Joshua's first road trip!

Check out Joshua's blog for a good summary of our recent road trip, but you can also look at the album I just put up on Facebook! http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2029112&id=27502550&l=e0315&ref=share

First haircut

I have been telling people it was traumatic, and they assume I mean for Joshua...but I just mean for me. Seeing all those curls going in the garbage can was very sad, but we left curls in the back. We waited until Grandma and Grandpa Rozen were here so that they could see both his crazy crazy curls and be there for an important event - that very first haircut! I did it myself while he was sitting in the bathtub, so some hair got in the tub and went down the drain, but I don't think it really clogged it up, so that's good. So I want to post some before, during, and after pictures. As his hair gets longer, we'll have to decide if we're keeping the mullet that will form...probably not, but it looks so stinking cute now. I miss his curls, but it is much easier to take care of. I wasn't super interested in buying baby gel or something like that and he'd wake up each morning and after each nap with his hair sticking straight out or straight up on one side or the other. It was endearing for awhile, but we decided it was time to get it a bit shorter. Ok here are the pictures!

A mystery...

So how old is Joshua now?  Just about 15 months, right?  So I’ve been “postpartum” for 15 months.  I’d say that since about September, life got uncrazy enough to make me feel like I’d have time and energy to do some exercising and get my body back to where I’d like it to be.  So I started out doing some crunches to tighten up that loose tummy skin, but that was entirely unsuccessful – just seemed to make it worse.  Those of you who saw me pregnant probably remember that my tummy went straight out about 10 feet (well maybe not quite that far, but it felt like it when I was trying to wash my hands and couldn’t reach the faucet).  Anyway, I’m back at my pre-pregnancy weight and don’t have much to complain about, I’m not saying that, but my tummy still looks funny – loose and very stretch-marky. 

 

So now I am motivated to do something about it again (yes, yes, about 8 months after I gave up the crunches, but better late than never), and I started looking online for advice on what to do.  At first I just came across all sorts of articles about how that loose skin will never go away and you just have to wait until you are done having babies and then have surgery.  That was very discouraging…but then I finally found some information about what happens to your abdominal muscles when that baby is in there, and which muscles will help (or harm) the process of getting rid of that extra stuff.  So basically what you need to focus on is your Transverse Abdominus, and not with the typical crunches or other ab exercises that you regularly hear about, which only exercise the surface muscles and so push your tummy out even further. 

 

Nope, to strengthen these muscles, the main exercise that I found is called the “vacuum” (or a variation is called the “cross”, which is just the vacuum with your arms extended straight out).  All there is to it is that you stand straight with good posture and your spine straight and suck in your stomach like you’re pulling your belly button towards your spine.  With a lot of repetition, this will help pull the muscles on the sides of your waist inward. This is also a really good exercise just to get your waist a bit skinnier – not only to get rid of post-pregnancy looseness.  Here are a couple of links if you’re interested: 

 

http://www.statssheet.com/articles/article49654.html

http://www.straighttothebar.com/2007/11/specific_training_for_the_tran.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_exercise

 

So today (6/23) I’m starting, and I hope to see some results.  If I can feel comfortable in a bathing suit, I’ll be happy! If it doesn’t do much, that’s fine, too – I’ll know that I tried, and I’ll be ok with my “mommy tummy.” Any other suggestions from moms who’ve been successful would be appreciated, too!

Joshua's words

I was in the doctor's office the other day, and waiting FOREVER for the doctor to actually come in, so I probably read every word of every poster on the wall. One of the posters was about child development, and it said that normal development for an 18-month old child is that they can say 8-10 recognizable words. This made me realize that Joshua's language development is really pretty remarkable. So I tried making a list of the words he says (most of them he says often and consistently, though some of them he's only said a few times, but I of course count them anyway!).

So here is the list of words he knows, and he picks up new ones each day (really!)

• Jesus
• Car
• Mama
• Dada
• Papa
• Mamma
• Banana
• Mindy
• Ball
• Baby
• Bird
• No
• Bath
• Book
• Milk
• Brush
• Meat
• Pillow
• Help
• Door
• Yikes
• Uh Oh
• Whoa
• Wow
• Eww
• Mmmm
• Amen
• Loofah
• Man
• Water
• What's that?
• Bottle
• Cracker
• Cookie
• Feather
• Bye-Bye

***Later addition of some words that I forgot, and new ones he has learned***

• Rowan
• Bumbo
• Apple

And then his signs:

• Yes
• Milk
• Eat
• More
• Please
• Thank you

And animal noises that he can make quite consistently:

• Cow
• Sheep
• Duck
• Elephant
• Walrus
• Baby
• Snake
• Horse
• Lion
• Dinosaur
• Monkey
• Fish

That was all - just wanted to brag about my genius baby. He amazes me.

I couldn't wait...

I wanted to wait awhile before posting another video...and I wanted to maybe have Nathan give this one some titles and music and credits...but if you know me much, you know I'm not very patient...so enjoy!

My little wanderer

A few disclaimers...

1. This video is perhaps a bit boring for some of you who see Joshy often, or maybe who have little ones of your own...but it is mostly for those of you who haven't seen Joshy walking around yet. This is a pretty typical few minutes in the life of our little explorer. Although, he amazingly doesn't get in as much trouble as he sometimes does.
2. I apologize (as should Joshua, really) for the gross-looking carpet - it's getting cleaned really soon. We very much underestimated the amount of damage having Joshy's high chair on the carpet would do. Yikes!
3. Our apartment is a disaster in this video...most of the chaos is put away at night and our home returns to some sort of order.
4. Check out our new vinyl flooring in our kitchen! I love it!
5. For Aunty Mindy - yes he is saying your name over and over through his second lap through the kitchen.

Enjoy!

Priorities!

I decided that rather than start in on my huge list of things to do, I'd post on my blog first. However, I do want to take a trip back in time and write out my to-do lists for the week like I used to do! Then I'll get on to the good stuff, I promise.

For Home/Family/Church:
do budgets
develop photos
post on blog
write birthday cards
plan trip dates
get photos from my baptism (to put on personal history)
scan more pictures for facebook
update my Personal Progress
finalize next week's service project
call about the presidency meeting on Sunday
have presidency meeting
plan lesson
teach lesson
go to doctor appointment
have FHE
exchange lids for bins at Target
put away the bins of Joshua's clothes
go to Mutual
many loads of laundry (it's been WAY too hot to do laundry...but I figure 79 is the coolest it's been in awhile, so I'll do it today)


Ok now for my to-do list for Work:
file things
get last rent payment
exchange ink
pick up forms
prep move-in papers for Saturday
mail move-out paperwork
figure out repairing cat pee damage :c(
get my new Asset Manager's cell number
traffic report
vacancy report
monthly report
update directory on cabinet door
meet with new Asset Manager
mail P.O.s

I've really found it helpful to make a big weekly to-do list, and add stuff to it as the week goes on. It has been a good thing for me, and I've been doing it for three weeks.

Things are going amazingly well at the apartments, soooo much better than last year at this time. Certainly having a toddler rather than a newborn is a lot easier in many ways, but most of it is just knowing the ropes more. Last year, we were just starting out, with no idea what we were doing (both in being parents and being apartment managers), and we had 5 apartments to fill. I shudder just thinking about it. Now for the last MONTH we've been at 100% occupancy, which doesn't mean that we've had no apartments empty, it just means that all the vacant ones or ones on notice have had people commited to them. So that's been amazing. Before this month started, we never went more than one day (15 hours to be exact) at 100% occupancy. Seriously. No good. But I'm really enjoying this. We even have a waiting list, though I don't know how long they'll be willing to wait, so by the time we get a notice, we may have no more waiting list. Either way, that's fine. We've had some stressful stuff come up with a couple apartments, but it's getting resolved, and will be ok. Yikes, I need to stop talking about this stuff, as I had to make a VERY conscious decision to post on here before doing work for the day. Joshy's nap times are my work times, and he's been asleep for almost an hour, so we'll see how much gets done today!

So that's the work situation - what about the adorable baby situation, you ask?

Well, our little critter is changing and growing so much - I love it! Pretty much from the moment he wakes up til the time he goes to sleep (and once or twice I've heard him say it in his sleep), he is asking, "wut dah?" about EVERYTHING. That's his form of "what's that?" So we are answering that question much of the day. He's still not super interested in walking on his own, but he's doing it more little by little. He is definitely into everything, though, and interested in climbing on anything, though we don't have a lot of climb-on-able stuff at his height yet. He'll figure out the couch and chairs soon enough, though. He loves climbing stairs, but we don't have any of those, so he doesn't get a lot of practice.

His language development is definitely going quickly - yesterday at Grandma and Grandpa Palmer's house, he wanted to know what some feathers were on a dream-catcher they have on the wall, and we asked him to say feather, and he said "fev-ver" very well. We were all impressed. He loves to say "Pa Pa" for Grandpa, and points out his "Pa Pa" in pictures for BOTH Grandpas, which makes me happy, since he doesn't see Grandpa Rozen as often. He loves his Aunty Mindy, and is very good at saying "Min-inn" when he sees her picture or sees her. Don't worry Aunty Emily, we'll keep working on Aunty Emmy - I'm sure he'll get it soon.

So, his repertoire of words currently includes (and I'll probably forget some) :
Wut-da? (what's that?)
Mama
Dada
Papa
Mam-ma (though he's been shy about saying it lately)
Min-inn (Mindy)
Buh bye (he LOVES to say buh bye for goodbye and goodnight)
Zee-Zuh ("Jesus," which he says with amazing accuracy when he sees different pictures of Jesus...or sometimes when he sees his Uncle Geoffy - ha!)
Cruh-cuh (cracker)
Buh (bird)
Meh! (Amen)
Buuuuuuh (Brrrr!)
Baw (or something like that...for ball)
MANY different animal sounds (elephant, snake, cow, horse, ducky, sheep) - we're currently working on what a walrus says, but mostly he just cracks up at that one
Yah-ya-yo (e-i-e-i-o, which I think was one of his first words because we sang Old McJoshy so often...but now he says it when we ask him what a farmer says)
Nana (Banana, and many other things in his world, often things that are yellow)
Do! (Door, which he is often very enthusiastic about)
Nn-yo (Unfortunately he is a big fan of saying no now, generally right before he does something that he knows I'll say no to, such as pulling the mouse off the desk or pulling over the garbage can that has recycling in it.

Ok I can't think of others...but I know there are more.

He is very musical, and we got him a little xylophone/piano, which he has been having fun with. He likes to play it with his feet, as well as Grandma Palmer's piano. I was sitting on the bench with him on my lap yesterday, and he started pushing with his feet against the piano, and I was too close, so he almost pushed us both over. That was scary!

He likes to play outside, though we sadly don't have many places for him to play, and I don't have a car to take him to the park, but we're trying to make more time for that.

He's great at throwing a ball - he loves to do that - especially when we are trying very hard to catch it, which is often hard. He doesn't know how to catch, yet (what a baby...).

Much of his time the last couple of weeks has been spent opening and closing the cabinets on our entertainment center and his bedroom door. He loves doors and the loud noises that the little springy doorstoppers make. It cracks me up. I can be doing other stuff while he's playing with his bedroom door, until he shuts it and then laughs a lot when I come knock on the door and ask if I can come in. He's so funny.

I finally took the doors off the bathtub, so he's been taking baths in the big bath now. I got him some floating letters that stick to the tub, and he loves those, and a rainbow loofah, which tickles too much when we try to wash him with it, but it is pretty entertaining :c)

I'm sure there are lots of other new things he's doing, but those are a lot of them, and I'll try to keep the updates coming. He's a great baby - gets into a lot of trouble, but that's ok. He's also very cuddly, which I love.

Here we go with some pictures!

His new xylophone Looking at a daisy with his Aunt Mindy
Playing bocce ball...
He was trying out his swim diapers in this picture, to see if they fit...at bath time he is generally naked :c)

His pinecone that he brought home from church
Look how much hair he has!
He's so cute in shorts
Quite the attack on his dada - he tends to pounce on us if we are laying down

He loves to climb on this basket

Well have a great day! Hope you enjoy the pictures and updates.

Look who's walkin!!!

So Joshua took his first steps on May 1st, but hasn't been interested in doing it again...until today! Enjoy :c) And go check out Joshy's blog for even more entertainment!

yikes!

Well, believe it or not, I have been blogging...just unfortunately not on any blogs that anyone reads. I created a blog (but it doesn't really look like a blog - just an advertising website) for our apartments, and then my boss has been paying me to make more for other apartments - which is sweet! So I keep working on those when I should be blogging on here or the Palmer family blog. So I apologize. And now that the Joshua's First Year calendar is finished, you must all be wishing and hoping for more pictures of Joshua! I need to do updates on what he's doing and what I'm doing, but for now, I'll just post some pictures!

Look at how incredibly curly his hair is getting!!

This is a shirt he got for his birthday from Grandma and Grandpa - it says, "I still live with my parents." Ha!
Showin off some of his cute dino pjs!
If you read Nathan's blog, then you've already seen this picture, but this is a snowman that Nathan built - it is a snow daddy holding a snow baby sitting on a bench. Very adorable if you ask me.
I love my cuddly baby!

That's all for now - I'll write more someday - hopefully soon, but I don't want to make promises!

And for Ashley again...

Ash, I hope this gives you good luck for your test tomorrow!

For Ashley

A little bit of Joshua walking with his new car and showin off a little of that tummy...though at his latest doctor appointment we found that he is actually now closer to the 70th percentile for weight, rather than at the 99th...so maybe this explains why he's able to lift himself off the ground now!

Some recent photos!

Here is Joshy modeling the adorable caterpillar outfit his great Aunt and great Uncle got for him - and with his fun car/walker that his friend Rowan got for him. He LOVES walking with it, and was a big fan of pulling at the little cateripillar feet. Thank you Aunt Lynn and Uncle Mark and Rowan for such nice birthday gifts!




Dada took Joshy to Minto Brown Island Park - it's not exactly a playground made for a 1 year old, but Joshua liked the slide and all the birds. Probably his dad was more interested in the birds than he was, though.

We're working on teaching Joshua how to be an expert back scratcher...we'll see how that goes. At least he didn't try to eat it!

My baby is a year old...

It truly is amazing that Joshua is a year old. He is becoming such a fun and hilarious little person. He is starting to get the biggest kick out of trying to repeat stuff. He is good at saying mama, dada, baby, maybe, and nonononononono. I'm sure there are other things I'm forgetting. Lately he's been starting to say things consistently, though we can't quite figure out what he's saying. He says bird, ball, blankie (I think), and book making a very similar "bye" sound. He's great at making a noise like an elephant, a lion, a snake (he's a REALLY scary snake), and lately he's been doing well and saying quack...though he will only say it very quietly. I think that is because when I give him his ducky in his crib at night, ducky tickles his nose and whispers quack quack quack, so I think Joshua thinks duckies make quiet noises.

Joshua also LOVES watching movies of himself. When he's eating in his high chair, he'll point to the computer and clap (meaning more) and shake his left hand in the air (meaning yes) as he points at the computer screen, to tell us that he wants to watch his movies. He especially loves the music his dada wrote. He likes the ones without music, too, but he waves his arm to lead the music in the ones that have his signature song.

I think Joshua will be very musical. I'm fairly sure he's left handed, and he just adores music. Whenever he hears it, whether it is on the cd player, the radio, the tv, one of his musical toys, a movie on the computer, or occasionally a cell phone, he starts moving his hand leading the music. And when the tempo is faster, he moves his hand faster...it's pretty impressive, I think! Not that I'm biased.

He does well with his signs - he's good at yes (waving his hand up and down), more (clapping), milk (making a grasping motion with his hand like he's milking a cow...he actually does that one correctly!), and sometimes he'll try to sign berries, banana, finished, and other signs I'm probably forgetting. He understands so much - it amazes me.

His dada started a new tradition of Joshua crawling from his room to the bath tub (quite naked, I might add) after he gets changed, and though he often gets sidetracked on the way there (the floor is an exciting place, after all), he is very good at eventually getting his cute little bottom parked right next to the bathtub for dada or mama to put him in!

He is so close to walking! When we hold his arms and have him walk, he doesn't need us to carry any of his weight, just for a bit of balance, and even then, I think he could take a few steps on his own and do just fine...but I know there is going to be a lot of falling flat on his face in the next few weeks! I think he'll walk soon, though. Now that we've gotten sort of adjusted to him pulling up on everything everywhere, I feel much more ready for him to be walking. We still haven't baby-proofed all the cabinets, though. We're still following him around most of the time that he is wandering, so if we want to do that forever, there's no need to baby-proof the cabinet doors, but I'm thinking maybe I don't want to do that forever.

For Joshua's perspective on his birthday, make sure to check out his blog. He's quite the technological baby - it amazes me sometimes. His dada helps him write emails, post pictures and videos, and even post on his blog. He has his own email address, blog site, youtube channel, and who knows what else he hasn't told me!! I find it very impressive. Sometimes he writes me emails. I don't think he writes his dada emails, but maybe he does.

Anyway, he's a wonderful one-year-old. He was disappointed to not go up to Washington for his birthday, but is rather happy that he gets THREE birthday parties now (two down, one to go!). We're going up the third week of April and he'll be splitting the birthday glory and festivities with his mama. I'm turning 25! But that's another post...

This has been quite a year - I'm so glad we have so many pictures and videos to remember it, as well as all the memories that are quite unforgettable! I love my baby boy Joshua.

A first birthday party...

...comes only twice a year (for Joshua that is). Joshy got to have his Palmer family birthday celebration this past Saturday. We also were celebrating Easter, so I made a bunny cake. This was inspired by at least one (there were probably more) bunny cake my mom made years ago. Here is the wonderful process I went through. At the end you will see my fat baby thoroughly enjoying his cake!

He enjoyed blowing out the candle, and then we gave him one of the ears! At first he was hesistant and just played with the frosting, but as you can see, he REALLY liked it once he tried it! He probably would have eaten the whole ear, so we had to take it away. Then he REALLY needed a bath. What a cute baby!

Rats!

So the other day I was at Home Depot, picking up some bug killer, in the same aisle as a lot of other pest control items, and then about 6 feet from me, this HUGE RAT goes skittering across the aisle.  It was dark gray and the body was probably about 8-10 inches long – a BIG rat, I’d say.  I don’t know how long the tail was.  It was the middle of the day, and in general it just really creeped me out.  I told a guy working there and he was like, “oh that’s nothing…we have some rats that are about the size of a cat.”  Riiight.  Gotta love that response.  I suppose it is pretty normal for there to be rodents getting into a building supply store like that, and he told me that it was probably out during the day because it had eaten some of the rat poison that they’ve set out and it was dehydrated.  So I guess I feel mildly bad for the rat, but I’d prefer that it didn’t surprise me ever again.  Probably it won’t surprise anyone ever again, huh?  I don’t want to buy bug killer anymore.

A couple of minutes...

My good friend Brittany’s adorable son Parker is in a contest on a local radio station in Utah.  He is singing karaoke, and she would really appreciate it if you would go on there and vote for him! All you need to do is click on this link and vote for #45 in the 2-4 age category.  Then you will get an email sent to you and you’ll need to click on the link in the email to validate your vote.  You can watch Parker’s video (and the other kids, though they’re not as good!) online.  They’d really appreciate your vote – thanks!

 

Here is the link: http://www.971zht.com/pages/kiddieokee/

This baby can EAT!

Seriously, I can’t believe how much Joshua eats.  So far for lunch he has had green beans, carrots, diced apples, peas, two turkey sticks (baby food turkey), and an apple wheel.  Oh and some of my pink lemonade (he is a BIG fan…I haven’t given it to him before, though).  He’s a good little eater – his favorite food these days is frozen blueberries, which I think he would like right now.  I get a big kick out of his purple face and hands after he’s done with his blueberries.  He does always tell us when he’s finished (that is one of the signs he is learning), but lately, I’ve been deciding for him, when he’s eaten just about as big a meal as I could eat!  No wonder he poops like 4 times a day!

 

Now that I figured out what the email address is to post on my blog, I think I’ll do it more often!  I have two drafts from awhile ago that I never finished, so I should work on those also.   I’ll have to actually get on there to post pictures, though.

 

Joshua has a blog now, too, if you didn’t know that yet.  You can click on the “boypalmer” link on my page.

I heard...

...that you haven't lived unless you have heard Joshua's laugh. Really...I heard this at cooking class on Tuesday :c)

I want you all to live life to its fullest, so do enjoy. And Ash - I hope you feel better! This is Joshua laughing at his dada back in mid-December.

More pulling up

Now Nathan will be putting together much better movies, but here are a few more clips of Joshy's new talents of pulling up. These are still a bit outdated, though - he's really close to moving around without having to hold on to furniture. Listen close - it sounds like he says, "k dada" in one of the clips. And you also get to see him fall down, which he does A LOT...

Long-awaited videos

Thanks Ash, for encouraging me to post new videos! This was from February 18th - Joshua's first standing in his crib experience!