Merry (late) Christmas!

I have lots more pictures to post, but they will have to wait for tomorrow cause I just got Graham to sleep and I am going to take advantage of that and go to sleep myself!

I found a better Edward

This is who I think should have played Edward. He would have been perfect.

Graham's first snowfall

The morning we left my Parents house, we woke up to it snowing!! We took Graham out in it to see what he thought but he didn't seem to care either way. Maybe next year he will be more excited about it.

All the things we did over Thanksgiving

We all went to see Christmas lights.

It was about 2 degrees outside so Elliot put Graham inside his coat. I guess he was pretty cozy in there because he fell asleep right away and missed all the lights.
He decided to come out when we got to the part where they hand out free hot cocoa but then pouted and fell back asleep after I told him he couldn't have any. (I couldn't find any mittens or gloves that would fit an infant so I ended up putting socks over his hands and it worked pretty well!)
There was a rousing game of charades. This is Elliot trying to get everyone to guess "Oprah's couch." My brother thought that was a really clever one he thought up.

We played battleship.

Graham tried to join in but couldn't hold his head up long enough to see the board.

There was a baseball game for awhile until no one could stand to be out in the freezing cold anymore.We read a lot of books.Unfortunately, Elliot had a project due right after Thanksgiving so he had to work on that all week.

And I just love this picture of Graham. My brother was giving him an airplane ride and it totally looks like he is trying to make airplane sound effects in this picture. Hilarious.

All the people Graham met

My parentsHe did really well for my mom in his bath. He has just started enjoying being in the water.

My nieces Kelly and Isabelle

Isabelle especially took a liking to Graham and wanted to play with him anytime he was around. It was really cute. She was also excited about feeding him and changing all his diapers. I should have brought her back home with us!

My sister Britany

My brother Shane

and Elliot's grandparents (who are good friends with my parents and came for Thanksgiving dinner)

The ride there and back

Well, to mine and Elliot's surprise, Graham actually did really well on our car trip. Not to say that there weren't several times where we got to enjoy this:

But the crying was few and far between for the most part. I am thinking he did so well because of my extraordinary parenting skills. I sat him down before we left and explained to him that the trip would go a lot better if he stayed quiet and slept or read scriptures, or started trying to learn his ABC's (it would be about time, he's almost 3 months old for crying out loud!).  I really think I got through to him because he respects me as a parent and wanted to make me proud. He ended up choosing to sleep for most of the 9 hour trip.
There is a part of me that wonders if the baby tylenol had anything to do with it? Nah, I doubt it.

We were about 1/2 hour from my parents house and pretty happy that we had almost made it without incident when Graham started screaming bloody murder.  At first, we thought we should just keep going since we were so close, but I couldn't get him to stop and I thought I smelled poo so Elliot pulled over and I pulled him out to change him. Oh wow. There was definitely poo. EVERYWHERE. I had laid him on the carseat with the door open so I could change him and once I opened his onesie up, poo suddenly was on everything. My hands, arms, sweatshirt, his legs, feet, clothes, the blanket. It was crazy. How is it that I can have this baby for 2 1/2 months and the first time he has a major poop blowout has to be in the cramped backseat of our car with the 20 degree wind blowing on his poor little bottom? I had to take all of his clothes off since the poo had contaminated them all so he was totally naked in the freezing cold while I wiped his body off with cold wipes. The way he was screaming, I'm surprised no one called child protective services. Poor little baby. What an awful experience. Luckily for him, we had the camera handy so we can all remember this momentus experience forever. 

I think we were all a little traumatized for awhile afterwards.

One month pictures

So I decided to finally post Graham's one month pictures. So lazy, I know. We went to JC Penney's and I would highly recommend them. You can pretty much find a coupon for them in any parenting magazine or even in a JC Penney store. With the coupon, I got a free 8x10 and then every sheet of pictures after that was only 3.99. So both times I've been, I haven't paid more then about 12.00 for several poses worth of pictures. I love how these pictures turned out. He was crying during almost the entire thing so I'm surprised we ended up with a few good ones. The photographer would blow in his face and it would surprise him and then she would snap a shot. Genius (or possibly kind of mean).


And guess what?? I found some baby pictures of me in some of my stuff and, good news!! Graham does look more like me then I thought (sorry Elliot). Here are the pictures of me (they are terrible copies but it was all I could find) and then a picture of Graham in a similiar pose.Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We leave tomorrow afternoon to head to my parents house. Wish us luck. We will definitely be needing it (along with some serious doses of baby tylenol).

Almost forgot his stats

In case anyone is interested, here are Graham's stats from his 2 month appt:

12.8 lbs

22.5 inches long

and here's another picture because I just can't help myself:

Shots and highchairs

On Friday, Graham had his 2 month well check (what does that even mean? Why can't we call it a check-up visit?) I was so worried for him about the shots and how he would respond to them. Here is what he looked like right before we left. I love this picture. How can you resist that double chin?

When we got to the dr's office, the receptionist advised me to put a blanket over Graham so it was completely covering him because there were some sick people in the waiting area and she didn't want the germs getting to Graham. Elliot was holding him so I put the blanket around him and then noticed it looked like he was nursing him! We both couldn't stop laughing about it and luckily I had the camera with me so I got to capture the tender moment.Here's Graham right before getting his shots. Poor little guy.  He got really red in the face when he got the first shot and held his breath for a little bit before letting out a loud scream. Surprisingly though, he didn't fuss much more then a few minutes after the whole ordeal. I expected him to carry on and on about it but he seemed to be ok once he was being held again. That is until we put him back into his car seat to go home.  Apparently he didn't want to waste his tantrum energy on the shots and was saving up for the moment his little butt hit the car seat. He had definitely saved up enough energy. He screamed bloody murder the entire way home, and of course went back to normal once we were home and took him out of the car. What baby is more upset by a car seat then by two sharp needles being jabbed into his leg? Weirdo. I suppose this is a baby who had a spinal tap at 1 week old. He just may think these vaccine shots are child's play.
In other news, we have discovered sanity saver #2 (the first of course being this). I put Graham in Carson's highchair the other night while I was eating dinner and low and behold he sat quietly in it through the entire dinner!! It was pretty fabulous not having to pass him back and forth while we ate. And then to sweeten the miracle, he fell asleep in it halfway through the meal!! That is the first time I have ever seen him fall asleep on his own without being held. Who knew I could feel such love for a highchair?
I went and saw Twilight on Friday too. I went in thinking it was going to be a fairly cheezy movie that wasn't anywhere near as good as the books (what movie ever is as good as the book?) but that it would be entertaining. I ended up absolutely loving the movie though! I thought it was really great and followed the book really closely. All the characters seemed pretty dead on to what I envisioned them to be when reading the book, and call me a 13 year old girl, but Edward was so dang sexy my heart raced a bit during different parts of the movie. 

Car seat trauma

So as I mentioned in my last post, Graham absolutely detests his car seat. He can be acting perfectly happy and then I'll snap him into it and he goes berserk. Even when I get him completely asleep before putting him in it (thinking I am so clever) he immediately wakes up, surveys the situation for a minute or two and, after realizing he is in the car seat, screams incessantly until the second I take him out (then he acts like nothing happened, the little bum).
On Tuesday, I took him to the mall (which is about 15 minutes away) to get his 2 month pictures taken and he screamed all the way there and all the way back. That 15 minute drive turned into what seemed like 6 hours. On the way back he was screaming so hard and loud, I seriously considered pulling over thinking something was wrong, but decided against it because I didn't want the drive to have to be any longer then necessary. He kept coughing mid-cry because he was choking from crying so hard. As soon as we got home, I took him out and what do you know, complete silence. What a strange little boy.
For the most part, the car seat hatred has not been much more then a slight annoyance when having to drive the short distance to church or to run quick errands, but next week we have decided to put to the test exactly how much he really does dislike that car seat. We are making the 9 hour trek up to Indiana to see my family for Thanksgiving. Oh boy. I have no idea how this is going to go and honestly, I'm a little terrified of what 9 hours of screaming is going to be like. Surely he couldn't actually cry the ENTIRE 9 hours.....right? I've never had the opportunity to see just how long Graham will cry for in the car, but I figure even an adult could only carry on for so long, so a baby must get tired after 1/2 hour? 45 minutes? an hour of screaming? He'll have to get tired eventually. Oh please tell me I am right.
We are going to leave on Monday night as soon as we get him to sleep. A nice hot bath, a bottle of warm formula, and I am hoping we can get him deep enough asleep that it will take a few hours before he realizes we have tricked him into the car seat. The last week, he has been sleeping between 7-9 hours a night (knock on wood that this keeps up) so if I can get him into the car seat after he is asleep and we leave right away, I think we might be able to make it at least 3/4's of the way to my parents house while he is asleep. Let's just pray that this is really the case. My fear is that this is going to turn into a 15 hour car ride from hell and Elliot and I will both be too traumatized to ever take Graham anywhere again.
Does anyone have any advice that could make this experience any easier? Or perhaps some baby narcotics? I would accept either with open arms.
Graham has his 2 month shots tomorrow morning. I am already sad for him. Poor little guy has no idea what is coming his way.

Taming the beast

Not sure if I've mentioned it before, but Graham is quite temperamental. In face, he can be down right grumpy most of the time. When he was in the NICU, the nurses kept telling me that he had quite a temper but I thought they were being wimpy about him crying sometimes, and since I only saw him about an hour each day, I happened to think his little baby cry was the most adorable sound I had ever heard (oh my short lived naivety). If he is not sleeping or eating, it is a fairly good guess that he is crying. I try bouncing him in my arms, putting him in the swing (this one leads to lots more crying. He in no way appreciates the soothing effect of the swing that every other baby in America seems to absolutely love), using the baby bjorn, taking him for a walk, singing to him, the list is endless and none of it works for very long. Until I found this gem of a baby toy:



I borrowed it from Megan one day to see if it worked and low and behold it does!! He is mezmorized by the flashing star that plays the music and will lay there staring at it for up to 20 minutes at a time. People, do you know what you can do in 20 minutes if you have both hands free and you no longer have to attend to your ears that were previously bleeding from the high decibel screaming?
Oddly enough, since the discovery of this babysitter, Graham has started really mellowing out. I'm not sure if the flashing lights have put him into a permanent trance or what, but I would say for the last week he has been quite calm. I have been able to lay him on the couch and play with him and he has started cooing at me and smiling back sometimes! He is so much fun. Not to say he doesn't still freak out sometimes for what appears to be no reason, but what baby doesn't? (if you were going to say your baby doesn't, don't bother, I have no desire to hear about it).
That being said, he does still ABSOLUTELY hate his car seat and acts like he is being stabbed everytime I try to put him into it. That is a blog for another time though. I have a baby crying in the other room.

Should I be concerned?

Last Sunday as part of the lesson to my beehives, I told a story about a woman who had lost her husband in a car accident and how painful it was for her, but how she got through it based on her faith. We started discussing how hard it would be for someone to lose their spouse and what kinds of feelings you would have. One of my beehives, wanting to make sure the class really understood what this would be like, raised her hand and said "you guys, remember when Bella lost Edward for awhile in the second book? Can you imagine if he had never come back? That would have been devastating." All the other beehives nodded their heads in understanding and murmured sounds of agreement.

Not quite sure when the Twilight books starting completely taking over our lives.

Rock on!

YEAH!!!!

Are we all not so ecstatic that Brady got the boot last night!? I personally did a little victory dance.

Now if only we could convince them to remove one more hindrance to the show....

At 7 months and 7 weeks, they are already destined to be best friends