Catilin & John's Wedding

My cousin Caitlin was the first baby I remember being around. She's 8 years younger than me & I remember her visiting us in San Antonio when she was just a few weeks oldthen I helped take care of her when we lived in the St. Louis area & her brothers were born. It's amazing how quickly time flies as Caitlin is a beautiful young women and Mike & I sat with her handsome brothers with my 3-month & 4-year-old boys.

Click to see albums shared by Charles, Pam, Mom

Caitlin asked Collin to be a ring bearer so we rented a REAL tux from Men's Warehouse and were invited to the rehearsal dinner. It was a very nice dinner and we got to sit with my Grandma, cousins & their lovely dates. Collin was in a good mood, but again stayed up WAY to late, which showed the next day.

Collin looked so cute in his tux! Carson wore the tux that Collin wore at Rob & Kristen's wedding when he was 5 weeks old (I'm not too surprised it fit him, given that Carson was bigger at his 2-mo. doctor's appointment than Collin was at his 4-mo. appointment). Doris offered to come to the wedding to take care of Carson, which I really didn't think was necessary but since she was going to be taking the boys during the evening reception I said OK. As expected, Carson was an angel and slept through the entire mass, but it was great to have Doris there to stay with Collin and Jon's nephew Patrick at the back of the church. She heard Collin ask Patrick "Are you scared?" Patrick said "yes" and Collin said "Me too!". Later he asked if he had to do that again and we said "No" and he said "Good". They didn't actually carry the rings but instead a small pillow that came in handy. As soon as Collin made it down the aisle he laid his head down on the small pillow and went to sleep for the entire service. It was the best thing that could have happened but it was too bad that he missed the formal pictures, wouldn't pose for one with Carson, and he was in a bad mood when we stopped by my cousin Matt's house.

In the several hours between the wedding & reception (a St. Louis Catholic wedding tradition) we saw Karen & Greg's new house for the first time and got to see our nieces. It's a really nice home in a BEAUTIFUL neighborhood and will be even nicer after they do their major renovations.

Collin rides his bike!

We have wonderful neighbors with a boy Charlie just a year older than Collin who shares many of his toys and clothes that he's outgrown with Collin. Our latest and greatest gift has been a bike for Collin to ride! He was so excited to ride it and it was a source of great enjoyment for mom & son while dad was in "Las Vegast."

(That's how Collin pronounces the city, despite our trying to tell him that it ends with the "s" sound as in snake. We were getting some strange looks in the grocery store the other day when Collin is singing "Viva Las Vegas....snake!" at the top of his lungs. You probably had to be there to enjoy the humor, but it was pretty funny.

So, I was a little concerned about Mike leaving the same week that school was over and what we were going to do together, but as usual, I enjoyed the time alone with Collin (now plus Carson). I'm even including a video of his first bike ride, which was taken at East Cobb park on the day we got his bike. The first day he asked for a two-wheeler and having the training wheels taken off but I told him he needed to practice some more. I had to run while pushing Carson in the stoller to keep up with him, which was a little hard to do in sandals. Today he actually asked for knee pads and elbow pads. I have no idea how he even knows about these things, but he is constantly amazing me where he comes up with these things.

I think he's going to enjoy riding his bike like his mom!

Visit from Raquel & kids

Just like Raquel was 5 hours south when we lived in Dallas and she in Houston, she's five hours south here too since she lives in Crestview, FL, about 45 minutes from Destin. She came to visit with the girls and we did several fun things in the afternoons. Tuesday we went to the zoo then met up with the guys for dinner. Wednesday they accompanied us to our regular East Cobb Park picnic outing to hear the concert. Collin unfortunately wasn't in the best mood for their trip but it was great to have them here!

Mother's Day

What a great day! I woke up with Collin saying "Happy Mother's Day, Mommy!" unprompted for the first time. There's nothing that compares to this feeling of happiness for family and being a mom. You can't describe to someone that isn't a parent how all the sacrifices are worth it but they are! I am so thankful and blessed for my wonderful boys!
I came downstairs to a wooden flower arrangement that Collin made for me at Home Depot with his dad as you can see here with picture frame and had he made me at school.

We went to church at 11:30 since we had gotten used to it even though Collin’s last Sunday school for the year was last week. We enjoyed a nice breakfast and relaxing Sunday morning, then went to Lunch at Five Guys (I figured it wasn’t a very popular Mother’s Day outing) but they have GREAT burgers and we could sit outside.

We went for a hike at Sope Creek right by our house that afternoon. It was our second annual hike on Mother’s Day since last year we went up to the North Georgia mountains, but a great tradition!

Carson is 2 months old!

To celebrate Carson's two-month birthday, we took him to watch the finish of his first professional bike race, the Tour de Georgia. We saw George Hincampe, Lance's former teammate come in second in today's stage. We parked in Mike's parking garage and walked over to finished at Centennial Park in downtown Atlanta.
Collin really enjoyed watching the bikes go by but crashed on the way home since he stayed up too late last night at a friend's house while we were at our neighborhood's progressive dinner. Carson went with us and everyone got to see how good of a baby he is. He was awake through appetizers and most of dinner and deserts at the clubhouse but stayed in his seat most of the time greeting many of our neighbors with smiles.

Carson has had a few more nights where he's slept all night (11 to 6), which is very nice of him. Still, the once a night waking isn't too bad since he's so close to us and I barely wake up to feed him. I thought life would change much more than it has - so far we haven't let having a newborn slow us down too much. I'm sure once he's crawling or needing to sleep in his own crib things will change, but until then we're enjoying being on the go as usual. Last week we went to the car show as a family, and during the week we're still running and errand or two after Collin's school and playground time. Carson has days where he's awake much more, but other days he still sleeps a lot. He is definately more alert and following sounds well. We're looking forward to his two-month doctors appointment to find out how much he weighs.

Spring Break

It's kinda funny to think preschoolers have a Spring Break but it's was good preview of summer not having anywhere we had to be so we decided to make the most of it. Monday we did our usual Monday morning run and playground visit with our friends Annabel and her mom Melinda. Tuesday we went to the zoo with our new friends Alex and his baby brother Bo (and mom Erika). Bo is just three days younger than Carson. Wednesday we enjoyed a walk and lunch with our friends Katie, Shelby (and mom Kim), went to the park and made some deliveries. Thursday we took a big trip south to Callaway Gardens with our friends Cameron and Conner (and mom Stephanie). Here's a picture of Cameron, Collin, Conner and Carson (lots of "Cs"!) in the Callaway sign outside the Butterfly House. The Azaleas were beautiful but the boys probably enjoyed the boat taxi the most. Friday we were able to meet with some friends from church who had a baby a few weeks before Carson was born. The week flew by quickly and it was fun to catch up with friends that have opposite school days as Collin. We had a great week visiting with friends and enjoying the beautiful spring weather and flowers!

Six weeks

It's hard to believe how big our little baby is getting - he graduated from "Newborn" to size "1" diapers around 1-month, and now he has already grown out of several of his 0-3 month outfits which is sad. He doesn't even seem like a newborn baby to us, probably because of his hair and size. His head is still wobbly, but he's beginning to be able to pick it up and hold it for short stretches of time. Carson actually enjoys being on his belly sometimes, so we try to get in tummy time as much as we can, but a lot of the time he's in his car seat or bouncy seat, and we just got out the swing this week.

He does still sleep much of the day, but we've had a few days where he's decided to be awake, and a few evenings where we've needed to hold him. I read somewhere that an average 6-week-old baby cries for 4 hours a day, and collicy babies cry 6 hours a day. Wow- we do have it good! The amount of time Carson cries is directly proportional to the number of times I change his diaper a day and the speed that I respond to his hunger cries, since usually the only time he cries is if his diaper is off or if he's hungry - usually a total of only about 10-15 minutes a day.

Most days Carson wakes up when we do (I usually put him in his bouncy seat while I eat my grapefruit and then feed him), then he's awake while I'm getting lunches and Collin ready in the morning, falls asleep on the way taking Collin to school around 9:30 AM. Dependng on my morning he usually sleeps in his carset while I do a facial or get something done until I wake him for lunch around noon before I have to pick up Collin. He continues to sleep until 3 or so and sometimes stays awake for an hour or so and other times goes back to sleep until 5ish. He's up most of the evening - here's a picture of the boys after Collin's bedtime around 10 PM when Carson is wide awake. I feed Carson before I go to bed around 11:30 or midnight and then put him in the pack & play next to our bed. He wakes around 3:30 AM and then 6ish. One day I'll get brave and put him to sleep in his own room to see if he'll sleep even better (Collin was in his crib the 2nd night home from the hospital). He did actually sleep through the night once (midnight- 6 AM) at 5 weeks old, on March 31st.

We haven't taken as many pictures lately because he's got a bit of baby acne but he's still super cute as you can see. We're often treated as celebraties when walking through places with everyone gawking and commenting on his hair, asking how old he is and how they've never before seen a baby with so much hair. Apparently an old wives tale says that when the mom has heartburn during her pregnancy, the baby will have hair. While I don't normally believe such tales, it is ironic that heartburn was one of my only symptoms of pregnancy and both my boys were born with a full head of hair.