Christmas

I didn't take as many pictures at Christmas as I thought I would. We had a lot of fun though. Rayne is old enough to be excited by lights and Santa Clause and learning that reindeer can fly and young enough to not expect too much for presents etc. Luckily, Jeff worked for a while in November and I was able to do some fun things. And, Rayne has very generous grandparents. Above: Rayne's first coloring book. She got some kid friendly markers in her stocking, but they didn't turn out to be the greatest idea. We have since bought some washable crayons and she LOVES to color!
Santa brought a farm. Rayne knows a lot of her animals and animal sounds. The farm makes sounds when certain doors are open. She loves to line up the animals to watch Daddy play games or lay them on their noses so they are "sniffing" the ground.

This is Christmas morning. I had planned on her bathing and wearing some cute red jammies that she has, but we were out late the night before and she fell asleep on the way home. Thus, the dirty (but cute) clothes.
The quilt over the snowman box is one I started making probably just after I finished high school, just for fun and mostly during General Conference. It was fun, and felt like quite an accomplishment, to finish it for my daughter. A lot of time and dreams went into making it!

This one's just cute.

Rayne's great grandma gave her this buggy and a talking, singing dog.

Those farm animals and Rayne have come to help. I better push post before this all disappears...

Purple

I'm having technical difficulties and this picture was supposed to be at the bottom. Oh well, you wouldn't know if I didn't tell you.
Rayne is learning to smile on command. I have friends who have kids that immediately pose and smile as soon as they see a camera because they are so trained by people taking their picture. Not Rayne. It's impossible to catch her smiling. Not that she doesn't smile a lot. She just shies up for the camera. Anyway, this is her first "smile" for the camera.

On Saturday, Rayne insisted on wearing purple. Grandma (my mom) had given her this sweater, but we did not yet have anything to wear with it. The only thing I could find was this summer outfit. Luckily, the weather was spring like enough that I was able to put together what I think is quite the cute, preppy little outfit.

Here you can see her squeaky shoes. Yes, that means that squeak when she walks. Squeak like a dog toy. It's pretty funny (thanks to her other grandma).

A short hello

We are down to about 2 1/2- 3 months to go with this pregnancy. It's been rough but SO much better than the first time. I got over morning sickness and have only had a few leg cramps, only one or two that actually got me out of bed in pain. I've been pretty sore lately. My lower stomach is so tight it's hard to walk. But other than that, I'm doing okay. Rayne keeps me moving and I think that most the time, that's a good thing.

Rayne sometimes calls me JoNanna. It's pretty darn cute. She doesn't say it like in place of Mommy, but she knows it's my name. She also called her Daddy, Uncle Jeff over the weekend because her cousin was here and kept saying it over and over and over and over again.

Rayne and I went with Aunt Nini (Khrys) and Kelsey Grandma to Karen's house on Sunday for the Super Bowl. I didn't think we were going to go- she lives a long way away. But it worked out and we did. I was pretty excited. It was really great to spend the day with my mom and sisters. We can talk about anything. Watching football for the first time in a long time was fun too. And then, because it was so late by the time we got back in town, Rayne and I slept and my mom's and left Jeff at his dad's. Nobody got a very good night's sleep, but it was nice waking up and talking to my mom for two hours! How long it's been since we've done that! And being away makes coming home and being with Jeff just that much sweeter.

Rayne insisted on Ramen noodles for breakfast. Am I a bad mom? But now she is done and saying "Mommy up please." The sweet asking won't last so I will run. Hello to everyone in blog world! I miss you!

Rayne's 1st Joke

Rayne has been doing more things lately that make other people laugh or, more importantly, that make her laugh. She's also been doing a few things that are more like pretending- making her toys go to sleep and wake up for example. I don't know when kids learn to do these things, but it's a fun development to see in her little mind.

One of Rayne's favorite things to do is look for toe jam. She discovered it one day and said "what is that?" So I told her. Ever since, whenever we take off her socks or footsie jammies, she looks for toe jam. Because of what I say when she makes me look, she often says "ew, look at that one."

Today while looking for toe jam, she handed me her foot wanting me to look and said, without any hints etc, "peanut butter in there!" I couldn't stop laughing. I've tried to say "jelly" when I'm talking about what's on her toast so as not to confuse things. I'm not sure where she made the connection, but it sure was funny.