5 Months

Our little Rose is 5 months!!!

She is developing such a fun personality. She still loves to spit and make raspberry sounds, but now she has also started coughing/laughing for attention - and of course we give it to her. It is so funny, so because we are laughing she continues to cough. If she is laying on her tummy, and she hears our voices she will "pop" right up to look at us by pushing up with her arms - it reminds us of a praire dog. I haven't been very consistent on the solid foods, but I have offered her green beans and she really seemed to like it. She is reaching for things more consistently and will become frustrated if she can't get what she's reaching for. She's started sucking on her thumb more and it is super cute! She's also had a few nights in a row where she's actually slept all night - no night feeding - it is awesome! Hopefully it lasts - we'll keep our fingers crossed.

I finally uploaded pictures to our computer so I have many many pictures to share :) Enjoy!

~ 10 Weeks / March 3rd ~

Rose's Blessing Day

~ 13 Weeks / March 27 ~

Rose & Aunt Janel

~ 14 Weeks / April 1-3 ~

 Taking a ride in the clothes hamper 

~ 15 Weeks / April 7 ~

~ 17 Weeks / April 21-24 / 4 Months ~

~ 19 Weeks / May 1-11 ~

Eating Rice Cereal

Eating her foot

~ 20 Weeks / May 12-15 ~

Love this dress! Rose does too - she kept trying to eat the flowers.

On Tues the 14th Rose fell out of her stroller onto the tile floor and got a big goose egg and purple bruise on her forehead :( This was a sad scary day but thankfully the doctor thinks all is well and she is in good spirits.

Eating Green Beans

~ 21 Weeks / May 17-19 ~

Rose's bruise is now turning yellow but it's fading.

Rose loves bath time!

I often wonder what Rose is thinking about and sometimes I can't help myself, I have to narrate what I think is going on inside her head. For example, with these next pictures:

"What's Mom doing over there?"

"*Gasp* It's that square white thing Daddy's always playing with!"

"I want to eat it, it looks so good."

"I am going to get it this time!"

"Here I come! Ahhhh!"

"WTC, I missed!"

"Oh well, I guess I can eat Daddy instead."

A Job! A Job!

Good news! Bryce has a job!

Here's the story - 

Bryce has been busy continuing to volunteer at Little Valley (where he did his student teaching), and he had been finishing up his 2 weeks at Mt America, so he didn't have a lot of time to fill out applications. So, since I am a SAHM, I decided that would be my project. 

I've been looking up job opportunities all over the place - Utah, Arizona, Nevada - and basically doing data entry on all the different applications. Then I'd have Bryce look over them, answer the essay questions, and then I'd send them off. 

Wednesday, Bryce got a phone call from a principal about setting up an interview. Bryce felt that he and the principal just clicked and felt good about this upcoming interview. 

Thursday, he had the interview - at our kitchen table over facetime. So I was able to listen in, and it went really well. Then, throughout the evening, we kept getting phone calls from Bryce's references saying they had just spoken to the principal. It was looking good for us and we were beginning to research and discuss all the decisions and things we would need to do if he got the job.

Friday, the principal called - my phone first lol - and told me he wanted us to come... Bryce was at Little Valley so I txt him "Good News!" and then said to call me. Then Bryce called the principal back and accepted the offer!

You may be wondering, where is this job at?!

Bryce is going to be the new 5th grade teacher at Hualapai Elementary School, in Kingman Arizona!

So we are moving to Kingman!

We both feel really good about this decision, and feel it will be a good opportunity for our family. We are so blessed the way things have worked out. I wrote before that my quitting my full time job was a leap of faith for us. Bryce had also just finished up his last two weeks of work at Mt America. And now, because we took those leaps, we don't have to worry about quitting or finishing up "two-weeks", we can start planning now and getting ready to move now. In fact, we are hoping to move at the beginning of June - just three weeks away! So we have a lot to do and accomplish!

This weekend we are going to go down to Kingman to scope it out - hopefully finding a place to live, visit the school and principal, find the library (very important), etc...

Bryce is still volunteering his time at Little Valley until school is out - and what a good thing because many of the teachers are cleaning out stuff they no longer need, and so Bryce has become the recipient for a lot of stuff he can use in his own classroom. I told him I will willingly take on the job of finding books for his classroom library :)

I'm sure at times it's going to be hard for me, being away from family, friends, and good ol' southern Utah. But, Kingman is only 3 hours from St. George, and a full time job for Bryce means a full time mommy for Rose. So, I think it's worth the sacrifice of leaving.

Maybe I'll actually update the blog more if I'm living away from everyone too? That will be my goal - we'll see if I actually follow through :)

Big News!

Wow, so much has happened this past month! Where to begin?...

Well, first off - I have now been an official Stay-At-Home-Mom for 3 weeks! After Rose was born, I had took some of my maternity time, but then went back to work and did part time work / part time maternity leave. It was so hard to leave Rose. Thankfully, I was able to leave her with my Mom, so I know she was in good hands, but.... 1) she was not eating from a bottle, 2) it was just too much of a strain/stress on me that by the time I got home each night I couldn't even enjoy her because I was so tired from work and coordinating dropping off and picking up, etc... and 3) I just plain missed being with my baby. I was dreading the month of May coming as that was when I was supposed to go back full time but deep down I knew I could not do it. I didn't know if Rose would ever take a bottle, and if working part time was taking such a toll then what would full time do? Bryce and I discussed the options, and in the end decided we needed to take a leap of faith on this one - so I gave my two weeks and now here I am, at home with my baby girl and I couldn't be happier. Hopefully Rose feels the same :) I think Grandma is pretty disappointed not to see her grand-baby everyday anymore though.

Bryce is now an official graduate of Dixie State University, with a bachelors in Elementary Education. I am so happy and proud of him! It was a long hard road of late nights, big projects and many hoops to jump through but we made it. We are now in the process of applying for teaching positions and are praying he is able to obtain one for this upcoming school year. We of course hope to stay here in good ol' southern Utah but we are willing to consider moving too.

Hmmm.... it seems like when I started this post there were a lot of other things I was going to mention... but now I can't think of them. I'll finish with an update on our sweet little Rose:

Rose is now a little over 4 months. She has discovered she can grab her foot and likes to try to eat her toes. She is rolling over pretty consistently, from her back to her tummy, but it's funny because once she gets to that position she'll let you know she does not enjoy it, however she won't roll over the other way. So we end up helping her roll to her back and she'll be all smiles again, until a few seconds later when she's on her tummy again. :) She just loves to be outside. If she is getting fussy all I have to do is go outside and she will be perfectly content to watch Tator and Kevin (our dog and cat). She likes it when her Daddy plays peek-a-boo with her or when Mommy pretends to eat her hands and feet.

At her last check-up the doctor said we could start her on solids, which surprised me as I thought you were supposed to wait until 6 months. So I decided to try a little bit of rice cereal just once a day, and just slowly build up to it. But I'm not going to be real serious about it right now or worry if I miss a day, since I read that 6 months is still the recommended age for solids. Gonna be honest - I'm not a big fan of our pediatrician, so I'm not sure I want to rely fully on his point of view on this. In fact, at the appointment Rose had the tiniest spot on her forehead that looked like cradle cap, so I asked about it, and he proceeded to give this  detailed description of using cortisone cream and then going and getting this special baby shampoo etc... I pretty much tuned it out. If it's going to be that serious shouldn't the dr write all this down for you? Who's going to remember all that? So I came home, googled it, talked to my mom, and decided to follow my mom's advice (baby oil on her head, brush her head everyday) and viola! Gone!

Anyways... that's all for today. Now for a video!

3 Months

Rose is now 3 months old! My baby is growing way too fast! She is in such a cute stage right now. She has discovered her hands - she'll bring them together and just stare at them or she'll try eating them by stuffing her whole fist in her mouth. She loves it when her Daddy sings to her - she'll just stare up at him smiling. Her little coos and babbles are so cute. She will sit and "talk" with me for minutes at a time, just cooing, babbling, blowing bubbles and making the cutest little facial expressions. I just love it.

She doesn't like taking a bottle so when I'm at work she hasn't been eating. So that is a little stressful and worrisome for me, but at least I'm only working part time right now so it's only 5 hrs. Sleeping by herself still hasn't happened. She'll nap for about 15-30 min in her crib - if we're lucky - but at night she's still sleeping with me. I am trying to enjoy each stage as it happens, but I am really looking forward to having my bed back.

Now for more pictures (again from my grainy phone) but still cute:

~ Jan 31 / 5 weeks ~

~ Feb 04 / 6 weeks ~

~ Feb 28 / 9 weeks ~

~ Mar 18 / 12 weeks ~