Hello, this is Jeff, Carrie's husband......

Carrie is always saying I never post on the Blog. So I decided to show her that I could.

Here are just a few posts.

Upper Frenulum

Maybe you haven't hear the word Frenulum before, but you know what it is. It's that piece of skin that connects your upper lip to your gums.

Owen has been doing so well on the stairs lately. So a couple day ago when I was making dinner I wasn't too worried when I realized he was crawling up and down our stairs to the basement. I was almost done with dinner when he fell. I rushed to get him and immediately noticed his nose was bleeding a lot. I got him cleaned up and he only cried for a couple minutes. He went back to playing. A couple minutes later I picked him up, he opened his mouth and there was blood in it. I thought he must have a cut in his mouth. He still has no teeth so I knew he didn't bite anything. As I searched around his mouth I found the source of all the blood...the place where his frenulum used to be. When he slipped he must have been on his tummy and his upper lip rubbed the carpet so hard that it tore his frenulum...and he got a bloody nose. Poor guy. I have felt guilty since. One of my neighbors is a doctor and the other a dentist. They both said this happens a lot and they usually heal really well. I just have to make sure it doesn't get infected.

He has been surprisingly fine. The big difference is his smile...it's not the same.

Before

After

His cut frenulum hangs down, but I think it is just because his upper lip is swollen. It looks a lot better now, than in this picture.
Something interesting...my frenulum was torn was I was younger too. I can still remember it well. My older sister, Julie, and I were sharing a 7up (it was one of those long-neck glass bottles). I was chugging it (probably taking more than my share) and Julie got mad, so she popped the bottom of the bottle while it was in my mouth. She tore my fremulum. I'm still a little bitter about it...ok, no, not really. Owen's is torn worse than mine was though. Oh---I still feel so bad.

On a happier note...here's a cute video of Owen dancing.

My Posh Baby Designs

My sister, Dana, and her friend have this cute little company they've started. It's called My Posh Baby Designs. They sell such cute stuff...it really makes me want to have a girl (no I'm not pregnant...just someday). But, they do have stuff for boys as well. You must check it all out. They are doing a giveaway.

Here is what they're giving away...

So, cute eh? You can win these if you go to their site and do a couple different things to be entered (you can get a total of 8 entries). Here is the link: http://www.myposhbabydesigns.blogspot.com/
I also have a link to it on my sidebar under my playlist.

How can you pass this up?

He's ONE!!!

The Birthday Boy

I can't believe it...Owen turned one today. He isn't walking yet, and he hasn't even cut his first tooth. But he loves to give 'high-fives' and wave bye-bye. I can't even begin to explain the joy that he brings into our lives everyday. Oh, and he's a huge mama's boy....I love it!

Playing with the cake is much better than actually eating it.

wow...what a fancy cake

Owen opening his first present. I think he does a pretty good job. Notice how sly he is about putting the paper in his mouth...so quick.

Gerber Daisies!

I love gerber daisies. I had them at my wedding, and I want them at my funeral. Jeff went to Vegas about 2 weeks ago with my bro-in-law, Trent, to see the Nascar race. That was the weekend the boys had HFMD (Owen did get it...but it wasn't too bad. He did have one sore in his mouth that did bother him though). Since I was having such a bad weekend, Jeff had these flowers delivered to me while he was gone. I love him! It's been awhile since I've gotten flowers, which is fine because they're so expensive and they just die. I actually still have these flowers on my island. They don't look as good, but they're still alive.

What a beautiful yellow and red...I love the combo. I've never seen one like this.

Here's Owen in his favorite hiding place. When I can't find him, this is where he usually is.

A cute video...

I love how he knows what bye-bye is. He's got such a cute little wave.

I've been slacking on the blogging lately. I've been very busy with one of my callings...Region Sports Director. We have been getting ready for our basketball tournament. It just started tonight, so I just have 3 more weeks of it. I do enjoy my calling, but it's very time consuming during tournament time. Poor Jeff will be home with the boys a lot.

Owen and his Little Birdie

Owen loves to point at things...with his middle finger.

Hello Little Birdie!

We went to California last week for a quick getaway. A lot of Jeff's family live there. Since Jeff snowplows in the winter, we had to wait til we knew the weather would be nice for several days in a row. We ended up being gone for a week (although we did spend 2 days driving).

Playing with cousins is always fun.


Oh look, Jeff has a little birdie friend too.

Right before we went out of town we got Benson a new car seat. It's a 5 point harness booster, so he can use it a long time. It's called the Britax Frontier. I love it. It's quite expensive, but for good reason. It's the best and safest 5-point harness booster out there. A lot of these have a weight limit of 40 lbs for the 5-point harness. It's best to keep your kids in a 5PH for as long as possible. Benson is already 33 lbs. The Britax Frontier has a 5PH weight limit of 80 lbs. So they can stay in it a lot longer. Since we got that for Benson, we upgraded Owen to Benson's carseat, the Britax Boulevard. We decided to put him forward facing for the long car ride. He really liked it.

While we were in California Benson was exposed to Hand, Foot, and Mouth Disease. Here are a few facts that I've learned about HFMD (from the nurse at the Pediatrician's office).

Kids between 6 months & 4 years are most likely to get it (it's unusual for adults & older kids to get it).

HFMD is very contagious.

When you get it you are contagious for 1-3 days and will usually have a low-grade fever.

You don't show any rashes until 3-6 days after you get it, so by then you're not contagious anymore.

So, it's a lot like chickenpox...you don't know you have it, but you're spreading it to someone else.

You don't always get rashes/sores on your hands, feet, and mouth.

30% of kids have it start on their buttocks.

Benson's started on his bum and I thought it was just a weird diaper rash, but a couple days later he had a rash on his legs then his arms. After I found out it was HFMD I checked his mouth and he has a couple coldsore type sores in his mouth. Nothing seems to bother him, so he has a minor case of it. I just hate telling people he has HFMD. I feel like I'm telling them he's a leper or something. Owen hasn't shown any signs of it yet, so he didn't get it.

Here's Benson giving a goodbye kiss to his cousin Laney. Luckily Laney didn't get HFMD.

Waiting to go home.

Bye Grandma

Owen loves to wave bye-bye.

We had such a good time. My sis-in-law, April, took some pictures of the boys while we were there too. She is so talented. I can't wait to put up some new pictures in the house.

The Day After Valentine's

Today, the day after Valentine's Day, means more to me than the blessed v-day.
5 years ago today, Jeff proposed to me. It's the anniversary of our engagement. So, Jeff's brother did a video of the actual proposal. We have it on VHS, so I took a video of the video. I know, so clever. It's obviously not the best quality, but you get the idea. Just a little info before you start it; we were in California with a lot of Jeff's fam. We were playing the game Cranium.
(Pause the music on my playlist)

My only request was to have it be a total surprise. I was not expecting it at all...he did awesome!
Love you Jeff!
You might have noticed Benson at the bottom of the screen watching the video. I thought he'd like it, but he just wanted us to put Dumbo back on.

"Come Back"

I'm not sure why I've been feeling such a strong impression to share this...the spirit I'm sure. I've been reconnecting with old friends from college and high school on Facebook (and here) lately. It's interesting to see where people are in their lives...and how different they are. Some have changed for the better. Some that I thought were not very 'active' members of the church have turned things around and have been sealed in the temple and are very 'active' in their callings and church activities.
Others have changed in a different way. They've gone the other direction. Friends who I went to church with, who shared their testimonies with me, who knew the plan and were going to stick to it...they fell off the path. It breaks my heart. I wonder what made things change for them. I'm sure for some it was a very gradual thing...miss church once in awhile, stop paying tithing, get new friends who don't share the same values. I'll admit, I haven't always been on the straight and narrow. But I'm sure glad I got back on it. I'm having a hard time getting these people out of my mind. Wondering what they think the purpose of life is...without the gospel.
A talk that kept coming to my mind was the April 2008 Conference talk by our Prophet, President Monson. I'll admit, I'm not usually good at remembering things our leaders tell us at Conference (sometimes I'm asleep or trying to keep the kids quite or happy..whatever). But for some reason this one stuck with me. I just loved it.

Here's the quote from President Monson's talk:

Throughout the journey along the pathway of life, there are casualties. Some depart from the road markers which point toward life eternal, only to discover the detour chosen ultimately leads to a dead end. Indifference, carelessness, selfishness, and sin all take their costly toll in human lives.

Change for the better can come to all. Over the years we have issued appeals to the less active, the offended, the critical, the transgressor—to come back. “Come back and feast at the table of the Lord, and taste again the sweet and satisfying fruits of fellowship with the Saints.”

In the private sanctuary of one’s own conscience lies that spirit, that determination to cast off the old person and to measure up to the stature of true potential. In this spirit, we again issue that heartfelt invitation: Come back. We reach out to you in the pure love of Christ and express our desire to assist you and to welcome you into full fellowship. To those who are wounded in spirit or who are struggling and fearful, we say, Let us lift you and cheer you and calm your fears. Take literally the Lord’s invitation, “Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”

educational games

I've been trying my best to be a better mom lately...so I've been playing some educational games with Benson while Owen is taking his morning nap. I did this before, but I didn't make an effort to do it everyday. For Christmas Benson got a game called Roll & Play from Grandma & Grandpa Gunther. It helps him learn his colors and follow simple directions. One time he rolled red, and the card told him to find something yellow. I showed him the card and reminded him what the color yellow looks like. He got really excited and ran out of the room. We were playing upstairs in his room and I could hear him running down the stairs. I figured he must have something yellow in mind and knew exactly what he wanted. A minute later he came up the stairs with a yellow banana. I laughed so hard...because the girl on the card was holding a yellow banana. Benson then had a snack.

Here's Owen with his Nap Hair aka Bed Head.

These are from a couple months ago, but I just wanted to show them. Benson actually likes to eat vegetables. We have a hard time getting him to eat the main course, but he'll eat his veggies.
Funny guy.


He especially likes his veggies when he can dip them in yummy veggie dip.

He's actually dipping his finger in the dip. Oh well, as long as he gets some calories...this guy is skinny.

Benson doesn't like to take naps or go to bed at night. On a few occasions I've just let him play in the loft until he falls asleep. This is really how it looked when I went up to move him to his bed.

Cruisin' Crawler

Owen is now 10 months old and is definitely getting into everything! He crawls very well (no more weird army crawl that looks like he's swimming) and he's quite fast.
His new favorite thing to do is crawl up the stairs.
Here's a video of it.

And here's another video to show what a fast crawler he is.




A couple weeks ago Owen had an ear infection...again. I was getting ready to take him to the doctor and Benson wanted to check Owen's temperature. I had recently checked Owen's temperature in his armpit (it was 101.2) so Benson wanted to do it that way too.

A cute video of the temperature taking.

I just recently started putting the boys together in the bath. They have so much fun together. They both did a good job covering their privates in this picture. Benson used a toy and Owen's tummy worked well. I didn't even have to tell them to do it...they're just so modest. ;)

P.S. A few people asked if Jeff had actually made the stocking he gave me for Christmas...yes he did. Jeff is quite the man...he can sew.

I'm behind...

I know, it's been awhile. Owen turned 9 months old way back on Dec. 18th. He was doing an army crawl at the time, which looked like he was trying to swim. Here's a cute video of it.

Owen is crawling at full speed now. I'll have to do a post on that next time.
Here are his measurements from his 9 month checkup:
Length: 29" (above 50%)
Weight: 21 lb 5 oz (above 50%)
Head Circ: 45.2 cm (almost 50%)

If any of you have been to my house, you've probably seen the baby cowboy room. When Benson was in there we had his name up on the wall and it was written with a rope. It's so cute. My sister Dana helped me with it. Well, I finally put up Owen's name, since it's his room now. It only took me 9 months to do it. It doesn't look as cute as Benson's because Dana didn't help me this time. The flower above his name is supposed to be a star, but it didn't turn out so great. I might fix it someday.

Here's another cute video of Benson and Owen. It shows some of the cute things Owen has been doing lately.

We had a wonderful Christmas. The boys love all their gifts.

Jeff made me this extremely huge stocking. It was my favorite gift. Homemade presents are the best.


Benson being cool at Grandma & Grandpa Gunther's house.
This is a video of Benson a few days before Christmas. I was trying to get him to tell me what Santa says. He's so funny.

We gave the boys haircuts a few days ago and we decided to go super short. Benson looks like he's going to an army bootcamp.

Benson loves to get in Owen's crib with him.
One last video. I think it's funny.

Our Christmas Card

Merry Christmas!!!
Let's just pretend you received our cute family picture in the mail along with a wonderful letter. I didn't quite get around to doing it this busy holiday season, so this is what you get...and you even get it after Christmas.
Hope you had a fantastic Christmas and have a Happy New Year!

All I Want for Christmas...

...is two sweet little boys!
I wanted to wrap them up and put them under the tree.
I was emptying out some boxes the other night and Benson wanted to sit and play in one. I put Owen in the other box and they were just as content as can be. Really, who needs toys when you have boxes?!


I tried taking pictures of the boys in front of the Christmas tree. They weren't as cooperative as I'd hoped,
but they're cute anyway.



I'm not sure what they are looking at.
There must have been something exciting on the TV.

Here's Benson sharing or taking.
I'm not quite sure which.

And again, sharing or taking?
I'll give him the benefit of the doubt and say he must have been sharing...since it's Christmas time.

Ornaments are always good for eating.
Look how cute they are holding hands.

Mom & Owen

Owen loves to yank on all my ornaments.
That's why I put some down low that he can play with.

Even when times are hard I always think about how very blessed we are. A few of 'Santa's helpers' came by a few days ago with some 'gifts' for our family. Thank you to those who are so willing and happy to give. We love our family, friends, and neighbors. Hope you have a Merry Christmas.