All About Caleb

1. Caleb is one year old already! :)

 2. Caleb is 21 pounds 14 ounces and in the 57th percentile.

3. He is 30 inches tall and in the 51st percentile.

4. Caleb has been walking since about 10 months. I felt like it crept up on us so quickly. We caught a good video of it on Everett's birthday. He had to learn quickly I guess to keep up with his siblings. :) Just a week or two after his birthday he started climbing as well and would climb up onto the table from the chairs. We have to really keep a close eye on him so he doesn't hurt himself. This kid has no fear. :)

5. Caleb has had a few ear infections this year. He wasn't taking the medicine very well so when we discovered the last one we had to go back to the doctors again and again for three separate shots. :( Not fun. He's also been teething a bit as well so it makes for a cranky baby sometimes (especially at nights). One of the reasons for the ear infections could be from me nursing while laying down. We're hoping once weaned, it won't happen as often.

6. He has a funny little habit lately of reaching his hand down my shirt when he's fussy and wants to nurse...He'll reach down my shirt, swiping and grabbing at anything he can until I have to either give in and nurse him or put him down or something so he can't reach. He also will reach down and just swipe or rub my chest when he's cuddling in my arms before falling asleep or in the middle of the night when he's having a hard time sleeping.

7. I have not done well with sleep training my youngest two boys. I've been lying down with him for naps, in my bed, so he goes down without any fuss. It gives me a little time to read scriptures while laying with him for a bit and later he just climbs out of bed and comes out super happy when he wakes up. :) At bedtime it's a little harder. I sit in the boys room until he falls asleep continually giving him a paci, soothing him or patting his back until he falls asleep. Then, as soon as he wakes up  we bring him into our bed to sleep with us.

8. Caleb says a few words or at least blabbers like he knows a few words... He says mamama, dadada,  (I don't think he's trying to say mama or dada yet though). He says ba I think for (bottle, banana, or ball) and he says moh (more).  He's also got his waving hi and goodbye down. :)

9. He's eating pretty well. He likes bananas, grapes, strawberries, yogurt, cheese, chicken, and interestingly... fresh tomatoes. :) It took him a little bit to figure out how to use a sippy cup but he finally figured it out and loves chocolate milk. :)

10. Caleb seems to love his siblings. He looks up to Claire. She helps pick him up and carries him around. When we left the kids for a few hours with my sister, he didn't want to leave Claire's side. He thinks Everett is so funny. Everett's always trying to make him laugh and he usually succeeds. And Seth is so full of love and is always either smothering him with hugs or wanting to involve him in their play which is maybe a little bit rough for a boy his size. Caleb handles it well though. He gets right back up and tries to play just as rough. He's adorable and we all love him so!

All About Seth

1. Seth is 3 years old!

2. Seth weighs 32.2 pounds and is in the 57th percentile.

3. He is 37 inches putting him in the 40th percentile.

4. Seth is still so obsessed with hair, especially my hair. He's always running his hands and sometimes his toys (despite my requests for him not to) through my hair. He loves to grab some and brush his cheek or face with it, so cute. :)

5. Seth still sleeps in our bed occasionally. I goes through spurts where he'll sleep in his own bed all night and he'll get a treat, but very often he wakes up and just wants to join us in bed, it's hard not to let me when he's so sad and cute in the middle of the night. :p

6. We started potty training Seth just a little bit before his birthday and he did really well. He seemed to catch on pretty quickly. :)

7. Seth is our little cuddle buddy. He loves hugs and he loves being close to us when he's sleeping. He loves piggy back rides and he loves sitting with the other kids on the couch watching movies. He's always been so friendly and loving to Caleb, he's just always been a sweet boy!

8. Seth loves playing with Everett especially with his action figures. He's very much all boy when it comes to playing with toys. He turns everything into shooters and play fights and wrestles and runs around with Everett. They get a little rough and competitive together at times.

9. His speech is so cute right now. I love how he calls things "perfect" right now. Not sure where he picks up things at times but he finds a word he likes and uses it a lot. :)

10. Favorites: song- Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam, show/movie-Animal Mechanicals, food- fruit dessert/treat-marshmallows, color- red, activity-play with claire and everett, animal-lion, book-look and find ones, drink- toy- wants to be himself when he grows up

All About Everett

1. Everett is now 6 years old.

2. Everett weighs 41.6 pounds and is in the 24th percentile.

3. He's 45 inches tall and in the 41st percentile for height.

4. He started Kindergarten this year,  just a week after his birthday.  He's super smart and already know all his letters and is actually reading pretty well, most of the sight words anyway.

5. Everett really likes his games still. He likes playing Minecraft with Claire and building little towns and cities, and he got a new Lego Batman game that he enjoys. He still loves to play card games and board games as well. He's definitely got a little competitive streak in him and gets a little sad when he loses but we're doing our best to teach him to try his best and just play to have fun. :)

6. He's really been getting more into dinosaurs. He can name a lot more dinosaurs than I can. He watches Dino Dan and is always telling me fun facts about some dinosaurs. :)

7. Everett has an appreciation for music. He's doing so well on the piano (when we remember to practice) and he remembers the words to the primary songs so well. And when he dances, he dances with a beat, full of energy. :)

8. He likes to chew on everything. Usually it's Bounce, his pet stuffed monkey, but we'll often find wet blankets and shirts and the other day, the end of his tie. :p

9. Everett has so much energy! He's always climbing on the furniture (despite my requests for him not to), running around chasing or letting his little brothers chase him, or just trying to do some sort of stunt.

10. favorites: song-Nephi's Courage, show/movie-Despicable Me 3, food-pizza, dessert-oreo milkshakes, activity-video games, color-red, animal-dog, book-Hop on Pop, drink-Sprite, game-Lego Batman video game, toy-dinosaurs, holiday-Halloween, day of the week-Monday, wants to be a PE teacher when he grows up.

All About Claire

1. It's great to be eight! I can't believe Claire is 8 years old. She is now a baptized member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. :)

2. Claire weighs 53 pounds and is in the 35th percentile.

3. She grew 2 whole inches since last year. She is now 48 and a quarter inches tall and is in the 19th percentile.

4. Claire is going to be in 3rd grade this year. She loves going to school. Her favorite subject is art. And she's made a new friend this last year. :)

5. This last year, Claire has mastered riding a bike, doing the monkey bars, jump roping, and hula hooping. She's so good at hula hooping, so much better than mommy and daddy. :) She's also been doing so well at learning to play the piano.

6. Claire has a funny little habit of occasionally walking in her sleep. And it seems to happen most when we are away from home. Yikes. Once, on our Christmas vacation, she walked out of the room and down the hall, even talking to my sister, but not awake at all. The second time I can recall, was in the hotel on our way home from Texas. She walked out of our hotel room and down the hall, and woke up while in the hall. She couldn't remember what room we were in though, so the desk clerk called our room at 3am telling us Claire was outside! It was scary at the time, but a little funny thinking about it later. :) I wonder how many other times she has done this at home and just gone back to bed herself...

7. She is getting to be a super big help to me. She's such a good daughter with a willingness to please and make her family happy. She's quick to finish little jobs when I ask and she's always happy to help with Caleb. She's becoming a little mommy herself and she can't wait to start babysitting. She keeps asking when she'll be old enough to babysit. :)

8. Claire has always been a Daddy's Little Girl. They have a special little bond between them. And right now, they try to always make a little time in the evening to read books together. It started with Harry Potter, and now they are reading the Percy Jackson series. I love seeing them together, cuddled up and reading.

9. Claire has a great relationship with her brothers. She's really close to Everett. They definitely have a bond. She's always willing to help him with his jobs so they can play games together and she loves to do little secret services for him. She even made him an activity book for his birthday. Claire may not play as much with Seth and Caleb, but she is always watching out for them. She tries her best to make them happy and loves to pick up Caleb for me.

10. Some of Claire's favorites this year... color - aqua; activity - art; book - Percy Jackson; song - How Far I'll Go; show/movie - Moana; food - spaghetti; dessert - cake; holiday - Christmas; day of the week - Saturday; animal - horse; drink - root beer; game - Harry Potter Trivia; toy - Rainbow (stuffed elephant). She wants to be an Elementary School teacher when she grows up.

Caleb's 9 Months

1. Caleb is 9 months. Time is just flying!

2. Caleb is a little over 20 pounds and is in the 59th percentile.



3. He is also 28 inches and is in the 35th percentile for height.

4. So Caleb picked up on army crawling so fast and was pulling himself up to things soon after that. At his 9 month appointment he was crawling up on all fours for only a few steps but then would fall and army crawl the rest of the way, but then he seriously picked up crawling almost full time the day after his appointment. He has gotten super mobile so quickly!

5. Caleb loves to give us little head bumps. Especially in the morning when he wakes up or when he's super tired and out of it he'll head butt us or nuzzle his forehead into our chest. I feel like he gets excited whenever the boys are wrestling around like he wants to join right in. :)

6. Caleb definitely has his likes and dislikes. He seems to like sweet potatoes and apples, and bananas and most of the baby food that involves those into their mixes. He doesn't like those foods plain or by themselves though and he doesn't like them if there is anything that looks better around. He loves trying whatever we are eating and when it's something he can't eat he gets pretty upset.

7. He's still spitting up occasionally, very similar to how Claire was. He has eczema too and he broke out in hives once. My only kid to react to a food allergy in complete hives all over. He wasn't fussy about it at all and he was breathing fine which was good. Unfortunately, I don't know what food we had given to him that caused it so I have to really watch for it again and remember what he tries.

8. He's pretty smart and picking up on some things quickly. He learned to clap, especially when we all say "yay!", he waves hi and bye, he was making everyone smile in the hallway at church when he started waving and saying something that sounded very much like it could be a "hi" :). He's also learned to shake his head no when he doesn't want the food I'm offering him or when he doesn't like something, (like when I'm trying to change his diaper and he doesn't want to lie still).

9. I tried to do some sleep training recently and let him cry it out a bit. I think he understands a little better now, and usually will fall asleep pretty quickly when I lie him in his crib. If he wakes up before I go to bed I can usually get him to fall back to sleep as well, but in the middle of the night, it's just habit to bring him into bed with us. He accepts a paci a lot more than his brothers did, so that helps but teething I think is upon us, which messes up any progress we had. :P

10. Caleb is such a chill baby. He's pretty happy for the most part and unless he's hungry or tired he likes to scoot around grabbing anything he can to put in his mouth. He loves banging on the computer keys and piano keys when I'm teaching the other kids. Right now he'll just follow the other kids around the house from room to room as they play. :) He laughs at Everett so much. Seth loves to gives him hugs and he's already trying to join him in his horse play. I constantly am still reminding Seth to be gentle, but Caleb seems to take it okay. He's used to the pokes and bumps I guess. And Claire is getting to be so good with him. She helps out in little ways, trying to make him happy when he's sad, feeding him, picking him up. I can already tell he looks up at her with love. We love our little 9 month old.

Caleb's 7 months

1. Caleb is 7 months old!

2. He weighs about 18 pounds, 12 and a half ounces, and is in the 66th percentile.

3. He is 27 inches and in the 51st percentile for height. He's growing nice and steady! :)

4. Caleb is always banging his head up and down. I'm not sure why he does it, but he looks like one of those bobble head toys. :) He does it so close to things when he's on his tummy scooting around that I'm always worried he's going to bonk his head into something.

5. I think Caleb is probably our earliest scooter. He started making his way around with kind of a side roll push around 6 months old and that quickly developed into a pretty fast army crawl. He's now making his way all around the house and having so much fun exploring all the corners and getting his hands on all the toys and papers that he finds.

6. It's probably not so much his fault, but he's a horrible napper. I've made the mistake of nursing him to sleep, and now he's pretty dependent on it. He's not that bad in the middle of the night. He sleeps with us and actually sleeps pretty well. I only nurse him once maybe twice in the night, but his naps are difficult. If I don't nurse him to sleep or at least hold him until he falls asleep, he just won't fall asleep. And when I do nurse him to sleep, I lay him down and he wakes up so quickly when he notices he's not being held. We're working on a little sleep training lately. At least trying to get him to fall asleep on his own in his crib at the beginning of the night. He's doing somewhat okay, but it's hard. I hate the process of letting him cry, soothing him, and hearing him cry again as soon as I leave, and doing it over and over again until he falls asleep.

7. So Caleb has had a weird start to eating solids. He seemed very interested and excited about solids when we first started. He seemed to like most everything. He was always looking at us eating during meals with so much interest and he showed us so much excitement. Then, he got sick and had to be given medicine. He hated the medicine. And I had a not so fun time trying to get him to take it - I would use his paci and squeeze little bits into his mouth and then give him the paci and force him to suck it and swallow. I think maybe it was that experience or maybe he was just sick for awhile, but he pretty much refused to eat or even try some new things. He would look all excited for food and then as soon as he saw the spoon coming towards his mouth, he would close his mouth and turn away from it, refusing to try it. I even tried only giving him the really good stuff for awhile, but still he didn't want any. :( So then we tried getting food pouches, putting the baby food in them, and letting him feed himself. Well either he started feeling better from whatever illness he may have had or he just loved it after that. It was super messy, but he liked food again. :)

8. He loves to put everything in his mouth right now. And since he's scooting around so much now, we have to keep an extra careful eye on him at all times cuz he finds things to put in his mouth from all over. He seems to especially love going and finding shoes to suck on or paper to eat. :P

9. Caleb is still our little noise machine. He's starting to make more gabbing sounds and he'll randomly scream or squawk or something. I'm pretty sure he's starting to recognize his name now too. :)


10. It's so fun seeing him with the other kids. Claire is learning how to hold him in different ways and picking him up. I've started letting her occasionally pick him up off the ground and carry him to me or just to pull him away from somewhere where he shouldn't be scooting to. Everett still loves to make him laugh and Seth still gets so protective of him. I think Caleb has gotten used to being bumped around by Seth. I've even occasionally found Seth trying to sit on him when he's on his tummy scooting around. He's going to learn to be tough with these older brothers around. :P