was able to get her to eat and she could chill out. She was able to come back and play for another hour or two after but then we put her down for a nap at around 5:30 and she was down for the night! Those cousins are hard to keep up with! Dave was/is super great! He let me play a lot with my family and took care of Bella pretty much all weekend! What a great hubby and daddy!!

Out with the old

This is just a cute picture of Bella munchin on an apple on our drive home from one of her cousin's baptisms. She's putting all those teeth to good work!

This was a child's chair my aunt had FOREVER as you can tell. The fabric on it was even plastic fabric type thing, it was fugly but super resilient. I decided I'd like to reupholster the thing but didn't know how. That is when our friends the Johnstons totally stepped up. It took us a little while to have our schedules align properly but we finally did it!

Kristan and I were supposed to be the ones actually doing it and Dan was supposed to show us how (as he is pretty much the expert) but the boys took over completely, which was fine as you can see below, they did a WONDERFUL job! The boys even had to go to JoAnn's Fabric store together to get some tacs for it, I am sure they looked super cute going together ;) We love the new chair and so does Bella!


Thank you to the Johnstons for helping us out and having a good time doing it!

Earning keep

Dave, Bella, Bono and I went for a walk with some friends today. We walked along the bike path behind our home to a small bridge over a creek. Dave was in charge of watching Bella and I had Bono. Bella went to the railing of the bridge and was just looking, but I had warned my husband that she would throw things over the edge and into the water. He didn't seem worried. After another minute I heard Dave say "oh no". Bella had thrown her sippy cup over the edge. Everyone just looked down in shock, all I could say was, "told you so". You would've thought then Dave would grab whatever else she had available to her to throw, but nope and of course next went over her binki and blankie. Yikes. Yikes. And I must emphasize that the sippy cup that went into the dirty, mucky water was her only one she would drink out of. And the blankie that went in was her most favorite. I thought all was lost and I, of course, was extremely upset.

That was when Dave and our friend Dan went down to the waters edge with Bono. Bono had just been groomed the day before so he was wonderfully clean and trimmed. Now, I also need to remind everyone that I have been on the verge, SEVERAL times, of getting rid of Bono, even going to the length of putting him on craigslist. Bono also does not understand the concept of fetch. Well, sometimes he does, but mostly he will chase after whatever you threw, get to it, look at it and look at you and then just leave it there - because he is that smart. But today, today he was my hero and he saved Dave's hide!

Dave took Bono off his leash and told him to "go get it". I thought there was NO way he would understand and was just going to go play so I started walking back to the house with Bella, Carina and Juliet. I was done and angry. All of a sudden I was hearing "good boy" several times and I looked over the edge and Bono had the handle of the sippy cup in his mouth and was swimming toward the shore. Next was the blankie, he went after it, but he hit it with his paw and it went sinking into the mirky water and we couldn't see it from above thus lost forever. (Bono is not a good swimming, a bit bottom heavy) Last was the binki, which is small and was surrounded with weeds, I didn't think there was a chance that he would understand to get it or even be able to find it. Not only did he find it, he retrieved it as well. It was amazing!! I had no idea he was even capable of such heroics!

We came home and of course Dave gave him a bath (that mirky, creek/swampy water is really stinky) and we gave him some treats and extra love for his good behavior. He is simply amazing and somewhat redeemed a special place in my heart. I am sure he will still make me upset with his non-perfect behavior, but I know he is capable of good things too.

Easter matches and pregnancy woes

My lovely sister, Debra, made Bella and I matchy skirts for Easter! Aren't they cute?! We just thought it would be fun to dress up together and Bella is like my personal live doll anyway. But getting a good picture of her is nearly impossible, she is always on the move! It was even more fun when Dave came down the stairs ready for church wearing his pink tie!! Too bad we couldn't get a family photo taken!

And who knew a stupid cold could put you into false labor, twice! Bella and I have been fighting colds since Tuesday. Tuesday evening I was having braxton hicks contractions but they were extremely painful and were occuring every 4-5 minutes and lasting about 1 minute each and this went on for about 4 hours. The same thing happened on Thursday evening. For those of you who don't know, you call the doctor when you have contractions like that - it usually means you are in labor and a baby is coming. So I went into the Dr. on Friday and thank goodness the contractions hadn't done anything as far as getting me ready for labor, so baby boy is safe and sound. The Dr. explained to me that when a pregnant woman is sick the white blood cells not only attack the virus but also may try to get the baby out because the vessel (my body) isn't a super healthy place for a baby which then causes these contractions that I've been experiencing. So pretty much I get to feel lots of fun pain for nothing (not that I want something to happen as far as birth is concerned, but when you are in pain you kind of want something to show for it, like a broken leg or something! lol). Bella and I are coming out of the sickies now, which is great so hopefully these kind of contractions will stop.

Dancing Bella

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-E_W9A_ajs

This is Bella dancing. We think it is super adorable as she just learned how to dance and she says the word dance too . . . well, her way of saying it. So listen closely, you can hear her say it too. She loves the movie Madagascar and the "Move It" song in it.

We sure do love this little girl!!

Sunshine

She is our absolute sunshine! Incidentally we had a sunny day and met Daddy at the park for lunch. Bella had a fun time on the swing, the slide and just walking around talking to everyone. She is SUCH a social butterfly. I know she is really trying to say something important, I need an interpreter.

Also, if you haven't already heard we are having a baby boy! We are excited to get him and we are excited for Bella to have a little brother :)

Shtuff

To catch up, again, we had a wonderful Christmas. We stayed at home and celebrated with just the three of us. Later Christmas afternoon, Grandma and Grandpa Melton came over which was fun, Bella sure enjoys their company (as do we, of course). We also went over to Gma's and Gpa's house for Christmas dinner with some more relatives. The dinner was great! It is always nice to have family, especially around the holidays. Then a few days later we took off to California for the Rose Bowl. We stayed with Dave's brother and sis-in-law, Jimmy and Dawn. Their youngest is just a few months older than Bella and they had a lot of fun with each other, as seen below.

We missed the pep rally for the Ducks and we decided to hit LA New Years Eve, which was when the Buckeyes had their pep rally (happening on the pier just behind us, in fact Buckeye fans were gracious enough to take our picture seen here!). We had fun doing the LA thing, seeing the sights like the Chinese Theater, Hollywood walk of fame, Griffith Observatory, etc. Too bad it wasn't quite warm enough to go swimming, that would've been way more fun!! Although, when we got to the pier, Bella totally had her first blowout!!! And, of course, I failed to pack a change of clothes, go figure. So we were able to go to a store all ghetto-fied, Bella in just about only a diaper, and purchase some clothes for her, thankfully they weren't expensive at all. The guy in line behind us even whispered to his friend, that baby is naked! Talk about embarrasing.

ROSE BOWL!! Dave had fun at the game even though we lost, it could've been a little bit better in my opinion. First of all, Pasadena SUCKS. It is a small town. The Rose Bowl is actually a really crappy stadium on all accounts. We also had a parking pass but still parked about 3 miles away AND we were in traffic FOREVER to park AND I'm pregnant and REALLY needed to pee and there was no where to go! Finally we found some where to go and there was no toilet paper, but being my resourceful self, took about the toilet paper roll and used that. You'd really think Pasadena would've though ahead with all of this or something. GEES. Then there was this obnoxious drunk Buckeye fan sitting a bit in front of us, I had some words exchanged with him. Then after we just about died in a crowd that was barely moving but everyone was pushing, I seriously had a panic attack. I still don't get what that crowd was doing. Yikes. Like I said, Dave had a lot more fun, but he is a die-hard Duck fan.

We were staying in Lancaster, Dave's hometown. We were to come back on that Sunday but decided to stay to go to Disneyland with Dave's brother's family on Monday. So we drive down to Disneyland on Monday and the whole time I'm not feeling well, I just figured it was pregnancy stuff. WRONG. We parked at Disneyland (remember, I've never been) and as soon as we did, I puked. It was bad, I thought that maybe that was it, wrong. So we didn't even get inside of Disneyland, we got back in the car (not fun with Bella btw) and drove back to Lancaster, a two hour drive. Then back to Oregon on Tuesday.

Moral of the story, stick to your plan, if you don't you may be sorry. Also, there is NO place like home. I love Oregon, the trees, the rain, the fresh air. I hate the desert, bad roads and horrible drivers of CA. I also love my own bed and my wonderful home. Makes you really appreciate what you have. Of course I was still sick for the ride home, so I probably appreciated everything that much more!

Bella is just really cute :) And have I told you she is a social butterfly. She will go up to anyone and just start talking to them! Crazy baby.

We find out if we are pregnant with a boy or a girl on Feb. 11th and we are super excited!! We don't really care whether it is a boy or a girl, but we really want to know so we can start planning. But the main thing for this ultrasound is to make sure everything is looking just fine with the baby which will ease my nerves a great deal. We are getting our home ready for this little new addition. Moving Bella into the the next bigger room and getting her situated, getting our office fixed up a bit and just our house organized.

We also went up and babysat my sister's children while they were on a cruise. It was good to spend time with the kids. OH, lest I forget . . . Bono . . . oh, Bono . . . the day after we got back from my sister's, Dave took Bono outside one evening to do his business. Dave doesn't usually take Bono outside using a leash because Bono usually listens. Not this time. Bono spotted something moving, I am sure he thought it was a cat and totally went after it. Then all Dave could hear was Bono sneezing, choking and coughing. After another minute Dave could smell it, yes, Bono was skunked! What a nightmare that was!!! Hopefully Bono learned his lesson. Although that night was the first night of his life he had to spend outside, alone. It was very tramatic for him and he still hasn't recovered from the 8 baths he recieved in 48 hours.

I am also feeling the baby move now, that is kind of fun, but I don't think I felt Bella this early. Maybe it is just because I know what baby movement feels like and so I recognize it better. Well, that is all for now. I will try to do better and take more pictures of our lives so I can share them with you all.