11 Months

According to Aviva Jill Romm, MD in her book Naturally Healthy Babies and Children, "Fever has another effect that often goes unnoticed. When children recover from a fever, they often demonstrate new skills and abilities.  It is as if the heat of the fever served as a motivating developmental force."  This book has been the go-to book for Shani when it comes to helping Landon with many different things.  It's right up her alley with all natural ways (mainly herbal and homeopathic remedies) to stay or get healthy.  Although she has heard that with a fever/sickness comes a jump in development from another source, it was reading it again after Landon was sick last week that she realized that it has definitely held true for him.

Our sick boy

For the past week and a half Landon has been fighting quite the bug.  He had a few nights of low-grade fever and several days of very warm temperatures.  He had the snotty-runny nose, cough, fussiness, even worse sleep, and trouble breathing.  We were definitely ready to be out of it and I'm sure he was too!  As he's beat his bug this past week we've noticed quite the change in our little guy. 

Here are some of the things going on with Landon lately:

• Turned 11 months on Saturday!  
• Four teeth on top and just the two on bottom.  
• Weighing 21 lbs 1oz and 30.5 inches long
• Standing on his own for about 5 seconds
• Expressive signing: milk, more, light (his favorite), dog/Mochi, possibly all-done
• Can clap and wave on prompting (don't even have to do the motion first)
• Throwing toys/balls for Mochi,offering her a bone
• Points to people in pictures (mom, dad, Nonni, Papa, Uncle Chris, cousin Morgan)
• Gives high fives, kisses
• Feeding himself well and eating larger portions (no more purees)
• The Biggest of All: 2 nights in a row he's put his head down and fallen asleep in his crib by himself (with some supervision from mommy or daddy, but no holding and no crying).  Also with this he's giving us 4 hour stretches of sleep and only nursing twice/night.  Yay!

Happy New Year!

New Year's Eve was spent playing at the park with cousin Morgan. It was such a beautiful day!  Landon had great fun with his cousin.  Later that evening we watched movies at Nonni and Papa's house.  We were excited to actually stay up to ring in the New Year together but Lando woke up right before so Shani spent midnight trying to get him back down to sleep.  How life has changed.  Not that we were big New Year's Eve celebrators in the past, but we usually did more than this.  However, the relaxing evening of pizza and movies without going anywhere was exactly what we wanted...and needed.  New Year's day is always spent in a food frenzy at Shani's parents.  Although John was disappointed that the Bowl games weren't on, we enjoyed pigging out and watching more movies. 

Having Monday off was great too.  It actually felt like a restful weekend, definitely a first for us in a really long time.  That rest was short-lived.  By Friday we both laughed at the fact that just Monday we had talked about it being restful.  Between Monday and Friday John got the okay to sign up for his California license test which meant getting back into hard core studying,  Landon got sick (fever Wed/Thur night, must sleep upright to breathe, restless sleep, fussy, needy, etc) and is still trying to fight it, and exhaustion for the both of us as we are up every 1-2 hours because of poor Landon.  We are definitely going to be more strict in the future about keeping Landon away from those that are sick.  We do know he will get his colds, but to get a bad one about 1 week after fully recovering from another one is killer on all of us.  The good part is, we know it's strengthening his immune system and there is always great growth that comes out of fighting a cold.  Hopefully that growth is better sleep!

Christ the Savior is Born!

We had a great time celebrating Landon's first Christmas!  Yes, we enjoyed it much more than he probably did.  Even the wrapping paper and boxes weren't that interesting.  For him, it was being around family that he loves.  Can you blame the guy?  He's definitely not starved for attention and that makes him a lucky boy!  

Landon visited Santa a couple different times.  The first time we went with Karin, Georgia, and August.  The Santa was a great one, but the picture turned out a little blurry. Since it was Landon's first visit with him we had to buy the picture (no matter how poor of quality and how expensive the thing was).  We then went again with Nonni to a different Santa and he had a little less of a personality, but the picture was much better.  Landon did great both times.  Everyone warned us how scarred he probably would be and how to set him so he wouldn't see Santa.  Landon could have cared less.  He just smiled at Santa and held onto his hand.  The second time he even turned towards Santa and pulled on his beard.  John was sad we didn't buy that picture, but it was hard to justify paying for a picture that you didn't even see Landon's face.  Looking back on it now, it was such a precious thing we should have paid the extra $8 for that pose too.  Oh well! 

On Christmas Eve we woke up, dressed (not) to impress, headed to coffee, and then to take on the mall.  Yes, the mall...on Christmas Eve!  We are strange. We really enjoy the mall during Christmas time as long as we don't have any urgent needs.  The spirit of the season and all the people joyfully (sometimes) looking for gifts for loved ones is much fun.  We hadn't had the chance to shop together so we decided to walk the mall on Christmas Eve.  We had a great time and didn't get overwhelmed by all the people.  It also helped we had no trouble finding a parking space!  We then headed over to Auntie Kim, Uncle Josh, and Cousin Morgan's house to have our Christmas.  Unfortunately this year Grandma and Grandpa Mac didn't get to join us.  It would have made the day complete if they could have been there, but next year...hopefully!  Morgan did a great job being patient as we ate lunch before opening presents.  Auntie Kim made Landon a beautiful quilt.  A first (and she says maybe last) for her.  It turned out so amazing and is very precious!  After we opened gifts we headed to Nuyo for dessert and on our way home for Landon to nap before Christmas Eve service.  

 

Our tradition is to enjoy Christmas Eve service with Shani's family at Bayside.  We were a little nervous about taking Landon as the music is extremely extremely loud.  Last year, while still in Shani's belly, he was kicking around like crazy because of how loud the music was.  We weren't sure how he'd handle it on the outside.  We had Papa bring his mowing earmuffs to help with the loudness.  Landon kept them on the entire time and even fell asleep during the service.  Yay it was a success!  We got to enjoy the service as a family without being the ones with the screaming child!  It was then home to bed...for Landon.  We for some crazy reason decided to watch a movie, something we haven't done in months, which ended at 1:30am.  Not the greatest idea since Landon is still not sleeping well and gets up often. More importantly, we couldn't sleep in the next day because you can't sleep in on Christmas morning! Oh well, we enjoyed the movie and the time to snuggle on the couch with each other.

So Loud!

Enjoying the service

Christmas morning we opened our stockings with Landon, then headed over to Nonni and Papa's house for waffle breakfast (another tradition).  We hung out while we waited for Uncle Chris and Auntie Kat to arrive.  John was about to jump out of his pants waiting for them to show up.  The Kelley house is quite a bit slower in the gift opening than the McIlnay side.  He survived the wait and once Landon woke up from his nap we started opening presents.  We were once again spoiled with wonderful gifts that people picked out for us.  The rest of the day was spent hanging out at the house before having an early dinner with the family.  It was such a nice and relaxing Christmas this year which isn't always the case. We look forward to many more with Landon and watching his face light up on Christmas morning!

We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas with friends, family, and loved ones.  We are so thankful for all of you in our lives.  Bless all of you as we celebrate Christ's birth and the end of 2011!  Merry Christmas!

December has flown by...

Sorry we haven't updated in awhile, but December has been busy and flown by.  So here are some pictures to update you on what's been going on the past month.

Landon turned 10 months!

Landon, Georgia, and August

Look at those top teeth

Cooking with Nonni

Our own "boy who lived" (Landon survived a head dive into the TV stand)

At Uncle Chris's graduation

Congratulations Dr. Uncle Chris!

John is 30!

Christmas lights at Dovewood Ct.  Matching hats that Shani knitted for her boys.

Spa-ing with Nonni and Papa in Palm Springs

Palm Springs

On the playground in Palm Springs with Papa

Landon in his knitted hat Shani made him

Landon has learned to climb onto things

Having fun with babysitter Kirstie