Annabelle is 6 months old!

I took lots of pictures! She is so cute, I couldn't narrow it down to just a couple, I needed to include different facial expressions and poses. And she has such a beautiful and contagious smile!






Annabelle is 6 months old today! It seems like the time goes faster with each child, I'm almost positive she was born last month. It must just be my crazy, busy, forgetful mom mind. I can deal with forgetting about minor details(like not switching the laundry until days later which means we have to re-wash b/c of the stink, which happens a lot. Or putting milk in the pantry instead of the fridge, or the worst is when you remember there's something really important you were supposed to do just now but you can't remember what, etc., etc....), I'm just hoping I can stay away from forgetting anything really important. So anyways, back to Annabelle. She has her 6 month appointment on Monday so I'll post her physical stats then but for now I'll mention some 'mommy observations':

Favorite positions
-sleeping on her tummy or side
-sitting upright
-when held, she likes to be facing out so she can see everything
-in the army crawl stance...though she's not crawling just yet(Charles didn't start crawling until after he was walking, though he was walking at 9 months; and Elisabeth started crawling one week before she started walking at almost 11 months so I'm hoping that Annabelle will also be a late crawler)
-laying on her back, holding her toes

Favorite foods (which is everything she's ever eaten so far):
-breast milk(not exactly a food but is the majority of her diet)
-sweet potatoes
-squash
-graham crackers
-baby oatmeal

Favorite toys
-baby annabelle(this is Elisabeth's little chubby baby doll that has blue eyes and very little hair just like our Annabelle...Elisabeth doesn't like Annabelle to play with her because, in her words, 'she always gives her slobbery kisses and tries to bite her.')
-winnie the pooh phone
-all sorts of chew toys

Sleep habits
-takes 3 naps a day for a total of about 5 hours of naps
-continues to sleep through the night. she goes to bed around 7pm and wakes up around 7am! LOVE this!

Temperament
-happy
-smiles a lot
-loves to be smiled at and tickled
-still is a bit afraid of being around Charles...but I'm sure as he gets older and gentler that will change
-loves people: playing with them or just being held

Other
-loves to be sung to(as have all our children)
-Annabelle sits up very well
-Annabelle is a fantastic roller! we lay out a big blanket on the carpet and she just rolls and rolls and rolls, she can get just about anywhere moving around this way
-Annabelle's second tooth came in this last month, also on bottom

look at those teeth!

Spot X - hard water stain and spot remover

I LOVE this cleaning product! Growing up in Washington, where the water is soft and glorious, I never had to worry about hard water stains. When we moved into our house several of the basement windows, a couple bedroom windows and our kitchen window were covered in hard water stains. In fact half of our kitchen window was so bad that you could not see out of it. Our shower door and the tile in the shower also got really bad over this last year (we've been here a year now!! Amazing!) We tried washing it with regular glass cleaner but that didn't help. We tried spraying it with vinegar and scrubbing, but that didn't work either. I asked a couple of older women from the neighborhood what they did, but nothing seemed to work for us. Then, when Scott was at Home Depot one day he picked up this Spot X cleaner and we tried it out. It was amazing the difference that it made! I could see out of our kitchen window again and everything looked so clear and beautiful! After we finished our Saturday project of cleaning the windows(which we did a couple of months ago) we forgot about the shower, which has gotten really bad. And then when we remembered to clean our shower we somehow forgot about our Spot X cleaner(or at least that it could also work on tile and shower doors). We tried a couple of cleaning products on the tile and shower door but they did nothing. Today I finally remembered our Spot X, pulled it out, and started scrubbing. Lovely! Now, it's not perfect but as you can see, it's much better than before.

before:

after:

before:

after:

I didn't think to take a picture of the tile until after I'd scrubbed for a few minutes, so you'll never get to see exactly how bad it was...but maybe that's a good thing!

before(sort of):

after:

Lessons learned continued...

1. Last week Charles learned why it's not a bright idea to stick a paper clip in a power outlet. He was shocked! Excuse the pun, but it's true. We have safety covers on our outlets, but our two oldest can easily take them out.

2. This week Charles learned why we don't stick our fingers between the protective metal wires of a fan while it's running. Ouch! Luckily there was no blood, just a little red finger.

3. Today Elisabeth learned that wasps sting, and it really hurts!

Thankfully, none of these episodes required hospitalization or visits to the doctors office. They all seemed to heal and bounce back very quickly. Elisabeth took the longest amount of time to recover and that took probably a total of 5 minutes. I was very thankful that we had special after bite cream for just this sort of thing and that my cousin Rachel was here because she thought of getting the ice pack(which helped Elisabeth A LOT with the pain and swelling) and helped watch the kids while I was taking care of Elisabeth.

See. All better!

My cookie monsters!

Last night after dinner Scott and the kids made cookies, normal sized cookies and monster cookies! They made m&m and chocolate chip cookies, and they made white chocolate chip cookies for me. For some reason monster cookies always taste so much better than regular sized cookies...well they probably don't taste that much better but they sure are more exciting.

Choices

I'm reading C.S. Lewis' (also author of the Chronicles of Narnia)Mere Christianity right now. I started reading it awhile ago but then I stopped to reread the Twilight Saga before Breaking Dawn came out and then I read The Princess Bride for our book club. Anyways, I've picked it up again and so it is fresh in my mind and making an impact on my life(he gives wonderful analogies on life and has such a great perspective). I keep a pen and journal with me while I'm reading his book so that I can write down quotes and page numbers because I find myself going back each night trying to find certain passages from his book to share with Scott and this makes it much easier for me. I'll probably share a couple of my favorite as different posts over the next couple of weeks, so be prepared to do some deep thinking :).

These two quotes below are on free agency and how our choices form our character. C.S. Lewis says:
1.)
"...Every time you make a choice you are turning the central part of you, the part of you that chooses, into something a little different from what it was before. And taking your life as a whole, with all your innumerable choices, all your life long you are slowly turning this central thing either into a creature that is in harmony with God, and with other creatures, and with itself, or else into one that is in a state of war and hatred with God, and with its fellow-creatures, and with itself. To be the one kind of creature is heaven: that is, it is joy and peace and knowledge and power. To be the other means madness, horror, idiocy, rage, impotence, and eternal loneliness. Each of us at each moment is progressing to the one state or the other…When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse he understands his own badness less and less."

I think the reason we understand more when we're 'getting better' or being a good person is because we are then given the light of Christ that brightens (because light shines and reveals things to us) our view and understanding. And when we choose to do things that we know are not right(and are contrary to the will of God) there is a darkness that clouds our minds and makes it hard to see clearly.

and my second quote...

2.)
"There is a difference between doing a just or temperate action and being a just or temperate man. Someone who is not a good tennis player may now and then make a good shot. What you mean by a good player is a man whose eye and muscles and nerves have been so trained by making innumerable good shots that they can now be relied on."

I love this analogy! That would be such a compliment to have someone think of you in this way: that because of the life you live they can always rely on you because they know you will do what is right. Now sure, even a really good tennis player makes a mistake every once and awhile, but you can count on them to learn from that mistake and correct it.

"Just Kidding"

My dear friend Katherine posted this video on her blog a couple of months ago: it's a short clip from SNL. It's pretty hilarious, Scott and I have watched it several times, and I think we like it even more now than we did when we first watched it. We've always used the phrase "just kidding," but recently we've sort of started abusing the phrase and so whenever one of us says, "just kidding" the other one feels the need to say it 5 more times in a row, and quickly. So there you have it: a little glimpse into the married life of Scott and Elisa.

New First Presidency picture

I've been wanting to replace my old picture of the First Presidency since they reorganized, but the couple of times I went to the Distribution Center to pick one up, they were always sold out. So finally I got smart and decided to check online with the Distribution Center to see if I could just buy it and have it sent. I placed my online order about a week ago(and they didn't even charge shipping/handling or tax so the grand total was $1!) and it arrived yesterday. The kids and I were very excited and we took down the old picture and replaced it with the new. It's displayed in our entry way and living room area, almost directly across from our picture of the Saviour. We are so blessed to have a prophet and apostles to guide us today.

Lessons

Today Elisabeth went out to check the mail and she came back with an envelope that she had opened that had a payment for a bill inside. I had put that envelope in the mailbox yesterday....the mail man hadn't picked up our letters yet. I had told Elisabeth on several different occasions that she's not to open any mail unless she gets permission first, but she obviously wasn't obeying that rule which could make a big problem for us in the future. Today I decided that I needed to help her learn her lesson by coming up with some sort of logical consequence. I told her that I now needed to put my payment in a new envelope and that I needed to use a new stamp and so she needed to reimburse me 40 cents for the stamp. I knew she didn't have any money so I told her that she could earn the money from me by doing chores. We settled on folding laundry. So this afternoon Elisabeth folded a load of laundry and earned 50 cents. We talked about tithing and how we give back 10%(which I'm sure she understood :), just kidding) of what we make to the Lord, so we set aside 5 cents to give to the bishop, she paid me my 40 cents and then she got to keep 5 cents of her hard earned money. She's getting so big and understanding so much it amazes me sometimes.

Now I'm going to completely switch gears here and post a short clip of Annabelle. She is a screacher, but it's so cute.

Anniversary celebration

We were in Richland, WA for our family reunion when Scott and I had our 5 year anniversary, so we really didn't get the chance to celebrate at that time but we knew we wanted to do something sometime soon. So this past Thursday night, we put the kids to bed a little early(the 2 oldest didn't take naps that day so they were tired enough) and then Scott drove down the street to Chili's and brought us home a couple of molten chocolate cakes! Yum!Scott and I ate, talked, played Spit(a card game) and boggle, we danced and had a really nice and peaceful evening together at home. This was probably one of my favorite anniversaries together...maybe it's because we love each other so much more now than we did 5 years ago, and even one year ago. It's amazing to me how that happens. You think you love each other so much that it's at it's pinnacle and there is no possible way that it could get deeper and grow, but it does. We talked about memories together and our accomplishments and changes over these past 5 years. We were a little amazed at all that has happened in such a short amount of time(and at a fairly young age, me being 25 now and Scott 27). Here are a few of the big ones we mentioned and they are listed in order:
1. were sealed in the temple
2. traveled through Europe (scott got to visit his old mission area in Italy)
3. I gave birth to Elisabeth
4. we both received our bachelor's degrees from BYU
5. I gave birth to Charles
6. Scott got his first job in his career
7. we bought our first car(well van)
8. Scott got his master's degree from University of Washington in civil engineering
9. we bought our first home
10. I gave birth to Annabelle

In just 5 years we've experienced a lot of HUGE changes. Perhaps that's part of the reason why our love keeps deepening: we're working hard together, going through different trials and making the best of them and allowing them to strengthen and build our characters, all the while we're growing closer to our Saviour. Imagine a triangle with the Lord at the top point and Scott and I as equals on opposite sides...through the years we're moving up the sides, getting closer to Christ and at the same time getting closer to each other. Again, I'd like to say how extremely lucky and blessed I feel to have such a wonderful, righteous, hard working husband. He is perfect to me in every way and I'm so grateful that our children will have such a great man to learn from, look up to, and follow. I love you Scott. You are my best friend.

Breaking Dawn...don't worry, no spoilers

I finished the book! I know I'm crazy and a nerd for reading the 755 page book in one day, but I can't seem to help myself. I went to the midnight party for Breaking Dawn with Rachael and her sister Bekah and it was intense, but fun. When we first lined up I was afraid the lady in front of me was going to get in a fight. She kept pushing into people(not that we had much room to move anyways) and her and another teenage girl were swearing at each other. I tried to take a step back(but I honestly couldn't move, we were all jam packed) and just hoped that if they started throwing punches or pulling hair that they wouldn't miss their target and get innocent bystanders(like myself) instead. Everything ended well, no fights. Rachael(the sweetheart) had gone at 6am that morning to get a wristband with a number on it which indicated when we could pick up our books. They grouped people in 25's and we were numbered 101-125. I thought it'd take at least an hour to get to the front because there was at least 200(probably closer to 300) people standing ahead of us(only one person in your group needed a wristband and then they could pre-order however many books you wanted, and generally however many books you ordered was the same amount of friends flanked by your side. Hopefully that makes sense, if it doesn't then oh well, it's not that important anyway) but we had our books in hand and were in the parking lot by 12:10 am, only ten minutes later!

A couple of very spirited fans. There were TONS of these fans...but who am I kidding, I dressed up as Hermoine for the Harry Potter 5 movie.
Buying our books!!! Yay!

I went home and got all ready for bed and tried for 1/2 an hour to lay in bed with my eyes closed and go to sleep so that I could wake up really early and start reading but it just wouldn't happen. I was too keyed up about my book-it was calling to me. So I got up and read for a couple of hours and then went to sleep. I woke up early and read pretty much all day long, minus food/bathroom/stretch breaks. I had previously arranged with Scott to have this day to myself which was so nice of him to agree to. I had Annabelle with me for a good amount of time but she's super easy so she doesn't really count. Anyways, Thank you Scott SO SO much for doing that for me! I was able to get the book finished that same evening(well technically early the next morning) just after midnight. I LOVED it! That's all I'll say. It was SO good! okay no more. I want to read it again! That's seriously the last thing I'm saying about this book. I'm sure I will read it again this week, though I'll probably spread the 755 page book over a week or two rather than a day this time.

Zucchini and red potatoes

We were gone for 10 days on vacation and when we got back Scott went out to his garden and was a bit shocked with what he found. He brought in this bag full of zucchini, lots of smallish ones and then these 4 monsters! (Here's a picture for size...do you like my 'shocked' face, I'm not a very good actress; and you can see my new haircut)
He suggested perhaps tossing some but I said, "No way, I'll make bread." And I did. Lot's of bread. I made muffins, a few mini loafs(we wrapped these up and froze them), and a bundt bread with a glaze topping. I had to start getting creative. For dinner I added some zucchini chunks into our spagetti sauce. Last week we also made a white sauce with zucchini. I'm about out of ideas so if anyone has some good zucchini recipes, please send them our way. I only used one giant zucchini to make all this! Scott brought another giant zucchini to a coworker which means we have a couple left if anyone wants one(or many more) just let me know.

Scott also pulled out a bunch of red potatoes! Last night we mashed them up and ate them for dinner! Yum! Since this is our first garden, we're both just so thrilled to see the progress and to actually eat food that we planted as little seeds. Amazing!

Annabelle's milestones

Annabelle has had some big changes occur recently. This last week her first tooth cut through(the front left tooth on the bottom)! We knew it was going to happen soon because the last month or so she's been doing a lot of slobbering and chomping down on whatever is near.
A couple of weeks ago Annabelle started sitting up without any assistance! She's pretty good at it and can stay seated without any help for probably a minute or so.
(She is SO cute! Look at those fingers in her mouth. What a sweetheart. And her cute siblings are sitting near by watching .)Just before our trip we introduced baby food to Annabelle. So far she's eaten squash and baby oatmeal. I know she's ready to be eating because from the start she loved it and will gobble it all down. We started her on solids 2 weeks ago at 5 months and we've only given it to her probably 5 times. We're going to introduce a couple other baby foods over the next couple of weeks but we'll be taking it slow, I'm not in any hurry for her to grow up, in fact I'd like it if she'd stay my sweet little, helpless baby forever! I guess we'll just have to have another one when she gets older; I LOVE babies! (The last two pictures shown were taken by Elisabeth. She's our little photographer in training.)

Friday and Saturday July 25 & 26: Grazzini Family Reunion

Friday morning we packed up the van and drove out to the Tri-cities in Washington(~4 hour drive, and luckily it's on the way home to Utah) for our family reunion on my mom's side. We played games, ate, the kids did crafts, swam in the pool, visited Granny and Grandpa Grazzini's grave site, and got to see Fred and Robin's new place(they moved to the Tri-cities from Colorado that very weekend! Perfect timing!).

Bocce ball

Elisabeth loved playing with my uncle Mark:

We stayed in a hotel Friday night which was fun, though we weren't sure how the night time thing was going to go with all 5 of us in the same room. The hotel provided us with a portable crib that Annabelle slept in. She went to bed before the rest of us so while I was putting her to bed Scott took the kids out to play with their cousins. Shortly after they got back we got ready for bed too. There were 2 queen beds and Elisabeth and Charles shared one and Scott and I had the other. The kids did pretty good and it was funny because the first 5 minutes or so after we all got in bed, Elisabeth would ask every 30 seconds, "Daddy, are you asleep yet?" To which he'd always reply, "No, I'm not." I did have to get up several times to fix Annabelle whose foot or arm would get caught in the metal bars on the crib or I'd need to console her after she would hit her head on the same bars(why don't they have bumpers?!). I finally got smart and made my own little crib bumper for her out of bath towels weaved in between bars and after that she didn't wake up again until morning. We took off Saturday afternoon and finished our drive to Utah. Unfortunately, we left our cell phone chargers at this hotel(and we just figured that out today, 4 days later...we knew they were lost we just had no idea where) so if anyone has tried to call and you haven't heard from us in days, that's the reason why...my phone is completely dead and the only time I can use it is if I run out to my van, turn it on and plug it in, which is what I had to do when I called the hotel to figure things out. They are fed ex-ing them to us today so we should have them up and running soon enough. I'm now all caught up with posts from our vacation! Wahoo!