Jace in all of his Cuteness

     While we were on the cruise, everyone would come up to Jace and say high-five! (like a 7 month old baby knows how to give high-fives...) But after a while, he would actually high-five them back. He wouldn't hit their hand back, but he would put his hand up to theirs. We figure for 7 months old, thats a good start to a high-five, so we started praising him when he would give high-fives. One day, he just started saying "ess" and making a fist and pumping his arm. You know, the action you do when you say yes! It is so cute. I don't know if it means the same thing to him as it does to us, but when we say YES! he will go es, and do the whole hand thing! its so great! He also recently started clapping. This replaced the YES action I think. Because sometimes when we say yes he claps his hands now. Usually its when we say YAY and he claps his hands. Its a hit and a miss getting him to do both actions right now, but I caught some on film that I thought would be so fun to share.

If you watch closely you can see Jace do his little YESSS thing during this video

This one is Jace's high-five followed by a small little yes fist pump

I have been doing baby led weaning because Jace just hates to eat the puree stuff. He eats two bites then acts like I am choking him and refuses to eat any more. So him feeding himself is much much more productive. Any how, he just makes the cutest sounds when he is eating, like its the best food anyone has ever eaten. So I had to post a video of it.

There isn't a whole lot to watch, but just listen to the cute noises Jace makes when he eats.

This is a quick video of Jace clapping. He is definitely getting better at it, and he socially knows when to clap. It is so crazy how fast he is growing up and developing!

Jace found my boots and started playing with them. So I slipped his little feet inside and had Paul take a picture. His little smile is just the cutest.

Because we were on the cruise when Jace turned 7 months I didn't really get pictures. I finally did, and because he is mobile, its impossible for him to sit still. This was one of the better ones I got of him. The background is cluttered, but at least Jace isn't blurry

I really thought Jace would pull the sticker off of his head and try to eat it, but to my surprise he left it alone until I put it in his hands and let him play with it for a little bit.

I had to take a picture of his cute little jumper thing he is wearing. I found this at a thrift store for $1. Its one of the best dollars I have spent in a long time!

Christmas 2014

     This year is my family's year for Christmas. This made me super excited because it was Jace's first Christmas and we got to spend the first part of it with my family. We also got to spend Christmas Eve with my family, (which has not really happened since we've been married). I was so excited to do all of my childhood traditions with my family and friends. It seemed like the time leading up to Christmas came so fast. We got back from our cruise, Paul had a few days of work, and then BAM, its Christmas Eve. I worked hard to get my quilt done, (we make a homemade gift every year) but I was still super behind on my quilt. Despite the fact that I started this quilt in July, it is now Christmas Eve and I am not finished tying it yet. Paul was able to take Christmas Eve off and help me tie the quilt. Even with his help, and stealing my sister Lena, and having Aunt Susan help, we were still late by 2 hours to the start of the family party!
   Every year my family goes sledding on Christmas Eve. We took a break from tying the quilt to go sledding. I probably shouldn't have done that, but it was definitely a break that I needed. We went sledding at Donut Falls, had some coco, then came home and continued to work on the quilt. Finally at 7pm we finished it. We threw everything together and rushed to my parents house. The Mustoe's, (a good family friend of ours), have dinner with us Christmas Eve and do the nativity, so they were there. We made fun little personal pizzas and caught up on life and how everything has been going. We did the nativity with all the little kiddos, and sang some christmas songs before our guests left to do their own Christmas Eve traditions.
    We got to open our ornament. (This tradition started with my grandmother before she passed away. She used to give us an ornament each year so we would have enough to decorate a tree of our own when we were all grown up. Now that she is gone, my mom gives us one every year to keep the tradition going). We also opened up our PJs before trying to corral my younger siblings to bed. Paul and I decided that we were going to spend the night at my parents house this year and do the big Christmas morning tradition with them at least one last year before we decide what types of traditions we want to start with our little family.
    I still hadn't finished sewing Jace's stocking by the time Paul and Jace were ready for bed, so I got them all situated and then stayed up cutting, pinning, and sewing the rest of his stocking. My mom wasn't quite finished with a sewing project yet either, so we stayed up together. Tanner came upstairs hungry around 12:30 and cooked us some tuna noodle casserole. So we stopped and took a break, then kept on finishing our projects. Mom finished a little before me and headed to bed. Just as I was finishing Jace's stocking he started to wake up. I hurried and got ready for bed, fed him, and put him back to sleep so Paul wouldn't wake up.
     Much sooner that I was hoping for, Paul woke up for the morning. I don't know if it was Jace that got up first, or Paul, but Paul was up and looking for his stocking long before I wanted to get out of my bed. But he came in and told me it had snowed. This was a big deal because we both had been dying for it to snow for Christmas, and we got our wish. There was lots of snow on the ground. I was excited, but not enough to get out of my bed for it quite yet. I went back to sleep for like an hour before I couldn't sleep anymore.
     The rest of my family was pretty much up already. So we opened or stockings and talked with each other for a little bit before getting ready for presents. We always start with our homemade gifts, which is so fun. I love it. Paul got a Norwegian game called KUB that my dad had made. My brother made me a super cute picture frame. My dad loved his Beatles quilt, and Paul is making Yulia a greenhouse. She is stoked about it! Jace had a blast with all of the wrapping paper. I don't think he actually opened a gift all by himself, but he did actually play with his own gifts once they were opened. It was so cute to see him going back and forth between the paper, the ribbon and his presents. I can't wait to see how magical Christmas becomes for him as he continues to get older. After we gave all of our gifts out, things sort of mellowed out a little bit. We cooked some breakfast/brunch, and played a few games together. Jace and I took a nap while Paul played some other games with my siblings.
    After my nap, we packed up all of our stuff and headed over to Paul's parents for their share of Christmas day. We got there just before it started snowing crazily again. We had a great dinner with the Burnett side of the family that came to visit, and we played lots and lots of games. We stayed so late that we decided to sleep over. Cottonwood heights had gotten easily 10 inches of snow, and we were told the roads were bad so if we could avoid them, that would be best. So we played games late into the night and just spend the night at the in-laws.
   I was a little bummed because Rex and Julie gave us a nice set of sheets for our bed, and I had washed and dried them at their place so they would be all ready for me to use, and I didn't get to use them that night. It was fun to sleep over though, because in the morning we were lazy and just relaxed with all the family members and played games basically all day long.
    I feel like Christmas came and went so fast this year. It was so different actually living near our families and not needing to stay with them for a whole week, but it was also nice being able to decide at a moments notice to spend the night at their house rather than drive home.
    Oh by the way, the best/worst Christmas gift we got was that of Jace being able to speed crawl. He has be taking 2 or 4 crawling steps for the past few days, but literally, Christmas morning he was crawling all over the place. It has been so fun to see him in action. I am so excited for all of the developments that are to come.

Jace about to go sledding with Papa. He is definitely not as excited as Papa is. 

Jace and daddy being lazy and not sledding with the rest of us.

Boom, they crashed into the shrubs, but they had fun on hill and didn't go too too fast.

He is giving us the, "I am ready to go home" face.

And this is the, hmmm maybe snow does taste okay face.

I was trying so hard to get a cute picture of his eyes, and the snow, and the light, and it just wasn't quite as good as I had hoped, but I didn't have a fancy camera, just my phone, so its as good as could be expected.

Jace and Paul beat the rest of my family back to the car. Jace had a blast holding onto the steering wheel. It was just too cute to not get a picture. 

The annual Blatter/Mustoe Nativity.

Jace was our little baby Jesus, but he was much more interested in playing with the toys than in laying peacefully in a manger

My kid isn't cooperating, but I had to get proof that I was actually with my friend Erin. 

It is WAY past Gloria's bed time. All you had to do was look at her and she cried. 

Still has puffy red eyes, but at least she isn't crying in this picture. She did start crying immediately after I took it though. 

Don't mind me, but Jace is opening eating his ornament from Mimi

Now Jace is trying to get into his PJs. I taped the bag shut though, so it is was tricky for him to open.

The cousins on Christmas morning. They are just so cute. And look, Gloria is actually happy for the time being.

Jace is actually interested in opening up his present

Yay! A book, he looks so thrilled

Jace is enjoying his loot from Santa

The Christmas tree at Mimi and Papa's in all its glory!

I think this is the only picture of us together that I got on Christmas

Yay, a present for Paul!!

Jace enjoying the box more than the toys!

Dad opening up his awesome Beatles quilt. His face was priceless, but even more so when he realized what the quilt actually was a picture of. 

Yay! Jace is actually playing with one of his Christmas toys. 

My cute niece Gloria. She is starting to get a cute little personality of her own. I can't wait until Gloria and Jace are crawling around the floor together. 

Once we got to Paul's parents, we FINALLY got Jace to take a nap. Since he is crawling now, we couldn't just leave him on the bed. He just sort of sprawled out on his make shift bed, and it was too cute to not get a picture of. 

Cozumel, Belize, and Honduras

     The first stop on our cruise was to Cozumel, Mexico. Lucky for us they have a port that we can easily unload of off. The next two stops we will have to take tenders. The plan for Cozumel was to relax at the beach and just snorkel like crazy. But when we got there EVERYONE told us that you had to pay to go to the beach and they could take us somewhere better for cheaper and it would include the car ride there and boy was it a nightmare. Luckily for us we had Tanner, my RM from Peru, little brother to translate for us. We ended up paying for some guy to take us to a beach resort type deal where we could play in the water, snorkel, and have a relaxing day at the beach.
      I was worried that Jace was not going to be happy about the water, but surprisingly enough it wasn't too cold for him. He didn't like the waves so much. But he was rather content to just stay in the water and float around with Paul or myself. I got to go out snorkeling with the first group, (Paul is so great. He just let me go and swim around while he played with Jace). After I was finished, I took Jace and Paul went out. Jace and I played around in the water until he got fussy. By then Paul was back and we somehow managed to get him to nap. Paul took him and napped under the coconut trees for several hours, (such an amazing husband I have), so I could spend some more time snorkeling. I absolutely LOVE to snorkel. Its like being in a whole new world and I love it. So Paul gave me some extra time to go out with my family and just look at how beautiful everything is.
     After our time on the beach, we took our taxi back to the city center. The boys dropped our snorkeling gear off on the ship while the rest of us went out shopping. My translator brother got us some great deals on real chocolate, and pan dulce from the markets. We were supposed to meet up with the boys, but we never found them after they dropped off our gear. Eventually we met up with them on the ship. The welcome reception from the crew members is great. They all stand outside the boat with drinks and cookies and play music and dance for you. It was pretty great.

Silly Jace just doing his thing sitting in the stroller while we wait to play in the water. He loves to play with his feet so its no surprise he is doing it in the picture. 

He also loves to eat the lanyard for his bink. for some reason it tastes better than the bink itself

Enjoying the 80+ degree weather!

Jace's first reaction to the sand. He wasn't quite sure what to think....

Then he thought, oh ok, "I can handle this. Its kinda squishy and stuff!"

"...And then oh boy, I bet this would taste good!" We were cleaning sound out of his mouth for quite a while. We weren't quick enough to get it before he got a good fistful in his mouth. 

Jace deciding if he likes the water.

My two brothers getting in the water to snorkel. The water was so blue!

Enjoying the beach!

After a long day nothin' tastes better than the water in Mom's camelback!!

      The next stop on our cruise was in Belize. My family planned to go tubing in a river that goes through some caves. Paul and I really wanted to go, but they said that we couldn't take Jace with us. My dad said, just come talk to the people and maybe you can do ATVing instead. So we came with them and the guy said we could bring our baby on the tubing trip. So we ended up going with my family on an excursion. We took a bus an hour away from the port. Drove into pretty much the jungle and then got to our destination. Everyone else in our group did a zip line excursion so we were going to meet up with them, but they were delayed and we didn't end up catching up with them. It was such a bummer, but We still had fun. Jace was unsure about being in the dark, so for most of the trip I had to nurse him, but once we were out of the caves and in the sun light, he loved it. He was cooing and smiling at everyone. The company we booked our excursion with fed us a homemade lunch. We had authentic chicken tamales cooked in banana leaves. Finding bones in my tamale was a new experience, but other than that the food was good! While talking with our tour guide, we asked how they felt about tourists. They said tourism makes up a huge part of their economy so they are grateful for all of the white people that come to visit their country. He also said that 70% of Belize is undeveloped jungle! It is crazy to think how much land is available in places like that. He also said that more and more Canadians and Americans are buying property down in Belize for super cheap, developing it, and reselling it for a profit. It is just crazy to see how everything works in different countries.
     Because We had to drive so far to get to our excursion we didn't have a lot of time to look around or go shopping when we got back into the port town. We hit up a few stores just perusing. The tender ride back to the boat was 15 minutes long. They said it was a 5 mile trip because there is a reef just off of the coast of Belize so they can't bring the ships in too close. Jace didn't like it. The boat engines were too loud for him, and he cried most of the trip back. but lucky for us the noise was so loud no one could hear him crying for 15 straight minutes. Poor kid had to put up with a lot. But he did great, and as soon as we were off the tender and back in the quiet ship he did great.

We didn't get any pictures tubing because we were worried about the water, but after we met up with the family for lunch I snapped a few. 

Tallus chillin in a hammock chair

We look so sunburned!

He was so zonked out from the long day. It was nice for him to actually sleep!

Jace and Aunt Nena! She bought him his Hawaiian shirt and he loved it!

Jace crawling with the dinosuars!!

or just destroying them!!  

     Our last stop was the Banana Coast in Honduras. A small city called Trujillo. Normally our ship stops at a private island called Roatan, but for some reason they changed our itinerary. Paul and I were a little bit sad at first because we had heard fun things about Roatan, but after our visit we were super grateful for the opportunity to visit Trujillo. Trujillo has only been having ships port there for a short time, so its not super touristy and it is still a very impoverished city. Our group had no plans for an excursion in Honduras we just planned to walked around and see the culture. Once we got there we walked straight to the edge of the tourist area and into the actual city. We stopped and got some fresh coconut water (my favorite), and we also got to play with a monkey. Some guy would let you hold his monkey and take pictures of it. It was so cute. My mom held him and most of our group had a turn with the cute monkey on their shoulders.
      We walked up and through basically a neighborhood in search of a market that was run by locals for locals with hopes of getting a better price for food than what they were making the tourists pay by the port. We found a small little market on the side of the road, and Tanner translated for us and got a great deal on some lichees. We sat in the humidity and ate our delicious lichees before heading down into the city center to find some shopping places. It was so nice to have Tanner with us because we were able to get great deals because he knew the language so well.
      My family wanted to have an authentic Honduran meal so we asked a girl to show us where she would go to get a traditional meal. We sat down and had fresh squeezed orange juice, chicken, rice, plantain, and beans. All of that food for just under 2 US dollars. Crazy! It was super good. I felt so bad though because I couldn't eat all that food. I felt so bad wasting it because there are so many hungry kids there, but I just could not finish. We had our lunch, did a little more shopping, and then headed back to the ship.
     I can not tell you how many looks we got for having a blonde haired, blue eyed baby. It was like a wonder of the world I kid you not! If Paul and I had a dollar for every time someone either took a picture of Jace or asked to hold him, we would have easily made $100! People were just in love with him. It was super cute, but you better believe I made sure that we were near him all the time and could see him so he didn't disappear. Jace loved it though. He gave high fives and smiled is super cute smile, and let them hold him with out a fuss. I do just want to mention how poor this little city was. We talked with one of the locals, and she said that people here just have no way to make money. They are all so poor. She said that the cruise ship stopping here has been so great for their economy. People can make money for their family, and it gives them something to do rather than sit around doing nothing and being hungry. It made me truly grateful for the wonderful country that I live in, and all of the commodities that I am privy to.
     Thankfully this tender ride was only about 5 minutes long and on a smaller boat so it wasn't so crazy loud for Jace. We made it back to the boat and got a huge glass of ice water. Paul and I didn't realize how hot and dehydrated we actually were because it was more humid than hot so we just sweat out all our water without even thinking about it.
    Our last two days were at sea. We had to cruise from Honduras all the way back to Texas. We sure made the most out of them though. We played lots of shuffle board, bored games, and the girls even did pedicures. When we docked back in Texas I was both happy and sad. It was nice to be of a rocking boat and on dry land, but it was so much fun to be surrounded by family, and away from technology for a whole week. I got to see sides of my siblings that I never see because one of us always has a phone or tablet to distract us. I was sad to leave all of Jace's new friends behind also. Every single one of the cooks, waiters, or staff that ran into Jace just loved him to bits. But I was grateful to be able to put Jace back on a schedule again. We got off the boat, into our Taxi, and to the airport without much trouble. After our 2 hour wait, we boarded the plane, got home, then had to rush right to a family party for Paul's side of the family. We both tried to be pleasant, but we were so tired from traveling all day that we may have been less than pleasant to deal with. After the first family party, we had a second one with Paul's immediate family to go to. By then Paul, Jace and I were just EXHAUSTED! We made it through that family gathering and headed home. We finally got home, to our very own home and our very own beds by around 11:00 PM. Talk about a long day! Our vacation was great, but now we have to get into the Christmas mood. It is only 5 days away!

Drinking some delicious young coconut water!

Lena's face is kinda interesting, but we had to get a picture in front of one of the biggest houses we found. Of course it was gated and the fence had spikes on the top. This is not uncommon in places like this. If they aren't wealthy enough for spikes on their fence, they mortar crushed glass in the tops of the walls to keep their families safe. 

The both of us enjoying a lychee. Jace actually liked eating them more than I thought.

The both of them enjoying being fawned over by the locals.

Sitting down for lunch.

The boys. Trying to get wifi service. Typical

The girls, just enjoying the culture

And then there is me and my daddy

This is the massive plate of food that cost us less than 2 dollars. It was really good! 

Paul pretending he liked the food. Just kidding he enjoyed it quite a bit actually.

This thing was just posted on the wall. We took a picture in front of it just because it was cool. 

Not too excited about taking the picture with the crab tonight.

Even more not excited about it.

Luckily dad is there to help him feel a little better

maybe he is kind of a little happier

Took off his clothes and gave him some paper and now he is happy as a clam!

I think things are going to be ok

Waiting for dinner.

Day at sea. We were trying to tan, but it was so stinking cloudy

Everyone attempting to enjoy the somewhat sun

I know this one is just about the same as the one above, but Jace is actually smiling and looking so I had to keep both.

Nena just being Nena

Apparently boys have to have their electronic devices to enjoy the sun

Like I said, electronics.... 

Enjoying the hot tub because the waterslide was closed.

We actually got to cuddle and spend some time with no baby.

Jace loved the water until we pulled him out and the wind was cold.

Last day on the cruise we stayed up late playing games. Thankfully we got this guy to konk out on some chairs so we could play. 

We leave the country for a week and he learns how to crawl. I can't believe it!