Christmas at a glance

Christmas was awesome! And yes, I know, it was ages ago. But as you can see by the post date, I've been working on this for a while! (you'd think it'd be cooler than this, haha) But today is actually Jan.5 and I am finally finishing up this post. Enjoy! Here are some pictures to show a little about our holidays :)

Cailen's presents:

Slide

Elmo Airplane

Piano (the rock and play!!!!!!!)

Elmo Chair

Elmo slippers

Helping everyone else open their presents

Other Christmas-time fun!

Lights at Temple Sqaure. Valerie and Cailen met up with Nissa and Jake for a fun little reunion (and meeting! Jake had never seen Cailen!). It was fun to catch up. Unfortunately, I never did get a picture of Jake and Nis! Cailen loved the lights and didn't mind (too much) being bundled up. He REALLY wanted to play in the snow and throw snowballs. He got out of his stroller to walk around and when he tried to pick up snow, he fell over! He was a little too bundled to bend properly :)

Barber Christmas party!! Cailen was baby Jesus again this year and was a little more active than last year. He was running around, refused to sit with "Mary" (although we did get him to do it once for the picture!), and would "lead" us all in singing the Christmas songs.

Hanging out at the Davis household, playing with new presents (his new Mess Free markers and coloring pad from Aunt Michelle) and walking around in the snowstorm!! ("eye, eye")

"Snowboarding" with Daddy and Daddy's adventurous video, all done in a church parking lot. *Sigh*...boys!

After Christmas clean-up :) Cailen loves bubbles and so he thoroughly enjoyed his bubble bath. Here he is playing with toys, showing the camera his bubble-covered-ducky.

On-going List!!

Yes, I forgot a few words, nothing big, just, oh...his Aunt Heather's name! Yes Heather he can say your name. I also forgot the word moon, in case anyone cares. And in all excitement (from my end), Cailen said his first true phrase the other day!!! While he has been saying "Love-you" for quite some time, I pretty much figure that's like a word to him. But the other day he linked two words to create: "Bye-bye Amy!!" He said it, clear as day! He refused to repeat it for me or do any other combination for me! No Bye bye mama or bye bye dada or love you mama, nothing. Then low and behold, he says "Bye-bye mo-vie!" He apparently has the bye-bye down and the only important things to say bye to are Amy and his movies. Silly kiddo. But I was very thrilled that he has a 2 word (bye-bye is one word to me) phrase!! Yipee! He's growing up!

Cailen's List of Achievements!

There are a ton of things Cailen can do by now! I thought I'd fill you in on his list of achievements :) There are so many listed here, but there are so many more that I know I haven't put on here! A lot of these he's been doing/saying for awhile, some are recent. It's a hodge podge. So just sit back and enjoy his 18-month cuteness and milestones.

Words Cailen can say:
Mama, Dada, Eyes, Nose, Mouth, Cheek, Eyebrow, Please, Thank You, Yes, No, Turtle, Grandma (ma-ma), Grandpa (ba-pa), Ryan, Becca, Movie, Book, Choo-choo, Honk-honk, Roar (like a lion, tiger), Woof-woof, Moo, Baa, Neigh, Tweet, Meow, Amy, Gabe, Noah (No-no), John, Up, Happy, Shoe, Sock, Coat, Na-night, Diaper, Elmo, Baby, Rainbow, Banana, Eggs, Milk, Water, Hat, Snow, Boots, Pacy (his pacifier), Doll, Ball, Down, Toes, Hand, Amen, Bellybutton, Pillow, Blanket, Tree, Light, TV, Vroom-vroom, Food, Juice, Snack, Bread, Cracker, Candy, Hello, Hi, Bye-bye, Phone, Love-you and many more!!

Things Cailen can do:
Sit up, Stand up, Crawl, Walk, Run, Jump (well...sort of), Talk, Laugh, Smile, Cry, Yell, Play Peekaboo, "Read" books, Sing, Pray (folds his arms and sometimes bows his head; he can sometimes repeat after me too), Points out most parts of his body, Plays with all his toys, Hug, Kiss, Blow a kiss, Follow directions, Play catch, Eat all by himself (fork and spoon), Point at things, Grab everything, "Vacuum" (see video on a previous post), Push buttons, Pull (like his shoelaces), Clap, Wave, Stomp his feet, Squat, Sit down and get up, Bend over to get something, Reach up on his tiptoes, Shake his head yes and no, Make his little surprised face, Climb up on our bed/chairs/etc., Rock on his little giraffe toy, Get books out of his bookcase and put them back, "Play" the piano, Go down the slide, Take his coat off, Play in the snow and throw snowballs, and so much more!!

Our friend Camden

Today we babysat a little boy named Camden. He is out friends Dustin and Brynna's little boy and he is fun! Cailen and him hung out a bit. Camden took over Cailen's high chair while Cailen ate his breakfast at the big table. Look at those cute pj's! They were my little brother's, haha! Cailen was a little unsure of having a second baby in the house. Guess this is good practice for the future, huh? They had to share my lap when we were reading books. Silly boys :)

After eating, we read a few books, Cailen watched his movie and Camden played with toys. Cailen had a little bit of a hard time sharing, I discovered. But he's learning. He kept taking his giraffe toy from Camden and taking it into the living room where he'd leave it. I told him over and over (okay twice) to get the toy and give it to Camden. Like I said, he's learning :) And now, both babies are asleep! Cailen keeps whining and I'm afraid he'll wake up, but I still feel like a pro-mom! Two babies? Pssh, piece of cake! (Like I told Mark, one day is WAAY different than every day. But hey, at least I did this one day! Okay a couple of hours...but still!)

Mo-vie!

To expand upon the previous posts about Cailen's love for movies, here is further proof. For the past two mornings, the first thing he has said is "mo-vie!" How can I not let him watch movies when he's obviously been thinking and dreaming about it all night?! Yesterday, we again had tears when I had to take him away from his movie. Dear boy, there are other things in life besides movies! But it is still adorable. Here is a video of him watching his precious movies (typically he watches them from his little station on the floor but lately it's been on our bed).

Okay so not the greatest video in the world, but you get the idea. He is so funny because he gets so into it! If you peek around you can watch him smile, laugh, stare, dance and sing to his movies. It's adorable! Here's a couple pictures of him smiling for the camera and one of his "usual" spot but without him in it.

His "station"

As a random addition to the post, I'll tell you that my boy is an excellent eater (most of the time, lunch is for some reason the hardest!). He is GREAT with breakfast! He loves oatmeal, yogurt, eggs, cereal, toast, etc. On this particular morning, he was having scrambled eggs and yogurt. I left him to go check some email, my blog, something like that and of course got distracted. I realized it had been a fair amount of time and my little boy was silent. Uh-oh. That's trouble. So I sneak in there to catch him in the act of dropping his eggs over the side of his high chair or something. But no! Low and behold, my little boy is carefully and wonderfully eating his breakfast! He was trying still to use his fork for his scrambled eggs and he had for the most part, successfully eaten his yogurt! What a beautiful little boy I have! He even had a great big smile to give me when I "caught" him. I love you Cailen!

My Little Mimic

Cailen does so many cute and amazing things these days! I have been meaning to get a post on here that just lists the amazing things my son does and says. It's wonderful! But in the meantime, here is a darling little video of my son vacuuming. I was vacuuming today and he had to get out his vacuum and follow me. I didn't even get him at his cutest, if you can imagine that! And it's just hilarious that he doesn't have his shirt on. A real man. I think this toy was one of the best purchases I ever made! I got it for 25 cents at a yard sale too! Woohoo for bargains!

Cailen LOVES movies!

Seriously, things have changed since my last post about Cailen sitting down watching movies. He has since become obsessed!! He sees a TV and demands to watch a movie. I take our portable DVD player to work with me and he watches movies on it the whole time we're there. Well, practically. But we go through like 3 movies a day!! He rotates Monster's Inc and Muppet Christmas Carol (he really loves those songs!) and lately he's added Toy Story to the mix. It's hilarious. He has this little station in our room where he sits back to enjoy his movies. We put a pillow down for him to lay on and he got mad at me today when I moved it to vacuum. He yelled at me until I put it back! It was pretty funny actually. He sits there and is mesmerized. He'll dance to the songs, sometimes singing along or waving his arms like he is conducting (mostly in Muppet Christmas Carol). He'll laugh at parts he thinks is funny (mostly in Monster's Inc.) It's really fun to watch. I couldn't get a picture of him tonight at his "station" because he needed to go to bed, but I'll get one on soon enough. Here is a video of him watching A Muppet Christmas Carol on the portable DVD player while eating dinner (he ate 10 pieces of sandwich meat! crazy!). Please tell me I'm not going to raise a TV junkie because he is watching movies so much! He loves them and cries when I take him away (seriously, there were many, many tears, and lots of snot bubbles when I took him away today). Hopefully he'll be okay :)

Oreos and Snow!

Did I ever tell you that my child is hilarious? And a bit of a dork? I love him to pieces!! His aunt Amy loves to spoil him with lots of sugar :) This days treat was Oreos. He liked the idea of dunking them in milk except he didn't take them back out again! He liked to basically throw them in there. He didn't even eat a lot of them. Despite mostly throwing them in the mug of milk, he did eat his fair share and made quite a cute little mess!

In other cuteness, Cailen played in the snow for the first official time! And I got some amazingly cute pictures and videos just to share with you all! We were at my parents house and went into the backyard. He had a little trouble walking through the snow until we got him on the basketball court/cement pad. He could actually walk quite well in his boots that are a size or size and a half too big! He was very excited to wear his boots, he loves them! My sister Michelle assisted/played with him for me while I was the cameraman. Cailen loves the slide in my parents backyard and snow didn't stop him from wanting to go down the slide. Once he went down once (and got a little stuck on the snow) his way was clear for a few more go's. Cutie pie Cailen!

Cute and dressed for snow!

Making snowballs with Michelle

Cute little footprints on the cement


Enjoying the slide

It snowed again this Tuesday and when I came home from the store I saw Mark out shoveling with Cailen tagging along. He was still in his pj's but had his coat, boots, gloves and hat on. He was adorable! He was "helping" dad. He loved to walk through the snow and made "snowballs" and threw them...basically at himself because it was pretty much powder that blew all over him. A few times he fell over and got his face in snow. He would just get up and say "Eye, eye" to let us know that he had snow in his eye and needed some help. Funny kid.

Christmas is almost here!

Christmas is upon us and we are excited!! I am so proud of myself because I got my Christmas shopping done early. YEA! I have time to relax and enjoy the holidays. I pulled out all the stuff I had bought for Cailen to show Mark so that we could decide what else we needed, if we needed to return stuff, etc etc. It was all on our bed and we were having a hard time keeping Cailen out of there since we kept going in. So I hurried and covered it up with our blanket. Silly Cailen. He decided he wanted to read a book on our bed. Little did he know that his Christmas could have been RUINED if he had looked under the blanket!! Whew! He didn't peek.Speaking of Christmas, Cailen got to see Santa Claus!! Mark's work party was the other night and they had Santa and Mrs. Claus there giving out gifts. And yes, the first picture is with Mark and I also sitting on Santa's lap. It was a little awkward, but that was Santa's way of helping ease Cailen into it (he cried when I first put him on his lap). After sliding Cailen off my lap and onto Santa's, I hurried behind the camera to try and get Cailen to smile. Yes, he is smiling in that second picture, it's just not his real smile. He does this scrunched-nose thing. It's pretty cute, but not when you're trying to get some good pictures! Nevertheless, we got some pictures taken on our camera and they printed one out for us and put it in a frame. Despite having his belly showing in that one, it was a fun night. Cailen got a Tigger toy that bounces. Funny thing is, we had just been playing with that toy at Walmart earlier in the day when we were finishing up Cailen's shopping. He was very excited for Tigger!

ZooLights and Nursery

I have a million things I need to post about! I've started drafts for them all to remind myself what it is I need to talk about, so if there are suddenly 33 new posts, you'll know why!

This post is about our trip to see the Zoo Lights! A few people asked us to go and Cailen and I ended up going with our good friends the Guilberts. It was FREEZING outside. But despite that, it was still pretty cool. Cailen stayed bundled up pretty well, but he did like taking his gloves off. He pointed at a lot of the lights too. After awhile I think he had his fill and was too cold because he started crying and wouldn't stop! That was our cue to head home. Here are some pictures of the Guilberts, the lights, and me and Cailen (yes, my coat is reflective and Cailen's face is covered. Hey, it's the best we could get!).

(Yes Allyson, I'm still planning on sending these pics to you, sorry!!)

In other news, Cailen is in Nursery now! This might sound uber exciting except for the fact that I now work in Nursery too. I was all excited for Cailen to go so that I could finally pay attention in Sunday School! Then I got called to Nursery. Bummer. But, the plus side is that I get to see Cailen do all sorts of cute things! He was right at him his first Sunday. He got VERY excited about the slide and played on that most of the time. They also have this cool swing that he had a couple turns on.

(I had to do the bigger pictures because he is just so cute!!)

Yes, I took pictures of him playing in Nursery. It was too cute! He was really good with the other kids and was great during singing time too. He sat on his little carpet with the rest of them and was mesmerized by the singing. He ate his snack very well, spilled his water (what can I say, it wasn't a sippy cup!) and listened well to the lesson! Dream child! The next week was a little different. He had a girl that kept following him around during play time "mothering" him (i.e. carrying him everywhere!) that really bothered him. I didn't want to "come to the rescue" though so I observed how he handled it. It was kinda funny. I also gave the lesson and he wasn't as good for me (darn). He kept wanting to get out of his chair, wanted snack early, wanted to pick out of the bag when it was someone else's turn, the usual. So we'll see how week 3 goes this Sunday! He's adorable! :)

Christmas Cards!

CALLING ALL ADDRESSES FOR CHRISTMAS CARDS! I am gathering addresses to send Christmas cards out. So if you'd like one, please give me your address! YES, I'M TALKING TO YOU! :)

Eek, attempt to catch up!

It has been a while since I've posted anything really worthwhile (so I feel) and so here is my attempt to catch up! I'm rewinding back to November, before Thanksgiving even, to update you on things the Barbers have done :)

First and foremost, my kid is hilarious and adorable. Here are some pics of him being silly:

He wanted to wear his gloves as he played and made a mess of his room!

Next, on one of Mark's days off, we went to the Museum of Natural History at the U. It was pretty cool! Cailen liked a lot of the stuff and so did Mark :) I had fun watching Cailen explore and went around taking pictures (without the flash mostly, since we were in a museum)

Cailen totally recognized these as horses immediately and neighed!


Playing with the toys they had in the kiddie room

Digging for dinosaurs with Dad!

Did you guys know that Utah has a state ROCK? It's coal, in case you were wondering.

Cailen wanted to peek over at the bones!

He loved looking through the microscope at all the bug parts. It was kinda gross and kinda cool.

Heather came to town for Thanksgiving (she's my sister for those who don't know) and Cailen took a little while to get used to her. But he warmed up and loved playing with her!

After Thanksgiving, we put up our Christmas stuff. Cailen helped Mark with the tree :)

Then I thought I'd throw in this picture of Cailen eating oatmeal :)

That's all for now because we need to get ready for "work." Cailen is currently playing drums on my arms as I type, so I think he wants some attention :) See ya later!