Dainen's Birthday Party

We had Dainen's birthday party with some of his friends last Saturday. This is the first time I've had the computer so I decided to put up the pictures while I had the chance. We had a lot of fun! YAY Dainen!

Here are Dainen, Chloe, and Braeden coloring Toy Story characters


We played Pin the Sheriff's Badge on Woody. Here is Dainen taking his turn


Braeden had fun spinning


Dainen blew out his candles all by himself


Close-up of the cake. Are you noticing a theme?


Dainen got some Toy Story figures from Braeden and Chloe, in addition to the ones on the cake. He LOVES Toy Story!


He also got a shirt and pants from Braeden and Chloe. The shirt has a monster on it that says "NOISY". It's so Dainen.


Play-Doh from Nonna and Papa. We think he learned this face from Ratatouille. So funny!


Nonna and Papa also gave Dainen a little bowling set. Braeden was really excited to throw the balls at the frog-shape pins.


Buzz Lightyear and his evil nemesis Emperor Zurg! The outfit is from Nonna and Papa.


Have I mentioned Dainen loves Toy Story? Specifically Buzz. Emily and Mike and their kids got Dainen footy pj's that look like Buzz Lightyear. He loves them!


Thank you so much everyone, for making this a great birthday for Dainen. And thanks to all those who sent cards, it meant a lot. We love our TWO YEAR OLD BOY!

Birthday Pictures

So when Dainen woke up this morning, Ryan and I went to get him from his crib and we sang the Happy Birthday song as we did so. As soon as we started singing, Dainen got this huge, ear to ear grin on his face and started jumping up and down in his crib. We got him out and were still singing when he started clapping and saying, "Yay! Yay!" It was so cute and so fun to see him excited about his birthday. We're not sure he really understands what was going on today, but he was getting everyone's attention and people were singing to him all day long, so he wasn't complaining. :) It was a good day.

Here are some pictures from Dainen's birthday:

This first one is Dianen talking on the phone with his cousins, Kali and Maci. They were singing Happy Birthday, hence the big huge smile.

Brad and Mallory gave Dainen an M&M dispenser.

Dainen loves Grandpa Gardner, affectionately called "Papa".

Daddy helped him blow out his candles. They were shaped in a "2".

Grandma and Grandpa Juchau sent Dainen some balloons with a card.


Thank you everyone for making this such a great day for him! He had so much fun and is so excited to be two!! We love you all!

All grown up

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DAINEN! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DAINEN! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DAINEN! HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO DAINEN!
I can't believe my baby is two years old today!! He is getting so big! I love him so much and can't wait to see what this next year brings!

Happy birthday little man!

Valentine's Day Weekend

For Valentine’s Day weekend, Ryan, his brother Jordan, his cousin David, Dainen, and I went to Albuquerque, New Mexico to visit Ryan’s family. We had a fun and… interesting time, filled with moments we aren’t likely to ever forget. ;)

Memory 1: Going to church with Ryan’s grandparents. We were looking forward to spending quality time with them one on one, and then we would go to their house afterwards. Good plan in theory, choppy in the execution. We got to the building, were about halfway through the first hour, the first speaker was up giving her talk, and I see Dainen sitting on Ryan’s lap puking his little guts out… all over Ryan, his phone, the pew, and the chapel floor. I grab him to take him to the bathroom and he proceeds to puke all over me. I won’t gross you out with more details, but needless to say, we didn’t stay long. We cleaned up the mess after everyone left the chapel and went back to Ryan’s cousin’s house. Happy Valentine’s Day to us!!

Memory 2: Having a relaxing dinner with the family at Dan and Lindsey’s house. It had been crazy and they wanted us to just relax and enjoy a good meal. Who knew we’d get a water show spectacular to go with it? After dinner we were all sitting around talking, watching the Olympics, when water started POURING from the recessed lights in their kitchen. Come to find out, pretty quickly I might add, the upstairs bathroom toilet had flooded and the water had drained into the floor vent that goes between the two stories and the only place it had to escape was through the lights. Alex, Dan and Lindsey’s oldest son, was ecstatic to have a waterfall in his kitchen and thought it was so cool! Lol. (As it turns out, it seems the damage wasn’t as bad as it looked and won’t be too bad to repair. YAY!)

Memory 3: Driving home, sitting behind the wheel, looking in the rearview mirror and seeing Dainen choking on a mouthful of peanuts. Dainen has this weird tendency to not swallow carrots and peanuts once he has chewed them. He always asks for them and wants to eat them, but he will not swallow them. Instead he usually ends up keeping them stored in his mouth for awhile and then spitting them out in my hand. Well, because I was driving and Ryan was in the passenger seat, we had no way of knowing that he was eating peanuts and not swallowing them. Ryan’s brother and cousin had no way of knowing about Dainen’s weird tendency, so he just got more and more peanuts. All it took was one cough and suddenly he was choking on peanuts. With one hand on the wheel, I reached my other hand back, shoved it in his mouth and scraped out all the peanuts I could, until Ryan realized what was going on and took over so I wouldn’t crash. (Wait until you’re a Mom, and then you’ll understand my priorities.) It took some coaxing, but they were finally able to get Dainen to spit out all the remaining peanuts and he was ok.

Despite all of these wonderful memories, we really did have a good time. Lol! :) Ryan and I got to spend a night out just the two of us, which doesn’t happen very often anymore. We got to spend a lot of time with family that we haven’t seen in a long time. We got to go to the aquarium, and Ryan got to snowboard with his cousins. It was a great trip and we had a lot of fun!!

(I tried to post pictures and videos, but for some reason, my computer is having a hard time doing it. So….pictures and videos to come. Sorry!)

Resolution

So I have to say I'm probably one of the worst bloggers on the net. And it makes me sad that I haven't chronicled any of our doings this past year. SO! With a renewed sense of... something, I have decided to give it another go. :)
This past year has been really great! We stayed home, here in Utah, for the summer. YAY no summer sales! Ryan took classes, shadowed doctors, and did research for one of his professors. He also took the MCAT, and did really well. We bought a new car, a Honda FIT, that we absolutely LOVE!! Ryan applied to Medical schools and D.O. schools (Doctor of Osteopathy), and we recently found out, after interviewing, that he was accepted to Touro University in Vallejo, CA. It is a DO school that also offers a dual degree program, so he can get a Masters in Public Health along with his Doctor of Osteopathy. He still has an interview scheduled with a school in Arizona, so we haven't made any final decisions, but we are really really excited about this school and the possibility of living so close to my family. Not to mention that it is just an awesome school with a great program!
Dainen is now almost TWO years old!! He loves to jump around the house, literally, and climb and jump off of things. It scares his mommy to death, but he has a lot of fun. His favorite game to play is tackling daddy. He runs as fast as he can across the living room and tackles Ryan at full force. He doesn't even slow down. He loves wrestling and playing with his daddy. He also loves movies, talking on the phone, and playing on the computer. He isn't quite talking in complete sentences, but he is trying. I understand about 90% of what he says, and the rest he makes up. We have a lot of fun playing together.
I am currently just a stay at home mom, and loving it. I have been working on a lot of projects around the house. Recovering the couch, making curtains for the kitchen (thank you Mallory for your sewing machine), decorating Dainen's room with vinyl lettering (thank you Lesley for your Cricut), rearranging the furniture in the living room, getting rid of old furniture and replacing it with new stuff, going through closets and getting rid of old clothes, organizing and cleaning... etc etc. Have you ever gone through a "nesting stage" when you weren't actually pregnant?? Weird. But it feels really good to be getting things in order.
So that's pretty much what has been going on with us lately. I'll update again soon.... I promise!! With pictures. :)

FIRST BIRTHDAY!!

Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday to you! Happy Birthday dear Dainen! Happy Birthday to you!

I can't believe my baby boy is one year old!! His birthday was on Sunday, the 22^nd. We had a little party for him the Saturday before. My mom, my sister Allison, and my brother Mike were in town for the weekend so they were able to come. In addition, my other brother Brad and his girlfriend Mallory came, and my best friend Lesley and her family came. It was so fun! Dainen opened presents (he likes taking the tissue paper out of the bags) and played with his toys. Braeden and Chloe played with him and showed him how the cars he got went into the little garage. It was fun to watch them all play together. He got lots of cars, some blocks to stack and build towers with (I think Ryan plays with these more than Dainen does), a steering wheel that honks and makes car noises, and lots of clothes. The clothes are a little bit big, sadly, because he's still so tiny. He's still wearing 6-9 month clothes. But at least he'll be able to grow into them. He's just so little. :)

After he opened presents we sang to him and had cake and ice cream. We stripped him down to his onesie and put him on the floor with his own little cake so he could just plow into it, but he didn't really like it. Ryan mashed Dainen's hand into the cake to show him what to do and Dainen just got frustrated. He didn't like the feeling of the cake mashed into his fingers and he kept trying to wipe it off. It was pretty funny. When he had obviously had enough with the cake we washed him off and just shared our pieces with him. I think he much preferred it that way. :)

The cake I made for everyone else was way fun. I'm proud of how it turned out. :) Dainen likes to climb all over us and everything else, so we call him our little monkey boy. Plus, he makes this face sometimes that looks like a monkey. So I thought it was only fitting to make a monkey cake. YAY me! Some of you might be laughing at me, but I don't care. I didn't have a cake mold or anything, just a picture, so I think it turned out really great. (Thanks Mom and Alli for your help!)

After cake, we just let the kids play with all the new toys until it was time for bed. Dainen had had a long and fun-filled day, so he was pretty tired by the end of it. (So was his mommy to be honest.) But it really was a great day! Thank you all for your love and support! Thanks for the cards and phone calls wishing our little man a Happy Birthday. We really appreciated it.

Here is a picture of Dainen trying to get to the presents on the table. He was really excited!!

Update

I know it has been forever since I last posted, and I'm so so sorry. Things have been going really well. We had a lot of fun over the holidays. We spent Thanksgiving in Nevada City with my family and Christmas in Idaho Falls with Ryan's family. It was so fun to see everyone and to be able to spend time with them all. Dainen has had a lot of fun getting to know his cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. And they all love him (who wouldn't, let's be honest).

Dainen is now 11 months old and he is walking. He took his first steps at 10 months and has spent the last month perfecting the art. He is still wobbly, but he's more confident. It is still shocking to see him walk, though, because he is so little. For those of you who haven't heard, he is in the 0% for his weight. When we took him in for his 9 month check-up, they were concerned about his weight so they told us to bring him back for a weight check in a month. So we did and he had only gained 5 oz. that whole month, bringing him up to a whopping 15 lbs. 12 oz. He's just so little. But one of the first things people say when they hold him is how solid he is. He's a strong little guy. And he's so smart. He understands what NO means, but he likes to test his limits, see how serious we are. He knows when he is in trouble, and he speed crawls to try to get away. Sometimes I can't help but laugh, even though I'm supposed to be serious so he knows I'm not playing. Kids are so fun. :) I love being a mom. I love watching him learn and experience things. I love it when he hits those milestones, or even when he just does something that he's never done before. He has started making this cheesy smile face when he thinks he's being funny, or when he thinks we're talking about him. It is the cutest thing! And he does this fake laugh with it. And it's great because it's one of the only times you can see his one little tooth. It finally came in last week, the only tooth he has. So stinkin' cute! I haven't been able to get a picture of it, but when I do, I'll post it.

So, last Thursday, I went to vacuum and Dainen was just walking around the living room. As soon as I turned on the vacuum, he froze. He didn't like it and he thought it was going to get him. So I turned it off and grabbed the camera, and this is what I got. At one point, he had the vacuum on one side of him and the door stop on the other, and he just didn't know what to do. (He really doesn't like door stops. The noise they make scares him.) Poor kid! But So cute!