Avery gets her ears pierced!

For several months now, Avery has been talking about getting her ears pierced, and she finally did it this past Saturday. Two of her best friends at school have pierced ears, so I guess the peer pressure put her over the edge and gave her enough motivation to go ahead with it. We were planning on meeting my parents in Southlake that evening for my Mom's birthday dinner, so we just went to Sweet and Sassy while we were over there so Avery could get it done. This pic is of the lady putting the dots on her ears and making sure they are even.
Then we have Avery with her newly pierced, red ears. She did awesome-- not one tear! I was really proud of her.Avery initially chose pink flower earrings, but they were out of those, so her second choice was a pink birthstone. She doesn't like her birthstone because it's blue, so she chose the pink one, which is for October. We told her that was pretty neat because not only was it the month she got her ears pierced, but it was also her Mimi's birthday, which we were going to celebrate right after she got her ears done!

All smiles and looking so big!

4 months

Another month has flown by and Judson is busy growing and learning to do new things all the time. At his 4 month check up he weighed 16 lbs 1 oz (74%) and was 26 in (85%). He laughs a lot now, which is so much fun. When he first started laughing the girls would ask me, "What are you doing?" when I would do silly things to make him laugh. But then the more he laughed, the more they started getting into the act of trying to make him laugh too. He absolutely adores the attention from them-- especially Avery. I can tell already that he's going to have a cute little sense of humor and be a little stinker. Speaking of being a stinker, he likes to smile and flirt with the ladies lately. He flashes a big squinty-eyed, open-mouth grin, and then bats his eyes and raises his little eyebrows. What a mess! He can roll over both ways easily now and has started sleeping on his tummy a lot. He still plays with his feet a lot and sometimes even sucks on his toes, which Avery thinks is so gross even though I tell her she did it too as a baby. In just the past week or so he has really gotten into grabbing things and playing with toys. It's fun, but it's going to get challenging once he's mobile considering all the small toys the girls have. I think we finally broke him of wanting us to come in and give him his paci back multiple times in the middle of the night (yay!), but he is still waking up between 4:30 and 6 am some mornings. For now I just go feed him and put him back to bed. The only good thing about it is that if I feed him at 5 or 6 then he will go back to sleep until 8 or 8:30, which gives me some time to myself after Scott and Avery leave for school and work since Kendall usually sleeps later too. Hopefully he will eventually drop that early morning feeding on his own even though the pediatrician thinks he's probably waking out of habit. Time will tell I guess! We are enjoying him as much as ever though and looking forward to celebrating all the upcoming holidays with our youngest family member.

Beaver's Bend

Labor Day 2011

For the second year in a row, we spent Labor Day weekend with my parents in Broken Bow, OK at Beaver's Bend State Park. We stayed in a beautiful cabin and enjoyed a relaxing weekend on the lake and in the forest. On Saturday morning we rented some jet skis and a boat and spent the morning playing on the lake. In the afternoon, we all enjoyed napping, reading, and throwing rocks in the creek out behind the cabin. Then Scott grilled us some delicious steaks for dinner. My Mom and the girls decorated the dining room and threw me a little birthday party after dinner. Avery made me a birthday banner, the girls put confetti on the table, and we had chocolate-peanut butter cake balls. Delicious! Sunday we took a pontoon boat out on the lake and enjoyed tubing, swimming, and exploring. After naps and relaxing at the cabin in the afternoon, we enjoyed a pretty drive through the state park and took the girls to a playground to burn off some energy. That night we made s'mores over the grill (couldn't use the fire pit because of the burn ban) and then Scott and I relaxed in the hot tub after we put the kids to bed. There were a lot of trees around our cabin, so we couldn't see too many stars, but we did see a raccoon and a possum come up onto the porch. Not something you see everyday when you live in the city. It was so nice to get away for a weekend to enjoy some family time and reconnect with nature!

Scott, Avery and Kendall at the marina

Sweet Judson

ready to head out on the lake

Avery and Judson

Avery looked like a little otter swimming on her back and playing with the rope to the tube

Avery and Scott giving a thumbs up to go faster

The girls thought the boat was like an amusement park ride and giggled a lot

Scott and Kendall tubing
Scott and Judson enjoying some guy time on the porch
our OU cutie
silly family pic
this was the biggest walking stick any of us had ever seen!
the girls thought this colorful moth was so cool
our cabin had a creek behind it and the girls had a lot of fun throwing rocks
Mommy, Kendall and "Juddy" (Kendall's name for him)
Mommy and Avery headed out on the jet ski
Scott and Kendall- speed demons!
Sassy sisters

taking a little spin on the ski boat

3 Months Old

Things have been so busy around here with Avery starting Kindergarten, our Labor Day trip (more on that later), and life in general that I am just now blogging about Judson turning 3 months when he's already 3 and 1/2. Part of me enjoys doing these posts and part of me dislikes it because it means that another month has already flown by and my sweet baby is getting bigger! He is such a good baby and absolutely loves to smile and talk to us. He is so content most of the time and only cries when he is really hungry or tired. He still dislikes tummy time, but he has gotten a lot stronger and can hold his head and body up really well now when you hold him or when he's in the Bumbo seat. And just today, he rolled from his back to his tummy for the first time! He has started laughing a little, playing with his feet, and sometimes tries to swat at or grab toys. He has also discovered that the TV is a pretty interesting thing and cranes his neck around to see it when the girls are watching cartoons. That's a male for you! Unfortunately, he has also figured out how to get his thumb in his mouth, but we are doing our best to "paci-train" him. Luckily he will actually take a paci when he's tired, so we just keep putting it in and he wears a cute little sock over his hand when he sleeps:) At 3 months, Judson is eating every 3 hours during the day (6 times) and once in the early morning- usually between 4 and 6. He has had some nights where he's slept straight through until 6:45 or 7:00, but the little stinker is just not consistent with it yet. He's so big that I'm afraid he might not consistently sleep through the night until he gets some solid food in that tummy! He is wearing 3-6 or 6 month clothes and size 2 diapers. We will find out his height and weight at his 4 month check at the end of September, but I'm pretty sure he's still on the upper end of the charts. Everyone says he looks really big or long and they can't believe he is only 3 months old. Overall, we just feel so blessed to have this special little guy as part of our family! God knew just what he was doing when he created Judson because he truly makes our family complete!

happy boy playing on his activity mat

in motion in his crib

Scott was trying to make the same face as Judson

He likes to hold on to the right side of his car seat like this. It's funny because I think Avery used to do that too.

Avery playing with Judson one day after school

Avery goes to Kindergarten!

It's official: Avery is a kindergartener now! In one way it is hard to believe that the precious little baby girl I held in my arms 5 1/2 years ago is big enough to go to elementary school. But then we have watched her grow and learn for those 5 1/2 years as well and we have known for awhile that she would be ready for it when the time came. It makes it a little easier knowing that she loves to learn, make new friends, follow the rules, and likes structure and stimulation. I learned a long time ago that I could not possibly provide all that she needs here at home-- at least not without making a full time job of it! Scott and I began looking at some private schools this summer for her to attend until we move to a new neighborhood, and we decided on Harvest Christian Academy. It has close to 300 students K-12 and appears to provide a good balance between the academic and spiritual. She has been going for a week now and so far she really likes it. She is all smiles when we pick her up, is already making friends, and has started praying for her teacher every night. It is an adjustment of course and she is sometimes tired or in need of one-on-one Mommy time after being away all day, but overall she is doing great. Here are her 1st day of school pics. The first day was free dress (no uniforms).

On her first day we took the whole crew with us up to the school, which was no small feat. Definitely couldn't have gotten everyone up and out the door by 7:35 without Scott's help. It made me really tankful that Scott is able to take her to school every morning on his way to work! They let all the parents come in the classroom to get their children situated and then we stayed for the 3 pledges- to the American flag, the Christian flag, and the Bible. Then I had to hug her and tell her to "Have Fun!" with a happy look on my face without tearing up. I was proud that I actually did it! Then they had a short reception/meeting for all the Kindergarten parents complete with boxes of Kleenex under the chairs. Then after a few tears in the car, I hurried off to get Kendall and I some breakfast before taking her to gymnastics. The first day was a half day, so I picked Avery up at 11:30 and we met Scott for lunch at Pei Wei.

Here she is on her second day with her cute little uniform on. That's my big school girl! I am so proud of you Avery!

Panama Week

Every year Scott tries to go on a mission trip to provide dental care for those who don't have access to it and/or cannot afford it. This year he went with Global Hands of Healing to Panama at the beginning of August. Maybe I will be able to convince him to carve out some time to post some of his pictures from the trip on here and to journal about it, but for now I just wanted to document a few of the things that the kids and I did while he was away. I tried to keep them busy and do some fun things that we don't normally do to help the week go by faster. We spent a lot of time with my parents on the two weekends that Scott was gone. That was a big help and allowed us to do some neat things like go to a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese, go to Mimi and Poppi's church in Coppell, and go to Rainforest Cafe. The girls also had a sleepover with their Mimi and Poppi one night while Judson and I spent the night at Embassy suites in Grapevine. My Dad and I took the girls swimming twice at the hotel and they surprised Judson and I on Saturday morning by showing up for breakfast at the hotel. My sister-in-law was also in town for the week, so one day we met her and my mother-in-law at the mall to let the kids play, eat Chick-fil-A and shop a little. We also took the kids to Let's Jump one day and let them burn off some energy there. It was a fun-filled week, but it sure made me glad that I am not a single parent!

After taking Avery to a birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese, we spent the rest of the day on Saturday at our house with Mimi and Poppi. Avery loves to make Judson smile and is really good at it!

Judson loves to smile at and talk to his Mimi

At my parents house after church on Sunday. I inadvertently dressed all the kids in brown so we had to get a picture!

Relaxing on Sunday afternoon. Judson and I are on the couch in the background.Monday night we rented Chronicles of Narnia and ordered pizza. We had a pizza and pajamas picnic.

My parents came over Wed after work to help out a little. My Mom did some activities with the girls including making peanut butter playdough. We all went to dinner at Dickeys and then had some ice cream from Braum's to top it off.
Judson and his cousin Eva at Let's Jump on Thursday. They slept and ate while the Mason, Avery and Kendall jumped, slid, and ran around.
Mason loves Avery and they played together almost the entire time at the jump place. Avery was ticking him in this pic.
In front of the waterfall and rainbow at Rainforest Cafe. Kendall was just a little scared of the gorillas at first, but she got over it pretty quickly and we all had a good time.The girls were too captivated by this alligator to look at the camera. They thought it was funny that he had pennies in his mouth.
Avery all ready to go swimming at Embassy Suites. The water was a little colder than my Dad and I would've liked, but we eventually got used to it and the girls sure did have a good time.

Silly poses in the hotel room before swimming on Saturday morning.