We were excited to spend our Memorial weekend in Sacramento for the second year in a row.
We drove Friday evening and into the night. Tanner was a perfect passenger!!
Jeremy's highschool/church friend, Bryan, and his daughter.
Tanner's Great, Great Grandma June. She's 95 years old and still going strong!!
Five generations! Great Great Grandma June, Great Gpa Davidson, Grandma Zavoral, Daddy, and Tanner. (this pic is from Oct 2011, I realized I never posted it on our blog).
5 generations of hands!
Hot-tubbing in the back yard. Don't worry--we made the temp around 85/90 degrees so that it was safe for Tanner.
Helping Grampz go through things.
Exploring the entertainment center.
Cousins and family!
Great Grandma Ginny.
Tanner was mezmorized by Gma's wheelchair.
Great Grandpa Davidson.
Great Grandma Davidson.
Memorial Day dinner.
Aunt Susie.
Auntie Lindie.
Jeremy taking down the overgrown tree with Matt.
Our little Tan Man showing his patriotism and guarding the flag.
My personal favorite...
Here is the picture from one year ago.
Here we are this year! Cody, the dog, managed to get in the pic both times.
These are from the middle of May.
Bath time- one of Tanner's last baths in the BABY tub. What a cutie! He has since graduated to the normal human tub.
Tanner loves playing with the washcloth. He lifts it up and watches the water drip down. He likes to put his free hand in the path of the dripping water.
The painted helmet! Jeremy used acrylic paint to do a patriotic design. It turned out looking like Captain America! With Flag day, Memorial day, Independence day and Pioneer day all coming up while he wears his helmet, we figured it's the best design!
Tanner is very obedient. Right as he crawls into the kitchen, we say, "Tanner can you open that cupboard and go through all the snacks? We need to know what snacks we have." And then he does it without any complaining. He even pulls out every single snack for us!
Problem: Dishes. They are the menace to every household in America, especially if you don't have a dishwasher and you have baby bottles to clean. For almost two years, we've been eating off of paper plates and plastic silverware to help keep the dish load down. I know, I know. Our carbon footprint is shameful.
Problem: Food. It can get expensive. Last week, we were eating some Thai food that I made at home. We're chomping away quietly when Jeremy suddenly blurted out, "This meal cost us over $20!" Sure enough! The pre-made curry sauce ($6), the eggplant ($2), mushrooms ($1.5), onion ($.30), spinach ($1), green pepper ($1), jasmine rice (about $2 for a cup), the labor of cooking and cleaning (I'd say my work was worth $5), and of course the paper goods (let's say $3) all added up to about $20.80 for a meal for two--and a crappy meal at that. We could have eaten like kings at a real Thai restaurant!
Solution: Eat out from now on. Well, at least a for a few nights, just to see what it's like. So we decided to eat out every night for the following week. And that, my friend, solved everything! I didn't have to stress about grocery shopping, cooking, or cleaning. We got to enjoy our meals and get waited on. I haven't had to clean a single pot or pan for over 9 days!! Well, we did end up cleaning all the dishes that were piled in the sink by doing a few each night. It was great because the pile always got smaller. What a novelty!
The best part is that we didn't bust our budget. We used gift cards, coupons, and went on days that we knew had specials. Here was our menu:
To start off, last week Tanner finally learned how to clap!! When we had his 9 month check-up in March, we realized that he hadn't clapped yet. I wasn't surprised, though, because we never clapped around him, so why should he? Well, after the check-up we started clapping tons, and he looked at us with his furrowed brow, totally confused why we all of a sudden we decided this was a cool thing to do. After a few days, he would join in the cheering part, and seemed to think that he was clapping with us. Finally, about 1.5 months later, he did it!! Click the video below.
Monday- We went to TK Burger! We love eating at this place. It's right across the street from the beach and they have great buns on their burgers.
During our walk around the beach, we saw tons of stage lights and a large area gated off from the public. We soon found out that one of Jeremy's favorite bands, The Offspring, was going to be doing a filming for a new music video. So we hung around to see it.
The lights were sooo bright, that we put sunglasses on Tanner. I love this picture because you can see both me and Jeremy in the reflection of the glasses. We try not to spoil and coddle our child, but I think this picture proves otherwise.
Look at those cheeks!!
Tuesday- Tanner expressed a great interest in the piano. I try to play about once a week (and let him play too), which isn't that much, so I was surprised that Tanner all of sudden was so eager to play it. He can stand next to the piano bench and reach the keys now. So this week, he would stand at the piano and fuss and fuss until we put him on the bench. He'll play for 10-20 minutes. Also lately, he has been fascinated with anything that makes noise. He loves his maracas, rhythm tapper, and tambourine. And of course, his new skill of clapping.
I made him some shakers with plastic eggs by filling them with different items to make different timbres- noodles, rice, smarties, and sugar sprinkles. They each have a match so that later we can play match-the-timbre, but for now he just shakes them. There is also a pair with nothing in it, and he looks very concerned when shaking them, as if something is wrong with them. He also notices sounds that come from unknown sources. He'll hear the kids playing outside or the ice cream truck or a dog barking, and look toward the window. He'll hear water running in the next room and look that way. Today, he noticed the low tones of the neighbor's loud video game, turning his head each time there was a quiet boom, trying to figure out where the sound was coming from. Actually, while I was trying to take these pictures below, he turned toward the kitchen and wouldn't answer to me. Then, I realized a plane was flying by, and he was looking at the window. After the sound stopped, he looked back at me. Being a music teacher, all of this makes me very excited!!
Thursday- Jeremy is in between semesters at school so he has been home more after work. I caught him reading to Tanner while Tanner drank his bottle. So cute! Tanner is almost completely weaned from breastfeeding. We are down to just one or two feedings a day. The rest are with a bottle. That means that I've gone about 2 months with no more pumping at work! (I stopped pumping the week Jeremy was in China, simply because I was too stressed out).
I re-arranged Tanner's room a couple of weeks ago because we finally put his swing in storage. Now it feels much more open and it looks more like a baby room!
Saturday- Yesterday was a big day. We took Tanner to the pool for his first time swimming!! We bought the swim suit at the store earlier in the day (and went out to lunch, did a bunch of grocery shopping and went to a baptism) and then we took him swimming in the early evening.
He was a little uneasy at first, prob cuz the water was a little cold.
But once we got used to the temperature, he was pretty happy chilling in his raft, splashing every now and then, watching the other kids. He didn't really squeal or even smile, he just leaned forward and chilled.
Sunday- This morning, Tanner (and Jeremy) brought me breakfast in bed with chocolate cake!! And Tanner made some dots and lines with a marker on paper that Jeremy turned into a card.
Also today, Tanner ended up asleep with his blankie like this. Tanner loves his blankies. He will smother his face with them and then play with the fabric in his hands until he falls asleep. It's sweet to watch his fingers open and close the fabric, tugging, folding, and stroking it. Very sweet.
This week marks the first full week of Tanner sleeping without any feedings during the night! I've been waiting for his lead on this, and it's finally happened nice and naturally. He slept 8:30pm-5:30am Monday all on his own. So the rest of the week, I encouraged this to happen again by not feeding him if he woke up before 5:30. Tuesday morning at 2:30am, he was pretty upset that I didn't feed him and he cried for almost 30 minutes. I made Jeremy comfort him so that I wouldn't be tempted to breastfeed him. By the end of the week, he just woke up once each night, fussed until I got up to put his paci in his mouth and lay him back down with his blankie. Hopefully this week he'll stop waking up and just sleep the whole night on a regular basis!
I am so grateful to officially be a mother this Mother's day! I love my son more and more each day. He has such a wonderful disposition, and he makes being a mommy super easy. It is an amazing blessing to have him in my life!
