The End of Christmas

On Saturday, my mom, Hayden and I went shopping. Wow. What were we thinking? Bad enough that it was the day after Christmas, but adding a tired 4 year old was not smart. We left Livee with my grandmother, fortunately, but it was still a lot to deal with. We hit up Kohl's, where I used my Kohl's cash to purchase more frames for my walls (where I'm going to put them I don't know), and then we headed for the mall to pick up a couple of things. After a quick meal at Orange Julius, we went in search of deals. We found one. Oh well, can't have it all, right?

When we finally made it back to my grandmother's to pick up Livee, Hayden was asleep. He was so asleep that I got Livee, put her in the car, got home to my mom's, and we all got out of the car without waking him. Christmas is a hard holiday on little ones I think. Too much excitement and they either get sick or exhausted or both. Sunday we just spent the day at my mom's baking eggnog cupcakes and chocolate cake with fluff frosting and giving Hayden a much needed haircut.

Great Aunt Polly and Livee

Handy Manny flashlight

Carley Grace and Aunt Gwen

On Monday we started cooking at around 10 am. We didn't eat until 5. Why does it take so long to fix a meal that only takes 15 minutes to eat??? My poor mother about worked herself down. Everything was absolutely delicious though and we had about 5 different desserts to choose from! After dinner, we opened up all of the gifts from my side. Hayden was super excited to get a dragon playset, a new robe, a monster puppet, a fireman's kit (the ax has since been put away), and lots of other surprises. Livee receive 2 baby dolls (which she LOVES), 4 or 5 cute outfits, and a play purse. She was asleep, so I had to open everything, but I'm sure she didn't mind! Overall, we had a great holiday!!!

Christmas, Take Two

On Christmas Eve my parents came to spend the night with us. We ate Mexican food for dinner and tucked Hayden in at a relatively decent hour in order for Santa to visit. We woke up the next morning bright and early, of course! At first Hayden didn't remember that Santa came and then when I reminded him I thought he might jump the baby gate to get downstairs. He was so excited to get everything he wanted. How did I know he got everything? He told us over and over. ha! Livee was just excited to see Hayden so excited. She squealed and squealed.

We had a delicious breakfast casserole, then started preparing Christmas lunch. We had oven roasted chicken, dressing, mashed carrots and sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, rolls, and pan fried green beans with chocolate peppermint cake for dessert. It was yummy and delicious.

Dave made his way to work while I packed up Hayden, Livee and I and we headed to Muscle Shoals with my parents. I am happy to say that I got to take a great nap that was sorely needed on the ride!

And so it begins...

Christmas celebration, that is. We started early this year and will end late. I'm sure Hayden will need the whole week afterwards to get back to normal. We went to the 'Ham on Monday around mid-morning and arrived just in time for lunch/gorging ourselves at Dave's mom and stepdad's.

We opened all of our gifts and hung out for a little while before heading out to Dave's father's in Vestavia.



At his house we opened gifts first and then feasted/gorged ourselves again. By the time we got back to my mother-in-law's to spend the night, we were exhausted and suffering from indigestion.


Hayden was asleep before his head hit the pillow, which I was quite glad for since he has been a handful for around the last 2 weeks. I'm really not looking forward to this attitude problem every year right before Christmas. Anyone else have this issue with their kids? Anyone, anyone....Bueller?


On Tuesday, I took Livee to the library to visit with my old work friends. I miss them and always enjoy getting to visit. I didn't get any pics, but Traci did so maybe one day I can get them from her (hint hint). We ate a quick lunch and chatted a few more minutes before I headed back to round up the rest of the gang and go to Trussville to visit Dave's grandparents. Once again, I didn't get any pictures (shame on me), but we enjoyed our visit just the same.
I've had a bit of a cold and been exhausted, what with packing, entertaining, and cooking, so I have an excuse for the non-existent pictures.


Today I went to Wal-Mart bright and early and straightened up the house a little before diving into a bit of cooking. Tomorrow I will spend the day baking, wrapping gifts, washing clothes, and packing up for our trip to Muscle Shoals on Friday or Saturday. Whew! I think the best gift I could receive this year is a day of sleep!

To be or not to be...

A thumb sucker. Livee can't seem to make up her mind. She still takes a pacifier, but sucks her thumb or middle two fingers sometimes also.

Santa!

Having a chat with the Big Guy.

Both of them smiling! Yay!

Livee looked at him a couple of times wondering who he was, but never cried!

5 Months!

Let's see, Livee was 5 months old yesterday. She's been eating food for about a month now, only once a day usually after her midday feeding. She eats 3 or 4 ounces and has so far had butternut squash, sweet potatoes, green beans, oatmeal, rice cereal, bananas, prunes, pears, and a little white grape juice. She loves to eat, but we're having some constipation issues (which I hate!). She had a 4 oz jar of pears yesterday and today, and it seems to be working things out. I am making her food, with the exception of pears and applesauce and maybe some other things down the road. For now, it is so much more economical and super easy for me to do. She LOVES sweet potatoes and pears. Hopefully in the next couple of weeks she will start having "breakfast" as well.

She is still breastfeeding 5 to 6 times a day and taking Zantac twice a day. We're starting on a new sort of routine the last couple of days, which I hope sticks. She's nursing every 4 hours starting at 6 am. She goes down by 8, then I get her up for a "dream" feed at 9 and she sleeps all night until 6 am (thank you Miracle Blanket)! The naps, on the other hand, are still sporadic. But she has taken a really good afternoon nap the last 2 days. As far as physical development goes, she can roll all around, but doesn't do it very often. She loves to play with her hands, on her play mat and in her exersaucer. We alternate where she plays every 30 minutes or whenever she gets tired of what she's doing. She loves to grab our faces now and rub her face on us. She watches everything that Hayden does when she can see him and lights up like a lightbulb when he talks to her. She squeals quite a bit and makes all kinds of funny noises. She is really a very sweet baby! She has recently been "kept" by each of her grandmothers and takes a bottle like a champ, so that's one less thing to worry about. She is still taking a pacifier also! We are excited about her first Christmas coming up!

ROLL TIDE!

'Nuff said...

It's The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Hayden's Frosty and Tree

Livee's Pink Tree

Front Door Festivity

Oh Christmas Tree

Christmas Card Outtakes

Some of the not so good ones:

Two cute ones that we didn't use:

Dave is 36! Whoa!

Dave turned 36 on Monday! And he also had the big "V". No more kiddies for us unless somewhere down the road we decide to adopt. :) Before there are any comments, he scheduled the appointment. I did at least get him fried chicken, mac and cheese, mashed potatoes, broccoli, and cocktail shrimp plus his customary ice cream cake from Dairy Queen. Hayden picked out the one with the orange balloons.

He is doing great and probably won't go back to work until Sunday. We're hoping for a restful next couple of days. We would like to go to the movies tomorrow, then watch the game on Saturday and of course Polar Express on Sunday! It's going to be so much fun to see Hayden on the train ride!

Also on Monday we received a little blue box in the mail. Dave opened it and asked me if I had ordered something from Tiffany's. I did my best Cher (from Clueless) impression and said "AS IF"! Then he realized it was a sweet sterling silver baby spoon with Livee's initials engraved on the handle from his boss (the general manager) at WSB. Did we mention how great his bosses are? I am going to keep all of the little cards and even the tissue paper (it has Tiffany&Co. on it) for Livee to have someday. It will probably be the only blue box I ever get to open, so I had to document it!

Thanksgiving & Birthdays

Well, we left bright and early Monday morning heading for Muscle Shoals. Hayden went back with my parents on Sunday, so it was just me, Dave and Livee for the car trip. That made it significantly easier for some reason. hmmmm.... Monday night we celebrated Brandon, Gwen, and Dave's birthdays (all in November) and Thanksgiving. It was a delicious feast of turkey, chicken, dressing, green bean casserole, corn, purple hull peas, mashed potatoes, marinated carrots, congealed salad, cranberry sauce, and homemade birthday cake!

Note Dave's T-Shirt. Uggghhh-I need to burn it.

Man, do we know how to eat!!! Tuesday Dave headed back to Georgia to work and the rest of us stayed in the Shoals for the week. The plan was to head back Sunday and stop in Calera for our Polar Express ride, but some dummy (ummmm ME) booked the wrong date so we do that next Sunday. The rest of the week was pretty non-descript. I got together with some of my oldest friends for coffee- Leanna, Brad and Elizabeth. Elizabeth is expecting her 2nd, so that was exciting! And Leanna and Brad are doing great in San Diego as well. The little newlyweds celebrate their 1st anniversary in December. Wednesday evening I got to see my aunt and uncle and cousin and her boys for yet another delicious Thanksgiving meal. On Thursday, we went over to my grandparents and ate homemade veggie soup. All in all, I think I gained 5 pounds. I guess I'm just too well taken care of when I'm at my parents. :)

Aren't these the saddest faces you've ever seen? They were so very tired.

Church Dedication

Let's back up to Sunday, November 22nd. At our church, Midway Macedonia Baptist, we dedicated Livee and Hayden to be brought up in a Godly home, with Christ as the center of it. We were so grateful to start our week of Thanksgiving in this way. We didn't get a very good picture of the four of us, but I'll post it anyway. We LOVE our church and our LifeGroup class if I haven't mentioned it before. It has been great to be able to connect with people our own age and make new friends. Our parents and one grandparent were able to come to the dedication and eat lunch with us afterwards at a local Greek restaurant. Yum! No important event is right if food isn't involved!

Thanksgiving Feast at Preschool

At Hayden's preschool they have a Thanksgiving Feast to celebrate the coming holiday. The 3's and 4's sing a few songs and then they get to enjoy a Thanksgiving meal while all of the parents gush over how precious their children are. Seriously, these kids worked on this for 2 weeks. They made all of the placemats, center pieces, and costumes! Hayden loves his preschool this year and I am so thankful that God placed all of the people in my life that he did at just the right time so that I could find it. Last year we had a bad experience and were thoroughly disappointed, but this year things have definitely turned around!

Hayden is the second from the left standing up (in yellow). Make sure you look at the kid to the far right (in yellow) with his ears plugged. Ha!

Helping Out

Hayden is such a big helper these days. He helped me empty all of the ketchup packets tonight, for instance. Here he is helping Dave blow leaves off of the back patio.

Outside Pictures

We were outside today enjoying the beautiful weather and snapped some pics!

4 Month Stats

Had our doctor's visit this morning and Livee is 11 lbs, 8 oz and 24 inches long. She is a bean pole! They weren't too concerned with her weight since she gained 2 inches, but we are still going ahead with food. I am baking sweet potatoes for her as we speak. She really enjoyed the banana yesterday and the day before, but I don't want any constipation issues, so I am skipping rice cereal for now and moving on to a veggie. I am attempting to make homemade baby food, mainly because I HATE paying for little jars of food when I can make a whole ice cube tray full for the same price. I can also add what I want to it. I am taking a few short cuts, in that I bought frozen steam fresh peas, frozen butternut squash, a huge jar of natural applesauce, and the sweet potatoes in the plastic that you can microwave. Whatever I can do, right? I have some fresh carrots so I may cook those tomorrow and freeze them for later. In the mean time, the house is a wreck with Christmas decoration boxes everywhere and a halfway finished tree, but the baby comes first! She had 2 shots and an oral vaccine, so I expect her to sleep most of the day. Here is an exhausted pic of her.

4 Months Old!

Livee is four months old, yay! She will be visiting the doctor on Thursday for her checkup and shots. She is so alert these days. She's still breastfeeding every 3 to 4 hours and sleeping all night, but napping sporadically. She watches everything we do with fascination, including eating, so tonight I gave her a little bit of banana. I don't know if I'm ready to go down the baby food road quite yet, but she seemed to enjoy it and gobbled it right up! We'll see in the next few days. We got out her exersaucer a couple of days ago and she is really enjoying it.

She's reaching for things and is getting good at playing with her paci. She also coos and squeals a lot and loves to kick. I have to say, I love this baby age because they really start engaging a lot more. She smiles at everyone who talks to her and is really pretty quiet while we're out doing things. This past Sunday she had her first experience in the nursery and didn't sleep at all. She is so nosey! The benefit for me, though, was that she took 2 really good naps when we got home!

Hayden’s Adventures With Tommy!

After leaving school on Friday, Hayden introduced Tommy to his family. Tommy rested on the couch with Hayden and his daddy and his little sister Livee. Hayden and Tommy watched TV and played until they went to bed.

On Saturday they went to Chick-Fil-A. Tommy tried to ride in the front of the car on the dashboard, but Hayden let him ride in his seat with him instead. They ate lunch and played on the playground. Tommy was just the right size to play. He went really fast down the slide!

That night Hayden and Tommy got to go trick-or-treating. Hayden dressed up as Spiderman and Tommy dressed up as a ghost. When they got home, they helped Hayden's mommy and daddy hand out candy to the other trick-or-treaters. Everyone loved Tommy's costume!

On Sunday, Hayden took Tommy to church with him. He had fun in the Zebra class learning about Jesus.

Hayden and Tommy also went to a birthday party for Hayden's friend Layton. Tommy loved seeing all of the birthday gifts!

Hayden and Tommy had a very busy and exciting weekend together. They can't wait for their next adventure!