Colson is 3 months old

Again, I will repeat myself by saying HOW TIME IS FLYING!  My sweet Colson just turned 3 months old last week, right before Christmas.  He is growing and changing and turning into more of a little person each day.

He has become so curious to everything around him all of a sudden.  He stays awake much more, and is alert and learning to interact with his surroundings.  

He just smiles and smiles all the time.  I am still getting used to the idea of such a sweet, laid back baby.  Cooper was quite different to say the least.  Colson is just mellow most of the time.  

He is still small, but growing and gaining weight at his own pace.  He may be a little on the thin side, but so is his Daddy.  And his arms and legs are so long!  Mommy is still trying to nurse him as best she can, but is having to supplement because her body just is not cooperating like she wishes it would.  But we are working it out by just taking it one day at a time, being patient, and praying diligently.  Everywhere we go, people like to tell me how little he is.  But I just have started replying back to them by saying "nah...he is just perfect."  Because he is.  Perfect in every way.

He has such a sweet demeanor.  If he is fussy, I can usually just hold him up to my face and talk to him, and he will stop crying and start to smile.  It just amazes me!

This month he also discovered his hands and loves to use them to bat at his toys, grab onto my hair, or sometimes onto other things when he is nursing...ouch.  :-) 

 The love that we already feel for this sweet boy just cannot be described or measured.  I cannot WAIT to see him next month, next year, or when he is as old as Cooper is...and what kind of a personality he will have, what his interests will be, and how he will act.  However, I am not rushing anything, as I know as each month passes, I already want to go back to the month before and enjoy it again. 

He sleeps all night.  It is incredible to me.  If I want him to nurse at night, I have to wake him.  I do frequently to see if it will help him pack on a few extra ounces.  But after he finishes, he just curls up and goes right back to sleep.  

He is quite a heavenly baby.  I think this picture depicts him well.  Happy, easy, mellow, beautiful, and perfect.

Can you tell we kind of like this sweet boy?

Happy 3 month birthday Colson!!!

Christmas 2012

Christmas 2011 was just awesome.  Having two boys instead of one made for a different kind of holiday this year, and I am already looking forward to next Christmas when Colson should be walking and even more interactive and playful.  This year, he mainly just hung out and stayed happy.  Cooper on the other hand, was wiiiide open with excitement about the holiday celebrations!

Our first family gathering was with Josh's family at his parent's house.  Cooper and Colson wore their matching shirts announcing they are on the nice list (compliments of their Nan of course).  Cooper had a great time playing with his cousins and his grandparents, aunts, and uncles.  He most definitely gets plenty of attention when he is with his family.

Mark beat Santa this year by getting Coop his #1 requested toy on his list.  He referred to it as "a certain wii game called Go Vacation."  That is because when Santa sent him a video from the Portable North Pole, he said it just like that.  So from that point on, it was "a certain wii game."  He pretty much came out of his skin with excitement over the game!  Of course, the next morning, he insisted we venture out to the mall so he could make sure to tell Santa Claus that he did not have to get him the game anymore because Mark got it for him!

Cooper's Aunt Pam always seems to show him extra attention.  It is so clear that she just adores our boys, and Cooper thinks the world of her for all of the love she shows him.  He has not stopped playing with the gift she gave him, either, as this airplane flies all over our house nowadays.

He also opened up some Hot Wheels from his Aunt Lacina and Uncle James.

Colson received a few more toys which is great since he really has very few.  

But I think he would have preferred to have played with his Pappaw's tool set.  He did not take his eyes off of it!

Our celebration with the Chappelear family, as always, was a blessing.  I find myself thanking God once more for allowing my sons to have such involved, loving, caring, and incredible grandparents in their lives.  

The next morning Buddy and Kelsey set up a hot chocolate party for Cooper.  

Then, we spent Christmas Eve preparing to go to NanPa's for another celebration.

Both boys put on their Christmas outfits.  Cooper in his Christmas sweater that mommy loves and Colson in his first Christmas tie.

Thankfully I was able to sneak in pictures with both of them.  Cooper did not want to have his picture taken with both mommy and Colson, but did agree to just having his picture made with mommy.  No family pictures this year.  Maybe next year.  But we did manage to get some good pictures in front of the tree with each of them.

Cora was also dressed in her Christmas best.  She and Cooper played all night together.  I am thankful the two of them get along so well (most of the time anyway).

I spent some time with Coop and Cora decorating sugar cookies for Santa.  I think they ate more cookies than they decorated, but I would say that is what makes cookie decorating so much fun.

Sadly, my battery died right after I took the first pictures of the night.  So I am counting on Justin and Grace to send me a few more pictures to add to the blog.  I am especially hoping for some of Cooper and Cora with their gifts from Pa and Nan.  Cooper got a big talking dump truck and Cora got a Dora microphone.  It was quite hysterical watching them play with their new toys all night!

Once we arrived back home, Cooper headed outside to sprinkle reindeer food in the front yard for Santa's reindeer.

Then he quickly set out his cookies for Santa.

Then he headed to bed.  He was so excited that he could not sleep.  After about half an hour passed by, Josh went in to check on Cooper.  He was sitting up in bed with his hands propped behind his head, eyes wide open.  That was when we realized that his new room had a straight ahead shot of the chimney from his bed.  Cooper was laying in bed watching the chimney intently, waiting for Santa to arrive.  Josh asked hm what he was doing and he whispered "Waiting for Santa to come down the chimney."  He toughed it out for over an hour, but eventually he fell over and slept soundly.  He was exhausted after all of the excitement from the day.

While he was sleeping, Santa snuck in to deliver toys for the good boys.  He most definitely enjoyed Cooper's cookies, and left him a letter thanking him for them. 

Cooper woke up sometime before the sun came up, and saw that his stocking was stuffed with toys.  He dumped it on the floor, grabbed a few items that caught his eye, and ran to the bed with the items and his letter from Santa, waking us up to show us.  We somehow, sleepily, persuaded him to climb back in bed and go back to sleep.  That was our Christmas miracle.

Later, once the sun was up, he woke us up again and went back into the den to check out his stocking.  As he was digging through, Josh asked him if that was all Santa brought him.  He must have forgotten that Santa delivered toys to the OTHER tree in the playroom, because he said that was all he had.  Funny, though, that he seemed content with it.  Until he saw what else he had coming...

He walked into the playroom and shouted "OH....MY...GOODNESS!!"  We just laughed as he made his way slowly around the tree, checking out the items that Santa had left him the night before.

He immediately unpacked his "wots of cars" and started playing with them.

We had to encourage him to open presents.  He seemed quite content to play with what Santa had brought him.  But once he started opening presents he definitely caught on! This was one of my favorite gifts that I gave him this year - a Super Cooper cape!

Colson just hung out in his chair and watched Cooper open all of his presents for him.  Colson did not get much this year.  There were diapers, a swaddle blanket, a few outfits, a sleeper, and 3 or 4 toys under the tree for him.  But he seemed quite content!

The two of them looked pretty adorable in their matching Christmas pajamas I had Amanda Hackett make for them with some clearance fabric I found after Thanksgiving.  

For breakfast we enjoyed a big casserole, biscuits, and some Santa pancakes for Cooper.  Christmas breakfast is always a special treat.

After breakfast, the mess was cleaned up, the gifts were put in their places, and all of the excitement and anticipation for Christmas morning started fading away.  Too fast.  This year Christmas arrived too fast, happened too fast, and ended too fast.  Maybe I can find a way to make next year's Christmas pass by a little slower so I can soak up a many memories with my family as possible.  This year was a good one for sure, but I wish it could have slowed down...kind of like the last day at work did before the holidays.  That was painfully slow.  Why is it that work days go so slowly but vacation days seem to fly by?

Cooper has been spending his time since Christmas enjoying his new toys.  I have been working around the house doing the usual organizing routine that everyone does after Christmas, trying to find room for the new stuff and find something to do with the old.

But as you can see, he got his "gun to shoot people with."  And he loves it.  So far, he hasn't shot anything he is not supposed to shoot. But we keep Colson inside while Coop is playing, just to be safe!

Since it is almost time to celebrate again, so I will go ahead and wish everyone a Happy New Years!  

I hope that 2012 is filled with as many blessings and wonderful memories as this year was! 

5 days til WHAT?

5 days until Christmas you say?  How is that possible?  It seems like December just started, oh I don't know... YESTERDAY!?   I guess time is just going to fly by at warp speed now that I am a mom of two, a full time teacher, a full time dance coach, and a full time housekeeper/cook/domestic engineer.  Wow...each day just kind of runs into the next and they are all happening at way too fast of a pace.  

Not to mention the fact that we go to school much later than we normally do this year.  We usually have a week before Christmas to prepare, shop,wrap, clean, cook...etc... but this year we only have two days.  TWO DAYS.  Yeah, we won't be quite ready.

We do have our trees up.  We have our pretty, tall, decorative tree next to the mantel.  This one is the tree that we had BC (the time in my life before children were born).

We have 4 stockings now.  We have a fifth one for Dave but only have 4 hangers.  I am on the lookout for a fifth one though!

Then, we also have our "cracker barrel" tree.  This is the tree with ornaments from my life, Josh's life, and now our lives with our children.  Ornaments are on this tree from when I was a little girl, items that were made by my granny, Aunt Martha, and my mom, and there are also ornaments from my students and dancers.  Now I am even adding ornaments made by the boys. 

  Slowly this tree is becoming my favorite of the two.  Funny how every favorite thing in your life somehow revolves around your children, isn't it?

Our elves Buddy and Kelsey showed up after Thanksgiving.  Which reminds me...I did not post any pictures from Thanksgiving.  So let me share a few quickly.

Cooper starred in his first public performance at the GBH in his Thanksgiving skit.  It was so cute to watch his class sing and perform in front of an audience and I was so impressed at what a great job he did!

We enjoyed Thanksgiving dinner at mom's house this year.  Here is Colson sporting his "First Thanksgiving" outfit.  Of course it was compliments of Nan.  Pretty much everything both boys wear is compliments of their Nan.  I cannot imagine how much $ she has saved us over the years so far!

Sweet cousins checking each other out.  Colson looks long and lean and Elinor is showing some pretty adorable pudginess already.  These two are going to have such fun growing up together!

She is such a pretty baby.  I know she is my niece and I am biased, but I still think she is one of the prettiest baby girls I have ever seen.

These two were the easy ones on Thanksgiving.  They fussed when they were hungry or needed a diaper change.  But for the most part, this was how they acted all night.

And then there were these two.  They were not so quiet.  They were a little bit more demanding to say the least!

The proud Dads with their newest additions.

And the proud aunt with sweet Elinor in my arms.  

It has not taken long for me to fall in love with her already!

So, back to the arrival of our elves.  That night after we returned home from our Thanksgiving meal we found our elves had arrived on the stoop of our front door.  They had a letter for Cooper.

The elves have been giving Cooper lots of laughs and surprises this month.  I love hearing him wake up and run all over the house yelling "Buuuuuuddyyyy.....Kelllllseeeeeeyyyy....where are youuuuu?"  I think I would love it more if it was not something he did at 6 in the morning on a Saturday, but nonetheless, I do enjoy seeing him so excited.

They brought him a coupon reminding him to write his letter to Santa and promised to deliver it to Santa for him.  So we did.  First, he sat down with some hot chocolate and a pen and did some shopping in the Sunday paper toy catalogs.

He intently circled every item he even remotely thought he might like.

Just one one page alone he circled over $800 worth of items!

 Thankfully, when it was time to write the letter, he narrowed down his options significantly. 

Here was his letter (written by mommy but signed by Coop):

The elves took his letter to the North Pole for him and then returned the next day with a coupon to watch Christmas movies and popcorn to pop.

One day they adorned the Christmas tree with his underwear.  Coop took this one personal and immediately pulled everything down.  He even scolded the elves for making such a mess saying "you don't do that!"

They played with his Cars.

They even followed us to Pigeon Forge for a dance competition.  Here they are in the condo.

We stayed at Wilderness at the Smokies.  Cooper has been begging everyday since then to go back.  Who could blame him?  There was a huge waterpark that would be every kid's dream to play in.

He LOVED the wave pool until the waves kicked in.  Then he was outta there as fast as lightning.

The kiddie section of the water park was where he spent most of his time.  

He made himself a friend and these two played together for at least an hour.  They had a ball.

On our way back to the room we made a stop in the lobby to visit Santa.  Cooper was very excited to remind him of his Christmas list.  "A certain wii game, "wots" of cars, and a gun to shoot with."  Great...already wanting a gun?  

Maybe this is where Santa says "You'll shoot your eye out kid!!"

Colson tagged along but obviously did not get to enjoy the water park quite yet.  He spent most of his weekend in someone's arms.  Mine, Daddy's, Katie's, Jenna's...it did not matter to him as long as he was warm and snuggly.

Now on to the Christmas card picture attempt.  Yeah...not like I hoped it would turn out.  I wanted to get a picture of Cooper, Colson, and Dave all together.  Maybe one of them would be smiling... or really I just wanted one where they all looked reasonably peaceful.  But instead I got this from Colson.

He just was not feeling up to the group pictures.  Neither was Cooper.  But I still think this one turned out pretty good, despite the pouty face.  I just say he must be a South Pole Elf.

Of course, later on, Colson mellowed out.

Thankfully I was able to get a few of the two of them together for the card.  No Dave this year... it just did not work out.  The one with him was too dark.  

But these were definitely winners.

Later on that week I managed to get a few more of him in his Christmas pajamas.  He is growing up on me and has such a fun little personality.   

I just cannot get over how BLUE his eyes are!

This month Cooper also starred in his SECOND public performance...his Christmas program with his pre-k class.  He was tree #4 in the play "The Littlest Christmas Tree."  He is the 4th one from the left in the tree costume below.

He was not shy on stage.  Not at all.  

He sang.  He danced.  He laughed.

He remembered all of his lines and spoke them loud and clear.   

Most of all, he had a blast on stage.  I don't think I stopped smiling the entire time.  It was just an awesome feeling to see him shine.  I am sure all of the parents felt that way about their children, too.  But I know my kid was the star of the show, right?  :-)  

He most definitely is a star in my eyes.  This little boy gives me more and more each day to be proud of. 

To wrap up this post... I will continue with a few more elf pictures.  Here are a few more things they have done:

They rolled the bathroom.

They drew faces on our family pictures.

They laid out all the ingredients we needed to make Cooper's favorite Saturday morning breakfast - chocolate chip pancakes.  Buddy even sampled the syrup.

They even gave Cooper tickets to ride the Polar Express and brought the boys matching Christmas pj's.

The Polar Express was really special this year.  Cooper did not know he was going to get to go until his elves surprised him the morning of with tickets.  He wore his new Christmas pajama pants that Amanda Hackett made him, and bundled up in a big coat.  He was fighting off a cold but that did not seem to bother his spirits at all.

We were waiting in line when the train pulled into the station.  He was so excited that he jumped up and down and shouted "It's here!  The twain is finally here!"  I loved seeing him get so excited.  There truly is nothing in the world as joyful to watch as a child that overwhelmed with excitement.  

His eyes just stayed plastered to the window most of the ride to the North Pole.

He did take a break to enjoy some cookies and hot chocolate (or yoohoo).  

His eyes were HUGE as he gazed at the big train car outside the window labeled "Toys to Deliver."  I asked him what was in the train for me and he said I was getting a new green car for Christmas.  Hmmm.... wouldn't a new car be nice?  And no, not a Hot Wheels car!

Santa waved to us as we entered the North Pole.  

Coop stood in his seat and waved back at Santa.  

When Santa arrived on our train, Cooper stayed in his seat and waited patiently for him to come talk to him. Josh and I kept waiting for him to rush the aisle or jump and scream, but he didn't.  Although we would have gotten a laugh out of it if he had done it!

He ran down his list of toys that he wants for Christmas with Santa one more time.  There were some new items this time that we had not heard before.  Good thing the mall has extended holiday shopping hours for Santa!!

After their chat, Santa gave Cooper a bell to ring.  Cooper asked for another one, and then another.  He gave me one and saved one for Colson.

It was really a nice evening for us to just focus all of our attention on Cooper for a change.  Since Colson has been born, Cooper has missed out on much of the time that normally has with just his mom and dad.  He has dealt with it so well, and does not seem to be jealous at all.  But last night he seemed to enjoy having us all to himself.  We enjoyed it too, very very much.  But we missed this sweet boy:

So now it is actually 4 days until Christmas as this post has taken me past midnight.  So much must be done between now and Christmas. I should have done some of it tonight, but really wanted to catch up on my blog before Christmas arrived.  (Can you imagine how long it would have been if I had waited any longer?!)  

No gifts have been wrapped, no wreath or lights are on our house, there are many gifts to be bought, meals to prepare, and the house must be cleaned.  BUT my top priority is just going to be to enjoy this time with my boys.  They won't care if the house is clean or not, will they?  Who needs clean clothes to wear?  

Truly, I do just plan to make and decorate cookies, watch Christmas movies, drink lots of hot chocolate and just spend time soaking up all the love these two boys have to give me.  Because that is what the holidays are all about.   I am ready for tomorrow at 3:30 to be here already!