Simply Smith

Happy New Year

2011-12-31T20:30:00.002-06:00

I know I haven't blogged lately (ok, not since April...wow) but I've allowed Facebook to take its place and keep everyone apprised of my life and the progression of my children. But the new year has inspired me to blog, not about kids or family or events, but my advice to you and yours for the new year. My advice can cover many aspects of your life and many different kinds of relationships. It covers your home life and your work life, your appearance and health, maybe your resolutions for the new year.

Encouragement. It's the key to everything in my opinion. I read an article yesterday talking about new year's resolutions, specifically weight loss goals which are so common this time of year. It discussed a study done last year with 3 groups of obese Americans - one tracked their food and goals manually in a log, one tracked electronically (an app on your iPhone, for example, or a spreadsheet), and the last and most successful group tracked their progress on an app that gave them encouragement after they entered their info each day. "Great job" or "you're more than halfway to your goal, good work" or even "you still have time for a 10 minute walk before bed."

I've seen this in my life. Some people know I did Quick Weight Loss Center last year and lost about 15 lbs in a couple months. I believe part of the reason their program works (when it does work, that is) is the visits to the counselors 2 or 3 times a week. If you have a good center (mine was Cypress) they take your measurements, weight, etc. and look at your food log. They tell you how great you're doing or tips to get more protein or curb your appetite certain times of the day. But mostly, they encourage you to do more. They don't criticize you for failures. They recognize your successes. There's a bell by the scale to ring when you have lost weight, not a gong they klunk when you gained a pound or two. :)

If you think about it, I'm sure you can think of a handful of situations or relationships that you are drawn to due to positive encouragement. A friend who consistently lifts you up, not blowing smoke at you but sincerely encouraging you to be the better you. A peer or boss at work who praises an achievement and makes you crave that praise some more by consistently improving your work. Your spouse throwing a term of endearment into a text or telling you they like the way that shirt looks. Even Facebook feeds the beast, whether its runkeeper posts (I know a lot of you hide them and I'm okay with that :)) and the praise that ensues when you knock out a good run, to encourage you to do better next time, or a picture you post of yourself and your best friends tell you how great you're looking after losing weight or getting a new hairdo. Encouragement makes you want to continue good behavior, be a better you, excel at what you're good at.

My advice is not only to appreciate the encouragement you're already getting from the people in your life. It's more critical than that. Look at yourself and think about how encouraging you are in your key relationships. Are you telling that employee how grateful you are that they stayed late to finish that project and that their time was well spent on a good work product? Are you telling your girlfriend how much you love her new shoes or that she made the right decision about this or that? Are you reminding your spouse that he looks fabulous in that sweater and he should wear it more often? How much more action comes from encouragement versus criticism? "I really appreciate what you did for me" versus "that was a stupid thing to say." Life's not perfect and you have to criticize in some situations in order to correct behavior, but encouragement of the good behavior will usually get you further faster.

Parents out there are saying "duh Kristi, pretty common knowledge when rearing children" even though we may not always follow the advice. But it works in your other relationships too. Regarding children, I do have a recent example. Hunter has always HATED blowing his nose. Last week, he was fighting it but somehow I convinced him to try. He blew (barely) and I went wild and crazy about how well he did it. He proceeded to blow his nose with all his might, succeeding more and more with practice, even asking me to help him blow his nose last night (for the first time ever). I continue to praise him like a crazy woman every time he does it. I know, silly example, but it works.

So a resolution...if you make one, say diet and/or exercise...find a good, positive accountability partner. Someone you know means well when they ask "what did you eat for lunch?" or "did you get your run in today?" And ask them to remain positive or have them read this blog entry so they know the encouragement you're looking for. Better yet, find someone with similar goals so that you can encourage them as well.

And my resolutions...I will be a more encouraging person, particularly with my kiddos as I'm not as consistent with this as I should be. And also, I will appreciate more...be thankful for what I have, for what people do for me, even if it's their job to do it. I will take encouragement and praise graciously ("thanks for saying that" or a simple "thank you" versus "shut up, that's silly" or "naw, you're just saying that" or various other things I normally say when people try to encourage or compliment me).

Lastly, and somewhat related but distant, I will be open about issues that are troubling me because being encouraging does not mean bottling up anything that isn't positive. If I have a problem with work, for example, the answer isn't to talk about it with my buddies and get everyone worked up about it but instead go to the person responsible and address the issue or find another solution. (You can substitute "work" in previous sentence with anything that fits - family, spouse, kids school, neighborhood, and then substitute "buddies" with spouse, coworkers, neighbors, family, etc.)

Happy New Year to you and yours. I hope 2012 is even better than 2011 was for you. Count your blessings and encourage the people who mean the most to you - I guarantee that it will come back to you in response.

Random videos from 2010

2011-04-02T21:48:00.001-06:00

I started this post nearly a month ago…finally figured out how best to use You Tube and Blogger together.

Forgive me for the wind sound in this first video. I would have put music behind it, but I wanted some of the reactions. This was both Hunter’s and Jenna’s first visit to the beach. We went to Port Aransas last August and they has such a great time!!

Halloween 2010

What a difference one season makes!!! Here is a video montage from Hunter’s first season of soccer at the YMCA. Shyness abounds!!!

Hunter’s Christmas program at school.

And here is Spring Soccer, season 2. What a difference!!!!

San Antonio 2011

2011-03-13T21:01:00.001-06:00

We had a wonderful vacation last week in San Antonio. We took both kids this year and I’m so glad we did because they both had a blast. We stayed at the Hyatt Wild Oak Ranch again this year and loved it. Hunter was excited because he got his own bedroom and it had TWO beds!!! As usual, he was up early every morning and we had to pry Jenna out of bed every morning so that we didn’t waste the day away.

We arrived Tuesday, got settled into the hotel and then headed to the Magic Time Machine for dinner. Cinderella was our waitress but Woody, Zoro and the Pirate dude were never far away. Jenna and Hunter LOVED watching all the characters, but mainly from a distance. They were very hesitant to get side-by-side pictures, but we managed to get a few keepers. :)

Wednesday, we woke up and headed to the zoo. What a gorgeous day we had! Every day was actually perfect – we were blessed with wonderful weather all week. The pool was a little too chilly that afternoon though, so we only stayed long enough for Jenna’s teeth to start chattering.

Thursday was all about Sea World. Last year, we missed the Shamu show, so we made sure to plan our day around the noon Believe show and it worked out great. We got to feed the dolphins and both kiddos loved the aquarium. If Hunter had his way, we would have stayed on the rides all day long! He loved them!!! We rode the Shamu “roller coaster” and the Abby Cadabby twirly thing (see picture). Jenna got to ride the carousel too. And Daddy and Hunter topped the day off with Journey to Atlantis, which is a VERY large version of Splash Mountain. Hunter took it all in stride and loved every second.

I’m a real sap because the Shamu show, Believe, made me teary eyed. The whales were amazing and even the baby whale performed (on the left in the first picture below). Keep in mind while watching the video that I had a child in my lap as well as a bucket of popcorn that she was protecting with her life, while videoing with one hand. Hence, very few pictures that weren’t too blurry to post here. :)

If you look really close, you can see Daddy and Hunter in the next to last row, behind the person with their arms up in the air. :)

After Sea World (and a long nap), we headed back to the pool for another try. The water heater was back up to snuff, especially in the lazy river, which Jenna and Mommy enjoyed thoroughly while Daddy and Hunter swam around the hot tub. We joined them after a lazy float around, but Jenna had her heart set on the splash pad. The girl is fearless, making us incredibly antsy when she would head straight for the pool!!! Oh – Hunter SAID he wanted to try the water slide this year, but once again, we got to the top and the very fast rushing water scared him away. Maybe next year. The pic below shows the indoor part of the pool (and “small” water slide tower) – there is a bigger slide outside, which we didn’t even attempt.

Last but not least, a random video of Jenna eating breakfast (or should I call it brunch) one morning before starting our day.

Blogging Fool

2011-01-28T21:40:00.001-06:00

Three blogs in one day??? What is up with that??? Ironically, I did something similar last January and caught up. Obviously, it isn’t realistic to set a new year’s resolution to blog on a regular basis because I’ll break it before I make it.

We had a fabulous evening tonight. The weather was PERFECT and thankfully, the neighbors were around to enjoy it with us. We had 6 kids out in the cul-de-sac and at least twice as many vehicles. I have yet to get a picture of Hunter on his Lightning McQueen bike, but tonight was his first night to ride it independently. I think he was showing off a bit, so he didn’t want much help, but he did take some advice and learned how to use the brakes, so we are making progress for sure.

Jenna seems to be more brave than the last time we were out on the street with friends. She’s getting closer and closer to Bella, the dog, and she is exploring the various bikes and scooters, calling all the Princess or Barbie insignia “Emma” – not sure if that is because her friend Emma always wears characters on her clothes? Or if she has just associated Emma with pretty girls? No clue, but it’s cute!

This scooter is Megan’s, who is 10 months older than Jenna and wasn’t outside with us tonight, but her brother brought it out of the garage and all the kids wanted to ride it. Jenna was the only one light enough to make it go because the battery needed recharging. She really had a great time, and Hunter did too even though there isn’t picture evidence. :)

So after our outing, we came inside for dinner. Talk about starving kiddos…Jenna missed snack at school because I picked them up early to go home and enjoy the weather, so she immediately went to the table for crackers while Hunter and I scrambled some eggs for dinner. (I could go on and on about dinner and how wonderful it was, but people are sick of me talking about food by now….I get it.)

After dinner, Hunter wanted to play his “game” on my iPad. And Jenna wanted to watch his every move (very typical – he is her American Idol, no doubt).

Ah, the rare picture where I catch Jenna smiling AND her eyes open!!! Of course, I took a zillion pics of her and only got a few keepers.

Daddy was working (busy time of year for both of us right now) and Jenna was admiring him…really wanting to type on his laptop with him. She’s giving him the stare down here…

And because I took so many shots of Jenna, Hunter finally took a break from the iPad and asked to say CHEESE. What a handsome little man we created….gotta love him…

After a long day and wonderful evening, those babies were tired. So tired that Hunter didn’t complain when I told him he had to turn the computer off and head upstairs. So tired that Jenna was laying her head down on the ottoman…snuggling with the leather. So tired that they cackled at each other in the bathtub and I SO wished I had brought my video camera upstairs with me. I need blackmail pictures and videos before they are too old to bathe together….they have so much fun (most of the time). It’s a joy!!!

Some New Plates

2011-01-28T21:04:00.001-06:00

You may remember about a year ago when I posted pictures of the bowls I made for my nieces and nephews, and the plate I made for Jenna. Well, I did that again before Christmas but focused on the neglected Hunter, and also did a “Happy Everything” platter.

They turned out really great and I have to thank my good friend and neighbor, Kristi, for continuing to invite me to these Make-A-Plate parties hosted by Janelle Janish. Her website is http://janellejanish.myctmh.com/.

Her blog is also wonderful - http://stampandthecity.blogspot.com/. Check it out when you have a minute. I can’t wait for the next one of these parties….might have to host one myself!!!

Here is a reminder of Jenna’s…we aren’t using it yet because it’s too cute on display in her bedroom. I love how vibrant the colors were on hers…

More Christmas (a month later)

2011-01-28T20:39:00.001-06:00

So I did really good to get our at-home pictures up the day of Christmas, but now it’s over a month later and here I am going through all the other pics from the holiday.

Merry Christmas 2010

2010-12-25T14:40:00.001-06:00

Is it possible? Could I possibly get Christmas pictures up the actual day of Christmas?? I’m going to do my best!!!

Twas the night before Christmas and all through the house a little bit of smoke billowed from the oven from overcooked cookies…(that doesn’t rhyme, does it?)

We started a tradition last year and continued this year by decorating cookies for Santa on Christmas Eve. Of course, all of the slice-n-bake cookies were sold out, so I had to improvise. They weren’t great, but at least the second batch I flattened so that they could be decorated a little easier. See if you can guess who was responsible for each cookie. Hint, Jenna didn’t do any…

Not too unbelievable, but I didn’t get a picture of Hunter’s bike?? He was very excited. And he also enjoyed unwrapping his helmet, which Santa decided needed to be wrapped in tin foil…very creative, that Santa…

Hunter was very helpful to Jenna in unwrapping her gifts. And I mean that…he didn’t take them away from her, but helped her gently. THEN he took them away. :)

Note that Jenna has one of Hunter’s gifts beside her in that last pic, so he wasn’t the only one “sharing” toys. :)

And I managed to get some video on my camera that easily syncs to this computer, so you get the joy of some video footage of the little ones. YAY!!!

Merry Christmas to everyone, and thanks to everyone who sent beautiful Christmas cards. Our Christmas wall of cards really brightened the family room and I loved seeing everyone’s families or reading your Christmas letters. Enjoy the rest of the holidays with your loved ones.

Wordle.net

2010-12-22T11:32:00.001-06:00

Created at www.wordle.net

Quote from the site: "Wordle is a toy for generating “word clouds” from text that you provide. The clouds give greater prominence to words that appear more frequently in the source text. You can tweak your clouds with different fonts, layouts, and color schemes. The images you create with Wordle are yours to use however you like. You can print them out, or save them to the Wordle gallery to share with your friends."

Hunter and Santa

2010-12-20T21:20:00.001-06:00

I’m not sure if all 3-year-old boys are like mine, but Hunter is not a very well-behaved child. I thought surely our “Elf on the Shelf” would help this year…the threat that Gussa (our elf) would go to the North Pole at night to tell Santa how naughty or nice Hunter had been…not so much. It works occasionally, but not as often as I would like.

Nonetheless, Hunter did get to tell Santa what he wants for Christmas. Here was his list (in order of appearance):

1. a Buzz Lightyear as big as the Christmas Tree (this was nixed from the list before sitting on Santa’s lap, thankfully)

2. a bike (we trained him well)

3. a car (the kid has at least 40 cars, but alas, he wants more)

4. a transformer (this was added after he sat on Santa’s lap, but was appropriately communicated to Gussa to relay up the chain)

The reason Jenna’s name is nowhere to be found in the title of this post is because she refused to get within 3 feet of Santa and kicked and screamed when I put her on his lap. Thankfully, we hadn’t stood in line long at all because this was an unexpected Santa sighting at our community center on “snow day” which was very cool. I felt incredibly guilty for taking pleasure in all of the activities, having come empty handed since we were just walking to the park!!

Jenna will get good reports from Gussa though. He sees her pick up her toys (and Hunter’s) every night, without any complaints. He sees her go to her daddy for night-night wishes and kisses like the sweet angel that she is. Gussa hears her trying so hard to say words like “Hunter” and “football” and succeeding at saying her favorite “mama” as well as dada, shoes, ball, nigh-nigh, bye-e-e-e-e, and a handful of other words.

Hunter also had a very successful Christmas caroling presentation at school last week. I actually didn’t take any pictures apparently and only got video, which I will have to work on getting on here because those kids are just awesome!! And Hunter was very good at yelling to his friends when he spotted their parents (“Emily, there’s your daddy.” “Landon, I see your mommy.”).

New York New York

2010-11-27T20:27:00.001-06:00

I’m very sad to say that I did not get a picture of my highlight of the trip…we went to Restaurant Marc Forgione to eat dinner the night we went to Caroline’s Comedy Club (see pic below). If you don’t know who Marc is, he is the latest winner of The Next Iron Chef on Food Network. He hadn’t won when we were there (early November) but he was one of my favorites, partially because a coworker went to school with him and knows him well enough to tell him we were coming to his restaurant. He became my absolute favorite that night because he not only cooked an incredible meal, but he was SO humble and kind when he came out to say hello. I really, really should have begged him to let me take a picture with him because I’ve been obsessed ever since. Best celebrity meeting ever!!

Some pictures around Times Square…

From Top of the Rock observatory…

The first pic below was this neat little playground in Central Park. I was sitting on a huge rock formation just behind it. It was a GORGEOUS day! The next two pics were also around Central Park.

Various statues and fountains…

Saint Patrick’s Cathedral, outside and in…

Another best part of the trip that we don’t have pictures of was our Wicked experience. Best play ever!! The actors in this musical were the best I’ve ever seen on stage, especially Galinda. We had terrific seats too. It was a fabulous evening.

The rest of our trip consisted mainly of eating great food…and of course, catching a movie one cold afternoon when we were tired of shivering outside. It was a great trip and I hope we continue this November ritual!

Company Picnic

2010-11-19T21:36:00.001-06:00

Had a blast at the zoo back in October. We even ran into Hunter’s best friend, Landon, and his family. Small world!! Of course, you couldn’t miss us in our bright blue Swift shirts!

Halloween 2010

2010-11-03T20:55:00.001-06:00

It was Toy Story year for the Smith kiddos. Hunter was Buzz Lightyear and Jenna was Rex the dinosaur. Here are some pictures from their Fall Festival at school and from Halloween night, after we were done trick-or-treating and were handing out candy at the house.

Fall Festival

Hunter and his best buddy, Landon. Hunter says that Landon is the REAL Buzz Lightyear.

Waiting for more people to come ring the doorbell…they liked giving candy almost as much as getting it!

I actually took quite a bit of video Sunday night, but who knows how long it will take me to download it…maybe in 2011…

Vacation - August

2010-11-02T21:59:00.001-06:00

Wow! I’m behind. But I blame my camera because I had to get a new battery just so that I could download the pictures from it!! Plus, I’m about to go on another vacation, so I should probably post the pictures from the August trip before I post the November pics, right??

Hunter first – pool, beach, lunch with Mommy, all so much fun…

And sweet Baby Jenna. She loved the beach so much….such a happy baby…

Hands always up in the air. She was cautious, but at the same time, she LOVED the sand. So much that she tried to eat it. :)

Quick picture

2010-10-26T08:24:00.003-05:00

Of my lovely Jenna...

Jenna - first words

2010-10-13T21:04:00.004-05:00

Jenna has been babbling for awhile, but we were starting to notice she wasn't really even calling us mama and dada like a normal 14-month-old might. We weren't concerned, since she was definitely hearing us and responding to things, but no "real" words except uh-oh, which she has been saying at all the right times for months now.

Tonight - breakthrough!!! I had just this week started noticing she was picking up some sign language, mostly the sign for "all done." I'm embarassed to say that I didn't realize her version of all done until the teacher told me she was doing it because her version looks very similar to her waving, except its both hands. But tonight, without any prompting, she was having a snack to tide her over until a later dinner, and when her crackers were gone, she put her little hands in the air, twisting them around similar to a wave, and said "ah duh" at the same time. Clear as a bell!! Of course, she wouldn't replicate for daddy....typical.

Here is a list of other neat little things about my precious baby girl.

1. Her favorite thing to do is peekaboo, which comes in handy during diaper changes when I need her hands to stay away from the diaper area!

2. She is very good at blowing kisses - its a very vibrant MUAH sound with each blown kiss. And she will even put her hand on your mouth and do the sound for you if you want.

3. Jenna gives kisses on command (most of the time) or shakes her head no if she doesn't want to give it up. And she is big on waving (Hunter never waved as a baby). I almost forgot that she LOVES giving high fives...sometimes might get confused and think it gives her the right to hit her friends....but it doesn't hurt....much. :)

4. She is obsessed with the fuzzy underside of her carseat cover - there is a space where she can get to it and she picks at it and pulls it apart while riding in the car. So we have fuzz to deal with just about every car trip.

5. Speaking of carseats, she is still rear-facing because my little munchkin is still only 19 lbs and some ounces. I think we'll keep her in the carrier rear-facing for at least another month or two - she has to be 20 lbs to face forward, and the carrier carseat lasts to 22 lbs.

6. Her teachers brag on her daily about how good she is about getting her "work" off the shelf, taking it to her mat, and putting it back on the shelf when she is done. If you aren't familiar with Montessori schools, "work" at this age is toys, but they keep toys in bins which have a particular place on the shelf. And they have a place on the floor that is theirs and theirs alone, which she takes her work to, plays with it, and puts it up when she's done. She's 14 months old!!! Hunter didn't start Montessori until he was already 2, so this concept took awhile for him. She'll be a pro by the time she hits the 2-year-old class.

7. Jenna is a very active little girl. She wants to walk everywhere and doesn't like to stay in her stroller for too long at soccer games or practice. She would walk right onto the field if we let her (and did at last week's practice). She walks so fast sometimes that she just falls over herself, but picks herself right back up without a second thought. She seems like she's going to be a tough little girl, which doesn't surprise me a bit - look at her momma!

8. She refuses to keep a bow in her hair, which is growing at a pretty good pace now. It's starting to curl a little at the ends, but its too early to say whether it will be curly or just wavy. Trust me - her hair will be as long as it will grow. Neither of us want to cut it for a LONG time.

9. Jenna sleeps SO well. 11-12 hours every night...she has only woken up during the night once in the past few months, and I think that was just because a new sitter put her to bed and she wanted her mommy. And she goes down for naps with zero hesitation at home (not so easy at school, but probably just because of all the distractions).

10. She's gorgeous and perfect in every way. I'm sure we aren't partial because we at least compare her to her brother and recognize she's cuter than he was at this age. LOL - Hunter, please don't get mad at me someday when you read this. She's cute - admit it!! :)

More soccer pictures

2010-09-29T21:12:00.001-05:00

First, from practice last Thursday…

#1 Cheerleader!

Stretching and getting warmed up

Peek-a-boo to pass the time

And game #2 last Saturday. We didn’t get any pictures of Hunter playing goalie, but I’m proud to say he was the best! Not one goal scored on him, and that says a lot because the other team scored a lot of goals the rest of the game. :)

Go team!!!

Hunter’s First Soccer Game

2010-09-18T21:23:00.001-05:00

The pictures don’t do it justice, that is for sure.

Hunter played his first soccer game this morning and we learned a lot of lessons:

1. We haven’t really learned this one yet, but we know now that we NEED to learn it. It’s okay if someone takes the ball from you….just make sure you go get it back from them. :) Defense is probably a little difficult to teach 3-year-olds though.

2. Make sure he eats plenty of breakfast so that the excuse “I’m hungry” doesn’t work.

3. Don’t rush to get there early….no one else will get there before 5 minutes before the game starts.

4. Pouting and/or crying is fairly normal in this situation as at least half of his teammates did it at one point or another.

5. Last but not least, it WILL get better and they will continue looking super cute in their cleats and shin guards.

First 24 hours of Port Aransas vacation

2010-08-20T11:01:00.004-05:00

We had a rough start...Jenna threw up ALL over herself, the carseat, everywhere before we even got out of Sugarland. Amazingly, you would never believe she was sick the rest of the day - I really thought she just gagged on something, not sick. She was in a great mood, took a couple of naps, stayed up late at a restaurant and was an angel. Then she woke up covered in it again this morning - poor thing. Diarrhea, the whole bit. The picture below was at around 8:30 last night, at the restaurant. She didn't get to bed for over an hour after this, but stayed in a great mood.

But because she's a trooper, I thought I would still take them to the beach this morning as promised, while Daddy was doing some offshore fishing with the boys. Even though I knew we wouldn't be out there long, we hit the beach just after 8 am. It was perfect, except when she ate sand... :) This was a first for both of my kiddos and they loved it. I can't wait to take them again, when I have an extra set of hands to get more pictures.

While we were playing on the beach, Daddy was fishing his heart out. And low and behold, he caught a 5 ft 80 lb shark!!!

More later, but while Jenna was napping (over 2 hours so far), I thought I would document our first day. Oh, and Hunter apparently learned about silly bands at school, so he has also been an angel today (new reward system). He was an absolute terror yesterday, not doing anything we asked him to do....just really bad. Hopefully, we're on the mend and the rest of the weekend will be a blast.

Quick update

2010-08-14T21:41:00.001-05:00

Jenna had a couple of doctors’ appointments this week. The first was the dreaded eye doctor. He told me it would be a good idea to bring her in at 12 months since her brother’s eyes are so bad. Thankfully, her eyes are not as bad as Hunter’s. All they can measure at this stage is astigmatism and she’s about a +2.5 in each eye (nearsighted). Since it doesn’t seem to be affecting her development, no glasses at this point. Yay! He said some doctors might prescribe glasses, but he wants to wait.

Her other appointment was her one year well baby visit. She’s doing great, but still on the small side. 10th percentile on weight and height…no wonder it looks so weird for her to be walking already. And she still has a monster head (97th percentile)…my kids and their big heads…they get it from me, I can’t deny it….

Jenna also started the bigger infant class this week and over night, she was walking all over the place. Last week, she pretty much would walk a straight line from somewhere to mommy. Monday, she was independently taking off from one place to another. This continued throughout the week, so she is officially walking now. I can’t believe how quickly this happens!!! My baby is now a toddler!!!

And my toddler is a big kid…Hunter got his hair cut again this week and it makes him look ever older than he already looks. He has a habit of twirling his hair, so he’s got a pretty bad bald spot, and I think he had started twirling just above his forehead because it was getting really difficult to “fix” and not look super thin. So we chopped it off, hoping he won’t be able to catch it and pull it out while twirling. Keep in mind that we NEVER actually see him twirling his hair. He’s either doing it in his sleep, or after we put him to bed, or in the morning before we get upstairs. He’s very covert…

We are headed to Port Aransas on Thursday. Everyone is very excited, especially Hunter because he wants to see where Nemo lives. A much needed vacation. Will post pictures once we are back.

Jenna’s 1st Birthday Party

2010-08-07T20:50:00.001-05:00

Pictures say a thousand words…

I just realized I never got a full length picture of Jenna in her outfit and matching birthday hat. And you can’t tell but she’s dancing in that next to last picture – dancing to the lamb-baby singing “Mary had a little lamb” from Grandmommy and Papa.

Thanks to everyone for coming to Jenna’s tea party and helping us celebrate!!

Happy Birthday to US!

2010-08-04T20:43:00.001-05:00

And I thought my last birthday was special…little did I know that every birthday from now on, I get the greatest present…my baby girl, year after year, she’ll bring joy to my heart. I’m the luckiest mommy in the world.

(Thank you Amanda for this beautiful dress. I know you gave it to us a while back, but she is finally tall enough to wear it and I love it to pieces.)

Celebrating 90 Years with a GREAT Lady!!

2010-08-02T20:59:00.001-05:00

We celebrated Great Grannie’s 90-year birthday yesterday in Round Top. She, Jenna and I share a birthday, which makes this year so extra special. Jenna turning 1 and Great Grannie turning 90. I’m not quite in the middle of those two ages yet thankfully…a few years younger. :)

I got a lot of great pictures and want to share them with the family. Thank you Shayne, Shelley, Shelby and Susie for planning and executing a great party.

4 generations…Grannie, Mema, Brent & kids…Grannie, Stuart, Shelley and Brayden.

I love this one of Grannie with all her grandkids and great-grandkids.

Birthday girls…

Isn’t Jenna’s cupcake cake adorable??? Thank you Susie!!

I took that last one at home before we left – this dress was SO cute. Thank you Rachel and Ava!!

Picture Happy

2010-07-26T19:57:00.001-05:00

Lots of great picture opportunities the past few days…

Water Park on Saturday

Sunday morning nightgown picture op…

Spaghetti face and first pigtail (tonight)

And Hunter with his bo-bo above his left eye, crooked glasses (from his bo-bo at school) and pudding on his face and shirt….ah, the joys of a 3-year-old.

2010-07-18T15:31:00.001-05:00

Baby girl had her picture taken last weekend. I can’t believe she’s about to be one already. It is going by WAY too fast.

She’s walking well now, but her main motivation is still just getting to mama (which she is repeating very well now…mamamamama). She did walk away from me towards a toy yesterday - progress.

She loves to eat anything with marinara sauce on it, which of course makes a huge mess, but her cherub face is still precious stained orange. And she can eat a pack of yogurt melts in one sitting.

Happy Birthday Aidan!

2010-07-10T19:25:00.001-05:00

We went to Hunter’s friend Aidan’s birthday party today at Pump it Up. What a great place for a birthday party!! All the kids had a blast. The parents too!!

The birthday boy, Aidan and lots of friends!

And Jenna had her picture taken this afternoon at the house, so I took some shots of her after the photographer left. I love this outfit, even though the pants are too long!

Happy 4th and Jenna’s 11 Months Old!

2010-07-04T20:36:00.001-05:00

You have to turn your head to watch video of some of Jenna’s first steps.

Enough hair for a BOW!

2010-07-03T09:02:00.001-05:00

Jenna slept late this morning and when she woke up, I was determined to get a bow in her hair. :)

You can see her two bottom teeth, which have been in for awhile. Her third, on top, has cut through finally and the fourth is right behind the skin.

Lots of Firsts

2010-06-30T20:01:00.001-05:00

Hunter’s First Movie

We took Hunter to his first movie in the theater this past weekend. We went to see Toy Story 3 and he was mesmerized. There were LOTS of previews and every time one came on he was like “That’s not Toy Story.” We had watched the first 2 at home over the past couple of weeks, so he was familiar with the characters, of course. He waffles on his favorite but its usually Buzz, sometimes Jessie.

Jenna’s First Steps

Jenna took one step a few times over this past weekend, but never more than one. Usually she is trying to get to mama as she has become a big-time mama’s girl (which you know just makes me miserable – not). Word on the street is that she took FOUR STEPS today at school!!! We can only get her to do 2 or 3 steps at home. But she’ll be taking lots of steps before her 11-month birthday this weekend, no doubt.

I keep repeating this over and over to people who ask me how the kids are, but it really is true. It is SO weird to see Jenna taking steps because she’s so incredibly small compared to what her big brother looked like when he was starting to walk. Hunter was 15 months and a BIG kid – she’s not even 11 months and is tiny. So she really looks like a baby walking instead of a toddler. It’s really strange for Mommy, and makes me feel like it is going by WAY too fast.

First Day of Swim Lessons

We signed the kids up for swim lessons – Hunter by himself with the teacher and Jenna doing a “mom and me” class. I was really nervous last week after I signed them up. I think I was fearful Hunter would be one of two extremes – fearless and jump in without anyone close enough to catch him or fearful and not wanting to get in without Mommy.

Their first day was yesterday and both did great! Hunter got in with his teacher, Miss Katie, with no problem. I immediately escaped to my corner of the pool with the mom-and-me class and watched him from a distance. His biggest challenge is that he doesn’t understand blowing bubbles under the water. His instinct is to suck, which is obviously BAD!!! Jenna, however, is a water baby no doubt. She loved it when she laid on my chest, both on her front and back, and I kicked her legs for her. But her favorite part was when I dipped the side of her face and her ear into the water – I think it tickled her because she giggled with joy every time. She even went UNDER WATER – babies apparently instinctively close their mouths and hold their breath when completely submerged.

I didn’t get any great pictures of any of these milestones, but I did shoot this one with my phone. Hunter and Miss Katie were already in the middle of the pool by the time I went to take my shoes off and pull out my phone for a picture!

Father’s Day 2010

2010-06-21T08:02:00.001-05:00

Here is a picture they did at school for Hunter to give Daddy for Father’s Day. I LOVE it!!!

We had a great Father’s Day and Daddy loved his cards and gift. Church was awesome – the sermon series they just started was on leaving your legacy, and I’m sure you can imagine what the pastor could discuss about that on Father’s Day.

Hunter’s 3rd Birthday

2010-05-31T21:46:00.001-05:00

I’m ashamed at how few pictures we got on Saturday! Forgive me for slacking!! Hunter had a wonderful time at his party. Thanks to everyone who could make it and jump around with us. I do have lots of video, but will have to get that downloaded another time.

Surrounded by girls and opening gifts…doesn’t get much better than that!!! We had two sets of twin girls at the party. He’s starting young!!

I’m also hoping to get pictures and/or video from Saturday night at Brent’s cousin’s graduation party. She had everyone sing Happy Birthday to Hunter before she gave her speech. It was SO special and brought tears to my eyes. Keep in mind – graduation parties in Round Top/Carmine are 200+ people, so it was very cool. Thank you, Shelby, for being so unselfish on your special day.

Jenna – 9 months

2010-05-09T08:25:00.001-05:00

Jenna turned 9 months old last week. Here are some of her favorite things:

1. Hunter or any of Hunter’s toys

2. Clicking her tongue

3. Cords – she seems drawn to electrical things and their cords. Takes child proofing to a whole new level.

4. Pulling up and STANDING up – I can get her into standing position and she will stand by herself for a couple seconds. She is very sturdy and balanced. I predict she’ll be walking by 11 months at the latest.

5. Tags – she prefers the tags on stuffed animals more than the stuffed animal itself. :)

Jenna is absolutely precious these days. She smiles at Mommy and Daddy all the time. She adores her big brother. She’s going through a Mommy stage where she wants me to pick her up or hold her anytime she sees me – makes it difficult to be around other family members that want to hold her. But Mommy sure does appreciate it!!

I don’t have any new pictures of Jenna, but I do have some from the last few months that I don’t think I posted. I will try to get some of us together today, since it is MY day!! :)

Pictures say a thousand words

2010-04-24T21:39:00.001-05:00

Jenna’s first trip to the “water park” in our neighborhood was quite the success. She was FEARLESS!! Crawled right to the middle of the fountain so that I had to go “save” her for fear she would allow the water to engulf her. It was a beautiful day and we took every advantage of it. Thank you God for your many blessings!!

The third shot was an accidental photo….why are those always the best? Probably because of the great angle…

Hmmm…what’s that over there???

Oh, it’s just water. What harm can a little water be???

Just barely missed!

A closeup of her soaked face…she was SO into it, but was also happy to get into dry clothes. What a great day!

Hunter’s first Astros game

2010-04-22T21:44:00.001-05:00

And Daddy’s first caught fowl ball! Yes, we put an exclamation point on Hunter’s first baseball game when Brent caught a fowl ball while I was taking Hunter to potty. So we missed it but got the play-by-play from everyone around us when we got back. It was very exciting!!

Hunter also had his first peanuts and cracked them open all by himself! It was too cute. He had his first snow cone (what a mess) and tried his first Cracker Jacks but didn’t like them (who wouldn’t like candy covered popcorn??).

Here are some great pictures from the big day. Oh, and this was the Astros 7th loss to start the season…I have no clue how they’re doing at this point but it can’t be good…

Free Photo Canvas

2010-04-07T21:11:00.002-05:00

Go to this link, one of my favorites. Then scroll down to the picture that looks kinda like this.

I haven't gotten mine yet - just ordered one with Baby Jenna's Easter picture. We'll see how it is before I'm willing to pay for one. :)

San Antonio 2010

2010-04-07T21:03:00.001-05:00

(I put this post together weeks ago and just realized it never posted because I had gone over my BLOGGER limit! Oops!!)

Hunter went on his very first vacation this month. We went to San Antonio for a few days – stayed at the Hyatt Wild Oak Ranch, which is right across the highway from Sea World.

Hunter started his vacation at the farm, at Mema’s house. He and Jenna headed that way after her baptism so that Mommy and Daddy could have some time alone without the kids. Mommy actually had complete aloneness (is that a word?) while Daddy went out of town for work. Talk about an empty nest!! That is when I posted all those pictures to catch up, at 1:00 in the morning, because sleeping in this empty house wasn’t easy.

Jenna stayed with Mema and Pa the whole week, but I did get to see her briefly when they brought Hunter to us in Columbus on our way out of town. We were on our way!!!

The hotel was superb! It was a one-bedroom apartment, fully loaded with a huge bathroom and nice sized kitchen (for a hotel). If you haven’t been here or to the Hyatt Hill Country (which is right down the road), you HAVE to stay there next time you go to San Antonio. The main benefit of Wild Oak Ranch vs Hill Country is the condo atmosphere (separate bedrooms for the kids) and the indoor/outdoor heated pool. Not to brag or anything, but God was very good to us when he set the weather map up that week. It was 40-something in the morning and 70-something in the afternoon – hardly a cloud in the sky.

Now, the pictures, because I know that’s all you come here for anyway. Not to read my ramblings.

Hunter couldn’t seem to take naps when we wanted him to on this trip. He fell asleep about 20 minutes before we got to the hotel the first day – a 2-hour car ride and he would NOT fall asleep, until we wanted him to be looking out the window, anxious to see where we were headed!

These were taken on our balcony. You may be able to see under the windmill in the picture with just Hunter, there was a water slide that started there. There was one outside and one inside. Hunter climbed up with me to the one inside, but decided to go back down the stairs. A bit scary with that water rushing out at you!

We had so much fun at the pool. I think we went every day except the last day we were there. Hunter was fearless, which scared me to death. So he’ll be starting swim lessons in May!

Hunter waiting for us to get ready to leave for the zoo. This was our bedroom and Hunter slept on the fold-away bed in the living room. Only disadvantage to that was that we were on the 3rd floor which had a skylight, so when the sun came up, Hunter was up. This was before DST started, so he was up before 7:00 every day. We’ll get a 2-bedroom next time, for sure!

The kimono dragon is the closest thing to a dinosaur at the San Antonio zoo. We didn’t get to see the real deal, but I think Hunter thought he was actually sitting on a dinosaur. At least, that is what he was calling it!

And we did the Riverwalk boat tour, with Mexican food to follow. Can’t beat that!

The hotel also had a playground, which we didn’t realize until the last full day at the hotel, but Hunter was a very happy camper there. We spent that whole day at the hotel, just chillin, swimmin, playin. Even tried the lazy river, if you call sticking your foot in to see how cold it is “trying” it. They had just turned the heater on the night before for the lazy river, so it hadn’t quite gotten up to par for my liking.

Probably don’t need to tell you where these pictures are from. They are a bit out of order because I wanted to put the pics with Shamu first, just because they depict how great the day was. Next time, we will spend at least 2 days at Sea World. Hunter could have stayed there forever if we’d let him. We watched one show (Azul), fed the sea lions, tried to pet the dolphins in their feeding pool, hunted for sharks and I don’t remember what else. Oh, and we ate Turkey Legs…can’t beat that!

The guy who starts the show at Azul literally sat down right next to Daddy. We didn’t have a clue when he was rustling past us to take his seat that he was going to be the star of the show. It was a great show and I took a zillion pictures, but my camera wasn’t nearly fast enough. I need to learn some tricks with it before we take our next trip.

Jenna – 8 months

2010-04-06T01:09:00.001-05:00

I get a lot of comments about Jenna looking like Hunter, but I just do NOT see it. Let’s compare again, shall we???

It’s not the easiest comparison, but her eyes are more squinty like mine are when I smile. And her ears don’t stick out like his do. :) Or maybe the hats and bows just distract the eyes so you don’t see the big ears.

Jenna has one tooth and is crawling all over the place. She has pulled up to her knees pretty often, and has pulled all the way to her feet while leaning on Mommy (probably helps to have that moral support). She’s about 15 lbs now, maybe a little more, and had her first ear infection at the end of March. We’ll go back later this week to make sure it’s gone.

Here are some other cute pictures of Jenna over the past week or so.

Future Soccer player????

Testing Windows Live Writer with new Template

2010-04-06T00:39:00.001-05:00

I love that picture…

Under Construction

2010-04-05T23:10:00.000-05:00

Please ignore my horrible temporary template...working on something new...

Happy Easter - 2010

2010-04-04T23:06:00.002-05:00

Jesus has risen – He has risen indeed!! And he has blessed me with beautiful children. Thank you Lord for a wonderful Easter Sunday!!

loves

her

much…

Happy St. Patrick’s Day

2010-03-18T01:53:00.001-06:00

I have a new camera and I think the file sizes must be HUGE because my import process is only 5% complete and I started more than 5 minutes ago…

Reaching back to 2008, here is a picture of Hunter in his St. Patty’s Day onesie (with Jake in the background….Jake will have to wait for another post).

And here is Jenna in the same outfit – I love that his clothes shrunk enough that these holiday wear items fit her even though she’s 2 months behind him and TINY.

And my babies together…so loving…

Various pictures in 2010

2010-03-09T01:14:00.001-06:00

If you didn’t already know, the babies are both in Round Top tonight. They went back with Mema and Pa Sunday after the baptism festivities. I think I would consider this my “withdrawl post.” Two nights without my babies and still another night to go. Then I will see Jenna briefly when we meet the crew to pick up Hunter on our way to San Antonio on Wednesday, for his first official vacation. I woke up numerous times last night, looking for their monitors on my side table…they weren’t there. And the clock just kept ticking away.

Here it is, 1:00 am on Tuesday, and I’m still awake, thinking of my babies and my hubby, who is also out of town on business. I’m pretty sure this is the first time I’ve been completely alone overnight without at least a baby in the house, since Hunter was born…kind of strange…I can’t wait to see them again. And probably the first time since Brent and I were married over 7 years ago that I haven’t at least had a dog to keep me company. Jake also went to the country, but permanently. His uncontrollable “tee-tee and poo-poo” and incessant whining when we had to put him outside due to said problem got to be too much for us to handle. Thankfully, when we tell the kids “Jake went to the farm,” it will be the truth and not some myth because he has passed away!

So here are some pictures, that helped tide me over. Hopefully they will tide you over too, until you see them again, or until the next post at least.

Just a swingin…

Other pics of Jenna – same day, I think…

Jenna at 6 months – she and Hunter have SO much fun together!

Eating her dress above…literally. And below, her sleep position. It was new at the time I took this, but that was a month ago…

Jenna’s First Valentine’s Day – thank you to Marie and Megan for giving us this gorgeous “Sex in the City” dress. At least that’s what we call it. It’s very “couture.” :)

Jenna at 7 months

Hunter “Reading”

2010-03-09T00:36:00.001-06:00

I just realized that I got “God our Father” at the end of this video. LOVE IT!!! And of course, you know, since Hunter is only 2, he isn’t reading – he just has the book memorized. Funny thing is, once he did memorize it, he totally moved on. He hasn’t asked for the Mickey book since a day or two after I took this video.

Link to video on Facebook, since Google doesn’t like me...

I really hope I can get the video function working tomorrow because I have a lot of videos I’m about to string together and add music to the background and I really want it saved here and not on stinkin Facebook…

Jenna’s Baptism

2010-03-08T23:43:00.001-06:00

Jenna was baptized yesterday morning, March 7, at Lakewood United Methodist Church in Cypress, Texas. It was a beautiful service with a beautiful baby, and we were surrounded by our loving families. Thanks so much to those of you able to join us. It was a blessed day!

Google isn’t letting me post a video tonight, so I will try to give you a link to it on Facebook. <<<<That gray text means it’s a link…Let me know if it does or doesn’t work. If it doesn’t, I will try again tomorrow.

Jenna – 7 months

2010-03-04T22:04:00.001-06:00

My baby girl is changing daily now…this past weekend, she was still doing the tripod sit. Now, she can sit up all by herself while playing with toys or doing whatever else she wants to do. And she’s not just doing pushups (literally hands and toes on the ground, with her body in a plank), but she’s getting her knees under her – she looks to be so close to crawling. And I copied this from a blog about Hunter moving around when he was almost 9 months old - “The best way [s]he's figured out to move is to go backwards, and then turn around…” Basically, she can get anywhere she wants to go but that’s usually a 4 foot radius of where I put her down. She’s way ahead of where her brother was at this point though. It’s a lot of fun to watch.

Jenna went in for a vaccine today – we spread them out and try to do one each month instead of 3 or 4 at a time at each well baby visit. She weighed in at 14 lb 8 oz, which appears to be closer to the 50th percentile line on the baby girl growth chart, so maybe she’s catching up with her peers??? She still looks like a 4-month-old – she’s tiny!!

I did get some pictures and video, but still don’t have a thumb drive to transfer them to the computer. Maybe next week while I’m on vacation…and I’ll have lots of pictures to put up since Jenna is getting baptized on Sunday, then spending the week in the country with Brent’s family while we take Hunter to San Antonio for his first official vacation. He has NO CLUE what is coming…it will be SO much fun!!

Some of my favorite things

2010-02-20T21:44:00.001-06:00

Jenna and Hunter took their very first bath together tonight. It was so precious. They love each other so much. Jenna loved sitting up in her tub seat and Hunter put water on her little head with his hands. I’ll just have to monitor how long the bath takes because I think Jenna was getting pretty cold while I scrubbed her brother from head to toe. Had to dowse her with warm water!!

Jenna is also sitting up by herself really well now. I love how she throws her arms up and down, hitting her belly, when she’s sitting up. Like she’s saying “Yay me!!!!”

Hunter now gets to walk to the park instead of riding in the double stroller with his sister. I love how he runs ahead of us on the path and stops when we tell him to because he’s getting too far ahead. And I love how he stays close to the stroller when he realizes that Jenna is cackling at his goofy running and hopping.

I love how they have to see each other as we walk down the stairs together ever morning. Jenna and I go down a few steps ahead of Hunter so that she can look up at him while he figures out which way he’s going to come down – jumping is the favorite these days since Jenna laughs and laughs each jump/step.

Jenna absolutely loves to sit in her high chair with 3 or 4 toys on the tray and either bangs them as loud as she can, or sees how fast she can throw them all on the floor. It is a wonderful game to see how fast Mommy can then find them all and put them back on the tray, only to be thrown again less than a minute later.

I love that my son knows more than I realize he knows. I thought he said something about a trapezoid on the way home from school the other day, but I wasn’t sure. So today when we were playing with his magnadoodle thing, I decided to draw one and see if he knew what it was. “Trapezoid” he said. I told Daddy to come see how smart his son is and he repeated the feat for him. He also named the typical shapes (circle, triangle, square, star, heart) as well as oval and diamond. When I drew a hexagon, he called it an octagon, so they apparently have taught him the general shape, but he doesn’t know yet to count the sides. The only word he recognizes is his own name, at least from what I can tell. And Mickey Mouse, if I say the letters for him, but that’s cheating because I sing him the song all the time. :)

I love nuzzling Jenna under her chin with my nose to make her smile or laugh. She’s so ticklish and has the best giggle.

I love how Hunter puts the word “silly” at the end of most of his sentences, like “Don’t do that silly” or “That’s not right silly.” I call him silly way too often apparently.

I love my kiddos. What more can I say??

So much for that resolution

2010-02-15T21:36:00.001-06:00

Did I say weekly???

I have been taking lots of pictures, but still don’t have an easy way to get them onto this computer, so you’ll have to wait to see Jenna’s “Sex in the City” dress she wore on Valentine’s Day, pictures of them swinging together at the park (multiple gorgeous days over the past few weeks, interspersed with all the cold and rain), and the adorable pictures I got of her playing with Hunter on her 6-month birthday. Instead, you have to see old pictures from Christmas because that is all I have access to right now. :)

Wow, what a difference a few days makes. Hunter helped me decorate the tree this year. I use a lot of unbreakable balls so I let him just stick them wherever he wanted. Note the long hair, and then scroll down to the Christmas Eve pictures and you’ll see the butcher job I did on him. It’s still growing out 2 months later. It will never be as long or as short as the pictures below, that is for sure!

From decorating the tree in November to decorating cookies on Christmas Eve. We all had fun with this, especially Hunter with his sprinkles. He was pretty wired on sugar after all this….good thing we had already been to church that day!!

Can you guess which ones I decorated??? I’m sure you can if you know anything about Brent’s artistic ability, not that mine is that much better.

And here is what Santa left behind.

The next picture exemplifies my world these days….Jenna watching Hunter’s every move, even if it’s him playing with her toys. She just adores him, and he likes her most of the time too. I’ll enjoy it while it lasts.

Last but not least, Hunter riding his pride and joy later Christmas morning…

December 2009 videos

2010-01-19T09:17:00.001-06:00

I know, I promised you more on Sunday, but I really did start this on Sunday, so I kinda came through on that promise. I’ve been battling a cold and also, you’ll see that this is a very large file so it took some time just to publish the final product to my computer – who knows how long it will take to publish it here on the blog! If you’re on a slow computer, not sure I would even try it if I were you. And this is after compressing it as much as I possibly could!!

I still have Christmas pictures to put on here, but I have to go to the doctor now, so it will have to wait. Hopefully, he will give me some good drugs so that I can function the rest of the day…

Let me apologize…

2010-01-16T22:16:00.002-06:00

I am so sorry that I have neglected you, oh blog of mine.
So much has happened and so much time
Has passed without me giving you any news
Of what is going on with my little brood.

So please forgive me in this new year
And accept my promise that I will to you be dear
In two thousand ten, I’ll try once a week,
I will write to you and those who come to seek.

So this is going to be a lot of catching up. I’ve been taking pictures, just haven’t found the time to save them on one computer and transfer the good ones to this computer, etc, etc. I could give you a zillion excuses, but I'll spare you.

Sweet Jenna

I think I mentioned, at least to some of you, that Jenna got professional shots done when she was four months old. Here are some of the best ones.

I think I also mentioned in my last post that Jenna is still not consistently sleeping through the night. Here’s a no-so-brief history of her sleeping habits the last few months – we started her in the miracle blanket in the pack-n-play which was set up in the study so that it was far enough away that we didn’t hear her every move, but close enough that I could get to her quickly when she woke up during the night. We moved her upstairs in the pack-n-play after that and then she figured out how to roll over onto her tummy, even while wrapped in the “straight jacket.” So I took away the miracle blanket, but of course, she doesn’t like sleeping on her tummy and would roll herself over and then scream until I put her back onto her back. This was probably around 4 months old – since we were still having trouble with reflux (and still are) and Jenna always took great naps in her carseat, I decided to wrap her in the blanket and strap her into the carseat at night. This ensured she couldn’t go anywhere and also kept her nice and warm since it was getting pretty cold here at night.

By the way, I can’t tell you how many different places she has slept in that carseat now…her bedroom is right by Hunter’s and just upstairs from us, so she was waking us all up during the night, which was why I tried the gameroom since it’s far from everyone and I could just listen to the monitor. But the gameroom is bitterly cold when it’s as cold outside as it has been lately, so she’s now in her carseat in the pack-n-play in the guest bedroom, where the heater works nicely and no one can really hear her if she starts crying during the night, except me of course, with the monitor.

Well, I was content with only getting up once during the night with Jenna, but it was getting a little old and I was anxious to see what would happen when I started back at work – she continued to wake up between 2:30 and 3:30 every morning. So I took the blanket away last week, but still have her sleeping in the carseat in the guest bedroom, and she seems to be able to get her fingers into her mouth or something that is soothing her back to sleep when she wakes up. So for a couple of days last week, and this morning, she woke up around 5:15 for her breakfast and then she goes back to sleep until I’m ready to get her up around 7:30 (or later on the weekends).

Oh, and here’s a picture of her when she had just started finding her thumb when she sleeps. Apparently, at school, this is how she sleeps for all her naps, and I think she slept like this today for one of her naps as well since her carseat cover was in the washing machine.

I have a lot of cute videos of Jenna too – will have to put them together tomorrow though. She laughs at almost anything. She adores her big brother. I forgot how much fun 5-6 month-old babies can be. Something new every day – new consonants, longer periods on her tummy with those feet kicking like crazy (she’ll be crawling in a month or so, I predict), almost sitting up by herself, rolling all over the place…it’s so much fun.

Here are some random Jenna pictures from December – I think the onesie in the first two says it all…

Mr. Hunter

Most of the pics I have of Hunter are related to Christmas, which will come in another post, I think, since it’s almost my bedtime. But I do have some that aren’t completely Christmas.

This first picture is proof that my kid is from Mars…that is a rice cake he’s eating. He won’t eat 70% of what I put in front of him, but when Mommy was eating a rice cake “burger” (aka black bean frozen patty in between two rice cakes), he decided he wanted to try one and LOVED it. I haven’t bought another pack yet, but he probably ate 40% of my rice cakes in about a 30 hour span. He wanted them for every meal and snack…silly boy.

The week before Christmas, my wonderful neighbor, Kristi, had a pajama playdate at her house, and Santa’s elves showed up to play games with the kids and sing songs. It was such a fun time for the kids (and the moms, of course). Here are a few shots from that morning.

And looking at those pictures reminds me….scroll back up to the rice cake picture. Note the MUCH shorter haircut. I had forgotten how long Hunter’s hair had gotten and Mommy CHOPPED it off right before Christmas. I won’t go into the details, but it was a mistake and is finally starting to look cute again (a month later). To say the least, I will not be using clippers on Hunter’s hair EVER again. :)

My Creative Side

The same neighbor mentioned above, Kristi, is incredibly creative. She is a scrapbook master and I really wish I had the time and energy to do some of the wonderful things she does. She had a “make a plate” party in December (maybe it was even late November?) where her friend brought all her stamps and inks that she sells (I will have to get her link to post here – I’m sure I have it somewhere), and we got to stamp away on templates that she then sends away to make plates and bowls with. I ended up going to two of these parties because I had so much fun making the girls’ bowls that I had to make some for my nephews. Funny thing is, even though I specifically unwrapped the girls’ bowls so that I could take pictures of them, apparently I forgot to take pics and just wrapped them back up and put them under the tree??? So, aunts and uncles, if you don’t mind and can take pictures of the girls’ bowls and email to me, that would be super.

Here are the boys’ and Jenna’s. Hunter didn’t get one as I ran out of time (and Jenna was with me and wasn’t happy about me trying to make her sleep at a stranger’s house).

More tomorrow, I promise!!

Pinot and Picasso

2010-01-13T16:40:00.000-06:00

I started this post months ago....sorry I'm so far behind!!! I have been taking pictures and video of the kids though, so I promise to catch up soon.

*************

In November, my team from work organized an outing at Pinot and Picasso, where you bring your own wine and a local artist teaches you how to paint a replica of her own work, step by step. If you go to their website, you will be incredibly impressed with some of the pictures. I will say that the pictures below look better than I remember the actual paintings looking that night, at least mine!!

I think Tammie neglected to get a picture of herself since we were using her camera, but we did get individual shots of the rest of us.

I am back at work now with these lovely ladies and extremely busy. I should have come back in December when I could have had some time to breathe before it got crazy busy. But it is good to be back and Jenna is doing well at "school," just dealing with some eating and sleeping issues. Of course, she has not slept through the night once since I started back to work last Monday. She and Hunter are picking on me, I think....

Hunter getting tubes in his ears

2009-12-29T08:12:00.001-06:00

He was happy at this point, and then he dropped a very heavy puzzle on his toe. Not so happy after that. Hopefully the surgery will go well and he will come out of the anesthesia without too much trouble. Should be going back with the doctor pretty soon - scheduled for 8:30.

UPDATE: We are home already (a little after 10:00). It went very well and Hunter is happily watching Cars and drinking juice. He was awake less than 15 minutes after the surgery was complete and we got out of there fast. Couldn't have gone any better!

Jenna – 17 weeks

2009-12-02T14:49:00.001-06:00

My goodness, this outfit is cute. Thanks Janine – we finally spent the rest of the gift card you gave us for Doodles. What a great store! You probably can’t tell but the print is America themed, but had some nice pinks and purples mixed in. Very tie-dye looking. I just wish the sleeves were long since its ridiculously cold outside.

Jenna had her 4 month well baby visit yesterday. She is almost 12 pounds, so still in 25th percentile for weight as well as height. And I won’t tell you how big her noggin is…at least it isn’t off the charts like Hunter’s! The doctor said she could start solids now, which we did last night. I couldn’t remember if you’re supposed to do the bottle first and then the cereal or vice versa. I tried cereal first, but I think she was too hungry, so after her bottle, I tried cereal again. This time, I was holding her in my arms instead of sitting her in the high chair (probably a no-no). You know, she’s such a mover that sitting still in her chair just didn’t set well with her. She downed the cereal – she was opening her mouth when she saw the spoon coming, and she didn’t spit that much out either. I know she doesn’t look pleased in the picture below, but she really did seem to like it.

Ironically, I looked back at Hunter’s 17 week post and he got his first ear infection in his 17th week of life. This week, Jenna’s 17th week, we learned that Hunter has to get tubes put back in his ears. His fell out over the past 6 months or so and he has some hearing loss due to the fluid behind his eardrums. So we opted for surgery again. He will have it done on December 29th, so keep us in your thoughts and prayers that day please.

Jenna – 14, 15, 16 weeks and Thanksgiving

2009-11-30T15:59:00.001-06:00

I know. I’m so far behind I wasn’t even sure which weeks I still needed to post. Jenna baby, I’m sorry but I might have to just start doing monthly pictures of you. Please don’t hold it against me someday when you are older and looking back at this blog!!! :)

Jenna – 14 weeks

You can see the progression…she was sleeping in her sling, I had set it down on the couch so that she could finish her nap and I could get some chores done. As I started snapping photos, she woke up slowly and then started laughing at me. So precious…

Jenna – 15 weeks

She was in one of Hunter’s old sleepers – my goodness, she looks a lot like him sometimes…except a lot more bald…

Jenna – 16 weeks

The next two pics are Jenna on left and Hunter on right. Hunter was a little older in his picture (5 months), but I definitely see some pretty big differences in their profiles. Jenna’s features are more petite. Hunter’s chin is flatter – Jenna’s is more pronounced I guess you would say. And her nose has more slope to it or something. Hunter’s eyebrows are a lot higher than Jenna’s, or eyes or lower, whichever way you want to look at it. Or maybe his eyes are just more closed than hers in this particular picture.

Randomness (before we get to the very few thanksgiving pics I have)

Nothing better than a toddler in footed PJs…

Another cute little smirk from my baby girl.

Uncle Brad came to visit for awhile his first weekend in town for the holiday. So fond of each other already…

And Hunter trying on my college softball jacket. Just a little too big for him, but cute nonetheless.

Thanksgiving 2009

One more comparison for this post. Jenna wore Hunter’s 1st Thanksgiving shirt on Thursday. I only snapped one picture of her. And the picture of him (right) shows just how big the kid’s head was! But at least he had hair AND it was already blonde at 6 months. And again you can see her little ball of a chin…so cute.

The only picture I got of my son on Turkey day and his FOOT was in the way.

I don’t get the opportunity to pull out the china very often, so I took advantage of the small crowd we had at our house on Thursday and set the table all nice and perty. Unfortunately, I didn’t get any pictures of actual food or people, but I really did serve food and have people. I’m not faking it!!!

And a closeup of the fake flowers…practicing my photography…

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!!!

Phenomenal Woman

2009-11-09T11:06:00.001-06:00

Before I talk about my daughter as a future “Phenomenal Woman,” I’ll share how phenomenal my son is. The two pictures below were taken one morning last week, before I took Hunter to school. We started the “school day” schedule last week and I was pleasantly surprised by how easy my child was before and after school. The mornings are the best because he is a morning person and I am not, but he makes me a better person in the morning. And the afternoons were great because the weather was nice and we took a walk every single day. Wonderful!

We bought these Melissa and Doug beads a couple weeks ago and Hunter was good at sorting them by color and shape pretty much out of the box. Of course, there is one shape that I don’t really even know the name of, so we call them barrels (no clue). But he wouldn’t string them himself – he would just hand them to me for me to string them for him when I said “give me all the red ones” or “give me all the squares.” I told him last week that he needed to do it himself – I think my hands were full with coffee and maybe rocking the carseat with baby Jenna. He figured out with my instruction how to get that string through the bead holding onto it with one hand and then switching hands to finish the deed. He proceeded to string the shapes together, all by himself. I was so proud, as evidenced by getting the camera out.

Oh, and he has gotten his hair cut since those pictures, by the way. My goodness, he was shaggy. And that awful bruise is fading too – he fell hard into a baseboard a week ago and the bruise got much worse before it started fading.

Now for that “Phenomenal Woman” I mentioned. The Today Show on NBC had a piece this morning on Glamour’s “Women of the Year” one of which was Maya Angelou. During the piece, Matt asked Dr. Angelou to quote a part of her poem “Phenomenal Woman.” Her reading was amazing. I had never heard this poem before, so I had to look up the words to the entire thing, and the pictures I’ve inserted are more of Jenna at three months, which I did not get a chance to post last week. I pray Jenna will be as phenomenal a woman as she is a baby. I pray that I will grow to be even more phenomenal because of her, and that I will set a good example for her always.

Phenomenal Woman

Pretty women wonder where my secret lies.
I'm not cute or built to suit a fashion model's size
But when I start to tell them,
They think I'm telling lies.
I say,
It's in the reach of my arms
The span of my hips,
The stride of my step,
The curl of my lips.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

I walk into a room
Just as cool as you please,
And to a man,
The fellows stand or
Fall down on their knees.
Then they swarm around me,
A hive of honey bees.
I say,
It's the fire in my eyes,
And the flash of my teeth,
The swing in my waist,
And the joy in my feet.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Men themselves have wondered
What they see in me.
They try so much
But they can't touch
My inner mystery.
When I try to show them
They say they still can't see.
I say,
It's in the arch of my back,
The sun of my smile,
The ride of my breasts,
The grace of my style.
I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Now you understand
Just why my head's not bowed.
I don't shout or jump about
Or have to talk real loud.
When you see me passing
It ought to make you proud.
I say,
It's in the click of my heels,
The bend of my hair,
The palm of my hand,
The need of my care,
'Cause I'm a woman
Phenomenally.
Phenomenal woman,
That's me.

Maya Angelou

First “Smith Family” Football Game

2009-11-07T21:42:00.001-06:00

So, Hunter is two-and-a-half and had never been to a sporting event. We weren’t sure how it would go, but figured the best place to find out would be a high school football game. Thankfully, I looked at the schedule the day before the regular season ends in Houston, and we were able to make it to the Cy Woods vs Cy Falls football game this afternoon.

If anyone has been to Berry Center, Cy Fair ISD’s athletic center and theater or whatever, you know what we experienced. This place is huge and the football stadium is better/bigger than my college alma mater (not comparable to Kyle Field, of course). It opened in 2006 and is very impressive.

The weather was perfect for football, a little breeze but perfect temperature and we got there just before sunset. Jenna was an angel. Hunter – not so much. I think he may be getting sick (again) so he was absolutely heartbroken when we finally said “If you don’t stay in your seat, we’re going home” and we really did. We got to see Cy Woods (that is the high school Hunter and Jenna would go to, but of course, they will surely have one or two new high schools by that time) beat up on Cy Falls a bit in the 2nd quarter and saw the very beginning of Cy Falls band’s performance at halftime.

Don’t get me wrong – Hunter enjoyed it!! He just wouldn’t sit still – he’s 2!! We expected this!! Next time he goes to a sporting event, we will ensure that a snack is handy and will use it to bribe him as often as needed. :) I told him when we first got there that he gets to see football in real life instead of on TV because Saturday is “Football Saturday” at the Smith house, so he knows, for example, to not ask to watch Mickey Mouse on Saturday afternoon because its “Football Saturday.” He repeated “football not on TV” a few times while we were there. So cute.

Anyway, Hunter gave us some play-by-play a couple of times when someone would get a long run. And he clapped when the people around us clapped (even though we were sitting on the wrong side – the Cy Falls people were nice though and we pretended to cheer for them). He seemed to really enjoy himself and probably would have gone up and down the bleachers harmlessly if we had let him further than 2 rows down and 2 rows up – this was actually a larger radius than I had originally anticipated, but we sat where the sun was shining in people’s faces, so there weren’t that many people around us. :)

We only got one snapshot unfortunately. When it was time to go, we drug him out and even tried to pretend we were going to let him go back into the stadium with a complete stranger that was coming in as we were going out, thinking that would scare him into submission. But he started heading back in, so Brent had to grab him. LOL! He repeated over and over on the way to dinner “I want to watch football!!” And then decided to change his stance to “I want to watch Mickey Mouse on TV in the family room.” The kid is too smart for his own good. Thankfully, he was back to his cheerful self by the time we got to the restaurant and we didn’t hear another negative word from him the rest of the night.

According to www.chron.com, Cy Falls pulled the win from Cy Woods, 46-43. I think Cy Woods had only lost one game this season before today, so this may have been quite the upset. Oh well – next year.

Jenna – 3 months (and Halloween)

2009-11-04T11:16:00.001-06:00

I never posted any “official” Halloween pictures, so here are the kiddos in their costumes – pictures taken at various times, including a couple of snapshots from that day.

Hunter – the dinosaur

The hat underneath that helped keep the dinosaur head shaped well (somewhat anyway) was one of many from his Pa-daddy.

Miss Jenna – the princess

We carved a pumpkin, but this was the one that didn’t get hacked on. It was Hunter’s pal on Halloween.

We had gone shopping earlier in the day. Jenna wore Hunter’s “First Halloween” onesie from when he was a baby. I was surprised at how well it fit her considering he was a couple months ahead of her on his first Halloween. Here is a picture that Daddy took with his iPhone.

We did go trick-or-treating that night. The whole family did our street and then we took Jenna home to go to bed, while Daddy stayed in to hand out candy. I took Hunter to the next street over and we enjoyed some time walking around with neighbors. I absolutely love my neighbors – every single one of them. Even the ones I just met and barely know – good people around here. We’re very blessed.

And miss Jenna’s 3 month pictures. I’m hoping to take some more later today. She was getting fussy for her nap. She started laughing yesterday, like audibly giggling. It was too cute, but I haven’t caught it on video yet. I made her laugh early in the day, but thought maybe it was a fluke. Then we were on our afternoon walk and stopped to talk to a neighbor so Hunter turned around in his seat to “flirt” with baby Jenna and she cackled at him. I couldn’t recreate it once Daddy got home unfortunately. I’m sure it will be a much more regular occurrence from now on. Love a kid’s laughter…so wonderful.

Oh, and you surely can’t tell since I have it covered up with her blanket above, but she is already “sitting” in her bumbo seat!! I don’t think we used that with Hunter at this age. She also “stands” up holding my fingers – might just be because she’s so gassy and stiff, but she seems to actually enjoy squatting and then standing back up. Such a strong little girl, she is!!!

3 months….come and gone….and she is STILL waking up in the middle of the night to eat. It’s a good thing I’m not back at work yet. I’d be a zombie…

2009 Lakewood Montessori Fall Festival

2009-10-29T13:12:00.004-06:00

I forgot that Brent took a couple of pictures at the Fall Festival last Friday night. I think this is the first one we've gotten of me with both kids, but Hunter isn't looking at the camera (typical). And Jenna wasn't really dressed up for this event - just in her very warm pumpkin hooded and footed sleeper. So cuddly!!!

Hunter was ALL over the place at this festival. I guess it's pretty normal for a 2-year-old to not participate in any events but want to look at every single thing. He did get to pet some very cool animals including a donkey (below) and a deer (beautiful). Hopefully at some point, he will have the courage to participate in some of the events and not shy away. His teacher said that he definitely is not shy in the comfort of the classroom. I personally think it was all a bit overwhelming for him, and it didn't help that the activities started before 4:00 and he had to stay in his classroom until we got there around 4:30. Poor kid kept watching his friends go out the back door with their parents and he had to stay with his remaining friends in "circle time."

I was looking back at Hunter's first Halloween pictures. He was Superman - adorable! I might have to put Jenna in that outfit just to see how much alike they look. I can't tell if they look alike since she's always in pink and he was NEVER in pink. :) What do you think? Is that silly to put her in his first costume? It's not like I'll take her out of the house in it or anything...

Jenna - 12 weeks

2009-10-27T16:19:00.003-06:00

I can't believe it's been 12 weeks already. Where has the time gone?? And next week, Hunter will start going to school just from 8:30 to 3:00, so we started practicing that timeline this week. It will be nice to have breakfast with him every morning. And the plan in the afternoon is to take a walk right after picking him up, either around the neighborhood if it's nice (like today - gorgeous) or I'll take the stroller in the car with me and we'll head to the mall to walk inside. I'm thinking that's the only way I'll ever manage to get these last pounds off.

We went to the park this afternoon after school. Hunter just loves the neighborhood park - it was still a little wet from all the rain, but he managed to find a clean and dry slide and a little water certainly didn't hurt his pants. And I just walked Jenna around in the stroller since the sidewalk does a nice circle around the jungle gym. Of course, I'm still not completely used to having him go potty before we leave the house, so he needed to go as soon as we got there. Thankfully someone was going in to workout and let us into the clubhouse so that he could go. Hunter is a pro at the potty, in case I haven't mentioned that lately. I can't believe he was in diapers just 4 weeks ago. He even woke up with a dry pull-up yesterday morning for the first time, so maybe we'll get to go back to big boy pants at night again before long. He also ended up going number 2 twice yesterday morning on the potty before we headed to school. Such a big boy! (He's sitting on the couch beside me right now watching Mickey Mouse.)

As for baby Jenna at 12 weeks, she sleeps through the night most of the time, although she has woken up at 3am the last two nights for a "midnight snack." We still aren't on a roll with bottles. I have got to get disciplined and start doing at least one bottle every day and I need to do it when she's really hungry. Think I'll do one when she wakes up next...should be any minute, so here are some pictures before I get pulled away.

Still trying to figure out what color those eyes are going to be...they're looking a little more green to me, but I'm sure it's just wishful thinking...

Jenna - 11 weeks

2009-10-20T20:51:00.000-05:00

You have to wonder sometimes - what is she thinking??? That smirk...those eyes...will they be green like Hunter's or doo doo brown like Mommy's...we'll see!

October 2009 Video

2009-10-16T08:46:00.001-05:00

Catching up

2009-10-14T16:45:00.001-05:00

I know, I know – I missed 9 weeks, but I did take the pictures. I just did not get around to posting them. We had Grandmommy visiting last week and then the big Potty Weekend, so it’s been quite hectic. So here are some pictures from the last few weeks.

Swift Company Picnic

We made the trip to the Houston Zoo for my company’s annual family picnic. It was so great to see everyone and Miss Jenna got tons of attention, of course. Everyone was a lot happier to see her, I think, than to see me! Thanks to Shannon for bringing us the tickets the night before – I snapped a good picture of her holding Jenna while she was here. Just a little fuzzy, but great nonetheless.

And although we didn’t get to stay long, we did get to see the lion.

I snapped this great picture of Brent and Hunter while we were at the picnic. This has to be one of the best pictures I’ve ever taken – seriously!!

That is a football on Hunter’s face. I have video of that but Movie Maker is stalling out, so I’ll have to post it another time.

Visit from Grandmommy

We had a very nice visit with my mom, Grandmommy, last week. Here are some pics from that visit.

Jenna – 9 weeks

Jenna – 10 weeks

You may not be able to see it but in that last shot, she was sticking her little tongue out at me. She’s just so darn cute!!

Potty Training Weekend

2009-10-12T22:01:00.004-05:00

We took Hunter out of school on Friday so that we could start our potty training weekend early. Let's just say Friday morning was pretty discouraging - I think we had about 4 accidents in 3 hours. I realized later that he was sitting on the cold tile and going almost immediately. Then he woke up dry from his nap (shocking) and had back to back successes after that, so it was a little more encouraging. And yes, I took a picture of his first TT in the potty because he LOVES the camera and I knew he would know it was a big deal if I took a picture of it, but I decided not to put it on the blog. I also decided the first poo poo in the potty probably wouldn't be great on the blog either....

I also forgot to take a picture of his "Potty Day" cake before we cut into it. The cake and probably the salted almonds (we usually do unsalted, but I was trying to make him thirsty so that we had more incidents to practice with) and the anxiety of the big day all culminated into an upset tummy during the evening and completely tossing his cookies right before bed. Poor kid - he never throws up and this was just a horrible way to end the day, but is also probably why he slept so soundly that night.

The rest of the weekend was kind of a mixed bag. We had quite a few times Saturday where he would start to go in his big boy pants and then would finish on the potty. Then Sunday, he actually told me 2 or 3 times that he had to go and when I sat him down, he went! This was a huge success in my eyes.

This was all cold turkey, by the way. We didn't do pull ups - well, I guess we did Friday night, but he went in the pull up just like he would a diaper, so I decided that wasn't the best approach for Hunter. We're strictly big boy pants now. And Saturday night worked out really well because I woke him up around 5am and he was dry and went TT on the potty when I sat him down on it, and then went back to sleep. Unfortunately, he then proceeded to do both number 1 and 2 between that time and 6:30 when I thought he had just woken up. I think his persistent cough is waking him up - especially last night. I went up there 4-5 times last night and he was soaked every time. Poor kid. So I'll be trying to wake him up before I go to bed tonight to see if he's wet or dry and sit him on the potty to try to empty him out. Might wake him at 5 too, just to be sure.

So our method was a mixed bag. We started with "Potty Training in One Day" with Potty Scotty. Hunter liked the doll and celebrated with him when he TTd on the potty, but the whole "practice runs" thing was NOT for us. So we continued with asking "Are you wet or dry?" and that took quickly. A few times, he would answer wet and was just barely wet, so he would finish on the potty, and I think Sunday, he answered wet one time before he had actually gone, so we sat him down on the potty and he went. The wet/dry thing was definitely a good thing for us. And repeating to him constantly that he has to tell us when he needs to go so that we can get him to the potty before he actually makes the mess. Now if we could just get him to do that during the night!!

Hunter went back to school today. I was SO nervous about how it was going to go, even though I had heard his teachers were really good with potty training. And his head teacher was out today, so I was even more nervous. But Miss Dali and Miss Rupa exceeded my expectations - he only had 2 accidents all day!!!!! They said normally they have 4-6 accidents the first day, so we were pretty happy with this. The only thing I didn't ask was whether any of his successes were self-initiated, because based on the report, they were taking him every hour. Hopefully I will get some more info tomorrow when his head teacher is back. Here is his daily report - note all the smiley faces are all of his successes. Yay for Hunter!!!

I have to thank my friend Pam yet again - I wouldn't have made it through the weekend without her. I also want to thank Brent for doing everything I couldn't do this weekend. Breast feeding a 10-week-old while also potty training a 2-year-old isn't ideal, and he totally took up all the slack. Thanks also to my neighbors Marie and Kristi for their advice, tricks and tips. And to all of the family that we called when we had successes, for making it a big deal for Hunter and thus, encouraging him to continue.

8 weeks - really??

2009-09-30T20:53:00.003-05:00

I guess it's natural when you have your second child to compare him or her to your first. I'm so glad that I started this blog when Hunter was born. Since I haven't done nearly enough scrapbooking like I had intended to, this blog allows me to go back easily and find old pictures or figure out when Hunter did this or that for the first time.

So when Hunter was 8 weeks old, he had hardly ANY hair!! Look at him!!

Hunter also started sleeping through the night at 8 weeks, which I can't actually find on the blog, but I am about 99% sure that was the case. And Jenna is following suit so far. In the last 6 days, she has slept "through the night" 3 times. The last two nights, she has gone down for the night between 9:30 and 10 and woken up the next morning at 5:15 on the dot. I'm about to wake her up for her last feeding tonight and we'll see if she does the same. So far, today's schedule has been pretty much identical to yesterday's so hopefully, we are on a roll here!!

Jenna - 8 weeks

2009-09-29T20:24:00.000-05:00

We received a beautiful crocheted blanket from my sister's grandparents-in-law (is that right??). Anyway, my sister obviously has very nice in-laws because they make stuff for us and send it unexpectedly so I get surprised when I go to the mailbox!! Thank you Nanaw and Papaw. (Maybe this is obvious, but the pics below have the blanket as Jenna's "prop.")

I thought the next one looked like she was taking the picture of herself - you know how you hold the camera out in front of yourself to take your own picture?

And the next one reminded me of a commercial I've seen, or maybe it's a magazine ad...something about her expression...

I really wish I had Windows Live Writer on my laptop. I like how I can do the larger pictures with that program. Plus, I don't have any good picture editing tools on this computer either. Oh well - maybe next week.

Pa-Daddy came to visit last week and I snapped a couple of pictures of him with the kids. Hunter wanted him to read to him for an hour and Pa-Daddy was very patient and made it through the Pooh book (which is very long and I'm surprised every time I read it that it keeps Hunter's attention the entire time).

Jenna - 7 weeks

2009-09-22T20:09:00.006-05:00

I couldn't decide which pictures I liked best, so you get to see all my favorites. The first one was manipulated a bit, which you might be able to tell. It kinda glows...

And in the basket...
My sweet baby girl...

And her silly little grin!!

Gotta love her!!

Lots of Firsts

2009-09-21T10:12:00.001-05:00

I promise I’m not a bad momma and I did give sponge baths the first 6 weeks of Jenna’s life – I just didn’t take pictures necessarily. Since her umbilical cord didn’t come off until that 6 week mark, she hadn’t taken a full blown bath until last week. Oh man, does she love the water! She loved looking at herself in the mirror and moving around. Hunter helped give her a bath this weekend too – so much fun. We take baths pretty often now since the poor little girl keeps throwing up all over herself. (And I’m working on my video making abilities, so I’ve put a song into this one. I hope it works because I LOVE this song.)

Jenna also started smiling last week. Sometimes its a random smile, but I can usually get her to do it if I tickle her face (aka poke her in different places while making funny sounds). This usually instigates Hunter wanting me to do the same to him, which is actually what we used to do when he was this age to get him to smile on command. :) Capturing a picture of her smile in its full splendor has been a little tricky though. This is the best I’ve done so far.

We also ventured out to church yesterday, so Jenna had her first visit to the church nursery. I’m guessing most folks take their newborns into the sanctuary with them based on the reaction of the lady up front when I said Jenna was only 7 weeks old, but I figure I was in the nursery at 2 weeks old, so my daughter can go before 3 months (which is apparently what is typical). And would you believe they didn’t break her??? They may have kissed her a zillion times, but no harm done. And Hunter moved up to the 2-year-old class. We missed promotion Sunday in August, but he went to his new class with no trouble and I believe got to wear a firefighter’s hat, so he was a happy camper when we picked him up. We managed to get them together in some pictures once we got home and got some food into their tummies.

I like this last one best because it looks like Jenna was telling Hunter a story or something that was keeping his attention, when in fact, I just told him to look at her. LOL!

Random Hunter Update

2009-09-16T10:25:00.003-05:00

My little Mario Williams was disappointed with the Texans this past weekend (not quite as upset as Daddy was though), but you'd never guess it with some of the smiles he flashed at the camera on Sunday. He sure likes his pudding, even though it makes his teeth look disgusting, at least in this picture.

And he figured out he could put these "bead" things on all of his fingers this weekend. We used to just do one finger and he and I would have "finger wars" with them on, to see who could knock the others off (I always win, of course, because he's laughing so hard when we play this game that he doesn't realize he's supposed to fight back). He gets a bit frustrated when trying to put the fifth bead on his finger because there's no room, so I have to help him out.

An update on school - we are now dropping Hunter off at the door at school with Mr. Dave and Hunter doesn't fuss at all. He likes Mr. Dave and as long as I stay put in the driver's seat, he seems to do fine. I love that we have the option of dropping him off and picking him up at the door so that I don't have to get the baby out every time. Makes for a much easier trip. And I don't think I blogged about this yet, but Jenna got moved up on her start date at Lakewood Montessori. She wasn't going to have a spot until April, so I was going to have to drop 2 kids off at 2 schools - someone dropped off the list though so she gets to start in December! YAY!!! That will make the morning routine and travel time to work a lot better!!

Jenna – 6 weeks

2009-09-15T22:11:00.001-05:00

It was a rough day! I took this picture right after giving Jenna a very quick bath after she let loose her late afternoon meal, but we had to get right into the car to go get Hunter, so her hair was still wet and curly. This was the best I could do for a picture on such a hectic day. Started off with contractors to put in a new AC filter system (trying to cut back on the allergies in our household), then a nice drive to the med center for my 6-week checkup (all is good in the world), and then another nice drive up to the Woodlands to Pottery Barn Kids to pick up our new activity table and storage bins (which will be put together tomorrow). And feeding baby Jenna every 1.5 to 2 hours along the way if you can imagine.

Baby Jenna may have reflux – we will find out when I take her to the doctor tomorrow. She’s been throwing up at least once a day and exhibiting other signs of reflux. Luckily, she’s only suffering during the daytime, it seems – she still sleeps great at night.

Jenna finally lost her umbilical cord today too. Can you believe that?? 6 weeks!! I thought Hunter’s took a long time, but this has to be a record.

A few more pictures…

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Aunt Loyce and Uncle Dunk came to see us last weekend, thanks to Uncle Brad for bringing them by. Unfortunately, Jenna was covering her face in this picture, but otherwise it is perfect. Hunter had a great time playing ball with Uncle Brad and Uncle Dunk. Thanks for coming to visit!!

And I need to take pictures of more of his hats, but here is one of Hunter in his “Queen Car” hat and nothing else! His Pa-daddy gave him a handful of hats for his birthday and I’ve been meaning to get pictures of him in them. I’ll try to get some more in the next week or so, or maybe have Hunter pose in them with his Pa-daddy when he comes to visit next weekend – yay!

And Uncle Brad came back on Sunday on his way back to Round Top with MORE gifts. The man can’t help himself but to spoil my kids! He brought pillow pals for both kids, and I was SO excited because I want to buy one every time I pass the little kiosk in the mall. Hunter got a horse and Jenna got a cow, because Uncle Brad is determined to make my kids into ranchers. They are ADORABLE and soft as can be. Love them!! Thanks Uncle Brad!

Another spectacular gift came this weekend, but it came in the mail. My sister’s mother-in-law, Terry, is very talented with cross-stitch and to ensure Jenna got equal love as what Hunter received, she did a birth announcement for her. I need to find this frame so that I can have at least 2 more in her room. It’s beautiful and we are very grateful to Terry.

Isn’t that frame beautiful?? And a detailed view of the cross-stitch below. I just love the lettering she chose.

Hunter Pre-Montessori

2009-09-09T11:37:00.001-05:00

Hunter has been accomplishing more and more each day, which made me realize that I need to write down some things he is capable of doing so that I can compare notes later in the year and see if they are continuing to develop him at the rate he has been developing at Kids R Kids. So, here is a laundry list of Hunter’s accomplishments to date. And make sure you get through at least #3 because the video is probably the best I’ve ever gotten of Hunter in action!

1. Counts to 10 (and 11, 13, etc. sometimes)

2. Remembers words from some of his favorite books so that he can “read” them himself. Examples: Elmo book (Mommy & Daddy take me to the water park, Elmo go to sleep), “Daniel book” (Daniel loves God, Daniel trouble, Lions, Hooray), 5 Little Monkeys (both “Jumping on the Bed” and “Sitting in a Tree” – bed, head, said, bed and SNAP, oh no, where is she?, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5), Hop on Pop (Red Ned Bed, fall off the wall, Pat sat on cat, Don’t sit on that, hop on pop – stop!). Hunter absolutely loves to read books – he would probably let us read to him hours and hours each day. He also tries to use it as a tool to stay up later at night, but has gotten pretty good about just picking 2 books out when I ask him to. He still wants to throw Daniel Book in occasionally.

3. Sings songs (this is brand new within the last two weeks or so) – Twinkle Star, ABCs (he leaves 3-4 letters out), God Our Father (had to ask his KRK teachers what the words to this one were because he was trying to teach me and I couldn’t understand “Thank you for our blessings” because it sounds more like “tank gaskins.” He obviously doesn’t understand the words, but he’s mimicking very well.) And he also says occasional words with me in Zacchaeus Was a Wee Little Man. He also asks us to sing “Pa-daddy” songs because when we are in my car, he gets to listen to his Pa-daddy’s old gospel albums from when my dad was an adolescent. (So I started this post last week, and since then, Hunter has proven he can sing Amazing Grace – like, we’re talking the whole first verse. And I got some of it and some other songs on video – this one is a keeper!!)

4. Recognizes some shapes – circle, triangle, square.

5. Favorite cartoon is by far Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and he loves to say “Oh toodles” and “Cheers” when they are using the Mouseketools. Favorite movie so far has been Shrek, but we don’t do movies very often – just in the car really, and we don’t take many long trips that necessitate putting the DVD player in.

6. Art – does well with Play-Doh, crayons, markers. Favorite is Play-Doh.

7. Sports – Hunter throws a ball well and also kicks a ball very well. He can throw a ball into his basketball hoop and also hit his ball off his blow-up tee with his blow-up bat. None of this is consistent, but he definitely enjoys his sports and knows the difference between a football and a baseball. Hunter LOVES to run and play outside, and as seen a couple posts back, loves to play in the water.

8. Language – Hunter is speaking very clearly. He understands most pronouns and puts together complete sentences easily. He understands prepositions and descriptors like in, out, under, over, up, down, etc.

9. Memory – A lot of the stuff up above is attributed to this kid’s incredible memory. Books, songs, routines, etc. He will tell you what happened at school that day, who bit him or what he learned.

10. Potty training – He will sit on the potty, but has a difficult time climbing up onto it using his step. He has gone tee-tee on the potty a few times at home and went occasionally at Kids R Kids. He went poo-poo on the potty last Wednesday morning, actually, and no, I’m not attributing this to his new school – I was just changing his diaper and noticed he hadn’t done much when usually it’s FULL. So I told him to sit on the potty to finish – I think his tummy was hurting because he was kind of clenching before I lifted him up there and then out it came. So it was kind of an accident, but we celebrated excessively. We will be doing “Potty Training in One Day” within the next month or so because he’s supposed to be wearing big boy pants in his new class – they’re kind of cold turkey at this school, which I like, but I want to do it right to minimize the accidents (and laundry!!!).

Jenna – 5 weeks

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Man, she’s pretty. A lot prettier baby than I was at 5 weeks (see below). Sometimes I think she looks like me, but when I look at that picture I realize I just was not cute at this point in my life. It got better with time though, I promise.

And here she is wrapped up in her Miracle Blanket, aka the straight jacket. She loves it though…absolutely LOVES it!

Water Park!!!

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Hunter used to LOVE talking about water park day at Kids R Kids. At first, he wouldn't go play on the splash pad at school, but once we started getting the little blow up pool out at the house and letting him play in there, he started participating at school as well.

So we have a splash pad in our neighborhood. The last time we went, it wasn't quite working right and only one level of the water spouts were working - the fierce level! He wouldn't really participate - this was before he had done water park day at school. We took him today and thought we might have the same problem. But then God intervened - there is one area in the splash pad where a bucket fills up and then dumps out on whoever is under it. He was just walking around and BAM! It got him full on!! Didn't even freak him out actually(scared me a little bit though) - and then he was game for anything. He had a blast and Daddy caught a couple of pictures on his i-phone. Wish I had remembered the video camera so that we could have captured how incredibly happy he was. It was a blast, and Jenna stayed asleep in her stroller til the very end. What a cooperative little girl.

Miserable

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Looks pretty miserable, eh?

Hunter and the Three Dwarves

2009-09-01T13:39:00.001-05:00

Today is Hunter’s first day at his new school, Lakewood Montessori. He was so excited that he woke up around 3 AM chanting “I want to go to school, I want to go to school.” Thankfully, he went back to sleep when I picked him up from the floor and put him back in his bed. Here are some first day pictures.

I didn’t get a picture of his new backpack unfortunately – it’s Lightning McQueen and he picked it out this weekend. He was SO proud of it. We got to school right before Hunter’s friend Landon came in, so Landon’s mom (who I was very happy to see again) came in to say hello and then took the two kids back into the other toddler room where they eat breakfast so that I could talk to Hunter’s teacher. When I finished and went back to the other room to say goodbye, he was sitting quietly at the table with his new friends and Landon, eating his cereal and drinking his milk. He gave me a kiss goodbye and off I went. No issue whatsoever. Hopefully, I hear that he had a terrific day and made lots of new friends! Will find out soon enough!

And here are some pictures of Miss Jenna at 4 weeks, with captions telling you which dwarf she was trying to look like…

Sleepy

Grumpy

Sneaky

Uncle Brad came into town this weekend and got to meet Jenna and get some good playtime in with Hunter. (Thanks to Uncle Brad for the blanket used above as Jenna’s backdrop.) Here are a couple of pics from that event. If anyone knows a good way to get rid of glasses glare in pictures, please let me know. Tried to retouch with Picasa and couldn’t get anything to look good…

And how precious is this photo shoot? This was last week, Friday, I think, and she’d just had her bath and was very alert and pleasant, so I took full advantage of the opportunity.

Thanks to the Fowlers for that Princess towel. A very nice prop and backdrop for Jenna’s photo shoot.

Jenna – 3 weeks

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(Make sure to scroll down past this post for a post on Hunter - I don't usually post two posts in one day, but his post was giving me a hard time yesterday, so I didn't get it taken care of till today. Had to switch to You Tube for videos too, so let me know if there is any trouble seeing the videos.)

Looks like she’s saying “How YOU doin’??”

Not sure what that face is saying – maybe “get that camera out of my face please.”

The two pictures above remind me of the pictures in People magazine where they tell you to find the 10 things that are different between the two pictures – same exact pose, eyes, etc, but obviously she’s covering up her mouth in the second one. hehe

Gotta love sleepy smiles!

And tummy time turned into naptime…this baby sleeps a TON!!!

I’m the Big Brother!

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Here are a couple of videos of Hunter, the Big Brother. He really is doing great with Jenna – very helpful.

And a still shot for those of you without video access – isn’t his hair cut adorable?

The next one was taken while I was nursing Jenna, if you can believe it. I set the camera on the back of the couch and hit record – amazing what you can capture with both hands full. Hunter was doing this all weekend – putting his blocks in order and “counting” them. And yes, when he gets to ten, what follows is “eleven, thirteen.” Sometimes sixteen or seventeen pop in there, but not in this video. :)

We visited Hunter’s new school this morning. September 1, he starts at Lakewood Montessori. I have mixed feelings about this. For once, I am excited about a transition for him instead of being a nervous wreck, but Daddy has gotten into my head a bit and there is some anxiety that he is going to miss his friends dearly. He has been in Kids R Kids since he was 3 months old – two locations, but the same company, same building setup, same format, etc. When we moved to Cypress, that transition was a breeze – he was only 13 months old though. Now, he comes home every night with another story about one of his friends – Bobby, Brody, Hudson, Hayden, Ainsley, Daniel. I was concerned about this right up until we walked in the room at Lakewood Montessori this morning and saw his old friend Landon from Kids R Kids!! I had noticed Landon was MIA at Kids R Kids probably about a month ago, but hadn’t thought to ask anyone where he’d gone. Now I know!! Hunter sat down for circle time by his friend Landon and settled in nicely. I think he will do great when he starts next Tuesday. He didn’t want to leave when I said it was time to go, and he actually cried when I dropped him off at Kids R Kids afterwards – this has NEVER happened before!! Crazy!

Jenna – 2 weeks

2009-08-18T22:03:00.001-05:00

Miss Jenna is doing very well after 2 weeks of life. She weighed in at 7 pounds and 11 ounces today, so she’s up half a pound from her birth weight, which is fabulous! Expectedly, her head circumference is in the 75th percentile – I make big-headed children, what can I say?? But it sure is a cute head!!!

Again on white… …and again on pink…

One of those (probably the one on white because I did some corrections on that one to make the white whiter and all that fun stuff) will probably be used for the birth announcement. I think I took about 20 of them, so be grateful I only posted three. :)

Thanks to my cousin Heather for this adorable Texas A&M outfit. Ironically, Jenna actually looks kinda like Alison’s kids (Alison is Heather’s sister) in this picture, at least to me. I obviously couldn’t get Jenna to keep her eyes open today, which means I probably won’t get much sleep tonight. Hopefully this isn’t a sign that our baby girl doesn’t like the Aggies, but she had her first blowout diaper in this outfit today, and also threw up on the shirt. Poor thing!

I also have a cute video of Hunter “reading” to Jenna from this past weekend, as well as some baby pics of me and Brent that look a lot like Hunter and Jenna. I’ll post these tomorrow or whenever I find some time.

Jenna – 1 week

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Gotta love that double chin!

At first I thought she looked a lot like Hunter, but now they look so different to me. She is much more feminine than he was – a smaller head is probably the main reason. And the shape of their eyes is also very different. Jenna’s chin also butts right up to her bottom lip, versus Hunter’s, which was a bit longer. And of course, Jenna has more hair than he did, but I’m sure it will all be gone soon. She’s already rubbing a spot on the back of her little head. Here’s a comparison shot for you, both at 1 week. I won’t do this all the time, but was curious how much they really looked alike at that age.

I’ll have to figure out a way to get one of my baby pictures on here because I think Jenna looks more like me and Hunter, more like his daddy, even this early.

So, to continue some of Jenna’s drama, she also has a condition called VSD, or Ventricular Septic Defect. This is one of many types of heart murmurs, but according to both pediatricians we’ve discussed with (the one who saw her while we were in the hospital as well as Hunter’s, who will be her primary care physician), it is very common and will correct itself in time. It’s basically a small hole between the two bottom chambers of her heart. It is good to know about in case we are ever out of town and have to see a new pediatrician and they hear the murmur and freak out. The hole is apparently labeled “small” which is why they do not have to do anything to try to fix it.

As for week 1, I think we are on the right track! Her sleep patterns are still unpredictable, but overall, she is sleeping well and eating well. Oh, and when we had to take Hunter to the doctor this weekend (yes, more drama – he has erythema multiforme, which is a rash you can get after a virus has run its course, but isn’t itchy or anything, just ugly), we weighed Miss Jenna and she was already back over her birth weight!! She was 7 lb 5.5 oz – in the hospital, she had lost about half a pound, so it was great to see she had gained all that back, and more, in such a short period of time! Yay!