C-A-L-E-B

Shannon posted this on her blog, and since I love taking online quizzes, I thought I'd play too (although all you do is type in your name). First I did me, which was pretty accurate, though not all true of me right now. But definitely true of me at different stages in my life. Then I did Brandon. He had a couple things in common with mine, but the things that were different were very true of him (but not of me). So, thinking that both had seemed fairly descriptive, I figured I'd try out Caleb to see what he's going to be like one day.

Forget one day, this already describes my kid just as he is right now.

What Caleb Means

You are very open. You communicate well, and you connect with other people easily. You are a naturally creative person. Ideas just flow from your mind. A true chameleon, you are many things at different points in your life. You are very adaptable. You are usually the best at everything ... you strive for perfection. You are confident, authoritative, and aggressive. You have the classic "Type A" personality. You are relaxed, chill, and very likely to go with the flow. You are light hearted and accepting. You don't get worked up easily. Well adjusted and incredibly happy, many people wonder what your secret to life is. You are friendly, charming, and warm. You get along with almost everyone. You work hard not to rock the boat. Your easy going attitude brings people together. At times, you can be a little flaky and irresponsible. But for the important things, you pull it together. You are full of energy. You are spirited and boisterous. You are bold and daring. You are willing to do some pretty outrageous things. Your high energy sometimes gets you in trouble. You can have a pretty bad temper at times.

What's Your Name's Hidden Meaning?

:(

If it was currently the month of December, the sight of the winter wonderland outside my window this morning would have made me so happy.

Sadly, it's almost April. I hate snow.

French Kiss

If I believed in reincarnation (which I don't, but if I did), I would totally believe that Caleb is the reincarnation of whoever invented the french kiss.

I first noticed it Wednesday and have been testing him over and over to see if it was just a fluke. But he does it consistently now. And for whatever reason, it no longer grosses me out.

Whenever I say "kiss" to Caleb (as in, I would like a kiss, please give me a kiss), he sticks his tongue out. At first I thought he was just being a bugger, but he does it every time. And then he'll lean in toward me, waiting for his kiss.

So if you want to kiss him on the lips, which is what he's expecting, all you get is tongue.

I'm just impressed he knows what kiss means. Well, more or less.

The Cake Says It All

We had a party for Caleb on his birthday (last Friday) at our house with all his friends. It went okay I guess. Well, everyone said so at least. I was too stressed for too long to unwind enough to enjoy the party. Or even remember it.

We borrowed our neighbor's bbq and had burgers and fruit salad and other such goodies. I tried to keep it relatively simple, since I really didn't need more stress, and didn't see a point to making food Caleb wouldn't/couldn't eat. So we ate, hung out, had cake, and opened some presents. We had a turtle bean bag toss game, that went over well with some of the bigger kids until it broke. Caleb really likes the bean bags though.

It was a turtle themed party since Caleb's our little turtle. I made his cake out of banana bread, since we're trying hard not to give him unnecessary sweets till he's at least two. I frosted it with banana baby food dyed green, then added some grapes to the shell. It didn't turn out spectacularly or anything, but he's one. He didn't really care.


In fact, he so didn't care that the only thing he ate was the grapes off the back of the turtle. Then he started signing all done. Oh well.

Ranting

I'm sure you want to see pictures from Caleb's birthday. Well, at least I know my mom really does, so I figure there's probably at least one other person out there who does too. But in all honesty, I don't really like the pictures from Caleb's birthday and just don't have the energy to try and fix them just yet.

So instead, I'm posting today because I want to complain. I have a whole other blog, which I don't let anyone read, reserved for complaining because I don't like to do it here. But I'm hoping someone can solve all my problems for me, or at least tell me that they struggle too and I'm not alone in this, so I'm writing it here.

I seriously struggle with being offended. I get offended so very easily. So easily. And when I get offended, it's so unbelievably hard for me to forgive.

I asked Brandon about this a while back, looking for some sort of fix-it answer. He said that he tries to think of possible explanations as to why a person behaves the way they do. Tries to see it from their perspective. And I can do that. At least, I can do that with complete strangers. I can do it with idiot drivers and not get mad at them for being such idiots. Which is funny since Brandon gets so mad at drivers, but can be much more forgiving of people he actually knows.

My problem stems from the fact that the more I love someone, the more offended I can get by them. Which is bad, because then the people that I should be more forgiving of, more tolerant of their faults, I end up furiously angry with. The kind of anger that boils and festers for years sometimes.

Last summer, there were a couple of girls that I thought I was friends with. Then it turned out that maybe we weren't actually friends and that really bothered me. It didn't bother me that I wasn't friends with everyone, or that people I never hung out with didn't want to hang out with me. Nope, just those who I first loved. It bothered me for weeks. Made me so depressed. Finally, with my husband's encouragement, I tried to talk to them about it. Maybe I wasn't as straight forward as I ought to have been, since most things were denied and some sort of friendship was rekindled. Only I know that at least one of the girls really doesn't like me and so I don't like her.

But that's just one little example. From a girl I didn't have much of a relationship with to start with and now don't have any sort of friendship, except to be fake polite if we're in the same room for some reason.

Where I really suffer is with people that I've loved for a lot longer. People that I expect to love me back, and hence to act like they love me. It's these people that I get so offended by, so angry at, and it just ruins my spirit. I obsess over it for days, weeks, months, and in some cases, it's been years now. How do you forgive people that are supposed to love you but treat you like crap? People that you can't cut out of your life because your lives, and everyone you know, is so intertwined that there's no way to avoid them?

I'm sorry to be ranting so long about nothingness. I'm just really upset and it's stupid really, to be writing all this here where I can't even explain why I'm upset because I don't want to offend anyone.

I guess that's the thing of it -- if you love someone, you should be able to see things from their side, and not act like such a selfish jerk and not do things that you know are going to break their hearts. And as for me, I'm sorry, but right now, I don't see a way to forgive stupidity like that. I don't know how to forgive someone who should know better but is intentionally cruel, no matter what their reasons.

So, my plea to anyone still ready this rant: don't be so mean to the people that love you. You're breaking our hearts.

Anyway, sorry for all the complaining. I'll try not to do it again. And in hopes of leaving you on a more positive note, here's a picture from Caleb's birthday.

The Egg Hunter

Happy Easter!

For the past couple weeks, I've wanted to take Caleb to an Easter egg hunt to get some cute pictures. We never got a chance considering the powers that be (aka those in charge of scheduling such hunts) like to make them during nap time. So today, it being Easter and all, we had our own little hunt in the backyard.

First, I put a coin (I was just going to do pennies, but didn't have many and ended up just doing all the coins in my wallet) in each egg, so they'd rattle. Then I masterfully hid them in our backyard. Some seriously good hiding. Only a master egg sleuth could discover them all. :)

Caleb thought it was fun. The ground was a little cold so we made him wear his new shoes, which he wasn't a fan of. But the eggs, he loved. He especially loved shaking them and didn't quite understand why he had to put them in the basket and then go get a new one.

Here are a few pictures of his great egg hunt. Isn't he so cute in his new little outfit? So grown up. I just love that little boy.




And look at how good he can stand now! Saturday he took eight steps in a row without falling or quiting. But he's refused to take any since then.

After the egg hunt, we came inside and got out Caleb's new piggy bank that he got for his birthday. He loved putting all the coins in the piggy bank one by one. Looks like I'm going to have start saving my pennies. Or rather, letting Caleb save them all.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CALEB!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CALEB!!

Our sweet little turtle is a year old today! I'm so glad to have him in my life. He is such a blessing to me. I just love being with him. Sometimes, in the middle of the night, he'll fuss a little, and a part of me gets excited because maybe I'll have the chance to hold him again already. It's hard to always wait till morning.

Here are some pictures of Caleb throughout the last year. I tried really hard to find pictures that weren't currently on the blog, so hopefully they're still good ones. But with such a cute baby, how do you not have good ones?

Brand new, in the hospital.

Three days old.

Easter. 2 weeks old.

Caleb's blessing day. 4 1/2 weeks.

Mother's day at the Houston temple. 7 weeks.

In California. 2 months.

3 months.

4 months.

In Hawaii. Five months.

6 months.

7 months.

8 months.

9 months.

On the cruise. 10 months.

11 months.

And now that he's a year, he gets to ride facing forward!

I LOVE YOU, CALEB!

Almost One

Today's the last day my baby gets to be a little baby. Tomorrow he's a one year old!

He's such a sweet little baby boy and so much fun to have around. I think I've posted just about every trick he can do the moment he does it, but maybe I should recap what he's been up to, in case you're not an avid reader of our blog.

He's been known to say (though not always with great consistency): Daddy, mama (though it's sometimes a rare thing to hear), banana, book, and bye-bye. He can also sign "all done" with amazing clarity, but tends to use it as more than just all done. Sometimes when he wants up, sometimes when he wants more, sometimes when he's just trying to beg off my plate. And yes, he's quite the beggar. But he eats better when he's begging (and by better I mean stuff that he normally refuses to eat, but will eat if he's eating it off my plate), so I let him.

His favorite food is grapes. He LOVES grapes. Next in line would be cheese. Then probably bananas. He also really likes minestrone soup, and it's a great way to get him to eat vegetables. He loves dried apricots and can munch on one little piece for hours (since they're hard to chew up when you don't have very many teeth).

He currently has two teeth. Last night I was up with him for most of the night, so number three might be making an appearance anytime now.

He isn't walking yet, but is a super speedy crawler and can stand for amazing amounts of time. Tuesday, he took two steps in a row, then just stopped. Didn't fall over or anything, just stopped. So I figure he can probably walk, but is still too scared. Maybe in another couple weeks.

Other than that, he's great at playing. He'll also follow us around the house as we get ready. He doesn't get into much trouble and is just a joy to have around. People say that when babies become mobile that you'd better watch out, but Caleb is just great. He doesn't get into cupboards or anything else he shouldn't. He's learned that pulling the toilet paper out is bad and doesn't do it anymore. He sleeps great at night (except for last night). Pretty much, he's just an angel child.

Sometimes we think we shouldn't have any more kids because there's no way they could be better than Caleb. We just love him so much.

Not a cute smiley picture, but look at those cute little teeth.

Here he is signing all done. I don't know why he doesn't like his picture being taken. It should be second nature by now. Maybe we'll have to try again later. After all, it's the last day that he's a baby. Got to get in a few more shots. We currently have only like 5500 pictures of his first year. That can't possibly be enough.

Stats Update

Went to the doctor's today. Caleb's now in the fifteenth percentile for all three things: weight, height, and head. He has broken the 20 pound marker and a half ounce -- completely naked. So way to go little guy.

He also had to get some shots today. I hate shots. Caleb cried. I wanted to throw up, I hated it so much. I just hate being the cause of his sadness. It breaks my heart to see those tears fall down his precious little cheeks. I told Brandon afterwards that I'm never going again (to get Caleb's shots), which means that Brandon's on his own. Or our kid will just end up immunizationless.

Busyness

We've been super busy this week trying to get ready for Caleb's birthday on Friday. I have tons of projects around the house that I'm working on -- and by that I mean, I wrote a list and Brandon's doing most of the work. :)

So until we get around to breaking out our camera again and taking new pictures, here are a few more from the cruise.

No, we didn't actually give him any money to gamble with. But look how much fun it can be with no money at all.

I know this one is a little blurry, but I thought his reaction to this gypsy statue was just too funny not to put up here.

And one last cute one of our not quite one year old.

Formal Night

Sunday night, on the cruise ship, was formal night. Everyone dresses up all fancy and there are a million photographers taking pictures. For us, dressing up fancy meant wearing our normal church clothes, but it was still fun.

All the other cruisers loved Caleb. They thought he was so cute and many took it as their own personal job to get him to smile for photos. Not that it's hard to get Caleb to smile. But boy did he love all the extra attention.

Here are a few pictures we took that night around the ship.

More of the Same

Here are a few more pictures from the cruise ship.

I was just going to post this first picture below. Usually when I have a bunch of similar pictures I just choose my favorite and post that one, which would be this top one of Caleb. But the other three are so cute too, that I decided to just post them all.

Cruise pictures

I was showing a friend pictures from our cruise the other night and realized that I never posted any of Caleb from the ship. Just our excursions. So here are a few from the last night on the boat.




This bottom one is actually from the night before the last night on the ship. We had just finished eating dinner. Caleb apparently hadn't liked his dinner very much and decided to snack on Daddy's nose instead.

And He's Off!

Caleb took his first step!!

We're so excited for him. He didn't really take a second step, but he took several firsts, and that's got to count for something, right?

We might just have a walker by the time he turns one!

A Day Playing

Two weeks ago, I took these pictures of Caleb just doing the things he loves to do. So here you have it, a typical day of fun for us.

I love that top picture. It's so easy to get him to smile at the camera (at least, until he decides to charge at me). And I love his one tooth grin. He now has a second tooth. It broke through on leap day and has come in enough now that you can actually see it. So we won't have many more one tooth pictures. But how I loved them.

For my niece Agnes' first birthday, we bought her this toy. She then came to visit us a month later for Caleb's blessing. One day, at the store, she saw this toy and wouldn't put it down, so my sister bought it for Caleb.

Caleb absolutely loves it now. We're trying to teach him to put the colors in the right order, but so far he's having more fun expressing himself artistically.

One of Caleb's favorite things to do is to pull books down off of shelves or tables. Here he is pulling books off the coffee table. We've since had to put the books away because he'd drop them on his feet and it'd hurt. But he still has plenty more books (that don't weigh as much) that he can pull off the bookshelf.

Here's the super cute smile he gave me after pulling off all the books.

Caleb also loves to pull tissues out of the box. He'll pull every last one out if you let him. (We don't normally let him play with tissues. But he loves it so much, that I figured we needed a couple pictures of it.)

Then he likes to rip them up. Sometimes he'll do it with his hands, but usually he prefers to use his mouth. Then he spits the pieces out into my hand.

We bought him this little table so he could practice standing up more. But his favorite thing to do, instead of playing with the toys on top, is to hide things in the little cubby. Yesterday, Brandon and Caleb were playing with a different toy and Caleb grabbed one of the toys and crawled over to his table and stuck it in the cubby for safe keeping.

You never know what you'll find hidden inside there!