{helping hands}

I woke up one morning when James was only a two weeks old and this is what I saw! I was so glad my camera was right next to me on the floor! Wyatt had just come in to check on both of us and James was just laying there awake so he decided to try and rock him back to sleep. He didn't want to disturb mommy! It was so precious! Little did he know that mommies don't ever "really fall asleep".

{ice cream}

I scream, you scream, we all scream for ICE CREAM!!!

I found this picture and I thought I had already posted but it looks like I hadn't. This is from our trip to Mammoth in May of this year....you can even see baby James still in the belly!!

{One Coat}

I saw the following post on a blog and thought it was such a great thing to do that I wanted to share it with my readers. I hope that you will pass this along to all your readers as well. The store Scrappin' Table where the donations are being taken is a bit of a drive from me but if there are people who want to donate I would be willing to collect donations then take them out to the store near the end of their collection time. Please let me know if you have anything you'd like to donate by November 15th.

The Scrappin' Table has once again offered to have a drop box for "One Warm Coat". You can help others by donating one or more of your winter coats that no longer fit. All coats and jackets that are donated will be given to the Los Angeles Mission for a person in need. Men, women & children would greatly appreciate your gift of a warm coat.

tammy i will be collecting coats from October 21- November 21, 2009.

You can either e-mail Tammy at tammyi@mac.com or contact One Warm Coat for more information.

{testing}

Ok I guess I should have explained what was going on before I posted the funny poopy story. Everyone has been emailing me wanting to know what's wrong with James! Thank you all for your concerns! The good news is all tests came back normal. So here's the whole story....

About a two weeks ago I had enough of James spitting up on everything all day long. It didn't matter whether he ate 2 ounces or 6 ounces....whether he had just eaten or it had been two hours. The only two things I knew for sure where 1. that it was inevitable that he would throw up at least 1/3 of everything he ate and 2. that he would throw up within 30 seconds of being laid on his back.....I'm sure most of you moms out there are thinking the same thing...Acid Reflux! So after going rounds with the doctor about whether or not he was eating to much and having to explain that the babies in my family seem to have an insanely high metabolism I finally got him to say he'd like to give James medicine for acid reflux! Hallelujah right?!?!!! Well that's what I thought too until one day enough vomit to fill a whole dinner glass shot out of his mouth and clear across the trailer (out camping)! Ugh here we go again...

The medicine we were giving him takes a few days to kick in. The day before we went camping he seemed to be spitting up half of what he had been and I was more than grateful! Then the next day up in mammoth he was spitting up like before again, the day after that was a bit worse and by that night he was spitting up 5 handfuls all through a 6 ounce bottle then screaming cause he was still hungry. Tyler gave him a blessing and he went to bed sleeping through the night for the first time! The doctor had told us to keep on eye out for these exact symptoms because there was a possibility he had a different problem, one which would require a small surgery. So needless to say after he projectile vomited the next morning I called Kaiser right away said I was on my way back from Mammoth and I needed a late after noon appointment.

We made it back in town with just enough time to go straight to the doctor, truck full of bags and towing a boat too! We talked to the doctor who then sent us directly to the fontana hospital for labs and xrays. Then the next morning I had to take him back for one more test where they fed him the "white chalk" and tracked in going through his tummy and intestines....(the poopy story)

So you want to know the funny yet almost frustrating thing about all of this? He hasn't had any severe spitting up since the day after all his testing was done. Bizarre! Anyway I got a call from the doctor just this morning letting me know that all of his tests came back normal but the xrays taken with the dye did show a rather bad case of acid reflux...

So was it elevation? car sickness? some kind of allergy? Well considering we had taken James there a month before and he was fine I'm going to say my prayers thank my heavenly father for a worthy priesthood holder for a husband and find comfort in the miracles that can come from a priesthood blessing!

{lol}

At only one week old James started laughing out loud {lol} in his sleep. I mean truly giggling! And for the last two weeks he's begun to try a half baked laugh with a cute grin. It was kind of a sigh with a hiccup at the end. Then after that horrible day of trying to "pass the poop", James being happy as can be in such a relieved mood, he did it! Mommy sat there next to him making a popping noise and making her fingers pop open like the popcorn popping in the tree song then whooshing the popped open fingers down to his chest purely for James' entertainment and there it was...a big loud laugh, just like the ones in his sleep! Oh how we wished there was a video camera in the house! I'm not sure if it was the fact that he finally laughed with his eyes open or the look on his face as realized he was laughing {seriously there was a 5 second moment when the look on his face was that "i did it" look kids get when they are proud of themselves} but mom, dad and brother laughed just as hard!

{that's just poopy!}

Monday and Tuesday James had to have some testing done at the doctors. The Tuesday test was horrible....no one told me it would be all day long!! They had to take pictures every 15 minutes of flouro dye going all the way through James' system. I was told to bring James in hungry...apparently so he would actually drink the dye. To the doctors surprise there wasn't one complaint from James about the white chalk filled 2 ounce bottle they gave him. However it was taking him a while to get down the half of it they wanted him to start with so I told the nurse to make the hole bigger in the nipple...James is already moved on the medium flow nipples. Well that did the trick! About 60 seconds later the doctor tells me to stop when he's drank half and I laughed as I tried to tell him to late it's all gone!

Well they took a few pictures and waited 15 min then took a few more. The whole while James was screeming. The nurse made a comment about him being madder than most babies about the xray and again I about fell over laughing when I told her "mam HE'S STARVING!!!" she seemed to think that a 2 ounces bottle should have been enough for him so I cleared up a few misconceptions that all babies "follow the rules" and informed her that this baby drinks 6 - 8 ounces bottles. Since he wasn't allowed to have his formula yet she gave him another 2 ounces of that white chalk stuff. Quick as a blink down the hatch it went.

Now for the sad, painful yet photographically funny part of this story.....

Finally I fed him a real bottle and 5 hours later we were headed home. She said the white stuff would pass but to make sure he's drinking his regular bottles so that it doesn't dehydrate him. Noon the next day came and it hadn't passed much more than a few drops. James was plugged up with white chalk. Here's the funny part:

"i think i can i think i can..."

This was only 1/2 as red as his face really got!!

Ahhh much better!!a little water always remedied a plug up baby and after about 4 ounces, a few hours and some very painful effort, the white chalk was history!

{apples to apples}

James: "this apple looks tasty...the worm too!"

Mom: "Silly James that apple doesn't taste yummy"

James: "hmm...maybe if i try to eat this one."

James: "Yuck I don't think I like apples"

Mom: "I told you..."

James: "Moooomm...who gives a baby an apple they can't eat?"

Grandpa does!!
:-P