2 years 4 months and 6 days

My heart kind of aches that I will never be able to capture all the cute and funny things about Dane in every stage (and I'm sure it'll only get worse with another baby). I try really hard to write things down when they happen, but there's only so much you can do. Dane is in such a delightful stage lately (most of the time)--he is a WONDERFUL napper, he has really begun to play soo happily by himself for long stretches of time (possibly because he has all these fun new trains and cars he got for Christmas), and he talks ALL THE TIME. I absolutely love it.

I love that he has no filter and everything he's thinking just comes out of his mouth. We'll just be talking and having a normal conversation and then out of nowhere he'll say, "I'm a baboon! Ba ba ba ba!" 95% of the time our conversations switch gears halfway through and we end up talking about trucks and cars, because that's where is mind is always going.

Yesterday, Dane came up into the kitchen with his arms outstretched and yelled, "YETTT IT GOOOOOO! YET IT GOOOOO!" We haven't watched that clip from Frozen for ages but he for some reason wanted to act out the Let It Go song. I just burst out laughing. Of course he wouldn't do it when I tried to get it on camera for Tommy.

Today at lunch, I said, "So, Dane, how about we have mac n cheese, blueberries, and carrots for lunch?" And he said, "Mmmmmm, how about some french fries?" Hahaha. He often will say things like, "How 'bout... how 'bout... hmmmm" when he's trying to stall me from doing something.

Whenever we ask him something that he doesn't want to answer, he'll just say, "Nope." If it's something too simplistic or obvious--"Nope." If we're trying to get him to say something he knows we already know--"Nope."

We've started to have him "help" setting the table. We always act so happy and surprised when he does it, and he LOVES it. He's actually pretty good at it too. He even knows to put the fork and knife on opposite sides of the plate now. A lot of times, he'll go put the plates on the table and then come back in the kitchen and say, "Faaaank youuu, faaank youuu," in this totally fake affected voice (like the voice we use with him when he's doing a good job at setting the table) and gives us both these big hugs.

He is absolutely angelic about his routines lately. He will usually stay in his crib for a while in the mornings before I come get him, and for a while before his nap and before bed while he's falling asleep. And he always just talks happily to himself and plays. I think he really likes that quiet play time in his bed. When we get him out of bed in the morning and after nap, he immediately gets down and walks straight into his toy room to play. Such a cute little routine. And he has his bedtime routines DOWN--he is super happy to go to bed as long as we've read a couple of books to him. Whenever we say "Should we read some books?", he'll say, " And then it's naptime!" He also always reminds us about reading scriptures (even though he acts like he hates it when we do get around to it).

I love how into his toys he is. He LOVES the little Thomas trains we got him for Christmas, and the set of cars from Cars that my mom got for him. He always, always has one of them that he carries around with him these days. And he always knows which ones he's missing. He'll come up to me and say, "Mommy, I don't know where my Thomas is." And then we have to go find him, wherever he may be.

We try to talk a lot about "the baby" and how he's going to have a baby brother soon. He likes the thought of a baby, but this entire pregnancy--ever since we've told him about a baby--he has been very insistent on saying, "I'm a baby." Any time we say anything about him being so big, he says, "I'm little. I'm a baby." Just right now, he climbed on my lap and said, "I'm da baby brother." He's just about the first toddler I've known who doesn't insist on being soooo big. I'm not sure if all of this insistence on being the baby is denial about being supplanted, but I'm sure finding it cute because I don't want him to be any bigger than he already is!

cute boy

Just posting this picture so that his grandparents can see them. SUCH a cute boy today at church! I got quite a few comments on how cute he looked today. Thanks to Brittney Bodine for the hand-me-downs!

New Year's Resolutions

It's already halfway through January, and Tommy and I still haven't talked about our New Year's resolutions for 2015. We usually try to do it for FHE at the beginning of the year, but we have had so many things to tackle and discuss with the house and buying a car and changing credit cards and all of these super-boring adult life decisions that this has fallen through the cracks. However, I have still thought of a few things I would like to implement this year. I usually come up with 25 resolutions that I want to tackle and end up failing at most of them--but I'm only going to do a few this year since I imagine things are really going to be changing in my life come April and I may have some new goals after that happens. But for now, this is what I've been thinking about.

Count to ten and take a deep breath before getting angry. I always think, "Oh, I want to be more patient, lah di dah," but that is not a very specific goal. I feel like I generally do a good job of keeping my head on straight with Dane, but I still lose my temper far too many times a day with him, especially when I am tired or annoyed with something else. It has been so obvious to me, though, how my behavior towards him affects his behavior towards me. When I am short with him or get angry really fast, he acts out more and more--but when I am patient and can redirect his attention or distract him, he stays calm--or we BOTH stay calm. It's really all up to me. He responds to my cues. So this goal is in hopes that I will be able to keep my cool more often instead of getting mad when he won't eat his dinner. It won't be easy though--because when I'm mad, it feels GOOD to be mad and show how mad I am (which is, of course, super dangerous). It's always the regret afterwards that kills.

Read my scriptures first thing during naptime. Naptime is my one free space during the day, and once Dane is in his room, usually, the first thing I do is grab the computer and veg out for ten minutes. I hate wasting time, but I do think it's okay to do something mindless like that when it relaxes me--as long as it doesn't go too long or keep me from doing what I really want to accomplish during his nap. But I think this could be a great habit for me if I grab my scriptures instead of my computer after coming out from Dane's room. I want to do it first, because if I get sucked into working or reading something else, I'm not likely to stop that to do it later. This isn't an easy one either, because lots of times, I really don't WANT to do it and I consciously decide not to grab my scriptures because I want to do nothing. One I start, of course, it is worth it. I am currently reading the Book of Mormon, focusing on learning about characteristics of Christ and Heavenly Father, and it is really, really great. I know that naptime is going to be significantly different over the course of the year--baby #2 will interfere with my blessed solitude, I know, and Dane may stop napping altogether this year (nooo!), but for now, this is a good goal for me.

Write about tender mercies in my journal once a week. I wrote about one thing I was grateful for in my journal every day in the month of November, and I LOVED it. I found myself searching for what I was grateful for and writing a lot about each of those things. I kind of ran out of steam by the end of the month though, but I want to do something similar this year--to try and write about little blessings or tender mercies I experience day to day. I don't want my journal to be just "this is what I did today"--I want to focus on the things that will be significant to me in the future when I look back so that I can remember how we have been so blessed.

Get our house in order before the baby comes. I don't even know if this is possible. I love, love, love our house. But we have a page-long list of things to do with our house--most of them little, but most of them I can't do by myself, and I am dying, dying to get them done before baby comes. The bigger issue is that we have basically no furniture still, so we have a lot of expenses just waiting to happen until we can get what we want. I really loathe spending money, but I would love to have all of our big items checked off the list--pictures hanging on the walls, new couches, some sort of sitting area in our bedroom, baby's room cleared out and organized. I don't even have big dreams of painting or decorating a nursery super cute; I just want to put everything in its place and put away. I don't think that's too much to ask, and we've got 3 months left to do it all (cross your fingers!).

Figure out our budget and stick to it. We have been experimenting with budgeting a lot since Tommy started his job, because all of a sudden we actually have a little more money than we just need to live off of. And with all the recent (and I'm sure, continuing) expenses with buying a house, I am making it my goal to make sure we are SAVING a high percentage of that instead of spending willy-nilly. We've been using mint.com and it is very helpful, although I kind of hate it because we still seem to go over EVERY MONTH. But we are still working on it and figuring out how much we really need to spend on things every month, and I think things will settle down in a few months and we'll be right where we should be.

Be kind to myself after the baby comes. I want to make sure I keep exercising as much as I can before the baby comes, because it is SO helpful for me mentally and makes me feel productive and somewhat human. And I know I will want to exercise pretty soon after baby is born, for all the same reasons. But I am not going to fall into the trap of dying to "get my body back" six weeks after he is born. It is not realistic, ever, for anyone, and especially won't be for me this time with two little friends to watch after. I am deciding now that I will allow myself to just do what I need to and not worry about getting into a bathing suit (although it is a bummer that the baby will be born in April and I'm pretty sure I'm going to have a toddler who will want to go swimming pretty soon after that).


This is not a hefty list--but I think they are little things that I can accomplish that will make my life better over the year. If I can stick to these, I will feel like I'm making progress in my life.

Also

Last night, Tommy was putting Dane to bed and Dane told him to tell a story about "the train going through the tunnel into the Jurassic Period." He's watched some of the educational kids show Dinosaur Train, where they do mention the time periods and their names and stuff, but we had no idea he was absorbing it like that. We could not stop laughing!

Sure glad he's got a high self-esteem

This morning, Dane was walking around quietly saying to himself, "I'm so important. I'm so important." And a few weeks ago, he was doing the same thing, saying, "I'm da best. I'm da best."

Cousin pictures

If we'd been totally fair and normal this year, we should have been in Ogden for Christmas, because we went to Irvine for Christmas last year. But our trips aren't just about the holidays, but about seeing everyone we want to see. Tommy's sister Melissa and her family were in Washington for Christmas this year, and we would have only seen them for about a day if we hadn't come later. And that was a BIG DEAL because Melissa's two kids, Zach and Baby Maddie, are two of Dane's favorite people in the WORLD. We really wanted to make sure that Dane got time to play with his cousins, and I am so, so glad we did. It was SO worth it! 

Dane had an absolute BLAST with Zach. He loved Jaxon and Maddie too, and I know they'll all play together more then they're all walking and running around together. But oh, man--Dane and Zach were little inseparable mischief makers the whole time we were there. While looking through all our pictures from the trip, I took SO many of the two of them together because it made me so, so happy to see them playing together! I kept just going and watching them playing, because it reminded me so much of being with my cousins when I was little. They would just run around, sneak off into the basement, follow each other everywhere, completely ignoring the adults and basking in the glory of not having anyone paying any attention to them--it felt just like how I felt when I was a kid reuniting with my cousins. And they're only two! I can only imagine how it's going to be when they get bigger--and I can't wait. I was so glad that we had a lot of days there with them, so that they could play together and really love each other. 

Look at them both laughing! So cute!

Zach taught Dane how to slide down the stairs on his tummy, and they just kept crawling up and sliding down and laughing the whole time.

They spent all of New Year's Eve running around together, jumping on the couches and sliding off them, and yelling together.

They kept interrupting Callie's workout because they wanted to play with her (and the treadmill!).

These three boys together! Such cuties. Once Jaxon is officially walking and running around, they will be an unstoppable team, I just know it.

They all look like they're in time out--but they were just playing there and we stopped them to get a picture.

 All of the four cousins eating dinner together.

Since Zach and Dane weren't there for Christmas, Grandma gave them both the same book--a construction vehicle book! How did she know?

Playing together at the kids' museum in Salt Lake.

We went over to Zach's house one morning and they really wanted to go outside together. All bundled up!

They just love hugging each other!

Dane keeps talking about how he and Zach took a bath together.

Dane really loves, LOVES baby Maddie. He's always talking about her and whenever he sees her, he runs up and gives her a big hug and says in a high-pitched voice, "Hi, baby Maddie! Hiiii!"

Just about ready for bed--the last night before we had to tear them apart again (tears!). 

I am so happy that Dane has two cousins around his age! And I'm happy that baby #2 will have two his age too--one on each side. I had about seven cousins my age, so I was a little bit spoiled--but two each isn't too bad. We had SUCH a good time in Ogden with everyone. While watching Dane play with Zach and seeing how much they loved each other, Tommy and I kept saying to each other, "Can you imagine if we lived closer and how they could play like this all the time?" But we'll have to just keep treasuring our visits and trying to visit as much as we can. We've been talking a lot about budgeting for this new year, and how we need to budget in for our trips to visit our families because it is really important to us that we set aside enough money to do that. We may not be able to visit as often as we like, but we're definitely going to try! Thank you for a great time, Leiningers!

New Year's in Ogden

We spent a few days in Ogden after visiting Irvine. We were only able to be there for four days, so it really didn't feel like a lot of time and we wanted to make sure we were able to do enough with everyone. We had a ton of fun with all the Leiningers while we were there though.

One of the best things we were able to be there for was the bachelorette and bachelor parties for Troy and his fiancee Sarah. Troy is getting married in Denmark at the end of this month, to Sarah, and they will be living there from now on. So this was our last chance to see Troy here before becoming an ex-pat, and my first chance to meet Sarah, who was visiting for Christmas and New Year's. Kurt and Kristen planned some parties for each of them to celebrate. The girls went to Color Me Mine and painted some pottery, and then to Olive Garden for dinner. It was really fun to get some planned conversation/bonding time and to get to know Sarah better. I loved it. After these parties, Tommy and I said to each other that even if we could have only been in Utah for this one day, it would have been worth it to be there for this.

One mom, four sisters, and three sisters-in-law. We were just missing Lindsay in China and Kurt's future wife, whoever she may be!

The boys (or men) went to a shooting range for their manly bachelor party, and then, of course, to a steakhouse for dinner. They had all four brothers and one brother-in-law there! Greg was working and couldn't go because he has a hurt shoulder.

On New Year's Eve morning, we were wanting to take Dane sledding, but Dane threw a major fit and would not get into his snow clothes, so we gave up. But an hour later he happily put on his snow clothes to go play in the snow and "sled" in the backyard. He had a number of willing slaves to pull him around the backyard!

Zach came too and the two of them LOVED getting towed around together.

Dane was majorly obsessed with Jet and kept running around with him trying to pet him.

We got to go on a lunch date while Dane was napping on New Year's Eve--our last one for the year! On the last day of the year! Good timing, Tommy!

Dinner with a packed house on New Year's Eve.

After the little kiddos went to bed, we played some Minute to Win It games (like pencil bouncing into a cup, passing M n M's with a straw, etc.) and had a Just Dance Wii competition in the basement for our New Year's Eve festivities. 

Probably my favorite moment of the night--the four brothers doing Just Dance together to "The Final Countdown." So awesome!

And then we had the three sisters-in-law, and Kurt representing his future wife.

The Leiningers' tradition is to make Black Bottomed Combos for New Year's Eve--some concoction with ice cream, chocolate syrup, and meringue. 

And of course, sparkling apple cider!

On New Year's Day, we went to a children's museum in Salt Lake City. Look at all these adults going to the kids' museum for just two toddlers! Also, note the engaged couple in the middle. (More pics of this to come.)

We went bowling on the last day we were there, and Dane absolutely LOVED it. He even got his own bowling shoes--so cute! He kept saying, "I push the ball into the pins!" He totally got it and understood what was going on. Thank goodness for those little kid helpers to get them to bowl.

Dane even got a STRIKE using this thing on his third try. What a champion! He also kept saying, "I got a strike!"

These two were VERY helpful with everyone bowling. They both of course wanted to help push the ball every time. For some reason we all got very low scores this game.