6 Months

Six months? Already?

 Turns out, you moms have not been lying; they really do grow up so fast.

Believe it or not, this little guy has been around for over half a year now. I hardly remember what life was like without him. Now he's my regular partner in crime. The more I get to know him and his little emerging personality the more in love with him I fall. I really do feel so lucky that Brock and I get to be his parents.



Okay enough with the cliches and on to the pictures.

Few things in life smell as gross as that deer puppet. It has been drenched in spit up multiple times, but Jack loves it and sleeps with it every night. I'm afraid if I wash it and remove the scent, he'll pull a mama bird and reject it, then suddenly have trouble sleeping. Actually... writing this just made me realize how ridiculous it all sounded. I think it's time to do some laundry. Anyway, Jack used to sleep peacefully on his tummy in the middle of his crib each night...

 

 

 

...but now he tends to move around quite a bit before settling in. It's cute to hear him "talk" to himself and roll around happily in there before he falls asleep. More often than not, this ends up his position of choice. Hey, whatever gets you to sleep through the night, buddy. (FYI- Jack is still a champion sleeper. Rarely do we get less than 11 straight hours out of him. I'm just hoping he doesn't start teething anytime soon because I've heard that can really mess things up.) 

Unsolved Mystery: Jack's Sleeve. Oddly enough, Jack wakes up every single morning with his right sleeve pushed up. It's always the right one; never the left. I have no idea why. We decided not to get the video monitor and I am gravely regretting that decision. I would love to know what goes on in there every night that causes him to have the same sleeve pushed up to his elbow every morning.

Jack loves sitting in the "big boy" cart seat now. We are, of course, at Costco. We've developed a shameless habit of frequenting Costco for "lunch" almost every day. And by "lunch" I mean free samples, obviously. Okay, and sometimes a churro sneaks its way into the mix as well.

Jack with uncle Joel. Not the best picture of Joel, but I am pretty sure he doesn't read this blog (or even know it exists) so I doubt he'll ever know I posted it. Plus, he goes on a mission to Taiwan in two days so I'm sure that looking creepy in my blog is the last thing on his mind.

Jack's not the cuddliest baby around these days, so moments like this these days are rare and CHERISHED. He loves snuggling up with Grammy and listening to ACDC. The "Rockabye Baby" version of ACDC. He looks absolutely huge in this picture. Partly because my mom is tiny but also because, well, he is huge.

My cousin Emma had her little guy George just a week after Jack was born, so these guys are exactly the same age! This was the first time we were able to get them together and their meet-and-greet was just as cute/entertaining as we'd imagined.

Two leaning buds, one toy pea. (Yes, it's a pea. I think it came with another pea... and a pod.)

I had started thinking that Jack was finally starting to grow some hair. Then George came around.

We went to go visit cousin Chase after he got surgery on his toe. This brave kid had a pin through his foot underneath that cast. I'm sure the chocolate milk and candy we brought him helped speed up the recovery process.

Mom of the Year! It's always a good idea to hand your child a plastic bag to play with when he's throwing a fit in Winco. This picture makes me laugh. I think my son is the cutest baby in the world, but I can fully admit that this picture is terrifying. 

Okay, the vital statistics: at 6 months, Jack officially weighs 21 pounds, is 28 1/2 inches tall and has a normal sized head. (I don't really care about or pay attention to the head circumference measurement more than that.) He is in the 94% for weight and 97% for height. I'm going to have to learn how football works because I have a feeling my future holds a lot of games.

I love this little goon. And this little goon loves that monkey.

Happy 6 Months Jack! I guess it's unrealistic for me to expect the chalk not to get smeared at this point...

...or the chalkboard to stay out of his mouth, for that matter.

Sunshine

This is going to be a hard post to write. As I post pictures of beautiful red rock, green grass and 65 degree temperatures, it is a bone chilling 23 degrees outside. The space heater blasting 6 inches away from me is just no substitute from that southern Utah sun.

Last weekend we were able to escape the sub-arctic temperatures for a few days and enjoyed visiting Brock's family in St. George. The drive down flew by, mostly due to sunshine, a happy, complacent baby, the always enjoyable company of my sis-in-law Bailey, Sonic breakfast burritos and access to Spotify on my phone. After what, 2 years of its existence? I finally broke down and signed up for the Premium trial. Let me tell you, I am SOLD. Access to like 90% of all music ever created within seconds on MY PHONE? Wherever I go? I'll take it. I just hate how if you forget to change the settings, it shares everything you listen to with all your Facebook friends. I apologize to all you who were plagued with important updates like "Carolyn Gassman Sargent starred "I Need a Girl: Part II" from the Bad Boys Soundtrack on Spotify." This is news that nobody needs to know.

Here are some of the weekend's documented highlights.

We did this amazing hike with Brock's mom, his cousin Jordon and his wife Ashley to a rock formation called "The Toilet Bowl" in a town called Gunlock. Take note of the hiking stick. Not only does it make us look like legit hikers, it somehow makes hiking way more fun.

Me, Brock and Jenn (mother-in-law). I really wasn't going to let go of that hiking stick for anything, was I?

Jumpy pic fail. Although, if you look closely, I'm pretty sure you could slide a piece of paper under my left toe.

Ahh, success! You don't want to know how many tries it took to get this. Synchronized jumping is as exhausting as it is cheesy.

What's this? An Abbey Road re-creation on red rocks? I don't know how I thought that this "pose" resembled Sir Paul McCartney. Once again, I have ruined an otherwise successful picture.

The cardigan was shed shortly after this picture was taken. It was a beautiful day at the baseball field. 65 degrees (or more) and not a cloud in the sky.

Too bad nobody ever wants to hang out with this poor, attention starved baby...

5 mile morning run. Rule: you can only run in this family if you sport neon gear. Thank goodness I have bright shoes because my tendency to buy all grey/black/white clothing nearly disqualified me. The starting lineup (from left to right): 4 models from a fitness magazine, Quasimodo and Rocky.

All in all, it was an awesome weekend. I think I'm about ready to go back. 

An Insomnia Induced Facelift

I have attempted to "re-vamp" the blog.

The key word here is "attempted". As it turns out, there is a really complicated process behind getting blogs look nice. Kudos to all you bloggers with clever fonts and custom layouts; all that copying/pasting of codes made my head spin so much I somehow ended up stress-eating an entire Totinos Party Pizza by myself. 800 calories later, I'm still rocking Blogger's default template and fonts that were probably available with Windows 95.

Ever since the Instagram era began (or rather, ever since I tardily jumped on the bandwagon when I realized that Instagram wasn't just a picture editing app), I've slacked big time on this little blog. For me it is an oddly daunting task to (gasp) plug in the camera (bigger gasp,) transfer the pictures (even bigger gasp,) attempt to tidy them up in Picassa, and (biggest gasp of all- your lungs should be full) upload them to my blog. The much more appealing alternative is a quick Instagram post. I can get my social media on in a quick 20 seconds, 50 characters, and a couple of "clever" #hashtags.

I have realized though that I do like to write occasionally, and I figured that maybe a little online "makeover" might give me the motivation I need to start this up again. I've been battling mommy insomnia for weeks and I figure writing might be a better alternative to the way I have been passing time lately. Which is watching Netflix documentaries about the Loch Ness Monster and Bigfoot. FYI- I am sold on both. Total believer, right here.

Speaking of insomnia, the painfully cheesy title of this blog can be blamed on last night's bout of sleeplessness. Have you ever spent the late hours of the night thinking up something really brilliant, playing out all the details in your head, growing increasingly proud of this stroke of genius that has hit you? Only to wake up in the morning mortified that you actually thought it was a good idea and relieved that you didn't act on it? (Unless you did...in which case, we've all been there, right?)

Well, last night while lying in bed around 3 am, my mind somehow wandered toward my blog and I began brainstorming (did I really use that word? I apologize; this is not 8th grade English) ideas for its much needed facelift. Then it hit me. The new blog title. "Behind the Scenes: The Raw, Uncut Footage We Call Life." Or no! Maybe "Deleted Scenes: What You Don't Catch on the Highlight Reel". I also played around with "The Lowlight Reel" and "The Sargent Show". I was giddy with excitement. This whole "movie/film" theme was brilliant, right? How clever and catchy! I finally drifted off to a delightful sleep, these brilliant thoughts marinating in my head.

Then I woke up.

"The what?" sputtered Brock between gasps of laughter, "Deleted Scenes?"
"I know, right?" I replied with tears of laughter in my eyes, "How ridiculous. That's what happens when sleep deprivation renders you practically intoxicated."

When the absurdity of last night's thoughts dawned on me, I had immediately relayed them to Brock. We laughed for a few more minutes. I was relieved that I hadn't made any of these changes during the night. What stupid ideas! What are we, film people? Movie buffs? (Again, I apologize for using that term. What am I, a 75 year old man?)

But somehow throughout the day, I couldn't seem to shake the idea of giving the blog a facelift. And every time I tried to come up with a new name, all I could seem to think of were titles involving the words "scene" and "highlights". And all I could picture was a clever little graphic involving a film spool. It was too late- the movie theme had seared itself into my brain in a bad way; I knew it wasn't going to leave. Apparently the thoughts we think during that late night state of mind are very powerful. Even more reason for me not to watch anymore conspiracy theory shows at 2 am. Or else my next post might be an essay on America's faking of the moon landing.

So here we are. I've got a new cheesy title and crappy "pixely" picture to accompany it. (Seriously. It was created in "Paint".) Anybody with a hint of pride would probably abandon the project all together, but my husband is at school until 11 tonight, Jack is asleep and I am waiting on my turn in "Words with Friends". Basically I have no life, so this post is getting published as a last ditch effort to entertain myself. It's a work in progress. I have plans to make it better, I promise. But for now, I am starving and there is another Totinos in the freezer calling my name. My body will probably hate me tomorrow. If so, I've got a sort-of new blog to complain about it on. You lucky reader. :)

Month 3... 2 Months Later

 When I was 1 year old, I weighed 18 pounds.

Jack is 4 months old. He weighs 19 pounds.

We are getting really excited about this kid's future athletic career.

I was really hoping my arm strength would increase proportionally as Jack gained weight. Sadly, this has not happened. My arms still resemble Spongebob's. 

Out of his many fantastic baby-esque qualities, my personal favorite these days is his ability to sleep. Jack has become a champion nighttime sleeper. He regularly sleeps 11+ hours each night. We're still working on the napping thing. He is quite the cat napper, peppering in little power naps throughout the day. If he's asleep for 45 minutes, I consider it a huge accomplishment. Mostly I'm lucky to get 20 minutes at a time out of him. Just long enough to draft up a mediocre at best blog post, right?

These pictures are from November when he was 3 months old. At this rate, I'll probably get around to posting his 4th month pictures in about June...

I love dressing Jack in "big guy" clothes. Because, you know, "big guys" are always wearing shirts with cartoon cars embroidered on the chest.

I had been planning Jack's lobster costume since about 2010. He ended up wearing it that day for about 13 minutes. Some would say the costume was a waste of $24.95+shipping and handling, but I say it was my favorite 13 minutes of the year.

This was going to be Jack's blessing outfit until we found the original get-up that Brock and his dad were blessed in. Jack took the outfit a little seriously and began sternly calling me to repentance.

Jack with Brock on his blessing day. He was so well behaved- he didn't even cry or poop during the blessing! Oh yeah, and Jack was pretty good too. I know, best joke of the day. 

We had a luncheon at my parents' house afterwards. Most people would probably take lots of artsy pictures of the tasty spread (soup, salad, bread) but of course I was too busy eating/wrestling with Jack to bother with the camera until the food and people were all gone.

Soon, young Jack, the sight of pizza will not be quite so boring.

Jack and aunt Bailey. For a while Jack had a widow's peak hairline. I'm glad it evened out. I saw the Twilight movie. I know how much trouble baby Vampires can be.

I'm not sure who is holding Jack here, but he is obviously liking the attention.

Jack is finally starting to like the car more. Either that or he's just getting lazier- he usually only bothers to whine for the first few minutes of each trip before he gets sick of it and quiets down. I think he's also glad to be back to our normal radio faves- he was getting a little sick of the constant Christmas music.

Bad parent alert! Yes, Jack is watching The Lion King on my laptop. Judge all you want. When your baby is so fussy and clingy you literally have to use the restroom with him on your lap, Disney is your last resort.

Jack likes to help hold his bottles. Sometimes he'll even hold them himself. The blurry hand in the lower left corner is either clapping with delight or rushing to aid a nearly falling bottle.

Tummy time. Jack sporadically rolls over, but it's not an everyday thing. The doctor said not to worry- its a lot harder to roll 20 pounds over from back to front. That makes sense.

This picture serves two purposes. One, to showcase the ghetto fabulous homemade PVC pipe toy we handcrafted for Jack. $5. You can't tell me a 3 month old knows the difference between this and the $50 model. Secondly, I wanted to point out Jack's thighs and the way they fill up the Bumbo's leg slots. Where he get dem legs from? He get 'em from his mama. Just kidding. Kind of.

Two Months

I was way too impatient to wait for a smile.

 Somehow it has been two months since Jack joined the fam.

This is the paragraph that I would LIKE to be contained in this post:

Jack has acclimated nicely to a predictable and structured schedule. He sleeps peacefully for 12 hours straight each night, along with the routine morning and afternoon naps we both enjoy. When this ever-so-smiley guy is awake, we spend hours cuddling and playing. Except, of course, from the time I set aside for exercising and getting myself ready for the day, that is. It would be a shame to hide this size two body under a pair of baggy, bleach stained sweatpants after all! Jack rarely spits up or fusses and his sweet smelling poop is always contained neatly in his diaper. And since he goes down at seven each evening, Brock and I are able to spend lots of quality time together. I never knew having a baby would be so easy! I'm already thinking about baby #2!

Ha. Yeah. Freakin'. Right. Don't I wish...

If there is one thing that I have learned in the past two months, it is this: babies (at least this one) are NEVER predictable. Not at this age, anyway. Almost every notion I had about Jack at one month has changed over the past few weeks.

Some examples:

The old Jack.

He used to love riding in the car. Any drive over five minutes was bound to lull him into a peaceful sleep, which sleep continued conveniently to last throughout any errand we were running. Now? Jack screams bloody murder for the entire duration of the ride. Seriously, the dull thunk of the carseat being clipped into the car is like a starting gun. The second he hears it, the shrieking commences at full force. You'd think there was some sort of creature hiding between the folds of fabric in there, constantly poking Jack with mini scissors. To be fair, the straps do look pretty uncomfortable. I've been known to do the "seatbelt tuck back" myself from time to time (shhhh, don't tell Officer Friendly.) At this point, I've just come to grips with the fact that any drive we take will be accompanied by the shrill sound of infant wailing, as opposed to the shrill sound of Carly Rae Jeppson. It's kind of sixes, I guess.

See? Serious but calm. And tastefully covered.

On a more positive note, Jack used to hate the bath. At first, our son spent a good chunk of his life hygiene deprived. It just made me too sad to see his slippery, wet and obviously very unhappy tiny body squirm in that hard plastic tub half filled with lukewarm water. I chalked it up to genetics. He obviously got his hate for baths from his mom. I personally haven't taken a bath since about 1992. I find the idea of floating around in my own filth water disgusting. However, I LOVE showers. They are always at least twenty minutes long and the water temperature must be skin-meltingly hot. Recently though, we figured out that while he hates the "baby bath", he loves the good old fashioned sink. At first, his baths were a silent and somber occasion. He always looked rather concerned as we soaped his little body down, but never actually cried, which we saw as a victory. Now he's gotten more used to his baths and he actually smiles and laughs in there now. Baths have become a daily occurrence, and it's a good thing too- which leads me to our next paragraph. (Take note of the clever segue.)

Poop. Jack used to do it all the time. Little, cute, neat diaper messes were cleaned up with ease. Apparently Jack's bowels have matured or something, because now he's only pooping once or twice a day. This is nice, as far as diaper/wipe conservation goes. (Who wants to spend $ on this kind of stuff, right?) But when he poop, he POOPS. Some of these blowouts have reached epic proportions. I once cleaned poop off my child's neck. This is not a joke. To date he has pooped directly on me (a few times), Brock, my sister-in-law Brandy, his carseat (that one was probably out of spite), his changing table and multiple blankets. This is some pretty persistent slime, sneakily fighting its way through a thick layer of diaper, a thin layer of onesie and whatever else Jack has on. The silver lining to this cloud is that Jack is almost always in a really good mood after this happens. Hey, I think we can all relate... (Did I just cross the line?)

Disclaimer: Jack never sleeps in our bed unsupervised.

Jack used to sleep for hours, all day and night. I'd find myself getting impatient for him to wake up because I'd be bored and want to play with him. Plus, he is cuter with his eyes open, so I preferred him awake when people were around so they could appreciate his maximum cuteness. Now he seems like he's always awake. Especially at night. This kid is a night owl. Try as we may to get him to sleep at night, he rarely goes down before 10:30. Sometimes it's more like midnight. I think his little biological clock is off by a few hours, because he simply isn't tired before then. Luckily he has started sleeping for long periods of time at night. He'll usually sleep anywhere from 8-10 hours once he is finally down. This has been life changing for me. Since he really isn't on any sort of schedule yet, his naps are very sporadic and unpredictable in length, making it almost impossible for me to doze along with him. Now I at least feel like I'm getting a somewhat decent amount of sleep.

$4 baby toy? Yes please. 

Happy babe, happy mom.

When all is said and done, we feel dang lucky to have this little guy. Although I realize now that baby habits are never set in stone, he hasn't yet thrown us anything we can't manage. He is getting to be more fun every day. He smiles and laughs more and more often and his excessive spit up problem is starting to improve. (Thank you, baby Prevacid.) I think he might have a touch of the A.D.D. like his mom; he is only ever entertained by something for a few minutes before he gets bored and wants something new to do. Luckily we've got a good rotation of "activities" for him. He loves his swing, his changing table (weird, I know, but it seems to be his favorite place in the house), his homemade PVC pipe jungle gym, and his boppy pillow. He loves his playlist full of lullabye renditions of classic rock songs. He responds particularly well to Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" and the Rolling Stones' "You Cant Always Get What You Want". Go figure. He also loves to lie on the floor and be played with. This probably interests him for the longest and it's definitely the most fun. It's just hard to get the floor mopped when you're gazing down at and making ridiculous noises to your sweet baby. 

We love our little man so much. I miss him when I'm away from him for an hour; I'm sure it's much worse for Brock who is at work and school all day. He really is the best!

Also, let's quickly address one more aspect of my "fantasy" paragraph. No, I am nowhere near a size two. Probably never will be. I have been trying to mix in a little gym time now and then, mostly because gym clothes are stretchy (thus easier to fit into). But my bleach stained sweats are always a nice alternative.

A few more pictures:

My main men.

I laugh out loud every time I see this picture. Sometimes I look away and then look back so I can laugh again. He looks like a creepy bobblehead or some sort of mutant from a Goosebumps book.

Acid reflux in action. Quite possibly the luckiest shot of my life.

The Fastest Month of Our Lives...

Not the greatest picture. The little gremlin would not hold still.

I can't believe we've been parents for a month now. These past few weeks have absolutely flown by. Sometimes I can hardly remember what life was like before Jack. The thought of having an uninterrupted night's sleep seems like the most foreign concept in the world. On the other hand, the whole having-a-baby thing still seems so surreal at times. I am still in awe that he is actually ours to keep, not just some glorified babysitting job.

 I think Jack is the greatest baby in the world. Here are some "fun and exciting" facts to help you get to know this little man.





10- The number of pounds Jack currently weighs. Well, this is a rough estimate. Our bathroom scale is off by a few pounds. At least, that is what I like to think. Shhh... let me be in denial on this one.

22- The number of inches Jack is tall. Again, this is a rough estimate. For some reason holding still next to a yard stick wasn't something Jack was crazy about doing.

4- The average number of hours Jack sleeps at a time per night. I am actually pretty happy about this. We'll try and do the whole "scheduling" thing at some point and hopefully get him sleeping through the night, but at this point I'm just gonna let him do his thing. The one day I tried implementing the "baby wise" system was the worst and most stressful day of our lives-both mine and Jack's. We both felt like failures until I realized he was only a few weeks old and cut us some slack.

8- The number of ounces of milk Jack once drank in one sitting. I was curious to see exactly how much he was drinking, so I pumped a bunch of milk and let him have at it. An hour and a full size bottle later, I was shocked to find out that a baby's stomach is roughly the size of a walnut and apparently my son was about to explode. Luckily a few good "BMs" (my favorite "medical" term) later, his little intestines seemed back to normal. I thought babies were supposed to be intuitive eaters, but apparently we've got a little binge eater on our hands. It's okay buddy- we all eat our feelings sometimes.

30- The number of pounds I've lost since delivery. Not as impressive as it sounds. 1/3 of that was pure baby and another good chunk was probably made up of weird fluids. Supposedly nursing does burn calories though and our little guy eats a LOT. So in a way, I am unselfishly giving him my fat. It's a win-win.

15,000- The number of diapers Jack goes through per day. I thought I would mind changing diapers more, but honestly, I'm thrilled when the little guy poops. Ever since the mild bout of constipation a few weeks ago, I'd much rather clean his little bum multiple times daily than deal with a whiny, squirmy, grunty poop filled baby.

1- The number of times he has rolled over. The other night I put him down on his tummy, left the room for about 30 seconds, and returned to find him on his back. I feel like this is quite the accomplishment for a 4 week old and consider his strength a promising attribute that will aid his future athletic career. I just wish I had gotten to see this display of strength in action.

1.5- The average number of times I wash my hair per week. I'm sorry but I'd much rather spend my precious time sleeping, eating or therapeutic cleaning (all luxuries now) than blow drying this unruly mane of mine. The sad part? More often than not, there are at least a few strands soaked in spit-up.

Jack really does seem to be a good baby, from what I can tell. He definitely has his whiny and clingy moments and yes, there have been a handful of sleepless nights, but all in all, he really is quite a mild tempered little guy. That being said, even with an easy baby, motherhood is SO much more work than I expected! It's a full time job with NO breaks! I am never, EVER off the clock. Even when I'm asleep, I dream about Jack. But motherhood is also so much better than I imagined. I'm finally starting to get it down. The thought of leaving the house isn't totally stressful anymore and as I get to know Jack, I am figuring out little tricks that make things easier. It's also nice to have such a great, selfless husband who is willing to help out so much. Brock goes to work/school for 15 hours a day sometimes and still always has the energy to hang out with Jack when he gets home. If anyone is running on less sleep than me these days, it's Brock. But...like all parents have been saying for ages, it really is worth it.

Now We Know Jack

Jack Douglas Sargent has arrived!

On Friday August 24th, 2012, I was somehow able to squeeze an (almost) ten pound baby out of me after only 6 hours of labor. I am quite proud of this accomplishment. He has set the bar pretty high for my future babies. Not that I even want to think about actually being pregnant again these days...

I know that as his parents we are biased, but Brock and I are convinced that Jack is just the greatest thing ever. I don't think I'll ever get tired of staring at him, in awe of his every movement.

Look Brock, he raised his arm!

Aww, look at his little pout...

Hurry get a picture, he's smiling! (I know, I know... just gas)

Obviously we are very easily impressed.

Jack has been the perfect addition to our little family. The thought of us not having him seems so weird, even though a mere week ago this was just the case. He is amazing. Like everyone told me before he was born, I just didn't comprehend the love I'd have for our child until I held him in my arms. Not to mention the love and admiration I have for my sweet husband. Seeing Brock hold, play with and talk to little Jack melts my heart. I am so grateful that he is willing to work so hard at work and school every day because I know he does it for our family. 

And now for the pictures!

 

I have seriously spent hours trying to get a picture of one of his elusive gas induced "smiles". This is the closest I've gotten so far. Also, Jack has spent the first week of his life almost exclusively in a white onesie. (Multiple white onesies, not the same one- I promise.) 

 

 The happy family. Yes, that is a Fig Newton wrapper. Pre-baby Carolyn didn't care much for the geriatric preferred snack food, but Post-baby Carolyn apparently loves them. After all I'd gone through, I don't think anything has ever tasted better to me.

 

  This wasn't a really lucky and well timed picture. Jack threw up and held up this gang sign/hand signal for about ten minutes while asleep one day. I would love to know what sort of dream he was having. 

9lbs 13oz? No wonder I waddled around for the entire summer.

 After Jack was cleaned up. I'm not going to post the pictures that were taken right when he came out. I look like a naked corpse (a happy one though) and Jack's skin looks grey. Ah, the glamors of childbirth! 

 I had very lofty plans for my post-baby diet. This diet was supposed to go into effect as soon as Jack came out. Yet, somehow almost a week later, it still hasn't started. Lo and behold, my choice of dinner that first night at the hospital. It probably had more calories than a normal person should ingest in a week. But hey, all that pushing probably burns a few, right?

 While I'm on the topic of food, this was the last meal I was able to balance on my tummy, a convenience I cherished during my pregnancy. Before the hospital that morning we stopped at McDonalds and I enjoyed a ceremonial "last supper" atop my built-in tray.

 Like all babies, there are moments when Jack looks just like an LDS General Authority. The little baby zit on his forehead was really tempting to me. Brock had to swat my greedy little fingers away from it on more than one occasion. Luckily for him, baby skin seems to have magic properties and it literally cleared up within hours. 

 Brock is the cutest dad I know. Jack loves to lie on his chest. Sometimes he gets confused though and starts searching for a milk outlet. 

Dancing on his new blanket. As a frequent attendee of UVU's Institute dances back in the day, I recognize this move as "the sprinkler".