Snow Pictures

Here are a few pictures of the snow last Wednesday. Anyone in Michigan who's reading this, I know it's nothing compared to what you're used to! But it was the top story on our news that night, and it was a big deal to us Texans! This one shows how excited Grant was about his first experience with snow: he didn't care for it much at all! About three or four hours later I took these pictures (around 11:30pm when it was about finished):

Poor hibiscus flower.....it was just as surprised by the snow as we were!

I love how it piled up on the Sago Palms!
Front yard:


I tried to write a comment about global warming on our car (and a few other places), but the snow was too thick and icy....so it never came out. We saw on the news earlier that night a picture of a car with "Global warming??" written on the window. Very funny (at least to us)!

Four years ago today.....

Dean and I got engaged! I can't believe it's been four years already! Four years, two children, and many crazy experiences later, and he still puts up with me!

That Christmas season was so busy (we seem to have many fewer things planned now that we're married and have kids!). But that year it seemed like every weekend we had one or two events planned. So Dean had mentioned early in December that he wanted to have a date night on the 17th (a Friday). That night, we went out to eat at a fancy restaurant at the top of the Hilton hotel, then we saw the Houston Ballet perform The Nutcracker (one of my all-time favorite things to do). Afterwards we went to Herrman Park to walk around and look at Christmas lights. Unfortunately, the lights were already off because it too late! But we walked around anyway, and he proposed at the same place where we'd had our first kiss four months before.

Today, we commemorated this romantic occasion by chasing our crazy two-year-old around JCPenney as we tried to have family pictures made (he was NOT excited about picture time, and kept trying to leave!). Then at noon, I had a minor surgery related to childbirth (still finishing up my healing), and we spent the rest of the afternoon dealing with our Dr. Jeckyll/Mr. Hyde child......I swear, one minute he is so precious, and the next minute he is whining, screaming, and throwing things! Life is so much fun with kids! :) (just kidding of course!)

This was taken the night after we got engaged, at my friend Ashley's wedding.

Here are a couple more pictures of us from around that time.

Weekly Update

These pictures aren't from this week, but they're ones I've been wanting to post from earlier this month:

Grant loves trying to give Drew his pacifier.
Monthly monkey picture. This was his two-month picture taken in late Nov. I'm trying to take one per month in the same pose, so I can look later and see how he's grown.
Yuck! Here's Drew after drinking a bottle from Daddy. Drew is a spitter, just like his brother!Daddy and Grant:
Grant can swing on big-kid swings now! He usually still prefers his little baby swing, though....
Here's his new train set that we got for his birthday. Grant spends a lot of time playing with his choo-choos.....he likes to play by himself, but then he'll come grab our hands and say "show choo-choos" when he wants to show us something he's built or when he just wants some company. The table doesn't usually look this nice, though....he doesn't keep the tracks together very well!

Silly Grant......

We've had a busy week! Grant, Dean and I all got sick last week (Dean being the worst)....it was some kind of stomach bug, but thankfully Drew didn't ever seem to get it. We're mostly better now, although Dean is still trying to get completely back to normal.

And.....everyone in Texas knows this, but we got snow on Wednesday! It was amazing.....they didn't predict it at all (at least for Houston). But that evening after dark, I looked outside and saw something white on top of Amminadab's cat house. Grant and I went out to play in it for a while (this was the night Dean got sick, so he stayed inside), but Grant surprisingly wasn't very excited about it. He wanted to come in after a few minutes!

A while later, after putting Grant to bed, the snow kept coming down harder and harder, until about 11:45 that night. Drew and I went outside to take pictures, and then later I came out again by myself to play. I felt like a little kid! By the time it stopped, we had probably over 2 inches in our backyard. It was majestic! I never dreamed I'd see that much snow in Texas. Our next-door neighbor built a huge snowman.....a real snowman, not a little 12-inch one!

And.....one other big event.....Grant slept in his toddler bed last night! We moved it into his current room, because we figured we might be expecting too much by asking him to change rooms AND beds. About 5 minutes after Dean left his room, we were downstairs and heard him talking loudly (we could tell he had opened his door). He was standing inside his room and said "door open!" when Dean went upstairs. He acted surprised, as if the door had magically opened by itself! This happened a few times before he finally went to sleep. And he woke up two or three more times after we went to sleep. Each time, he got out of his bed and came out of his room, calling for Daddy. So we'll see how he does tonight and for his nap today.....we might have to put a childproof handle on the inside of his door.

Today we are going to Grant's Mother's Day Out Christmas party, then Dean will be on his own with the boys while I get my hair cut and go to my doctor's appointment. He was on his own with them about 10 days ago and did great!

11 Weeks- My little social butterfly

Okay, I'm finally posting again.....it is SO hard to find time to actually do it! And I'm always behind on getting pictures uploaded....I think that will be the story of my life for at least the next 18 years!

Drew is eleven weeks old today! He has been so precious lately; he loves attention and will smile at us when we look at him and smile (as long as he's not tired or hungry!). He's got the cutest little smile, although it's really hard to capture in pictures! And he's sleeping pretty well now.....the last four mornings, he's slept until past 5am (three of those days he didn't wake up until after 6am). Until now, he hasn't been as good a sleeper as Grant, but he's finally catching up!

We're still not on any type of schedule yet, but I'm really okay with that for now. He usually takes one good nap per day, and the rest are short naps scattered throughout. And he's doing a little better in the carseat; for the past few weeks, he'd been crying pretty much nonstop in the car. But he's been doing a lot better (at least not crying the entire time!). Hearing your baby cry in the car is one of the worst things in the world! I feel like I drive like a maniac trying to get to my destination so I can take him out and rescue him!!

I just look at my two little boys and feel so blessed. Some days I am VERY frustrated, but then I remember that this time will pass in a flash, and I try to keep from getting irritated when things don't go the way I plan. I am a work in progress!

Some pictures.....

Bathtime! Drew LOVES his bath.....now we've actually started bathing the boys at the same time in their bathroom. Dean bathes Grant in the tub while I bathe Drew in his little tub on the counter.
My chubby little man!

We tried to take a picture of Dean and the boys in their Alabama clothes, but Grant wasn't overly excited....I don't think he liked seeing Drew sitting this close to his Daddy!
Hearing Grant scream made Drew cry too!

Sleepy little boy.....he still sleeps on me a lot, which I love. Some days I don't get much done, but it's worth it!

Drew is a master at spitting up (just like his brother), so I try to keep bibs on him as much as possible. This was is from Elizabeth....I think it is so cute!

Daddy worked late one night last week so Drew, Grant and I had fun hanging out and watching SuperWhy. Margaret and Doug gave this to Grant when he was little.....now Drew gets to wear it on cold days!
Here's a good smile!

Handsome

These pictures are over a month old, but I love them and have been wanting to post them for a while. This was Grant's picture day at school, and we dressed him in this cute little outfit (a hand-me-down from his friend Andrew). These pictures that Dean took were much better than the ones from school!


This was taken that same afternoon, when Grant and I took a walk down the street. He had fun making stops to play in the water and examine the acorns! We ended up walking all the way to the park, then Dean came to pick us up a while later. It was fun spending a little bit of time alone with Grant (which doesn't happen as much as it used to!).The reason for the title of the post: a few weeks ago, Dean's laptop was sitting on the kitchen table. His desktop picture is one of Grant (go figure!). Grant looked at his picture, and said "Grant. Handsome." It was so funny! Whenever we see pictures of him (usually playing on our screen saver), I say "look, there's Grant! Isn't he handsome?" So I guess Grant has learned that he's handsome and decided he would use the word to describe himself!

Every day he makes me laugh by the phrases he puts together and the vocabulary he picks up without anyone specifically teaching him. He still doesn't use prepositions, but he can get across what he's trying to say. Here are just a few examples:

- "I fall down- grass."
- "I fall down- knee" (meaning that he hurt his knee).
- The other day he said "No sir. Sit down. Table. Now!" (I often say "no sir" to correct him when he's doing something wrong. That little stinker already knows how to mock!).
- He tells the kitty, "No! Outside, Amminadab!" and he'll chase the cat around the house yelling at him until he goes back out (this is our cat that was banished outside for spraying).
- He also now says "I like ___" and "I need ___" quite a bit. And he likes to describe things as "cool!" or "awesome!"

And Dean recently read that between ages 2-4, kids will make up innane words and will begin to use words in ways that they know aren't correct (because they know it sounds funny). Grant has started doing this. He holds up anything to his mouth and says "apple juice" as he pretends to drink it (even if it's one of his toys) because he's seen that it makes us laugh. And he'll take anything that's flat, put it under his arm and call it a Bible (yesterday it was one of our trivets!). Again, he has learned to be creative because he knows it will draw a laugh!

With Grant, we're always either having a wonderful time or a horrible time. He'll be sweet, charming, and hilarious one minute. Then the next minute something doesn't happen the way he wants it to, and he turns into a terror! This was particularly true the week of his birthday.....I have never seen him act so insane and out of control during his fits. He's been better in the past 10 days, but he can turn from Dr. Jeckyll to Mr. Hyde in no time. I get so frustrated and angry at him, then I feel bad because I remind myself that he's two and I can't expect him to act like an adult!

The next chance I get, it's Drew's turn to be the subject of a post!