Almost There!

Leila is still not crawling, but she is getting so close! She goes from a sitting position to leaning over her foot.

Then she gets stuck, and can't quite figure out how to get that foot out from underneath her belly!

Jace tries to help her by showing her how to get on her hands and knees.

He's so helpful!

Ah ha! There we go! Foot free! But now what?

There's that darn foot again!

Nixon is Potty Trained!

Well okay, so he's been potty-trained for a few months now, but I never did a post on it. He's been relatively easy to train, and had it down in about a week. He loves that he is a "big a boy" now. I'm not sure how he went from being German, saying anything that ended with a k sound like chhhhhhhh (like he's hocking a loogy), to being Italian and saying "I'm not a baby! I'm a big-a-boy!" but that's our Nixon. I had to get a shot of him in his "big-a-boy underwear. He put them on himself! Backwards and inside out! Love our Nix!
So Proud (and eating something)


I had to get a picture of the wedge in back! Have you ever seen a cuter bum?


Ah, there we go.


And this has nothing to do with potty-training, but I found him asleep like this yesterday while watching Toy Story 1 or 2 or 3. Who knows anymore. He loves them all, and watches them over and over in no particular order. Looking pretty comfy.

Leila Jade is 9 Months!

Leila turned/became 9 months old on January 14th. She is getting so big! I just can't believe it. We had her 9 month well check last week, and she is doing great. Her tear ducts have both opened mostly. They still get infected every time she gets sick, so they think that they may be opened, but just slightly. We'll take her to an eye doctor after her next appointment if they're still bad. When she's not sick though, they are clear and beautiful! She loves all foods. She is not picky. Just like her mom. She is still not crawling, but can reach like the best of 'em! She will get bent so far over that she is practically laying on the ground, but that one pesky leg always gets stuck! Once she figures out how to get that leg behind her, she'll be good to go! She recently had both of her bottom middle teeth break through, and her top two are swollen, and look like they may break through at any moment. When we were at the doctor, Dr. Burnett asked if she had been fussy at all lately. I said no. She's never fussy, why? Oh, she has an ear infection in her right ear! Poor baby. She is just too sweet to let us know! She did wake up the night before that and was fussy for about 10 minutes which is very unusual for her. I guess that was it!
In this picture I asked her to show me her teeth! She didn't want to.


Here she is yesterday after church. Still no hair, but the most beautiful baby girl I know!


With new teeth, and others trying to break through, she loves to chew on things. Water bottles are a favorite.

Yeah, that's the same dress she wore in her 1 month photo shoot. It was a little big then, but I can't believe it still fits! It was the first thing I bought when I found out she was a girl.

We sure love our Leila bug!


She weighed in at 17 lbs. 8 oz. which is the 25th %

She was 27.5" long which is the 60th %

I can't remember what her head circumference was, but it was the 70th %

So she's tall, thin, and smart. Every girl's dream.

Date Night

My parents give us a spiritual New Year's Resolution every year. Last year it was to do a service project once a month with our family and read the conference editions of the Ensign in May and November. Brock and I were the only ones to complete it this year, and we each got a gift certificate to Ruth's Chris. It is one of our very favorites, and we were so excited to go! This year our goal is to read the Book of Mormon. We've both already started, so lets hope we finish by the end of the year, and get to do this again next January!

Kids

I love my kids so much. Some days are good, some are better, but I am so glad to be a mother. To be THEIR mother.

The other day, I asked the boys to clean their room before they could watch a movie, or play a game, or whatever it was. They were in there for a while. Jace came out and said, "Okay, we're all done cleaning." I told them they could watch their movie. A few minutes later, when I had a chance to check it out, this is what I found.


I guess I know to check on it before giving them the okay! Maybe our next FHE activity will be learning how to clean up properly!

This week while I was at Young Womens Jace made a sign for me, and placed it carefully on my night stand where he knew I'd see it. It definitely made up for the "room cleaning" incident. Love my Jace. And I am so proud of his writing skills!

Love you too buddy!

Then one night I came home to this. The kids all bathed and jammied watching a movie in bed with Daddy. I love my family!

Leila Loves to EAT!

Leila loves loves loves to eat. Anything and everything. Her latest obsession is graham crackers. I love to give a bunch to her while I work out. She'll sit there completely happy the whole time if she has crackers! She snarfs 'em down too! I give her one, and I swear 10 seconds later it's gone! The first time I gave her one, I looked back over and saw that it was gone so I went over to find it. It was nowhere to be found. She had eaten the whole thing in a matter of seconds! I gave her another and another. Love her! A girl after my own heart!

She's kind of messy when she eats on her own!

When its gone, she'll just sit there and suck the remnants off her fingers.

I could only get her to take her fingers out of her mouth to get a good face shot by showing her another cracker. You can see she is staring at it open-mouthed!

Daddy and His Baby Girl

I like to tease Brock by saying that he and Leila weren't really friends until she was about 4 months old. He actually takes offense to it though. It makes him feel bad. All I mean though, is that I was her only source of food up to that point, so I was always with her, and always HAD to be with her. I got up with her at night (if she woke up), and she pretty much needed me all the time. We were still adjusting to having a 3rd child in our house, and the boys were primarily his responsibility. Once I started working though, that all changed. Well, some of it. Leila went to the bottle, and Brock was able to spend more time with her feeding her and just being with her since I didn't have to be. We became mostly adjusted to having 3 kids (do you ever get adjusted to having 3 kids?), and could divide our time amongst the kids pretty evenly. Well, its been 5 months since I started working, and they are best friends now! Leila is so lucky to have such a great daddy. All of my kids are. I grew up having the most amazing father in my life, and I am so so grateful that my daughter will have that too. The father-daughter bond is so special, and its a bond that can't be duplicated.

Here she is laying with him while he plays XBox with Jace. She's such a happy baby.

Jace sure loves his Leila girl too. He wanted pictures with her too!

Christmas Sunday Outfits

Don't ask me how I forgot to post this in my last mega post, but I did. Here are the kids before church the Sunday before Christmas!

I was off to the side trying to make the kids laugh. Leila wasn't impressed.

This was about the point where Jace had been smiling too long, and his smile became fake.

Then we got one of Jace in front of our Christmas Card display. Oh yeah, these babies stay up all year round, so if you sent us one, we'll be looking at you for a year!

December 2010

Well December came and went. I can not believe another year is gone. Time really flies when you're having fun!

Our sweet Leila is officially a sitter. I know, I know she's 8 month old. She'd better be sitting! I must admit though, I love how laid back and content she is. It sure makes my life easier!

Here she is at Brock's Uncle Randy's birthday party. He turned the big 5-0! Her brothers thought it would be funny to decorate her!

There's that cute smile!

When everyone started laughing and thought she looked so cute, they couldn't just let her have all the fun!

Brock's family went to see the lights at Temple Square one night, so we headed to dinner at Crown Burger first. It just happened to be the same night as the David Archuletta/Mormon Tabernacle Choir show, and I'm pretty sure everyone came to Crown Burger first! It was so so crowded!

The kids tried to keep themselves entertained while waiting for dinner, as you can see!

My princess. She is eating her yummy puffs here. She is crazy about food. All food. Any food.

I had just gone to see the lights the night before with the Young Women, so Leila and I decided to call it a night after dinner and just let the boys go. They had lots of fun, but it was FREEZING!

My girlfriends and I had our annual Christmas party. Well, we had two. One with just the ladies, and this one with our families. I only got a picture of the girls though.

Lindsey, Jenn, Talitha, Me, Stephanie

We put lights up most years. And when I say "we" I mean Brock.

I decorated the inside with the kids. Nothing better than the smell of a real Christmas tree!

At school every year (daycare) the kids make an ornament with their picture on it. We have them since Jace's first Christmas! The boys love to see their old pictures, and put up those ornaments themselves.

I asked Jace to take a picture of me and Leila with the tree. This is what I got. Bad angle, and no tree.

Jace had to wait until Daddy got home to put the star on.

Leila got so so sick a couple of weeks before Christmas. She threw up everything she ate, and was just so lethargic. I was worried about dehydration, but the doctor gave me some signs to look for, and she didn't really have them.

Even at her sickest, she was still the sweetest baby!

And then she'd be asleep.

She was like this for a whole week. It was so sad.

One Sunday after church, I found the boys like this. I love that they both have their blankies. They always have to have their blankies.

Bath time is such a fun time at our house. Leila is really starting to hold her own with these two crazies!

She loves to splash and get the boys wet!

We're growing out Jace's hair, and we have had to start using conditioner and a brush! Have you noticed that he's at the age where he has to make a face in every picture? Yeah, I have.

Nixon seems to get hurt everywhere he goes! He had been climbing on a rocking chair at school. He managed to tip the chair over, and slam his eye on it in the process. OUCH! This was taken a couple days after.

And then, a couple days after that.

Luckily, it didn't affect his smile!

Since my parents are in Malaysia, my brothers and sister and I try to get together for our Christmas gift exchange. This year we met at 5 Guys and had lunch. Jace was our photographer.

Here I am with my siblings.

And I had to get one of Leila!

After lunch with my family, we headed to Ogden to watch Brock and Brett try the Flow Rider where you get to surf indoors. It was really cool. They both started out on the boogie boards.

Brock

Getting washed away!

Brett

The kids were keeping themselves occupied in all the nooks and crannies.

Next, they tried surfing while holding a rope to keep balance.

Wham!

Jace

Nixon

Then they got better and didn't need the rope.

Griffin and Leila were thrilled to be there.

By the end of the hour, they were both pretty much pros.

Almost.

After that, we went to see the Ogden City lights. It rained on us the whole time. Well, sprinkled. This December was pretty mild, as far as winter goes. It hardly snowed, but it rained quite a bit.

The whole family. Leila is in the carseat asleep.

The flash was too bright for her.

I looked back to see Nixon like this. He was trying to keep warm.

Peek-a-boo!

Grandpa K and Jace

We decided to have a gingerbread decorating night. It ended up being the Handy's against the Keddingtons. Okay, it wasn't really a contest, but we had fun!

Somehow, it always seems to end up just being me.

Keddingtons

Handys

Christmas Eve we always spend with Brock's mom's side of the family. We get together for a yummy steak dinner. Then we pop these popper things with prizes and these fun hats in them.

Here's our annual Christmas Eve hat picture.

Ian and Natalie

Brett, Kallie, Beckett, and Griffin

Brock's sisters and I all wore practically the same outfits! We had to get a picture! Gray sweaters with black leggings and black boots. I just happened to be the one wearing flat boots. As if I wasn't already short enough.

We let all the kids open one present. Their jammies.

The boys got Cars, and Leila just got some warm wintery cute ones!

I love that Nixon is kissing her hand. So sweet.

Then we attempted to get a picture of all the Keddington grandkids. This was the best one.

Leila, Nixon, Griffin, Jace, and Beckett

Stu and Chelsea got us these yummy looking cupcakes. The boys had to peek.

Then we took a second and let all the kids open their gifts from Brock's uncle Brian. He had been suffering with cancer for about a year, and passed away just about a week before Christmas. He had taken the time though, to make sure he got each of them a present. It was really sweet.

Right on the mark! Anything Toy Story is going to be a winner with our boys!

He even got Leila some cute sparkly pink shoes!

Then we attempted the Nativity. Leila made a cute angel.

The robes were a bit big, but there's the angel, a couple of Shepherds and the baby Jesus. Can't you tell?

Then we went home and wrote a note to Santa. Dear Santa, these brownies and Mt. Dew are for you! Thanks for all the presents! We happened to know that Santa's favorite drink is Mt. Dew, and we thought it would help keep him awake during the LONG night ahead.

We opened presents at our house first, and then headed over to Grandma and Grandpa K's house for more. Notice - No snow outside! Lame! I am not a lover of snow, or the cold, but it is pretty much required on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day! It can melt and never come back after that, but come on! Rain? On Christmas?

Leila was super excited for her first Christmas!

First the boys found their stocking stuffers. They loved these finger lights!

Then it was time to open presents. We take turns, and it is so much fun.

Wait a second, what's in that box?

Oh, its Jace!

We had such a great Christmas. We got to talk to my parents on Skype. Times like these are so hard without them. They spent their holiday in Singapore. They are not living the hard life! We went to breakfast at Brock's uncle Gary's house, and then back to Grandma Bills for presents with the Bills. We were definitely spoiled again this year!

For New Year's Eve, we were invited to a party with some of our neighbors. We had it at our church, and everyone brought an appetizer to share, and some fun games. Jace and Nixon had so much fun with all the little kids. Jace would run around, and all the cute girls would chase him!

Here are some of the kids. Jules had painted their faces. My boys didn't want their faces painted.

Someone brought "Just Dance" for the Wii, and it was so much fun!

Madeline, Whitney, Gabby, Lynette, and Lyndsey

Then Brock even got in on it! He rocked it too! Got the best score on this round!

We put a movie on in the nursery for the kids. Despicable Me. They loved it.

Then, at about 10:30 we headed over to Brett and Kallie's house to ring in the New Year! They were all getting ready to go to bed! What? We brought the party back!

Nixon and Beckett both had their Buzz Lightyear pajamas on, and they were having fun pretending to be him.

"To infinity and Beyond!"

Then they started playing some games on the Wii.

leila and I watched.

She wanted to show off her awesome crawling skills.

Yeah, she doesn't crawl yet. And she doesn't care.

Some more Wii. The pictures aren't as fun as it was in person!

Nixon and Beckett went upstairs to watch Toy Story 3.

Then at midnight we ran outside and sprayed our silly string!

Jace getting Daddy.

Now everyone get Grandpa! Nixon got Grandpa right in the mouth. It was hilarious! I was seriously laughing so hard!

Our first picture of 2011! Maybe this should go in the January post!