Saturday, August 28, 2010

toys!

Thanks Nana for the new toy :)

spatula

Wednesday, August 18, 2010

butts

C6
true!

C4

C1
such a big kid - those pants are size 12 months

C3
Baby Butt

kody

Little Butt

noisy
Big Butt

fb
fuzzi bunz for my baby butt

Monday, August 16, 2010

Frogs and Rain

Tucker is really ready for monsoon season to be over! His new hiding place

tuck shower

tucker

Carter bounces himself in the bouncy chair and has a talk with Ribbits. Also on vimeo. Warning, I am not a professional video taker and you might end up veryyyy dizy! In the works is a four month video compilation...




Sunday, August 15, 2010

What's new and better late than never!

First, a four month picture. Better late than never.... considering he's going to be 5, yes FIVE, months a week from Monday. Craziness.

Carter four months

Carter has hit some big milestones recently. Feet. He found them, he loves them, he talks to them, they keep him up when he is supposed to be napping. They are the greatest thing since squash in Carter's book.

feet5

FEET


Sitting up. Carter loves to sit up. He is always pulling forward and is doing really well sitting on his own. He also loves the red pillows we have on the cough. He lunges for them and tries to eat them.

sitting

Finding things and passing them from one hand to the other. Carter is now aware that when things fall to the side that he can turn his head and find them and then tell his hands to go get it! He is constantly pulling Radar, Ribbits, or the blanket bears to him. And if he flings it to the side, no biggie, he can find it again! Carter is also big on hugging his animals :) He loves to pull them to his face and squeeze them.

radar hugs
Radar getting some love

Eating solids. So far Carter's menu has included - squash, banana, avocado, peas, and peaches. So far his favorite is squash. Peas weren't a hit, and peaches he seems to like after he gets over the taste of the first few bites :) I have been making all of his food - the noncook makes baby food! We blend, bake, boil, mash, and put in ice cube trays and into the freezer they go. Making his food has been so easy and I like knowing exactly what he's getting.

baby food


Carter is still head over heals in love with his sippy! He sees it and his eyes light up and he reaches out for it :)


sippy


His other favorite thing to chew on is Sophie. I never understood the craze for this rubber giraffe, but I totally get it now and I'm on the Sophie bandwagon big time! This little lady comes with a rather hefty price tag considering she's a rubber giraffe, but she is worth every penny! Her neck and legs are the perfect size for little fingers to grasp onto, and her face with her bumpy ears, horns and mouth make for some great chewing!

sophie 3

We've also moved Carter into his big boy crib (as we call it) aka his own room. He did so great with the transition... I, on the other hand, had a tough time with it. The first night I walked into our bedroom and past the empty pack n play.... sad :( He is growing up so fast. What happened to the little baby that was swimming in the newborn sleeper?

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And now he's a big kid sleeping in his big kid crib in his own room!

sleepng2

sleeping


Although I have to admit it is fun to finally be using the room we prepared for him for months before he was born. I would go up and sit in his rocking chair and think "wow in a few months I'll have a baby in my arms that I'll be rocking to sleep" and now I actually have Carter in my arms to rock to sleep :) While pregnant I organized and sat in Carter's room quite a bit. I remember organizing his closet looking at the newborn size sleepers and thinking "wow do babies really come out that big?" Just last week I was organizing a tub full of clothes he's outgrown and saw a newborn sleeper and remembered when he was just a wee little thing that fit in there and slept on my chest for hours on end. Just yesterday I found a newborn size diaper and I had to take it outside to show Joe. "Look how small this is!" I said.

diapers

And if you're looking at the pictures above and wondering why Carter's diapers are blue and yellow it's because we've gone cloth full time. Yep, I make baby food and cloth diaper my kid. I know some people have been shocked that I would make all of Carter's baby food and especially cloth diaper, but we do and we like it! The food is easy. We're still working out some kinks with the diapers. Cloth isn't as absorbent as a disposable and we're still working on a nighttime combo that doesn't leak - hence why Carter is sleeping on the blue sheet saver in the crib pictures above. Changing a crib sheet and mattress pad is way harder than changing a pack n play mattress and mattress pad.

That about sums up what is new over here. We're all happy, healthy, and loved and enjoying the little things each day!

Thursday, August 12, 2010

Mpls part tres

Finally part three of Mpls. Monday Carter and I went to visit some of my friends from college. Jamie and her son Brady, 8 months, Sarah and her daughter #2 Olivia, 2 months, and Becky. We sat around catching up and loving on babies! It was so fun to get together and it really made me want to move back ASAP. Brady has some wild hair and such a cute smile - he even looks at the camera and smiles. And somehow, as we were taking the picture below, he knew which camera to look at! So cute! We woke Olivia up for the picture but she wasn't too into these boys.. but watch out that girly is a cutie!

Carter, 4 months, Brady, 8 months and Olivia, 2 months. Aren't they cute?! Joe loves this picture and how they have their arms around each other. So cute!

carter brady olivia


We spent most of the week getting in some quality time with Nana and Papa. Swimming, going for walks, sitting in the back yard or on the swing, lazing in the hammock, etc. Carter was loved on like crazy :)

mom and carter 2
Carter says: "geesh, not that big black thing again"


carter 17 weeks
he loves to show off his belly

papa and carter hammock
chatting with Papa

hammock
relaxing - he loved the hammock

mom dad carter max
Nana, Papa, Max and Carter

carter mohawk

carter sky

max

Later in the week we headed out to Edina to meet up with Carter's first girlfriend, Pen. Aren't they cute?

pen and carter

We also went to hang out with Stephany and Luca. Luca is 2.5 and totally blew me away! He is talking. Talking, talking. Like conversation talking. I have never met a 2.5 year old who talks like that. It was crazy!

All in all we had an amazing time at home. It made me want to move back like crazy!!! We also need to send a big thank you and baby giggles out to Nana and Papa who made our trip soooo much easier. We really appreciate all the baby stuff you got in preparation for our arrival. It made is so much easier to pack knowing we had the essentials in MN already. We didn't have to "make do" at all :) And that is hereditary!

Proud Mama Bear!

My little baby bear is rolling over!!!


Sunday, August 8, 2010

Mr Yuck

Mr.Yuck-713258

Carter isn't too sure about new tastes.. it's like he's expecting one thing and then gets something completely different. I call it his Mr Yuck face. Cracks me up. In this video he is eating peaches. He's had peaches a few times but every time he makes this face for the first few bites. But he continues to eat it and gobbles it up so I'd think he must like it after the first few bites.






Up next Mpls part 3 and Carter's four month pictures!

Wednesday, August 4, 2010

Mpls part 2

Wow, I only got to day 2 in my last post. The rest of this trip is going to be summarized in less detail otherwise I'll have pages upon pages of posts. Anyway, after spending the day with my fam we drove up to St Cloud to hang out with Joe's fam.

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Especially surprising was that Joe's brother Jesse was home at the same time. He just joined the Air Force and was home for a few weeks before moving to DC. Jesse being there meant Joe's whole family was there - including Carter's cousin Nathan! To say Nathan has energy is an understatement! Nathan is one super energetic five year old! Nathan was so cute with Carter. He gave Carter gentle kisses and asked if Carter liked him, if Carter would ever be bigger than him, etc. It was so cute. We spent our time there hanging out outside while Nathan splashed in the pool, having a fire and being eaten alive by mosquitoes, and going to a local park.

t and c

j t c
This isn't the best picture, Carter and I look like ghosts, but it is a family picture, and we don't have many of those

j and c

carter grass

blanket 2
I think he's saying "Give me that camera!"

grabs camera
Carter successfully grabbing the camera while I try to take his picture!

blanket

chunky leg
gotta love chunky baby legs!

carter park

looks at grass

Joe was nuzzling Carter and Carter had some great giggles going. This kid loves his daddy!

giggles

After a couple relaxing days at Joe's parents house we headed back to Shoreview and Joe headed to work. The week was pretty lazy but we did take Carter to the lake to stick his feet in for the first time. After all we are Minnesotans at heart and this kid needed his tootsies in the water stat! We got him all dressed up for the occasion!

going to the lake

He even wore some goofy sunglasses.... I think my sunglasses look better on him than these baby sunglasses! Carter wasn't impressed with them either.

carter sunglasses

carter sits
doesn't he look like such a big kid in this picture?!

After relaxing by the lake we finally dunked his toes!

carter lake 4

He didn't have much to say about it but he liked looking at the water.

carter lake 5


carter lake 3
This picture's background screams MN and childhood to me!

In addition to going in the lake for the first time Carter also went swimming! Carter loves his baths so we thought he'd like swimming and we weren't wrong!

carter floaty
This picture is soooo Carter - totally chill!

sitting on step
aww look at that cute little boy! love this one

pool

joe and carter

Joe and I also had a date night. We headed to PF Chang's for dinner. While there guess what we talked about? Carter. We called home to ask my parents question .... I can't remember what the question was. Anyway, I called and asked the question then guess what we talked about? Carter. We hung up and two seconds later my phone rings. It's my parents. They called because Carter was talking and they wanted me to hear it! So needless to say our "date night" was not kid free!

After dinner we didn't know what to do...... we saw a baby store so we went there! Seriously. Before Carter was born we loved to go to the baby store and look at all the stuff. Apparently we still like to go to the baby store since we did it on our date! I wish I would have taken a picture!

That weekend some of my aunts and uncles came over and we hung out outside until it started raining. Carter was chill, as usual, and was passed around and loved on. Not much to report, it was pretty relaxed.

That night we went out and met up with Jen J, Tiff, Ryan, Abby, Stephany and Matt at a bar in NE Mpls. Of course the one night we go out it is storming like mad! But it was fun none the less. We hung out at Psycho Suzies, sitting around drinking beer and catching up. Jen J and Tiff had friends at a bar nearby so we headed that way. As soon as we walked into this new bar Joe and I were instantly ready to go! Sometimes it amazes me how much our lives have changed. A bunch of drunks hanging out at bar made me want nothing more than to get home and smooch my little dude.... so off we went.

The following day was Sunday. And the day that Joe had a flight booked back to AZ. I knew he wasn't looking forward to leaving and felt his time in MN was too short...and I wondered how he would take leaving Carter. Joe spent the morning snuggling Carter and put him down for his nap and we headed to the airport. I could tell Joe was sad about leaving so I said something like "Carter is going to be fine and he loves you and is going to miss you." While my intentions may have been in the right place, I don't think I did anything to make it easier for Joe. I don't want to "out" him here on the blog, but he was a sad daddy. And a sad daddy made for a sad but seriously happy momma! Sounds terrible that I would be happy in Joe's sadness, but that man loves his little boy like crazy and that fills me with an indescribable amount of happiness.

Wheww, that was a long one. One more post to go.