bald is beautiful

Tatum and Papa are balding twinners. She wore her "bald is beautiful" shirt to make Papa feel better. :)

handy

We had the usual crew (Gretchen, Andy, Kassy, and David) over for dinner and games last weekend.  Dinner wasn't a real hit (except for Brennan's breadsticks, always a crowd favorite) but dessert was well-received, thank you pinterest.  And our game closet pulled through for us as well.  Periodically we steal borrow games from my parents house. We borrowed "Handy" ages ago and I had forgotten that we had it until I looked in our closet earlier that day. Good thing I found it! It was great entertainment. You see my family has so many games that we tend to cycle through them. We go through phases of playing certain games a lot or not at all. And we haven't played Handy in quite some time. (Although, now that I think of it maybe that's because it has been hiding in my closet haha.) But it really is a fun game.  So random, but so funny.  Tatum was a little bit of a stinker and wouldn't go to bed so I wasn't able to play for most of the time.  But I did get to snap a few pictures of the action. So if you're looking for a new game that is sure to make you laugh check out Handy.

I love games.  And I love laughing.  And I love playing fun games with fun people and laughing lots. :)

4 months

It is hard to believe that it has been 4 months since I was headed to the hospital, scared out of my mind.  It seems like it was just yesterday.  But at the same time it feels like we have had Tatum forever. It's strange. She had her 4 month check up yesterday.  Everything checked out fine and she had her second round of vaccines.  Oh so fun. The shots don't seem to be affecting her as much this time around, which is good.

Her 4 month stats:

11 pounds 6 ounces (3rd percentile)
24 inches long (26th percentile)
41 cm head circumference (59th percentile)

 

She is a little bit of a runt. Our doctor didn't seem to be too concerned about it at this point but did ask me to bring her back in about a month just for a weight check.

Facts about Tatum at 4 months:

She is still in size 0-3 months for clothes and 1-2 for diapers. She is ticklish pretty much anywhere between her waist and her chin. She prefers to sit up or stand almost all the time and will lift her head, doing a little crunch, whenever you lay her down. She has been congested off and on for several weeks so is back to sleeping in her car seat so she doesn't wake up hacking. Even so, she has gone back to waking up once a night to eat. It is kind of hard after getting used to her sleeping through the night, but we really can't complain. She likes to sit in her bumbo on the table while we eat dinner. She will tolerate tummy time for a few minutes now, instead of crying right away. She loves looking at herself in the mirror. She likes to talk a lot, but seems to always need her index finger in her mouth in order to make lots of noise. It's pretty funny.  Basically she is perfect and we love her! :)

 

Easter

Our Easter was pretty low key but still really nice.  I got back from Utah at 5:30 in the morning the day before.  I'll go ahead and use that as my excuse for totally dropping the ball this year.  Brennan pulled through though and put together a little basket for me.  I'm sharing my treats with him, that's something right? We decided to copy a tradition that my brother and sister-in-law do at Christmas and make it one that we do at Easter.  Each Easter we will get each of our kids a book and we will both write a little message in it. I think it will be neat for them to have.

Saturday night we dyed Easter eggs.

I made some yummy deep dark chocolate cookies I found on pinterest.  They really were delicious but my cookie dough wasn't nearly as easy to work with as hers seemed to be in the pictures. It was a little messy...

 

Tatum's first decorated Easter egg.

 

She was not happy about her egg participating in the traditional egg wars.

 

After Church we headed to my parent's house for a yummy Easter dinner.  When I saw that Brennan and Tatum matched so nicely for Church I tried to find something to wear that would fit the theme.  Since we all matched we decided to take a couple of family pictures.  Crystal was nice enough to snap a couple for us and then started to pose us in funny ways.

 

Not sure what kind of face I was trying to pull off....and I think Tatum was done.

It really was a great Easter together as a family.  We did not forget the real reason for this Holiday.  We are so grateful for our Savior and all that He did for us. Hope you had a great Easter too!

p.s. Our camera is crummy.  Its stupid flash whites everything out and it just isn't fast enough to catch Tatum's smiles. Anyone out there have a really nice camera that they love? That is maybe somewhat affordable?

Tatum's first trip to Utah

So Tatum and I headed to Utah on Brennan's birthday.  My parents were traveling out there so my dad could spend some time with his father.  Since they were driving and had room in their car I decided to tag along so I could see my brothers and their families. It was a fun week.  In fact I have found that it is difficult to come back to my quiet and somewhat lonely day-to-day after hanging out with people all day every day. A big thanks to Stacy for letting me and Tatum stay with her and cramp her style for awhile.  We got to Utah just in time for General Conference which of course meant girl's night out for ice cream during the Priesthood session.

So many girls!  And the lone male who accompanied us...

 

I went to a couple of Libbie's very windy soccer games, played lots of Old Maid, Go Fish, and Sleeping Queens.  Good times! And Tatum got lots of attention from all of her cousins.  I didn't get a picture of everyone with her, but lots with Claire and Jaren.  They were definitely the most interested. Jaren would lay down by Tatum and watch what she did so he could copy her jerky arm motions and funny noises.  It was hilarious.  By the end of our week there he would also start fake crying (loudly) whenever Tatum would fuss.  I'm sure Stacy appreciated that haha. 

 

He is a very willing photo subject, always ready with a "cheese".

I love this next picture.  Jaren is giving his usual sweet smile and Tatum looks slightly frightened.

 

There were plenty of willing (or in Libbie's case, not so willing) people to hold Tatum.

 

 

 

Mom played Bear in the Middle with all the grandkids upstairs.  I have a pretty sweet video of it that I might have to share at some point. 

 

Wyatt was sure to stay out of the way.

 

 Tatum and I also ventured out so she could meet her Great Grandpa Cardon.  Alex was nice enough to meet us there so we could hang out with him for awhile.  We are working on convincing him to live by us someday...no success so far. 

We also had lunch and spent some time with Grandma and Grandpa Muranaka. Lester even wore his Hawkeye sweatshirt in honor of our visit.

 

We also saw Great Grandma and Grandpa Harding, Grandma and Grandpa Harding, Dustin and Kim, Abbey, and Jentri. Tatum got to meet two of her cousins on Brennan's side as well.  It was my first time meeting Ada and she is over a year! We tried to get a picture of the three girls but I think we tried too late.  Neither Ada or Tatum wanted to cooperate.  And my camera was being dumb, so the next picture is all we got.  Pretty good, right?

 

It really was a fun trip.  Tatum was a champ for the long car rides on either end of the trip.  Hopefully she will be just as good when we make the drive again in a couple of months. We had fun seeing so many people and spending time with people we love.  But we are definitely glad to be home and happy to see Brennan again.

25

It's official.  Brennan is really and truly an adult now.  I know, I know, that happens when you turn 18, but really this is the birthday Brennan has been looking forward to for quite some time.  Why? Because now he can rent a car without an additional fee for being under 25.  When he expects to be renting a car I couldn't tell you.  I think he has rented a car once in his life and that was on our honeymoon. I guess that was all it took for him to anxiously await the huge milestone of 25.

After all the anticipation for this big day I'm sure his birthday was a letdown.  I ended up leaving for Utah that day, so besides a breakfast of french toast there wasn't much celebration.  The poor guy just went to classes and then stayed later at work and came home to have leftovers, study, run, and head to bed. Pretty exciting, eh? Give me some credit though! I'm not that uncaring of a wife!  It really just meant that he got to celebrate all week.  We headed to my parents house on Tuesday for his family birthday dinner where he was spoiled with a steak dinner and his favorite cake, "Better Than Anything" cake.  My parents were nice enough to watch Tatum for us and we headed to see The Hunger Games after dinner. I loved the books and surprisingly enough I was not disappointed with the movie. (It's not very often that I enjoy a movie made from a book that I have actually read.) 

 

This picture is totally a fake. He blew out the candles before I had the camera ready so he just staged it. :)

Since I knew I would be gone on his birthday we went out to dinner the night before and he opened presents. He got a new Wii game and the expansion pack to Ticket to Ride so we spent our evening playing those.

 

 

Tatum and Brennan at dinner. I'm not sure what is so interesting off to the side...

 

Pretty classy.  Leftover cake in a whipped topping container with a '2' candle on top.

So...now he's legit.    He can go out and rent as many cars as he wants since he won't have that unbearable extra fee. ;)

more visitors

Two or three weeks ago we were lucky enough to have some more visitors.  Brennan's dad and step mom and little brother, Quinton, came for a long weekend.  While they were here Quinton submitted his mission papers so it might have been the last time we get to see him before he leaves for two years.  We are really glad he could make it!

They got here late on a Thursday night.  On Friday after they recovered from the long drive, we headed to Cold Stone for some yummy ice cream and to pick up Brennan.  From there we headed out to Kalona, the Amish community nearby.

Brennan and Quinton making a lame pose. :)                                     Funny that Quinton pointed to the sign and Brennan pointed to himself.

 


On our way back from Kalona we stopped at a little Boutique/ Antique store and found a perfect photo op for Brennan and Quinton.

 

After dinner we headed back to our place for some Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune on the Wii.  Since both games can only have 3 players, we played in teams.  Tatum was kind enough to be Quinton's teammate. :)

 

On Saturday morning we headed to Nauvoo since Quinton has never been there.  We had a picnic near the temple, checked out Brennan's Grandma's painting in the art gallery, and went through several of the sites. Unfortunately, I had a nasty head cold which was of course accompanied by a horrible earache that day, but it was still a fun day!

 

 

After Church on Sunday we enjoyed the beautiful weather at the park and playing yard games in our backyard. And of course spent plenty of time playing with the little miss.  It was great to have them visit and meet Tatum.  Thanks for making the drive guys!