Happy Birthday Javan!

We celebrated Javan's 32nd birthday yesterday. On Saturday when i told the kids we were going to make dad's birthday cake Ethan got all excited and wanted to know what kind of cake we would make. He wondered if it should be the Scooby Doo cake or Spongebob? When I said we were probably just going to make a plain cake Ethan and Ally were both sad. They thought he needed a fun cake like they have on their birthdays.

So we scavenged some toys from Ethan's toy box and here's what we came up with:
Ethan was quite pleased with the result.

Blowing out the candles, with some help.


Opening presents.


Happy Birthday Hun!

Javan's Slideshow

I can't make this work right. Click on the "view all images" and it will take you to the photobucket website where you can view the slideshow if you are interested.

Husband Tag

In honor of Javan, since it's his birthday tomorrow, I thought I would do this tag on him. Anyone else feel free to do it too.

1) Where did you first meet your husband?
I knew him in high school, he was friends with my sister, but then when he got home from his mission we worked at the same motel. I used to ask him to work for me.

2) How long did you date before you got married?
1 year

3) How long have you been married?
8 1/2 years!

4)What does he do that surprises you?
He teaches a good Sunday school lesson. Not that I didn't think he had it in him to to do but he has a real fear of public speaking so I am surprised at how well he does, put me to shame every week.


5)What is your favorite feature of his?
I love his hands

6)What is his best quality?
He's very handy, he can do, or figure out how to do anything.

7)Does he have a nickname for you?
Hun

8)What is his favorite food?
He's great cause he likes almost everything. 7 layer dip is a favorite, fajitas

9)What is his favorite sport?
Is motorcycle riding a sport? How about shed hunting? Because their his favorite things to do.

10)When and where did you first kiss?
4th of July, Mike and Shan's cabin.

11)What is your favorite thing to do as a couple?
Dinner and a movie -- as long as we're together I'm happy.


12)Do you have any children?
3 - Ethan, Ally, Ryan

13)Does he have any hidden talents?
He is very good at his job, I am amazed that the things he does, and like I said before he can figure out how to do anything.


14)How old is he?
32 (tomorrow)

15)Who said "I love you" first?
It was me, and he didn't say it back right away. That's pretty sad.


16)What is his favorite music?
Um, hard rock, is that what it's called?

17)What do you admire most about him?
The responsibility he has taken on with his family, his hard work to provide for us.

18)What is his favorite color?
Brown or black


19)Will he read this?
Possibly

4 Months Old

And we're back. It's quite the process to replace a hard drive and get everything loaded back on the computer and restore old files. I don't wish that upon anyone. I'm still not done but I decided I should do this post while Ryan is still 4 months old.

Unfortunately Ryan decided that he was done nursing. For a few days after Christmas he would just scream his head off every time I tried to feed him. It was so frustrating and sad for me but he is done nursing and just on a bottle now. I still have tons of breast milk in the freezer and sometimes he won't even drink that. I am taking it pretty personally. What have I done to deserve this? So with the absence of nursing I decided to start him on cereal hoping that he would sleep through the night since I would have to get out of bed to make him a bottle now. For the first few nights it worked awesome, he slept for about 6 hours straight. I thought we were really onto something, but it was short lived and he is waking up every 3 to 4 hours to eat. I don't really like this arrangement.

Ryan has become quite the little jabber jaw. He coos, and oohs, and aahs. He is becoming more reactive with Ethan and Ally, smiling when they talk to him (as long as they keep their distance) and laughing when they play little games with him. They think it's quite hilarious when he laughs.

This all sounds really good but he has quite a naughty side too. No one will believe Javan and I when we say he is naughty because he always acts like a perfect angel when were away from home. But he has earned the nickname "cryin' Ryan", which suits him well, and which I am not happy about. He gets this death scream that sounds like his arm was ripped off and he is being beaten with it (that's how Javan describes it). He cries so hard and for so long that his voice becomes hoarse, and you can't console him. For the first few times this happened I thought something was seriously wrong. But now we realize this it what he does. Sometimes it's so frustrating we just have to leave the room and let him cry it out for awhile.

He really is a sweet chubby little guy and I love him to pieces, just wish he wouldn't cry so much. It's not helping out in my plea for another baby with Javan. And to be quite honest, it's also deterring me a bit.

Anyway, enough of that.

Okay, at four months old Ryan weighs 15 lbs 14 oz and is 26 inches long.

His hair is growing fast (on top anyway). We even gave him some spikes for church. Not pictured here.

The handsome little man.

Ryan loves the bath. The second he hits the water his arms and legs are moving a mile a minute.

We broke out the bouncy chair the other day and Ryan quite likes it. He gets excited when the kids run by and jumps around. Sometimes THEY think it's fun to swing him really high, HE doesn't like it as much.

Ally was playing a little game with Ryan the other day where she was running around him in a circle and making lots of noise. Ryan loved it. He was laughing and jabbering the whole time. Here's a little clip of it.

Hard Drive Failure Immanent!

Oh no!! I am in a serious state of panic right now. We got home from work last night and there was a message on our computer that said "Hard Drive Failure Immanent. Back up hard drive immediately." Holy crap, this is my worst nightmare. If you think about it immanent is a pretty scary word. Because despite all your efforts, nothing can be done. What about all my pictures and videos? This is the only record I have of my kids. What if I lost all their pictures? I panicked.

Thankfully I had purchased an external hard drive recently and was able to back-up to that. (I think, I left it going over night and forgot to check it this morning.) I called HP support and spent an hour with them. Thankfully (again), our computer was still under warranty so they will replace the hard drive for free. HP is not my favorite. We have had several other problems with this computer. In my opinion, stick with Dell.

So I might be away from the computer for awhile. They are shipping a new hard drive and then I have to install it in the computer and reload all of our programs on to it. So if you don't hear from me for awhile that is what happened. I hope all is safe and sound in my little external hard drive. You all should think about getting one.

Happy New Year!! (right?)

I am using a computer at work to post this.