Christmas in full swing

Christmas is one week away and I can hardly stand it. It's so fun to experience Christmas with kids. I'm so excited for Santa to come because Joseph is so excited for Santa to come. And it's so wonderful to be able to teach Joseph about "baby Jesus." Joseph summarizes, "Baby Jesus growed and growed until he was big and he helped people." Here are some of our Christmas tree pictures. This is the first year we've had a big tree. We've always just put up the little 2 foot tree that my mom sent me one year I was in college. I don't really have enough decorations to fill it up but I was surprised to realize how many decorations we have been given through the years that we've never used because they were too big for our little tree. It is an artificial tree and most of you will think I'm horrible to live in Seattle and not buy a beautiful live tree. But we got an amazing deal on a used tree that I just couldn't pass up. It just looks so beautiful in our family room. I will be so sad to take it down.


I just love the pictures of babies grabbing at Christmas trees with the lights lighting up their faces. I didn't realize how dark my pictures were. I'll try to get some better ones for you.

ER

One week ago today I was sitting in the ER with my 6 month old baby. My first trip to the ER as a mother. Want to hear the not-so-gory and embarrassing details? I was clipping Justin's toenails and decided to trim his fingernails while I was at it. This was my first attempt at his fingernails because I'm a professional nail biter and I usually bite off his fingernails. I'm not sure why I decided to go for it on this particular afternoon. So he was starting to lose patience and I told him I was just going to do one last trim on his thumb, when I notice the bleeding. Ahhhh! I punctured my baby's thumb and made him bleed! I couldn't really see the cut; he was screaming and it was bleeding a lot. I grabbed a tissue and started applying pressure, but everytime I looked at the wound, it would pool up with blood again. After 10 minutes of this I started to get worried and called the nurse line. She told me to use a wet washcloth to apply pressure for 5 whole minutes before looking at the cut. She said every time I took the tissue away, I would reopen the cut, making it bleed. Good to know, huh? It's about this time that I realize that I've damaged his right thumb, the one he sucks himself to sleep with! So I've not only hurt my son, but also taken away his ability to comfort himself. Great job, Jill! Thirty minutes tick by and I hang up with the nurse having decided to have Justin seen today. The bleeding hasn't stopped and she's worried about possible infection and stitches on top of that. Right about now, I start to lose it. Darren isn't picking up his phone and his pediatrician can't see him for an hour. Justin is losing patience as I try to bandage his thumb he wants to suck so he won't bleed all over himself. So I call up a neighbor who graciously comes over to sit with my napping Joseph, and we head for the ER. By the time the nurse sees us, the bleeding has stopped and I'm feeling like an idiot. Two hours later, the doctor takes a look and says, "Let me put a bandaid on it for you." How humiliating! And I just felt so awful for my little baby that I caused pain! But in the end, I am happy to report that Justin is fine (can you believe how fast kids heal?) and I've learned a few things: 1)I'll stick to biting his nails. 2)I'll take humiliation over a serious injury any day! 3)And hey, now I know exactly how to get to the ER for the next time...? Let's not think about that.

Baby update

I must brag a little bit about what my baby can do. Justin is 6 months this week and now sits up on his own, rolls over from his tummy to his back, and he's eating solid food. I can't believe Justin is getting so big. It seems like it's going even faster than it did with Joseph. And I also can't believe that watching your baby learn how to do these things is just as amazing the second time around. The cutest thing is to hear Joseph praise Justin when he learns something new. He'll say, "Great job, Justin! You did it!"



I know this video is not very action-packed, but it's for the Grandmas. Justin was so ready for baby food. No funny faces, you say? No spitting the food out? No way, he just downed it like a pro. FYI: Joseph's excited exclamation is about the fact that Justin is wearing a Mariners bib. He's so silly.

Cute Giggles

Look! The brothers can play together! Joseph is often on the quest these days to make Justin smile and laugh. It's not that difficult anymore. If Joseph is paying attention to him, Justin is thrilled.

I'm a lucky girl

Thanksgiving has come and gone and it makes me think about what a lucky girl I am. I have the most beautiful family: a loving husband and two gorgeous little boys. I love being their wife and mommy. What a blessing to be so happy with my life and not want to be anywhere else in the whole world than in my home with all my boys around me. But it doesn't stop there! I am surrounded by wonderful extended family all over this country who love and support me and my family. The same is true of our good friends. They bless our life daily. One of those family members is outside our country serving a mission for the church. I am so thankful for Elder Anderson, my little brother, and the service he is giving in the Dominican Republic. Speaking of our country, I am blessed to live in this beautiful free country where I can live my life where and how I choose. I am so thankful for my freedom and for those who fight to preserve it and keep us safe. I am so thankful for my Savior, Jesus Christ, and for the truthfulness of the restored gospel in my life that brings me peace and happiness.


We had a very fun and yummy Thanksgiving in Oregon with my in-laws and their good friends the Mitchell's. Darren's sister Jenni came from college and his brother Brad with his girlfriend, Kristy came too. Joseph and Justin loved spending time with Grandma and Grandpa. We fed the ducks at Alton Baker park, looked around Autzen stadium, did a little shopping, watched movies, played games and stuffed ourselves with turkey and pumpkin pie. Thanks for the good time, Jolleys!

A few things of note

Joseph LOVES looking through toy magazines. Here he is hard at work making his Christmas list. As Darren and I were explaining to him how he needs to let Santa know what he'd like for Christmas and then work on being a very good boy, he was visibly troubled by the thought of sitting on Santa's lap at the mall and having to tell him what he wants for Christmas. Way too scary for Joseph! The suggestion of sending him a letter went over a little better.
In other Jolley boy news, Justin has found his feet and they are his new favorite toy. Once in awhile he sucks his big toe. He prefers no socks and no diaper for optimum foot to mouth action.

An eventful weekend

Usually our weekends are fun, just uneventful. But this past weekend was both. Darren and Joseph went to the Sonics/Jazz game on Friday night. They had Darren's firm's tickets on the 8th row! Unfortunately, the little firework display at the very beginning kinda freaked him out. But he was thrilled to see his favorite player, "Number 5 Carlos Boozer," and see the Jazz win. He represented his allegiance to both teams with his Jazz jersey and Sonics hat. Then on Saturday night I got to go out to dinner with my hot husband and several of his co-workers and their wives. (Thanks to our babysitters, our friends the Burgesses.) It was so fun to have a night out on the town and such a yummy dinner with friends.

Help! I'm going to be a single mother for 5 days!

My husband is leaving on a business trip tomorrow night. He'll be gone for 5 days and 5 nights and I'm just a little concerned for my sanity with my two kids. He's been away this long once or twice before, but not since we've had two kids. The days are so long when he's away and I don't have his help with the kiddies in the evening, or his adult conversation after pretending to be Buzz Lightyear or Clifford the Big Red Dog with Joseph all day. The only plusses: Not having to make a "real" dinner because Joseph doesn't mind macaroni and cheese or pancakes, and being able to hold the remote control in the evenings so I don't watch ESPN and I do watch the Oprah re-runs. But it only takes a couple of days for me to tire of bad dinners and miss Darren so much that I leave the TV on SportsCenter while I do the dishes so it feels like he's home. I have so much respect for single mothers and army wives who always carry all the family responsibilities! Any ideas to help keep me from going crazy over the next five days? (I'll probably be bothering most of you on the phone at some point and using you as my adult conversationalists.)

Sunny Autumn Days

Today was the first day in a long while that it rained during the day. It made me sad because it ruined our after-lunch ritual that we started. For 3 days in a row Joseph, Justin and I have been taking a walk around the block and then playing baseball in the backyard while Justin looks on from his stroller. Joseph says, "We are the Mariners and Justin is the people watching us play baseball." It's been so nice to get outside and enjoy the crisp autumn air without all that Seattle moisture getting in the way.

I've been tagged!

OK, April and Libby, this one's for you.

1. I have lived in 4 different states and moved 12 different times in my 6 years of marriage.

2. I love to make homemade cards and I profess to be a scrapbooker, just don't ask to see my scrapbooks. I only have a wedding one done and my 3 year old's scrapbook is done up to his 6 week mark. I've got some work to do.

3. I am obsessed with Full House re-runs, Cadbury Creme Eggs at Easter time and the music of Paula Abdul. I know, I know, she's a weirdo in real life. But her music is my favorite.

4. I'm a horrible cook. Even after 6 years of trying, I still manage to mess up/burn dinner regularly. My husband is a good sport.

5. I still bite my nails like crazy. The worst part about this bad habit: My 3 year old bites his nails, too. Good example, Mom! Unless it's just genetically inherited? Yeah, right.

6. I can burp really loud. Darren thinks it's so lady-like. But Joseph enjoys it. Again, good example, Mom!

Happy Halloween

Here's a look at the Jolley family Halloween festivities. Joseph really understood the trick-or-treating concept and he couldn't get enough of it. He was in love with his Nascar costume too. He was hilariously shy, though. We'd get up to a door step and he'd hide behind me and hold out his bag. We practiced saying "trick-or-treat all day but you couldn't coax it out of him at the door. Then as soon as the door closed, he was himself again, saying, "Let's go to another house!" Justin just looked adorable, as usual. We went to a ward Trunk-or-treat party too. You couldn't have asked for a better Halloween night, weather-wise. Which is quite a feat in Seattle.

Here's Joseph at our playgroup party with his buddies. Finally, here are our Jack-o-lanterns. We did some at my parent's house in Utah and one at home. For Joseph, carving pumpkins is a spectator sport. His comments: "I don't like guts on me."

Switcheroo

Sorry so long between posts, but the last couple of weeks our family did something interesting that was taking all my time. Darren took his "paternity leave" (two weeks paid leave when your wife has a baby) and took care of the kids all day while I worked from home. Pretty sweet, huh? Well it got even more interesting. I'll try to give you the short, non-boring version. I sat down at my computer two weeks ago to get to work (I work less than part-time for my Dad's computer software company creating animations that teach computer design software.) Sorry, you're bored already, aren't you? So it turns out that my antiquated computer can't read a DVD to install software that I needed and it can't run on my old operating system. And nobody had thought of this previously. I was so frustrated! But as luck would have it, the whole family flew out to Utah the next day on Darren's company because there happened to be a recruiting event I was invited to at BYU. How about that?! So for the past two weeks I have worked from my parent's basement while Darren watched the boys upstairs all day. Joseph was thrilled to be able to spend more time in Utah. I was excited to have a complete break from my kids and activate my brain all day being productive for this company. And Darren was excited for the break in work. But I think I can speak for both of us when I say that it didn't take long for both of us to miss our former roles as care-taker and wage-earner. My intellectual high wore off after about a day and I longed to shut down that computer and run upstairs and scoop up my boys. And I got to hear Darren a couple of times complain about how hard it is to care for two kids all day. I gotta admit, I thoroughly enjoyed that validation. I did really enjoy the work I did for my Dad (yes, I am really done now; my computer has given me no choice in the matter). What a blessing it has been to work from home all these years I've been married! But what a blessing it is to also know that I love my job as mother and homemaker, and have a loving husband who works his butt off all day so that I can stay home with our beautiful kids. We are truly happy in our roles in our little family.

We love Portland

We just got to spend another fun weekend with family in Portland. We went down for Darren's best friend's sister's wedding (did you get that?) and we got to hang out with Darren's brother Marc and their family. We went to Marc's HS team's football game (Go Tigard Tigers!), had a great time at the pumpkin patch and went swimming at the YMCA. The wedding was very beautiful too. Joseph and Justin have cousins just their age that they love to hang out with. Aren't they the cutest? It's so great that we live close enough for them to play together once in awhile. They're good buddies. Thanks for having us, guys!

Highlights from our week in Utah

It's always so good to spend time in Utah with family. Joseph could hardly contain himself when I woke him up and told him it was time to leave for the airport for Utah. The combination of an airplane ride and seeing his grandparents was almost too much excitement for him to handle. Justin did very well on his first airplane ride. Thankfully (since I flew there by myself), there was room for Justin's carseat and he slept like an angel the entire way. Darren met us there for the weekend and I went with him to a recruiting dinner that his accounting firm puts on at BYU every year. It's basically a free date night for us. Well, for me at least. Darren had to work a little bit in answering recruits' questions. I just got to eat the yummy dinner and chat up the recruits' wives. We even had free babysitting (thanks Mom and Dad)! Justin got to meet a couple of uncles, great grandparents and lots more extended family for the first time. The rest of the fun is summed up in the pictures below.



Joseph and Justin with Grandma and Grandpa Anderson



Cousin Alexis and Joseph pretending to sleep. This was their favorite game to play with Grandma. They pretend to sleep until Grandma wakes them up with her tickling. They played it over and over! Grandmas are such good sports! I couldn't get over how cute Alexis was mimicking how Joseph holds his precious blankie while he sucks his thumb.



My sister's neighbor is a firefighter and gave us a private tour of his fire station. It was so fun! Joseph was super shy at first, but really loosened up by the end. He climbed in the ambulance and the fire truck. He also tried on the gear, as you can see.



Here are my two favorite golfers, teeing up at good old Trafalga with all the fam.




We were also lucky enough to be a stop on my sister and brother-in-law's trip through Utah. Too bad it couldn't have been a longer stop! One day wasn't long enough for me! Here's my boys with their adorable cousin Easton.

Joseph sings "I am a Child of God" - almost

Joseph doesn't like to perform for the camera. I had to trick him to get him to even sing this much by saying I was going to take his picture when he was done. So when he stops in the middle of the song, he tells me to take his picture now. He is such a sweetheart. I just love how he's holding Justin's hand and Justin is looking over at him.

Talking up a storm

Go Ducks!

Check out my boys on game day. They got all decked out to watch the Oregon Ducks kick butt at Michigan on Saturday. It was such a fun game to watch. I have to admit that I'm not a huge fan of football. The games are way too long and thanks to Darren's fantasy football league, I get football overkill at my house. But I also have to admit that I love Darren's love of Oregon Duck football and his passion is contagious. I actually like to watch the Oregon games with him because he gets so into it. It rubs off on Joseph too. By the end of the season he'll have the whole team memorized and his favorites picked out, I'm sure. He can already sing you the fight song.

I wish he was a big boy now!

The race car you see pictured here has become a permanent fixture in our bathroom on the shelf above the toilet. It has now been there for over 3 months. It is Joseph's prize for going poo poo and pee pee in the potty. (He was 3 in May.)
If you are perhaps unaware of Joseph's obsession with Nascar, let me tell you, it is intense. He has about 8 little cars already and carries them with him everywhere. He'd rather watch the race car channel on Saturday morning than cartoons. He can tell you the numbers, sponsors and drivers of every car he owns. It's really quite odd, because his Dad and I don't give a hoot about Nascar. Needless to say, Joseph is dead set against using the potty. And every day that goes on, I swear, his diapers smell more and more foul! Everyone keeps telling me that this means he'll just wake up one day and be potty-trained, but man, that day is beginning to seem like it will never come. We've read so many potty books, watched videos, and talked it to death. He's seen his two best friends his age go in the potty. Our success for right now is that he's now gone off his potty chair strike and will sit on his potty chair for me again. So we've been doing that twice a day for a week now, but nothing has happened in it yet. He is simply not ready. Sigh. So I go on waiting....

Our summer of visitors

The summer is almost over and so is the flow of visitors to our house. I've quite enjoyed everyone coming to see us this summer and I'm sad to see it end. Ok, ok, I know they didn't come to see me, they really came to see Justin. Thank you to all our awesome family that traveled to Seattle. We loved hanging out with you and we appreciate so much your love and support of our family.



More cute cousins! Kellen and Caleb



Uncle Marc and Aunt Connie



Grandma and Grandpa Anderson



3 generations of Jolleys



Aunt Jordan and Justin



Cousins Megan and Kevin



A whole lot of Jolleys

Justing smiling and talking

Facts About Me

This one's for you, Emily.

1. I have lived in 4 different states and moved 12 different times in my 6 years of marriage.

2. I am obsessed with Full House re-runs, Cadbury Creme Eggs at Easter time and the music of Paula Abdul.

3. My very favorite food in the whole world is corn on the cob straight from my Grandpa Mangum's garden.

4. I will eat an entire tub of popcorn if you let me.

5. I love to make homemade cards and I profess to be a scrapbooker, just don't ask to see my scrapbooks. I only have a wedding one done and my 3 year old's scrapbook is done up to his 6 week mark. I've got some work to do.

6. I love Tae Kwon Do and Tae Bo. I made it to brown belt before leaving for college, and Billy Blanks is my personal trainer.

7. I have no clue as to keeping plants alive, decorating and arranging my home, and don't ask me to do math past a 5th grade level. I'm also very good at burning dinner.

8. I have the best husband in the world and the two cutest boys on earth!

Aunt Michelle and Justin

Cute cousins!

Ode to Grandma

I've been meaning to write this post for a week now, but I've been so busy without either of my wonderful moms' help to get it written! Having two little ones to care for is hard work! I feel so blessed that I had grandma to come to the rescue. They kept me sane, my house clean, and my kids' diapers dry. And you wouldn't believe how perfectly timed each of their visits were.

Get this: The plan was that we'd call my mom when I was in labor and she'd hop on a plane. But she called the morning before Justin was born (5 days before my due date) and said she was ready to come. I went into labor that night after picking her up at the airport. It was so great to just be able to leave her with Joseph when we left for the hospital at 6:00 AM! She bought our groceries, cooked our meals, did my dishes, not to mention driving Joseph around an unfamiliar city! I just didn't want her to leave!

Then the day after Carol came to visit, I got sick with mastitis. Darren and Joseph had plans to go to the Mariners game, so she came to the doctor and picked up my prescriptions with me, and when we got home she took care of Justin while I went to bed. Then when I woke up, my laundry was done and she made our dinner. She just took all the stress out of being a sick mommy.

I just can't thank them enough for what they do for me and my family! Moms are the best! What would I do without you?

I wish all babies could be second babies!

My doctor told me while I was in labor that this was her favorite quote from a patient and I now totally subscribe to it too. Everything was easier and shorter this time around: labor, delivery, recovery, breastfeeding, the works. Instead of being totally worried about how to take care of a newborn, I just worried about how to split my time between two kids and how to meet both their needs. So in that way, I guess it's just a different set of worries. But Justin has been a sweet baby (no colic has set in yet-- knock on wood), and Joseph has been very good to Justin and very patient with me as I take care of a newborn's many demands. (I forgot how much they poop!) I am still getting used to saying that I have kids, plural. That sounds so crazy. But I feel so blessed to have another beautiful, healthy boy and to be a new mom again.

justin arrives!

considering jill is a little unavailable at the moment, the responsibility has fallen to me to post some pictures of the newest member of our family - justin alan jolley. we'll share more later, but the basic stats are that he was born at 12:12 p.m. on wednesday, june 13. he is 7 lbs. 13 oz., and both jill and justin are in great shape and looking forward to seeing you all soon! darren

Camping Out

We did it. We finally bought a tent. Darren finally had just the right excuse. I hosted a YW sleepover last Friday night at our house and so the boys went out and bought a tent, set it up in the backyard and went camping. They had so much fun in it on Friday night, they invited me to join them on Saturday night. We made smores and watched a movie in the tent. Joseph thought it was so great. Aren't my boys the cutest?

Check me out!

Well, I'm officially a blogger now, can you believe it? Several friends have been using these for awhile and I love to read them and see the pictures of their adorable families growing. So here I am finally putting one together. I feel so technologically advanced. Thanks for the inspiration: Emily, Diane and Lori!

So as you can see from my pictures, we've had some very fun visitors lately. My sis-in-law Emily came for the weekend with her adorable little Easton and we played at the children's museum and the aquarium. It was so great to see them because they just moved from close Oregon to far away Idaho! Then my sister Jordan came to hang out with us for the weekend and we had a blast playing with Joseph, shopping downtown and hitting the art museum, something I love to do with her. And back in March we visited my fam in Utah. We got to spend a lot of time with Taylor which was awesome. He is now serving the Lord in the Santiago, Dominican Republic mission. I'm so proud of him!

Seattle is treating us well. Now our family is just trying to wait patiently until our little baby boy decides to come out and meet us. I have about 3 weeks left unless this baby is anything like Joseph; then it'll only be 2 weeks. I wouldn't mind that at all!