happy holidays

2007 has been a busy and exciting year for us! The most significant event was welcoming our daughter, Mia, into the world in April. She has been such a joy to have in our home. Mandi enjoys having another girl in the house and Mia is definitely a girl. We can already sense her tender and emotional nature. She has such a joyful personality and our favorite part about Mia is that she always wakes up smiling. She brings a lot of peace to our home with her happy disposition. Jonah has really surprised us and is a wonderful older brother to her. It didn't take long for him to accept her and now he always wants to include Mia in his activities, especially taking their nightly baths together.

Shortly after Mia was born, Mandi found out she was pregnant again! The babies will be just under 12 months apart, and no, this was not planned. Mandi is due in April, and we are excited to be able to welcome another child into our family. Jonah is thrilled that it's going to be a boy! Mandi is now feeling better and is enjoying these last few months of just having 2 kids to chase after. Life will get busy without a doubt! Mandi is still serving as Primary President, so free time is hard to come by. It's been a good learning experience for her and has helped to prepare her for our own little nursery of children at home.

Chris finished his 2nd year of dental school and took his National Boards. He passed! Yeah Chris! He immediately started his 3rd year, which consists of working on patients in the clinic. He sure enjoys the clinical aspect of dental school a lot more. He's still busy, but we do get to enjoy Daddy a lot more this year.

Jonah is now 2 1/2 and talking better and better all the time. Our favorite phrases include, "That make you happy Momma?", and "I can not believe it!". We are working on potty training and as soon as we decide to really tackle it, we're pretty confident that Jonah will be ready too. It will be nice to get one of the kids out of diapers before the new baby arrives.

We spent Thanksgiving in Montana this year a had a great time with Chris's parents. Jonah got his Christmas present early from them, which was a motorized train set. He loves nothing more. As parents, we are really excited for Christmas morning since Jonah is now understanding the concept of Christmas and Santa. We'll be spending Christmas at Mandi's Parents home in the Lake of the Ozarks, Missouri, with most of her siblings and their kids. The cousins always enjoy being together under one roof, and us adults will waste lots of time with the Nintendo Wii.

We hope you have the happiest of holidays. It's been such a blessing to have children and get the opportunity to teach them about the importance of this special occasion. We are so grateful for the knowledge of a Savior and the chance to dedicate time to celebrating the blessed event of His coming into the world. Merry Christmas!

it's a boy!

We got a very definite view that a little boy will be joining our family in April. We are excited to add another boy to the mix, but it will be sad seeing the girls get out-numbered so quickly! Jonah will have such a fun time with a little brother. They will be just under 3 years apart, so I'm sure they will be great friends. Mia will have a brother to protect her on both sides =) I'm still trying to figure out where we're going to fit the new baby in our home, but I think he will share a room with Jonah right off. I have plans to make matching crib bedding to go with Jonah's sporty room, but there's no doubt it will be a tight squeeze. I still remember when I was growing up and 3 of us girls shared a room that barely fit the queen-sized bed. Those were some fun years for me, so I'm sure the boys will enjoy being so close. We're sure excited to meet this little boy soon!

happy halloween

This year was Jonah's first experience with Trick-or-Treating. He now tells us that "Jonah loves trick-or-treating", but what kid wouldn't? He was very good at "bouncing" just like Tigger's do, so the costume was perfect. Mia was just fun to dress up. I can't take any credit for the adorable costume--it's from my sister Melissa, but she sure looks like a princess in it. She enjoyed watching Jonah trick-or-treat from the stoller and I'm sure she'd love the candy if she got a chance. Jonah caught onto the idea of Halloween really quick and even approached the doors, rang the doorbell and said "twik-o-tweet" all by himself. As parents, it was so fun to watch. Happy Halloween!

family photo shoot

Getting a family ready for a photo shoot is stressful! First of all, it took me forever to come up with something we could wear, and stick to some sort of color scheme--How do I match my son with Mia's exclusively purple and pink wardrobe? Then I had to find a shirt that would fit my 11 week pregnant belly--that's a pain! Then of course we had to time the naps and the meals with the setting sun because that's the best time to shoot pictures, I guess. It was extremely humid, so the time I spent curling my hair was a waste, but we were very relieved to see some pictures that turned out. We really had such a fun time at Hodge park last night taking these photos. My friend, Lori Garcia, did a fabulous job. She was so good at keeping the kids' attention and entertaining them too! Jonah earned "marshmallows" from her for smiling in the pictures. We couldn't have asked Mia to cooperate better! It's fun to see pictures of our growing family.

feeding mia

I started feeding Mia for the first time last week. She was really "eyeing" our food and anxious to give it a try, so, of course, I made her some oh so yummy rice cereal. Fortunately, she doesn't know what she's missing out on yet. It didn't take her long at all to figure out how the spoon worked. By the second feeding, she was a pro, with audible gulps and all. Now that she's realized that there is more to life the the bottle, she will never be content drinking it while we are eating real food, so I always have to feed her when we're eating dinner. She inherited her Dad's love of food for sure!

summer fun

Thanks to our friends who own a very nice home in a great neighborhood with an even greater pool, we spent lots of time swimming this summer. Chris spent most of the summer studying for his National Dental Boards, so we were anxious for the test to be over with and done. On August 15th he took the 8 hour test, and PASSED! Once we got the letter with the good news, we didn't waste anytime and took the kids swimming! It took Jonah just once in the water to decide that he had no fear and he swims on his own with his "water-wings". He does more jumping-in than he does swimming. Mia enjoys the water, but her mom doesn't like to waste the swim diapers for the 3 minutes that she stays in the water. So, she just gets a little dip from time to time. It was a great past time for a very humid climate. Thanks Jones family for the use of your pool!

mia

We love our little Mia! She began sleeping through the night at 7 1/2 weeks and has been consistently doing it since then. Mommy loves that! During her wake times, she is very happy and we think she has the cutest little gummy smile. She resembles her mom a whole lot, which is very exciting to see since Jonah only seems to carry his dad's genes.

jonah's 2nd birthday

We celebrated Jonah's second birthday a few weeks early because his Grandma and Grandpa Rapp were in town. He was showered with gifts and loves being "2". His favorite part was blowing out the candles, which he frequently tries to reinact. One day, I found him on the kitchen counter, having climbed up there in search of the matches. He actually found them and managed to light one! Luckily, he blew it out, as he had planned, but he did burn his finger. We're just grateful that our house is still standing! Two-year-olds are crazy! Jonah loves golfing more than any other sport. Chris takes him golfing and just pushes him in the stroller. Jonah is in heaven watching his Dad swing at the ball, and always gives off a cute giggle. He's working on his swing everyday.