March....part 2

Colton got to stay at Bunny's house overnight last Friday. Bunny cooked a delicious roast and had Zach and April over too. Once we put Colton to bed, we all stayed up and played "Apples to Apples" and "Imagineiff"...It's funny because we played the exact same games with Jack's fmaily last weekend to celebrate Brittany's 18th birthday. After the games, Jack and I headed home and left Colton with Bunny. It was so nice to sleep in on a Saturday! Thanks Bunny!

Laying on Lovey!

Two weekends ago, Papaw surprised us by coming over to work in our yard. He was just going to mow and add some mulch, but ended up replacing an entire section of rotted fence. We were out of town visiting Jack's family so he really surprised us! We came home Sunday afternoon to find him at our house and Colton was so excited to see Papaw and his truck! It was really hot and I couldn't find any shorts for Colton so I just left him in his shirt and diaper. Here he is "helping" Papaw! He loved spreading the mulch everywhere!

Playing at his water table.

This is a song by Carolyn Arends. I posted it back when I was pregnant with Colton and wanted to share it again for our 2nd little miracle. Life truly is sacred and we are so excited to meet this little boy that God is forming.

Psalm 139

I run to the cleaners

Stop by the bank

Pick up some groceries

Gas up the car

Same old routine

EXCEPT Now all of it's sacred

Charged with wonder

Every breath is for two

YOUAre being knit together

Here in my womb.

Such knowledge is too wonderful for me...Too lofty to obtain.

So I run to the cleaners

And I stop by the bank

Afraid and in awe...

Everything's different

Because even this moment

You are being fearfully, wonderfully made.

March...part 1

Our little man turned 20 months old on March 12. We love him more and more with each passing day and are so thankful for his little spirit! He keeps us very entertained and very busy! It's amazing what he retains from day to day. He's like a sponge. He's starting to wake up asking for the toy we played with the night before and falls asleep talking about his day.

Our sweet brown-eyed angel boy!

All dressed up and no place to go... The boy knows how to accessorize. I know I need to get out Jack's ties too, but he seems to find my stuff first.

A serious moment in the tub at Bunny's house. Love that little face!

More Randomness

Colton's first of many stream wading experiences.

I love watching his face when he's reading a book. He gets really excited about his books especially if they are about animals.

Could I be any cooler?

Randomness

I just figured out how to download pics from my iphone to the blog...So here are a few of my favorites.

Brad & Kate (our good friends and awesome real estate agents) & Jack enjoying a little Starbucks back in January. We had a fun night on the town sans kiddo. We went to see an early movie, (Valkyrie - I give it 8/10 stars), ate dinner at a Brazilian steakhouse at Firewheel (9/10 stars - their pineapple is my favorite!) and then topped off the night with some coffee. It was fun to stay out late for a change! Thanks Bunny for keeping Colton that evening.

More Mohawk Cuteness!

Colton and I took a walk a few Saturdays ago and turned down a street we usually don't take. Lo and behold there was a PINK pony waiting for us. Colton was way excited! We watched the pony for a while and then out walked a baby cow and donkey. Pretty exciting stuff for our neighborhood.

All boy! We went to Breckenridge Park last week to meet Bunny and Colton immediately found the water! At first I wasn't thrilled that he was soaking his shoes and pants but then I couldn't resist his joy in that moment! He loved getting his feet wet and we even saw some baby fish along the way.

18 and 19 months - "Faces of February"

The "I just woke up/bed head" face.

The "Look of Concentration" face

The "It's Hard Being a Rockstar" face.

The "Too Cool for School" Face

The "I love Elmo on TV, but up close he's a little scary" face

The, "angelic, did I just make a mess" face. We received this wonderful stool from Aunt Paige and Uncle Doug for Christmas. It's called a Kitchen Helper and Colton has really enjoyed being able to "help" Mommy cook.

Can't see his sweet face here, but I thought this was a cute pic. Colton LOVES his Little People and Animals. We play with them almost everyday.

Colton also loves our shoes and pretty much everyone's shoes. Dad's shoes are a little too hard to walk in right now, so Mommy's will have to do. Pretty cute!

This age is so much fun. Here are some of the things I want to remember about 19 months:

• Repeats everything we say!
• Starting to understand joking.
• Loves to wrestle with Daddy. And I mean this kid can wrestle. Please do not show him any type of professional wrestling on tv. We don't know where he learned his moves, but it's a little scary.
• Such a big helper. Knows how to pick up his toys and can throw his diapers away in the trash. He also can water the flowers all by himself. One evening his daddy and him were playing toys. I called them in for dinner and Jack came right away. However; Colton stayed behind and picked up all his toys before coming to dinner! I hope this trait sticks around forever!
• Adds an e to some of his words: "sun-e" instead of sun.
• Reminds us to pray before dinner. Sometimes we pray twice because he will stop us in the middle of dinner and say "Pway?" How can we resist? Starting to put his hands together and bow his head.
• LOVES his little "an-mals". He can identify a giraffe, lion, zebra, gorilla, hippo, snake, puppy, cat, bear, fish, horse, penguin, frog, cow and a few others. He can say most of them but we're still working on the sounds. Most everything says "roar" or "moo".
• Becoming a very good eater. However; I'm afraid we've created a monster with ranch dip. Our dr. told us to add butter or dip with everything since he needed to gain a little more weight. Now, Colton can barely have a meal without "dup" as he calls it.
• Oh, and the reason his shirt is off in several of these pictures is that he insists on not wearing a bib at meals lately. Thus, we end up shirtless!

We love you little man!

My Little Valentine

Happy Valentine's Everyone!

I've been informed that the grandparents are getting a bit anxious for more pictures on the blog so here are a few recent ones! Also, here's just a little bit of what we've been up to lately and why I haven't been a better blogger:

• Our house is officially on the market. We are hoping to move a little closer in to the city and our church, jobs and friends. We haven't started looking for a house yet since we want to see if we can actually sell our house. Prayers are welcome!
• My 1 year old camera will only take video not pictures :( I finally dug out my old digital camera and have been making do with that.
• Facebook (enough said)...
• Showers, showers and more showers to plan and host for sweet friends.

This is the only pic I got of Colton in his Valentine's shirt. This is at his school with one of his sweet afternoon teachers, Jessica. They got to meet "Charlie" the duck after their Valentine's party. Colton was very excited to see a real duck! I mean really excited. I thought he was going to hyperventilate. Of course I didn't have my camera when they first brought out the duck so I missed that precious moment - but it was so cute!

Colton - 1 year ago today...

Mommy and her lil' Valentine at the park! And yes, that's a lollipop in his hands. He stole it from me and I never got it back.

I don't know what this expression means - but I love it!

Colton loves to play peek-a-boo and cracks up because he thinks we can't see him when he covers his eyes.

The park pictures were taken by our friend and now realtor, Kate. She's done a great job helping us get our house ready!

IT'S A....

Boy! Colton is going to have a little brother! We are thrilled and so thankful for another healthy little boy. Everything looks good so far. He is 12 oz and about 8.5 inches. They are sticking with June 21st as a due date so I am about 20 weeks this week. He has been kicking up a storm so I know he's anxious to get out and play with Colton! I've been telling Colton about the baby in my tummy but he just kind of looks at me funny right now. He'll figure it out soon enough! In the meantime I bought him a little baby doll for him to practice being gentle with. He's been very loving and likes to share his pacifiers with it.

I tried to get Colton saying "Brother" on video, but he only says it off-camera! Colton is also saying "Hallelujah", "Mess" and "Sorry" these days. Usually the sorry follows the mess!

I'll try to get a few sonogram pictures and belly pictures posted soon. For now, enjoy a few pictures of the big brother!

A rare look at the parents of Colton.

Colton sitting at his "big boy" table.

He has a special affinity for our vacuum cleaner (only when its off, though).

Today is also special because it's Grandma and Grandad's anniversary. Here's Colton a year ago and...

here he is today! It took a while because I had to chase him around and get the camera back but once I offered him the baby for the camera he was ready to cooperate! Hope your day was really special Grandma and Grandad! We love you!

What's your vote???

Today's the day we find out if Colton will have a brother or sister! I am so excited to see our little miracle again on the sonogram - It's been 12 weeks since we've seen him/her.



Just for fun, I thought I'd post a little poll to see if what my blogging friends think? We have the sono at 3 pm so I'll post tonight what we found out! The poll is over to the right...

17 Months and Holding...

Colton is a week away from being 18 months so I thought I better write a few memories from his 17th month before it gets away from me! Colton continues to bring us SO much joy and is a flurry of activity from morning til night. Here he is standing in his new playroom! Papaw helped us build these nifty shelves from IKEA last week! Thanks, Papaw! Mommy likes it because everything finally has a place! We'll see how long it stays organized, but so far so good!

"Cooking with Colton" - While I was on the phone with Jack one evening, Colton grabbed his dinner plate (he was all done, thankfully) and a few items out of the tupperware cabinet and begin mixing up his own concoction! He loves to help cook!

Reading in his new Elmo chair from Bunny. Yes he does sit every once in a while.

And I haven't forgotten about Christmas. Here's a little taste of what's to come!

Things I want to remember about this sweet age:

• Vocabulary is growing daily. He is beginning to repeat/mimic whatever we say. New words include: play, read, books, outSIDE!!!, no-no (usually pointing at an outlet or something else off-limits), Na, na, na (his idea of singing), wa-wa, Lovey, cook, eat, milk, MINE (thanks to Cousin Wilkin), hot, Elmo, car, truck, boo, bird, dog, cat, slide, ready....
• Wants any adults in the room to NOT sit on the couch. He will come pull on our pants legs and give us a little nudge until we get on the floor with him.
• LOVES his Daddy! Any sound that sounds remotely similar to the garage door will warrant a flurry of Daddy, Daddy, Daddy... All through the day, he asks about Daddy and has just now began saying "Wok" (work) because I have to keep telling him that's where daddy is and he will be home soon! It's so fun to watch his whole body smile when his daddy comes home!
• Continues to love playing with his toys. He really can play for quite a while independently and loves putting his little people/animals in and out of the school bus, airplane or Ark.
• Likes to lick the bubble wand instead of blow and wants to do it all by himself!
• Loves to brush his teeth. (His version is actually sucking all the toothpaste off the brush and then throwing it down on the ground, but I figure it's better than nothing!)
• Says "Baby" when he wants to watch Praise Baby - He still loves those videos! Only thing besides books and eating he will sit still for.
• Loves to throw everything! We're working on only throwing balls after mom got a busted lip from a close encounter with a block!
• Loves to be outside!
• Knows when his books are upside down.
• Loves wrestling with Daddy!

We love you little man! You are our sunshine!

This is Colton not 5 minutes after I took his temperature and it read 102.6!!! He has been sick with Strep since Monday but you wouldn't know it! He's the happiest sick kiddo I've ever seen. We like to call this the "Crazy Dance" in our house :) Enjoy!

Big News...

Colton has some big news to share with you! He's going to be a BIG BROTHER this June. I've been meaning to post this forever. I am 17 weeks along and feeling great! We are so excited about this baby. We'll find out what we're having at the end of this month. I can't wait. Colton says "Baby" all the time, but he really has no idea what's in store for him.

Here's a little video of our man reading books and talking. Enjoy!

Merry Christmas!

Here's our picture with Santa. No tears or screaming so I would say it was a success! We waited over an hour to see St. Nick and Colton was so good while we waited. It helped that the mall had a fish tank, play area and balloon-making clown near the line area. Very smart thinking on their part! Have a very Merry Christmas!

Congrats Zach again!!!

What's better than a brother graduating from fire/rescue school? A brother getting engaged to the sweetest, loveliest girl ever!!!

Yes - just over a week ago - Zach and April got engaged! I'm so excited April will be joining our family! Way to go you two!

16 & 17 months

So I'm a little behind on Colton's updates... 16 months has passed us by and now our boy is 17 months old... Here is a glimpse into life with the C-man!

Voracious reader like his mommy and daddy! Colton insists on reading by himself on the couch and also insists on having ALL of his books nearby.
Where is Colton? All bundled up on a cold day. This picture happens to be in the kitchen. Colton loves sitting up on the kitchen counter while I'm cooking or doing anything in the kitchen.
Colton "sliding" to Daddy. Colton invented this game all by himself. He smashed a diaper box and started calling it a slide. I thought it was pretty ingenious!
Colton built this tower all by himself too. He's getting so big!

Here are a few other things to remember about this age:

• Can signal a touchdown with both hands in the air.
• Saying elmo (melmo), outSIDE, see (which we think means paci), more, eat, mama (now says this over and over until I do whatever he wants), lights, ball, car, truck and lots more I can't remember right now.
• Signing more, please, all done, no and eat. Working on thank you, yes and milk.
• Telling himself "Ready, set, go" and then takes off running across the house.
• Clapping for himself when he does a good job.
• Blowing kisses.
• Giving sweet kisses and hugs complete with sound effects! So cute! You have to be careful because a kiss can quickly turn dangerous with scratching and hair pulling.

We love this little boy so much! Thank you God for giving him to us to love and raise. Please guide us as we parent him.

Videos coming soon...