Just a blurp

Kaleb:
Kaleb has started to teeth. Has a bit of his bottom two teeth poking through. I don't know who is having more "fun" with this, Kaleb, or us parents. He hasn't been sleeping very well at all so we're all a little grumpy and tired around here. Not to mention his diminished appetite, lately it has been trial and error to see what we can get Kaleb to eat. He is still so much fun and can get into things quicker than I can blink.
We went this past Sunday for dinner at our friends house - the Murray's - you know - the triplet baby family (sorry Nick and Karin, that is how you will always be referred to from now on) It was interesting to see what a different personality Kaleb has compared to his friends Todd, Tessa, and Rose. He would usually take a toy over to a spot by himself and turn his back on everyone, whereas the others play very well with each other, since they are obviously used to having each other around. It will be interesting to see how Kaleb reacts to having a brother. I think it will be good for him to learn how to be social, and share at an early age.
Jake:
Jake got a calling. He has been called as Ward Mission Leader. This is definitely a new one so it will be interesting to see what it entails. He's a bit nervous about this calling, not to mention, I think a bit surprised, wasn't expecting it at all. Despite what he thinks, I think he will be awesome at this job. Although he doesn't seem to think he was a very good missionary I know how powerful his testimony is, and how knowledgeable he is about the scriptures, and the church, so I know how perfect this calling is because he is amazing and has such a power with words that will make sense to those whom he is in contact with. I'm sure it will be a challenge, but, also I'm sure, a good learning experience.
Kristen:
I'm just barefoot and pregnant, making bread, quilting, scrapbooking, all while having a baby hanging on my knee. Everything seems to be going really well with this pregnancy, just the usual heartburn and stuffy nose complaints. I guess it's okay that Kaleb is up crying frequently because I would be up anyway making another trip to the restroom, right?
I went last Saturday to meet my Studio City friends, Karin carpooled along with me this time. We met for dinner at an Italian restaurant to help another friend, Michelle, celebrate her pregnancy. It was a really loud place with the staff running around singing, drums, piano, etc. It makes it tough when you have to yell at the person sitting next to you to be heard. All in all it was a fun good evening though, and fun to get out with friends. Everything is going well here, and I'm so excited for my sister Shawna and her hubby Matt and baby Sabine to come visit us this weekend...guess I should get back to cleaning then.

The crazy life of Kaleb

Although I have no pictures to post I thought I would share a few stories anyway. It has been pointed out to me, and I rather agree, I should carry a camera with me at all times. I have come to the conclusion that so far, this is my favorite age of Kaleb...I'm sure I'll be saying that a lot depending on the day. He is so hilarious and fun to be around, and always manages to get himself in some predicament or precarious situation, I just have to ask half the time...how did you manage to do that!?
Example 1: Kaleb loves to play with those door stoppers, the ones one the back of the doors that are springy. I am actually surprised by this turn around, there was a point there where he was terrified of that noise. As he was in the bathtub Jake would play with it just to torment the poor child and he would be screaming and crying and impossible to calm down...aren't we parents so mean? Now, quite often I go to find Kaleb crying in a dark room because he went in to play behind the door and shut said door, and obviously couldn't get out.
Example 2: I could hear Kaleb kind of whining a bit so I went to figure out where he had gone to. Could not figure out for the life of me where he was, all the doors were closed, which I usually try to do so he won't play in the rooms. I finally discovered him in our room, but, even better, he had managed to crawl into our closet and also closed that sliding door. I pull open the closet door and he just looks up at me with a big grin, holds up a square of bubble wrap and starts popping the bubbles with a squeal of laughter.
Example 3: Probably one of my favorites. I once again hear the whine of, 'help me'. Discover Kaleb in the bathroom wedged behind the toilet. How did he even fit or why would he even think to go back there in the first place? It took a bit of ingenuity, okay mostly grunting and arm pulling to get him out since the toilet is inches away from, between, bathtub and sink cabinet. It doesn't even seem to faze him most of the time, I'll usually discover him trying to do the same thing that just got him into trouble not mere hours before.
I'm not sure this will make sense without a picture. We have tall barstools pulled up to the counter bar. Kaleb saw some food between the chair legs that he wanted. As he reached in to grab it he fell forward, he couldn't get his legs back on the ground behind him and ended up teetering like a see-saw on the cross bar between the back and front chair legs. He would teter forward onto his hands, teeter back onto his toes. He just had this look of "uh-oh, now what am I going to do?"
It was at that point that I rescued him but then I had the thought. Do I rescue him or take a picture first? I should take a picture first! WIsh I would have.
How many things he has pulled on top of him...luckily nothing that has done much more than a few bruises.
A bit of a blurb about me - I had another Dr. appointment yesterday, all's well! So far so good with this pregnancy. I can't believe how quickly it has passed actually.
Last Friday I met some friends after work to help our friend Michelle celebrate her birthday. I miss living in Studio City because these girls know how to party! I'll only post the innocent pictures :-)We met at a Thai restaurant for some way yummy eatin' and then headed over to a friends house for way too much junk food and laughing. (I was shocked when I realized it was already midnight, I haven't gone to bed past 10PM at the latest in a long time)
These were all us prego ladies in order from budding to popping...there must be something in the water.
I have the best friends and I am so grateful for them. They have become like my family here.
Living here without my family has been eased so much just knowing that I have so many arms I can turn to, and so many hearts open to listening.
Just a quick story about why I have the best friends in the world. Only those on my side of the table probably knew what was going on, but as it is quite funny I thought I would share. Just as we ordered I realized, my keys aren't in my purse...augh! The last time I locked my keys in my car I was pregnant, and actually I did it two days in a row, one with the car running of all things! This time they were just innocently sitting on the front seat. It isn't so easy when Jake has no car to come rescue me, and is 30 minutes away anyway. At least 5 friends whip out their phone and start calling AAA...I only need one locksmith! AAA came within 5-10 minutes and I had my keys within minutes. If this is going to be a regular occurance (cross my fingers, I hope not!) maybe we should invest in AAA?
My friend are always there to jump in and help out at a moments notice, and have several times with regards to babysitting Kaleb, and other things. This was just a quick shout-out to my friends, thank you - I am so grateful and love all of you! You make life fun and intersting, and bareable...I would say you keep me sane, but, I'm not so sure that's possible anymore.

Frogs and Bunnies

We spent our Easter Sunday relaxing and enjoying the perfect (in my opinion) weather.
I'm not really into the whole gift giving thing for Easter, but I decided to try it out this year...since I love spoiling my two favorite guys. My Mom (and Dad) would hide each of the kids their own candy somewhere in the house, sometimes in a bag or basket, or there were several times it would be tied in a bandanna, or something else...we really didn't know what we were looking for until the first kid found theirs.
Every boy needs a multitude of trucks - right? And I found some fun things for Jake too...
My favorite part about Jake's present? The homemade peanut butter cups -mmm - A new try for me, and it turned out good and was so worth it.
For breakfast we made french toast. After cooking we dipped each piece in butter and then placed in a plastic bag with cinnamon sugar mixture and tossed...really didn't need syrup with this sweet breakfast!
We missed being with the family - and Jake really misses the used to be tradition with his family of four-wheeling over the Easter break. Some day we hope to start that tradition up with our family...just need a garage to store toys, which I guess means we need a house attached to said garage. While we're at it, we also need more than one four-wheeler that needs a complete internal overhaul (but hey, the outside looks good!)
We went for a walk to enjoy this beautiful day, stopped at the park and captured a lot of fun...

I'm half way done!

Now wouldn't this be such a cute perfect picture if my face wasn't right there?

Thank you Grandma Stevens for the cutest Easter/summer outfit!













Kaleb is getting real good at standing up and walking around furniture, and us. Now the hard part is keeping him sitting in the bathtub, and not pulling himself up using objects that can't support him. It does make it difficult to get things done when you have a baby attached to your knee, or sitting right on your foot.
Kaleb is figuring out clapping, loves "Patty Cake" and almost thinks about waving.
I gave Kaleb a haircut this morning - this boys hair grows like no other! It was much more difficult this time around - even with him strapped in a booster seat. I am amazed how people cut babies hair for a living. Oh well, not too bad, and both his ears are still attached. Jake wouldn't let me cut off his duck tail this time.
All-in-all this was a really enjoyable and good Easter Sunday. A nice quiet family day as it should be. We made homemade pizza for dinner - yum! Now I think we'll put Kaleb to bed and watch a movie...what a perfect way to end the weekend and start another week.

Can I Just Say

I have the best husband in the whole entire world! And it's not just because he gives the best presents - that just helps :-)
A huge box arrived via FedEx the beginning of this week, I was told to ignore it - how rude! Jake said it was a mothers day present so I would have to wait a whole month. I finally told Jake he needed to put the box somewhere else because I wasn't going to trip over it (or stare at it pondering and guessing) for another month.
He had to open it to check the items anyway, decided he couldn't wait either. As this will be my first official mothers day (I guess being prego didn't count last time) he wanted to go all out. He was a little worried about his gift since it is an item that requires me to work...are you kidding me? How could I not love this!?
Jake was just excited because it came with a separate food slicer (cheese stake sandwiches and what have you)
I am not putting down KitchenAid mixers at all - I have just always been of the opinion that a Bosch is way better, and is the way to go (what do you expect when my mom's has lasted at least 20 years, probably more, and I don't know how long Jake's mom has had hers) A Bosch dares to go where a KitchenAid cannot.
I'm excited also because the amazing Mom and Dad Stevens gave us a wheat grinder this past Christmas - it is AWESOME! Our bread has never been better since receieving this grinder. It does give you quite the arm workout though, but the wheat flour you get in the end is so worth it! Bosch sells an attachment that will work with our grinder - yeah!
I also recieved several other fun things to coinside with using my mixer - several different baking pans, a wheat cookbook, and they threw in a CD of their faborite recipes (it was an Ebay purchase, as Jake calls it - FleaBay - but, sometimes you do find good things)
Now that I'm done bragging I need to come up with something to mix - just made cookies - bread earlier this week - hmmm

Swingin' Through Life

Wow - I can't believe it's April already.(can't you tell from this picture? Welcome to CA! We stole all the global warming)

Not very much has been happening around here the last few weeks. I always say that and then my posts are 10 pages long.  All that has been happening is day to day life in general.
The updated baby news is that we had our ultrasound last week and found out we're expecting another boy! We both secretly wanted a girl (probably me more so than Jake) but I am excited because I won't have to buy any clothes, aah, we start the hand-me-down process early. I commented that now we're going to have two boys running around battling it out with wooden swords and Jake piped up "and I'll be in the middle!"
Kaleb has been growing and developing quicker than I can blink. He crawls everywhere now and gets into everything. We have our computer hooked up to our TV. We just haven't hooked up wireless yet. In the mean time we have to sit on the floor in front of the TV to use the keyboard and mouse. I have learned I can only do this when Kaleb is asleep or confined. Yes, that above, is the ball that goes in our mouse, I frequently have to hunt for it before I can use the mouse.

(at least the edge of our keyboard gets spit clean often, it's the cleanest part on the keyboard)

I called poison control last week (or the week before) when he decided to try what an Air Wick essential oil, plug-in thing tastes like. He didn't get very far on his tasting before I heard him gagging and ran in his room to snatch it away. Just in case, I called the hot line. A few days before this I had the inspiration that I needed to program poison control into my phone...glad I listened since it could have been worse. He survived, and all was well. It's an essential oil so worst case scenario is that it can be inhaled. I just had to watch him for signs of choking and coughing but he didn't seem to have any effects. After this I quickly grabbed my plug protectors and ran around the apartment putting them in all the outlets...still need Jake to put latches on the cabinet doors.
Kaleb pulls himself up on everything and will occasionally walk around furniture - yikes! I'm not ready for that next stage so soon - according to Grandma Stevens he needs to crawl longer or else he'll be a spaz like his dad (or have no hand-eye coordination).
We're still working on getting him to sleep through the night (down to only one waking most nights), we still get the up 4 times for no reason. He is starting to nap a bit better also. Talks to himself for about 1-1 1/2 hours and sleeps for about 45 min. - 1 hour (just need to work on getting the sleeping part to be longer and the talking part shorter)
I have decided to let Kaleb start learning to feed himself. I'll just have to get over the fact that I know it's going to be a HUGE mess. I don't want to feed him the rest of his life! We have carpet in our dining room so I think I'll look for a tarp or canvas to spread under his highchair.

I am officially done nursing! (I'm sure you all wanted to know that) Apparently I have a slightly higher risk pregnancy since I am pregnant so soon again. My body wasn't quite ready to carry another child already. And something about the umbilical cord not being centred. All these factors combined means I couldn't keep nursing since this baby could have growth issues as it is because it's not getting nutrients as direct and fast. I can't be supplying nutrients for two babies and myself, have to focus on one baby and me. I am just so grateful that I was able to supply Kaleb with 9 months of such a valuable, nutritional substance (even with only one side working...again, I'm sure you all wanted to know that)
I got a recipe printed in a cookbook Worldwide Ward Cookbook - I am very proud to see my name in print. They only printed a caramel popcorn recipe - but, I feel very special, okay. Even if I did get the recipe from my mom and she really should have been given credit for it.
Without further blah blah blah...here's a glimpse into our daily life through pictures (and a video)
This is where we're at now...Tujunga (let me pronounce that for you...tu(as in Tupperware)-hun-ga (as in garage)
We love it here we have...
A view from our window.
We share our zipcode with the national forest, so that tells you how close it is. It helps us both feel more like we're home. Utah was the best because of the mountains that surround you and protect you, we found mountains again! It is only a 20-25 minute drive from work in Studio City but so worth it. We feel like we are out of the city and the drive is nice too.

Wildlife...

(what, you expected me to take a picture of the mountain lions?) We got a warning to be aware of our surroundings because there are mountain lions in the area - we just got excited - YEAH! Wildlife! The other night we were laying in bed listening to an awesome coyote brawl somewhere extremely close - oddly, I haven't heard the local rooster since then.

Architecture...

I'm still trying to figure this house out...did they go to a sight where they were tearing down an old castle and steal the turret? Isn't that what the round part is called? If you can't see it, it has a rounded door.
Then we have this beauty...

I wish I could have taken a better picture of it and managed to capture all its quirks. There is a bridge. There is a round door, the roof looks like a thatched roof. I keep expecting the Seven Dwarves to walk out of it.

We have a small park close by that Kaleb and I frequent every day after morning nap and lunch.
It has...

Old guys who congregate at the park every day, all day. They have gone from siting on the stairs to sitting at the picnic tables playing games. There is quite a crowd sometimes.

Kaleb's first 4-wheeler

Slides, not so much a favorite of Kaleb's

Kaleb is discovering the joy of sand eating...cleaning out his insides.

Most importantly, it has...

SWINGS!

Kaleb is a huge fan of this part and could probably sit there all day letting me push him back and forth, up and down.

Most importantly of all, Tujunga has only 1-1/2 miles up the road (and I mean literally UP - whew)
the Murrays!We met Nick and Karin in Studio City, and then along came Rose, Tessa, and Todd, and a bigger house in Tujunga. When we found our apartment here we couldn't contain our excitement that we were in the same ward as some of our greatest friends.
(thanks for letting me steal this picture without your permission from your blog)

We also have not too far away...
our Studio City friends.This is only half the Low family - Tanya, Brian, Kevin, and Adam, came for dinner this past Sunday. Jake had to show off his TV and surround sound by throwing in a THX certified (ask Jake) DVD, Star Wars. For the few minutes it was on, all the kids were captivated.
Are you close enough to the TV Kaleb?

Life is going on. We are enjoying it.  Jake is still working at the same job, and seems to enjoy it (most days). He takes the car in the morning which leaves me with a stroller and two legs for transportation.  I get a lot of exercise.  Everything is uphill.  You would think this would mean I would get downhill on the way home, oh no, it's all about 50/50 so you end up going uphill both ways (just not in 2 feet of snow).  One of the great things about our location is that I pretty much have everything I could need within walking distance.  One direction within 1-1/2 miles is a grocery store, bank, and a quilting store.  The other direction within a mile I can go to another grocery store and the library.  There is the post office right next door, and the park just a few blocks up the road.  

We love our ward, although we still haven't been given a job to do.  Jake taught in Elders Quorum a few weeks ago, which he was very excited about.  He usually doesn't like EQ and it really bugged him in this ward because the person sharing the lesson would just read it or pull out the video.  I'm sure they didn't know what to do when someone actually prepared a lesson and expected them to participate.  The RS presidency came over one night to meet me and mentioned that they talked about Jake in PEC and they were excited to have him in EQ since the numbers are so few anyway.  I met my visiting teacher and also found out there is a quilting get together.  The RS is making baby quilts for humanitarian and a gentleman in the ward (he is the big seamstress, has his quilts in art shows, makes his own clothes, unusual I know) he gets whoever is interested together once a month and is teaching them how to make a quilt.  When the RS presidency came over to meet me they saw the quilt I have up on a frame being worked on and they were excited to have me join them.  This ward is an oldy but a goody.  Oh yeah, I wasn't going to write very much since nothing is going on in our life.  I'll leave it overly long and sign off.