Last Bottle

I totally forgot to mention that Hunter is weaned from the bottle! He now drinks everything from a sippy cup! HURRAY!

It really didn't take that much effort... just a lot of dishes. :P I would give him a sippy cup full of milk - cold - and let him drink a little. Then I would warm it up and give it back to him and he would drink a little more. After that, I would transfer the warm milk to a bottle and he would finish it off.

I did this for about a week and a half and as the days went on, he would drink more and more from the sippy cup. And then on October 16th, he drank the whole thing of milk from the sippy cup! So, I figured that he was over the bottle and could definitely get all of his milk from the sippy cup, so I didn't give him a bottle after that. He didn't cry for it or anything! It was definitely a lot easier than I thought it would be.

One minor set back is that he will only drink the milk warm. I have tried the same weaning technique with cold and warm milk but it doesn't work too well. But I would gladly warm up his milk in a sippy cup than have him walking around with a bottle when he's way too old to have one! No offense to parents who have kids that were a little more stubborn letting go of their bottles... ;)

Now, we just got to take away that binky... but that's going to be more difficult because that "plug" comes in handy in sacrament meeting! :P

The "Official" Halloween

This year, Hunter got to experience what I am calling his "official" Halloween. Last year, he was only a month old, so he really didn't know what was going on. I also didn't go all out with a costume last year either because he was so little (I just put him in a little onesie that had a ghost face on it and put a white cap on his head - you can go back to that post if you want to see.) But this year, we did the whole "shabang." We got a real costume, went to Halloween parties and even went trick-or-treating!

Hunter's cousin Robee LOVES Scooby Doo. So we decided to dress up the kiddies as the Scooby Gang: Robee was Shaggy, Hunter's young aunts - Rebekah and Hannah - were Velma and Daphne, and Hunter's 2nd cousin - Cameron - was Freddie. So, what does that leave Hunter as? SCOOBY DOOBY DOO! :P

I ordered his costume online and expected it to be just "okay" because I didn't want to spend too much on it. But when it arrived, it was a TON better than what I ordered! I was very impressed!

A week before Halloween, I took Hunter to a pumpkin patch up in North Ogden and got some pictures of him with his cousins on my side of the family (like we did last year). They turned out very cute and Hunter even got a picture with "Pumpkin Man!" He would not take his eyes off of him... he just stared him down! It was really funny...

On Halloween, we went to Josh's parents house. We carved up some pumpkins (Josh did one and I did one - a Jazz one) and Hunter didn't want to touch any of the pumpkin goo but he seemed to enjoy watching us carve. Later on, we had a potato bar. I had Josh try to give Hunter some of his potato, thinking maybe, just maybe, he would eat a veggie for once. Unfortunately, Josh did not check the temperature of the potato before he gave him a bite and as soon it touched his tongue, he freaked out because it was too hot and it burned his little tongue. The only thing that would calm him down was homemade root beer and peaches. Not a very nutritious meal but what can you do? Josh felt really bad though...

After we ate, the kids got their costumes on and we took some pictures. Hunter didn't want to stay still for his "Scooby Gang photo op," so he just crawled around their feet. It was so adorable though because you couldn't really see his face when he was crawling around, so he really looked like a little Scooby Doo!

After the pictures, we went out trick-or-treating. Josh didn't really want to go but I made him because I told him that it was Hunter's first trick-or-treating experience and that I needed help carrying him when I got tired. I think he just wanted to stay at the house and get in the hot tub and sauna (which he did first thing when we got back). As we went to each house, Hunter caught on to what we were doing, so when we would leave one porch, he would point to the next house and kick his feet in excitement. It was very cute. We only went to about 20 houses because it was kind of cold but it was definitely fun.

We ended up with a good amount of candy and I should've split it between the other kids but that candy looked too good! So, I selfishly kept it for myself, so I can rot my teeth out of my head. :P I even give Hunter a tiny piece of chocolate occasionally - I know it's bad but he loves it!

H1N1 Vaccine...

I thought I should document our little adventure with the H1N1 vaccination...

My friend Shelbi wanted to get her little daughter a swine flu vaccination because of obvious reasons and wanted me to take Hunter to get one as well. I had my reservations and basically believed what most people did about the vaccination - that you would be worse off if you went and got it. After speaking with Josh and other family members and doing A LOT of research, I decided that it would be best to get one for him.

So, on October 22nd, we woke up at 6 am, got ready and then met Shelbi off the freeway on 21st street. She transferred her daughter Aubree and her things to my car and off we went! We pulled up to the Weber-Morgan Health Department office and looked at the line. It didn't look too bad! So I dropped Shelbi off to go get in line and I went to park the car. I saw a spot towards the end of the parking lot and noticed that there was another car wanting that spot too. The parking lot was pretty full, so desperate times call for desperate measures... I had the better angle on the spot, so I totally stole it from the other car! I felt bad but then I noticed that another car was pulling out of a spot a few rows away and the car I cut off got a parking spot, so that made me feel better.

I got Hunter in his stroller and got all of the baby accessories and headed towards the building. I called Shelbi to see where she was at and she said that the line we saw was just the beginning of it! The line was clear around the back of the building! Oh boy!

They only had 400 injectable shots so we knew that our position in line was going to cut it close but we figured we would take a chance. I knew we would need to "hunker" down because we were going to be waiting for a while and it was kinda cold. So I bundled Hunter up and prepared for a very awnry baby. I brought a bunch of toys, books, snacks and even a portable DVD player... but he didn't need ANY of that! He just sat in his car seat in the stroller and was a perfect little angel! He may have been a little lethargic because I woke him up so early but he was still way good!

By the time the line moved up to the front of the building, we had been waiting in line for about 2 1/2 hours. When we got closer to the door, a lady had a paper with little tally marks on it and told us to "hold on a sec" while she counted them up. She looked at both me and Shelbi and said, "you guys are good" but then told the lady behind us that there was no guarantees for her! My stomach just dropped! We had been talking to this lady the entire time in line and she was so nice and had tried to get her little daughter a shot a couple times before but wasn't able to, so I felt so bad!

We got into the building and got to where the nurses were and they were trying to figure out how many injectable shots they had left. They checked with all of the nurse stations and the nurses kept saying, "I'm out! I'm out too!" I was panicking at this point thinking that they had just ran out but then one of the nurses was like, "We have a few left, come on back." So, I took Hunter into one of the rooms and got him ready to get the shot. I looked at the supplies and noticed that she was holding one of the last vials of vaccine. I said, "Man, we cut it close, didn't we?" She said, "Oh yes, VERY close." She gave Hunter the shot and he started crying but then I gave him his binky and he was fine.

I met Shelbi and we got ready to go (she was able to get her daughter a shot too) and we saw the lady that was in line behind us. We asked if she was able to get one and she said yes, that they had found a case of more vaccine, so they were able to get about 20 or so more people vaccinated. Phew! SO close!

I'm glad that I was able to get Hunter a vaccination but he still needs a booster because he is so young, so I hope I won't have to go through that again. But I still can't believe how AWESOME Hunter was throughout the whole process. We ended up being in line for about 3 hours and he was so good that the only time I gave him his binky was AFTER he got his shot! I definitely underestimated my little man! What an adventure, I tell ya!