Quinny Turns 2!

One of my favorite little boys turned 2 this Sunday! Quin Joseph is such a happy, loving, smiley, and sometimes, ornery little boy. He greets pretty much everyone with a kiss and hug and makes my heart melt every time I hear him say "Aunt Jess". He loves Uncle Chris, Crockett and Bowen a lot too. He is just such a sweet spirit and we have been blessed to get to watch him grow. On Saturday we walked to the Curry's house for an ELMO pajama party! All of Quinny's friends ate doughnuts and fruit with chocolate milk (maybe the mommas and daddys did too :) It was like a breakfast picnic and everyone thought it was AWESOME! They got to make cereal necklaces and color ELMO and play with LOTS of balloons! I think all the kids had a great time! Quinny got lots of very fun gifts, including TONS of ELMO gear! He can now wear ELMO from head to toe, seriously. Quinny also got an awesome tricycle from LuLu and Papaw. It was so cute to see him on it! He was very excited! He had a great time at his party and it might have been the most successful 2 year old party I have ever attended :)

Quinny's real birthday was on Sunday. So after Church, we all went and joined the Curry's (including Nena and Pops) for a special birthday lunch of lasagna and Nena's special spinach. It was SO yummy! I love it when Curry's have birthdays! HA! The special birthday lunch ended with a special Elmo birthday cake. It was delicious. Quin was a pro at blowing out his candles. He even got to blow them out one more time after dinner, when LuLu, Papaw and Johnny were there. AND we all had a little more cake :) It was Quinny's birthday weekend, after all. Happy Birthday to sweet Quinny. We love you BIG much and love watching you grow.

Bowen Barrett - 5 months old

Another month has come and gone, in the blink of an eye. My sweet little boy is still growing like a weed, but thankfully, has slowed down a teeny bit. He began as a fussy, unhappy baby and is now one of the happiest, most laid-back babies I have ever known. My days are all brighter with this sweet smile that just melts my heart.

Bowen, You are growing so quickly. You weigh 19.6 lbs and are growing in length too, although I don't know how long you are. Your diapers are size 3s. You are still wearing 6-12 month clothes, but most 6 and 9 month clothes are quite snug. I have stopped buying 6-12 and will soon get the 12-18 clothes out. I can't believe that. You are still SO chunky. There is so much of you to love :) You have rolled over a couple more times, but are pretty content to just lay there. Or maybe you are a little lazy ;) You still don't like being on your tummy, but you are very strong and can hold your head up so good now. You love to sit up or stand up. You want to see what is going on and do not want to be left out. You get distracted very easily, which makes meal time a little difficult. You still eat every 3 hours and are on a great routine, most days. You wake up, eat, and play then take a nap. Usually a small nap in the morning, a longer nap in the afternoon and a cat nap in the evening. After your first 3 months, I never thought you were going to get on a schedule... I am so thankful you finally decided to cooperate :) I am also thankful that you are able to go-with-the-flow on those days when a routine is not quite possible. Maybe that is just part of being baby #2. You are ALWAYS such a trooper. I decided to wait until 6 months to begin foods, so you are still a breast-only baby. I think you are going to love food, though. You are such a happy baby. You wake up smiling and make everyone you come into contact with smile. You have the most adorable, contagious belly laugh. You are so ticklish and love to be thrown in the air. You are such a great bouncer these days, even our friends in the Cradle Roll class at church have mentioned this to me! I think you will be getting your first tooth in the near future because you NEED something in your mouth constantly and have begun drooling. You will have the cutest toothy smile. You also really still like playing with your feet. This makes diaper changes a little challenging! You are changing daily and I love being home with you to see it all. Your brother still thinks you are the greatest and cannot keep his hands off of you. You are one lucky, loved, little boy. You have blessed our family in ways I cannot even articulate. I look at both you and your brother and I am in awe of God's amazing plan for our family. My cup runeth over.

Poor Crockett

Poor Crockett was blessed (HA!) with my allergies and asthma. After dealing with a runny nose constantly for the last 3 months, we decided it was time for him to get tested so we could get it under control. I didn't tell him where we were going or what we were doing, so as soon as we arrived at the Dr. office, he started crying. He was not happy about this surprise. Luckily Aunt Mon had let us borrow the iPad... She was our hero! :) When the Dr. asked Crockett what was wrong, Crockett immediately pointed to his nose. So the Dr. asked,"What is wrong with your nose?" Crockett replied, "It is running." I immediately stopped second guessing myself about the visit and knew if it was bothering Crockett, we were in the right place. They did the allergy test, which was the only time Crockett really cried. He was SO brave. We played the iPad to keep his mind off of his back. Only a couple of times did he try to "fratch" his back :) I was so proud of him! He was allergic to quite a few things and his back was a red, splotchy mess. I am glad we are done with the test and in the process of getting his allergies and asthma under control. I can already tell a difference. SO proud of my big boy! He is such a trooper.

What A Weekend!!

I am kicking myself now for not getting more pictures, but Poppa and JJ came to town a couple of weekends ago. Crockett asks for Poppa almost daily. So Crockett, Braidy and Quin were all SO SO SO excited when he arrived at our house!!! The boys apparently thought Poppa was a jungle gym, because they jumped on him, climbed all over him, made him swing them about 100 times each... I bet he was one tired Poppa when he left! It was such a fun weekend. Rach was in town for the TTU game (we were all pretty bummed that they got beat by UT. Boo.), and Poppa and JJ were in town for the game and to celebrate JJ's daughter, Leigh, being inducted into the TTU Hall of Fame. It was so much fun to see everyone and get to spend some time together. Crockett loved getting to hang out and is already asking to see everyone again... and pick Rachy up from the 'hairport' :) So Fun!

Halloween 2012

I will admit, I always have a hard time getting into Halloween. I am not sure why, but, I just don't look forward to it. It is hard not to have a little fun, though, with kiddos. It is fun to hear what they want to dress up like and how it plays into their sweet personalities. I am thankful that Crockett is still in the nice costume phase and not the creepy, scary, bloody costume phase... yet. I am sure we will get there. We began our Halloween this year with hot dogs at the Curry's. Once we ate and took lots of pics of all our boys, the Trick or Treating began!! Braidy was definitely the leader, with Crockett close behind. The little boys, Tabor and Quinny, were content to ride in the wagon and eat the candy they had already collected. Bowen just enjoyed the beautiful weather and fell asleep after about 10 minutes. We couldn't have asked for a nicer evening. It was beautiful outside. We went around our neighborhood and got LOTS of candy! The big boys eventually stopped carrying their bags because they got too heavy. I might be a tad bit biased, but we really had the CUTEST Trick or Treaters around! I love each of these boys so much and had such a great time watching them tell everyone "Trick or Treat"!!

Braidy-SMASH Hulk!, Johnny-Texas Ranger, Bowen-Duckling, Quinny-Monkey, Crockett-Fireman, Tabor-Nemo

Despite my initial reservations about Halloween, we all had such a great time! It was a VERY SUCCESSFUL, and oh so fun, Halloween 2012!!! I think we will all be excited when it rolls around next year!

Halloween at Little Gym

We love going to Little Gym every week! It has been SO MUCH FUN and Crockett is learning so many important skills. This week, since Halloween was the next day, Crockett got to dress up. Since his fireman costume was a little too bulky to be a Funny Bug in, we decided to show up as SpiderMan instead! He really wanted to wear the mask, but that was frowned upon :) Spiderman and his friends has such a great time doing all their forward rolls, walking on the balance beam, running around and being snakes! It is so fun to watch them all interact and see their smiling faces!

Just a Jumpin'

Bowen is no longer content to lay down on a blanket and watch the fan or the ceiling or whatever he can see from there... he now wants to sit up and see what is going on all around him. He does not even want to lay back. I mean, he wants to be sitting or standing straight up! I guess it is about that time. Plus, he has outgrown most of his chairs that I could set him in. So, as I was trying to figure out how to get in the shower with a wide-awake baby, I remembered the Johnny Jump Up that the Curry's so kindly donated to us, for now :) I put it up in the doorway of the bathroom and put my little Bowen in it, and he LOVED it! He could not only see everything, he could move and jump and still gnaw of his fists! It was wonderful and he was so very happy! Crockett always wants to swing him or help him jump, which I don't approve of, but Bowen likes it and just laughs and smiles at his big brother. That must be one of my very favorite things about having these two boys. We love to spend our days just a jumping! Such a happy baby!!