Elizabeth Jane

In Which We Welcome Elizabeth Jane

Thursday morning I woke up around 7 with mild contractions. We went to the hospital, and it was slow-going at first, but after the doctor got there, I only had to push for about 10 minutes before we had a beautiful dark-haired little girl. She weighed 8 pounds, one ounce, and was 19 ½ inches long. She was born at 5:46 p.m. on November 5. Her oxygen was a little low, but luckily nothing else was wrong. They monitored her color a little for the first 24 hours, but everything ended up being fine.

The boys came later that evening to visit and meet their sister. My sister-in-law called while they were there, and Jackson answered the phone. She called to find out the baby’s name, which he told her was Elizabeth Jane. But at this point Brian and I hadn’t officially decided. He must be better at making decisions than I am. Grant kept calling her Kate, but he quickly caught on. The boys drew new family pictures to bring for her. They were adorable. Both boys loved her instantly and Grant just keeps asking if he can hold her.

The boys enjoyed a good couple of days with their grandparents and Brian went home a lot to help out with them. Elizabeth and I were fairly bored in the hospital, but grateful to get some extra rest.

We came home on Saturday afternoon to a great big “Baby Girl” sign with pink balloons on the house.

Aside from the baby, we had one other moment of drama. Last week, Grant was eating candy from a candy bracelet when I heard Jackson say, “Grant, don’t put that in your nose!” Too late. Grant had a tiny piece of candy wedged in his nose. I tried to get him to blow it out without luck. I was the only adult home and knew that I would need another one if I was going to try to get it with tweezers. So I was waiting and he was able to ignore it, but kept sneezing. After a while, I checked on it and it was gone. He said it was in his tummy.

Please don't make me touch the pumkin's insides!













38 Weeks


In Which Grant Sings Backward

Anne, my friend from college, came for another visit this past week. It was great to see her, and my boys were very excited for her to come. She was talking to Grant and he sang her the ABCs. She asked him if could sing them backwards. He said that he couldn’t. When she offered to help, he responded by saying he could do it himself after all. He promptly turned around, facing away from her, and sang his ABCs.

Brian had a job interview over the phone for a teaching position in the Houston area for the fall of 2010. He received another call back from them and will be going for an in-person interview in November. Hopefully it works out.

We had a great Halloween weekend. Jackson dressed up as Calvin, and Grant was Hobbes from the comic book series. Friday we went to our ward party and then trunk-or-treating. Saturday afternoon, we carved pumpkins. Neither one of the boys would get their hands dirty cleaning the pumpkin out, but Jackson got scrap a little out with a spoon. We finished off the weekend with a visit to a friend’s house where we had dinner and then went trick-or-treating. After about an hour, Jackson was too cold and said he had enough candy and wanted to go home. When we asked Grant if he was done, he said that he wanted to keep going. So Brian and Grant kept going for another 30 minutes or so, until Grant’s bag was so heavy that he was dragging it along the pavement.

Today at church the boys were rough housing in the hallway. Grandpa, trying to gently persuade them to respect the church building, turned to them and asked them, “Do you know where you are?” Grant replied, “We’re right here!” and continued to attack his brother.

Pumpkin Patch

In Which Jackson Needs a Whooping, “Right Now!”

We had Jackson’s very first parent/teacher conferences this week. We got a glowing report from his teacher, and we’re happy to hear that he seems to have lots of friends in his class.

The boys were with their grandparents, and Jackson did something disobedient. Grandpa said to Grant, “Maybe we should take Jackson outside to the woodshed and give him a whooping!” Grant said, “Noooo!” seemingly outraged. But then he said, “We should give him a whooping right now!”

We spent Thursday in and out of the doctor’s office and hospital. I woke up with contractions that were about 5 minutes apart, so after monitoring them for a while we headed into the hospital. Because there was little or no progress, they sent us home to walk. The contractions seemed to get stronger throughout the afternoon, but by that evening they had spaced themselves out and eventually subsided. So I spent the whole day having real contractions just to have them die.

The boys were running through the house, which is not generally acceptable behavior, when Grandpa asked Grant if he was running. Grant said no, and continued on “running,” this time in slow motion.

Friday, Jackson didn’t have school, so we went to a pumpkin patch with some friends from the ward. It ended up being really muddy and cold. But the boys still had fun riding on the hay ride, and they each picked out a pumpkin to carve.

About every time Grant sees his Grandpa he asks if he can play chess on his iPhone. Grant was playing one night when Brian asked him what he was doing. Grant responded, “I’m getting my hands sweaty.”

This weekend I got the opportunity to attend Time Out for Women. It was a wonderful conference and I had a great time being fed spiritually.

Today was the primary program at church. Jackson read his little part great. He had previously volunteered to sing a solo also. I was a little nervous about how he would do because we couldn’t get him to practice at all. But he did great! He sang the second verse of one of their songs. We were really proud of him.

Football

In Which Grant Says, “mmm”

Grant has been playing ABC games on the computer. It emphasizes the letter sounds and how they work together. If you ask him what a certain letter is, he often will answer with the letter sound, not the name. So “m” is “mmm” not “em.”

Jackson got his very first report card this week. He’s doing great academically, which wasn’t surprising. But I was very curious to see how his behavior and participation was, and he scored great in all areas. Way to go Jackson!

Saturday the boys went to a park to play football. Brian forgot to take coats for the boys. Jackson, as usual, didn’t seem to mind the cold. But Grant was cold. Luckily, they found a hooded sweatshirt of mine in the car, and Grant stayed plenty warm. When he came home he kept telling everyone that he got a touchdown. He said “I ran very fast, faster than Dad and Jackson!” He was very proud of himself.

In Which Jackson Names Trang

Friday, Jackson had the day off of school, so we went to the cheap theater--$2.50 per person. It was pretty ghetto: the chairs were slightly reclined, but only because they had been sat in way too many times. We saw Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs. The boys had been very excited to see it. It had some fairly intense parts, and Jackson kept switching from the front row, by his friends, to the back row by me out of fear.

Saturday afternoon Jackson went to a birthday party, and Brian, Grant, and I went to Toys ‘R’ Us for diapers. They had a great deal that for every two boxes of Pampers you bought; you got a $15 gift card. So we stocked up on little diapers. Grant thought it was a pretty cool store, but luckily he left without putting up a fight. He was excited to recognize the letters on the sign to the store. Then he pointed to the cartoon giraffe in the logo and said it was a lion-cow. Hm.

After we picked up Jackson from his party we went to the Liberty View Elementary School Carnival. The boys loved playing all the silly little games, but wanted nothing to do with the pony rides, or the small amusement park ride. They both got balloon animals, but neither one would go near the clown. In the end they ended up with lots of little prizes and luckily ate no sugar in the process.

Every other free moment this week the boys (Brian included) have been watching the baseball playoffs or football. Jackson keeps making up schedules, and he practices drawing the logos of NFL teams. If you want someone to talk with about sports, he’s your man.

Jackson has been making up a story about a lion and a tiger. At one point the lion and tiger were fighting. Jackson described it, “The lion juked the tiger to escape.” (Juke means to dodge someone in football)

Today Grant was practicing spelling his name, and Jackson thought it would be great to mix up the letters and name a baby brother Trang, which he said was “the best name I’ve ever come up with” and then Omm for a sister. We’ll see . . .

Today Grant said something like “they talk to they chother,” instead of “each other.”

A friend from high school (Cory Chisel) preformed on NBC’s Late Night with Jimmy Fallon Friday night. We taped it and watched it Saturday morning. Grant recognized him from seeing him live in concert over the summer. He got really excited and asked me if I could get him a guitar because he wants to play with Cory.

Love,
the McMillans

In Which Sees Himself in Target

We drove past Chuck E Cheese’s and Jackson blurted out, “Look, it’s Chunky Cheese!” He’s never been inside one, but at least he knows it’s not good for his health.

Brian printed off an NFL schedule for Jackson. So all we’ve heard all week is who is playing whom and when. It’s been getting a little old, so we’ve been working on what city each team plays in and then what state that city is in. Brian even found a U.S. map of all the football stadiums. When Jackson was looking at it for the first time, he kept pointing out the states and he knew what the names were (the map didn’t have any names on it). We’ve done a U.S. puzzle a couple of times and apparently that’s enough for him to remember where Maine and Minnesota are. Now if only I could remember.

Grant has been playing on www.starfall.com this week. It’s a great website for teaching letters and eventually how to read. We were at Target and he pointed to a large “G” on the wall and said, “That’s my letter.” He’s started to recognize a few others as well. In the car one day this week Brian taught him how to spell his name. So he’s been chanting it over and over this week.

I finished our family’s 2008 scrapbook this week! All the pages are done and uploaded so they can be printed in a book. There were so many pages that I had to make two books for the one year. If you want to see it go to http://haileysdigitalavenue.blogspot.com/ where you can see a little version of it.