34th Birthday

For whatever reason, these pictures turned out terrible.  Oh well.

 Daddy got a nerf gun too.  They've had a lot of fun with it their nerf guns.

 Logan wanted an orange cake.  So I made the Pioneer Woman crush cake, but it did not come out of the bundt pan at all.  I don't know why but I think it was the copious amounts of sugar and soda that just made it stick stick stick.  I had to soak and scrub the pan it was so bad.  It still tasted good though:)

That night we left the kids with the Grafs and we got a Rigotti's pizza and went and ate it up the the Red Hills Desert Garden.  It was AWESOME! Perfect weather and perfect company.

Of course I have to include (as I do every year) that I met Logan on his birthday and this year marks 9 years since I first laid eyes on that handsome blue eyed boy:)

3rd Birthday

This year for Chapter's birthday he knew exactly what he wanted and I think it's pretty safe to say we made all of his dreams come true.  Of course, they were pretty small dreams:)

 He wanted a snowman umbrella, a chomping dinosaur, an "orjange" nerf gun, a cake and balloons.  He also wanted to eat a "junior hamburger at daddy's office".  I threw in a dizzle for good measure;)

 He also had a friend party.  We had 3 girls and one boy over to play dinosaur games and have dinosaur dirt cups.

His little friends are so cute and he got some great gifts.  It's so fun that he is FINALLY getting excited about stuff.  I love it.

Swiss Days

 5th annual 3rd ward pancake breakfast at the Blake house.

 The parade wore her out:)

The kids made these cute necklaces at the pioneer games.  He was pretty obsessed for a few days.

We LOVE Swiss days!  It's seriously my favorite because it kicks off the start of the holiday season here at the Blake house.  Then we have Chap's birthday, Logan's Birthday, Halloween, Thanksgiving, my birthday and Christmas all in rapid succession.  Love it:)

6 Months and 3 Years

These kiddos, I tell ya.  They are just too much fun:)

Merit: She is amazing!  She's so much fun to have in the family.  She is a little spazzy and it scares me a little sometimes to think about her getting mobile in the next few months.  She has just barely started eating a little babyfood and she likes it most of the time.  She likes to blow raspberries, and she thinks her brother is HILARIOUS!  We went to the dr. today and she's almost 16 pounds!  I always dreamed of having a blue-eyed baby but her little brown eyes are just the cutest thing and I love them so much!  I was really worried about having a girl and doing the girly thing, but I love it and I think I'm figuring out this accessory thing.  I have been so blessed to have this little one join our family.

Chapter: He is getting so big and it is killing me.  He is the best brother to Merit.  He loves to hold her and sing to her and hand her toys.  He still isn't really big on listening (haha) but he's getting better all the time.  He's a brave little monkey too.  Today he had to get a shot and he didn't cry one bit.  He also had to have his blood drawn as a follow-up to the needle stick incident he had about a year ago and he didn't cry for that either.  Everyone in the lab was shocked at how good he did and they gave him stickers and suckers and a bouncy ball for being so brave.  He loves to play with his cousins and is completely obsessed with dinosaurs. He's been having nightmares lately, but nothing too hard to deal with I just mostly feel bad.  I don't know how I got such good kids but I'm sure thankful I did.

Breast vs. Bottle

Now that I've made it to the 6 month mark of breastfeeding Merit I feel somewhat qualified to compare the two primary ways of feeding your baby.

Now for a little background on each child. Chapter is the most stubborn child.  He absolutely would not eat in the hospital.  We tried everything.  The lactation consultant tortured us both for hours before finally giving up.  We had nurses literally crying and worrying he was going to have to go to the NICU.  In short, he is a little stinker who only does what he wants to and he was born that way. We finally got him to take a bottle at around 2 1/2 days old.  I was just happy my kid wasn't dead and unhappily pumped for 2 weeks and then happily gave him formula for the next 12 months.  Merit did pretty much the same thing, only we had better nurses and she finally figured out how to nurse at around 1 1/2 days.  We have been happily nursing since (minus the first month, ugh).

Formula Pros:

1. You know exactly how much your baby is eating.
2. Your husband can take a turn in the night.
3. You don't have to stress about leaving him with a babysitter.
4. No pain.

Formula Cons:

1. You have to buy formula.
2. You have to remember to buy formula.
3. You have to have a bottle, water and formula with you at all times.
4. You have to actually get up and make a bottle in the night. 

The Breastfeeding Pros and Cons are basically the opposites, but I'll cover them anyway.  

Breastfeeding Pro:

1. All you need is you. 
2. It's free.
3. In the night you can just grab your baby and feed her without turning on lights and tripping through the kitchen.

Breastfeeding Con:

1. It's a much larger commitment for you. It's all you.  No passing the baby off on someone else.
2. It's not all that fun for the first month or so.
3. It can be very isolating having to hide yourself away at your family's house, at church, in public, etc. 
4. You stress every time you leave your baby.  Also, not being able to leave for longer periods of time, like going to the temple.  That thought just stresses me to no end.  

Additional observations:

•  As far as the weight loss argument goes, I think it depends on you.  I actually have had a much harder time losing weight while breastfeeding, whereas it just happened all by itself and really quickly with Chapter.  
• You get judgy stares no matter how you feed your baby in public, only they are from different people. 
• I get really annoyed when I hear people talk about the "bonding" of breastfeeding. How if they quit they will lose the "bond". Holding, feeding and loving your baby is going to result in a "bond" no matter how they are getting their nutrition.  
• I feel like a lot of "mom shaming" goes on on both sides of this argument, but if I had to be honest I feel like the breast feeders shame the bottle feeders a lot, and I think it's unnecessary.  I don't think it's anyone's business how you feed your baby.  There's this mentality of if you don't breastfeed you don't love your child or care about them.  I've done both (I've done both as far as the pain meds during labor goes as well) and I can tell you that it doesn't impact how much you love your child.  I do not love Merit more because I had a (basically) unmedicated birth and I've breastfed her.  

Anyway, just my experience and something I've been thinking about a lot lately.