Christmas Re-invented

I think my favorite part about Christmas is the decorations. Some people wait until they are married, or have families, or are actually going to be at home for Christmas to put up a tree. Not me. I've put up a tree every year for the past 7 or 8 years. A real tree. And I've only spent Christmas at my own home for a couple of those years. So, I'm dedicated. And, I've acquired quite a few ornaments over the years. Ornaments that I love...and that would be no match for "The Destroyer". So, this year I decided to get creative and make some new, baby-proof ornaments. All it took was a trip to Hobby Lobby and a couple of craft nights with my best girls and here is what we came up with.
Not bad if I do say so myself and needless to say they have been a huge hit with the under 3 foot crowd in our house.

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Proof

...that we actually celebrated Thanksgiving and that Brad can cook a beautiful bird.

I am thankful...

...that my husband knows how to cook a turkey and make pies from scratch.

...for Mountain Hardwear jackets made of miracles. I've had mine for 5 years now and I still love wearing them every chance I get.

...for diet Dr. Pepper.

...that babies learn to sleep through the night, and climb on everything, and give hugs.

...for hats during this awkward growing-out stage my hair is going through so I can still feel cute sometimes.

...for vaccines, so I don't have to worry so much about my family getting the flu, or measles, or polio and I never have to get chickenpox.

...for good friends.

...but most of all, I am thankful for family.

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!!!

Fall Fun

Fall is my favorite season. By. Far. It has the best holidays and the best weather. One thing I love about living here is that the Fall seems to last a long time - with relatively short winters and summers. Here are some of the fun things we've been up to this fall (in reverse order).

Family bike rides.

(if you look closely he is totally conked out asleep in his bike trailer)

Bouncy house birthday parties.

Visits from Autie Erin.

Trunk or Treat with the buddies.

Apple picking in NC.

Couldn't even wait to get it off the tree.

Go here to see our end of summer extravaganza.

Old News

As several of you have so kindly reminded me, I let a couple of months slip by without posting anything. So, since this is the closest thing I have to any kind of journal I'm going to work on filling in the blanks. I like to keep things in chronological order though, so keep checking back for older posts that weren't there previously.

Happy Halloween

* click to enlarge
Hope yours was as fun as ours!

+ One

Not only has he been my "plus one" for many occasions, including morning jogs, church meetings, and even a breakfast date to Panera when Brad was on a boy scout camp out. But my plus one is now one plus! Here are the highlights from the last three(ish) months.

Fifteen Month Stats:
Height: 32 3/4 inches (91%)
Weight: 22 lbs 12 oz (now only in the 25%!)

In the last three months he has become an expert walker, and now he can even walk backwards and run - that awkward toddler run that is so cute.

He can also say the following:
Dog - "dot"
Dad - "dadda"
Mom - "bop"
Ball - "boo"
What a cow says - "brrr"
What a sheep says - "baaa"
What a chicken says - "ba ba ba"
He likes to repeat words or sounds that I say. Sometimes we play Miracle Worker - where he is Helen Keller and I am Anne Sullivan. He runs around pointing to everything and I tell him what it is. Ok, so just kind of like Miracle Worker b/c he can hear and I can't sign much at all.

He can also sign book, all done, and more. I've tried to teach him more signs but I think he has figured out that he can get just about anything he wants from anyone with those three signs. So, the joke's on me I guess.

Some of his favorite activities are:

Picking things out of the garden. Which means I usually have to inspect what he has picked, then replace it with a more or less (gross) ripe vegetable then distract him while I go wash it off and give him an acceptable vegetable to play with/eat. Many times we have come in from the garden and had fresh tomatoes. He loves them. The peppers he just likes to play with.


Helping around the house. Seriously, he did this on his own. He loves to help sweep and mop!




























Finding his belly button and playing at the park. He will even go down the slide by himself (on his belly) if the other kids are doing it.














He loves to cuddle and give us hugs, as well as other moms, babies, and dogs. He's knocked over several of his unsuspecting friends doing just that. And I love that he will just walk up to my friends and ask them to pick him up and hold him. He has such a big personality for such a little guy. I can't wait to see what the next few months will bring. Unless it brings temper tantrums, then I would rather just stay right here.

I'm no runner...

...but I ran a 5K with my friends Angela and Jeabri in the Race for the Cure. We trained for it all summer long in the heat and humidity, with babies in jog strollers. So, when race day came around and it was cloudy and cool, and we were stroller free, it seemed fairly easy and FUN! Hopefully we'll do another one soon. Maybe even a 10K next time (don't hold your breath).

Farewell to Summer

We spent Labor Day camping on Edisto Island, going to the beach and then to Charleston. If a picture says a thousand words, then I think this one says it all.

But just in case, here are a few more.

testing the waters with dad

picking the best shells

walking along the beach

playing in the park

strolling through Charleston

Big Brother

Yesterday was my brother Scott's birthday. He is in Finland now so I wasn't able to wish him a proper happy birthday. But really, what's better than a blog birthday? At least this birthday tribute will last forever. So, here are some of the best things about my big brother (mind you he is 10 years older so some of my memories may be a little fuzzy).

• I'm pretty sure the time I cut my own hair was while he was babysitting me. I told my mom "it fell out" but I'm pretty sure he still got in a little bit of trouble for not watching me closer. Sorry :)
• Another time while he was babysitting me I ran under him while he was lifting weights. I got hit right above my eye and it cut me pretty bad. Scott took care of me, cleaned it up and put a butterfly bandage on it. Debby came home, said he did it all wrong and bandaged me up differently. My parents came home and decided I might need stitches and took me to the doctor. The doctor looked at it, and ended up putting a butterfly bandage back on it. (This is how I remember it, but my memory is hazy because I think I was only 3 or 4 and I had just gotten hit in the head afterall).
• He protected us from all kinds of ferocious wildlife: the copperhead snake that slithered through our campsite, and the wild bees that attacked us while we were sitting on the Renfrow's lawn. Scott rolled down the hill to distract the bees or squash the bees, I'm not really sure. But, he had a ton of bee stings and I only got one.
• He also protected me from the neighborhood boys. Apparently one time Scott tied our neighbor Chris up to a tree because he had been mean to me. There was also a bow and arrow involved. I didn't find this out until I was a junior in highschool and Chris and I were in the same class. I guess it worked, because I only remember him being nice to me.
• Scott really liked to tie anyone up. I got tied up to the post on the porch several times for various reasons.
• My friends LOVED him. They thought he was soooo cute and would just swoon when he would come to the basketball games to watch me cheer when he was home from college. I can remember several times meeting girls a few years older than me that knew who he was, even though he was still several years older than them.
• He only dated girls whose names began with an "S". And of course he married the best one.
• He could kick the football over the house.
• He is a man of few words but yet he studies and teaches linguistics. Perplexing.
• By example, he taught me the finer points of the "lay low policy". This is when, particularly as a teenager, you go about your business without drawing a lot of attention to yourself. You tell, rather than ask, your parents where you are going as if they have already given permission. You don't talk back or cause big fights and thereby you pretty much get to do whatever you want without nearly as much parental intervention or inquiry as our fiestier counterparts (a.k.a. the other three sisters).

Happy Birthday Scott!!!

Church Pants and Hand Prints

Feeling slightly more confident in my sewing skills, I decided to make some baby pants out of a pair of Brad's old dress pants that Blink chewed a hole in. Not only did the pants turn out really cute, but now I can hate Blink a little less.

I wouldn't call myself a clean freak but I do like to keep a tidy house. However, I think this little messy reminder might be sticking around for awhile. It's just cute.

This little gem...

I picked up this little gem at a consignment sale recently and it has been worth every penny!

Nap Pants

I have little or no creative talents of my own and have always been amazed by people who could create something out of nothing. However, creating something out of something else...now that is something I can do. Well, at least with a little help from my friends*. So recently I've been getting reacquainted with my sewing machine and making baby pants from old T-shirts. I call them nap pants b/c not only are they comfy for the little guy to nap in but they are so stinkin' easy to make that I can whip out a pair during his nap time.

* Thank you to Lauren for always being creative and inspirational and having links to creative people on your blog, thanks to Dana whoever-you-are for the idea and tutorial, and special thanks to Angela for the letting me come over and sew with you!

Best Friends

This one is for you, Rebecca.

And Now For the Good Stuff...

...but first, 12 month stats and such

Height: 30.5 inches

Weight: 21 lbs 9.5 ounces

Teeth: We'll call it 7, but 2 are just barely poking their way in.

Sleeping through the night? Yes, if you consider a 5:30 am wakeup still sleeping through the night.

Walking? Yes! He can walk halfway across a room now, but for longer trips his preferred method of transportation is still crawling.

Favorites: Blueberries (still), opening and closing doors and gates, shoes (as toys), having books read to him over and over, pulling apart legos, pushing buttons (on toys, tv's, phones, etc), pulling all of the clothes out of the drawer (we call this helping).

And finally: Parties, Presents, and Messy Cake Faces

* click to enlarge

THIS

"This" is the word he uses when he wants something. Not want, or more, or even that. This.

Somehow in what seemed like only 3.5 minutes he went from...

This

to This.

This may sound crazy but sometimes I have to restrain myself from waking him up just so I can cuddle him a little longer.

This has me wrapped around his little finger (I think he knows it).

Afterall, who could say no to something as sweet as This?

Happy (Belated) Birthday Brad

It occurred to me that I didn't do a birthday tribute for Brad when we celebrated his birthday a couple of weeks ago. I guess since I see and talk to him everyday I didn't think to write something to memorialize the occasion. But, so no one thinks he is being slighted, here is his birthday post.

10 Things I Love About Brad (in addition to the obvious):

1. He often lays down on the floor with the dogs before he goes to bed at night so that they don't feel like they never get any attention.

2. He's always up for doing something fun. I never have to convince him. In fact, most times when I start a sentence with "Do you want to..." he replies "Yes" before I get out the rest of the sentence.

3. He's not afraid to bake.

4. He knows the real scientific reasons for phenomenon that I would otherwise explain by ghosts. For instance, when I set a plastic cup on some water on the counter and it started to move, or why the light in our bedroom would sometimes inexplicably turn on.

5. Ever since a Boy Scout camping trip when there was apparently a shortage of firewood he has been obsessed with firewood and devising plans to get firewood. Whenever we drive past a large foresty area (which is quite common around here) he says, "Karen, look at all that firewood". He also often says he needs a chainsaw. Mind you, we only have three teeny trees in our yard - they are barely good for kindling.

6. While I'm on the subject, he really builds the best campfires. I always thought mine were pretty good and my claim to fame has been that I once built a campfire good enough to cook on in the pouring rain. He beats me on consistency though.

7. He has dispelled the myth of many foods that I deem "magic food" - food that can only be produced in a factory or restaurant. Such foods include pho, spring rolls and truffles. There are others but I can't think of them now. I think the only remaining magic foods are oreos and twinkies - and really, those are magical.

8. We both have a little bit of OCD. It's especially noticeable right before we leave on a trip. This would be great if we were both OCD about the same things, but we are not. I find it necessary to have the house completely clean. Clean enough for the Queen. I know the Queen is not coming, just the petsitter, but still. Brad, on the other hand uses this time to make last minute repairs. Before we left for Washington DC he fixed the door latch to the basement (so the dogs couldn't get upstairs). Before we left for Myrtle Beach he took out our car stereo to see if it had an auxillary input on the back so we could plug in our MP3 player. It didn't. So he burned several CD's instead. And, right (and I mean moments) before we were going to leave for Kansas and Missouri he decided to check our sprinker system. One wasn't working so he asked if I thought he should go to Home Depot to get a new sprinker head so he could fix it. I said "no". I still needed to get the floors mopped :)

9. He doesn't have a set order for starting a drive or stopping one...for instance, when I am getting ready to go somewhere I always do things in this order - get in the car, turn the key, foot on the brake, put the car in reverse, fasten my seatbelt. He has no such order and sometimes will try to put the car in reverse without turning it on or whatever. It was particularly obvious when he was used to his manual transmission and then would drive my car. It made me laugh and laugh, sometimes until I almost wet myself.

10. He reads Harry Potter to the baby at bedtime. At about two pages per night, maybe by the time they finish the first book Dozer will be old enough to see the movie.