California Trip: Part 1

We were lucky enough this year to have a fabulous trip to California this year that was generously sponsored by my parents. They paid for a large portion of it and rented a beach house for all of us--my siblings and the grandkids--to stay in. It turned out to be a truly DREAM vacation thanks to my wonderful parents! (Thanks again Mom and Dad!) On the way down we stayed in a simple motel in St. George and celebrated my sister Emily's birthday (Happy 19th sis!).We got to the beach house late Saturday afternoon and enjoyed a little relaxation after the long 12+ hour drive. We also picked up my brother Nate and his family (wife: Allison, kids: Owen and Olivia) from the airport since they flew in from Atlanta.On Sunday we went to one of the local Newport wards and then couldn't resist a visit to the famous Newport Beach that was only two blocks away. We didn't swim because it was Sunday, but that didn't stop the kids from having a blast playing in the surf.Owen in about four months younger than Gavin, but because of language barriers and oldest child attitude (?) Owen had more fun playing with Emma.Josiah didn't seem to mind the beach at first, but at later visits, we discovered he didn't really like it--too much wind and noise and not much fun for one so little. This is the only picture we have of him smiling while at the beach (and that's only a partial smile).That night we visited the Newport Temple which is pretty new and very beautiful. Unfortunately it was too dark to get people and the temple pictured together.
We had so many activities that we did during our week stay in California that I need to seperate this post into several sections--I hope you enjoy! (We sure did!)

American West Heritage Center

Emma and Gavin each went on seperate school field trips in April to the local living history farm, the American West Heritage Center, to see the new baby animals. I didn't get to go with Emma's class, but Josiah and I did with Gavin. It was a wonderful experience for both boys (and I'm sure Emma) to have an up-close and personal experience with animals. Gavin had fun sitting on a pony by himself. (His classmate Charlotte is in the background.) We got to hold and pet the baby chicks.

The rabbits were soft and sweet.

We saw around 20 different animals in their cages, then suddenly found ourselves surrounded by the free range birds that were obviously used to being around humans!Gavin started losing interest (he was acting tired) by the end--though his excitement was renewed when he found this unique swingset and got to ride a different kind of horse! (He's being "helped" by his classmate Cameron.)

Overall, Gavin loved it and so did Josiah. We went to the gift shop afterward and Gavin fell in love with a stick horse. With his birthday coming up I decided to get it for him, though we ended up getting him a new bike instead--so now you all know what he'll be getting for Christmas!

Easter

Easter was fun this year. We threw our own little Easter party for some friends where we looked for eggs, painted eggs, and of course ate candy.

We also went to the local businesses on egg "hunts" where the stores all gave the kids candy (you can see it in their cheeks).

Here are our darling children showing off their new Easter outfits. Aren't they sweet?

It was such beautiful weather; we had a picnic on our lawn for lunch. We also talked about the real reason for Easter and celebrated Jesus' life and death.

No Excuses…

So, first of all, I recognize that it has been over 4 months since I last wrote a blog entry. I also acknowledge that I have had MANY friends and family request that I update the blog, which, I must admit, it is gratifying to know that many of the people I love are willing to take the time to read it. And I have many, many excuses that I could use; you know all of them I'm sure: I've been busy, easily distracted, too much going on in life, three kids to take care of, blah, blah, blah… But I am not going to claim any of them. Frankly, I just go through phases in life where I am more interested in some things and less in others and for the last several months I haven't been interested in blogs (writing or reading). And every time my interest was kindled I started reading everyone else's blog and by the time I had caught up again on the goings on in your lives, I didn't want to take the time to catch up my blog. But I figure the time has come. I am going to try to catch things up though, so hopefully you won't get too bored with old things!

Scootin' on a Scooter

In April we became the proud owners of a new scooter! With Jason working two jobs and only having one car, we decided that it was time to look for alternate transportation so that I could have the car available more. We love it! And we can go fifty or more miles before having to fill up the tank and it never takes more than $2.00 to fill up!

Giant Josiah!

I've been wanting to dedicate another post to Josiah for all of those who haven't been here to witness his incredible growth and to give me a chance to acknowledge my tremendous gratitude for his incredibly sweet nature. We'll start from the beginning because it's fun to watch a photographic journey of his growth and hopefully it will help me remember some of the major events from his young life.

At one week old and already an angel: Almost a month and Mommy just can't get enough of him:

Two months old and already winning the hearts of everyone he meets with his genuinely charming smile: We waited until the first week of December to have his baby blessing so that our house would be fit to hold people and because our life was truly crazy with all of the construction still going on through November. My parents, brother Jordan and fam, and the Mills family who are our best friends from Salt Lake all came up to support us (not the best picture, but the only one we got...): Three months old and already playing hard to the point of exhaustion:

This might be gross to some of you, but we found it fascinating that Josiah has an almost perfect star shape in his "innie" bellybutton (the picture doesn't do it justice): We started him early (not quite 4 months) on solids because we were hoping that it would help him sleep through the night. It did help him go from waking up three times to only twice each night--not quite as miraculous as I had hoped, but it was an improvement. And like Emma and most of the Corneliuses, Josiah loves to eat:Four months and ready to walk (well, not quite) and doesn't he look dashing in his Sunday clothes? Oh, and he was topping out the scale at 18 lbs 10 oz.--95 percentile for weight, 92 for length, and 98 for head circumference! Five months old and already a star. This is a 6 month-sized onesie that I got him for Christmas which he only got to wear a couple times because he grew so huge! It was the only thing he owned that was green for St. Patty's Day, so I put it on him even though he had long since out grown it. One of Gavin's preschool teachers compared him to a stuffed sausage... I had to agree: I couldn't put it off any longer, at six months old Josiah was desperately in need of a real haircut! I had trimmed it previously, but I just loved how long it was and all the comments that we would constantly get about how much hair he had. Unfortunately, when the sweet old ladies at church started laughing at him, I knew that we had to do something about getting rid of the terrible toupee look. You see, Josiah had a beautifully large bald spot on the back of his head that made him look like a normal mostly bald baby from the back, but then when you saw the front (see the picture above) it was just too much-- and everyone couldn't help but laugh. So he got a real haircut and thankfully he still has all of his many natural hair colors still intact (I was afraid that they would disappear as baby hair). He was fairly patient at first but then got really upset so I stopped and discovered why he was so upset--he was exhausted, so I finished while he was sleeping: Six and a half months, weighing in at almost 21 lbs, he's now 89% for weight, 93% for length and still 98% for head circumference (he's wearing mostly 12month clothes now). Gavin, Josiah and I all went to the American Heritage Center to see the new baby animals for a field trip for Gavin's preschool. Josiah was absolutely fascinated when one of the ladies brought a chick over for him to see: He really enjoyed the long walk that we took while Easter egg hunting at the downtown shops here in Logan. Josiah is perfectly content to just be with people--you don't really even have to entertain him, he just loves being in the middle of things. So hanging out with his siblings and parents is pure bliss (I can hope that it will always stay that way, right?). Don't I have the sweetest family? By size comparison, you wouldn't necessarily guess that this cousin of Josiah's, my brother Jordan's sweetie Elanor, is almost 9mos older than him! It was cute opportunity to see Papa holding two of his baby grandkids at the same time:

Now at 7 months, Josiah is bigger (weighs more, but is slightly shorter) than this other cousin who is over twice his age. My brother Nate's family joined us in Disneyland and this is Olivia and Josiah patiently waiting for everyone else to be done on the Tea Cup ride (more on that trip later):
Josiah is growing so fast! I remember with Emma, just marvelling at each step and wondering when she would do the next exciting thing--it seemed like forever between each step. Now Josiah is already sitting steadily, eating healthily, and playing happily all day long and I'm left wondering what happened to my "little" baby! Here he is with Daddy thoroughly enjoying an opportunity to play with Lego's at Legoland:

Josiah is now sleeping through the night 90% of the time, unless you count the one wake up between 4 and 5:30 AM that he still does every morning to eat. He really wants to eat whatever we're eating--but I've been slow to introduce new foods and he still has no signs of any teeth coming--so his diet is slowly expanding everyday and he's eating more and more "real" foods with the rest of us. He is so content that he hasn't cared to try and move much, he's happy to just sit and play or watch. He could roll both ways before he was four months old, but is just now starting to use that to try to get around. He hasn't tried to crawl and frankly I think it will take a while for his arms to get strong enough to hold up his big body and huge head, but I'm happy about that because I really don't need him to be mobile yet with all that that entails. He is quiet a lot but also loves to babble and is just starting to try to imitate. Overall, he's thoroughly endearing and we get comments EVERYWHERE we go from all kinds of people (even those you wouldn't expect to notice a baby) about just how cute he is--and I can't help but agree!

Funny kid story: A couple of days ago, Jason and I were talking to Josiah and standing above him on either side. Josiah seemed in heaven to have these two big adults--the most important people in his life--paying so much attention to him at the same time. He was looking adoringly back and forth at each of us as we talked to him. So just for fun I asked him, "Who do you like better, Daddy or Mommy?" He seemed to look back and forth between us like he was thinking, then very distinctly (so both of us heard it as clear as a bell) he said,"Blargh, Da Da." I am choosing to think that Blargh means "not".... LOL!

Pay it forward!

My sister-in-laws have had this on their blogs and I was finally fast enough to take advantage of Sammy's terrific homemaking skills. Here are the rules…
1. Be one of the first THREE bloggers to leave a comment on this post, which then entitles you to a handmade item from me — I’ll try to be creative.
2. Winners must post this challenge on their own blog, meaning that you will Pay It Forward, creating a handmade gift -anything!- for the first THREE bloggers who leave a comment on YOUR post about this giveaway!
3. The gift that you send to your 3 friends can be from any price range and you have 365 days to make/ship your item. This means you should be willing to maintain your blog at least until you receive your gift and have shipped your gifts. And, remember: It’s the Spirit and the Thought That Count!
4. When you receive your gift, please feel free to blog about it! If you are not one of the first three to comment on this post, you can still play along. Go ahead and start your own Pay It Forward chain, and encourage your blogging friends to do the same! SO, REMEMBER…Pay it forward!