Merry 1st Christmas!

The boys had a wonderful first Christmas! We spent the night Christmas Eve at Grandma Sharon's and Blake woke up a little earlier than usual, around 6:15 am. And when Grandma Sharon heard his happy morning noises she decided it was time for everyone to wake up! So the tables turned and for once, Brad and Sharon were the ones jumping on Nate and Tyler's beds first thing Christmas morning. The boys liked the little toys in their stockings more than anything else they opened that morning. I for one was happy to see some clothes that were actually big enough for my growing boys.

After a fun filled morning of presents and french toast (and two uncharacteristically long naps) we packed the boys up and headed off to Aunt Amanda's house to see Grandma and Grandpa Shankula. The boys were loaded up with more toys than they knew what to do with! It made me afraid that down the road on Christmas morning I'll hear, "We don't care about Santa's gifts! We just want to go to Grandma's house!" Hahaha

After visiting for a bit we packed up the family and headed up to Grandpa Tom's. The boys still managed some smiles and giggles even after a long day. (Thank goodness for Walgreens being open... I left the formula at Grandma Sharon's!) Aunt Gabby helped us open gifts while the boys drank their bottles. They got some more cute clothes and their first little police car.

As I was stressing over what to give who I contemplated about what I'd like for Christmas. Of course, it didn't take me long to realize that I already got what I wanted most this year. Two beautiful, happy, loving little boys. I am overwhelmed by how much they are growing up lately. They are nearly 21 lbs and 30 in. long but it's much more than their physical growth. They are interacting with each other, scooting around on the floor, and showing so much more emotion. Little Caden pulls the funniest faces! Scrunching up his eyes and breathing fast out his nose. He is the most unabashedly curious child I know. If he wants to inspect something nothing else in the room exists. And baby Blake does nothing but smile and scream at the top of his lungs! He thinks he has to test out the full capacity and range of his vocal chords at least 20 times a day. His dark baby hair is also on it's way out. The tips of his hair is still brown but the growth underneath is fuzzy blond.

We feel like the luckiest parents in the world. Thanks to all our friends and family who made this Christmas special for us! We love you!

Happy Belated Thanksgiving

So thanksgiving was great! Here are some pics of the little Indians who joined us for dinner.



Being a mom is more fun than I could have imagined! The boys are going through some crazy transitions right now. They are learning to feed themselves finger foods, hold their own bottles, and even army crawl around the room! I can see my life getting more complicated right before my eyes!

Nate's Company Party

So this is what Nate's coworkers do when they get together. The band members are Nate's coworkers and the singers are his bosses. What a fun date night!

I Like to Move It, Move It

While the boys are not actually crawling yet they LOVE to move around in their toys. It wasn't long after we got both a walker and a jumper that I realized the boys have a preference. Caden is definitely a jumper. He has always loved kicking both legs together and now he has a more fun doing it! Check him out...


Blake on the other hand doesn't really jump or bounce much. But when he gets in his little walker watch out! He usually forgets about the toys in the middle and does lap after lap, around and around...


When Caden gets in the walker he still jumps and moves around the toy like a kangaroo. Blake really likes the flashing lights and toys in the bouncer but mostly just spins around. I watch these videos and I can't believe how big my boys are! We have so much fun together, I just want to slow down time and enjoy their little smiles and giggles in slow motion! Thank goodness for video cameras! In fact, at the end of the day when the boys are in bed I will sit down and watch the videos and look at the pictures from that day. I just can't get enough of them!

Don't get me wrong, I do get burned out like every mother does. But it doesn't take long to recharge my batteries! Then I'm aching to see them again just to watch their little expressions and hear their little growls and giggles. I have been blessed!

Caden's Tooth

Caden would like everyone to know that his first tooth came in only one week after Blake's did. He doesn't really like to have it photographed but he was relieved to have it come through. I think his next tooth should be coming in anytime... at least I hope that's what's behind his recent mood swings.
And I had a request to show off the new "do" so here's Caden and I celebrating his new tooth!

Just a wee bit darker :) It was time to get rid of the highlights! You can tell from Blake's face he wasn't a fan of them...

One last bit of news. Blake's second tooth came in around the time Caden's first tooth came in. Blake now has an even pair on the bottom and he's looking older every day! Good job boys!

Big Week for the Boys

Lots of fun things to report this week! Blake hit a milestone on Monday (the 11th) that he'd like to share with you all: HIS FIRST TOOTH!!! You can't really see it in this picture very well, but trust him, it's there.
The whole day after Nate made the discovery of the tooth I had the song from fiddler on the roof in my head, "Sunrise, Sunset." It seems like now that Blake has a tooth is just a matter of time before they're all grown up :) But this is how he feels about it:

We have been outside a lot this week, trying to soak up the last bit of good weather. The boys helped me decorate our front door for Halloween. We still haven't figured out their costumes, any good ideas?
We also had the great joy of getting out with our new bike trailer three times this week! (Thanks Grandma Sharon!) They absolutely love it. It is a cure for even the fussiest of teethers. They each stare out their respective window and watch the world pass by.

They like it so much that sometimes they can't help taking a little snooze along the way.
The boys also turned 7 months this week! They are getting so old and so big. One of the biggest differences I've seen in them lately is their awareness of each other. They have always looked at each other with curiosity and a smile now and then. But this week they have been grabbing each others hands, holding eye contact for a few minutes at a time and laughing at each other. Their brother is a person they are excited to see now, not just a mass of moving limbs and grunting noises. They look at each other like they look at mommy and daddy.

Speaking of parents, Blake started enunciating his first syllable... "Da da da da da da da." Looks like we already know who the favorite parent will be. But that's not a shocker, he always has been the fun one! I'm trying to catch the boys attention with a new "doo" but the dark brown hair isn't phasing them too much. Oh well, I will just have to be content being the comforting parent. It's not a bad job either :)

Family Home Evening

We played tennis for our family activity the other night and the boys were good sports from the sidelines. They cheered hard for mommy, but daddy has no mercy...

Boys will be boys

My boys are so much fun! Even though they are having issues waking each other up at 5:00 am, then not being able to go back to sleep....

Their new favorite activity is to sit in the stroller and watch the traffic on Lehi Main Street. Their eyes get big when the big trucks roll by and they make little sighs and grunts, seemingly saying to one another, "Dude did you see that one?", "Ya, it was huge."

Then there's the sound effects. Blake has been making his for a while now. If you try to imitate television static then you're probably making his exact sound. He does it when he's happy, excited, or just bored. This morning I went in to check on him and his eyes were barely opened. I couldn't tell if he was still sleeping or just waking up. He didn't stir at all so I was about to leave when I heard it... Blake's soft little static. He hadn't moved or opened his eyes, he still looked asleep! Then his mouth broke into a smile and the static got louder and louder. It was super cute!

Caden prefers a messier sound effect. He has recently discovered his lips and the wonderful sound they make if he closes them while blowing out his mouth. His favorite time to do it is right when he gets a mouthful of food. I'm pretty sure he discovered it while eating peas, or trying to avoid eating peas. But now he does it all the time, in between big opened mouth smiles. Ya, he thinks he's pretty funny.

In so many ways I am beginning to see their personalities come out. Blake loves people. He loves interacting with and watching them. He giggles and laughs easily and doesn't usually have strong opinions about his environment (except the noise level, no sudden loud noises, Blake gets offended by them). All in all, he's just happy to be alive.

Caden, on the other hand, is almost never content to be where he's at. He's always reaching, rolling, stretching to get at something just out of reach. But he usually gets it without help from me. His play looks like work. It sounds like it too because he's almost always grunting from the strain of his efforts. He is very fun-loving, like his brother, but he expresses joy with flailing limbs and excited gasps.

They smile a lot at each other and I know their differences will be complimentary and encourage a great friendship between them. I must be the luckiest mom in the world!

Solids, It's a New Day

So Blake and Caden have been doing cereal for a few weeks with no real problems. Blake wasn't sure about the whole spoon situation at first but he got used to it. Then we did some bland fruits like apples and bananas. They liked those right off the bat. Then one day I decided to try some peaches. Well, I'll let them tell you what they thought...





They got used to them after a little while but they kept looking at me with these shocked little looks like, "What in the world are you doing to us??"


So I decided to try some veggies and they have loved everything I have given them since the peaches (except peas, they must get that from their Aunt Lizzy). They love carrots, squash, and sweet potatoes. It is fun feeding them solids. Caden is a professional eater, like he's been chowing down on solids forever. Blake gets easily distracted by other things, usually his brother, and spits much of his food back out. In fact he usually eats the same mouthful 3-4 times before he actually swallows it.

Both boys are growing, healthy, and happy. They don't seem to care one bit that their mom is about to turn 28... I am so old!

Lake Powell

These pics tell their own story, I just wanted to get a few up here. And I wanted to record some of the things I learned from our two adventures:

1 - Sharing a hotel room with someone when your babies don't sleep through the night is stressful. (As long as they love your babies they won't mind, but you still feel bad.)
2 - Babies are very curious about the world around them. They were pretty fascinated by the birds and all the commotion at the aquarium.
3 - If babies are tired enough, they will fall asleep anywhere... however, after the 3rd or 4th day of sleeping anywhere, don't expect them to be happy when they wake up.
4 - You cannot have two infants in the same row on an airplane. Luckily, Sharon and Brad were sitting behind us and could take one of the kiddos.
5 - Babies and planes... it's pretty much a crap shoot. Cross your fingers and bring as many soothing methods with you as possible.
6 - Babies don't use clothes in Lake Powell. Blake and Caden wore their birthday suits the whole time.
7 - When on vacation, toss the "schedule" to the wind. It's going to happen anyway, so you might as well enjoy yourself instead of stressing over it.
8 - Be grateful for all offered help and accept it graciously. (WE WERE SO LUCKY TO HAVE SO MUCH HELP!!)
9 - Sometimes, no matter how sleep deprived you are, staying up late to chat with your significant other is the icing on the cake of any fun/exhausting trip.
10 - Live in the moment. Even melt downs are memories worth holding on to.

California Dreamin

What a busy month it has been for us! In the middle of getting Caden lined up for physical therapy (he has mild torticollis, uneven muscles in his neck), we packed up and headed out on one vacation right after another!

The boys took their first plane ride on our trip to California with Brad and Sharon.

We went to attend Narrah's wedding (my mission companion) and it was beautiful! I also got to see a dear friend from Italy there, Maria Elisa. Brad and Sharon were kind enough to come with us and help us with the boys while we were at the wedding. While we were there we went to the Long Beach Aquarium and hung around the hotel.


The boys spent a lot of time in our rental van discovered some new talents. Caden can catch some winks and never lose his death grip while Blake experiments with how much he can really fit in his mouth....

more pics to come, blogger's server is down :(

4 months old!

Blake and Caden are 4 months old today! I can't believe it. They are so funny! Blake is having tummy issues right now, but if I prop him up on his side on my bed he becomes facinated with the red curtains and forgets his woes... until he sees me again of course. Then he feels he must let me know he's unhappy. As soon as I'm out of sight he again becomes enthralled with the flowing curtains.

Anyway two fun things to report. First of all we went to a cabin up in Eden with our family over the 4th of July. It was fun to be with everyone and get out of the house for a while. Independence Day is one of my favorite holidays. Not because we have any spectacular traditions, I just love the celebration of our country. I LOVE THE USA!!!!

After the cabin we stopped by Grandpa Ross's for dinner. Tom taught Nate the patented Daddy Ross hold that will cure almost any crying spell. The boys love it!

The other fun thing to report is that the boys went swimming for the first time! They were a little unsure of everything at first but in the end they had a blast with daddy showing them a good time.

We are also very excited for Nate's brother Tyler who just got engaged to a beautiful girl named Kelsey! Yay!! The boys are excited to have another Auntie! And my sister Jessica leaves for Thailand this week from the MTC! She is so excited :)

Well, that wraps it up for today. I hear the boys chatting with each other upstairs so they'll probably be ready to eat soon. How grateful I am that a mother's work is never done.

First Family Pic

As you can see we had our first family pictures taken! My lovely sister Amanda took these for us and I love them! I was looking at them today and feeling blown away by the blessings in my life.

I am so happy right now! Almost like I don't want to blink for fear that it will all pass me by too quickly. Every day with my boys is a miracle. I get them for 19 years. They are mine for 19 short years before the Lord calls them away from me. Then they will return as men and have little need for their mommy after that. We will be friends, I know, but they will not NEED me anymore once the Lord has made them into men.

So for now I revel in every moment. I smile when Blake whines for his binky at 4 am. (They are already sleeping through the night!) I smile when Caden sticks out his lower lip at the end of play time, letting me know it's time for his nap. I smile when I sing "Baby Mine" and Blake takes a deep breath and relaxes after a good cry. I smile when Caden is simply too happy to see me to effectively eat from his bottle. And I smile so much it nearly makes me cry to see my sweet husband play with his boys. Their eyes follow his voice and his movements.

Oh yes, I have been blessed.

Gotta love 'em

Well, what can I say? I'm having a ball being a mom! But Blake is hungry and he's not the most patient baby right now. He's had an ear infection for the past 3 and half weeks... It won't go away!!! So I'm off to feed him. Hopefully I'll be back with more of an update :)

Our smiling boys!

So our boys are officially smiling now! Blake smiles all the time and Caden saves his smiles for special occasions. They are somewhere around 11.5 pounds which means they are huge!! I will notice the growth at random times when I say to myself, "Hey, that neck fat wasn't there yesterday!" They are graduating out of their newborn diapers and clothes. I can't believe two months have already gone by...

Trip to Toquer and St. George

After trying to handle things on my own for a couple days (Nate is back to work) my dad talked me into going down to Toquerville with him and Mary. I can't believe how much easier twins become when you have two or three people always on hand to change a diaper, put a binkie back in, or bottle feed a cranky Caden or Blake. I offered my dad a job as our nanny, but he didn't bite...

Two days after the boys and I arrived Nate joined us and was happy to see his family again. We stayed in St. George for a couple days at my mom's. I only snapped once, wanting to justify my way of doing things with "Because I'm the mom, that's why!" Haha, that came out a lot sooner than I had anticipated. But who can blame a Grandma for wanting to hold her Grandbabies all the time??

Introducing Caden and Blake Ross!!!!

Almost two weeks ago the best two little boys in the whole world joined our family!

The night before my scheduled C-Section Nate and I felt like little kids on Christmas Eve. We were so excited and so anxious about getting what we wanted (two healthy babies) that sleep was nearly impossible. The next morning was all a blur, the most surreal experience of my life. One minute I was waddling into the hospital and the next minute someone was holding a larger-than-expected purple screaming baby over the top of a blue curtain. I couldn't believe what I was seeing. One minute later I heard a second scream and saw a second tiny person held up over the curtain. Soon, Nate was sitting by my side holding two little strangers in his arms. He was a natural right from the start.

I'm still processing the fact that we are actually parents. Since those first wonderful moments I haven't looked ahead more than a couple hours at a time. When will they first poop? When is their next feeding? Will I ever sleep more than 1 hour at a time? I have been so focused on the details it has been difficult to take a step back and realize what just happened: WE HAVE CHILDREN!?!?!

Were were in the hospital for 5 days then we happily left our couped up little room to come home. Nate was able to take two weeks off and this has been the best "vacation" of my life. We have had so much fun with our new little dolls! Yes, I'm sleep deprived to the point of making delirious comments to Blake at 2:00 am about visiting his school the next day and asking Nate to get the boys their "silver backs." (?) But we have thoroughly enjoyed every second with our new little family. Luckily we've had a lot of help from our family who have taken various feeding shifts this week so we could get some sleep.

It is so interesting to have two babies. I think we can tell more about their personalities because of their contrasting little demeanors. Caden is strong willed and absolutely hates waking up. When he cries it's an angry outrage! Blake is our little jumpy baby. He jumps at every little sound and when he cries it is more of a sad plea for help. Blake seems to be a little more easy going in general. And Caden loves to be held and cuddled. We couldn't be more grateful for our little angels.

Video for Grandma

Just Some Pics

Our first family picture...



















I guess you could say we are all ready for the boys... but only if you mean physically ready ;) I love this nursery! Thanks Nate for all your hard work!





























Nate played city league for that last two months or so and really enjoyed it. He hadn't played for a while before that because church ball can become a little too dramatic. And I have to say, I have never seen grown men wine and act like 5 year olds more than when I go to Nate's church games. Luckily, this team was great to play with.