Pencil Test

So a few months ago, my friends told me about the pencil test. You stick a needle and thread in the eraser of a pencil, hold it above your wrist, and depending on the direction it swings, it will predict the gender of your children, in order, and stop when all of your kids have been identified. We did it to each other over and over again and every.single.time. we got the same results. Here were mine:

-Miscarriage

-Miscarriage

-Baby Boy

-Baby Girl

-Twins

Then it stopped. Truly, every time they did the test to me this was the result. It made us all very curious.

Well, I am here to verify that the pencil test is right again. Say hello to our baby girl.

Remind you of anyone??

**i am sort of hoping the pencil test will be wrong about the twins...

10 months

Dear Oliver-

You are such a good boy. Very busy, constantly on the go, but so sweet. You love mama and dada and are so happy to see us if we have been gone. You love playing with your friends, the dogs, your toys, and everything else around you. Your grandparents all adore you and you adore them back. Actually, EVERYONE loves you, and we get so many comments from strangers about how adorable you are.

You are turning into a social little thing. You do the cheesiest grin when you are really excited, your nose scrunches up and your eyes get squinty, its so funny. You smile all the time and love to be tickled. You also love to be startled-you think its hilarious. You still love being swung, thrown, tossed, spun, and anything crazy. Shaking your head "no no" is one of your favorite things to do. You also love to look at the light and point to it with your tiny hands. You are smart. You say dada, baba, and dah for dog. You LOVE the dogs more every day, they make you laugh.

You still aren't officially crawling, although I know you can because you have done it multiple times. You prefer army crawling and are very fast. You love getting into things, especially the dog food. When you head towards it (or anything else naughty) we say "Oliver...." and you look back and smile and then scoot REALLY fast towards it. Such a stink. You love singing, and your favorite song is still Popcorn Popping. You occasionally do the actions with me. You have started clapping-you are so proud. You pull yourself up on things and as always, you love standing up (with assistance!)

Our favorite thing you do right now is give kisses. We didn't even teach you, one day you just did it. If we make a kiss sound to you, you open your mouth wide and press it against our faces. Its so adorable and we are glad you know what kisses are-its because you have gotten so many in your lifetime!

You are a little guy, you weigh 17 lbs 15 oz which is 7th percentile. You are also a shorty, only in the 3rd percentile in height. Food is one of your favorite things so I think you are going to move up on the charts by your 1 year appointment.

I love you so much sweet thing. You are the best part of my life!

-Mama

Mercy

So far being pregnant the 2nd time has been hard. I am so grateful to be pregnant, and happy that we didn't have to struggle for almost 2 years to get this baby like we did last time. But being a mom of a baby, while being pregnant, is some hard business. Luckily I haven't been AS sick as I was when I was pregnant with Oliver-it mostly hits the hardest at night when he is already in bed. But I have been EXHAUSTED. I think its a combo of having busy days and pregnancy hormones, but at times it just makes my whole body ache. Anyone know the feeling?

Getting ready in the morning is nearly impossible thanks to the exhaustion and trying to entertain a 10 month old baby. But this morning, Oli had mercy on me. Our house was stinky because a certain someone (BIRDIE) had an accident so I opened the door to let some fresh air in. Oli scooted over to the door in a flash to watch the birds, so I put his coat on and wrapped him up in a blanket. He watched the birds for 15 minutes without making a peep. Anyone who knows Oliver knows this is miracle. I was actually able to get ready all in one sitting.

Then, this afternoon after a stressful doctor appointment and a trip to Costco, I was feeling sick and tired. I turned on a show for Oliver, which he isn't interested in too much lately. I laid him in his carseat with a blanket, hoping to be able to just sit for one minute. He is STILL lounging in his carset, watch baby einstein, and its been almost an hour. I just looked over and he is asleep. hehe

These tiny moments in my life are such blessings that I had to acknowledge them on my blog. Thank you Mike, Oliver, and Heavenly Father for getting me through this rough patch.

friends

I thought I would document all of Oliver's baby friends so he can look back and know that we weren't loners when he was little! Plus, how cute are photos of a bunch of babies?

Stella and Nora-our next door neighbors, and the greatest friends! We see them almost daily and Oli is learning how to be tough around two girls who are a little bigger and older than he is...

Leah B-as we like to call her. We used to babysit her while her mama went to school. We miss seeing her now! Lets play soon Leah & Emily!

2nd Cousins-Ty, Jada & Chloe. We had fun when we were all together, lets do it again! Jada and Oliver weren't sure about each other until they bonded over their hatred of driving in the car (and eating puffs apparently)

Whit-our other next door neighbor. We love playing with Whit because they get along so well. He is a sweetie and always so happy. We need more pictures together!!

And of course..

Cousins! Olivia, Carson, & Charlotte-Cars and Liv have adored Oli since birth and love to make him smile and laugh. Char didn't care much at first but now LOVES Oli, and he loves her back. They are funny together and will be life long friends!

Oli has lots more friends, but we haven't taken pictures with them-not sure why! There are tons of babies around his age in play group that he is finally starting to venture out and actually play with instead of wanting to be held the whole time. Most of them are boys, so we are in for some fun times in the next year or so when they all get bigger and more into each other.

We love our friends!

9 Months

Dear Oliver-

I can't believe 9 months has gone by. You have been out of my belly as long as you were in it-except its gone by much faster. You are such an angel baby lately and I just can't get enough of you.

Here you are with the same bunny as a newborn and at 9 months. You have grown so much!

You are learning like crazy. You wave hi & bye now more consistently. You are copying sounds like crazy-you especially love to fake cough if you hear other people cough. You can hold your own bottle now and can feed yourself finger foods. You love to eat and like almost everything you have tried. You have a sense of adventure-you love being tossed, twisted, dropped, spun, or any other scary thing there is. You are going to be a major thrill seeker.

You are scooting now and are really fast. You love the entertainment center-turning the xbox off and on is your favorite thing to do. You also love pulling my favorite bowl down from the shelves. The dog's bowls of food and water also catch your eye. Looks like we are going to have to do some baby proofing! You are going to crawl any day now-you rock on your hands and knees but decide its not worth it since you are pretty fast at the scoot/army crawl thing.

You have a funny sense of humor but most of the time only give us little chuckles. You are hard to crack when it comes to a real belly laugh-just like your mama. You smile a lot though and are very happy. You like to be teased and tease back, your a playful little one. You love faces and always want to press your face against other people's faces. You still love blankets and binkies. You adore the dogs and think they are hilarious. They can get a good laugh out of you.

You weigh about 18 lbs now. You are chunking up again-yay! You wear size 6 month clothes for the most part, and a few days ago I finally put away the last of your 3 month outfits. It was a bitter-sweet day-you are growing up! You have your two front bottom teeth and man are they adorable. Your tongue is always out-it drives me nuts because your face is sooo rashy from the dry weather and all of your spit, but oh well!

I love you to the moon sweet Oliver. You mean everything to me and make me and Daddy so very happy.

Love,

Mama

Oliver & Olive

Today Oliver tried an olive for the first time.

He was very interested in the olive and enjoyed its company.

This is good news, because there is an olive in my stomach.

It will be joining our family in August.

Luckily he/she will be bigger than an olive by then since, we wouldn't want Oliver eating it like he did today.

Christmas with a kid...

is awesome! I had low expectations for Oliver's excitement level/noticing anything at all about Christmas, but he got excited for every gift he opened. I know he didn't truly get what was going on, but he smiled at each new toy he got.

We are lucky to have both families within a few blocks of each other, so we were able to go back and forth and see everyone. We definitely got spoiled this year-especially Oli.

Unfortunately, I wasn't feeling great on Christmas or Christmas Eve, so I didn't think to take many pictures. This is all I got-it was still dark outside so they aren't the best quality either.