Merry Christmas!!!!!!

Things have been going well for us! We spent our Thanksgiving in Topeka, Kathleen was able to bring her family up and James was there too! It was the first time Jada saw her Cousins, unfortunately they spent most of their time ignoring each other :/ Oh well, Hopefully that will change the next time they see one another. Jada is full speed ahead in life. She isn't walking yet, unless she's distracted with a toy in each hand, but then she realizes her "mistake" and she get down and crawl. She ate her first full jar of baby food yesterday- it was pears, so we're hoping she'll start eating those again... we'll see. She has so much personality! I was putting up our very few Christmas decorations and she wanted to play with them. Well seeing as I didn't want them broken, I moved them to a higher shelf, Jada got up on the empty box that held the decorations and tried using that as a stool!!!! Can you believe that?! She's only 10 months old!

I left her with Daniel while I went and did a little bit of grocery shopping and when I came back she had colored all over her legs with a pink marker! I was a dumb-dumb and didn't take pictures :( I can't keep up with her! she moves from one mess to another, and while i clean those up she already has 3 more messes for me to clean up! My house is a perpetual mess.... and yet when she naps all I wanna do is rest, but then the mess never gets cleaned up! I've been trying to make my own bread, something I have yet to perfect, and none of the loaves have tasted bad, but something about them is really heavy. Daniel's been a sport and eating them like there's no tomorrow, probably because once it's gone he doesn't have to pretend to like it until the next loaf ;) But Jada, the everlasting critic, won't even touch it!!! When I get some in her mouth, she promptly spits it out!!! and if I set some on her tray she either throws it on the floor or on her seat below the tray where I don't see it until I get her out :/

Daniel is in the middle of finals. We're luckier than the chiropractic students because of how much time Daniel gets off in comparison to them. Dec. 11th is his last day of class then he has a month off!!! Over a month actually, he doesn't start the next semester until Jan. 20th- Jada's first birthday! This year has gone by so fast!! And I have yet to wish that Jada were still a tiny baby (every one told me I would miss that, but I don't), I'm OK with the hours of Jada entertaining herself :) Not to mention she's finally sleeping through the night! It only took her 9 months to do it, but once she decided to, well she sleeps any where from 12 to 15 hours every night!!! It's bliss!

Jada dances now! It started on a Sunday and Daniel was just making noises, not any thing resembling a song, just noises and she started to dance!!! well more like bobbing up and down :) since then she'll dance to the clicking of the dishwasher! But her favorite is Weezer!!!!!! That's my girl!!!!

Back again!

So for an update, we moved into some new apartments and we really like it! Not only is it WAY cheaper but we really like the people here, there is diffidently a family feel here. Also most of the people living in the complex are members! The move in itself was a little rough on Jada, poor baby got ignored for 2 days! and she made up for that by not sleep at all for the first little bit. But she is liking it a whole lot more, especially cause she can see out the sliding door at all the little kids playing on the playground, she thinks it's great! She's moving right along, is sooo close to walking she can hardly stand it! She will NOT, however, eat her baby food! She absolutely refuses to, so right now her diet consists of crackers, puffs (cheerios made for babies) crackers, crackers, crackers and what ever she can get me and Daniel to give her off our plates. She has developed a particular liking to french fries! She bites off the end, spits it out, eats the soft insides and leaves a soggy outside on her tray! I think she just likes the salt personally, so once that's gone she just spits it out and moves to the next one!

Daniel is also moving right along, in classes though. He always has some story or other to tell, about his classmates or the teachers, but he likes it ALLOT! In our new ward, Daniel is the odd man out because the ward is filled with Chiropractic students, there are 3, including Daniel, who are not. And of course there's the friendly banter that goes along with that, but all in all we REALLY like our new ward!

I spend my days cleaning up after Jada (not a big change there) On sunny days we go out and play on the swings for hours, Jada LOVES the swings, and of course she is my biggest helper when I'm folding laundry :/ I am super excited for Halloween which is odd because I'm not really doing anything, Daniel has to work till 11:00 that night so I'll be hangin' out with Jennae and Trevor watching Halloween movies and making Halloween cupcakes, and hopefully passing out candy to trick-or-treaters. Jada is going to be a giraffe (thanks for the costume Trina!) and I'm going to be a zoo keeper!

We are all excited for thanks giving! Chelsea and Zach are stopping by on their way to Arkansas and Kathleen, Brent, Evin, Adrian and James are all going to be here (and by here I actually mean Topeka) But it'll be lots of fun- it's the first time the cousins will see each other! Carmen and Eric have been doing a KC BBQ tour of sorts with Daniel and I and so far we like Oklahoma Joe's the best, it'll be fun to go there with the Simon's! and a shout out to the rest of you- if your ever in our neck of the woods, Daniel and I would be more than willing to take you there too! I have become quite the BBQ snob, but I guess that's what happens when you live in BBQ country!

Happy Halloween to everybody!!!

Hmmm... Lets see if this works....

So, if that worked, it's Jada eating rice cereal! She really good at eating it, and is up to about 3 tablespoons! plus she drinks about 6 onces of watered down apple juice! so 2 onces of juice and 4 onces of water. But she loves it!

We've been taking her swimming every other day. She is the CUTEST baby there! there's this little boy named Joshua who has a huge crush on her and insists on following us around the pool!

Jada and I get to go up to Washington on the 22nd and we are SOOO excited! Chelsea and Zach are getting married in Aug 8th, and there's a big 'ol party for Grandma McCombs' 80th birthday July 24-25. So we get to be there for about 3 weeks! YEAH!!!

I'm Back Online!

Daniel and I just got internet in out apartment, so I give you all an update :)

Daniel started school and is liking it alot. Surprisingly there are 4 girls to every one guy! I guess there are alot of women going into that field. he finished his first quarter of classes this week and will start the others soon.

Jada is moving right along in life. She has an opionion of every thing and lets you know it. She's discovered her voice and likes to let every one hear it! Whether it's in Walmart, Sacrament meeting or at home, she wants to be heard! The funniest thing was I had the Little Mermaid playing last weekend and she loved the songs and the action, and most of all the colors! She was sqealing like crazy through the ENTIRE movie! It was hilarious!

I spend my days handing Jada her pacifier, puting her to sleep and trying to keep up on the cleaning and laundry. I'm enjoying cooking now and am trying a bunch of recipies that I've never made before. I like to change a few things here and there and so far it's turned out pretty darn tasty if I do say so myself!

Here's one of my best ones so far! It's a Sweet and Sour Chicken recipie that my mom has. but I added pine apple juice and tidbits, teriaki sause, and cut down the sugar and the vinager. Oh and the peppers are a last minute add in too!

3-4 chicken breasts, cubed
1 can pineapple tidpits, drained (save the juice)
1 small red pepper
1 small green pepper
1 small yellow pepper (all peppers are diced)

garlic powder to taste
seasoning salt to taste
1/4 cup flour
1/4 cup corn starch

1-3 eggs

1/4 cup vinager
3/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons Ketchup
2 tablespoons teriaki sauce
2 tablespoons water
1 chicken boulion cube
1/4 -1/2 cup pine apple juice

Coat the raw chicken in the flour, cornstarch, seasoning salt, and garlic powder. dip coated chicken in the egg, then brown it in a frying pan with a little bit of oil. In a pot disolve boulion cube in the vinarger and water. add Sugar, Ketchup, Teriaki sauce and pineapple juice. In a 9x13 spread the chicken, pineapple tidpits and the peppers. pour the sauce over them. Place in oven set at 400* for 40 minutes serve over rice.

Like I said- it was delicious! If any of you try it, let me know how it goes! Any way thats all for now. I have to re-figure out how to find my pictures cause we have a new computer, so that'll have to wait! If any of you are in our area drop in and see us, we would love some company!

Three Months with Jada!

Grandma is so good at getting that baby to calm down

Jaci holding Mabel, Jada and Josie
Josie and Jada are only 8 days apart

Caden being more than willing to feed Jada

Weston holding a limp sleeping Jada

Logan and Jada showing off their bed head!

With the greatest Great Grandma Ever!

At the luncheon after the funeral

Check out that baby's double chin action!!

Sooo sweet!

Chelsea and Jada after Bath time

Grandpa and Jada watching the Colorado sunset

I guess it's been a really long time since I've done any thing on this site so here it goes.

Daniel and I are in our final month of living with Carmen and Eric! We are SUPER excited to be living on our own again! Daniel starts school the first of June, and he's really excited about that! But before move into our new apartment we're making a trip up to Washington!!! With stops in Utah, Colorado, and Idaho of course to see the family and friends that we miss so much! I'd count down the days but Daniel hasn't told me what day we're actually leaving....

Jada has been soo much better! I'm sure you all know by now, but we changed her to a soy formula diet and things have gone up from there! It accured to me on the day of Jada's blessing, after a hellish time at church and a baby that wouldn't be comforted, that she might be lactose intolerant! I don't why I didn't think of it before, because the Bowmans don't seem to handle milk very well. So that night Daniel and I went and bought some soy formula and started feeding her that nasty play dough- smelling stuff right away! And Guess what?! It worked! She gained two pounds that week!and It took 6 weeks, but she finally gained her birth weight back! She was a much happier baby and I have to admit- it's nice not having to nurse. May be it wouldn't have been such a bad experience with a baby that would have actually cooperated.....

With Jada being a good girl and not needing to be held 24/7- LITERALLY, I was able to start getting our lives pulled back together. A clean home is soooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo much better that an messy cluttered home. It makes having Jada allot easier to deal with because I can relax when she's asleep, and since I can relax, Daniel can relax ;)

Daniel and I were able to make a bitter sweet trip to Colorado over conference weekend. My Grandma Lanier died, so we went to attend her funeral. And although I'm sad and the more I think about not being able to see her any more that sadder I get, it was a fabulous trip for us. My family got the chance to see Jada for the first time and it was great! Daniel and I hardly had any thing to do with her all weekend! ;) Just kidding! But it was nice that Chelsea and Jaci would fight over who got to change her or give her baths! And it was really nice to see my Dad with his first grand baby! They got along really well! The song off of "the fox and the hound" comes to mind, the one that goes "when your the best of friends...." Any way they were really cute together! We also took Jada swimming for the first time, and by we I mean me and Jaci, talk about a cute baby in her little swim suit! Thanks Trina and Claire!!!

The funeral it's self was done very well and my Mom and her Sib's all did excellent jobs when they spoke! I learned allot about my Grandma that I didn't know before, Like I got to know her as Bobbie Lanier instead of just Grandma Lanier and I loved the stories that were told! My cousin's wife Jenn made a slide show, and in it she was interviewing my Grandma about various things in her life. So there were stories about her child hood, her dating experience with my Grandpa and the raising of her family. I love the stories and the pictures, but most of all I love how Jenn was able to record my Grandma's testimony. The whole slide show makes me cry, but I am very grateful for it, and I have watched it several times since Daniel and I got back. There was one thing that Daniel learned VERY well while we were there, and that's that ice cream is very much a tradition in the Lanier family! Especially when it's home made and your eating it at 11 O'clock at night! Every one there mentioned that when they spoke, and we ended our stay on Colorado by doing just that- Home made ice cream at mid night and more than you could ever eat!!!

There was probably close to 150 people at the funeral that were family! All of my Grandma's siblings were there with their children and grandchildren, and all in all it was allot of fun to go and be with family for the week end! It was amazing to see so many people that loved my Grandma in one place!

I've had a few requests to put more pictures up so I hope these work! I can't figure out how to put the pictures in the middle of every thing, thus the picture book then the story book ;)

One month old!

Jada's First walk, and Daniel being a goofy goober ;)

this is the closest I've gotten to a picture with Jada smiling

she got Daniel's hair line which means hilarious bed head!

Still her first walk, but I'm not prego any more- although I'm still chubby
(my jeans aren't buttoned in this picture and I still can't get them buttoned :p )

As crazy as it sounds, Jada is one month old today! Weird- I'm a mom! I'm ready for the first 6 months to be over- cause that's when they say the baby starts really interacting! Jada does the funniest thing though, every now and then she'll go crossed-eyed! It is so funny and I no matter how hard I try I can't seem to get a picture of it! But I'm getting a little ahead of myself.

The Saturday after we took my mom back to the airport we had to rush Jada into the emergency room because she was choking and wasn't getting enough air! She finally spit it all up on the way to the hospital and some in the waiting room, but it was a green bile. But the y decided to have the Dr check her over and do an X-ray even though she was breathing fine at the time. Jada did NOT like being X-rayed! She was sooo angry, not to mention she left the X-ray tech a little gift on the table!

Well, for reason I don't quite understand, they decided to "rush" Jada to children's Mercy in KC. Rush is too strong of a word, Daniel and I could have gone home, packed and taken her ourselves in the time it took them to get her there. But what ever, can't argue with stupid Dr's any way, it's like trying to argue with a Scientist- pointless because they are always right :p

the whole thing was rather emotional for me, and that first day at Children's Mercy- I was bawling like a weepy Mormon mommy in the middle of the primary program! But Jada gave the nurses a run for their money the whole time we were there. she kept pulling off the monitor so that on the main screen the nurses had it looked like she was showing no vital signs. So they had to keep running and checking up on her. And when they started giving her oral medicines she kept spitting it back out! All in all I hated the whole experience, even though the nurses were really nice.

I guess it wasn't that pointless because we found out that Jada has reflux and had a bacteria in her urine that could have lead to a urinary track infection and they were able to help us prevent that. But When Daniel and I made the decision to go to the ER we thought they would pump what ever was in her lungs out and send us home, so our baby bill quadrupled in amount- :(

But since we've been back Jada started actually nursing, which makes things surprisingly easier. Actually I personally think that a bottle is easier and faster, but formula is sooo expensive! I'm pretty sure there's a conspiracy on anything that has to do with babies. There is no such thing as cheep baby any thing!

But life keeps getting more.... "fun". Over the past weekend both Daniel and Jada caught a cold. Daniel had it worse than Jada, which was both good and bad at the same time. Good that Jada wasn't any where near as bad as Daniel because it would have been 10X's worse for her. Bad because Daniel was sick and really tired and wasn't able to help with Jada. This past week has really made me want to make Daniel move back up to Washington! Life would be soo much easier for me up there!

Other that there's not much going on. I stay on the couch all night and all day, alternating feeding Jada and trying to sleep. And Daniel goes to work and plays indoor soccer, although not much has changed in that aspect ( I mean soccer). :s

Little Baby Jada Lynn Bowman

So... Daniel and I were in the hospital from Sunday night at 7:30 to Thursday afternoon around 3:00!! Let me tell you- way too long to be in the hospital! What happened was that the gave me.... what ever it is they give you to induce you and for two days I was at a 2! I wasn't progressing very fast and they didn't let me eat any thing but Ice chips and the occasional apple juice. By Tuesday I was a wreck. I even was crying in front of the Dr, which I normally don't cry in front of any body so you can imagine how bad it was.

Tuesday he finally gave me the option of breaking my water instead of waiting for everything to happen on it's own. I said lets do it and he broke my water right there and - HOLY COW! I had soooooo much water in there, they had to have two other nurses come in and help the one that was assigned to me to help her clean it up! That is the most akward feeling ever! They had my legs spread wide open and it was like I was peeing my pants and I had no control and an audience! Then the contractions came on REALLY strong and I almost broke Daniel's thumb (poor guy). I had to wait about 30 minutes before they could give me an epidural because they needed to pump me with more fluids. That was the most painfull 30 minutes of my life!

Then the guy came up to give me the epidural and he happened to be one of Daniel's soccer buddies from the out door league! Talk about akward! But one the pain meds kicked in Labor was actually enjoyable for me. Really I didn't feel a thing. Daniel and I watched some spongebob, we took naps and we found out the life story of the nurse! I went from a 2 at about 2:00 that after noon to a 10 at about 7:00! The nurses had to actually tell me when I was having contractions!

And at 8:20 Tuesday January 20, 2009 Jada Lynn was born! She weighed 8 lbs 1 oz, was 20 1/2 inches long and had red hair! So far she is a sweet tempered little girl that has an oppinion as to how she is going to be fed and really likes her daddy and his endless noises! Her sleep schedual is backwards (no surprise there) and I spend my nights trying to keep her fed and/or asleep! She's usaually not irratable at night, she just lays there with her eyes wide open and looking around at every thing and nothing! It's amazing how strong she already is! Her little legs allow her to climb upo her daddy's chest when he's trying to burp her! And if she does't want to nurse (which is always) she has no problem arching her back and pushing her self off of me!

Her hair is getting darker, but in certain lights there is no doubt that she's a red head! A girl after my own heart. She sleeps like a rock, which she gets from her dad, and she wakes up like me, wanting to go right back to sleep and not in the best of moods. She got my stubby little toes and she got Daniel's crooked pinky! She also got his very diffinitive cowlick! already her hair is doing exactly what it wants to! But it looks adorable with a little bow in her crazy- sticking-up-all-over- the-place hair! On a funny side note, the bows we stick in her hair are stuck there with KY jelly! The nurses taught us that one!

PS

Ignore the stupid typos- I can't quite figure them out and I'm going to use Kathleen's excuse and state that being prego makes you brain dead!

Two Weeks early!!

So my appointment that I was talking about in the last post... to say the least was interesting. My Dr told me that because of Jada's size we're bring her out two weeks early!! Which I am so grateful for because just in these last 12 hours or so I have been soooooo tired that everything puts me over the edge!

Yesterday Daniel, James and I went to a Institute kick-off. Which is ironic because I have never been a fan of institute and I don't plan on going and I ve before he went crazy! But some there approached me with a "great ideadoubt Daniel is either, But Daniel was super excited to go because they were playing volley ball and he needed to do something active! While we were there I was approached by Alison Wilkes (basically she drives me insane and it's hard for me not to make too many comments on what she says and does- SHE'S CRAZY). She decided it would be great fun to have the entire branch come and see me in the hospital Monday morning! I could have easily choked her then, but I was saved by President Jacobson, who saw that I was about to get .... mean- and told her, in as kind of way as possible, that you don't do that with new borns because you don't want them to get any flus or other sicknesses. So I was saved yet again by his quick thinking and stepping in at the right time!
But all in all Daniel had a good time and was able to release some of his energy!

Today I got an email from my Mom, and in it she mentioned that Caden (my 16 year old brother) prays daily that it won't hurt me when I have the baby! How sweet is that?! That kid is such a goober, but he has a good heart. It's weird to think of him like that, but it's true! I remember he got this bike for his birthday and not long after offered it to me for keeps! At the time I told him not to be stupid, but I look back and think that I've always liked that kid! I am very grateful that my family is thinking of me constantly!

Daniel and I are VERY grateful to have James back for the semester! Since the Kubie's moved it's been so boring for us. And we can only get Carmen and Eric to play so many games with us. It's nice to have some one willing to hang out with us. And James doesn't seem to feel weird about hanging with two married people. He is helping us stay sane!

Any way I guess that's all for now. Actually it's mostly because my butt hurts and I am going to waddle around for a bit and get some blood pumping through my whale- like body!