Christmas Party, Treats and Presents

For a month now I've been hyping up Caleb for Santa. I got books from the library with Santa, found a video with Elmo and Santa and point out Santa pictures in all the stores. I though Caleb would be prepared for meeting him but I was wrong! Caleb was really nervous walking up to him but he would stand next to him and let Santa talk to him. See:

As soon as we tried to get Caleb close to Santa for a picture the situation turned from this:

To this:

Oh well, at least he made one friend:

That night I was a part of the entertainment. After leading the children in Jingle Bells and Silent Night I played a duet that I had played with my piano teacher in high school. My mom wanted us to film it so here's a little over a minute of the song. While Derrick was filming Caleb pointed to the screen and said, "Mom." He was excited to see his mom playing, which makes me happy.

Caleb got a nativity set in the mail from his Grandma Isaacson and he was so excited to get it open:

Caleb has also been enjoying the treats of the season. Here Caleb is sporting chocolate:

Things to Remember

1. Two weeks ago we were at the grocery store. Caleb waved and said "hi" to everyone that looked at him. In the checkout line Caleb said "hi" to the lady behind us:
Caleb: Hi
Lady: Hi, what's your name?
Caleb: Kay Kay (this is how he always says his name)
Lady: I'm Joan. Are you out shopping with your mommy?
Caleb: (pointing to my chest) mama

2. Yesterday I get a phone call around 5pm when Caleb and I are walking in the house from our last outside trip for the day. Caleb is never happy to come back home because he loves being outside so much. I turn on the lights put Caleb inside the house, close the door and I stand outside to talk on the phone because I couldn't hear over Caleb's crying protest to stay outside. After a minute Caleb is quiet but I stay outside. Then I see Caleb at the window. He looks at me, waves, and smiles really big like he was saying, "I found you."
Caleb disappears again. He comes back to the window holding the prescription hand cream box I had just picked up that day. Earlier I had told him not to get into the bag with the cream in it. When he held up the box he smiled really big again, shaking the box, it was like he was saying, "I got this even though you didn't want me to." Then he opens the box and pulls out the tube. Showing that to me too. The look on his face was priceless. That memory made me smile many times last night.

3. When Caleb wakes up, Derrick and I like to get him and bring him back into bed with us. However, Caleb is not very fond of sitting or laying still (I'm still waiting for a day when he will snuggle with me for more than 5 seconds). He will have us put him on the floor then he tells us "dow" for us to get down too. One morning when Caleb did this, Derrick sat up and turned to dangle his feet only inches from the ground. Caleb grabbed both of Derrick's feet and pushed them to the ground. Caleb means business when it comes to getting us out of bed.

4. Caleb loves this guy in our apartment complex named Doug. The things Caleb likes about him are: he makes funny faces at Caleb, plays peek-a-boo with him, does a funny dance for him that looks a little like an irish jig and says Caleb's name really deep. This morning Caleb saw Doug about 30 yards away on the other side of the parking lot. Caleb said, "Doug," then imitated Doug's dance and ran to him. It was so funny.

How in the world?

A few days ago we got a package in the mail: a beautiful painting that Derrick's grandpa Rudy did. After we took it out of the box and got the bubble wrap off we turned around and found Caleb decorating our Christmas tree with the styrofoam peanuts from the package. We didn't put any ornaments on the tree so we have no idea how he knew you were supposed to decorate a tree with more than just lights. I am always amazed at how smart he is for someone so young.

Thanksgiving Weekend

We celebrated Thanksgiving at Mark and Mary's house. Kevin, Mary, Lily and baby Sammuel were there too.

The food was delicious!

Caleb and Lily had so much fun together. They played in this room for a long time. Caleb couldn't do as much as Lily but that didn't stop him from trying or getting our help.

Whenever Caleb sees this picture he says, "Lil Lil."

Here's the pumpkin cake I decorated for dessert:

On Friday we drove to the temple. I went in while Derrick walked around the grounds with Caleb. Caleb loved the fountain and videos in the visitor's center. Caleb could have stayed there all day. On our way back we stopped at a mall to pick up some Christmas gifts. In Sports Authority, Caleb found the row of basketballs, footballs and soccer balls. We literally had to pick him up to get him to leave, he cried the whole way back to the car.
That evening we went to Rite Aid and got a 3' fake Christmas tree and lights. I really wanted just a small tree and Derrick, after a little begging, gave his approval. Caleb loves the lights and I am so excited to have a taste of Christmas in our house.


Also, after showing Caleb one or two times the picture of our ultrasound and telling him it was his sister, he now knows it's "siseh"

It's a girl!

Well, we've done it: covered both genders with our first two babies. For all technicality reasons I wanted another boy: hand-down clothes, same toys to play with, can keep their bedroom boyish and since the b-day's will be close it would make one birthday theme easier.
BUT, I am really glad that I will have a little girl to dress up, do hair (in a few years), and sew little girl clothes. We also have a few more ideas for girl names this time--though we still don't know the final name yet. Being at 20 weeks pregnant, we still have some time to go.
About the ultrasound: she was very active--stretching all limbs and constantly turning. The pictures they got weren't as clear as the ones we had with Caleb...oh well. Derrick and I still can't believe how completely formed babies are at just 20 weeks. Everything really is there from a beating heart to 10 little toes. Caleb sat in Derrick's lap for the full 40 minutes! We couldn't believe it, he was so good and for that, we are grateful. We can't wait to meet our little girl!

Sleep

Yesterday morning Caleb was a wreck. Unless we were outside he couldn't stay calm. Around 10am I laid down with him on the living room floor, his head on my arm, and I sang to him while stroking his hair. He eventually stopped crying and his eyes started to get droopy. After 5 minutes he was out. I was able to slide my arm out from under his head and he slept like this for a half hour:


I was at the computer with my back to him and when he woke up, he sat up, I turned around and he said, "Hi" with a slightly sleepy face and a smile. He has never slept on the floor like that before.
I also wanted to get a picture of our bedtime routine. Derrick or I will sit in the rocking chair and read Caleb books, then we turn off the lights and sing him a few songs. Precious moments.

Crazy Boy

There is nothing to compare to the energy level Caleb had on Sunday evening. It was crazy even for Caleb standards. He was running around like a mad man. At one point he did this over and over again, no less than 50 times (I am not exaggerating):

As soon as he would finish he would run back again to the first sofa and climb up. At one point I sat in the spot he used to get up and he started tugging at my dress and saying, "dow, dow" for down. I moved and he proceeded.
That night after dinner he also got up on the chair at the dinner table and started spooning the juice from our green beans into his mouth. He then started eating the beans and splashing in the juice. Then he stuck his head right in the pot and tried to get the beans that way. I tried to get a video but he wants the camera too much. So here's Caleb crying for the camera but it gives you the picture of where he was when he ate the beans:

Maybe this was all because of daylight savings time. He still is not used to it and he has been sleeping less than usual. I am hoping he gets adjusted soon.

Bravo!

I've been meaning to write this story down all week: On Sunday I had the senior primary sing my song, "We Give Our Thanks" for the special musical number during sacrament meeting. We sat in the second row (no one sits in the first) so I could conduct the kids from right there. Derrick was watching Caleb during the song and he said Caleb was hooked to those kids the entire time. He loved them singing. Then as soon as the song was over and I was gesturing the kids to go back to their seats, Caleb starts clapping his hands and said, "Yay!" He had a huge smile on his face. I at least have one fan!

Halloween!

We had two Halloween parties on Friday and I am convinced that Halloween is Caleb's favorite holiday. Caleb was a scarecrow, I was a farm girl and Derrick was a stock of corn.

There was a person in a dog costume and we are certain Caleb thought it was a real dog. He was in love with this dog:


Another funny thing that happened (which I wish we had on camera) was that I saw a two or three year old dressed up in a head to toe Elmo costume--hood and all with the eyes and nose on top of the kid's head. I knelt down and told Caleb, "Look it's Elmo." The second his eyes found Elmo he went running up to the boy, whose back was to us. When Caleb gets right up to him he's practically touching the boy as he circles around him to look right into his face. Caleb thought this was the real Elmo and he was ecstatic.

There was also a bouncy house there but it was always filled with big kids so we just held Caleb while standing next to the structure and we bounced up and down. He was smiling the entire time and he really felt like he was in there too. At one point a little girl came up to him from the inside and put her hands on the netting and let Caleb tap her hands. I always love it when kids older than Caleb make an effort to play with him because it makes him so happy.

We ate popcorn while we waited in line to get balloon swords. Caleb was going around grabbing every other kid's balloon, so we had to get one too.

After the work party we went to our church party. We ate food, talked to friends and did a little trunk or treating. Caleb quickly got the hang of reaching out his hand to take the candy and put it in his sack. We only let him get like 7 pieces or so but he loved it and ate a fun size bag of m&m's on the way home.
I made some yummy pumpkin cake for the party and decorated it like this:

With the extra pumpkin puree I had left we made pumpkin pancakes the next morning and they were the most amazing pancakes I have ever had. We used this recipe, in case you ever want to try them. I will certainly be making them again!

Sunday

Grandma Isaacson sent Caleb two new ties that are actually his length! The one tie I could find for him was almost to his knees so this is much better:

In his suit with his scriptures:

For almost 10 minutes last Sunday Caleb sat quietly in his little play corner looking at books and playing with his toys. It was so cute I had to get some of it on camera. You will also hear him talk of Elmo in this clip. Elmo is his favorite thing in the world, besides me of course. We even got him an Elmo bowl and Caleb is always clearing the food out of the way so he can see Elmo's face.

Three Randoms

On Sunday Caleb and Derrick were both wearing white shirts and blue ties. I had to get a picture before church because I thought it was so cute. Might I say here too that I am so happy Caleb got Derrick's blond hair. I love blond hair!

Here's Caleb after eating rice for dinner one night. This isn't too bad, it's just funny. The bad part was all the rice that fell into his diaper but I didn't take a picture of that :)

This is Caleb watching a video on Derrick's cell phone of his Grandma and Grandpa. They are singing Popcorn Popping and he will watch this video over and over. I think his favorite part is when they say "Hi Caleb" at the beginning.

Palm Springs

We had a fun weekend in Palm Springs to celebrate my grandparent's 50th wedding anniversary.

We went out to dinner two nights and had fun with the family. During the day we enjoyed the pool:

Caleb had fun with Gram and Pop

We also enjoyed frozen yogurt and doggies

My favorite part of the trip was our game night when we played Wits and Wagers, Apples to Apples and Guesstures. Everyone really got into game mode and we had a blast.
Back in Huntington Beach Caleb's favorite toy was the little car.

On Monday we wanted to take Caleb to the Zoo but it was raining too hard when we got there so instead we did a train ride. I didn't know how Caleb would like this but he had no problems staying on the train the whole time.



They also had horses/ponies there and Caleb loved looking at them.

Caleb thinks any big animal is a cow:

Our Tuesday

I felt all ready for my first baby appointment now that I knew what to expect. I knew they did an ultrasound on the first appt. so this time we had Derrick come too so he could see it. I got an early morning appointment but when I got there I found out this office does it differently than my last office. A nurse sees you on the first appt and goes over info, schedules future appts. and I get lab work done. There wasn't a doctor appointment open until 11:30am. We decided Derrick would take the day off since he wanted to be there and we had the missionaries over for dinner that night...otherwise he wouldn't get 8 hours of work in. So we went home for an hour and a half and then went back to the doctor's office.

The actual ultrasound is so much better than the picture. The limbs and torso were so much clearer and its perfect little heart was beating strongly. When I saw him or her the spirit overcame me. I am, quite frankly, terrified to have another newborn baby (I wasn't at all scared with Caleb)...but now I know the horrors that very little sleep does to my head, the blackouts I experienced, the 8 weeks of healing...and it makes me scared. But when I saw this little baby, laying there quietly inside me (Caleb was active and moving around for this ultrasound), I couldn't help but feel peace. He or she was meant to come to us and I am grateful for that confirmation.
When we got home, Caleb went down for a nap and Derrick and I read Harry Potter. This is Derrick's first go around with them and he is loving them. We are on the fourth book and we always want to be reading...it is so fun.
Later that day while I was preparing dinner Derrick took Caleb out of the house and as they were coming up the stairs Derrick yells out to grab the camera. Here's what I saw:

It was a hot day so Derrick decided to take Caleb out for a play in the hose. Caleb thoroughly enjoyed himself as he always does when it comes to water.
We had the missionaries over for dinner, that night we got some chores done and we read some more Harry Potter. Later that night Derrick got an e-mail saying that everyone in his organization was getting an extra day off for good performance! We were wary of taking the day off and when we got this e-mail, it was like someone was saying, "See, you were supposed to take today off...you made the right decision!" We had a great day!

First Week of Nursery

I forgot until now that I wanted to post about Caleb's first week in nursery at church. True, he still has a few weeks to go until he is 18 months but Derrick and I both have callings in primary so we got the okay from the nursery leader to bring Caleb in early.
I took him in and brought him over to the tables where the kids could play with toys. He sat right down in the chair without me even asking him. He was just fine as I left the room. I go back to primary, go through opening exercises and then at the end of junior primary singing time I see one of the nursery leaders come in with Caleb whose face was red like he had been crying. The nursery leader handed Caleb off to a friend until I was done with singing time.
I got Caleb and headed back to nursery with Caleb to see what happened. They said when he had someone's full on attention he was fine but whenever he was with the group of kids he would slowly break into tears. I played with him and the other kids until I had to go back to do senior primary singing time. Luckily when I left they were getting to snack time and Caleb sat right down at ate with the other kids.
I did singing time then came back to nursery to see Caleb sitting in a rocking horse, happily sucking on a plastic doughnut. I heard that all of snack time and play time he did great. I watched him play until the end of church and he did really well playing with the other kids. I think he will get adjusted to nursery very quickly.

Favorite Place to Play

Caleb is always asking to get in his crib now. He just never wants to get out and has me give him his stuffed animals and books and toys. As long he's happy with that, I'm totally ok with it...keeps him out of trouble.

Also, here's the shirt Caleb wore to Utah when we broke the news to the family.

Caleb is obsessed with the camera, as seen above. It is so hard for me to get any good videos these days...same in this video. He was about to dance for me but sees the camera...bummer.

Three things

The Saturday of Labor Day Weekend we went to The Tech Museum. Derrick got us free passes for this year from work which included 4 IMAX movies. We watched "Under the Sea." Caleb sat through the full 40 minutes of the movie! It was amazing. Here's the one picture we got:

Caleb knows his face parts:

Here's me getting Caleb to say words that he uses a lot. I wanted to remember how he sounded when he said them.

Monkey See Monkey Do

Last Saturday I was preparing for singing time. I was teaching the kids the second verse of "When He Comes Again" in sign language. I had memorized it weeks before but I wanted to review it again. I pulled up the video off the church web site and started signing with the lady. Caleb watched the video the whole way through. When I played it a second time Caleb starts waving his hands in front of him the whole time I'm doing it.

This morning the first thing Caleb noticed when he got up was that the lap top was open. He goes over to it, moves his finger around the mouse pad, then puts his hands in the typing position and starts pretending to type. He really looked like he knew what he was doing.

Utah Trip AND...

Alright, we're letting this out early but we are 8 weeks pregnant. It got out to almost the whole Isaacson family so we'll just let everyone know...yes Mom and Dad, feel free to tell whoever you want.
Caleb's travel clothes to Utah consisted of bright blue shorts and a shirt I made that said, "April 10th, 2011" on the front and "Big Brother in Waiting" on the back. That's how we broke the news to Derrick's family. Everyone on the plane and at the restaurant we went to when we got to Utah thought the shirt was adorable. Note: Caleb's birthday is April 11th, one day after the due date. For birthday celebration reasons I'm hoping for another boy. How do you pull off a girl/boy birthday party?
Onto Utah...Sunday after church we did a tour with Derrick's grandparents that included a house the Grandpa Isaacson built, a house that Great Grandpa Isaacson built, a house that Great Grandpa Spencer built, a cemetary visit (very windy) and some touching stories about family history.

Okay, I was AWFUL at taking pictures. Lisa took some that I will try get after she gets settled in at BYU.
Monday: Isaacson Family 5k. I jogged the whole time!
Tuesday: Temple Square--we went into the Salt Lake Temple while Paul watched Caleb, had a Cafe Rio picnic, Caleb got soaked in the reflection pool, ate some Hatch Family Chocolates.
Wednesday: Bowling at BYU, dinner in Provo (my mom and brother James joined us), visit to Gma and Gpa Isaacson's
Thursday: Intertubing down the Provo River (weather was perfect, water level was high and we even saw some beavers), bbq at a park near the river (my parents bro James and sis Jenna came too). We got this pic and video

Friday: 2002 Winter Olympic Center in Park City--zip line, alpine slide, watched professionals practice long jump down a watered turf on a mountain side and watch professionals ski down a ramp that led to a pool where they could practice twists and twirls in the air before landing in the water. It was way cool!

Other fun things:

-Caleb fell in love with his grandparents. They were the ones that took him to do fun things so naturally he wanted them more than Derrick and me. The grandparents: let Caleb help in the garden, put him in the kiddie pool, played with him on the slide and swing, took him to the park and much more. Here's Caleb in the garden:

-THE BEST THING was that I didn't have to take care of Caleb much for a full week of morning sickness. I was so glad they loved Caleb (and me) enough to let me rest. Lynne would even make me warm breakfasts in the morning since cereal doesn't sit well with me. Derrick would make my lunches for me and get me whatever I asked for. It was a blessing!

-We played a lot of 500...my favorite card game

Overall, it was a good trip. Back to normal life.

San Jose's Children's Discovery Museum

This trip was a blast. Our friends have year passes where they can get 2 guests in for free so Caleb and I joined in on the fun today. Here's Caleb in a fire truck with Sabrina.

There is a temporary Bob the Builder Exhibit that Caleb loved! He could have walked around that thing the entire time and never would have got tired of it.

There were other places to discover too:

Oh how Caleb loved the water! The aprons did little to stop him from getting wet but I guess it's better than nothing.

Some Cute Things to Remember

Talking to my family last night I realized there were a lot of things Caleb has been doing that I want to write down and haven't yet, so I'm doing it now.
1. One evening last week Derrick just came in the front door from work. He rested his bike on the wall and picked up Caleb while his helmet and sunglasses were still on. Derrick walked into the kitchen where I was doing last minute dinner preparations and Caleb immediately folded his arms and bowed his head. He knows when Daddy comes home it is time for prayer and dinner.
2. Caleb says "bye bye" to everything: when a truck drives by, when a bird flys away, when Derrick leaves for work or when people walk away from him.
3. Caleb will grab my keys and hand them to me when he thinks it's time to leave the house because he knows we bring them every time.
4. For a few days Caleb would point out the outside light fixtures next to every door in our apartment complex. He would point to each one fervently and say, "I, I" (light).
5. We are always playing in the car, it is Caleb's favorite place to play. I never taught him this but he knows that the key goes in the ignition and sometimes he actually gets the right key in it. How he knows the key goes there, I have no idea because I don't think he can see me do it from his car seat.
6. Caleb understands a lot of what we say here are a few of the phrases he knows very well:
-Do you want to brush your teeth (or wash your hands)? (he LOVES these two things and will run straight to the bathroom)
-Do you want breakfast (or lunch or dinner)?
-Where's your....cup, blue bear, blankie, hat?
-Let's wake up Daddy.
-Do you want to go outside?

So smart and a little conceited

Caleb loves this book and he knows four of the animals on the last page:

Caleb will look at himself in the mirror sometimes and just smile. It is only when he is alone though. I can only get this on camera until he realizes I'm there.