Captured moments brought to you by Instagram

My friends introduced me to the iPhone app Instagram this summer and I instantly fell in love with it. Lately Casey and I have been chronicling our lives through this application. As I was going through our pictures to upload to this blog, I realized that I need to start doing a tribute to Instagram every few months. The pictures we post there are the moments that I want to remember and capture our day-to-day lives better than anything I can write. So here is my first of many posts that show the Pattersons through the eyes of Instagram.

Casey and Cash caught a huge moth. This is Cash's cheese face. I have no idea why he does it, but I love it.

Casey grew out a mustache in support of cancer research and in honor of my Dad for Movember. His teammates said he looked like Chuck Norris. Proudest moment of his life.

Face painting at the mall does wonders for a cranky little boy. Here he is portraying Spiderman's serious side. I can hardly get him to look at the camera these days, but he wanted to see what he looked like in the picture so he was concentrating.

Guy was just hanging out with Daddy on the couch and he looked like such a little man.

We took a last minute trip to Old San Juan and the museum we were headed to was closed, so we walked around and took pictures instead. I love these two little boys so much. I can't believe they are all mine.

This picture makes my heart soar. Cash gives us kisses every night before he goes to bed, but he is not very forthcoming with them at other times. While we were in Old San Juan, I randomly asked him for a kiss and he obliged. Luckily Casey was already going to take a picture of us, so he snapped away. I am so happy we caught this moment on camera. He's such a sweet little boy at times. This is also the day before I chopped off my hair.

I told my Puerto Rican friend to tell the Dominican hair dresser to just cut off a few inches. I should have known that I was just a pawn in her masterpiece when she started with chopping off half of my ponytail. I was shocked, sad, and slightly relieved.

Finished product. It was shorter and redder than I asked for, but I love it. I have always wanted to be a redhead and the shorter hair with lots of layers is way easier to manage in this humidity and heat. Casey keeps referring to me as his Russian mail-order bride, Svetlana. And I quote, "I've always had a thing for redheads."

We make quite the pair with his freshly shaved face and my new spicy hair.

The first time that Guy really sat up by himself for a longish period of time was at the beach. I had to capture that moment. And it just so happened that it was after he munched on a fistful of sand too. Too cute.

Cash saw me taking pictures of Guy and wanted in on the action too. I love going to the beach in December.

Cash loves trying to sit in Guy's car seat and bumbo. I gave in one morning and he insisted that I put the tray on for his popcorn and sippy cup. What a life.

I looked down from my phone and saw Cash sitting on top of Guy just like this. Guy was just smiling and laughing. And Cash looked like he knew he wasn't supposed to be sitting on him, but he was going to do it anyways.

Guy recently discovered his tongue. He blows raspberries and sticks it out all day long. This day I was trying to get a shot of his "Guy" shirt and he was going crazy with his new trick.

Guy started crawling soon after he turned six months old. He was rocking back and forth on all fours for a while and then just bit the bullet and went for it. He still scoots occasionally, but starts off crawling

Have I mentioned that I love going to the beach in December? Cause I do. And I love capturing Guy's first experiences on camera. He was playing in the sand with Daddy. Sitting up like a big boy.

I kept putting off Christmas not knowing whether we would still be in Puerto Rico or not. Then one day I just bit the bullet and decided to go all out celebrating the holiday season here. We borrowed a tree, bought tinsel since it's the cheapest way to ornament a whole tree, bought winter wonderland scented candles, wrapping papers/bows, a few presents, and turned up the Christmas music. All of a sudden it really felt like the Christmas season. This is Cash helping me frost the tree with tinsel. He always requests that we turn the tree lights on and the rest of the lights off as soon as it starts getting dark. Then he oohs and ahhhs at how pretty it is. Followed up with a "Ho ho ho. Santa Cause. Kissmas." I think he shares his Mother's love for the warm glow of lights of the Christmas tree at night. This will be his second Christmas in Puerto Rico and Guy's first ever. It's going to be a special one.

Casey's team won in the quarter finals and advance to the semi final round of playoffs. We celebrated by hitting up the local kids waterpark, Aqua de Sol.

Casey captured this joyous moment at church. This Guy makes me smile.

Happy Thanksgiving from PR

Thanksgiving has become my favorite holiday (yes, passing up even Christmas, Halloween, and Independence Day) due largely to the fact that my family celebrates the crap out of it. We do Thanksgiving right. It's a week-long celebration filled with way too much family time and obscene amounts of good food. And the best part of all is that we get to sit around and talk and talk for hours. We play games. Get into fights. Watch too many movies. And it's always the best time I've ever had. I could go on and on about how much I love my family and how cool I think we are. But I'll spare you. Just this once. Needless to say, I have been a little depressed that I am the only one out of my 10 siblings that wasn't partying in Utah over Thanksgiving break this week. I thought about skipping Thanksgiving all together and going to a remote island with my boys. Basically pretending that the holiday just didn't happen for anyone this year. But Casey didn't have enough time off from practice to make any trip really worth it. And to tell the truth, I was sad at the thought of skipping my now favorite holiday. So we stayed and we ate and we partied.

And you know what? We had a great time. We started the holiday off celebrating with friends from church. We gathered at the church building in the afternoon and began our long day of feasting. We had two tables filled with all of the traditional food that Thanksgiving time makes me crave plus way too much pie and egg nog! I love our ward here in Puerto Rico. It's a small ward made up of people from all different walks of life. Smaller wards give you the opportunity to get to know more people on a more intimate level and offer more opportunities to serve. I've already taught a Relief Society lesson and spoken in sacrament. And I was in charge of the Thanksgiving party. It was a hit. Cash started off his first meal with whipped cream and three rolls and ended it with pie and two cupcakes. Within an hour of eating he had run himself ragged and was ready for a nap. After all three of my boys took naps to recover from turkey comas, it was time for round 2 of our Puerto Rican Thanksgiving.

We gathered at Beba's house with our Puerto Rican family. I showed them how to make green bean casserole (my favorite Thanksgiving side dish). And I watched them make all sorts of traditional dishes with their own spin on them. Cash actually mixed in some turkey for dinner with his cupcakes this time. And Guy had a bowl full of his first sweet potatoes (double layered with marshmallows, lucky baby). We finished off the dinner with turkey cupcakes and a hilarious game of Guesstures. I'm not sure if Casey and I are just terrible at that game or if it's the fact that they are yelling out guesses in Spanish and we have no idea what they are saying, but then someone standing by us will tell us if they got the right answer. It's makes it hard to feed off what they are saying and turn them in the right direction if it all sounds like they are shouting gibberish at you. Either way, we were the weak links of our teams, but it was so funny to watch and listen. We love the Morales and Rodriguez families that have adopted us. They love our boys like their own and always make us feel at home here in PR.

 

I'm grateful that there is an English speaking ward that we can attend and that we've quickly made good friends in that ward. I'm grateful to have a family to be with on holidays when we are so far away from our own families. I'm grateful that they love us and our sons as much as we love them. I'm grateful to be in tropical weather this holiday season. And I'm grateful to be with Casey, Cash, and Guy on a new adventure in our life together.

Casey said he was showing off his mustache in this picture. He grew it out for Movember. Sexy beast.

Baby Guy' First Thanksgiving

P.S. I'm grateful for all of my family and friends who read this too. hugs and kisses.

It's already been half a year?

Our baby Guy is six months old. Where did the past six months go? It feels like a blur of newborn snuggling, kissing, loving, crying, sleepless nights, milestones, diapers, more diapers, more snuggling, complete infatuation, love, endless smiles, and exhaustion. And what do I have to show for it? A beautiful, yummy, sweet, smiley, cooing six-month old. I guess that's a pretty good deal. We feel so blessed to have Guy in our little family. I am completely obsessed with him. I smother him in kisses whenever I get the chance. I just love this stage. He smiles whenever I look at him. I remember when Cash used to do that. It melts my heart. Casey calls Guy the silent laugher. When he smiles, his whole face lights up and it looks like he is miming a laugh. We only get a few giggles out of him, but his smile is the best thing in the whole world and he gifts us with it all day long. 

All Mom’s probably feel this way, but I could stare at my babies all day long. Whenever I change Guy's diaper he looks up at me and starts cooing and grabs my face to bring it closer. It’s like the best thing ever. I always wondered if a second baby would get as much attention as our firstborn did. The answer is yes. I feel like I understand how fast it goes now, so I soak up all his babyness as often as I can. All I have to do is look at Cash and it instantly makes me want to snuggle Guy closer. Cash doesn’t want me holding him close unless he’s super tired or sick. And once upon a time he was my baby. Luckily I have my little baby Guy to hold close and I'm not letting go. I asked my Mom one time why she had so many kids. (I’m the youngest of 11.) She responded, “As soon as my babies grew up, I would miss having one, so I had another. I love babies.” I totally understand how she felt. My love affair with my babies starts from day one. The newborn stage comes with a lot of changes, healing, and exhaustion, but holding a perfect tiny baby on your chest while they sleep is the closest thing to heaven that I can imagine. Then when they start sleeping more at night, staying awake during the day, recognizing you, smiling at you, and reaching for you, it’s bliss. When my little baby smiles at me just because I’m his Mother, it feels like everything I always thought Motherhood would be.

So I guess all it takes for me to forget the past is six months. Remember how I have bad pregnancies and I always say that every pregnancy is my last? Well just today Casey said to me (like he always does), “Good job Mom. You sure do make cute babies. Let’s have another one.” And for once, I replied, “Okay. Let’s do it.” Here I am. Completely in love with my husband and two boys. So happy that I can hardly stand myself. And I’m ready to do it all over again so that I can expand our little family that I love so much. Gone are the terrible memories of nausea, back pain, labor pain, labor issues (and all that implies), healing from birth, breast infections, etc. All that remains is joy and love for this perfect little angel that makes me feel complete. How could I not do this again? It is more than worth all of the pain. I’m not saying we are going to start trying to get pregnant any time soon. I’m just saying that my mind is now open to the idea. I’m with my Mom on this one. As soon as my little baby isn't my little baby anymore, I guess I’ll have to start over with another one.

Back to Guy. Here are some things he is doing at six months.

• scooting
• goes up on all fours and rocks
• sitting up with a little help
• eats rice cereal, pear sauce, apple sauce, and bananas
• puts his own binky in (one of my favorite milestones!)
• sleeping through the night from 7pm to 7am (a little blessing to Mom and Dad)
• smiling smiling smiling
• cooing (and it’s just the most adorable thing I’ve ever heard)
• torturing his brother whenever he can get his hands on him (The other day I made Cash a sandwich and put it on his mat on the floor for him to eat. I put Guy in the bumbo on the floor farther away so he wouldn’t bug Cash while I ran downstairs to the kitchen. Within a few minutes Cash started screaming, “No, no, MINE, Nooooo!” I ran back upstairs and Guy had flopped himself out of the bumbo and scooted his away across the floor to Cash’s plate. He had one half of Cash’s sandwich in his grasp and he was gnawing on it as fast as he could while Cash ran to the corner to scream and escape his wrath. What a bully. I told Cash to calm down and just move his plate away next time Guy comes after him, but I’m not sure he could pay attention. He kept eyeing that sneaky Guy. I was just mostly impressed with how quickly Guy made it all happen.)

Our baby Guy is growing up and our little Cash is getting so big. Casey always says the next thing we know, they'll be going on their missions. Realistically, I know that day is far away and when it's close I'll probably be shouting for joy. But right now it makes me heartsick for the day I'll have to say goodbye to them. For now, I'll just keep changing their diapers and appreciating these special times I have with them. I feel so blessed to know that I'll always be their Mother. 

Happy 6th Month Guy Smiley!

El Morro Fort

One of my favorite places in Puerto Rico is Old San Juan. It might be one of my favorite places I've ever been. I think it's the familiarity I feel with the European roots of this old city. On the northwestern-most point of Old San Juan is the Fort San Felipe del Morro, or El Morro to locals, named in honor of King Philip II of Spain. It was designed in the 16th century to guard the entrance to the San Juan Bay and defend Old San Juan from seaborne enemies. I have been here many times and each time I learn something new and then take a bunch of pictures to make the memory last forever.

My favorite thing about El Morro is the vast green esplanade in front of the fort. There are always people enjoying the esplanade with picnics, kites, tours, field trips, or most recently karate classes. Our goal for this trip was to fly the Buzz Lightyear kite that we bought for Cash. The parking that day was especially busy, so Cash and I jumped out of the car to get started while Casey and Guy found a parking spot. I couldn’t take a picture without letting go of the kite and risking Cash letting go of the strings, so I don’t have pictures of our first kite flying adventure. It’s just as well because Cash lasted about 10 minutes before he got bored and wanted to go inside the “tassle” (castle). Cash and I explored the whole fort while waiting for Casey and Guy to find parking. Cash loved the cannons, cannon balls, and the waves crashing up against the outer fort wall.

Once Casey and Guy joined us, Cash was cranky and hot, but that didn't slow us down. I was on a mission to get some pictures whether he wanted to cooperate or not. As always, Guy was a happy camper and just along for the ride.

I really wanted to get a family picture but I was not in the mood to ask anyone to take one for us, so we attempted to get our own. Not very successful, but definitely memorable.

A commercial was being filmed while we were there, so we couldn't get great shots of the whole fort. You know what that means? We get to visit El Morro again and take more pictures. Heaven for me. Torture for Cash and Casey. It's all for the memories boys.