ONE YEAR!!

Well Carter boy I can't believe you are a year old today!!! You are such a fun and sweet little boy! You love your momma and cry when you see me getting ready in the morning because you are afraid I'm gonna leave you. You are so smiley all the time. You have a fake laugh just to make people think they are funny even when they aren't. You also have a fake cry and it's so funny. It is so obvious it's fake that even strangers know you're faking, but you think you have us all fooled. You have brought so much joy to our lives over the past year and I hate to see you grow up so quickly!!

A Few TidBits About My Man:
Height: 30 inches? (we will know for sure next Tuesday but he is very long and most of it is in his waist)
Weight: 21 lbs/10 oz.
Babbles: Says mama, dada, baba, "A" for hey & kiki (kitty) and imitiates a lot of the things we say.
Food: Anything and everything. He loves waffles, strawberries, popsickles, any type of noodle dish, cheese crackers, poptarts. He has been eating gerber graduate meals since about 8 months old, but now he is starting to not want any type of baby/toddler specific food. He wants whatever we are eating and knows the difference between the real thing and the baby equivalent food.
Teeth: He has a total of 9 teeth with the 10th about to cut through the gum. He has 4 on top and 4 on the  bottom in the front and 1 of his 1 year old molars is coming in on the left side. The other one looks like it's about to pop through any day now.
Sleep: Well....this is a hard one. He has done extremely well the past month usually only waking up once at night and sometimes not at all. However, last week was a different story. We brought him to the dr. thinking he had an ear infection, but he didn't and we figured it is those big molars cutting through in the back of his mouth. He was up for 3 straight nights last week. It was miserable for all of us.

Others: He gives the sweetest kisses!! He leans his whole head into yours.

He loves to "share" with you even when you least expect it. Like in church when you all of a sudden have a soggy goldfish in your mouth while you're singing.

He loves drinking out of a sippy cup and can also suck out of a straw/juicebox now. However, he refuses to drink milk/formula out of anything but a bottle.

 He can go up and down stairs, as well as back off of beds, couches, etc. I don't have to worry about him falling off as much because he knows how to turn around and get down. He even turns around to back into the pool. Kinda scary!

He is climbing on EVERYTHING. This may be an understatement!! The nursery at the gym calls him "the climber" every time I bring him in. I've seen him on top of picnic tables, counters, chairs, Maci Rose's queen size bed, cars, wagons, and the list goes on and on. He has also learned to push his little riding toys over to shelves/tables and stand on them to reach whatever it is he wants.

I don't really think we can call him a walker just yet. He will stand up on his own and take 5-6 steps at a time, but once he falls down he just crawls the rest of the way to get there. So he can walk but prefers to crawl because it's faster. He stands up all the time though. He will stand up and drink a bottle or eat a popsickle or play with a toy. The other day my dad came over and he took about 10 steps accross our kitchen to get to him, but it's rare occasions we see that many. I think it's going to be in the near future that we see him take off!

 And the way he sits gets quite a lot of attention. We get comments all the time about his little squat. I don't know how his legs can handle it but he can sit like this for like 5-10 minutes at a time.

He will dance on command. It doesn't matter if you have music or not, you can say "dance Carter boy" and he will give you a little dance. It's so cute! He also recognizes the following words when we say them bi-bite, uh-oh/ouch, baba, no, Maci Rose, daddy, mama & when a phone is ringing he will put his hand up to his ear like he is talking on the phone.

He has the fattest/biggest hands and feet ever. The only shoes I can get on him are his sandals and crocks and occasionally a pair of keds that are 2 sizes too big. People are constantly making comments about their size, including my pediatrician who when I made the comment about him being a football player because of his size he held up his hands and said I'd say a basketball player with these hands!

 I asked him how old he was and he held up 1 finger!! (totally kidding....he's pointing at the camera)

 Look at the size of those hands!

Why'd you put me in this high chair just to take pictures???

 Oh....nevermind...is this cupcake really mine??



He is the sweetest and cutest little boy ever!! We have enjoyed every second of you this year and are excited to watch you grow into a handsome young man. We love you so much! Happy Birthday Carter boy!!

Here is a sneak peak of what we're doing to prepare for his party. The theme this year is fishing...

I can't wait to show pictures of how it turns out!!

And another...

Another cute video of Carter laughing hysterically at Maci Rose splashing around in the bathtub.

As Promissed...

Here is a video of Carter dancing. He will dance on command even without music. It is sooo funny! It's even funnier when he is standing up out of his booster chair because he still does the crazy hand motions but he bounces up and down too.

11 months

Ok so I know I'm a little late on this post, but I've been going 90 to nothing lately. I've been going to a May mini term class for 5 hours every.single.day for the past 3 weeks and we've had homework every day and tests every Thursday. This Thursday will be the final and the class will be over. Pretty cool to get a semester worth of knowledge in just 3 short weeks!

Anyways, I figured I better get this post on here soon because one week from tomorrow my baby will be 1!! And I don't want to skip it because this is a way I can archive and look back and see what he was doing at 11 months.

A few of his accomplishments this month include:
* going up and down the stairs (we don't use a gate anymore)
* drinking from a straw...he loves juice boxes
* almost completely on milk instead of formula
* dancing!!....omg....this is the funniest thing and I hope to post a video of it soon
* sleeping through the night for the most part. He has done so well this month and on the nights he's woken up it's only been once so I feel like a new woman these days (*better keep my fingers crossed on this one*)
* saying mama and dada

Here are his 11 month pics....

 Playing peek-a-boo...

I will tell you a lot more exciting stuff on his 1 year post. I can't believe he will be 1! Where has the time gone? You are getting cuter and funnier by the second!! I love you Carter boy!!

A little bit of everything...(and Easter)

WARNING: This is an extremely long post!!

I have been blogging like once a month lately hoping that life is going to slow down any minute so I can catch up. Well this past week reality set in and I realized LIFE IS NEVER GOING TO SLOW DOWN. I have been going full blast with school assignments, house stuff, weddings, showers, birthday parties, holidays, family reunions, and the gym/working out. Yes!! that's right I said GYM. We joined the Y 2 weeks ago and I'm proud to announce that I am officially a member of a gym for the first time ever in my life. I have enjoyed going to spin classes and step/workout classes for the first time. I have lost 0 pounds so far but my body is looking way more toned.

Here are some other things that are going on around here and definitely getting in the way of my blogging...

1.) I  have finals this week (yes, I should be studying) so that has me busy enough.

2.) Carter has surgery on Friday and I am a nervous wreck about it!!

3.) I started cleaning my aunt's house once a week, which takes about 3.5 hours. She has a really big house, but I'm working on blinds, ceiling fans and baseboards and it is hard stuff!! I need the money though and everyone who knows me knows I'm a germ/clean freak so it is something I enjoy doing.

4.) I have had weddings and baby showers taking up my weekends lately. And if I'm not at one of those I'm trying to spend some time with my kiddos in our new and improved backyard. Jeremy built us a fence and we finally got a net for our trampoline so our backyard is our new "park".  We have a playhouse, swingset, trampoline and swimming pool and should be getting a sand box soon.

5.) School has been tough and on top of the classes I'm taking this semester I have been trying to work in some floater classes to get me through school a little faster. So as soon as finals are over this week, I will be starting the May mini term Monday morning and going to class 5 hours every day for the next 3 weeks straight.

6.) Carter is into everything!!! And requiring a lot more work to watch these days!! He turned 11 months old yesterday and I haven't even taken his 11 month pics yet, but I promise that post will be coming soon because there is a lot to share. He will be 1 in less than 4 weeks and I am trying to start working on his birthday party.

7.) I have been gathering stuff around my house for a huge yard sale my whole entire family is going to be having at the end of May. I have taken a lot of those things and donated them to those who lost everything in the horrible tornado last week.

Speaking of that...I can hardly watch videos or footage without pouring tears. I am so heart-broken about Tuscaloosa where I spent 4.5 years of college. My parents went to Alabama and my brother went to school and law school there. My little sister is a senior there right now and was down there and less than a half mile away from 15th street last Wednesday when the storms hit. They have let school out completely for the semester and moved graduation back to August now. I am very thankful she and all of my other friends and family are safe, but my heart breaks for those who have lost loved ones and everything they own. My little sister continues to tell me stories of friends of friends who are still missing. It's so sad!


I'm sure there are many more things I'm leaving off this list, but I'm sure you can see how busy we've been and how busy we're going to be. Life is just not going to slow down any time soon.

So I'll leave you with Easter pics and events (since that was supposed to be a post of mine last week). Ugh! We dyed Easter eggs with cousins, had 2 Easter egg hunts with mine and Jeremy's families, Easter bunny came, and then I tried to get some pics of my kids in their Easter outfits, but it was hot outside and they had already eaten lunch and were ready to change and play and I made them sit and take pics. Needless to say they weren't very enthused!