Tree Time

For the past 3 years we have gone to a tree farm down the street from our house to cut our own tree. We have an extremely tall ceiling in our den so we are always looking for at least a 9 foot tree. I'm not a huge fan of the Frazier fir, I think because I grew up with real Douglas firs and I stress the word REAL. I have never in my entire life had a fake Christmas tree. They may work for some and I am not against fake trees for others but we will always have a real tree in our living room. We do have a fake one upstairs in the playroom so, see, I am not totally against it. :)

 Anyway, back to the reason for the post~we went to the tree farm last Saturday.

 We rode on the tractor to the different sections to pick out the perfect tree for us. (Carson was at home with Peppi taking a nap :)

Here Andy and LG are measuring the tree against their heights to make sure it is really 9 feet ;)

This is our beautiful, crazily decorated Leland Cypress tree. Although in most areas of my life I like complete order, when it comes to the Christmas tree I like complete disorder. The lights have to multi-colored and there are all kinds of random ornaments. I really love it now that I have kids and I keep getting these hand-crafted ornaments from daycare~Fabulous!!! We also have haunted lights. Every year half a strand of the lights will randomly blink. Sometimes they don't blink and then one night they will and then they won't~it's weird but we love it!

This is our house with the lights.

I think we are one of two houses in our neighborhood that has lights on it. Apparently, I live around a bunch of Scrooges. Oh well, we plan on putting more lights on this weekend so we hope we can make up for everybody's "bah humbug" attitudes.

On another note~Carson is taking multiple steps now, at least 4 or more at a time. I wouldn't say he is walking yet because he prefers to crawl but he has started the process. My baby is quickly becoming a toddler. :(

Ewwww...

I didn't know what else to title this post...I took Carson to the ENT on Monday for his follow up after his ear tubes. While we were waiting in the office (for at least 30 minutes) he got down and crawled around on the floor. I tried to keep him in my lap but let's face it, he's almost as big as I am so it doesn't take a lot of wiggling for me to give in and let him down.

At some point he decided it may be good idea to put his mouth on the metal chair leg.

Then he thought it best to wrap his mouth around the leg and begin to chew on it~let me just say that it is not a pleasant sound hearing your child's teeth/gums gnawing on metal~shocker, right?

Then he saw the metal foot stool on the patient chair and apparently thought it would be a good idea to put his whole open mouth, tongue out and all on it. Well, this is where I drew the line! I clapped my hands together and shouted, "NO!" He proceeded to look at me with his "hurt feelings" face, whined a little, stuck his fingers in his mouth and laid his head on it.
So gross!

Even though he is a yucky baby :) the nurses still love him. Nurse Angie was told by the other nurses that "her baby" was there so she came in and held him for a few minutes.

Between two babies with ear tubes and other ENT issues we are regulars at that office and the dr and nurses make it such a pleasant place, even if your baby is a metal muncher. :)

Thanksgiving and the wonderful day after

This year's Thanksgiving was much better than last, when I was 9 days postpartum and Carson and Andy stayed at home while I went to my family's get together. At least my immediate family was all together this year. We went to Columbus, MS to my aunt and uncle's house to celebrate with my grandmother and cousins. We were missing my mom's brother's side of family who spent the week in Orlando. I think they sent us a picture to rub it in. :)

Thanksgiving with Mickey or with the Baker side of the family...hmm, I think they made the wrong choice. ;)

This is the group of us who were there~minus the two youngest (Carson and Harrison) who were taking naps.

This was the kids (and a pregnant Jennifer) pretending that they could all go to sleep together at nap time...NOT!!!

We made it back to Southaven that night with two very sleepy babies and a mama who was too excited about Black Friday shopping.

My cousin, Missy, and I have a ritual where we get together Thursday night after the festivities are over to go through the newspaper ads and make a plan for the next morning. This time we started at 4:30 am, which was perfect because all the stores opened at midnight and the rush was over! We went to at least 6 stores and only waited in line at one for a short 25 minutes! It was fabulous!!! When we started, I had a list of 20 people and not a clue of what I was going to get any of them~at 9:30 am we had all of our shopping done. That is the way to do it.

1 year check up

Carson had his 1 year check up yesterday and he did so well. He is right on track with development. He is standing on his own and cruising from one thing to the next but not quite walking on his own yet. He is babbling. I forgot how cute it is when they talk to you and the words don't make any sense but you can tell they are serious about what they are trying to say. He says, mama, dada, uh ohhhhh (newest sound), babababababa~not sure if that's bye bye or bottle. He waves good bye, clicks his tongue (don't know how to describe that), makes a kissee face, shakes his head no, plays a game where he goes to hand you something and when you try to take it, he pulls it away and laughs, plays peek-a-boo, has a tiny bit of separation anxiety, especially from his daddy and so many more daily fun things. He eats 3 meals a day with 2 snacks in between and has 2 sippy cups of about 7 oz of whole milk~one in the morning when he wakes up and one right before he goes to bed. He goes to sleep at 6pm and wakes up sometime between 5:30-6am.

Official stats:

Weight: 28 lbs 12 oz~OFF THE CHART

Height: 32 inches~OFF THE CHART

Head circumference: OFF THE CHART

He's wearing 24 month clothes and size 5 shoes.

Dr. Lacy said that Carson's a 12 month old who thinks he's a 2 year old. :) My little Thanksgiving butterball! 

Why is it so difficult?

Last Saturday we failed miserably tried really hard to get a good family picture for our Christmas cards. I also wanted to have Carson's one year pics done at the same time. We picked a nice location outside in Southaven, chose a good time so it fit with the children's schedules (nap and feeding), bought new matching Christmas outfits for the kids, matched our outfits to those outfits...I thought I had it all covered. Can I just tell you that it was a NIGHTMARE?!--an all caps NIGHTMARE! 

Andy's sweet cousin, Becca, was so patient with all of us. Carson wanted down so he could crawl around outside and explore, LG's attention span is about 3.5 minutes long so after the first couple of pics, she was done and when I say done, I mean gradually slipped into pitching a full on fit mode. Andy and I had to be constantly looking at the camera smiling just in case, by some small chance, LG and Carson looked at the camera at the same time. At first I was anticipating everyone would look at the camera and smile, then I was just hoping we could all look at the camera, and by the end, I was just hoping we would all be in the same frame. After about an hour, their outfits were ruined, I was screaming for LG to just "shut up and smile," poor Becca was trying to direct us but it had become one of those times when the next day, you wish someone would have been secretly filming you so you could submit it to America's Funniest Home Videos~we weren't laughing but I'm sure everyone else would've gotten a big kick out of it.

Becca did send us a couple of preview pics that she was able to catch amidst all the chaos

Don't let the angelic faces fool you, I almost called a priest because they could have passed for possessed creatures that day.

Thank you, Becca for putting up with our craziness and catching the sweet moments when you could. :) 

She is a great photographer and reasonably priced~check out her website at www.4110photography.com.

More birthday bounce and an LG funny

Andy had some more pics on his phone from Carson's birthday party that I thought were blog worthy

 If you knew all the daddies of all the babies in this picture, you would know that they all look just like them. It's really quite a slap in the face to a momma when you carry them for 9 years months and they come out looking like you weren't even there...;)

 This is LG's drawing of a pilgrim~not sure if that is her arm attached to her face or what...

Last night, LG, my mom and I were watching TV and a commercial with a turkey in it came on. My mom asked LG what kind of animal was on the TV and she said, "a flamingo with a coat on." Too funny!

Cast Away

LG got her cast off on Wednesday! Yay!!! We were all so tired of trying to work around it. She was struggling in the bath and at school, most of all. She is left-handed so she was wanting to complete all her assignments even though the teacher told her she didn't have to. She was writing and coloring with her right hand so she was trying to do her best with what she had to work with.

We saw Dr. Spence at the Campbell Clinic in Southaven on Wednesday. He ordered some x-rays, which LG actually enjoyed. :) She loved on all the nurses like they were family. One of the nurses even commented that she had never gotten a hug from a patient. LG has never met Dr. Spence but I told her before we got there that he is a friend of one of her church friend's parents. She thought that was so cool so as soon as she saw him, she ran up and hugged his leg. He was kind of startled by it but has kids of his own so he just went with it. She also hugged him and told him she loved him after he cut her cast off. So sweet!!!

Here she is surveying the x-ray machine

Cheese :)

Sweet x-ray tech remembered her from the last time we were there~it could be because she pitched such a fit or it could be the curls...it's a toss up

This was her after the cast removal and before we went to church~arm out, mini tiara on~watch out choir, here we come!!!!

The big day...

...is tomorrow but we celebrated Carson's first birthday this past Saturday with family and friends. It was going to be a small gathering of just family but I also wanted to invite friends who had babies around Carson's age so he could start spending his milestones with his friends. :) It turns out that the majority of our closest friends have babies around his age so the party turned out to be a bit bigger than I expected but we enjoyed having everyone celebrate this BIG day with us.

The theme was pumpkins since his birthday falls in the middle of "pumpkin season."

This was the cake.

 Luckily, Carson had his very own little smash cake. He would have eaten every bit of it but we finally took it away. As you can see in the pics, he was "double fisting" the cake. :) He does that with all his food now. He fills his left hand up with food and eats bites off his tray with his right hand until all the food on the tray is gone. Then he shoves the food he has been saving in his left hand into his mouth. Too funny!

 He ate that cake in probably five minutes. It was crazy how fast he was eating it.

 We borrowed a mini bounce house from our friends and it was perfect for the little ones to play in.

This is his friend, Micah, patting him while he tries to steal his car back from his friend, Rhett.

We also had the Alabama/Texas A&M game on. Such a disappointing loss but nothing like a "Big Fat Baby" birthday party to take the sting out of such a crushing defeat. :)

Stats to come on Monday after dr's appointment.

Accident prone is an understatement

LG has to be the most accident prone child EVER!!! If it is going to happen, it is going to happen to her. She is 4 and has already had stitches, a black eye, been involved in an accidental death of a pet and had two casts!!! Seriously, I swear I am not a bad parent, she's just fearless and wild! I thought that boys were the ones who always got hurt and if that's the case, I am scared for Carson.

Our latest accident consisted of LG dislocating the radial head from her elbow joint. This injury is most commonly referred to as "nursemaid's elbow." She and one of her teachers were playing on the playground last Tuesday. LG tried to get away from her by buckling her knees and dropping down to the ground at which time the teacher pulled up on her arm. POP~out comes the bone. They called Andy and I immediately. We rushed her to the dr and as soon as he saw her, he knew exactly what it was. He said it happens ALL THE TIME. So please if you're reading this, do not pull your children up by their arms, swing them by their arms, etc.~it is not pretty. He had another dr come in and put it back in place because apparently that is the worst part. Dr. Lacy and LG are pals so he didn't want her to associate that experience with him~I love him!!! 

That was supposed to be the end of the story. But with my child...of course it's not. By Wednesday night, because she would not move her arm and left it hanging down by her side, her left hand was super swollen.

We were referred to an orthopedic on Thursday who confirmed that she had nursemaid's elbow and put her arm in a cast for a week to keep it immobile and give it time to heal. 

(don't mind the big baby to the right eating the cake~post to come)

I am not sure if physical therapy is in our future but we go back tomorrow for them to remove the cast and check the progress. I'll keep you posted.

Funny story for the day~I wanted to take a pic of LG's hands (pic above). We were in the car on our way back from Wednesday night choir. She received a CD that night of the song she will be singing in the Christmas program at church so we can listen to it and practice it. As I'm sure all you parents know, we had to listen to the same 2 songs all the way home that night. After I took the hand picture, she asked me to take a picture of her singing, "Hallelujah."

I don't even know what to say now...:)

Nash~vegas...AGAIN?!

Yep, that's right. I went to Nashville twice in the span of a month.~two different girls' trips that just happened to be planned a couple of weeks apart. How can I say yes to one and not the other, right? It's my duty as a friend. ;) And let me just say that my husband is the greatest for many reasons but the fact that he was completely fine (as far as I know :) with keeping the kids by himself for two weekends so close together makes him even greater!!!

This weekend was completely different than the first one. We stayed in the middle of downtown Nashville and did some shopping but that was not the focus of the trip. This trip was spent spending time hanging out, relaxing, eating, and going out. We went to Margaritaville the first night for dinner. The food was good and they had a live band.
Amanda, me, Alisha

Heather and Alisha...I'm not quite sure why Alisha is making this face. She would kill me if she knew I put this on here but I don't think she ever reads the blog. Guess this will be the test. :)

 Shannon, me, and Alisha~Best friends since high school. Love these girls.

 The whole group~Alisha, Heather, Amanda, me, Shannon, and Tanya

After dinner we went to a cute little karaoke bar. The place was PACKED!!! We put our name on the list to sing when we got there and they didn't call us for 2 hours because so many people were already on the list. It was hilarious. People would get up there and think they really could sing but apparently alcohol makes you deaf. :)
 Shannon and I before we got up and sang~Kiss by Prince.

BTW~I was completely sober and still got up in front of 200+ people because I thought it would be fun and it was!!
We slept in on Saturday, ate breakfast, did some shopping at the Opry Mills Mall, went out to dinner at Demo's, a great Italian restaurant and then went back to the room for girl talk and quality time :). We got up early Sunday morning (5am) and headed back so Tanya could get on the road to New Orleans.
We had an awesome time. Looking forward to doing it again but I have to put some distance between this trip and the next one. ;)