Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

My parents gave us a book of them reading (it has a recording in it) The Night Before Christmas. Joshua LOVES it, though it is a little temperamental sometimes. He asks "Read a Christmas book a grandma and grandpa?" (Note: the word "a" in Joshua languages gets put wherever there is a need for a filler word, like "a", "the", "with", "to" etc--So this sentence means, "Can I read the Christmas book with Grandma and Grandpa?")



We are trying to get in the Christmas spirit around here, even though it is hard when the sun is shining and I don't even have to wear a coat outside! Last weekend Justin's brother Zach was in town for a race and we got to hang out with him. We went downtown to the Mission Inn (yes, like the tortilla chips...see, Riverside IS famous for SOMETHING!) where they have a huge light display and some fun Christmas-y things. We had a blast with Uncle Zach!

Unperfect

I often think that I'd like to record some of my more personal thoughts/feelings on my blog, just to get them out in the open and have somewhere to "vent". But I usually think twice about it because I am not sure I want everyone to really know what is going on in my head. Or in my life, for that matter. Truth be told-I don't want everyone to know that I am not a perfect person. (I hear your thoughts now-"Anna, I never thought you were perfect...")

So here I go. I am not perfect. I used to be, but I am not anymore. I am unperfect. (Okay, so really, I was never perfect, but I find myself all too often thinking "but I used to be able to read my scriptures for 20-30 minutes everyday!" or "but I used to be a good people person!" etc, etc.)

But I feel bold tonight. I will probably regret this in the morning, but by then this will be posted. (But then I guess I could delete it...) I feel empowered by the book that I am reading, "The New York Regional Mormon Singles Halloween Dance" by Elna Baker. Some of you might be offended if you read it, but I absolutely love it. I love that she is honest and forward and frankly, herself. I could ramble on about the many laughs I have had already from the first 100 pages of the book, but I will move forward to the purpose of my post. Admitting my imperfection. Or rather, my unperfection.

I have a 2 year old. I don't need to say much more about my life, because he defines me right now. I think he has an extra bad case of the terrible twos. I know most moms probably think that about their first child, but I really think he is worse than most. It's only been the last few days that he has been over the top. I have cried every day. And I am not pregnant, so I can't even use that as an excuse. (Though I guess I am nursing...)

Tonight, as he was sitting in his chair screaming for the 100th time (you think I am exaggerating to make this post more funny, but I guarantee that I am not) in the last 36 hours that his Nemo band-aid went down the drain (yes, it happened yesterday morning and he has not stopped crying about it since), I asked him, very calmly I might add, "Do you want to die?"

He didn't answer, and I honestly forgot that I had said it. But he did not forget. 2 year olds never forget. Joshua never forgets. 5 minutes later, Justin was asking him what he wanted for dinner.

Justin: "Joshua, do you want spaghetti O's? Mommy made you spaghetti O's!" (See, I am even admitting to feeding my child spaghetti O's for dinner! I really am feeling bold!)

Joshua: "No!"

Justin: "Well, what do you want?"

Joshua: "Die!"

Oh dear. I wish he was old enough to understand the phrase "just kidding". Now every time we sit up for dinner, he will ask to die. Oh dear, dear, dear. Good moms don't threaten their children with death over the dinner table, do they? Me=definitely unperfect. Good thing there is tomorrow.

Halloween peek!

So you're probably wondering why I haven't posted more recent pictures of Nathan. I realized last night that I have hardly taken any pictures of him because there is rarely a moment when I think about taking a picture that he is not crying. I don't want to have ALL crying pictures of him (he's a little colicky) for future posterity! But last night we went to a Halloween party and when I first put him in his costume, he was happy for a few minutes, and I got a picture or two before he burst into tears! Hope you like my little dinosaur and lion! :)

Nathan at 2 weeks...

Okay, so Nathan is almost 2 months now, but I thought some of you would like to see these awesome pics that Emily took. Cute Nathan Fred!

Blessing

Happy Family!


Not so happy cousins...



Very happy grandparents!


These pictures are all thanks to the wonderful Emily. Thanks! (She also did a photo shoot of Nathan when he was two weeks old which I have yet to post...stay tuned!) We blessed Nathan the night before we moved. Just a small blessing with our immediate families in the area. We love you Nathan Fred!

Starting Young

We are surprised at how quickly Joshua's reading ability has developed. He even chose Tolstoy himself!

The Big Water

So now that we've been to the beach a couple of times, every time we get in the car Joshua asks "Go big water?"

He loved it!

And so did we.

Britax Carseat Giveaway

I meant to do this post a week or two ago...but with moving our stuff and then Nathan coming earlier than planned....it just didn't happen! This giveaway ends TODAY, but if you get a chance to go enter, DO IT!!

This is one of my good friends from high school and I posted before about her cloth diaper review blog. A Britax carseat obviously has NOTHING to do with cloth diapers, but she has a pretty amazing story about this carseat saving her daughters life and because of it, she got Britax to do a giveaway on her blog. Pretty awesome.

Britax Carseat Giveaway

Nathan Fred White

So I have a few minutes by myself this morning at the hospital. Little Nathan is having a car seat check (since he was born early, they have to monitor his breathing while he's sitting in a car seat for an hour or so) and Joshua and Justin haven't gotten here yet...so I thought I would blog!

Our little guy is here! My due date was Sept. 1st, but Nathan decided he wanted to come a little early. Good thing he wasn't even a day sooner, because we just moved all of our stuff to California and got back early Wednesday morning. I was so wrapped up in moving our stuff to CA, there were a lot of things I was "putting off" until we got back. I figured I had at least a couple of weeks before the baby would get here. We hadn't packed a hospital bag, set up the baby's bed, bought diapers, and a few other little things. But oh well!! My water broke on Thursday morning (though I wasn't really sure if it was my water or not). I kind of watched it throughout the day, and still couldn't tell if it actually was or not, but finally around 3:30 Justin and I decided to go to the hospital and just get it checked. The nurse wasn't sure at first either, and even pushed up on the baby's head to see if anything leaked out and it didn't. She said to just wait for a few minutes to see if any "gushes" came and then she'd try one more test. So I pretty much decided it was a false alarm when WHOOSH! The gush came. The nurse came back and said, yep you guys are having a baby.

It was close to 5 by this time and so I thought for SURE he would be born before midnight, which I was looking forward to. They always say your 2nd labor is even shorter than the first, right? Well, since he was 3 1/2 weeks early, I had only dilated to a 2 by that point, and by midnight (yes, 7 hours later) I was only at a 3. Talk about disappointing! The one silver lining was that our nurse was a friend from our ward when we lived on 2nd south...that made things fun. I would be moving forward, with regular contractions, and then they'd slow down again...it was frustrating. Finally they thought I probably had a fore sac, so they brought the doctor in and he popped it and then the contractions started regular again. I started progressing faster, but then the baby's heart rate started going all over the place. I could tell Elizabeth (the nurse) didn't want to alarm me, but she seemed worried after a little bit. She brought the Dr. back in (I was dilated to 7 at this point) and the Dr. looked and said he was going to stay there til we had the baby, which wouldn't be long. It was probably 15 minutes later that Nathan was born.

He had the cord wrapped around his neck pretty tightly which was causing his heart rate problems. Luckily the last little bit went very fast and I hardly had to push at all so he could come before they had to do a C section or anything. PHEW! We are sure glad you are here little guy!



He weighed 6 lbs. 0 oz. and was 19.5 inches long (that is pretty long for just a little tiny guy!) He is super skinny and every time I pick him up I feel like I am going to break him. He just sleeps and sleeps and sleeps...I honestly can hardly get him to eat even! He has hardly cried at all (because he's too busy sleeping) and I love him to pieces.

Love for the Gambills

Have I told you about Margaret and Nate? Well, I am in love with them. I have heard people talk about the fact that after you get married, you still date, but you date couples. The other day, before Nate and Mags came to visit us, Justin leaned over to me and said, "Do you think Nate and Margaret want to go steady?"

I hope they do!

I just have to give them major points because we have already hung out with them TWO TIMES and they haven't even been married a month. How many couples do you actually enjoy hanging out with who have been married less than a month?



I stole this picture from Jaclyn's blog, because I don't have pictures of my own yet. This is from June 26th when the adorable couple got married. (I thought I'd also show you my 7 month pregnant belly-don't worry, it's even bigger now)

Showing off

This is purely to brag and because I think it's pretty much the cutest thing Joshua does these days.



And he's not even two yet! We're proud, since he started off so far behind in his speech. GO JOSHUA!

Fun with cousins

I have been busy scrapbooking and hence have NOT been busy blogging. Here are a few pictures from a couple of weeks ago when Katie and her kids were visiting Logan. Actually all of my siblings were in town, so we had a little 'family reunion'! We took the four little boys (soon to be 5! ah!!) to a little farm park to see some animals, swimming, and to the playground. It was a fun week!

The Cloth Diaper Report

One of my really good friends started this blog more as a resource to post info about those who are wanting to use cloth diapers for their kids. She features lots of great products on her blog, and they aren't JUST cloth diaper products, but good products for mama and baby in general. She is doing her first big giveaway on the blog and the product looks awesome! It's called Maggie's Soap Nuts. It's totally natural and safe for the most sensitive skin (nothing synthetic or artificial). She also uses it for her daughters wipes and and also made a cleaning solution with a 10:1 ratio, water to solution. For a more detailed review and a chance to win, check it out at:

The Cloth Diaper Report

Competition and promotion

So I know everyone wants to know how I did in the competition right? Well, I got 4th again. But actually it turns out to be not so bad. I win this:



It is the desk "top". So it can go on top of whatever desk I am using and I can have some nifty little drawers that I will be able to see into--I think it will be very handy. I already decided after we move to CA this is the set up I am getting from Ikea:



I am super excited. So thanks everyone for helping out. I REALLY appreciate it!

I have one more "scrapbooking" tidbit for my post. I don't know how many of you out there like to scrapbook or make scrap cards or anything like that, but I have a little promotion going on. If you didn't know already, I am a consultant for Close to My Heart, an AWESOME scrapbook company. I mostly do it because I like to get the discount, not because I really actively sell that much (I am not really a great sales woman...). BUT, this month I am offering a 20% discount on ANY thing that you might want from their catalogue. I just have to sell a certain amount by the end of June to keep my consultant status and with being in Europe and being pregnant I haven't sold anything yet, so I am trying to do so before June 30th.

Anyway, if you're interested at all, email me or post a comment on my blog. I have extra catalogues (they come out with new ones every few months). Products include:
-paper packets with coordinating plain card stock and designed paper
-stamp pads/pens
-acrylic stamp blocks and stamps (if you use wooden stamps still, you REALLY need to check this out...)
-card kits
-lots of accessories and fun things!!

Let me know if you're interested!! :)

Still trying

Every post is a few more points and I really would love to win this desk. If you haven't checked out the site yet, do it at

The EZ desk Giveaway vote for me if you have a minute!! :)

Ribbon Box

Cool pic huh? Just another picture of one of the products from the Original Scrapbox. Go scrapbookers!! The contest is just chugging along and hopefully I will win a desk soon....

The EZ desk Giveaway VOTE!

Our weekend in Bonn

So I haven't posted nearly enough pictures of Germany, have I! We got a visitor's pass for the city that we are living in, Bonn, last weekend and visited a lot of really neat places. The visitor's pass gets you into a lot of museums and places for free or reduced price and it was perfect. (Minus the whole Joshua-not-wanting-to-set-foot-or-stroller-inside-a-museum thing)

FRIDAY

Friday we spent most of the day in Koenigswinter, a little tourist town across the river from us. We spent an hour or so in the Aquarium there-Joshua was definitely a fan.



Then we headed up the "mountain" on this old school train to see the ruins of an old castle, Drachenfels. Here is what it looked like a long time ago...



Here is what it looks like now!




But what you REALLY paid for was the view. Gorgeous. We just sat up there for an hour or so just taking in the scenery. (It helped that Joshua had fallen asleep in his stroller...)





In the evening we tried to go to an art museum, but that lasted all of about 20 minutes with Joshua. Oh well. We tried, right?

SATURDAY

We started out the morning going to the Fleumarkt here in Bonn--otherwise known as a flea market. We were told it was huge, it only happens once a month. Honestly, we don't even know HOW big it was, because it was too big to walk through all of it! It was a garage-saler's paradise. No joke. My picture doesn't even BEGIN to capture half of the tents that were set up...it looked like it went on for miles!



Here are our meager purchases: A hacky sack for Joshua and a wooden spoon for Justin and I. The spoon is made out of olive wood and the sellers had tons of other wood products. Cutting boards, pestle and mortar, bowls...and they were so beautiful. But we decided a spoon would do for us. We actually need a new wooden spoon anyway. :)



We got some crepes with nutella on them from a little vendor and everyone could tell that Joshua enjoyed his. We of course also had to let him out to play by the water fountain. He is beginning to love water (rivers, water fountains, etc., not just a bottle of water) as much as fans!




On the way over to the central part of Bonn, Joshua was SO close to falling asleep, we decided to walk around and look at the shops in hopes that we could get him asleep before we went to any museums. Fat chance. No sleeping for him on Saturday. We decided even if we didn't get to all of the places we'd hoped, we would at least make it to the Beethoven House.

Beethoven was born in Bonn and they have his birthplace preserved and have lots of artifacts from his life-original manuscripts, one of his pianos, his viola...pretty amazing!




I was pretty much the only one who got to spend some quality time inside. Justin spent quality time outside with Joshua driving his cars. Thanks sweetheart. :)




SUNDAY

So we missed church all together on Sunday. Since Joshua had a bad nap day Saturday, we decided we would let him sleep and just go to Sacrament meeting. But we missed the bus, and the buses only come once an hour, so...we had our own church while Joshua was napping. It actually turned out to be really good. We watched Elder Bednar's Young Adult fireside that he gave on March 3rd. Seriously, it was one of the best talks I have heard in a long time, I recommend it to EVERYONE. I think I need to watch it a few more times myself...

Then we took the train to Bruhl, which is a little city/village about 15-20 miles away. There is a big "Schloss" there, which is translated to be "castle" in English, but we think the word "Schloss" is more like mansion. It's technically a castle I guess, but one built in the last couple hundred years. This huge victorian mansion was BEAUTIFUL!



We didn't go inside because it is an hour long tour. We figured the other people who paid to go in would enjoy it much more without a shrieking almost 2-year old. How can you be sure he would be shrieking, you ask? Because we would have had to leave the "wa-wa" outside...



This is a view from the woods that surround the house. There were walking trails and so many big trees. It felt like Virginia!



And then a couple of pictures of Joshua's new favorite past-time: pushing the stroller. He is actually quite good, but gets frustrated quickly if it runs into something. He learning to sign "help" instead of shrieking, so that's good. This is also another reason he doesn't like museums, because we have to put him IN the stroller. He would MUCH rather be behind it!




Now if you made it through all of THAT, I am impressed!