Christmas - New Years 2011

Sadly enough, I did NOT get many pictures from Christmas morning!  I did get some videos, but I was honestly having TOO much fun playing with Parker and watching him open presents that I completely forgot to take pictures - SHOCKER I know!  A few silly memories: He had been OBSESSED with the Wizard of Oz for several weeks before Christmas.  It was on TV one night and he couldn't keep his eyes off of it!  For weeks before Christmas, he would constantly ask me to see "Wizzer Oz" on my "pooter" (a.k.a. my computer).  I had found some random clips from the movie on youtube, so we let him watch those.  So naturally, we bought him the DVD thinking he'd be super excited... yeah not so much.  He opened it and just looked at it - threw it to the side and started opening up some other gifts.  His FINAL big gift was his awesome train table.  He opened up a Thomas train then we told him we needed to go put all this new toys in the playroom!  He jumps up and runs to the playroom with his Thomas Train and he sees his train table and just stops in his tracks, stopped what he was saying MID sentence and started playing immediately.  No jumps, no screams, just - "SWEET let's play now.  Not to waste a second!"

The few pictures I took were with my phone... hence the horrible quality.

The Train Table!

 After Santa came!

 Aunt Ashley bought Parker a batman outfit to dress up in since the only other outfits he has been dressing up in are Kayley's Cinderella and Repunzel outfits (which he LOVES by the way....)

 You know what?  He's 2.... he likes to dress up in Kayley's clothes and high heels... and he can rock the outfits AND the heels... more power to him!  Besides, I've got GREAT blackmail on him now!

 What our house looked like for 2 days after Christmas...

 Sweet baby girl showing off her First Christmas outfit.

 So - we were in a hurry to bathe the kids and get them to bed on Christmas night, so Chris took Parker and I bathed Caroline in our kitchen sink.  I fed her quickly after her bath and put her right down without brushing her hair.  Well - this is the result of that.... she was NOT happy with me for not brushing her hair and making her wake up looking like this...

A few days after Christmas, we headed to Waycross.  Papa and Mimi bought Parker a F-150 black pick up truck JUST like daddy's for Christmas!  The only trick was that they had it delivered to Waycross SO - we had to make a little trip down there to pick up the pick up!  Parker and his cousin Griffin LOVED it!  He had a very similar reaction when he first discovered it... ran outside thinking we were just going to play in the yard... he sees the truck.  Stops in his tracks.  Stop mid-sentence.  Jumps in and starts to drive it around!

Chris and his mom with the kiddos.

These two are TROUBLE!

Parker and Griffin loved playing in Mimi and Papa's huge bath tub!

It was actually hot in Waycross - on New Years - hence my tiny baby being naked!  She had just gotten a bath and was getting some face time in with daddy!

My parents were looking at furniture in Jesup a few days after New Years so they drove the extra 30 minutes to Waycross to have dinner with us one night! 

 This girl is ALL STAR traveler... we stopped to feed her in Tifton - but we had to wake her up!  This girl LOVES snoozin' in her carseat!  We did not hear a PEEP our entire week of traveling!

After our trip to Waycross, we headed to Lake City to see Jeff and Lan (Chris' brother and his wife) and their 2 kiddos, Griffin and Morgan!  Griffin loved giving sweet kisses to his newest cousin!

The boys had a slumber party in Griffin's room the two nights we stayed there!  So we let them start the night off right by jumping all over Park's air mattress!  These two kiddos (who are only about a month apart) are crazy together... we are in for some major damage when we get these two together!

T. R. O. U. B. L. E.

The F Family Visits!

 A few days before New Years, the F family came to visit!  I baby sat their oldest when her mommy went to school when she was only a few months old!  I always sort of had K, the oldest, picked out for Parker to marry, he likes older women anyway... but NOW little A is here and much closer in age to Parker than K!  I think we have an arranged marriage coming their way!  :)

K pulling Park in the wagon all around our yard!

 K pulled Park around while sweet L mowed our dead grass for us!

 Sweet little A - she's a feisty one - but I think Parker can deal!  It was actually pretty pleasant outside so the kids played in Park's water table... and all got soaked of course!

 K would sit in Park's rocking chair and pretend to be Santa!  All the kids fought over who would sit on her lap!  I think Park literally weighs more than she does!

 Before we left, we tried to get a picture of all the kiddos together!  SO stinking difficult!  Especially since A and Park did NOT get a nap!

Santa!

We went to see the famous Phipp's Santa a few days before Christmas!  I made our appointment way back in August when the reservation system opened and chose to wait as long as possible after C's birth to make the trip to Buckhead to see Santa!  Parker literally RAN up to Santa and hugged him immediately and hopped on his lap!  Caroline just looked around the entire time - no tears from either of my brave kiddos!  I never have gotten a screaming shot of my kids with Santa - those are always so cute!  Hmmm - there is always next year.

Sweet Caroline all snuggled up after she saw Santa for the first time!

We decided to head over to Lennox Mall after we went to Phipp's to try to go ride the Pink Pig.  We took Parker last year and he LOVED it!  Well, we get there and the line is LITERALLY about a mile long - wound around the entire mall.  Um - no.  BUT - the trip wasn't a total loss because we met up with the T family!  LOVE the T Family!  I babysat for all the T kids from when their youngest was about 9 months old - and she's all grown up now!  So hard to believe.  Parker with Abby and Luke at California Pizza Kitchen at Lennox.

Sweet Abby loved holding Caroline!

Park thought Luke was awesome.

Beautiful Maggie holding Caroline.

Park just being his precious self...

LOVE this family!

When we got back home, I wanted to get a sweet picture of Sweet Caroline in her Christmas dress - handed down from cousin Kayley.  This picture brought me to tears when I saw it the first time because here was my 1 month old baby - looking NOTHING like a newborn anymore.  :(

 

A few days later, was Christmas!  My parents were in town so they woke up bright and early with Kayley at her house Christmas morning then came to our house by 9 am to watch Parker open his!  I'll post pictures and videos from that later, but here is our family picture on Christmas night at Whit's house!

One month late, she's one month old!

 Caroline was one month old on December 16!  My sweet friend, Kaci, gave me these stickers to put on Caroline for all her "month" birthdays!  Can't wait to see them all lined up in 10 more months!  She has already changed so much - and she has ONLY gotten prettier!  I seriously just look at this precious child nearly all day long, every day, in awe at how absolutely beautiful is.  Her eyes literally make me melt.  I have already decided NO DATING til she's 18 and out of our house!  :)  Ha!

 She was NOT  fan of the puppy dog!

 Parker is becoming such a sweet big brother.  He has stopped asking if "Carowine can go back in Mommy's tummy..."  I think he "gets" that she's here to stay!  He likes to hold her about once a day - for about 5 seconds - then he says, "I'm done!  Get her off!"  He does enjoy giving her kisses and hugs though - sometimes his hugs are a little too hard, but C-Line seldom screams.  I think she knows deep down that she's gotta get used to a rough older brother!

 Tummy time on the day after her 1 month birthday!  Parker LOVES all these new toys we pulled out for Caroline!  This tummy time picture was taken before we found all the little animals that hang from the floor mat!  I had put them away when we put the mat away when Parker was about a year old and I could not remember where I put them! 

First Half of December Catch Up

 I got this picture with my phone and it was included in an email to my boss after he asked how I was doing.  My response was something along the lines of - "How can life not be perfect with this next to me."  So true.  We are so blessed to have a nearly always content, healthy baby!

 First weekend in December - my Sip N See (a southern tradition of inviting close friends/family over after the baby is born to "sip" on tea and "see" the baby!)  All my friends wanted to throw me a shower when I was pregnant but I just really didn't need one.  All my friends were having babies and I was super busy planning showers for them in the summer/fall - I just didn't want to have a shower just to have one.  I really didn't need much and without knowing the gender, it wouldn't be very fun for plan a second baby/gender-less shower!  SO - we compromised on a Sip N See after the baby was born so that people could see the baby, know the gender, and they could have fun with the shower hosting!  My only requests were that the shower would be at my house and I would provide the food.  I won the first request but not the second - another compromise :)  The SNS turned out AWESOME and I could not ask for better friends!  Here are some pictures...

 Our little lady of the hour slept through the entire shower - she was in deep thought and gratitude for all her presents - and diapers!

Literally - a few hours before the Sip N See began, we made the finishing touches to Caroline's room.  Chris and my mom had done most of the makeover when Caroline was just a few days old.  All that needed to be done was paint the blue stripe on the wall pink, change out the bedding with my sister's pink bedding from Kayley's crib, change out the blue lampshade with a pink one (also from Kayley's nursery) and that was pretty much it!  We still have a few more things we want to do, but just haven't gotten around to it.  I have a feeling they may not ever get done considering we made Parker's new room back in July and still haven't "finished" decorating it! 

Caroline loves her ornament outfit from my sister's sister-in-law and mother-in-law.  SO stinking cute - she's actually still wearing it after Christmas because she can :)

We put Miss C-Line in her own crib at only 2.5 weeks old.  She slept AMAZING the first night - 5 hours - which was GREAT since she had really only been sleeping about 3 hours at a time in our room.

I took this picture and immediately thought - GOOD gracious - this child looks NOTHING like her momma!  Which I obviously don't mind considering she looks just like her daddy who I happen to think is VERY handsome!

I helped my sister out by babysitting one morning a week while she went to pilates! Here is Caroline and Garrett together having floor time - they are 3 months apart - such little buddies!

Parker gets VERY jealous when I try to take pictures of Caroline by herself or with someone else... don't ask me why one arm is out of his shirt.  He walked around for about 3 days in December like this... I didn't argue and thankfully on day 4, he decided to keep both arms in his shirt!

My work had our Christmas party at SmokeJacks BBQ the first week of December - it was GREAT to see all my co-workers and their spouses at the party.  Caroline was the HIT of the party of course.  :)

Yes - that is  GIANT brown bow in her hair - the girl never leaves the house without a bow!

And we are having some issues with Parker wanting to wear hair bows now, too... He puts them in himself...

One of the city managers (for my work) in Orlando actually made Caroline a blanket and a hooded towel!  Here she is in her blanket.

After an episode of Dora had Dora and her friends traveling to the moon, Parker had a few days of being obsessed with "going to the moon" and we had to get on the "rocket ship" (aka the couch in the play room, our bed, his bed, etc) and put on our "rocket helmets" (aka a basketball hoop trash can and his clear plastic drum) and pretend we were going to the moon!

In mid December, we had our Life Group Christmas Party!  Here are all the kiddos lined up - Caroline 1 month, Tanner 2 months, Caleb 3 months and Dylan 4 months!

And the mommies!

My family came up for my Nano's funeral (another blog post will be devoted to her) and we enjoyed a fun dinner together at our house.  My mom played my piano and Ashley and the kids sang along - it was too stinkin' cute!

My Poppy is a baby whisperer... he's amazing with babies (and kids too!)

Whit and Garrett...

These three kiddos are TROUBLE!

Ashley and Whitney's son Garrett

Whit with Chris and Ashley's son, Miller - we were all mixed up!

We tried to get a picture with all the girls and all the kids - NOT easy.