March 2013

March felt like a really long month, but I think it's because we did SO much!  Last March we had really warm temperatures and were able to play outside almost the entire month, this year, however, it has still been chilly!  Most of our March was spent indoors with a few nice afternoons here and there.  (Be prepared for a long post, but there are lots of cute pictures!)

We started the month off celebrating Dr. Seuss' birthday on the Maryville College Campus at an event they had for kids.  Dawson made this cute Cat in the Hat hat and Carter got a Thing 2 wig/hat.  I was able to get a picture of Dawson in his, but Carter thought his was for tearing instead of wearing, so no picture of him.

 

On March 2nd, Dawson and Carter's friend Charlie had his 3rd birthday party at Pump it Up (an inflatable play place), and both boys had a blast.  This was Carter's first time on an inflatable, and he loved it!

Here are Dawson, Charlie, and all the bigger kids

at the party!

 

Dawson had fun letting Carter ride in the back

of his Gator (while I held him) around the backyard

one afternoon.  Carter loved it and would

squeal and sign "more" when Dawson would stop.

 

One warmer Sunday afternoon we let the boys play in the sandbox.  This was Carter's first time playing in the sand.  They had a blast!  Carter quickly learned not to eat the sand, yuck!  Now he loves getting in there!

 

We dyed Easter Eggs the ENTIRE month of March-seriously, we did it three or four times.  Here is Dawson dying eggs one of the times.  He really enjoyed doing this!

 

While we colored eggs, Carter say beside us in his high chair and played with plastic Easter eggs.

 

Here's Dawson with the finished product!  Last year we made an egg for Carter even though he wasn't here yet, so this year in addition to making eggs for Carter and Dawson we made one for Nora Kate!  Her's

 

Carter started taking one step, but we decided that wasn't officially walking that he needed to take two to be walking.  We knew he was on the verge of walking any day, so we took him to Stride Rite to get his first pair of *real* shoes.  He measured in at a 4.5 wide.  The sales associate called his thick, wide feet "fluffy" haha!  Sounds just like his big brother at this age.  We picked out this cute pair of shoes for him at the Stride Rite at West Town Mall.  Then that afternoon (March 16th), at 11 months and 3 days old Carter took his first steps in his new shoes in our backyard!  He walked from me to his Daddy.  All of us including Dawson were so excited and cheered and clapped for him!  It was sweet to see how excited Dawson was for Carter!  :)  Since then Carter has really taken off, now he's taken 18 steps in a row that I've counted and more that I've missed counting.  Just in the past couple of days he is starting to get where he prefers to walk rather than crawl.  He's really steady and fast on his feet.  I can't believe we have a walker!!!

 

Attempting to measure the feet of our little wiggle worm!

On March 17th we celebrated St. Partick's Day!  We all wore green and since John had to leave to go out of town on this day, we went over to Lolly and Pop's house for lunch.

My sweet leprechauns!

Carter's first St. Patrick's Day!

 

 Lolly and Pop gave the boys their Easter surprises early, which was great because it gave them something to do the first week John was out of town!  Here they are going through their Easter baskets...Dawson really wanted to help Carter!

 

BUT Carter was happy to do it on his own!

 Here's Carter having a blast at Tumble Bears Gym!  For a long time he was content to be held or in the Moby while we went to this playdate once a month, but now he wants to play too!

 

John had to travel to Greensboro, North Carolina (a little over 5 hours away) for TWO WEEKS for work this month.  We knew that would be absolutely too long, and since the boys and I didn't have anything keeping us in Tennessee we decided to pack up, drive over, and join him for the second week of his time there.  I was unsure how the drive would go with just me, Dawson, and Carter in the car, but they did AWESOME!  I could not have asked for better travelers.  Dawson is really at an awesome age because he understands that we are going somewhere fun, even though it takes a long time to get there.  He was also such a help and entertainment to Carter in the backseat.  Seriously, it could not have gone better.  Since I was unsure how the drive would go I made arrangements for us to stop in Asheville (a little less than half way to Greensboro) on the way there for lunch and play time at the house of our friends, the Whites!  It was perfect!  We stayed about two hours, Cassandra had lunch for us, we got to visit, and best of all Dawson and Carter got to play with Thomas and Henry and get out some energy!  When we got in the car they were full and ready to nap!  Coming home we drove the 5 hours with just one stop for fast food for lunch, and the boys did great too! I was really impressed, now I'm wondering where I can take them next!  :)
When we first arrived in Greensboro, Dawson said he was going to give John the biggest hug he had ever given before!  So sweet!  I know he missed John the first week he was gone!  After we got to Greensboro, we took the boys to Celebration Station for some entertainment.  Dawson had fun playing games with Daddy!

 

And we even played a little putt putt!

 

Sunday, our second day in Greensboro, was rainy and cold, but it was one of John's two off days so we headed to the mall where Dawson got to build a bear!  He loved it!  It's name is Little Bear, and he's slept with it every night since!

 

We also let the boys get out some energy in the mall's play area.  This was Carter's first time in a mall play area, so we had to get a picture!  He had fun and was not intimidated by the bigger kids at all!

 

Our third day in Greensboro, John had to work.  The boys and I decided to check out Greensboro Pump it Up, an indoor inflatable play place.  Dawson had a blast and was not still a minute!

 

Carter enjoyed the inflatables AND this cool baby area they had for kids his age!

 

 The fourth day in Greensboro, was John's other day off so we had a few really fun things planned!  First we went to the Greensboro Natural Science Center.  This is a small children's museum, small zoo, and small aquarium all in one!  We all had a blast!  Here's our baby bird in a nest!

Dawson and Carter both had fun doing some grocery shopping and putting them away and cooking in this little kitchen!

 We all thought this giant dino was pretty cool!  Dawson asked us if he was real and if he would bite.  :)

 We told him no, but then we took this picture!  :)

 In the weather area of the Natural Science Center there was a room on tornadoes.  It was up to date because it even included the day of tornadoes that I think we will never forget when we lived in Alabama!  We had to take a picture of this portion of the wall!

In the zoo/animal area of the science center they had all kinds of animals from sheep to wallabys!  You could actually go inside the wallby area  and walk around with them!  It was amazing how close we got to them!  They are really fast jumpers, and it was so neat!  Unfortunately, I didn't get any good wallby pictures because we were too busy watching them jump around us!

 There were a couple of peacocks that just roamed around the property of the science center and we thought it was really cool!  Dawson wanted his picture made with this one, but this is as close as he would get!

 After a morning at the Natural Science Center, we hoped to continue making the most of John's day off so we headed over to the Greensboro Children's Museum in downtown.  It was AWESOME!  I wish we had a good children's museum here that was close...if it was like this we would be there all the time.  There was a huge play area for crawlers and toddlers.  They had a great tunnel that Carter enjoyed among other things. 

 The Children's Museum had a real fire truck, police car, tractor trailer, and air plane that had been made safe for kids to play in.  The kids could climb up and play in all of them.  Here's pilot Dawson taking us all for a flight!  Carter was the co-pilot!  (To exit the awesome plane, you had to go out the emergency escape which took you down an tunnel slide.  We all had fun doing this!)

 For our 5th day in Greensboro, John was back at work so I took the boys to another indoor inflatable play place called Safari Nation.  They had six inflatables, two of which were just for kids three and under so Carter had fun in those!

 One of the inflatables there was the biggest I had ever seen.  It had three huge slides and two different bounce areas.  Dawson immediately climbed up and began sliding down. I think it was his favorite!  Every picture I got of him on this was a blur though because he was going so fast!

Our 6th and final full day in Greensboro, we went to visit John at the store where he was working there.  Then we went in a few stores and shops that I had been wanting to stop in all week!  I found a cute little fabric shop where I picked up a couple pieces of fabric to make things for Nora Kate and a new fabric to make more bowties for the boys!  This was probably the least exciting day for the boys, but they didn't seem to mind because in the afternoon we went back to Celebration Station to use up the tokens Dawson had left from our first visit and to play putt putt one more time!

Then on Friday morning the boys and I packed up and drove back to Tennessee.  John got home the following evening since he had to work Saturday there before coming home.  We were both really skeptical about our tagging along on John's work trip because he had to get up and leave the hotel every morning by 3am which also meant he had to go to bed really early.  With all of us in the same room, we were not sure how this would go.  Also, I was really worried about Carter wanting to play on the hotel floor (gross!) the whole week.  Thankfully, we were able to find a lot to do so we didn't have to stay in the hotel room much at all, and the boys were worn out for going all the time so they didn't have any trouble going to bed a little earlier than normal.  In fact, they both did so well being in the same room that we have decided to go ahead and move them into the same room after Dawson's birthday, rather than waiting until closer to Nora Kate's arrival.  After riding all the way home in the car, when I carried Carter into the playroom he was so happy to be home!  He walked around everywhere!

The next morning, there was a community Easter Egg Hunt at Springbrook Park, so we decided to go!  Here are the boys in their matching Easter shirts before the egg hunt!

 

Dawson and Carter both got to hunt eggs in the same age division which was nice!  Here's Dawson saying CHEESE before the hunt began!

We invited Grandad to go with us to the Easter Egg Hunt!  Here they are waiting on the egg hunt to begin!

 On Easter morning the boys woke up and checked out their Easter baskets! 

 Here are both boys with their Easter baskets after unloading all the goodies!  We even let them have a couple of treats BEFORE breakfast!

 Then we got ready for church!  Here are several pictures of Carter in his little seersucker Easter suit!  Happy 1st Easter sweet Carter!  (The rocking chair he is sitting in was mine when I was little.)

And here are my two handsome boys in their seersucker suits ready for church on Easter morning!

 

I thought this one was cute of them talking...wonder what these boys are planning!?

Then we got Aunt Em to take a picture of us all in our Easter attire after church!  (It's a wonder she's willing to take a picture of our family after taking our Christmas card pictures for us this year, hah!)  Easter 2013:  Dawson 3.5 years, Carter 11 months, 20 weeks pregnant with Nora Kate.  My how our family has grown since our last Easter picture!

One more picture that got out of order of the boys in their matching Easter shirts.  It's hard to tell from how they are sitting but they have a bunny and their names on the shirts!

 

Our March was SUPER busy, but it was a lot of fun!  April is looking to be just as exciting!  We have Carter's birthday party scheduled for April 13th and then we're planning to go to Alabama at the end of the month!!!

IT'S A......GIRL!!!!!

We had the gender ultrasound to find out if Baby Number 3 is a boy or girl, and we are so very excited to announce that we will be adding a GIRL to our family!!  John and Dawson both thought it was going to be another boy, and even though I guessed girl, I was surprised that it really was!  In asking all of our friends, about 95% of people guessed girl! 

We are all so excited!  I was worried that Dawson would be disappointed since he has said it's a brother the ENTIRE pregnancy so far, but we told him he was lucky because he would have a brother AND a sister.  He was completely fine with it.  Now he talks about having both a sister and a brother with excitement!  I can't wait to have some pink in our lives and see what life is like with a little girl!!

As we have with the previous two pregnancies, we had our boy and girl names ready to go at the ultrasound.  Baby Number 3 will be named Nora Kate.  We actually picked this girl name out back in 2008 when we were thinking of names for Dawson if he had been a girl, and then we were going to use it for Carter if he had been a girl...so we are very excited to finally get to use it.  The name is really special to us because my grandmother's name is Nora, and John's grandmother's name was Katherine.  We will always call her both names, Nora Kate.  I love double names like this, and I'm so excited.  Dawson has started calling her by name, and it's sweet to hear him say her name and talk about his sister. 

Speaking of siblings, we took both Carter and Dawson with us to the ultrasound so they could see the baby.  Carter, of course, had no idea-but still we can say he was there.  Dawson was interested in seeing Nora Kate on the screen, and the ultrasound technician was so kind with him.  She turned the machine on to the 4d setting, so Dawson could really tell that Nora Kate looked like a baby.

 

 

Here's one of the ultrasound pictures where

you can see Nora Kate's face and arms.

I am so excited for pink...

and I think Nora Kate's Aunt Em

is too!  On the day of the ultrasound

she brought us Nora Kate's first gift-

this soft pink blanket and pink pacificers!

I love it!

AND our friends are excited for us

to be adding a girl to our family, as well!

Our friends Chris, Alana, and Colt

gave us this ADORABLE hat for

Nora Kate!  I love it! 

(I tried to put it on Carter to see what

it looks like, but he got lucky because

his head is too big!)

Carter's 13 Month Update

Our sweet, happy baby is already ELEVEN months old!  I'm not sure how this has happened so quickly, but we are loving every minute of Carter at this age! 
He continues to be a very happy baby.  Right now he is on the verge of walking any minute it seems.  He's great at cruising along tables, couches, toys, and now he even pulls up to standing by just balancing himself against the wall.  So he can even cruise along the walls without a ledge to hold on to.  We are watching for his first step, and we know it will be soon!  He's such a fast crawler though, that when he really wants to get to something quickly (like his brother's toys), he drops to his knees and speeds across the playroom.  He has also started walking behind his push toys this month, but he really seems to prefer cruising over this.  When the push toy gets going to fast, instead of being afraid Carter just laughs and tries to catch up!  It's hilarious!
This month Carter has continued to be a great eater.  He LOVES eating food, and he has decreased nursing to just 4 times a day on his own.  He seems to eat all the time, and I think he just enjoys feeding himself.  His favorites to feed himself are probably dairy free bread, any fruit, and peas.  He continues to eat meat and more veggies that I've made into baby food, but he's not as interested in picking up pieces of chicken to put in his mouth as his favorites, although he will sometimes do it.  He always accepts it off the spoon though.  Along with all this interest in eating, has come an interest in snacking too.  When Dawson has a snack, Carter begins signing "more" and yelling "more!" frantically as if we never feed him!  Usually I get him a dairy-free snack, and he's happy.  But lately he's been crying to eat the same thing Dawson is eating and chasing Dawson around for the food.  Dawson's snack usually has dairy (think Cheez-its, goldfish, etc), so this has been a little bit of a dilemma.  I am thankful that he's such a good eater though!  He has gotten to try A LOT of new things this month, too many to list really, but I think he's enjoying expanding his diet!  He's also become a pro at drinking from his sippy cup, and he drinks a whole sippy cup of water over the course of the day-on his own when he's eating or sees Dawson's with a cup is usually when he wants it.  What really impresses me about the cup, is that he's so good at drinking out of it.  He only holds the handle with one hand and turns it up to get a drink. 
As for teeth, Carter's 11 month pictures still showcase a gummy grin!  He is, however, a drooly mess right now, and we can see two teeth on the bottom just under his gums.  He has not been fussy at all, but we know these two will pop through any day now. 
Carter is getting to be such a big boy, and he thinks he's just like his big brother!  Carter only wants to play with big kid toys in the playroom like tractors, trucks, and trains!  He also loves to crawl over to Dawson and wallow on him trying to wrestle, or as we call it "play rowdy."  Speaking of big brother, Dawson and Carter seem to be playing together better and better every day.  Carter is so lonely when Dawson isn't here.  A couple of times lately Dawson has gone to have time with grandparents, and Carter has asked "Bu?bu?Bubu??" all day long!  The most recent time, when we watched Dawson get in his Nana's car and ride away, Carter started crying.  So sweet!  I play with Carter the whole time Dawson's gone, but he's so much happier to play with when Dawson's here...apparently I'm not as entertaining and fun as when we all play together!  I'm so glad that these two have each other to play with though, and I love watching them as they begin to interact more and more.
Carter is becoming more and more vocal.  In addition to the words he's been saying for a while he has added "book,"  "bird," and "all done" to his vocabulary.  I have taught him the sign for all three of these, and he will do the sign for all done as he says it; BUT he really prefers to say the words over signing them...I guess communication is the goal, so I don't push it.  I still love to see his sweet hands signing "more" though, and he does this ALL the time!  The sweet thing is that he has learned the meaning of "more" not just associated with food, but sometimes if you stop playing he will sign it wanting you to play again!  He has also started saying "no" and shaking his head.  He does it in the appropriate times also.  The other day I said, "Carter do you want to go get changed?" He stood at the train table, shook his head, and said, "no no!"  I signed "changed" to him (a sign he knows), and he said no again!  Another new addition to his vocabulary is "uh oh!"  He now drops/throws things on the floor on purpose just to say uh oh.  Then he always gives us a big grin.   
Quiet possibly the best development this month has been the new sleeping habit Carter picked up...sleeping through the night!!  Carter has been sleeping through the night for about 3 weeks now, and it's amazing!!  He does it all but about 1 or 2 nights a week.  It's awesome to sleep through the night, and I could not be happier!  In terms of sleeping, Carter is iffy on his morning nap.  He takes it about half of the time.  When we're home he naps one hour, but if we're out he is content and happy to stay awake.  Carter ALWAYS takes an afternoon nap, and it usually lasts about an hour and a half.  Carter just doesn't require a lot of sleep in the day, which is fine because he's generally happy!
We love our sweet Carter so much, and we really cannot believe that it's been 11 months since we welcomed him into the world!
Here are some pictures of our big 11 month old!!

Carter walking behind his dino push toy!

Dawson and Carter absolutely LOVE to get out

the tents, tunnels, and balls all at one time.  Carter

crawls through the balls (all 150 of them) and in and

out of the tunnels and tents.  He loves to chase Dawson

through the tents or into the tunnels.  They were playing

really well together doing this until I grabbed the camera,

then they both just starred at me like they had been caught!

 

 

 

 

I LOVE THIS!  A couple of months ago

Dawson's friend Charlie taught us a new prayer.

It's the superman prayer.  We hold up our arms

and sign the prayer to the theme of superman.

Dawson insists that this prayer be the one done at

all meals!  Carter has started doing the superman arms

when we're doing the prayer.  Here he is taking a break

from eating his apple sticks to do the prayer with us

at breakfast.

He is always very intently focused

on doing his arms when he does

the superman prayer.  It's serious business!

This is the happy face of a boy who

just ate a Chick-fil-a grilled nugget

and french fry, and he loved them!

 

Carter is always happy to be eating

especially if he's getting to feed himself!

 

Official 11 month picture.

He looks like such a big boy!

Official 11 month brothers picture.

This month's pictures were the most difficult

(yet) to capture.  Dawson cooperated perfectly,

but Carter was wild and wanted to explore!

Then they both got wild!  I know this picture

is blurry, but I still just love how they're both

giggling and being silly!

February 2013

February was another fun month for us!  We started out the month with a birthday party for one of Dawson's friends, Charlotte.  She had her birthday party at Tumblebears Gym which Dawson loves!  For the party they even got out the zipline, and Dawson was so brave to do it!  Unfortunately the picture I got of it was not too great.

 

February was a cold month and we have had some snow off and on, but we also had about 3 days where it was warm enough to play outside for a little while.  Both Dawson and Carter were thrilled to be outside. 

 

We went to the zoo once this month.  It was a rainy day, so we just went to Storytime at the Zoo where the kids got to listen to stories, pet a hedgehog, and then make a hedgehog out of construction paper and stickers!  After that we spent the rest of the morning in the Wee Play Area.  Carter even had fun crawling and cruising around the baby area here this time!  As we left it had stopped raining so we got to see a few animals before heading home!

Dawson was excited to also get to pet this lizard!

Dawson and his friend Jay playing in the Wee Play Zoo.

Carter LOVED this crawl area!

 

One of Dawson's favorite things we did this month, was go on a visit to the fire department with our Moms of Maryville group.  Here fireman Steven is putting on all his gear to show the kids that even with the mask on, he's not scary!

Dawson loved climbing up in the big truck!

Dawson and some friends climbing on another truck.

Dawson and Colt in the big truck.

Dawson with Fireman Steven.

Dawson loved this!  He said it was like a Gator

for the firefighters.

A fun morning at the fire department!

Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of Carter

at the fire department.  I had him in the Moby wrap

the entire time we were there.  (Which was probably his last

time in the Moby, because he was pushing right on baby three!)

 

Since the month has been SO cold, we have had a lot of indoor playtime, and Dawson and Carter are starting to interact more and more when they play.  I love it!

 

 

On Valentine's Day we had heart-shaped

pancakes for breakfast (dairy-free so Carter

and I could enjoy too!) 

 

 

Oops!  This picture got out of order, but one semi-warmer day I loaded the boys up and went to the park to work on Dawson riding his bike.  We had a fun morning, but we were getting a little chilly by the time we were done.

Dawson looks like such a big kid on this bike!

 

 

 

Now back to Valentine's Day!  Here's

my Valentine Dawson! So handsome!

 

We made this Valentine's Day cake for a little

Valentine's party we had with M.O.M. friends.

 

My two sweet Valentine's!

 

 

Lolly with her grandsons on Valentine's Day.

 

 

Then we tried to get the same picture with Pop,

but the boys got a little rowdy!  I still love this

picture, though!

 

Nana and Grandad came by with Valentine's

for the boys too, but for some reason I wasn't

thinking and didn't get any pictures!  :(

Here's my precious Carter on his first Valentine's Day!

 

 

At the very end of February, our friends the Whites drove over to visit us from Asheville, NC.  We had such a fun day watching all of our kids play at catching up.  Even though the picture below, doesn't show it-they all had a great time playing!  We hadn't seen them since the end of summer, but hopefully we will see them again soon!  Left to right: Dawson (3.5 years), Carter (10 months), Henry (2.5 years), and Thomas (1 year).

 

 

One of Dawson's newest tricks is getting in Carter's crib.  He thinks it's hilarious.  I think it's funny to see how big he looks standing in the crib!

 

Then we ended the month back at Tumblebears Gym for a playdate!  Dawson's current favorite thing to do there is swing on the rope, and I think this is where we spent most of our time.  He was begging me to take pictures of him on the rope, but he swings so fast most were blurry. 

 

Dawson loves it when we go shopping at

Earth Fare because they have his size shopping

carts!  I love how cute he looks pushing this!

My helper!

Baby Three Update: 16 Weeks

Time for an update on Baby Three!  Today's the last day of the 16th week for us, and we will find out the gender on Wednesday!!!  We're so excited to find out.  John and Dawson think the baby is a boy, while I'm guessing girl.  I thought my pregnancy with Carter went by quickly, but this pregnancy is flying by!  I cannot believe it's already time to find out the gender!
To answer all the normal pregnancy questions-
-How have you been feeling?  I've been feeling great!  This has been the easiest pregnancy!!  I had no nausea or morning sickness, and my only complaint was being tired early on.  Thankfully even that has passed now.  I've still been feeling good enough to run a couple of miles at the gym a few times a week even.  I'm hoping that this will continue to be an easy pregnancy all the way through to the end!
-What are you craving?  I'm not really craving anything specific.  My diet has been so restricted eating dairy-free for Carter's milk allergy, that I think I've gotten used to a limited amount of choices.  If anything, I think I could always eat some salty chips though!  :)
This past week, I started feeling the baby move for the first time, and it's still just as exciting with number three! 
So, next time we update the blog we will be sharing the baby's gender and name!!!
For now, here are the weekly pictures.  The baby is growing!

13 Weeks

14 Weeks

15 eeks

16 Weeks