The Reed Family

All Went Well!

2012-01-30T12:45:00.005-06:00

Hudson's surgery went great this morning. He was such a big boy and was so brave. We were very proud of him. He didn't even cry when we had to hand him over to the nurse. I'm proud to say that we didn't cry either, although it is pretty awful watching your son go through those double doors not having a clue as to what was about to happen. One of the worst parts of the whole morning was not the hour wait in the waiting room (why do they tell you 7 am when they really mean 8 am???), which was pretty bad, but rather it was getting that darn gown on Hudson. He did not want to wear it! He is a boy and it did look like a dress! :) When he got back to our room after surgery, one of the first things he said was that he wanted to go home and watch bowling. What?!?! It was funny.

They made Hudson drink liquids in the room and let it sit for a while to make sure he wouldn't get sick and of course he did great with that (he was laying down not moving--of course he did great). As soon as we get him to the car and I start backing out, the projectile vomiting started. And, it continued until after we got home. He is just like his mama...we do not do anesthesia very well! I felt so bad for him--he was so pitiful. After a bath, I was able to get some food and juice in him and he was able to keep all that down. Thank goodness! We watched a movie and now he is fighting a nap. Nothing has changed there! I thought he would come home and want to zonk, but nope, he wanted to play (even though I KNOW he needs a nap).

Thanks for all the prayers and well wishes. We are glad it is over and hopefully we will be ear infection free for a while!

A Trip to the Circus and a Birthday!

2012-01-29T16:18:00.006-06:00

We had a great time at the circus again this year! Hudson LOVED it even more than he did last year. We left Harrison at home so we could have special time with just Hudson (and Hudson kept telling me that Harrison was too little to go anyway!). There is something for everyone at the circus and I can't wait to go again next year and let Harrison experience the fun too! We definitely missed him!

We had been talking up the circus and telling Hudson about all the animals he was going to see and he kept telling us that he was going to ride the train too. He thought we were going to the zoo! I then made the mistake of telling him that there would be clowns, and he totally freaked. The whole way there, he kept saying, "I don't want to see any clowns. I don't want them to get me!" I was nervous that I may have ruined it, but now he will tell you that the clowns were silly and liked to fall down a lot. Ha!

I just think the lion and tiger guy is crazy. They sure have those animals trained! I try not to think about how they got them that way. :)

We were able to make it another year without having to buy one of those expensive light up things...Hudson really never even noticed them! I wonder how long that will last!

On a side note, the circus will always have a special meaning to me because not only is it always Joel's birthday, but last year, it was on the way to the circus that I spilled the beans to Joel that I was pregnant! It's hard to believe that was a year ago!

Speaking of Joel's birthday, Saturday was his big day. Unfortunately, Joel and Hudson were both under the weather. We are almost 100% positive that Hudson has another ear infection. Tomorrow cannot come soon enough. He's had to just tough it out this weekend and I know he's not feeling good. We did manage to go eat a late breakfast at Another Broken Egg, and then picked up some Gigi's cupcakes to celebrate. The only gift I was able to give Joel was three uninterrupted nights of sleep. I have had no time, but I guess that's the best gift I can give right now, especially when he's sick!

Joel and I were supposed to have a date night last night, but he just wasn't feeling up to it, so we cancelled. I was bummed, but I guess I would rather spend our rare date night on a night that he is feeling good! We watched a movie instead and all got in bed early.

We celebrated Joel's birthday again tonight at the Reed's house with a yummy dinner.

I can't leave out this cute little guy. He'll be 4 months this week. Where is the time going??? He's been busy working on his sitting up skills!

Tomorrow is Hudson's surgery and even though we've been through it before, I'm still nervous about it. There's always that risk that you don't want to think about, no matter how minor the procedure is. I'm so ready for him to be feeling better, and I know he is too. He's probably forgotten how it feels to not be sick!

Safe and Sound

2012-01-23T20:43:00.003-06:00

I don't really have much to report. There's never much to report in January. Is this the longest month ever to anyone else??? I'm somewhat of a zombie today after the middle of the night tornados. The sirens started going off at 3:30 and by 3:45 we had a very scared two year old crying at the top of the stairs. We needed to keep the tv on to make sure we were safe (the storm went just north of us thankfully--many were not so lucky), so I went upstairs to sleep with Hudson. At 4:30, Hudson had finally gotten back to sleep and the storms had calmed some so I headed back to my own bed. Not 5 minutes later, Harrison was crying! Ugh! So after a bottle, we were all back to sleep again until that darn alarm went off at 5:30. Time to get cracking for the day! Not a great start to a Monday, but I am thankful that we dodged another tornado.

We got the jumperoo out for Harrison this weekend and I think he's liking his new view. Not much jumping going on yet, but he is really reaching out and grabbing things!

This is where Hudson usually hangs out--on the floor playing with some kind of vehicle. On this day, it was the ambulance, and peekaboo seemed like the perfect game to go along with it!

I see you!

We had a very low key weekend, which was good. We have started Friday night movie night and it's so fun! Of course, last weekend it was Winnie the Pooh and this weekend was Dinosaur, so obviously not adult choices, but I wouldn't trade that snuggle time for anything!

Saturday it was stormy and Hudson really needed to get his wiggles out so we headed to I-Jump for a bit and let him run wild. It's not my favorite place, but Hudson loves it and it always guarantees a good nap! After lunch at none other than Chick-Fil-Way (in two year old talk) and a close encounter with the very scary Chick-Fil-A cow, it was time for naps.

Saturday night, we headed to the Kincaid's for a cookout. It was so much fun hanging out and Hudson had a blast playing with Hunt. They played together so well. I just loved walking into the room they were playing with and hearing them carry on a conversation. They are getting to be such big boys! Harrison stayed awake the entire time, but never even made a peep. He is such a sweet baby.

Yesterday, it was church and then we celebrated Migi's birthday at Macaroni Grill for dinner. Such a fun night!

The countdown to the weekend is on! We are going to the circus and celebrating Joel's birthday. I can't wait!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Tubes Date Set

2012-01-19T14:48:00.006-06:00

I begged the nurse at Children's to get us into the ENT more quickly than the 26th and she came through for us and got us in today. We had to get Hudson's hearing checked first, which showed he has hearing loss in his left ear (it was very clear that he was not hearing certain sounds from that ear), and then 2 and a half hours later, the doctor came in (for all of 5 seconds) and told us we need to get round two of tubes and have his adenoids taken out too. Surprise, surprise. I wish I could have just called in and gotten them to schedule the surgery without having to miss work and go to that place for them to tell me what I already knew! Oh well!

Anyway, we are all set for Monday, January 30th (for now--may try to change it to a Thursday). I had hoped for a Friday so I wouldn't have to miss any more work, but the next Friday they had available was at the end of February and that could be at least two ear infections away from now so I took the first date I could get. I don't want this boy suffering any longer than he has to.

I'm going to hate having to send him back for surgery. It was different when he was a year old and didn't know what was going on. Now, he's fully aware and I'm preparing myself for a total meltdown (for the both of us!) when I have to hand him over. Not to mention, I'll probably be by myself because Joel will need to take care of Harrison! We'll get through it though. It's really minor and I know it will only take a few minutes and hopefully, we'll be done with ear infections for good! I know, I know, I said that the last time.

This is completely unrelated, but Hudson was outside and picked up a stick that looked like a gun and said he was shooting water at me. Where they learn this stuff, I do not know!

He even knows how to use it!

Please say a prayer for us on the 30th!

Look Alikes?

2012-01-15T15:46:00.001-06:00

What do you think???

They look like brothers to me!

* New post below.

Officially in the Crib

2012-01-15T13:57:00.005-06:00

Thursday night was Harrison's first night in his crib and what do you know, he slept from 8-6 without waking! He did it again on Friday night. We thought we finally solved the sleeping problem. Unfortunately, last night he was up every THREE hours. He hasn't done that in forever. I'm so ready for his sleep to be consistent, especially as I start back to work this week! However, I still feel like a million bucks. I didn't realize how much his grunts and raspy breathing affected my sleep! It's nice not hearing that anymore, but on the other hand, when he's up every three hours, it's not fun trekking across the house and upstairs to get to him as quickly as you can before he wakes big brother up! And, I do really miss him being close to me. It's amazing how attached you can get! It had to happen sooner or later though and I'm sure we'll all adjust to it soon.

Don't be fooled, this picture was taken at around 8 am after he had gone back to sleep after his 6 am feeding, so he was in a really good mood at this point. Usually, he's screaming his head off until you get that bottle in his mouth!

I took some pictures after church today and there ended up being a bad glare on Harrison's head, so I put them in black and white and ended up really liking them. If only I had the time to really edit pictures that I take...I hardly have time to get them on the blog!

I can't leave our precious Hudson out. He won't let me take his picture much anymore, hence the reason that Harrison has been making the blog more than Hudson lately! We're counting down to his 3rd birthday in a little over a month. I've got most of his firetruck party planned and he's so excited about it. I shouldn't have mentioned it to him because every day he thinks it's his birthday (and we have until March 1st to wait!). He's still not potty trained and has absolutely no interest. We gave him big boy underwear (Toy Story of course!) for Christmas and he cried. I'm not going to push it, but I think he's terrified and I'm not sure how to get him over that. I'm just going to give it time for now.

He has really enjoyed working all 21 of his puzzles that he got for Christmas. He's just like his mama. We are puzzle people. He's really good at it too! He LOVES riding his new Jeep that Santa brought him for Christmas. I have yet to get a picture of him on it, but he is having fun with it. We are ready for some warmer weather though so we can spend more time outside.

Another thing he's into is sticks. And dirt. And puddles. And mud puddles. In his Sunday outfit of course.

I see a lot of this in our future...ha!

In Hudson's defense, he was only trying to give Harrison a hug!

And, a couple of I-Phone pics from the week. This little onesie from Aunt Carrie is so appropriate!

I'm going to miss seeing this sweet smile all day every day when I head back to work!

Smiles From Harrison

2012-01-11T14:25:00.001-06:00

This is my first post from our new IPad so I have no idea how it is going to turn out. These were some cute pictures of our happy little guy in his LSU gold. :) Just kidding Bama fans--it was a good win for our state. I promise we didn't have a Cajun dinner and wear our yellow and gold that day (and work on our "Go Tigers" cheer).

He has a cute little dimple!

Well we are dealing with yet another ear infection for Hudson this week. That is 3 ear infections since Thanksgiving. Ridiculous. Our tube appointment can't come soon enough! The good news is that Dr. C checked Harrison's head while we were there and thought it was looking somewhat better and he is definitely not leaning to the right as we had originally suspected as a result of the flat spot. Yay!

That's all for today! Got two "no nappers" to attend to!

Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Weekly Tidbits

2012-01-06T14:37:00.005-06:00

I just wanted to jot down a few random tidbits from our week.

On Tuesday, I took Hudson to his first movie, Alvin and the Chipmunks. He is obsessed with the other two Alvin and the Chipmunks movies, so I knew this one would be a hit, and it was! He loved everything from the movie to the popcorn to his first coke. What a treat it was! He did think it was too loud to begin with, but after he got used to it, it was fine. He was pretty quiet and sat still for most of the time. He did get a little fidgety towards the end and started climbing on all the seats in our row, but he was quiet and kept one eye on the movie at all times! Luckily, there was not a ton of people in there. It was a big success and I can't wait to take him to more movies.

On Wednesday, Hudson had a dentist appointment. I was dreading it because of how the previous dentist appointments have gone, and this was no exception. We started the appointment by Hudson falling backwards out of a waiting room chair and landing on his back (his head landed on a stuffed animal that was laying on the floor--phew!) while I was signing in and trying to get Harrison a bottle (of course, he had to be hungry right at appointment time!). And then, Hudson kicked and screamed all through the appointment. It was another one of those times that I had a sigh of relief when I got back to the car (but not before a mega fit in the parking lot over juice--the dentist said he had to wait 30 minutes to drink anything and you would have thought the world had ended). I'm glad we have another 6 months before we go back.
Thursday was back to school day! Hudson was so excited to be back in school and when he got there, he gave his best buddy Caleb such a big hug that they both fell over. It was so cute. Unfortunately (for me), Harrison got his first taste of school on Thursday too. I'm sad to report that I did cry despite my best attempts to hold it in! I did make it to the car though--barely. I remember sobbing in front of Hudson's teacher on his first day and then crying at work too, so I did a little better this time around! I was fine once I got to work. I had several meetings that I had to go to at work and so Harrison stayed most of the day. They said he did great though and I even got a text message with the picture below from his teacher around lunchtime that said, "Hey mom, I'm having a great day!" It made the day a little easier! Now, I'm going to enjoy the next week at home before going back for good on the 17th. Maybe I'll be ready then--probably not--but, I'm praying I at least don't cry again!

Harrison has decided to start waking up in the middle of the night again to eat. Not cool! He's done it the past two nights. I'm hoping it's just a growth spurt and it will pass in the next few days.

Last night, Hudson threw the biggest fit over having to eat one single green bean. I feel that is blogworthy because it was a lay on the floor, scream like a baby fit and all he had to do was eat one and we could go get ice cream. We're not striving for much here! I really thought the green bean was going to win and I was getting really upset about it because I really wanted to go get ice cream, but he finally gave in and gagged it down. How do you get your kids to eat veggies??? I feel like we've tried everything and he just won't eat them.

I know I've said this before, but Joel likes to make fun of Hudson when he says, "Mary has a wittle wamb." Well, the other night Joel asked Hudson what does Mary have, and Hudson replied, "Mary has a baby, and his name is Jesus, and he was born!" That shut Joel up real quick! Ha!

We do prayers with Hudson every night and he tells us who all he is thankful for. Most of the time, it's us and baby Harrison, and all the grandparents. One time it was Kobe (Carrie and Andres' dog). Last night, he went through the list and then said he had one more to thank. He said, "I want to thank God for Santa." :) Maybe he's getting over his fear of Santa after all!

He also told me last night that Mr. Peter Pan was going to fly through his window during the night on his motorcycle. Not sure where the motorcycle part came from...

This little guy has been working on holding his head up while doing tummy time. It's hard work, but he's doing great!

Happy New Year!

2012-01-03T15:52:00.004-06:00

We spent New Year's weekend in Mentone this year with my family. As usual, it was such a good time and I think I appreciated it even more this year because it gave me a bit of a break. Help is good! I'm definitely re-energized and ready to start 2012 out good!

We headed up there Thursday night and Friday, our little family went to Little River Falls. We've seen it many times before, but Joel and I got a new lense for our camera for Christmas and we wanted to try it out! Hudson loves seeing waterfalls too, so it was a fun trip out.

Hudson's threatening to jump in!

There was a group of kayakers getting ready to kayak the river so Hudson had so much fun watching them. Can you imagine kayaking off these falls??? I can't! They did have lots of padding on and of course wet suits, but they were still crazy. We had lunch at the Wildflower (YUM!) before heading back to the cabin for the afternoon.
Friday night, I cooked dinner for the family and it actually turned out really good! I was worried because I'm a terrible cook and it's usually best for me to just pick something up than attempt to cook. But, I made shrimp and grits casserole (compliments of Cameron!), strawberry pretzel salad, and rolls. Soo yummy! It felt good to actually contribute something while we were there. I feel like Mom always does everything.

Saturday was a beautiful day up there. It was sunny and very spring like! We headed out on a hike for the morning and then played with the other kids on the mountain on the Cam court until finally coming in to eat lunch around 1! It was such fun!

More playing with the camera...(and no, that bird is nothing but a vulture!).

I love this picture...

And this one too! Of course, we are donned in our Auburn gear for the big game that night!

Saturday night, Joel, Harrison, and I got on the gator and went on a ride to watch the sunset. We thought we could get a good view by going down the mountain some, but it didn't quite turn out that way. There was another mountain in the way! But, it was still pretty nonetheless!

Sweet Harrison slept through the bumpy ride!

Love the orange sky!
We watched Auburn crush Virginia, which was so much fun! Auburn played the best they have played all year, so it was a good New Year's Eve!

I wish I could report that we stayed up and rang in the new year at midnight, but we all went to bed right after the game. I know, lame us.

I forgot to mention that Saturday morning, we also decorated New Year's hats. Mom thought would be fun for the kids to decorate hats for us all to wear on New Year's Day. It really was fun and they all turned out so cute! We did take a family picture, but it's on Trey's camera and I think he was so embarassed that we will probably never see it. I'm sure it's hilarious! So, we did celebrate New Year's some! And, we ate our pork loin, blackeyed peas and cornbread so we covered our bases!

Here are some of the hats...

After a big New Year's Day lunch that was absolutely delish, we headed down to the lake for a little while to see Joel's family. Of course, Hudson spent the entire time we were there on the gator and the four wheeler with Pops. He always has so much fun!
On the way back to the cabin, Joel thought it would be fun to take us on the scenic route through Little River Canyon. Well, it happened to take an additional 2 hours and luckily, Joel had an old water bottle in the car that we could use to make a bottle or else it really would have been a long ride home! It was beautiful though and we got to see another waterfall on the way!

It was a great and relaxing New Year's weekend!

Harrison at Three Months

2012-01-02T13:37:00.003-06:00

Our littlest buddy is three months old today!

He's growing and changing so much every day, and is really starting to become more interactive with us! It's getting so much fun!

Here was Harrison at 2 months...

And now here he is at 3 months...

You can tell that he is so much more alert. And, here was Hudson at 3 months...

I'm starting to think they look nothing alike! Hudson looks a lot bigger, but it could just be the way the pictures were taken. I think Harrison is probably close to 15 pounds, so he is a chunker too!

At 3 months, Harrison is sleeping through the night. He's going down around 9 and will sleep to anywhere between 6 and 8:30 or so. If he gets up at 6, he'll go right back to sleep, but if he sleeps until 7 or 8, he's up for the day. He's still in our room, but that is going to change very soon! It's time for him to go upstairs, so we've been trying to get him to take naps in his crib so he'll be prepared for when the time comes. We just have to get a new video monitor before we permanently make the transition, but that will be soon!

Speaking of naps, he has been a little more consistent with his naps lately. He has a bottle every 3 hours during the day (usually 5 ounces) and will play for a while and then will nap for a little while. Sometimes he cat naps and sometimes it will last an hour and a half or so.

He has just started laughing, but I think I'm the only one who has heard him do it. He has also started to coo and make noise. He has also rolled over once from his tummy to his back. That was a few weeks ago and he hasn't done it since so maybe it was a fluke!

Harrison is really starting to reach out and touch things at 3 months. We got him a new play mat for Christmas and to say he loves it would be a huge understatement. It has a piano on the end that he can kick and it plays music, and he just goes to town on it. He's doing a lot better with his head control and can sit in the bumbo for extended periods of time now, which is good for his flat head!

This month coming up will be very eventful for Mr. Harrison as he will start daycare. My maternity leave is coming to an end and it's a little bittersweet. I hate thinking about someone else giving him his bottles during the day and playing with him, and even changing those stinkies. I've enjoyed my time with him and will miss him so much! He's just such a sweet baby and I'm going to miss this one on one time that we've been able to have while Hudson was at school! I'm sure I will cry on his first day. But, I know life is not going to be like this forever and it's time to get to how our new normal is really going to be.

Happy 3 months sweet little buddy!

Christmas 2011

2011-12-26T15:41:00.009-06:00

We had a wonderful Christmas this year! It was busy as usual and we were all exhausted by last night, but I love all the family time we get.

We started out with lunch at the BCC on Christmas Eve. Hudson was just a little bit excited about the Christmas festivities!

About 5 minutes after the above picture was taken, Hudson fell out of the chair and busted his chin and bit something in his mouth. He was fine--just a little blood and some tears, but luckily it didn't last too long.

Harrison was loving all the attention he was getting!

This was the only family picture we took all weekend and it's not very good. Hudson was ready for a nap.

We made it home in time for Hudson to take a quick nap before heading to the Christmas Eve service at church. We let Hudson sit with us in "big church" and he did great! He was so proud of himself for being at big church and was very well behaved and quiet the entire time! Joel's parents and brother met us there. The only time he really talked out loud was in the middle of the service, he said, "This music is goooodd!" It was so funny. He even went to the front of the church for children's time! I was so proud of him!

After church, we headed to my parent's house for dinner and opening of presents.

My best gift from 2011!!!

Hudson loved opening presents--no surprise there!

Andres did good!

Like we do every year, we try to go slow so everyone can see what everyone is getting, but then it just turns into chaos and it looked like a tornado had gone through the room! It was a lot of fun though and we were very blessed! We definitely did not deserve all that we got!

We tried to start dinner/presents early so that those with kids could get home early, but of course we didn't get home until close to 10 and we had a lot to do! I loved every second of it though and the 6 hours of sleep that we got was worth it! :)

This was the first year that we didn't have to go get Hudson out of his crib and bring him downstairs to see what Santa brought, so I was a little unsure of how the morning would go down. Hudson ended up coming downstairs at 7:30 and Joel and I didn't even hear him. We usually hear him coming down the stairs. I finally heard him in the den and I went out there and he said he wanted to get the race cars out of the car from the night before. He totally had bypassed all the presents Santa had brought (or maybe he didn't care about them!).

I think once he realized it was for him, he got excited. He loves his new jeep!

Of course it had to be raining and we couldn't go outside to really ride it. He had a hard time with that! We let him ride it for a second in the house, but he almost took a wall down! No worries though, he's gotten a lot of riding time in today!

He's checking out the half eaten cookies and Santa even wrote him a note! I really don't know how much of this he really understood. I think at times he was a little overwhelmed! I'm sure that next year he will be really into it.

He cooked us some hamburgers on his new grill!
Sadly, I think his favorite thing was the dollar candy that was in the stocking!

He was scaring everyone with his new dinosaurs.

Harrison finally joined us around 8:30. Hudson had already destroyed his stack of things and had played with everything before Harrison even got up. The Reed's came over and had breakfast and visited for a bit as well!

After we played with our things from Santa for a while and opened our presents to each other, we headed to Joel's aunt's house for brunch.

Hudson helped Papa John open his gifts.

We had a good time at brunch hanging out with Joel's family. This was our second meal of the day. Once we finished there, we then had to go to my parent's house for lunch with my grandparents on my mom's side. We had eaten 3 times by 1 pm that day! It was all SO good!

We got home around 2 and took naps and then headed to the Reed's that night to do Christmas with them. I left my camera in the car unfortunately so I have no pictures from their house. I hate that! We got some really great things though and had a wonderful time! Once again, we got way more than we deserved this year! It was just fun to be with family though. Harrison slept through most of Christmas at the Reed's (he was one tired little baby), but he finally joined us at the end and played with some of his new things as well! He's really starting to reach out and touch things and be interested in toys. It's so fun!

It was such a fun and crazy two days. We all got to sleep in this morning so we're feeling pretty good! And believe it or not, we already have most of our Christmas decorations down. Once Christmas is over, it's over, and I want my house back! Ha! Hope everyone else had a very Merry Christmas. We are thankful for so much this year!

Christmas Activities

2011-12-23T13:40:00.011-06:00

We have had a fun filled week of activities as we await Christmas.

We took a trip to Zoolight Safari at the zoo. Hudson had so much fun and threw the biggest fit when we told him it was time to go.

It was cold. We had Harrison so bundled up that he was sweating though!

We went to a Happy Birthday Jesus party at Hudson's school. They read the Christmas Story and sang Happy Birthday to Jesus.

This is Hudson's new pose--you'll see it several times in these pictures.

We even got out the paint at home. I made the mistake of leaving the paint on the table (which had never been opened before--wrappers still on the top) AND Hudson in his nice smocked t-shirt (which I was about to change him out of) and came back to paint all over the table and all over him. I swear he can get into everything on no time flat! Hence, the all black outfit below from Hudson's Christmas program...he could splatter paint everywhere on that and you'll never know!

I believe I can be crafty when I have the time to be! :) Hudson REALLY wanted Harrison to participate and I even tried to get Harrison's hand prints on it, but he would absolutely not let me unclutch his little fists that he's in all the time! Oh well. Hudson actually did really well with the paint on his hands. I was worried since he wouldn't do it a few weeks ago.

We went to the library to see Fancy Nancy. Well, we didn't actually go to see Fancy Nancy--I've heard she's all the rage with the girls, but the library was doing a fundraiser and they had donuts to eat, the kids made an ornament, Santa was there (we had to avoid him!), a mariachi band playing Christmas music which was Hudson's favorite thing, and Fancy Nancy read them a story. It was really cute, but I'm pretty sure the volunteers at the library were not expecting the crowd and it was very overwhelming (and I might have been a teensy weensy bit stressed out trying to wrangle my two year old who wanted to run wild while maneuvering our gigantic stroller through 200 kids). Let's just say I took a big deep breath when we were finally back in the car...I survived.

The "pose" again...

We met Lindsay and Caroline there and they loved painting their ornaments!

We played outside a good bit this week since it has been close to 70 all week! Crazy weather. I'm glad it's finally getting cold so maybe it will actually feel like Christmas!

We went to see Santa at the mall! I told Hudson that we were just taking Harrison and that he did not have to get near him, but Santa was very enticing and getting there at 9 am really is awesome because there was no one in line and Santa got to spend a lot of time talking to Hudson and getting him comfortable. Not comfortable enough to sit on his lap, but at least he's next to him. He would not sit on the sofa next to him, but was willing to sit in my lap. You can see my jeans in the picture, but I was trying my hardest to be out of it! What is up with the purple couch at the mall?!?! It was a little strange. Santa was fabulous though!

Unfortunately, we also had a trip to the doctor and learned that Hudson has his second ear infection in 3 weeks. We are headed to the ENT for another round of tubes and his adenoids out after the first of the year. Also, Dr. C. looked at Harrison's flat spot and it's not getting any better so it looks like we'll be dealing with that in January as well. Until then, we're working on not laying down during the day except for naps, so we're doing a lot of bumbo time!

Joel and I even got a night out without kids to go celebrate his friend Hunter's birthday at La Paz. It was a lot of fun!

Lastly, we made cookies for Santa!

It's been a fun week and we are ready to celebrate this weekend!

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-21T14:09:00.003-06:00

Christmas cards are one of my favorite things about the holiday season. I just love going to the mailbox every day and seeing all the cute cards. It makes me so happy! Of course, anything is better than seeing a bill in your mailbox! Ha! I wish we could have sent a Christmas card to everyone we know, but since we can't, below is what we sent out. Merry Christmas to you all (even if you didn't get a card from us!).

This is the front...

This was on the back...

I was SO pleased with how they turned out! The only thing is that the square card presents a stamp issue at the post office. Unfortunately, the post office doesn't make 65 cent Christmas stamps, so everyone got a lovely 65 cent dolphin stamp from me! :) Did anyone even notice??? I'm thinking not.

Merry Christmas!!!

Birthday Celebrations and a Tacky Party

2011-12-19T14:09:00.005-06:00

Friday night, we headed to Leonardo's for dinner with the Reed's. It was Joel's Dad's birthday. I was a little nervous about heading to such a nice place with our little stinkers, but it actually was a great place to take Hudson because they had an pianist and an accordian player. He was in heaven! And of course Harrison always just goes with the flow, never fusses a bit!

They don't love Harrison at all...Ha!

Happy Birthday Pops! We had a great time celebrating with you.

Saturday, Joel headed out early to shop for me and then we met my friend Cameron for lunch to celebrate her birthday in a few days. We had a great time at the new taco bar in Crestline and Cameron even gave Hudson and Harrison a gift for Christmas. Thank you so much Cams! It was so much fun! After lunch, I got a couple of hours to myself to finish Christmas shopping. It was glorious not having to tote around that heavy carseat for a change! You all with babies know what I'm talking about...that thing is ridiculous. I got so much done in such a short period of time and even bought myself a few things! :) But, I was glad to not be out in the madness for long. It was crazy out there.

Saturday night, Joel and I went to our Sunday School Christmas party. It's our second annual "Tacky" party and it was so much fun! Joel and I totally lost track of time and made it home a little later than we thought we would be. Sorry Migi and Pops--I'm pretty sure we have used up our babysitters for a while now--ha!! We appreciated the night out though. Here we are in our tacky outfits. Joel is a bit more tacky than I am this year--well, I should say a bit more "redneck." It sort of snuck up on me and I didn't have anything to wear with my Mrs. Claus wig which was oh so ugly and itchy. I apologize to my mother for wearing her gold tunic to a tacky party. I promise it's not tacky at all! :)

Here is a picture of all the girls. We did not see our husbands the entire night. They were outside by the heater the whole time and all the girls were inside. I think they had fun, but we definitely did! We were even contemplating going to a BAR at the end of the night--but, then I remembered I have an 11 week old and staying out later than we did was probably not a good idea! Ha! I'm laughing at writing this because we were home by 10:30...that is hardly "late" to most people's standards!

We even had an awards ceremony. Here is the winner of the "best accesorized" girl...

Joel won Most Creative! It was creative, alright! Yikes! Check out his tattooed arm...

I think this one was "Sexiest Male"...WOW.

I think this one was Most Gaudy...

And the Most Tackiest Couple went to the hosts of the party. They also won last year and have set the bar really high!

She even had an outfit change...

It was such a fun night and I can't wait to hang out with everyone again soon!

I'll end this post with one smiley little boy...

who is FINALLY sleeping through the night! Woo hoo!!!

Hudson's First Christmas Program

2011-12-15T13:47:00.002-06:00

Hudson performed in his first Christmas program on Tuesday. This is one of those things that makes this mom thing so worth it! There is just something about hearing those little voices sing. It makes my heart melt!

The two year olds only sang one song and then they were promptly removed. I guess they thought they might not sit still through the whole thing??? They dressed up as lambs and you can see in the pictures that Hudson refused to wear the hat and they tried to paint a little nose on him, but he had already taken it off by the time the program started. Typical! Hudson did a whole lot of ringing bells and not a whole lot of singing, despite us having practiced the song every day for the past month. I took a video of Hudson's song. You might want to fast forward to about a minute in...I started it a little early and I apologize for the bad camera skills. We don't use it that much so I am not very good at it! And, I should have done a big view of the whole stage instead of fixating on Hudson the whole time. Oh well, it's still cute!

It was such fun to watch him perform! I already can't wait until next year!

Another Classic Santa Picture

2011-12-14T11:11:00.004-06:00

Remember this one from last year???????

Well, nothing can really top that, but this year's picture is pretty good too!

His teacher told me that he tried to remain brave, but when it was his turn, he lost it.

I told Hudson that we have to go see Santa one more time so that we can get a picture of Harrison in his lap. He told me he would go, but that he wasn't getting close. :)

Polar Express and Parties Galore!

2011-12-12T10:25:00.013-06:00

I love this time of year. There is never a lack of activities to do with the kids. We may have overextended ourselves a bit this weekend because I sort of feel like I have been hit by a bus today, but I just didn't want to miss out on anything!

Friday night, we headed out to Calera to ride on the Polar Express. I bought the tickets for this way back in July because it sells out so quickly, so I think I was just as excited as Hudson was by the time it finally got here. Hudson had been watching the movie since Thanksgiving, and was so excited about riding the train to see the North Pole! He was not, however, excited about seeing Santa and kept telling us all that day that Santa wasn't going to be there.

We got there a little early and looked around at some of the old trains that they have on display. Hudson loved looking at them, but couldn't wait to get on the real train!

Below was the car we rode on!

Patiently waiting in the freezing cold to get on! One of his favorite things was the glowstick we had to buy for a dollar. He hasn't put it down since and likes to use it as a weapon unfortunately!

Boarding the train!

He was like a kid in a candy store. He was thrilled to be on that train!

We went with our friends, the Kincaid's, and Hudson and Hunt had a good time together!

And, we're off to the North Pole!!!

We rode about 10 minutes on the train to the "North Pole". It was a little village of lights, and we got to wave to Santa and Mrs. Claus from the train.

Hudson started to hear something...

An elf!!!

Then, he started to hear something else...

Uh oh!!!

The train ride took a turn for the worse...

Santa decided to skip us first...I think that was a good idea. But then, he came from behind!

I just want to say that he was a really great Santa. He told me that he would get him calmed down and he did!

He's asking Hudson what he wants for Christmas. And then, Santa tells him he's going to bring him a bicycle. Santa probably should have asked Mom and Dad if that was ok because Mom and Dad would have most likely said no on that. Thanks, Santa. He has yet to forget that Santa told him that.

Santa even got Hudson to hold his hand! Like I said, with the exception of the whole bicycle thing, he was a good Santa! This was huge!

This is as close as we could get to a picture. But hey, he's not screaming. We're making progress here.

Once Santa was gone, the world was ok again! Ha! They brought out cookies and chocolate milk, and Hudson was in heaven!

It was a fun ride. I'm not sure that we have to do that every year, but Hudson loved riding on the train so it was worth it for that! After dinner with the Kincaid's, we went to pick up this happy little man...

We figured it would be too cold to take him with us, but don't feel too bad for him. He was getting spoiled by his grandmother!

Saturday, my dear friend from college and her family came up to visit from Gulfport. They had heard about the Polar Express and were doing it Sunday night. They have a son a month younger than Hudson and then had a sweet little girl this summer. We went to Olexa's with them for lunch and then came back for the Liberty Park Christmas Parade.

It's hard to believe we now have two kiddos each! I wish I could see them more. Austin and Hudson had the best time playing together.

They were so cute holding hands.

After the parade, they came back to our house and played for the afternoon.

That night, we had another Christmas party to go to. My friends Cameron and Caroline had their annual Christmas party. I was a little worried about taking both the kids, especially with no naps Friday or Saturday for Hudson, but we took them anyway. I think we've exhausted our babysitters this holiday season already! :) We had a great time seeing everyone and the food is always SO good. That is one of my favorite parts about it. Of course, they always have their house decorated so cute and it's just always a fun time. This year did not disappoint!

We got to stay a couple of hours before the meltdowns began and we had to make a quick exit! Thanks Cameron for a wonderful party!!! Can't wait until next year!

Sunday, we went to church and then to lunch with Joel's parents, and then Hudson and I went straight to a cookie and gingerbread house decorating party. I pretty much knew we were pushing the limit with Hudson at this point, but I also knew this party would be so much fun and I didn't want him to miss it. Margaret went all out and had every little detail of the party planned out perfectly. I hope this becomes something we can do every year! The kids were too cute!

She started out with the kids making Christmas hand towels. Hudson was not interested in getting his foot or his hand painted, so he skipped that part. I was so sad about that because I really wanted one, but he's funny about getting his hands dirty and I wasn't going to push it. All of the other kids did it and they turned out so precious. Now that I watched her do it, I may try to do it at home once Hudson is out of school for the holidays. We'll see how that goes! I'm definitely not crafty so it will probably turn out as one big disaster!

Then, all the kids got to use the cookie cutters and fun sprinkles and make some cute Christmas cookies!

The last part was decorating gingerbread houses. I'm pretty sure Hudson ate an entire bowl of M&M's while decorating his house, but oh well. They all turned out so cute. You can't mess it up!

Then, we tried to get a group picture. These crack me up. You absolutely cannot get five kids to look and smile at the camera at the same time. I'm impressed we got them to stand there though, so I call it a success!

I can't wait to watch these kids grow up together!

Thank you Margaret for such a fun party. Hudson is still talking about all he got to do!

We had such a fun and FULL weekend. I loved it though. However, I did not get a lick of shopping done so I'm way behind. I can't believe Christmas is in 2 weeks!

Nursery and Big Boy Room Pictures

2011-12-07T12:04:00.005-06:00

I have been waiting to put up the pictures of the nursery and big boy room until they were completely finished, but I'm realizing that being "completely finished" is never going to happen, so I decided to go ahead and take the pictures. I have problems with starting things and never finishing them--oh well. They are done enough.

We decided to put Harrison on Hudson's side upstairs and they share a bathroom. I'm not sure this was the best idea as we are reluctant to start letting Harrison sleep up there until he's sleeping really good because we are afraid he will wake Hudson up. But, that's where he's going to be so it is what it is! It's really not as bright yellow as it appears in the pictures below. It's more of a soft yellow. I know I've said this before, but I wanted something totally different than Hudson's nursery. I think we achieved that!

The bookshelf is still filled with pictures of Hudson. Maybe someday soon I'll get some pictures printed and replace those! And, we still have some hanging of things to do in there.

Below is Hudson's firetruck room. I'm not big into themes at all, but this was easy and he loves it. My Dad did the pictures above the beds and I think they are just perfect!

The room definitely needs some accessorizing still and I would like to get a bookshelf in there to put all of his books in. Right now, there are some books in his bedside table and some in the shelves under his bed. Most of the time, they are scattered all over the floor (I cleaned them up to take these pictures--the room never is this tidy!). And trust me, it is rare to see the bed made up in this house!

I also included some pictures of our littlest guy from the week. We've enjoyed a week of shopping and Christmas card addressing so far. And, as we speak, Hudson is meeting Santa at school. He was very distressed about it this morning and cried a lot over having to meet Santa. He's still not a fan! I told his teachers to try and put him on Santa's lap because I have to have that picture! I'm such a mean mom. Pictures to come I'm sure.

Life is tough as a 9 week old--fell asleep in the bumbo!

Bath time!

Bath time always puts Harrison in a good mood. I was getting lots of smiles after bath time last night!

Can you tell how easy going this child is??? He'll fall asleep anywhere!

Smiling!

We have a fun and busy weekend planned. We are doing the Polar Express train ride on Friday night, Christmas party Saturday night, and Christmas cookie decorating party on Sunday. I love this time of year!!!

Decorating for Christmas

2011-12-05T12:23:00.004-06:00

Friday night, Migi and Pops kept the boys for a little while so Joel and I could go to my work Christmas party. This was our first outing without kids and it was a nice break! We didn't stay out too late because we knew Saturday was going to be a full day of decorating!

First up, finding that perfect Christmas tree! If you know me at all and have read this blog for the past few years, you know that I'm not too fond of "real" Christmas trees and all their imperfections (and the pine needles that seem to take a year to get completely vacuumed up). But, the experience of finding that perfect tree is something that we want to share with the boys. And, Joel is very devoted to the boy scout lot because he worked there for years.

Every year, we end up saying we are going to buy an artificial tree in January and this year was no exception! Ha! Let's just say that when we brought the tree home, it was on a major lean, so that took a while to figure out how to get it straightened out. Then, Joel thought he was putting water in the stand, but it was really going all over our hardwood floors--I think he realized this after 5 pitchers full of water. There was water everywhere! Then, while cleaning up that mess, Hudson broke one of our den lamps. Let's just say it was not exactly a fun time around the Reed house. Not to mention, this took ALL of Saturday and we didn't get much other decorating done. Oh well, here are some pictures from our day anyway...

Waiting to go get our Christmas tree!

Hanging out in the bumbo!

Hudson had more fun with all the strings that were on the lot than actually looking for a tree. Maybe next year...

Finally, we found the one! Well, let me rephrase, Joel found the one. They all start looking the same to me after a while!

Sunday, we went to church and lunch and then came back home to get the decorating DONE (but, it didn't all get done--sigh). We have half the wreaths on the outside windows. We couldn't do the upstairs windows because of naps and then it got dark. And, we have to hang a wreath in the den and add one more hook to the mantle for Harrison's stocking. But, I did get Harrison's stocking monogrammed a while back, so at least that's done! Joel finally got all the lights on the tree, so last night, we put all the ornaments on it. It was really fun. We blasted the Christmas music and had a dance party!

Harrison just took it all in this year. I can't imagine what he's going to be like next year! I'm thinking all.over.the.place.

Hudson LOVED putting the ornaments on the tree. You can definitely tell which ornaments Hudson put on the tree--they are pretty much all on the same limb! I just left it though...I think that makes it all the more special that he helped do it too!

We only broke a few ornaments and I'm actually the one that broke an ornament first! Hudson broke a few more, but they were all old ones and nothing special at all.

Posing in front of the finished product!

It looks fabulous! I'm SO glad the tree is done. I just love the house all decorated for Christmas. It's just cozy and makes me happy. Now, if we can just get the rest of the decorations up and finish that shopping, we'll be doing good!

Two Months

2011-12-02T13:28:00.008-06:00

Harrison is two months old today. I'm shocked it has been two months. I'm really wondering where November went because it FLEW. I'm already getting sad that my time at home with him is running out. I do have about 6 more weeks though, so I'm thankful for that.

Here is Harrison at one month...

And here he is today at two months!

He has gotten so big! It looks like his hair has lightened up a lot, and is definitely turning a little red.

Here is a comparison between Hudson and Harrison at 2 months. I took one look and said that they look nothing alike, but then Joel said he thought they looked exactly alike! It's something about the eyes that is different for me...

Harrison is just about the sweetest baby ever! At two months, he is smiling! His whole face lights up when he smiles. He's just precious. Of course, I couldn't buy a smile with our photo shoot today, but I promise, he does it and it's awesome.

It seems like Harrison is either awake all day or he sleeps all day. I feel like I did better with a schedule for Hudson, but we are just so on the go all the time right now that it makes it hard. He sleeps very well in his car seat still, so that is a plus. He's still teasing us with sleeping through the night. About twice a week, he'll sleep to 5 or so, but then he always goes back to 3:30 the following night. I'm ready for that to be consistent, but it's not too bad.

He's eating 4 ounces at a time, every 3 hours during the day. I give him 6-8 ounces right before he goes to bed. It usually knocks him out! I didn't weigh him, but my guess is that he is around 13 pounds, maybe a little less. He loves to be on his play mat and see all the lights. It never lasts more than about 10 minutes though. He hates the bouncy seat (always has, just like Hudson). He'll tolerate the swing for a little while, but that never really lasts either. We have the swing in the kitchen so we try to put him in it for meal time, but it seems that every time we sit down at the table to eat, that is when Harrison cranks up. My babies always know when it's meal time! Ha!

He is SO squirmy. If he's laying down and awake, he's swimming! His arms and legs are always on the go. It makes it hard to hold him sometimes. We stopped using the swaddle a while ago because he would bust out of it within 5 minutes. I think we had Hudson in the swaddle for at least 6 months! Just in the past week or so, he's started noticing his hands. I love watching him follow his hands with his eyes. He can also put a lot of weight on his legs. He loves to "stand" up. He's very strong. Sometimes I have to pry his hands away from his mouth with all my might just to feed him a bottle.

He's about to bust out of his 3 month sleepers. Why is it that they are never really in their "size"? Or maybe that is just my children...they are big!

The photo shoot lasted about 2 minutes this morning before he fell over and went to sleep. No fussing, he just fell to the side and zonked!

Happy 2 months little guy! Here's to a fun third month!

Happy Thanksgiving!

2011-11-27T19:15:00.014-06:00

We had a great holiday weekend spent with both our families. We were all sick at one point or another over the weekend (and pretty much passed it on to everyone else we were around too--sorry folks!), but we toughed it out and I'm thankful that our families were ok with us being a little sick around them! Well, they probably weren't ok with it, but at least they didn't kick us out! :)

Wednesday night, Joel, Hudson, Harrison and I all headed up to Mentone to spend the night at the cabin before driving the 30 minutes down to Weiss Lake on Thursday morning to spend Thanksgiving with Joel's family. Of course, we had a horrible night Wednesday night, which included Hudson sticking his fingers down his throat at midnight and throwing up all over everything, including the dog! So, after we got all that cleaned up and everyone showered, Hudson tossed and turned the rest of the night and didn't sleep much at all. Joel was a little under the weather all last week, but seemed to be fine Wednesday until that night and he coughed all night Wednesday night and woke up feeling awful on Thursday. He spent most of his time at the lake in the bed. So, it was not a good start to Thanksgiving!

We had Thanksgiving with Joel's family and there were 52 people there! They have such a big family and it was crazy. The day even included an awards ceremony which was hilarious. Surprisingly, Harrison slept through most of the chaos!

You can tell that Hudson was not feeling the best, but he did ok and loved running around with all the kids that were there.

Family picture with the Reed's...

This picture below makes me laugh because this is pretty much what life feels like right now! Hudson refusing to take a picture (or refusing to behave, period!), the baby crying, and Joel and I just trying to manage!

We are thankful for our new bundle this year!

My two turkeys...(not cooperating of course!)

They are OVER it!

We spent the afternoon visiting with Papa John and the family before heading back to Mentone. My parents had Thanksgiving at their house in Birmingham that day and then headed up to meet us in Mentone, along with the newlyweds, Carrie and Andres! What a treat it was for them to come up too seeing as though they had just gotten back from Italy at 11 pm the night before!

Friday morning, my mom cooked monkey bread, which is a Thanksgiving Day breakfast tradition (just the day after this year!). For as long as I can remember, we woke up to monkey bread and hot tea and watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade. Joel doesn't understand my obsession for the parade, but I just love it! I think he now understands my obsession with monkey bread though...and the 4 sticks of butter it takes to make it! :)

Joel had heard about this old historic covered bridge in Mentone and we went and saw it Friday morning. It really wasn't all that great, but it was a beautiful day and we enjoyed getting out in it!

We watched a lot of football on Friday and had a great time hanging out with the family!

Harrison even gave us some smiles!

Friday night, we headed to the McKewen's house, which is a couple of houses down from my parent's house, to have a cookout. It was a lot of fun and Hudson had a blast playing with all their kids and all their toys!

I was so thankful for all the help this weekend! It was nice getting a little break.

We were supposed to head back Saturday morning because we were invited to an Iron Bowl party, but since everyone was still sick and I woke up with a sore throat too, we decided we didn't need to spread it any further. We ended up just staying in Mentone until after the game and then headed home after that because I had to teach Sunday School the next morning at church. Since we decided to stay, Dad had heard of this place in Rainsville where you could feed the reindeer. He wanted to take Hudson to do that so some of us tagged along. Boy, was it a sight!

The "reindeer" are below!

Santa's Country "Reindeer" ended up being goats. Poor Hudson kept asking (even for hours afterwards) where the reindeer were. I think he's content now with knowing they are still at the North Pole! :) We cracked up so hard at the goats, and were making jokes about the fact that Santa was probably going to be in overalls, until we actually SAW Santa...

And he WAS in overalls! And, sitting in a recliner. Ha! And, this is what Hudson thought of the "country" Santa...

Yes, buddy, I thought the same thing too! And, he turned out to really be a creepy old man so we got out of there fast. He even got out of his recliner and chased us down in a golf cart to give us a peppermint. That didn't help things. Oh how we were laughing at Dad for bringing us to this place. What an experience it was!

On the way home, we started smelling something stinky and my Mom determined that she had stepped in manure. So, that was a fun (and smelly!) ride home! We definitely made some memories with this place!

After lunch at the Lookout (Shondra and Morgan joined us too as they came up to Mentone for Saturday night), we headed back to the cabin to watch the Iron Bowl. Poor Auburn...we expected it though so it really wasn't too awful to have to watch! After the game, we loaded up and headed back to Birmingham. I was so sad to leave. We had such a good time with our families this weekend.

Now, here it is Monday and I took Hudson to the doctor this morning because he just isn't getting any better, and he has a double ear infection. I think he's probably had it for about a month now...yep, I'm an awesome mom! He never once had a fever though and really didn't act like he felt that bad other than having a cough and a runny nose. Although, he's had his fingers in his mouth for a while now and hasn't been sleeping great, so I should have known better. Hopefully, we will now all be on the mend though just in time for Christmas!

Christmas Card Preview

2011-11-22T15:07:00.003-06:00

Instead of doing a birth announcement and then sending out a separate Christmas card this year, I'm doing just a holiday birth announcement. I had Kristin Mathis at www.funkyjunkphotography.com do our pictures this year and I highly recommend her! She was SO good with Hudson and he did everything she told him to do. In fact, I've never seen him listen so well! Ha! He was so sad to see her drive off that day. I knew the pictures would be good, but didn't know they would be THIS good!

Here is a preview, not including the ones I picked for the card. Most of these are of Hudson as Harrison was only cooperative in short spurts that day, but I just love every single one of these. And the best part about using Kristin is that you get the whole CD!

Happy Thanksgiving! I'm so glad the holidays are here!!! I'm sure am thankful for these two cute little fellas this year!

6-8 Week Checkup

2011-11-20T13:12:00.002-06:00

We had Harrison's 6-8 week checkup on Thursday. He's 7 weeks today--can't believe that!!! He weighed 11 pounds, 6 ounces (75th percentile) and was 22.5 inches long (50th percentile). At Hudson's 6-8 week checkup, he weighed more and was longer, but we're still on track to have another chunky boy. I love it!

Dr. C. said we need to do more tummy time with Harrison as he's getting a flat head. We definitely don't want him having to wear a helmet to round it back out. He doesn't love tummy time, but we've spent the weekend doing it a lot! He's also still really cross-eyed, so he told us to give it a month and if it still isn't better, we need to go see a pediatric opthamologist. Joel thinks Dr. C. told us both those things at Hudson's 6-8 week checkup, but I must have blocked that out of my mind. AND, since his baby acne still has not cleared up and he has such dry skin already, he thought that it may be related to my milk so he has us trying soy formula for a while (in addition to breastmilk) to see if that will clear it up. Hopefully, it is not a milk allergy or excema related, but we'll see. Hudson did have bad excema as a baby so I won't be surprised if that isn't part of it. It does look better than it did a few weeks ago, so I'm just hoping it is still just related to the hormones and is just taking a while to go away. We're trying the soy formula though and also putting hydrocortisone cream on it, so surely one of the two of those will help! Harrison had to get a bunch of shots too, which was awful! I got really upset after the appointment. You want to hear that everything with your baby is just perfect and I felt like all those things I said above were all my fault (like how I made him cross-eyed--ha!--it was just a bad morning overall and that appointment just sent me over the edge!). These are all minor things though and I'm counting my blessings that he is perfectly healthy.

These boys just make me so happy! Hudson has been so sweet to Harrison and he always wants to pat his head or in the case of the pictures below, hold his hand. I promise these pictures are not staged at all! He talks to him a lot too, especially while we're riding in the car. Before Harrison's appointment, Hudson told him that he was going to have to get shots, and they were going to hurt, but only for a minute and that he could pick a sticker if he was good. He also tells him to dance in the car, and on several occasions, apparently, Harrison has danced for Hudson. Wish I could have seen that! :)

Harrison is still doing good in the sleep department at 7 weeks. He's getting up around 5 to eat and then going back down, so while we're not quite to the sleeping through the night stage like I thought we might be last weekend (he totally teased us with that!), I'm definitely ok with getting to sleep from 9:30 to 5! Now if Hudson will just sleep a little later than 6:15 (or 5:45 as it was on SATURDAY morning!), we'd be doing great. He's eating 4 ounces at each feeding, but we do give him more right before bedtime to fill that tummy!

We're looking forward to a fun week with both families for Thanksgiving! I can't believe it is already here!

Carrie's Wedding

2011-11-18T09:34:00.010-06:00

I'll just let the pictures do most of the talking here.

Friday morning, we started out with the bridesmaids' brunch at Olexa's. YUM!

Then, Friday night, we rehearsed at St. Francis and then headed to the rehearsal dinner at Vulcan Park. Andres, whose family is from across the country, wanted to do a southern barbeque for the rehearsal dinner and so we had Dreamland. It was SO good and we had a blast toasting to Carrie and Andres.

Saturday morning, we all got our hair and makeup done at Richard Joseph in English Village. I thought Carrie's hair looked gorgeous!

Then, it was off to get dressed and get in the party bus for pictures!

Nothing about this wedding was traditional, which is what Carrie and Andres wanted. There were no pictures taken at the church at all. The party bus took us all over downtown Birmingham. All of the pictures are very urban, even some in front of grafiti. I think they are going to turn out really neat! She had a fabulous photographer who was so much fun.

After pictures, it was time to head back to the church to get the vail on and get ready to walk down the aisle! Carrie wasn't nervous the whole day until right before she walked down the aisle. I ran back in the bride's room right before I went down and the photographer was asking Carrie if she needed a trash can! :) She did great though! How beautiful is she?!?!

I love this picture! Oh and her flowers were AMAZING!

After the ceremony, we headed to Park Lane to have some fun at the reception!

First dance...

Dancing with Dad...

I couldn't get Hudson off the dance floor!

This is out of order, but our only family picture of the weekend. My headpiece thing had come untied...I wish I had fixed that before the picture was taken!

Thanks Cameron for coming!

Someone stole my camera...

Mom even danced with Andres' Dad! So funny!

I was too busy dancing myself to take a ton of pictures, so that's all. I did snap some of their goodbye. I was too scared to hold a sparkler, but they looked so neat!

On Sunday, they met their photographer early in the morning to do a "destroy the dress" shoot. How neat is this?!?! They said the water was a nice "warm" 10 degrees! Ha!

It was such a fun wedding. I hope they are having a blast in Italy! I'm only slightly jealous here!

School Picture

2011-11-17T17:17:00.003-06:00

This has been one doozy of a week, especially today, but this boy ALWAYS makes me smile! This is Hudson's school picture for this year. Man, do I miss those curls!

I'm thankful that dinner is being brought to us tonight (I sure am going to miss these meals that we've had for the past 7 weeks--we've truly been blessed with wonderful friends who are STILL taking care of us!), and a tall glass of wine is in order! Time for the weekend to get here!

Oh and I did jinx the sleeping through the night thing, BUT, I'm blaming it on the thunderstorm that came through in the middle of the night Tuesday which had Hudson in tears, which in turn made the dogs start barking, which woke Harrison up. Last night, he slept from 11-6 (yes, 11--we could NOT get him to go to sleep last night!), so 7 hours isn't too bad. Here's to it being a good night tonight!

Six Weeks

2011-11-15T12:43:00.002-06:00

Six weeks has been good to us.

This little guy has learned to smile (caught the tail end below). They are still hard to catch on camera, but its pretty awesome!

And...

He slept through the night!!!!! I'm quite positive that I'm jinxing it by blogging about it, but Friday night and Saturday night he slept 7 hours straight, and then Sunday and Monday night, he went from 10-6 and 9:30 to 5:45. I call that sleeping through the night! Go Harrison! Six weeks seems early to me to sleep through the night, but I'll take what I can get!

I know I have wedding photos to upload, but I'm having to work this week so with taking care of a baby and having to work when he sleeps, there isn't much free time. I have to mention this one little funny though before I go...be glad you did not have to call and tell your employer that your work paid cell phone no longer works because your baby projectile spit up all over it. :) It's so very embarrassing!

Beautiful

2011-11-13T19:52:00.002-06:00

Congrats to Carrie and Andres!!!

What a fun weekend! I can't believe my sister is married! More to come later...words cannot express how exhausted I am, but I just had to share this beautiful picture of the bride and groom!

Fun Weekend

2011-11-07T09:40:00.005-06:00

The weekends seem to be flying by these days! Saturday, we headed up to the lake to see Joel's 94 year old grandfather, Papa John, and introduce him to Harrison. He couldn't wait to get his hands on Harrison! We had a little birthday celebration for Papa John and spent a wonderful day up there.

Hudson literally spent ALL day on the gator. He loves this thing. Harrison even took a ride on the gator! I'm pretty sure he didn't know he was on it, but he did it!

I caught Hudson putting the key in the 4 wheeler. Gotta watch this little guy!

Being a ham!

Handsome boy...

He even got to get on the big blue tractor with Pops.

Joel wanted to watch the Alabama/LSU game on his TV (and we didn't want to pack all that stuff for just one night away), so we drove back late Saturday afternoon. We got back just in time for kick off and watched a great game! It was all I could do to stay awake until the end, but I made it! Harrison decided to sleep from 10:30 to 5 (and then again until about 8) so we felt pretty darn good on Sunday morning! If only Hudson had gotten that memo to sleep a little later! But, he did sleep until 7 (which was only 6 am with the time change). Since we had some extra time in the morning, we decided that it would be a good day for us all to go back to church since Harrison was born. Oh and Harrison sleeping that long was apparently just a fluke...he was back to normal last night--such a tease! Boo!

Hudson wanted to hold Harrison for some pictures, and when I told him I was done, he started to just get up without even thinking about little Harrison in his lap! Harrison about nailed his head on the hardwood floors! We're obviously still working on the "we have to be careful around the baby" thing!

After church, we came home for a super quick nap (for Hudson) and then Hudson and I headed to Hunt's 3rd birthday party at I-Jump. Hudson had SO much fun. Can you tell by his red face and sweaty hair?!?! He did not want to leave that place!

Here is Hudson with the birthday boy. They were both so sweaty and in need of a drink that we couldn't get them to look at the camera for anything!

It was a really fun weekend. I'm sad to see it go, but we have Carrie's wedding this weekend coming up and I can't wait!

Disney on Ice

2011-11-03T12:31:00.002-05:00

We had a great time at Disney on Ice last night! Can you tell how excited Hudson was?!?! We had been talking it up all day long and he could not wait!

Hudson and Hunt loving the show!

Hudson sat in his seat in excitement the entire time and did not move. We thought there was going to be more of Mickey and Minnie, but as it turned out, they only introduced each of the "movies" that were part of the performance. Hudson kept on asking where Mickey went. He liked the rest of the performance, but he had not seen any of the movies (Lion King, Little Mermaid, Lilo and Stitch, and Peter Pan). We need to work on that! :)

During intermission, we went and talked to some of our friends (Kristi, Brady, and Beckett (aka "Bucket" as Hudson kept calling him!) and Hudson was so afraid that we were leaving. He did not want it to end!

He clapped and danced just about the whole time!

And of course he got to see his beloved Tinkerbell. That was by far his favorite part. We need to get Peter Pan for him to watch. He kept talking about seeing "Garbie" (Barbie), who was really Wendy from Peter Pan. So funny!

It was only a 2 hour performance, so the time was perfect for Hudson. Joel and I managed to stay awake through the performance too (of course I was drinking a huge coke!). I'm so glad we took him. Watching him be so giddy and excited just makes this parenting thing so worth it!!! I can't wait to go to more shows like this with him!

One Month Old! And a Big Boy Haircut...

2011-11-02T13:27:00.017-05:00

Harrison is one month old today! Time really is flying by this time.

I couldn't wait to do Harrison's one month picture on the chair and compare it to Hudson's because I just knew they were going to look like twins, and now that I'm looking at it below, I'm not sure they look anything alike! There are times (a lot of times) though, when I look at Harrison and he reminds me SO much of Hudson, especially when he is sleeping. I can't wait to see how he continues to change over his first year.

We have survived our first month as a family of four. While I feel like the past month is a blur, it really has not been nearly as big of an adjustment as I thought it would be. Joel and I say all the time that it was a much bigger adjustment going from zero children to one than it has been from one child to two. I'm sure that I might think differently once Harrison gets mobile! I'm just so much more relaxed this time, and I don't stress about every little thing. And thankfully, there have been no tears this time around (I think Joel is most thankful for that one!).

Harrison continues to be pretty easy. He has had his moments, but for the most part, he only cries when he's hungry or is extra sleepy. He's eating every 2-3 hours during the day (about 3.5 ounces each time) and we're getting one 5 hour stretch at night and a 3 hour stretch. We load him up on milk right before 9 at night and he will sleep until 2 or a little later. While it has not been bad being up during the night, I'll be happy when he's sleeping through the night! :) Especially when you have a 2 year old that wakes up at 6:30. When Hudson was a baby, he would go back to sleep until like 9 so I could always get some more sleep, but no go this time! Harrison always goes right back to sleep after his night feeding, so that has been great. I don't have him on any kind of schedule. I just don't have time to think about schedules and we're always on the go so he just has to eat when he needs to eat and sleep when he needs to sleep, which is mostly in his carseat during the day! It has worked out fine so far!

In the past week or so, we've started putting him on his play mat. He likes it for about 10-15 minutes at a time, and then he'll let us know that he's had enough. It's nice to be able to put him somewhere because he does not love the bouncy seat or the swing much at all. Hudson was the same way. He does like being in the Baby Bjorn so I wear him around the house from time to time so that I can get things done during the day.

Sweet feet!

I love big brother hanging his head over the crib checking Harrison out. Hudson really is taking to Harrison quite nicely! He always has to know where he is. When I go change Harrison's diaper, Hudson always has to come watch. He even helped me bathe Harrison last night and likes to help hold his bottles. When we are going somewhere, Hudson will always open the car door on Harrison's side for me, and "help" lift the carseat into the car. He also lets me know if Harrison is sleeping in the car or if he's awake, or if he is spitting up. Or, if he made a stinky--I think the neighbors can hear Harrison make a stinky--it's loud and I always feel like it's going to come flying out of the diaper (sorry if that was too much information!)! :) If Harrison is crying, Hudson will tell me that he needs a bottle. It really is sweet. We have to watch him though. He just gets wild around Harrison and we've had a few close calls. I even found Harrison with a pillow on his head one time--Hudson told me that he needed some covers. He has good intentions! Overall, I think he's going to be a great big brother!

Harrison is holding his head up pretty well at one month. I definitely need to do more tummy time with him than I do now, but he's doing good. He probably weighs 9 or 10 pounds at this point and I've put away all the newborn clothes and diapers. He's now wearing 3 month clothes and size 1 diapers. Sad day! Why do they grow SO fast?!?!

Happy One Month little boy! I can't wait to see what the next month has in store for us!

........................................................................

On another note, I have to show off Hudson's big boy haircut that he got this morning. Hudson had a mop on his head and it needed to go, but I will never, I repeat NEVER, say, "You can't cut it too short, I'm not really tied to the curls," ever ever again. Normally, they are always afraid that I will get upset if they take too much of the curls off so it's never really that short after he gets it cut (hence the reason why I said what I did--so she would at least cut a good bit), but this time, she took my words literally and went to town on his hair. The curls are definitely gone. I'm a little sad. There's not a day that goes by that a random person doesn't comment on how beautiful his hair is--even though I feel like his hair looks like bed head 90% of the time, I know some people would kill for his hair! We've even had several people say, "Oh it's a shame he's not a girl with that hair." I never really know what to say to that one! We'll see if they come back this time!

Curls or no curls, he's still one handsome little boy!

Joel and I are taking Hudson to Disney on Ice tonight. He's SO excited! I just hope we all stay awake for the performance. It doesn't start until 7, which is late for us sleep deprived parents!

Happy Halloween!

2011-11-01T13:45:00.006-05:00

Yesterday was a FUN day! Hudson got to dress up in his costume for school. I made him take a picture before we left. He was so excited to be Woody for the day!

His school had a costume parade (aka "mass chaos" parade!) to start the morning. They sure were cute!

The two year olds...

Hudson and his best buddy Caleb.

I couldn't decide which ones to not include, so I just uploaded all of them!

Then, they had a little Halloween party in their class. Hudson was in a horrible mood at the party. He threw the biggest fit during their blessing (I have no idea why, but I assume it is because he thought I was going to leave--he's been that way at most of his class parties) and pretty much cried most of the time. Let's just say we had a good nap when we got home!

They added silly faces to the pumpkin as part of the party, which was fun for all of them to do.

Let's not leave this little guy out...

Once Daddy got home, it was time to go trick or treating! Hudson couldn't wait!

I ask him to show me his teeth, and he shows me his tongue...never fails.

Can you see the excitement?!?!

We went around our neighborhood for about an hour. He started out really shy and wouldn't say "trick or treat", but then he got the hang of it. One thing he did not like was when someone handed the bowl out to him and he got to pick what he wanted--he made me pick it out. I don't like it when people to that because you don't know how many pieces you can get! Do you get just one, or two, or a handful?!?! Anyway, Hudson was very upset when I told him we had to go home, so Joel took him to a few more houses and when they came back, he was happy and done. He had a blast and was so proud of all the candy he got!

When we got back home, he had fun seeing who came to our door. But, he freaked out if they were wearing scary masks. He DID NOT like the scary costumes!

Hudson telling me, "Mom, put up that camera!!!"

It was a great Halloween!!!

Our Week

2011-10-29T18:44:00.004-05:00

Joel is in Auburn at the game and Hudson is at the lake with the Reed's, so Harrison and I have enjoyed a nice, quiet day together! I am thankful that the Reed's offered to take Hudson. I have gotten a lot done today! I went out shopping for some things to wear to Carrie's wedding festivities because shopping with two kids is absolutely out of the question, worked on my speech for the rehearsal dinner, put up toys and straightened the house up, and did about 10 loads of laundry (that never seems to end!). Productive day I should say!

This week has been crazy. Monday, Harrison had a little surgical procedure down at Children's. It went really well, but he's been recovering all this week. Poor buddy. He's on the mend though! This week, he has had the worst case of baby acne. Hudson never had it this bad! If anyone knows some remedies for this, let me know! It does seem to be getting better, but it still looks terrible. I've been told to just let it run its course, but I hate his face looking like this. He's still cute though and oh so sweet.

Wednesday night, one of our dogs chewed up the tubes on my pump. There was a piece missing (I assumed she ate it) and so off we all went at 7 pm to Babies R Us to get new tubes, with a promise to go to Bruster's after that to get ice cream. This was a huge necessity as I've been exclusively pumping and without the tubes, that's it for the breastmilk (I told Joel that it was a sign from God and that maybe I was supposed to just quit! You know, because me and the pump are best friends and all. Ha!). Anyway, I couldn't find the tubes at Babies R Us, so off we went to Buy Buy Baby, where I found out that they didn't sell the tubes individually anywhere. Awesome. I almost burst into tears right in front of the lady in Buy Buy Baby. She told me you had to buy the tubes directly from Medela and that it would take several days to get them. That didn't help me! I had to pump that night! I was able to buy a manual pump for $57 that had the right tubes. So the dog cost me $57. It was almost 9 by this point and we had still promised a certain little guy that we would get ice cream (and he doesn't forget things!), so off we went. When we got home, I decided to search the house up and down for the missing part to my pump, and wouldn't you know, I found it. Anyway, long story short, I am still pumping and I got my $57 back, we got ice cream, and Hudson didn't go to bed until about 9:30 which made for a really fun next day! :)

Thursday was flu shot day. We had to be at the doctor early and had plans to do the mist, but the nurse had already gotten the shot ready, so we just did that. Hudson did really well surprisingly, and when it came time to pick his sticker, out of the Spiderman, Thomas the Train, Superman, and even Toy Story stickers, he picked Tinkerbell. Have I mentioned that he loves seeing Tinkerbell??? I know, strange. Highlight of the visit--Dr. C. loaded us up with more formula. He's the best pediatrician ever. I'm trying to stockpile the formula so that when we do make the switch, we won't have to buy much. I hate having to pay for formula! It's so expensive! I then dropped off Hudson at school and when I picked him up that day, Hudson's teacher told me that he went to time-out twice that day because he hit his friends. She told me he's definitely going through an adjustment period at school. I hate that. He is not a hitter at all. He's usually so sweet. Hopefully, this too shall pass!

Friday, Hudson woke up and said he did not want to go to school, and it was cold and rainy so I kept him home and we declared it a movie day. Bad idea! It just so happened that my sweet little Harrison wanted to cry ALL morning long, so by 9:30, we had to get out of the house. I thought maybe a ride in the car would calm him down. We went and visited Mama Jean and Harrison cried the entire way, but then was a perfect angel when we got there. I guess he likes to be on the go just like his Mama! Hudson had fun visiting Mama Jean and of course getting on a sugar high from all the treats that Mama Jean has to offer. Our day got better after that and we all ventured out to Tortuga's with the Reed's for dinner that night. Everyone behaved perfectly and we had a great time!

Side note, doesn't Hudson look like such a big boy in the picture below!?!?!

How sweet is this?????

And this????

And just for the record, I got peed on three times this week (and I did not change my outfit two out of the three times!), and had poop spray on me mid diaper change in the middle of the night. Yes, it is fun with a newborn boy around!!!

Grand Ole Pumpkin Patch

2011-10-24T10:47:00.004-05:00

We headed to the Grand Ole Pumpkin Patch in Clanton on Saturday morning. We did the pumpkin patch at Old Baker Farm last year so I wanted to do something different this year. I think Joel and I both agreed that the one in Clanton had more for kids to do, BUT, we liked Old Baker Farm better just because it was more of a traditional farm atmosphere and a lot less commercial--but like I said, there was a lot more for Hudson to do in Clanton. It was still a fun morning out though and only a 30-40 minute drive from Birmingham. And now, our front porch has its first fall decoration--a pumpkin! Mama has slacked on decorating this year (I'm giving myself a good excuse this year though!).

The pumpkin patch in Clanton has helicopter rides, which was so neat for Hudson to watch. He loves helicopters as any little boy would. We decided to just watch the helicopters this year--maybe we'll do it another year!

After checking out the helicopter, we headed to the bouncy house/slide area. The slides were huge and so fast too. Joel did the slides with Hudson while I had to feed Harrison. They had so much fun!

I just love seeing this happy face!

Pure JOY!

Like I said, the slides were HUGE.

They also had pony rides. Two pony rides in two weeks for Mr. Hudson! What is funny is that he has the same serious face as he did on last week's pony ride, but he loved it again. He just doesn't like to show it in the pictures apparently!

They also had a petting zoo. The one thing we didn't love about this pumpkin patch was that each separate area was a separate cost. It wasn't much, but it felt like all we were doing was doling out money all morning! Ha! Hudson was having a blast though so we didn't mind, but it was kind of annoying!

I tried to get Hudson to pose for a picture...no go on that! I should post the picture of Hudson "holding" Harrison, but I'm afraid I might get in trouble with DHR if I did that! :) Just kidding, it wasn't that bad, but let's just say that Hudson was more interested in looking at the tractor than holding his little brother and looking at the camera!

This is what you get when you get a random person on the ride to the pumpkin patch to take a picture of you...oh well.

Two cute boys!
We finally made it to the pumpkin patch and Hudson just wanted to run to the end. He had no interest in looking at any of the pumpkins. Joel kept trying to get him to look at certain pumpkins and he would just tell him no, that we needed to keep walking (not that Joel would have let Hudson pick out our pumpkin anyway--the engineer in him is such that we have to get just the perfect pumpkin with rounded sides and a good top).

And we found the perfect pumpkin!

It really was a great morning out (can you see how beautiful it was outside?!?!). I just love this time of year!

2-4 Week Checkup

2011-10-20T14:05:00.005-05:00

This morning was Harrison's 2-4 week checkup. He'll be 3 weeks on Sunday. His stats are:

Weight: 8 pounds, 10 ounces (WHOA!) - 50-75th percentile
Height: 21 inches - 50th percentile
HC: 14 inches - 50th percentile

Just as a comparison, Hudson was 8 pounds, 9 ounces at his 2-4 week checkup and was 21 inches long too. Hudson was 7 pounds at his first checkup while Harrison was 7 pounds, 1 ounce. So, they are exactly the same in how they gained weight in two weeks. I think my jaw dropped at the appointment today because I thought it seemed like a lot of weight gain in just 2 weeks, but then I looked at what Hudson did and I feel better about it. Dr. C wasn't concerned either! He just said he's a growing boy. No more feeding issues at this house! :) Hudson was a chunky monkey so I'm hoping Harrison will be one too...I love big babies!

Harrison had to get his heel pricked and took it like a champ. No tears for this guy! Everything else looked great and we go back again in about a month.

We are still sleeping great at almost 3 weeks. This week, he is sleeping from 9 to 2 am and then gets up again at 6, which we're up by then anyway. He'll go back down after that, but unfortunately, I can't--got a two year old to take care of at that point! It's ok though...I'm not sure I could go back to sleep after that anyway. I think I'm getting used to less sleep!

The picture below is from last week when Harrison met my grandparents for the first time. My grandmother is 92 and my grandfather turns 94 today! Happy Birthday Granddaddy!

Hudson LOVED Granddaddy's scooter!

Mama Jean wanted Hudson and I to come to Somerby's Halloween party and while I wasn't thrilled with taking Harrison with us with all those old folks, we did it anyway. No one except Mama Jean was allowed to touch him! Hudson is Woody from Toy Story for Halloween. He wouldn't wear the hat or the boots of course...

We didn't stay too long, but it made Mama Jean's day to have her great grandchildren there!

Feeding the Ducks

2011-10-19T08:20:00.002-05:00

I'm playing catch up on the blog. On the morning of October 1st (I went into labor that night), we headed out to feed the ducks at Star Lake in Hoover. It was such a beautiful day and we wanted to do something outside. Joel said he knew exactly where Star Lake was because that's where he went in high school to "have fun." :) Well, he apparently had a little too much fun in high school because where we ended up was NOT Star Lake! Ha! Anyway, we ended up at another lake in Hoover that had ducks and so we started there. They had a little park as well, so we had fun doing that and walking around the lake.

This picture below cracks me up. Hudson did not want to get too close and once the ducks realized that he had bread, they all kind of charged at him!

It was better from a safe distance away!

We finally made our way to Star Lake and now Hudson was a pro at feeding the ducks. He still didn't love getting too close to them, but he liked to throw them bread.

It was much better being safely held by Daddy!

It was a really fun, little did we know, last day out with our family of 3!

Change of Scenery

2011-10-16T17:55:00.010-05:00

I was already getting a bit of cabin fever trying to keep Harrison at home for a while, so crazy us packed up our 2 year old and 2 week old and headed to my parent's cabin for the weekend. I like to be on the go, so we might as well get Harrison used to it early!

We forgot how much it takes to pack for a baby. We definitely need a bigger car to handle two munchkins, but after an hour of packing, we finally got on the road. We got there around 6 Friday night and then headed to an outdoor concert for a little while. I carried Harrison in the Bjorn (which was fabulous by the way!). It was chilly though, so we didn't stay very long. We had Harrison so bundled up that I think he was sweating! He was very happy though, so that was good!

We did have a rough Friday night, but it wasn't due to the baby. He was only up once! It was Hudson! Hudson slept in the room with Morgan (my 8 year old niece) and he would not be quiet. He just kept talking and talking, which was really funny for a while, but when it got to be 11 pm and he STILL was not asleep, we knew we were probably in for a long night! Morgan was such a trooper with it all though! I finally went in there and layed with them until he fell asleep, but then we heard him walking around the house at 5 the next morning. We tried to get him to go to sleep in our bed, but he was ready to go for the day! So, a whopping 6 hours of sleep (maybe) for our two year old (and less than that for us!). Yikes! I think Joel almost made us pack up and go home! Luckily, the lack of sleep had no affect on Hudson. I was expecting fits all day, but he was great! And, we all got a big nap Saturday afternoon, so it was ok.

We had fun riding on the gator! (Multitasking at its finest--who says you can't drive while holding a newborn!)

There was a huge art show in Mentone so we headed down there for a bit Saturday morning. Joel and I are not really into the art thing, but they had a kids area with lots for Hudson to do and it was so much fun. Despite the look on his face in the pictures below, he claims that the pony ride on Pee Wee was his favorite part!

He was very serious about it all (I think maybe due to the lack of sleep!).

We had Morgan with us too and she had a blast!

Then there was the hamster ball. Morgan had done this before so she couldn't wait to do it again. We didn't think Hudson would be interested in getting in the ball, but boy, were we wrong!

This was the point that I thought Hudson would freak--them blowing up the ball. They used a loud blower to do it and he was supposed to be covering his ears, but of course, he didn't follow directions. Surprise, surprise!

And he's in! You are supposed to act like a hamster and roll all over the water, but Hudson was content just sitting there.

Joel tried to roll the ball a bit to get him going, but he still just sat there! I was just impressed that he got in there!

There were bouncy houses and a huge slide for them to do as well.

And trout fishing! Morgan caught one!

Since Morgan was doing it, Hudson had to give it a try too. He did not want Joel to help him, but he was too little to do it without him!

Hudson caught one too! (Well, the man in charge already had one hooked and slipped it over to Joel while Hudson wasn't looking...Hudson was so excited that he had caught one!)

Harrison napped in the stroller the whole time and was a perfect angel. Seriously, he's SO easy! I hope he stays that way!

I might have done the big slide once or twice! :)

After the art show, we headed back to the cabin and ate chili and took long naps, went to the park, watched Auburn whip Florida (I say "whip" very loosely!), and ate a big steak. It doesn't get better than that!

It was nice to have some help with Hudson and Harrison and the weather was just SO nice this weekend. I already want to go back!!!

More Hospital Pictures

2011-10-13T09:34:00.008-05:00

I'm finally getting a chance to upload the rest of the hospital pictures. Sorry for the picture overload!

This was Hudson waiting for baby Harrison to arrive...he looks super excited here! :)

Proud grandmamas!

Joel finally getting to hold sweet Harrison!

Hudson getting a little more comfortable and curious with Harrison!

Mama Jean got to come to the hospital on Monday to meet Harrison. She was smitten!

My dad meeting Harrison for the first time.

My TWO boys! Hard to believe!

Harrison's first bath at the hospital.

This boy came out with some LONG fingernails, evidenced by the long scratch on his poor cheek!

First family of four picture!

All set to go home!

Here we go! I was so glad that he got to go home when we did...Hudson had to stay in the NICU so we went home without a baby. This was WAY better!

At home and in the bouncy for the first time.

Big brother made his way home shortly after we got home. He came bearing a gift for Harrison...an elephant. Jury is still out as to whose elephant it really is! Hudson refers to it as his elephant of course! It was sweet though and Migi did a great job in letting Hudson pick out something to give to his baby brother. Hudson even gave me some flowers! Oh so sweet!

On My Own

2011-10-10T20:09:00.004-05:00

Today was my first day on my own with the two kiddos and it went really well! I was surprised at how fast the day went by, but then I think about the fact that I didn't sit down all morning. Thank goodness for afternoon naptime! Life with two is BUSY! Both boys woke up while Joel was getting ready this morning (around 6:15--ugh!) so the day started early. It was a task getting both of them fed, me fed, Hudson bathed, both dressed, me showered and dressed, etc. I was exhausted by 9 am! Luckily, we had nowhere to be today because we sure would have been late if we did!

I did venture out with both of them to the park. I thought that would be good for us all to get outside for a little while and was a good way to ease me into getting out with two in tow! I even took some pictures!

If you look closely at Hudson's face, you will see that he took quite the tumble. While he was with my parents yesterday, he apparently fell face first into the concrete. My mom was not sure exactly what happened because she had gone inside for a second, but she thinks he went head first off his riding toy or something. It didn't bother him though, but it looks horrible! I know my mom felt bad, but it could have happened anywhere. He's just a boy and is rough and tough! But, he's got scratches from his forehead to his lip! Ouch!

I was able to take a short nap this afternoon before Harrison woke up, so that was good. Hudson took a 3 hour nap (woo hoo!) so Harrison and I had a little photo session while he was actually awake.

He's just SO sweet! I love seeing those eyes open!

Tomorrow I'm taking the boys to see my grandparents. It will be the first time they have met Harrison so hopefully he'll be on his best behavior! :)

One Week

2011-10-09T12:52:00.004-05:00

We have a one week old! He's just the sweetest thing I've ever seen and so far has been really easy. I feel like he's slept through his first week because he sleeps SO much! I just forget how much newborns sleep. We're not on any kind of schedule yet, but for the most part at night, he's up around 12 or 1 am and then again around 5 or so. He goes right back down after eating. Big brother has been sleeping later so we've been able to sleep in until around 7:30 or 8, so that's been nice. We are not complaining about sleep at one week old! :)

I love his hands in this picture below!

We've had lots of visitors and dinners practically every night so far, so it has been wonderful not having to worry about cooking!

Hudson is really coming around. He started out not really caring much for Harrison (not in a bad way, just not even realizing he was around). He has been extra loud though...I know he's just trying to get attention, but he talks in a voice that is about 10 times louder than his normal tone! In the past couple of days, Hudson has helped give Harrison a bottle and also held Harrison for the first time (see the post below). He's even helped put (or shove!) a paci in Harrison's mouth! Hudson always wants to know where Harrison is. I'm really proud of big brother. I've definitely had some guilt over the past week over what we've done to my first born, but it gets easier every day when I see Hudson taking to him so well!

So far, the bottles have been going great and he is gaining his weight back. Yay for that! He's eating about 2 ounces every 3 hours or so.

We ended Harrison's first week by giving him his first sponge bath. My mom and sister were appalled that we had not given him a bath yet (it is pretty bad!), so last night was the night! He liked it about as much as I knew he would! :)

He sure did smell sweet after that bath though!

All better!

Tomorrow, I'm on my own. Joel goes back to work and Hudson's school is closed Monday and Tuesday, so we'll see how it goes! Nothing like being thrown into it!

War Eagle!

2011-10-08T15:40:00.002-05:00

Today was the first time Hudson has held Harrison (the first time he's even WANTED to hold him--we're warming up here!). He was SO sweet with him! Harrison started crying and Hudson kept telling him it was going to be alright and patted his little tummy. Made my heart melt!

War Eagle tonight!

First Outing With Harrison

2011-10-07T08:55:00.004-05:00

Harrison got to meet Dr. Cortopassi for the first time yesterday. We had his first check up. Let's just say he wasn't as happy as it may appear in the picture below! Harrison hates having his clothes taken off, much less getting poked and prodded! Poor thing!

Unfortunately, I'm starving the little guy--not intentionally of course! His weight was 7 pounds, 13 ounces when he was born, then it dropped to 7 pounds, 5 ounces when we left the hospital (which was normal), but he's now at 7 pounds, 1 ounce and his bilirubin levels are still up there, meaning he has a bit of jaundice. So basically, I was told I have to start supplementing him. I really wanted to nurse this baby after pumping exclusively for 7 months with Hudson. I thought it would be easier to take that extra 15 minutes of pumping a million times a day out of the picture. But, after nursing for a few days and having absolutely no idea of how much he was getting (which clearly was not much!), I am realizing that maybe pumping is the right thing for me, if I have enough milk to do that. Plus, I am realizing that with two kids, it is nice to be able to let Joel give Harrison a bottle so that I can do things with Hudson. Last night was the first time I have been able to give Hudson a bath and put him to bed and it made my night. I have missed spending that time with my buddy! So, we'll see how it goes. I am still going to try to nurse if I can, but I'm totally ok with not doing it. As long as he's getting the milk and gaining weight, that's all that matters. Another total change from when Hudson was born--I totally stressed out about the nursing thing (and cried and cried and cried!), but this time, I really am not worried about it! He's going to be just fine whether I nurse or not!

The rest of the appointment went great though and I know we all enjoyed getting out of the house for a little while! I know I have a lot more pictures to upload from our hospital stay, so hopefully in the next few days I will get to that. We are still doing great though. We've had one really bad night of sleep, but the rest of the nights really haven't been that bad! I can't complain so far!

Harrison's Big Day

2011-10-05T10:04:00.004-05:00

I wanted to do a quick recap of Harrison's birthday. We'll see how quick it actually turns out to be!

Saturday was a BEAUTIFUL fall day here. I woke up feeling great, better than I had felt in the few days leading up to Saturday. The Auburn game started at 2:30, so we decided we would get up and get outside for the morning. We decided to take Hudson to feed the ducks at Star Lake, which was really fun (another post on that soon). We walked around the lake and then decided to go do a hike at the Moss Rock Preserve since we were in Hoover already and had the dogs with us, and hey, I didn't hurt for me to WALK a lot!

We ate lunch out and then headed home to watch the game. The game was a doozy! We beat South Carolina, but it was the ugliest game. I'm not sure either team really wanted to win. Anyway, we stayed in for dinner and watched half of the Alabama game before calling it a night at 9 (I know, early for a Saturday night, but we're so glad we ended up going to bed early!). We had talked about skipping church on Sunday and getting everything else ready that we needed to get ready. For some reason Saturday night, I had this feeling that I needed to get some things ready that night, but of course, I just tossed that thought aside and went to bed!

Well, at 11:30 (in the middle of having a dream about having Harrison and at the point where they had just handed him to me!), my water broke. I calmly told Joel that my water had just broken and he jumped out of bed so fast saying, "What do we do? What do we do?" It was SO funny. I said, I don't know what you're going to do, but I'm taking a shower! Ha! I didn't know when the next time would be that I could take a shower. My parents were out of town, so we called Joel's parents to come stay at our house until morning. I was not having contractions that I could feel, so the getting ready process was very calm and we took our time. I had packed some things a couple of nights before, but we still had a lot to get together!

We got to the hospital around 1 am and I got checked and I was only at 1.5 cm dilated, but I was having contractions every 5 minutes (that I absolutely could not feel!). By the time the nurse got done with all she needed to do and admitting came in, it was probably close to 3 am. We tried to get some sleep, but that was pretty difficult! My doctor came in around 6:30 and checked me again and I was at a 3, so things were moving along. He said they were going to go ahead and give me some pitocin to get it moving a little faster (which I didn't want and didn't have with Hudson, but oh well--I think the doctor didn't want to work Sunday afternoon!). He said I could have the epidural whenever, but I really wasn't in any pain so I held off a little while on that. The whole labor this time was easy! I started getting a little uncomfortable around 8, so I went ahead and got the epidural, but I really wasn't ever in a ton of pain so I'm thankful for that! The morning went on without any issues. We had visitors and Hudson even came to see me, although with all the grandparents and family there, he was not interested in Joel and I in the least! He did not want to be in the labor and delivery room at all, which was fine with me. He was happy, but I think also a little confused.

At 11 am, I was at 8 cm and my doctor still thought it would be another couple of hours. However, I started feeling a lot of pressure and by 11:30, I was ready to push. We had to wait on the doctor to come in (all the while the nurse telling me not to push--do you know how hard that is?!?!). He finally got there and after only 10 minutes of pushing, Harrison was here at 11:49 am. It was nothing this time! Although, I will say I felt it a whole lot more than I did with Hudson and it HURT. I would not want to do that with no drugs! But hey, for 10 minutes, you can do anything!

Harrison was immediately put on my chest and I loved it. I didn't have that experience with Hudson. He was whisked away so fast and I didn't get to hold him until we got to our room upstairs. This time, I got a whole hour with him to myself doing skin to skin (which the hospital now requires--a change from 2 years ago). It was so nice to have that bonding time with him! Although, I will say that Daddy was pretty ready to hold his new little guy too!

So, that's pretty much it for Harrison's big day! It was such a calm and easy experience this time and we are so thankful for a healthy baby! Here are some pictures from his birthday!

Below is Hudson meeting Harrison for the first time.

He wasn't really sure about it!

Carrie couldn't wait to get her hands on Harrison!

Here is Hudson opening some of his gifts from Harrison. Once he got his tractors, he really had no interest in Harrison!

More pictures to come!

Introducing Harrison Walker Reed

2011-10-03T15:57:00.002-05:00

Harrison joined the world on Sunday, October 2nd, at 11:49 am. He weighed 7 pounds, 13 ounces, and was 20.5 inches long. He looks a lot like Hudson did as a newborn! He's absolutely perfect in every way.

Will update again once we get home tomorrow!

39 Weeks

2011-09-30T14:15:00.002-05:00

and one day...

And STILL pregnant! I never thought I would still be pregnant at this point, but that's ok. I'll survive! I went back to the doctor this morning and had very little change again. My doctor thinks I'm just going to be one of those that doesn't progress until I'm actually in labor, which is really what happened with Hudson, so I'm not discouraged. I have been cramping a little bit the past few days, so hopefully that is a sign of something going on. Only time will tell. It looks like I'm going to have an October baby after all. Woo hoo!!!

ABC's

2011-09-27T13:27:00.003-05:00

Our video camera has been full for months so this week I have been getting all the videos off in anticipation that we might want to take some more videos soon! :) I meant to post this video several months ago. It is from the very beginning of June when Hudson started really doing his ABC's. He's an old pro at them now, but I thought this was too cute not to share! For a while, he skipped "e", "f", and "g", but I thought that was pretty good at barely 2 years old!

Our Weekend

2011-09-25T20:18:00.004-05:00

I keep thinking, maybe this will be our last weekend as a family of three, but then I just don't feel like Harrison's coming anytime soon! I thought for a while that he would come early, but now I just feel like he's going to be late! I have no basis for that though! :) The more that I think about getting induced, I think it would almost be better with the second one since it will all be planned out and we'll know when and where Hudson needs to be and all that will all be taken care of. I sort of don't like the unknown with all this! With the first one, we had no other obligations, but now, I just want it to be as easy on Hudson as we can make it. I know it is totally out of our control, but gosh, it sure is consuming my mind!

Anyway, back to our weekend (the purpose of this post!). What a beautiful Saturday we had! I wanted to spend the whole day outside, but of course there were a lot of good football games on too! We kept our furry nephew, Kobe, starting Saturday morning until today while Carrie and Andres went to Atlanta, so our house was a little crazy with three dogs, one of which being a puppy! But, Hudson LOVED having Kobe here and he really was such a sweet dog. Our dogs, however, did not love Kobe and didn't give him a very good welcome, but they survived. He did so well and I think he really enjoyed having a backyard to play in (and a two year old to run laps with!)!

He really is as cute as he looks!

These are the instructions Carrie left us...hilarious. Kobe is definitely her baby!

Saturday night, we headed to Cayce and Andrea's to watch the Auburn game. While I didn't end up watching much of the game, I think that turned out to be a good thing. From what I did see, even though we won, we are terrible! There were other kids there and Hudson had a ball playing. They absolutely wore each other out, which was awesome! And, it was nice that he could play without me and I actually got to relax and socialize!

Today was my day in Hudson's Sunday school class so we headed to church this morning. It was fun, but exhausting! They are just so darn cute and I love seeing Hudson interact with the other kids (even if he is a little bossy...and destructive). We came home and did a little Sunday cleaning. We're trying to do better in keeping our house straight. It didn't help this weekend having three dogs, but our house was a mess and the maid just came on Thursday so the thought of having a dirty house for the next two weeks really bothered me! I told Hudson I needed to vacuum and he went and got the vacuum out of the closet, plugged it in (I will mention that I do NOT condone him plugging anything in the wall, but he sometimes fails to listen), and then went to town.

He had so much fun helping out. He really has become such a good helper around the house. He always wants to pitch in, so hey, why not let him. Maybe he will learn to do toilets next! :)

After naptime today (I myself took a 3 hour humdinger!), we dropped Hudson off at Migi and Pops' house and Joel and I headed to do a little shopping for Hudson. We wanted Hudson to have something from baby Harrison when he gets here and I think we may have gone a little overboard! Let's just say that if Hudson doesn't like Harrison after what he's getting, he's crazy! He's not spoiled at all, I promise!

38 Week Checkup

2011-09-22T11:52:00.002-05:00

I went for my 38 week checkup this morning and again, no change from last week. I did lose two pounds--woo hoo! My doctor did say he thought it would be rare if I went past my due date based on my history (all ONE other baby!), so I'm holding onto that hope! I'm really ok with it though. I know Harrison will come when he's ready and it just gives us even more time to get ready and to enjoy our last few weeks as a family of 3! I have a bit of a cold, thanks to my 2 year old, so I need to get that gone before I take on a newborn. I know a lot can happen in the next week, but I'm sort of hoping he has an October birthday! Nothing against September, but I just like the sound of October better. It was like that with Hudson. I did not want him to have a February birthday for whatever reason. It was a good thing it wasn't a leap year when Hudson was born--we barely made it to March 1st! So, maybe the same will hold true with this one. October 1st would be great and easy to remember, although, that day is an Auburn football game day and I might lose my husband to the tv if I go into labor that day! :) Only time will tell!

Baby Sprinkles and a Bridal Tea

2011-09-19T19:34:00.005-05:00

I was never one to want any kind of shower or sprinkle with baby #2, especially since it was another boy. I kind of felt like people had just done a shower for me for Hudson, so I hated for people to have to do it again! I don't love being the center of attention either and would have been totally fine not having anything this go around! But, I have some wonderful friends and co-workers that absolutely would not take no as an answer, and I was blessed with a couple of sprinkles for baby Harrison in the past couple of weeks in addition to the diaper shower I had last month that was given by our Sunday School class. I feel incredibly blessed to have all these awesome people in my life and I appreciate every one of you! You all made me feel so special and it didn't matter that it was another boy on the way--everyone wanted Harrison to have just as many cute things as Hudson did and for that I am SO thankful!

The first sprinkle was at the Tavern, one of my favorite places to eat! I got a night out with some very dear friends and it was SO fun! I got so many cute things. The first go around, I needed so many of the necessities--this time, it was all about the cute stuff and I loved it! Thank you girls for everything.

The girls at work threw me the next sprinkle at Olexa's. I just LOVE that place so that alone was a treat! I was spoiled again and had a great lunch and got some really special gifts! Thank you to all who came. I really am lucky to have you all as friends! Since I failed to actually take pictures at the sprinkles, pictures of the gifts will have to suffice! I definitely did not deserve all of this, but I LOVE it all!

Yesterday was the big bridal tea for Carrie. Why I thought it would be a good idea at 37 weeks pregnant to host a tea is beyond me, but nevertheless, I was so glad that I could do it for my sister! I'm definitely paying for it today--I'm SO sore from being on my feet all day. I did have a lot of help so that was good. I can't believe her wedding is in less than 2 months! I'm so excited for her and I know she is going to be the most beautiful bride you have ever seen! Just wait!

I spent all yesterday morning getting the house ready. It's not easy when you have a 2 year old to keep your house spotless! :) My mom came over Sunday morning and did the flowers (they looked SO good!) and graciously took Hudson back home with her after that so I could get everything done. It was a HUGE help! It's hard when you put all the toys up only to go back in the den 5 minutes later and they are all back out again, so I was so glad that she took him. Here was the main food table--I thought it turned out so cute!

The dessert table (my favorite part of course!)...

We all know that Carrie is a little out there and she does not like to do the norm. Therefore, a very formal bridal tea was not what she was looking for! So, we did a hat theme and everyone that came had to wear a fun hat. I thought at first that it might be a little silly and people wouldn't really get into it, but let me tell you, it was FUN! Everyone wore a hat and it gave us all something to talk about and oooh and aaaah over.

The bride and me! I think this might be the first time EVER that I have had lighter hair than her! Ha!

My mom and my aunt. We all thought my aunt's hat could have been worn at the Royal Wedding!

Here are some of Carrie's closest friends that were at the tea. See what I mean about the hats? What a cute idea it ended up being! And yikes, I'm starting to look humongous!

Carrie got a ton of great things. Seriously, I want everything she registered for! I was jealous!

Carrie, I absolutely cannot wait until your special day in November!!!

37 Weeks

2011-09-17T10:41:00.002-05:00

I'm now 37 weeks and at this point, baby Harrison is feeling good right where he is! Which is good with me, seeing as though I have only one family member in town this weekend AND, I'm hosting a tea for my sister tomorrow afternoon at my house. So, he needs to stay put until after 4 pm tomorrow! :)

I went to the doctor Thursday and there was no change from last week so I gave Joel the green light to go to the AU/Clemson game in Clemson. I would have never let him do this with child #1! I know he really wanted to go though and hopefully, he'll get to see a win! We asked my dad for tickets to this one long before we found out we were pregnant. Joel lived in Greenville for a while after college and we always talked about going to this game together and seeing some of his friends from up there. Oh well, at least he still gets to go!

Hudson and I are having some good one on one time together, all the while trying to get the house ready for tomorrow's tea! We went to dinner with some friends last night, watched a movie, and Hudson got to sleep in Mommy's bed! He was SO excited about that...and just as excited at 6:15 this morning when he said, "Hey, Mommy! Get up!" :) We went and got his hair cut and then got a treat at Edgar's, and are now patiently waiting for the game to start!

He was saying, "Down, set, hut-hut!"

And, "War Eagle, HEY!" Hudson's ready to see Aubie on TV and look for Daddy and Pops.

Hopefully, this game won't send me into labor! If it's anything like the past 2, I'm in trouble! Sis, you better keep your phone on!

36 Week Update

2011-09-09T15:12:00.002-05:00

I went to the doctor for my 36 week checkup yesterday morning and I have made a little bit of progress! Not much, but progress is progress! Everything looked great and the doctor even said, "Woah, that baby is definitely head down and ready to go!" So, all good news and onto next week! While I'm still feeling really good, I feel like I've started the "waddle", especially since he's sitting so low. My feet are finally starting to swell a little bit as well, which is to be expected. I can't believe I made it to September with no swelling. I got lucky this time I guess!

I think we are just about ready for him to be here, although I'm really getting anxious about bringing him home with us and adjusting to life as a family of 4! I'm not worried about the delivery part--just afterwards! It makes me nervous to think of having to handle another child, but it's coming whether we are ready or not! (I know you moms with more than one child are probably laughing at me right now!) Hudson thinks that baby Harrison is already at the hospital and that we're going to see him soon. He says he's going to be sweet to him! We'll see! I will update again next week!

Hudson's first day of school went great on Wednesday. He loves his new teachers, Miss Molly and Miss Shaundra, so I'm relieved about that. He moved up basically 2 classes, and there are only a couple of other kids from his class last year that are in this year's class--the rest are in the class below. I was nervous about that, but Hudson really didn't care. As long as his best buddy Caleb is in his class, he's good to go! They have a behavior chart in this class which should be very interesting! He starts on green every morning and then if he misbehaves, it will move to yellow and then to red. So far, we've stayed on green! Hope we keep that up!

For some reason, we've been ordering a ton of things lately and the boxes have been overwhelming our house. Hudson thinks the boxes are his toys and he has had a blast being pulled around in the box in the backyard!

This is how I found Hudson and Joel the other night. Hudson is really big on piling up the pillows these days. I find myself picking up pillows about 5 times daily. I think they look so much alike in this picture!

Happy weekend to all! War Eagle!

First Day of School!

2011-09-07T10:32:00.000-05:00

First day as a Duck! So excited!

Ready to GO!

Tigers for Tomorrow

2011-09-06T12:27:00.002-05:00

On Sunday, we had plans to go to the lake for the day, but Joel's parents told us they were coming home early because of the rain and the lake was so down that they weren't sure they were going to put the boat in, so we decided to figure out something else to do for the day. We knew we had to come up with something good because we had told Hudson we were going to the lake and knew he would not be very happy when he found out we weren't going!

One of the things we had been wanting to do for a while now was to go to Tigers for Tomorrow up near Gadsden. It is basically a place that raises tigers and runs solely off of donations. I think that LSU got their last tiger from this place. We thought Hudson might really like to see some tigers! We checked the radar and while there was rain from the tropical storm definitely on the way, we thought we might could beat it since we were going north. We didn't mind getting a little wet anyway!

It was a lot farther to get to than we thought, but we finally made it, and man, it was really neat! I was a little worried though when my ticket to get in said, "Enter at your own risk." There were times when I didn't feel the safest, but I'm sure it was fine. We sure were able to get up and close to the tigers though! They had a ton of them. You are not allowed to take any kind of camera in there, but I did sneak in some camera phone pictures.

The tigers were huge too! Since it was a wet and cool day, they were all up and moving around so it was really neat. This one below was playing with a ball and running all over his cage. He even went and jumped in his pool of water. Hudson loved it!

We were surprised when we got there because it was definitely not all tigers. You walk in and there is an area with a camel and a zebra (strange combination!) and then a petting zoo area with a bunch of goats, peacocks, chickens, roosters, and other animals that I'm sure I'm forgetting about. When you passed the petting zoo and went in the actual preserve area, there were cages of wolves, lions, black bears, grizzly bears, mountain lions, panthers, etc. It was a lot more than you can see at the zoo! That was a very pleasant surprise!

The mountain lions LOVED Hudson (and not in the way that is warm and fuzzy!). I think they thought Hudson was something they could take care of pretty easily if you know what I mean! I got really nervous with the one below. He would crouch down at Hudson and act like he was going to charge him. And then, Joel picked Hudson and put him up on the fence, and the mountain lion jumped up too. We did this about 5 times before I couldn't stand it anymore!

We talked to one of the workers there who said that the majority of all the animals there were born in captivity, most of which were former pets of people. Can you imagine having a lion or a tiger as a pet??? People are nuts!

I would highly recommend going to Tigers for Tomorrow! It was a really neat place and something different to do. We ended the morning with lunch at the Top of the River in Gadsden--yummy catfish! We were glad that we got in some outside time on Sunday because once the rain moved in, it was about the most boring end to Labor Day weekend ever! I'm not sure I can take any more kid movies! Ha! School starts back tomorrow for Mr. Hudson after a week and a couple of days off. He met his teachers this morning and they seem to be great! I think he's going to have a fun year.

Thank You Auburn...

2011-09-04T20:11:00.003-05:00

For almost sending me into early labor! :) I thought the heat might do it, but I was so wrong! Leave it to Auburn to stress us out. What a game--I think I'm still in disbelief that Auburn was able to pull that off. Sadly, it was to Utah State, so I think it may be a long season for us! But, I guess a win is a win and we'll take it!

It was HOT in Auburn. I knew it would be, and the only stipulation for me going was if we were able to score a parking pass, which we did, so I didn't have to walk very far. Thank goodness for that. Although, for an 11 am game, everyone gets to Auburn at the same time and it was a nightmare trying to get to our parking lot. We had big plans to eat lunch before heading to the stadium, but we just had to go on. I didn't want to miss the eagle flying! We had talked it up so much to Hudson that we just couldn't be late! We did take Hudson once last year and missed the eagle flying. We are always late it seems.

Hudson did like seeing the eagle and the marching band, but his absolute favorite part by far was seeing Aubie. He just LOVED Aubie running to the middle of the field holding the crystal ball from the national championship win last year. He thought that was just great, as did we all! He wanted to know where Aubie was the entire game, even asking for him during the Star Spangled Banner (hard to keep a 2 year old quiet during that!).

He also was a dancing fool! It's a good thing the band plays something in between every play because Hudson just loved it. He is such a mess! I'm not sure he watched much of the game, but he was really good anyway. There's always so much to look at. He was asleep in the car before we even got out of Auburn.

We had a great day in Auburn! It's good to go down there and see a win, especially since this was probably the last traveling weekend for me before the baby comes. I probably won't get to go down there for another game this year even though we did get tickets, so I enjoyed every second of it (sweat and all!). War Eagle!

Weekend/Monday

2011-08-29T21:12:00.002-05:00

The Reed's took Hudson to the lake with them on Saturday. He was SO excited about going that he woke up before 6 on Saturday morning! He was READY to go get on the boat! They graciously kept him all day and brought him back late Saturday night. He was so zonked that he didn't even wake up when I put his pj's on!

He got to do more than just the boat though...he got to ride on a 4 wheeler and apparently, he loved it! He had a blast and Joel and I were thankful for a full day to get things done around the house, and got a couple of kid free meals out too--can't beat that! One of my projects was doing the letters for Harrison's room. I think if we have a third child, he's going to have a four letter name! :) Eight letters was a lot!

Sunday was my first day to help in Hudson's Sunday School class. It really was a lot of fun, but I have a lot of respect for those that do that all day long! Maybe it's because I'm so pregnant, but it was exhausting! All the kids were so sweet though, with the exception of Hudson. I hope to goodness that he doesn't act like that when I'm not around! :) He wasn't terrible, but he would not share a toy to save his life and was just very needy the whole time. And, I couldn't go play with another child without Hudson getting jealous! I do think he was still very tired from Saturday so that didn't help his behavior! I'm looking forward to this year though and watching all these kids grow up. I just LOVE this age! They are just so darn cute!

Hudson's school is randomly closed this week (and two days of next week, but who is counting?!?!), so I'm staying home for most of the week with him. I'm kind of glad that I'm getting some good one on one time with Hudson because I feel like this baby is coming in the next few weeks. I just have this feeling I'm not going to make it to October--maybe because this one is so LOW that it hurts to walk!

We had a really good first day together. Hudson actually slept until 7:30, which is like sleeping in for me! It was great! We started off by going to the grocery store and I learned that I need to start going to Publix on Monday mornings! There was no one there! It was great. Hudson loves "driving" the cart at Publix and of course, has to get a blue balloon every time we go. I had given him the option of going to the zoo or going to the pool (secretly hoping with everything I had that he would choose the pool!), and he picked the pool! :) However, our neighborhood pool was closed today--who knew? And, how do you tell a 2 year old who has been excited about going to the pool all day and you've already gone through the torture of putting sunscreen on him that the pool isn't open?!?! So, we headed to the Birmingham Country Club instead. Not a bad alternative, even though I had to lie and tell them I was my mom because we are definitely NOT members! Good thing I still remember the member number from growing up! Ha! (sorry Dad!)

We had the pool to ourselves and had such a fun time!

After the pool, it was naptime for Hudson and a little work time for me, and then we played outside until Joel got home. It was a fun day, but man, I'm pooped tonight!

Recently...

2011-08-25T08:58:00.003-05:00

As you can see, the blog has been suffering! I haven't taken a single picture since last Sunday (a week ago) before church. We've been busy doing things around the house to get ready for this baby...except that we haven't really done anything to get ready for the actual baby if that makes sense! Ha! We did a mini-redo of our master bedroom which stemmed from the fact that we desperately needed new carpet in there. We had to have the painter come anyway to fix a slight water issue that occurred a few weeks ago (that involved water FLOODING through our kitchen ceiling from the washing machine upstairs--Joel had unhooked the water hose without telling me!), so while he was here, we got him to repaint our bedroom. We took the opportunity to get new bedding and redecorate somewhat. The new carpet is coming next week, but it looks a lot better already! Anyway, we also got our den rug cleaned and are having all the carpet in the rest of the house cleaned next week. I guess this is part of nesting??? We've been cleaning out drawers and just doing things that we have been needing to do for a long time. It feels SO good! However, this weekend coming up is going to involve working on the nursery and getting out all the baby stuff that has been collecting dust in the attic. I think I will feel a lot better when that is done.

Here are the pictures I took last Sunday. Hudson started a new Sunday School class last weekend which seems to be really good so far! I'm going to be teaching in his class one Sunday a month, so that should be interesting. I'm excited about it though!

He has started this new thing where I ask him to smile and he gives me the cheesiest smiles!

Since I don't have much else to write about, here are some funny things that Hudson has been saying and doing lately.

"Do we have to watch baseball again Daddy?" Needless to say, Joel was a little upset by Hudson's unwillingness to love the Braves (even though we have to watch them EVERY night--I think Hudson learned that one from me!).

Joel and Hudson were outside and I heard Hudson crying and he ran inside to me and said, "Mommy, Daddy pushed Hudson and he needs to go to timeout!" Joel's story was that Hudson was disobeying and had to get a spanking on his bottom. Hmmm...

Friday, I had a big presentation at work so I had to be there for half the day (normally my day off). When I got home, Joel had tried unsuccessfully to put Hudson down for a nap before heading back to work for the afternoon. Hudson came downstairs and asked for a "foot knack" (fruit snack--his obsession!) and I asked him if he had already gotten one from Daddy before he left. His answer was no, of course, that he needed a foot knack. So, I promised him a fruit snack if he would take a nap, which he did with no issues. Only later did I find out that he had conned me and Joel HAD given him a fruit snack, so he got two. He's already trying to outsmart us--and it's obviously working!

"Mommy, we NEED the air conditioner!" This is what he says when we get in the hot car every day.

Every day last week when I picked Hudson up from school, I did my usual and aksed him about his day, who he played with and what did they do, what he ate for lunch, and the all important question--did you go to time out? Every day, he said that he did because he hit someone. And, it was a different child every single day so it was very believable! Well, I finally asked his teacher about it and she told me that he was pulling my leg, and that the only reason why Hudson went to time out last week was because he took his shoes off at the playground. :) She said he is definitely NOT a hitter! Now, why did we spend our whole week getting on to him about hitting people?!?! Ha! Oh and by Friday, when Joel picked him up, his teacher said that he was intentionally taking his shoes off on the playground and then putting himself in timeout, all the while smiling about it. It was a game. Oh well, at least he's not hitting!

While Oliver was painting the kitchen ceiling this weekend, Hudson yells, "Mommy, O-wiver is cleaning the ceiling!!!" He was so excited that Oliver was "cleaning."

I was talking to him about when we start to potty train, and he got really excited and said, "Mommy, I want to ride on the potty train! Choo-choo!!!" He clearly does not get the concept yet!

We were passing by the Statue of Liberty in Libery Park and Hudson was talking about how tall HE was. I told him that actually, it was a "she" and not a "he" and he said, "No, Mommy, it's a MAN." We went back and forth about it and I started to tell him that yes, while she does look like a man...then, I thought maybe we should just end that conversation!

His new thing to say is, "Oh my goodness!" It could be for anything and is just SO funny.

And lastly, we have hit the terrible twos I believe. It's been SO easy so far and he's just been so sweet that we thought, why does everyone say two is bad (although I have also heard that 3 is worse!)? Well, we've found it! He loves to tell me "no" and point his finger at me, and his new thing is to do that and then spit at me. Where he learned that, I have no idea, but we're working on nipping that one in the bud! Phew, he has an attitude! But, he's also sweet too so I guess it balances out!

And, as I finish this post, Hudson is now walking around upstairs--way past his bedtime! Duty calls!

Diaper Shower

2011-08-16T15:10:00.002-05:00

Last week, our sweet Sunday school class had a wonderful diaper shower for me and another girl in our class that is due a week before me. We had a girl's night out at the new La Paz in Vestavia and it was so much fun!

The other guest of honor and me! Starting to look kind of big (me, that is!)! Ha! It has been so fun going through this with Margaret. Since we're only due a week apart, we have been comparing bellies and everything else that comes along with a new baby the whole time. She has a little boy a couple of months younger than Hudson and is having a girl this time!

ALL of the diapers and wipes! We are set for a while! We are SO grateful for this!

YUM...Ashley Mac's cupcakes. I'm not going to mention how many cupcakes I ate, but let me tell you, they were ALL good!

I'm so thankful for all of these girls and am so glad that we are part of such a fun class! Thank you to all who came and so generously gave us diapers and wipes. We appreciate it more than you will ever know and believe me, they'll be put to very good use! :)

Paci Free!

2011-08-13T19:59:00.002-05:00

I finally got the nerve to do it. The paci went to the garbage man. This big boy is getting bigger every day!

We've always been a proponent of the paci, but only in the crib for naptime and bedtime. It was never a problem, and yes, we have known for a while now that it needed to go, but it's just one of those things that we thought we would deal with later and since he never had it out in public, did it really matter? It was security for him and helped him get to sleep, and I hated the thought of the day we had to take it away.

Ever since moving to the big boy bed, it has become a bit more of an issue. Hudson would bring the paci downstairs with him every morning and while we we would make him go put it on the stairs or back in his bed, he started to give us some pushback on it. The worst was in the afternoons though, when we got home from work/school. Hudson started telling me that he was going "night-night" and would go to his big boy bed and get the paci, and taking it away resulted in a fit. On Wednesday, I had had enough! I guess I was in a bad mood, who knows, but I did not want to deal with it anymore!

The middle of a work week was not what I had envisioned when I thought about taking the paci away, but that's the way it happened! I got so mad that afternoon that I just took it away and told him it was gone forever and the garbage men were picking it up on Thursday (we have been saying for months and months that he was going to give the paci's to the garbage men, so he knew what I was talking about). I kind of had a feeling it would make a reappearance that night at bedtime though--I didn't want to lose a night of precious beauty sleep and we were ALL still trying to catch up from the wedding last weekend.

Bedtime came and it was heartbreaking! I told myself that I was not going to back down on it, even though after about an hour, Joel told me to just give him the paci so he could go to sleep. He was NO help! I laid in the other twin bed in the room with him and just sobbed and sobbed. I felt so bad for taking it away. I felt like the worst mother. I think I also started feeling some guilt about Harrison coming along and taking some of the attention away from Hudson, and it just made me sad to think about how Hudson might feel in a couple of months. It was all those things and emotions hitting me at once! Who knew a silly paci could do all that?!?!?

He struggled and cried over it, and was so restless, but I stayed strong! I just kept telling him how much I loved him and what a big boy he was. And finally, he fell asleep. We didn't hear from him all night and he was happy as a clam the next morning. He even told me that his paci had gone to the garbage man and that he was a big boy!

The next night, Joel put him to bed with no problems! It was easy! He didn't even ask for it. Yesterday was my day off with Hudson and in the morning, we were talking about it and Hudson asked me if I was going to take Ra-Ra (his BELOVED dog that he sleeps with every night) away and give him to the garbage man too. Talk about a dagger in the heart! I guess he thought I was going to take it all away--so sad! I reassured him that I was not taking Ra-Ra away and he could sleep with him forever if he wanted to!

Unfortunately, we have had no success in the nap department without the paci, so we've had a rough couple of days. He has taken naps at school without it for months, so I know that he'll soon get adjusted.

I think we learned our lesson with this though. We won't wait until Harrison is 2 1/2 to take the paci away! While it wasn't really as bad as I thought it would be for Hudson, it would have been much easier on ME to do it earlier. :) Now, let's just hope he doesn't regress when Harrison gets here and start stealing Harrison's paci's!

Dalton's Wedding

2011-08-08T20:02:00.007-05:00

My first cousin, Dalton, got married in Atlanta this past weekend. Friday, which so happened to be my 30th birthday, we headed over there bright and early for the bridesmaid's luncheon. My sister and I helped my mom with the decorations, which I thought turned out so cute!

The luncheon was at South City Kitchen in Midtown Atlanta and the food was SO good! Here is the Vann crew. The bride is the third one from the left.

Joel and Hudson got there mid afternoon and we had a short birthday celebration at the hotel before the rehearsal dinner that night. Carrie's birthday was the 4th, and mine was the 5th, so we did get to blow out some candles and eat some cake to celebrate our birthdays! I really was totally ok celebrating someone else on this birthday, but it was nice getting a little bit of attention! Ha!

Hudson was quite the wild man at the rehearsal dinner, but overall, he did ok. He didn't disrupt too much!

Hudson and Carrie at the rehearsal dinner...

Saturday, Joel and I took Hudson to the Georgia Aquarium. It was so fun!

I think his favorite thing there was the penguins (he kept saying, "they're so cute!" over and over again), but he did love the sharks too. They have some pretty huge whale sharks there and said that they can get up to 40 feet long. He was not a fan of the beluga whales and I have no idea why! They were so neat to look at!

We got there right at the time they opened and we were so glad that we did. It was already packed when we got there, but by the time we left, it was insane. Someone said that it was an hour and a half just to get in! Crazy! I promised myself that if I ever did go to the Georgia Aquarium that I would definitely not go on a Saturday, and definitely not a Saturday in the summer! Oh well, that's just how it worked out! I'm glad we were able to squeeze it in.

Hudson kept talking all morning about the dolphins and I did notice that there was a dolphin show, but thought there would also be an exhibit with dolphins so we did not purchase the extra amount to go to the show. Well, that's where they get you! You apparently could not see the dolphins unless you went to the show, so once we realized that (and Hudson was STILL asking where the dolphins were--he has the most remarkable memory), we had to poney up and purchase the tickets for the show. It was a huge hit though and a great ending to our time at the aquarium!

Here is Hudson enthralled with the dolphin show! He would not sit on our laps or anything. We were late purchasing the show tickets so we got there about 10 minutes before it started and had to sit in the nosebleeds. We thought he would want to stand up to see better, but he was Mr. Independent and sat in his seat the whole time. He loved it.

After lunch with my parents and a very good, long nap, for all of us, we headed to the wedding. Unfortunately, a terrible thunderstorm hit right at the time that we left for the wedding. My parents had found the church and reception site earlier in the day and found a place to park that was right in between. Both places were only about a mile from our hotel. Anyway, we left at 5:20 (wedding started at 6) and got caught in the thunderstorm. We decided to wait in the car and hope that it would die down because the lightning was quite scary! Well, 5 minutes before 6, we decided that Dad and Joel would drop all the girls off at the door and they would just meet us at the reception. We drive up to the church and lo and behold, it's the wrong church! Ha! I thought my mom was going to kill my dad! So, we rushed to find the right church and of course, they had a great parking lot and people with umbrellas escorting everyone to the door. We were very late, but luckily, they held the wedding for 15 minutes because of the weather. The side door that we went in led us straight to the front of the church, so our whole family had to walk in the front of the church and definitely made a scene! It was so embarassing! But, we made it! Ha!

Hudson was the PERFECT angel at the wedding. He didn't make a peep the whole time and we were sitting at the front and in the middle, right in on the action, which made both Joel and I very nervous--the plan was to sit in the back in case we had to duck out. I was shocked. We had suckers, toys, books, food, and didn't have to use any of it! I will say that we did give him a paci (I know, terrible), but it worked like a charm! He was very interested in the wedding!

Once we were at the reception, we finally got to relax! It was so much fun! Here is our only family picture from the weekend. Hudson looks mad and exhausted, but I can promise you he was far from that! There was an hour long cocktail hour before we were able to go in the reception room, and Hudson kept asking when he could go dance. When he finally got the chance, he was a dancing machine!

Finally, the happy couple! Dalton looked so beautiful!

Dalton and her Daddy!

Here she is dancing with her step dad...she's so lucky to have two great men that have raised her!

And, here are some pictures of Hudson dancing. My camera had trouble all night, so the pictures aren't the best, but you get the point.

Dancing with his Aunt Carrie!

It was time to go at this point! Sleeping on the dirty floor! I think he made it until 11 something, so he was exhausted!

We had so much fun at the wedding. You know it's a good wedding when EVERYONE, including this pregnant girl, was out on the dance floor. At one point, my Dad even laid himself out on the floor dancing...talk about HILARIOUS.

We came back yesterday morning, and then took Mama Jean out for her 86th birthday last night. I'm pretty sure my whole family dreads August as all of our birthdays are in the same week! We had a great dinner and had fun celebrating Mama Jean! It's going to take a few days to recover though--we are all completely exhausted!

Mini Vacay!

2011-07-31T19:58:00.003-05:00

I'm 30 weeks pregnant, turning 30 on FRIDAY, and Joel and I had our 6th wedding anniversary on Saturday. So what did we do???

We went to the beach! Just us! No Hudson, no dogs, no cooking, and absolutely NO responsibility. And, it was GLORIOUS!!!!!!

We left after work on Thursday and got there late that night. Friday morning, we slept in until almost 9! We haven't done that in I don't know how long. It was great. Then, we went to the Great Southern Cafe in Seaside for a wonderful breakfast. It was SO good. Beignets, fruit, eggs benedict, fried green tomato benedict, etc. DELISH. It was so nice to not be in a rush to do anything, not stress over a meal out, and just having adult conversation was fabulous!

After a beautiful day in the sun on the beach, we headed to the outlets to get some things and then ate at Mitchell's in San Destin. We've been there before, but for whatever reason, this meal was the best we've had. Maybe it was the fact that we were alone! Ha! Don't get me wrong, we missed that little guy so much, but I think every parent needs a break to rejuvenate every now and then!

Saturday, I wasn't able to sleep past 8:30 (but still, that's LATE for me!), but Joel slept until almost 10! I think he needed the sleep! I went on out to get some sun while he slept. I read a whole book this weekend! I went in around lunchtime and we hopped on the bikes and rode down to Rosemary for lunch. It was HOT, but really fun. We had to take a picture of me being 30 weeks pregnant riding a bike! It was a sight for sure!

After another relaxing afternoon at the beach, we went to our absolute most favorite restaurant down there, Cafe Tango. We crave this place and haven't been since we have had Hudson...almost 3 years! They only have about 10 tables in the restaurant and you have to have a reservation (and you would not want to take a child!). It was such a special treat and a great way to spend our 6 year anniversary! We joked that it will probably be 20 years before we get to go back.

I never took a belly shot with Hudson, so what the heck. Here's me and baby Harrison at 30 weeks! Yikes!

Here we are at dinner...it's been a great 6 years! (Joel was so embarassed that I asked the waiter to take our picture!). Oh well, he'll thank me later!

And now, we have been reunited with the CUTEST little boy in the world. We missed him like crazy, but enjoyed every minute of our little vacay! Thanks to my parents for keeping him and the dogs for 3 nights. They went to the cabin and I think he wore them slap out!

What a wonderful weekend we had, and even more wonderful to come back to this smiling face! We sure did miss him!

Bachelorette Interruption

2011-07-25T20:25:00.003-05:00

I hate it when special reports take over my TV shows! I know the debt of America is VERY important, but does the President have to talk about it during The Bachelorette?!?!? Seriously, of all the times...not my one TV night of the week! So, while Barack has taken over my show, I thought I would put up some pictures from the weekend. We didn't do much at all, yet, I feel like it was somewhat productive.

First up...much needed haircut for Mr. Hudson.

He LOVES getting his haircut. He thinks it's just about the most fun thing you can do. He sits as still as can be, probably because he knows there is a treat at the end of it. You can kind of see his green mouth in the picture below! You can't beat a sour apple dum dum. He looks so old now! Then, it was off to see Mama Jean. Hudson always loves visiting his great grandmother. I think it's because she gives him lots of treats! :)

Second up...new tires for my car. :( Gotta love taking your car in for a routine tire rotation and oil change only to be told you need new tires. Oh well, such is life.

Third up...we went to the Blocker's house for dinner Saturday night and had the best time! I wish I had taken my camera. Shelley cooked us a fabulous dinner and Hudson earned himself a new nickname...WILD MAN. He was ninety to nothing at their house and acted like he had known all those people forever. He was Mr. Personality for sure and I loved it! I expected him to clam up as there were no other kids there, but he wanted nothing to do with Joel and me! He picked on all the adults! At one point, I heard him in the other room asking Cayce and Hunter what a peacock says. What does a peacock say???? I have no idea. Anyway, he was so good and so funny the entire night. Thanks to the Blockers for having us over. We really enjoyed getting to hang out with everyone and talk about baby Will that is set to arrive in just a few weeks!

Fourth up...I packed up my sewing/embroidery machine, put it on Craig's List on Saturday, and sold it on Sunday. The lady picked it up tonight. Sad, but something that needed to happen. I just didn't have the time or the patience for it, and I know it's only about to get worse! I'm happy to know that I at least gave it a try. It just wasn't my thing! I did learn that paying the $10 to get something monogrammed or appliqued is TOTALLY worth it. Once we packed up the sewing machine, we made the room that it was in a playroom/movie room for Hudson upstairs, so I'm excited for the room to hopefully get some use now!

Fifth up...we FINALLY got the train table out of our den and took it to the playroom downstairs. It has taken over my den for the past 5 months and I'm glad to have the space back! We're knocking things off the honey-do list! Woo hoo!

Oh and Hudson told me tonight that I was "stanky" and I "needed a baf." Thanks buddy.

Ok, The Bachelorette is back on! Yay!

All About Baby

2011-07-20T19:40:00.005-05:00

This post is dedicated solely to the baby! It's officially time to kick it into high gear to get ready for this new addition! I will be 29 weeks tomorrow. I can't even believe it. This pregnancy has FLOWN! I can't complain at all. It has been so easy so far. So easy that I don't even think about it that much! I just feel like when I was pregnant with Hudson that we talked about it non-stop, but this time, I think we might finally realize it's real when we're at the hospital! There are even some days that I don't even think to notice the baby kicking until I'm laying in bed that night. I'm just so busy with everything else. It still is a sweet, sweet feeling though! And, the kicking is now making my whole stomach move, so that's always neat in a weird way!

I had a doctor's appointment last week and everything looked great. I had my sugar test and actually passed this time! I learned the first time around that you need to fast before the first test (despite what they may tell you!), so I did it this time and passed with flying colors. I also limited my sugar intake the whole day before. Last time, I ate normal before my appointment and failed the first test, but then passed the 3 hour test. Anyway, I'm thankful for no diabetes!

I've gained about 15 pounds so far this time. With Hudson, I gained a total of about 32 pounds, so I think I'm doing better this go around! However, 8 of those 15 have come in the last 2 months, so I'm gaining ground quickly!

The most remarkable thing to me is that I haven't had the swelling like I did the first time. Now, I know I still have 11 weeks to go, with the hottest month of the year coming up so there is probably NO way to escape it, but at this point the last go around, my ankles were unrecognizable! I think that was the one thing I was worried about when I found out I was pregnant this time with the worst of it hitting in the middle of summer--I didn't want to be wearing cute maternity dresses with cankles the size of Texas! Ha! The heat really hasn't been awful yet either, although in the past few weeks, I've just been hot a lot more than usual, but not unbearable.

Now, for the fun stuff! We have decided on a name! It is going to be...

Harrison Walker Reed

We will call him Harrison. We chose Harrison because it's just a name we both like, and Walker is a family name on the Reed side. I love how Harrison goes with Hudson! He will also have the same initials as Hudson. I was hesitant about that at first because I thought it was a little cheesy, but the more I think about it, it's going to be good that we can re-use all of the monogrammed stuff! Doesn't it look cute monogrammed on a gown?!?!?

As for the nursery, it's a work in progress. We moved the furniture in the room, but it's not in the right place yet. I finally ordered the bedding last week from www.polkatotdesigns.com. Here is a picture of it from the website...

I wanted to do something totally different than the brown and blue that I did in Hudson's room. I feel like Harrison will have enough hand me downs that he deserved a new room that was all his own! And, I needed some color this time! The walls have been painted a soft yellow.

I'm thinking about doing some or a combination of the below paintings in the room. I just haven't decided if I want to pay for them! I'm blessed with a Dad that can replicate any painting you give him, but I think we may have overdone it with the firetruck paintings (which, by the way, have exceeded all my expectations and are just fabulous--I can't wait to share!)! I don't feel like I can ask him to do any more. I think they would look cute though!

I'm also going to do some sort of wall monogram over the crib. I have found a few that I like, but haven't ordered anything yet.

I started going through Hudson's old clothes to see what I could keep and what I could not since I didn't throw away a thing and some things just don't need to be kept. Let's just say that spit up stains on outfits aren't too cute--I guess I was just being so sentimental that I couldn't throw them out when I first went through them! All the clothes are strewn everywhere in the room right now! It's a mess! Needless to say, the whole room is a work in progress and it probably won't even be ready by the time he gets here, but I guess he won't be sleeping in there for a while anyway!

My good friend Meggan had baby Avery Grace yesterday and seeing the pictures of her just makes me SO giddy about having another baby in the house! Just remind me of these thoughts after the first few weeks when I'm sleep deprived and totally overwhelmed! Ha! But, seriously, there is nothing like a newborn. Time just goes SO fast and I hope that this time around, I'll be able to soak it up a little more since hopefully I will know what's coming. I was so not prepared for the changes that we went through when Hudson arrived. It was just a total shock for me and the hormones didn't make it any better! This time, I think the hardest thing will be juggling two and making sure that Hudson still gets all the attention he deserves! It makes me sad to think his world is about to be rocked, but I know he'll adjust in time.

That's about all I have to say about the baby! I felt like he needed some attention on the ole blog! I'm just so excited for October (or late September if he's ready to come early like Hudson was). We can't wait to meet our sweet Harrison!

Mowing in Our Sunday Best

2011-07-18T20:15:00.002-05:00

This kid LOVES to mow the grass, especially when Daddy is mowing.

These are the only 2 pictures I've taken in a week! There's not really that much to report. We've had a couple of weekends in town which has been great. Life is about to get crazy again here soon so we have enjoyed some low key time. Hudson and I survived being alone for a few days last week while Joel went to Vegas for work. The only bad thing that happened while Joel was gone was that our mailbox was bashed, as well as half of the mailboxes on the street. Time for school to start...the teenagers are running out of things to do.

Hudson had his first big fall this weekend. The weather was actually not too hot on Saturday and Hudson refused a nap, so we headed for the park. We had a great time until the very end. We were trying to get Hudson to leave, and he wanted to do one last thing (as always). He climbed up on one of the tallest platforms that had a stair that went up even higher, and when he was coming down, he tripped and fell backwards. Joel and I had two of the three openings covered, but he fell towards the one opening that we weren't guarding. Down he went, backwards, and landed on the ground flat on his back. It was horrible. He cried of course, but he was more concerned that he had lost his shoe in the process! I was the one trying to make sure he had all his teeth and he wasn't paralyzed and Joel was checking his eyes to make sure they weren't dilating from a concussion! Ha! He was absolutely fine, but I think it took Joel and I a few minutes to breathe again. I know these things are going to happen, but I expected it to happen during a time when only one of us was there! Joel and I were BOTH there and it STILL happened. I'm thankful he was ok though.

On a lighter note, we joined Costco this weekend! It was very exciting...well, until we reached the checkout line and heard our total. But, I'm hoping that it is really going to save us money in the long run! We'll see!

I have to end with a few Hudson funnies.

- Hudson - "Mommy, look, an airplane!!!"
Me - "I see it, Hudson! Where is it going?"
Hudson - "It's going to the North Pole, Mommy, to see Santa!" (Christmas in July, maybe??? Who knows where this came from!)

- Hudson - "Look, Mommy, Old McDonald on that building!" (in reference to the inflatable Ronald McDonald sitting on top of McDonald's on Acton Road)

- Me - "Hudson, you need to start going tee-tee on the potty."
Hudson - "No Mommy, I have diapers." (Potty training is going to be difficult!)

- Hudson - "Mrs. Taylor is stanky!!!"
Me - "Why is Mrs. Taylor stinky?"
Hudson - "Mrs. Taylor went poo poo on Ellie. It was yucky yuck yuck." (Mrs. Taylor is his teacher and Ellie is Mrs. Taylor's daughter, who is also in Hudson's class. Not sure what happened at school that day, but so funny!)

- Hudson - "Mommy, I want a silly bar." (in reference to a cereal bar)

- Hudson - "Mommy, I want a freaky sun." (in reference to a "capri" sun)

IJump

2011-07-10T12:31:00.002-05:00

Hudson and I are always looking for fun (indoor) activities to do on Fridays in the summer. This Friday, we headed to IJump with my friend Kristi and her 3 year old Beckett. It is only $5.99 for 2 hours, and we had a buy one get one free, so for a little over $3 a piece, we had a fun morning out. Can't beat that! We lasted about an hour and a half, which was just perfect. The bigger kids had started to take over at that point, so it was in our best interest to get our little boys out of there! They were red faced and sweaty and ready to leave at that point too (with the promise of chicken nuggets from Chick Fil A once we left!).

I would definitely suggest getting there when the doors open at 10 because it got so crowded and there are not age limits on the bouncy things, so it did get crazy at times. But, the boys LOVED it and Hudson has been asking to go back ever since! Oh, and it resulted in a GREAT Friday afternoon nap! We'll definitely go again!

Little did we know that it was dress up like a cow and get free chicken day at Chick Fil A. It was a madhouse! They even had employees dressed up in cow costumes, which Hudson HATED. I don't know why I was surprised, seeing as though he has never been a fan of Santa or the Easter bunny!

We did get cute cow hats and fans, and a little cow stuffed animal, so it was fun. Hudson decided that he needed to dress up like a cow and used his chocolate milk to give himself spots! I couldn't help but get tickled at how cute he was, even if he did intentionally pour most of that on himself!

You'll be happy to know that Oxy Clean and a little bleach did wonders to get every bit of that chocolate milk out!

Next fun Friday indoor activity--the dollar movie theater! We'll see how long he lasts!

Fourth of July Weekend

2011-07-06T12:36:00.010-05:00

We had a great Fourth of July weekend with our families. Friday, we headed to my parent's cabin, where we stayed for the weekend. Hudson ran straight from the car and jumped in the baby pool. This kid is a FISH!

A few minutes after we arrived, Trey, Shondra, and Morgan got there and Hudson immediately asked Morgan to go put on her swimsuit!

He's very shy around pretty girls!

On a side note, make sure you put a swimmy diaper on, even if it is the baby pool! We had a diaper explosion and it wasn't pretty! Regular diapers are not made to hold that much water. Trust me, you will be cleaning up all kinds of foamy stuff...not pretty!

Morgan and Hudson drew all over the court with chalk...and all over Trey too! Ha! Well, that was Hudson's doing. Morgan knows better!

That night, we headed to Mentone for a fish fry and a concert. It was SO fun, except for the fact that they ran out of fish right as we got there! So much for dinner! It didn't matter though--it was still so much fun sitting in our chairs, drinking our beverages, watching the kids play, and watching the Mentone crazies dance!

Hudson and Morgan found a cat and we could not get them away from it! Finally, it ran away, but not before we caught Hudson trying to climb under a deck to get to it.

We witnessed one of the most redneck first dances you have ever seen. A couple and their family (who we were told by the innkeeper make swamp people look good), got married in front of the bed and breakfast while the concert was going on around back, and then headed back to the concert for their first dance. It was pretty wild...picture, tie dye shirts (and dresses for that matter), mullets, mohawks, lots of cigarettes, zombie t-shirts, and a 40 year old groom (with one ear pierced) who appeared to be marrying a girl that is still in high school (or maybe his daughter???). Jury is out on whether or not there was a baby in that tummy! Yikes! But, hey, they looked very happy and it provided some great entertainment for the rest of us. I did sneak some pictures, but for the sake of the blog being public, I'm not going to put those on here for fear someone might know someone who knows them!!! Highly doubtful, but you never know!

Back to the concert, Hudson LOVES music, so he had a blast! I love this picture!

Once we got back to the cabin, Mom threw together some dinner and then we sang Happy Birthday to my mom (she turned 29!) with yummy strawberry cake! Then, it was bedtime. We tried new sleeping arrangements this time at the cabin. Hudson is no longer willing to sleep in the crib, so we put him in the kid's bedroom that has 3 twin beds, and so Hudson, Morgan, and I slept in there. I didn't want Morgan to have to deal with Hudson's wake up calls in the middle of the night by herself! Morgan thought it was going to be a fun slumber party. You know, once you turn the lights off, you talk ALL night long? Well, maybe when we were like 12 we did that, but this almost 30 year old can't hang like she used to. After a thousand questions from Morgan, including questions such as "what is your craziest dream, what is the funniest thing you ever said to anyone, your most embarassing moment" she told me that she could just stay up all night...I thought I might die! Ha! But finally, the talking stopped, and we actually had a great night's sleep once it got started. Hudson went right to sleep the minute he hit the bed and slept through all the talking. I was shocked! So, after a late night for at least one of us, the three of us headed down to Weiss Lake on Saturday morning for a day at the lake with Joel's family. We are lucky that it's only about a 30 minute drive from the cabin.

Hudson is now obsessed with the boat (no pictures on the boat this time). I did take one stroll on the boat in the morning when the lake was still smooth, but by the afternoon, there was no way I was going out in it in my condition! Hudson loved swimming, even more so than Memorial Day. He would have stayed in the lake all day had we let him.

He jumped off the dock probably 1,000 times, but only to his daddy and to Pops. Some of the others tried to get him to jump to them, but he refused. He knew who he could trust!

We had NINE dogs at the lake. It was total chaos. Four of them never got out of the water. It is amazing that they didn't drown!

There was even some brotherly fighting going on as usual. It actually looks like Joel is winning this battle! Shocker! :)

After a full day at the lake, we headed back to the cabin, where we had dinner and then headed out to the porch to watch the fireworks in the valley below. Little did we know that Dad was right below us lighting up some fireworks that about scared me to death! I grabbed Hudson so fast because I just knew that he was going to be in freak out mode, and he was just a smiling and laughing and pointing. He thought they were great. I am not one to want to be super close to fireworks, so them being about 20 feet over my head about did me in! Not Hudson though!

On Sunday, Joel, Morgan, and I went kayaking! It was a blast! These pictures were taken with my phone, so not the best quality, but we really had a fun morning out on the river!

Morgan was my kayaking partner, and about 2 minutes into our trip out, she decided she wanted to swim. She swam alongside the boat for about a mile before I made her get back in. I was afraid she was going to wear herself out! Sure enough, she fell asleep right after we turned around and I was alone again trying to paddle our two person kayak. We laughed that the pregnant one had to do all the work! It was fun though and it was such a great workout! Hudson got to go to the park with my mom and apparently wanted nothing to do with the playground, but rather wanted to play in the creek the whole time. Poor Mom!

We all took fabulous naps that afternoon. Hudson did not have a nap at all on Saturday and we were staying up late and getting up early, so he was exhausted. Joel had to go home on Sunday afternoon because he had some work he needed to do on Monday. Hudson and I stayed up there and showed off Hudson's new look...

Aren't these hilarious?!?! I had to slick back the hair and put on the white shirt for the full effect. Thanks to my dad for making the jean diaper purchase. I've wanted to buy a pack for a while now just for fun, but just couldn't bring myself to do it. I'm now the proud owner of an entire box!

Monday, Mom told us to be ready at 9 am for a little activity. So, of course, we donned our red, white, and blue and met at the front of the house at 9.

My mom had planned a great Fourth of July parade for us all to partake in, complete with patriotic music and all! It wasn't cheesy at all, I promise! :)

The parade wrapped up at the flag pole, where we said the Pledge of Allegiance, and of course, sang Happy Birthday America. My little Hudson is STILL talking about waving his flag and singing Happy Birthday to America. He loved every minute of it!

Mom kept talking about these 3 tenors that she just loves, so Dad played a song by them. We all had a good chuckle over the fact that we were listening to Italian music on America's birthday! Don't worry, we did get some Lee Greenwood in eventually!
Then it was off to a ride in the big gator with Big Momma.
And a ride in the little gator--that we could NOT get Hudson off of all weekend. We had to set the steering wheel to go around in circles. He didn't quite have the steering down pat (don't worry, he only went off roading once by accident!), but he was obsessed with this thing. One night, he was so tired that his eyes kept closing while he was going around in circles. Talk about hilarious.

We spent most of our weekend outside. The weather up there is so much better than here! It did get hot, but it was bearable.
We played numerous games of horse on the basketball court. I finally did whip Trey, much to his disliking! I quit while I was ahead! Hudson even got in on the action and dunked it a few times. Oh how he LOVED playing with Unk Trey!

It was a GREAT weekend. We had a blast with our families. We ate entirely way too much. Let's just say my doctor is probably not going to be happy with me next week at my appointment because we ate dessert after lunch and dinner every night, AND in between! Hudson even asked for dessert after breakfast one morning. That is how bad it was! It was all so delicious though!