Conversations with Felicity

I love this girl! And right now she's at the stage where her language and comprehension are growing by leaps and bounds which makes for some hilarious and cute conversations. Here's a few we've had lately:

Even though it's been nearly 3 months since Christmas, she still talks about Santa quite frequently. She likes to tell me that he lives at the North Pole (and points north), that he says ho ho, how she saw him at Kneaders but wouldn't sit on his lap, that he's nice and she sat on his lap at the church and he gave her a Curious George book, and that she really wants to go to Santa's house. It makes me wonder if the Santa conversations will die down as the year goes on. Knowing her, probably not, and she'll just be extra excited when Christmas rolls around again.

A few weeks ago, I was sitting in the living room, and Felicity came running down the hall carrying a small picture of Jesus. She showed it to me and said, "Mom, I found Jesus. I love Him. He's my favorite." I responded, "I love Him too. Do you know Jesus loves you too?" "Yes, Jesus loves me and I love Him," she replied.

For the past month or so, Felicity has been very interested in discussing heaven with me. We talk about who's in heaven (Jesus, Heavenly Father, my mom, etc.). Then she likes to talk about how she lived in heaven before she was in my belly and came to our family. She has to also remind me that Bridget and Dayton were in heaven too before they were in my belly. Last week we were discussing this topic for probably the 10th time this month. This time when we talked about who was in heaven, we went through the usual list and then she started talking about the Lamanites. She told me they were wicked, they killed people, and that Jesus doesn't like wicked people. Then she went back to talking about how she and her siblings lived in heaven before they came to us and that Jesus took good care of her. I guess she's been paying more attention lately as we've been reading the Book of Mormon together as a family.

Like I said, heaven seems to be on her mind a lot lately. A couple of weeks ago, she'd just woken up from her nap, and as I was hurrying to get her ready to go pick Bridget up from school. She had a really sad expression on her face, so I asked her what was wrong. She started crying and with tears streaming down her face she said, "Mom, I really miss Jesus." That melted my heart a little, and I said, "I miss him too." We continued to get ready to go and a few minutes later she started crying about it again. I told her it was okay because Jesus misses her too.

It's conversations like these that make my day and make me feel like I'm not doing too bad of a job teaching and raising my children. It also helps make up for the times when she drives me crazy by asking 5000 questions every day and quite often the same questions over and over that I've already answered.

Visit from Jill, Elaine, & Charlotte

My sister Jill and her girls, Elaine & Charlotte, got to come visit for a quick trip this week over their spring break. Even though we don't get to see them as often as we would like, our girls love being with them and play very well together.

Elaine and Charlotte don't get to be around babies very often, and they both loved meeting Dayton for the first time and holding and playing with him.

We also planned a little family gathering with our extended family while they were here.

Megan is always the favorite aunt.

We also went to Megan's new apartment and then went to dinner together. After dinner we went to a cupcake shop where these cousins had a great time playing together. So much fun!

5 Months

Guess who finally learned to roll over yesterday? He's certainly not fast at it most of the time and not inclined to do it very often, but he did it six times yesterday. He's rolled from his back to his tummy once, but most of the time he just likes to roll onto his sides as he's trying to grab for his feet.

 

Speaking of feet, they seem to be one of his new favorite things. It can certainly make it a little more difficult to bathe him or change his diapers sometimes because he wants his feet where he can grab them.

 

As far as sleep goes these days, he's doing a little better . He's had a few nights this week where he's slept for 8-9 hours straight at night, woken up to eat, and then gone back to sleep for another hour or so. Hallelujah! We've also gotten him to go to sleep on his own so he doesn't always have to be held or rocked to sleep. The only downside is that his naps still tend to be shorter - about 45 minutes on average. And by the evening, he's pretty tired and ready to go to bed for the night no later than 9 pm. 

Don't let this next picture fool you. He's much more of a momma's boy than a daddy's boy, but that's because I'm his only source of food and spend more time with him than anyone else. He's to the point he will sometimes cry if I'm out of sight and he's wanting me or turn when he hears my voice and start crying until I come rescue him. It's okay though because someday he'll realize that Nate is the fun one.

He's also gotten really, really grabby with his hands so watch out. Felicity is NOT a fan when he gets a hold of her curls. (Thanks to my sister Jill who got this awesome action shot).

Other things to note:

• Loves his pacifier
• Started making loud squealing/squawking noises that are almost birdlike (thank goodness for the pacifier)
• Still extremely drooly
• Wearing almost all 9 month size clothing
• Birthmark still hasn't faded at all and left tear duct is still blocked
• Loves to be held as much as possible which is hard when he weighs over 20 lbs. I'm pretty sure my left arm is 2-3 times stronger than my right.
• Loves to give open mouth, slobbery kisses
• Very observant and still loves to look around at everything around him with those big blue eyes
• Still gets really excited when he smiles resulting in many blurry pictures trying to capture them
• Very, very wiggly
• Can sit up for a few seconds by himself before he topples over to one side or another