Isaac's First Christmas

We had a wonderful Christmas! The 3 of us were lucky enough to spend the holiday in Arizona, surrounded by our family. It was perfect! Isaac loved being around people all the time and he seemed to bask in all of the smiles and love.
Here are some pictures that we took in his Christmas outfit on Christmas day. (By the way, I am not usually one for silly hats - but I loved how he looked like an elf in it. It was hilarious! So we took a bunch of pictures without the hat and then put it on to take a few more pictures - and of course those are the pictures that turned out super cute. Sorry Isaac - you'll probably hate me for putting you in this outfit someday.)

Opening Presents

We opened presents with the Nilands (my family) on Christmas Eve. As soon as we put a present in front of Isaac he went for it. He loved the bright colored paper and he especially loved just sitting and exploring new things. He loves that! At first he was a little timid, but by Christmas day he was attacking the presents like an old pro.

Christmas morning was spent with Jeremy's family. Unfortunately, Jeremy got sick on Christmas Eve and so he missed the whole excitement of Christmas morning (with 7 little kids at the home there was QUITE the excitement). Poor Jeremy! Isaac and I were able to enjoy the morning though. We sat and watched (and played with the discarded wrapping paper). Anyway, we waited to open Isaac's presents until the afternoon when Jeremy could be there to watch. Here he is enjoying the paper... I mean the presents. :)



It was so much fun to be with the family and feel the excitement of Christmas. It was really fun for me to have Isaac this year and to watch his face as he intently looked at the Chrismas lights, grabbed at the Christmas presents, and explored all of the sights and sounds of the season. I can't wait for next year already!!!

Sickness and Superman

Unfortunately, we commemorated another Isaac "first" this week. Isaac is sick! He's never been sick before and as any good, paranoid, first time mom... it has been distressing to me. The day he got sick I rushed out and bought a humidifier, saline drops, infant motrin, and extra infant tylenol (just in case we run out in the middle of the night some time). I nursed him, cuddled him, and listened to his little congested breaths. Now, you would think that my nursing background would give me some sort of advantage - some degree of peace and sense of calm in this sort of situation. NOPE. Instead, I take his temperature. Count his respiratory rate. Watch for grunting, retracting, nasal flaring and worry about every complication possible.

Here's a picture of my sweet sick little baby.

He is so congested, sneezes all the time, and every so often coughs a deep "old man" cough - that startles him. He looks up at me all scared after he coughs as if to say, "Mom... what was that??" So sad!

The good news? This last week he has finally decided to accept his pacifier! We are thrilled about that since it is able to comfort him. Inspite of it all he is still smiling and trying his best to enjoy playing. What a trooper.

Speaking of troopers.... we are very lucky to have SUPERMAN in our family. This guy is amazing. Isaac has been sick and I have actually gotten really sick as well (no picture necessary). So, our SUPERMAN Jeremy is in the middle of finals, working on two different 15 page papers, busy with church stuff, planning a Sunday School lesson, getting up all night with our little guy, watching Isaac so that I can sleep in, bringing me flowers, catering to my every need, cleaning the house, doing the dishes, making dinner, and preparing for us to leave on our 3 week vacation. Whew! Wow.... he really is superman - isn't he?? Thank you for taking such good care of us... we love you Jeremy!!!!

We take it for granted...

Sitting up is not as easy as it looks! Isaac is just starting to learn how to sit up. I've been helping him practice for about a week (I didn't think of it before then - oops). And he's doing great! On December 10th he finally sat up on his own for a few seconds (long enough for me to be able to let go - grab the camera - and snap a few pictures). The safety conscious Jeremy set up pillows around him. Isaac thought that was pretty fun.

Here's his grin after one "spill."

But he is getting better and better at it. Practice makes perfect!
Only leaning a LITTLE to the side at times.

What a cute kid.

So this is it! His first moment sitting up. He's growing up SO fast!!!! I can't believe that he is sitting up already!!!

Music Without the Spoken Word

Isaac loves music.

Particularly the music that his toy giraffe plays when you pull on the handle, the music that my cell phone makes when it rings, Jeremy's drum beats, and the music from our keyboard. We have recently discovered that he loves to "sit" at the keyboard and play for us.

Here is his musical debut...

All I have to say is that he must have inherited his Granny Jo's genes...

Catching up on Blogging

When Isaac was born I was a little overwhelmed and I didn't blog for the first 2 months of his life.... so... I have decided to go back and blog about the important events in that time so that when I print off my blog as my family journal - it will all be in there. So, over the next month or so you can enjoy catching up with me. Feel free to completely ignore the posts - it is mostly for our family journal. But we thought that everyone might enjoy seeing the pictures that they missed out on.

Rolling Over is Fun to Do

Isaac rolled over from his back to his stomach for the first time on November 10th. Then - he didn't do it again for a few weeks.

Finally, on December 5th he decided to perfect the maneuver. And now he is rolling over constantly. And he's fast! You put him down on the floor on his back - blink - and he is squirming on his stomach. It's pretty impressive! He loves to roll over and play on the floor now. But he gets frustrated once he rolls over onto his stomach (he seems to have forgotten that he already knows how to roll from his stomach to his back - silly boy!). So after he squirms for a while I place him back onto his back - and the game begins again. It's pretty fun!

Here's the slow motion play by play...

He's so proud of himself and he loves practicing his new skill (could that be because I cheer and clap everytime he does it???). Anyway, we love watching him learn to do new things. What a fun and active boy!!!

My Recipe Blog

Just FYI... I decided to start a recipe blog. I enjoy cooking and I especially enjoy trying new recipes - so I decided that I wanted to start another blog just for myself as an online recipe book... somewhere that I could compile all of the recipes that I have tried (and what I think of them and how I have adapted the recipe and what I want to do differently the next time that I make it... etc). Anyway, I am just getting started on it so there aren't very many recipes yet. It's pretty simple stuff - but feel free to check it out if you want to. There is a link to it on the side of this blog that says "My recipe book" or the address is http://johnstonfamilyrecipes.blogspot.com.

Thanks!

Homemade Laundry Detergent

So... last night I made my own homemade liquid laundry detergent! Weird. I actually feel very domestic - like quite the homemaker. :) Anyway, to make laundry detergent (just in case you were wondering...) you need only these 3 ingredients. It's actually pretty simple.
First, you grate the Fels-Naptha soap bar so that it looks like this...

Then you add it to some boiling water until it dissolves. Next, you add the Arm & Hammer Washing Soda and the 20 Mule Team Borax and stir the mixture until they dissolve as well. It will look like this...

and it will smell like a magical potion and you may feel like a witch brewing something in a black cauldron... (or maybe that was just me)

Finally you dilute the mixture with some water... and voila! Homemade Laundry Detergent! Why, you ask??? Why would someone make homemade laundry detergent?? Well - two reasons......

1. For the thrill of trying something new and learning how to do something on your own.

2. To save a little $$. This batch costs $.70 to make and it will last us for 70 loads!!! That is only $.01 per load. What a deal!

I just took my own laundry detergent and filled up my empty detergent containers. One batch filled both detergent bottles and an entire empty milk jug. I got this idea and recipe from a friend's blog (http://iamfrugal.blogspot.com). Go there and click on frugal recipes to find the exact recipe for homemade laundry detergent. Anyway, she has some other great frugal ideas if you are interested... included homemade dishwasher detergent - which I plan to try soon. She has been using this laundry detergent for 6 months with no problems... so I am going to give it a try. I'll let you know how it goes!