Rudolph-November 29, 2011

Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer is by far my FAVORITE Christmas show!  It always comes on so early in the season and tonight your Daddy and I watched it with you for the first time!  Of course, you had no clue what was going on and slept through most of it, but you will learn to love Rudolph just like we do! 

Clemson vs. Carolina Game-November 26, 2011

We are so proud to raise you a Clemson Tiger and we couldn't wait for you to use your burp cloth we got from your overseas family, The Kerseys, to mark this game!  We dressed you up in your Clemson cheer leading outfit and you were ready for game time! You made it through about half of the game and then you were out!  Don't worry, you didn't miss much, however, you were able to successfully use the burp cloth!  Your Daddy and I are proud Alumni of Clemson University.  We hope that one day you will make the choice to follow in our footsteps and attend there as well!

First Thanksgiving

Happy First Thanksgiving our Princess! 
We got up this morning and did a little cooking for our Thanksgiving dinner later at Nana and Papa's house.  Paw Paw is here this week also.  Cak had to work but we celebrated with her over the phone.  Once we got the food started we settled in for a nice, cozy morning and watched the Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade.  I can't wait until you are older and can watch it with me.  As a little girl I remember watching the parade every Thanksgiving.  It was the kick off to decorating for Christmas in our family, and although I put up my decorations much sooner than we did when I was little, we have decided to save our den tree for Thanksgiving weekend to make a new tradition for our family!  This will become our little kick off to Christmas! 

We enjoyed a nice dinner and then headed home to take some nice "after turkey" naps!  We spent the evening at home enjoying you!  You love to play now and we have so much fun with you!  You just smile at us and are so nosey as to every move we are making!  We had the perfect Thanksgiving Day!  The weather was beautiful and we have loved having you here with us this year!

The back of your Thanksgiving pajamas from Cak! So cute!

You and PawPaw!

The 3 of us!!

Your first birdie!

Happy First Thanksgiving! WE LOVE YOU!

Finding your Fingers and Toes-November 26, 2011

You have played with your hands so much recently!  They haven't found your mouth yet, thank goodness!  I don't like fingers in the mouth and slobber everywhere!  Although I assume I"ll have to get over that quickly enough.  You have now found your toes.  Daddy managed to capture a few pictures of you pulling at your toes and bending over to see them.  You were so cute wondering what those things were!

Picking out our Christmas tree! November 25, 2011

The Loris Chamber of Commerce (of which your Daddy is a member) is selling live Christmas trees this year as a fundraiser.  It was always tradition when I was growing up to go the Friday after Thanksgiving to get our Christmas tree for our living room.  Since I decorate the rest of the house so early, we decided we would save our living room tree for us to decorate the weekend after Thanksgiving. So today, we went to pick our tree out! 

We can't wait for you to be excited to go pick out a tree with us!  We LOVE Christmas time and decorating and just think it's such a special time of the year and we cannot wait to be able to instill that love for Christmas in you! 

Daddy's Hands-November 23, 2011

This picture says enough by itself.  So sweet!  I love you both so much!

Daddy feeds you his first bottle-November 20, 2011

You haven't done very well trying to take a bottle from me, you usually fuss and spit it back out, so tonight, I decided to let your Daddy feed you.  We've got to get you used to taking a bottle because in 2 weeks I go back to work!

You did okay and with practice you'll get better!

Thankgiving Trip to Walhalla-November 16-19, 2011

Since this was our year to be in Loris for Thanksgiving, and since Cak had to work Thanksgiving day, I decided to make a special trip to Walhalla to visit the week/weekend before Thanksgiving. This was mine and  yours road trip together by ourselves and I have to admit I was a little nervous!  You got up to feed about 6am.  When you finished, I put you in the car seat and we hit the road.  You normally go back to sleep after your early morning feed and I was hoping you'd sleep the whole way in the car....and I WAS RIGHT!  You slept like a champ!  You woke up around Greenville for a second and ventured back off to sleep until we pulled into Great-Gran's driveway!  Great-Gran had invited Cak over for lunch and so we surprised her when we pulled into the drive way!  We spent the whole weekend at Cak's house.  We went to see your PawPaw as well but we spent the night with Cak for this trip.  On Saturday, we had Thanksgiving dinner at Great-Grans with the family.  Everyone just adored holding you and spending time with you!  I decided to leave later on Sunday morning to come home after your second feeding of the morning around 10am.  BAD MISTAKE!  After this feeding you are awake a majority of the time and you definitely didn't want to sleep in your carseat!  I had to pull over twice between Seneca and Easley and get out to console you because you were pitching a fit!  Finally around Greenville, you decided you'd sleep and slept until we were about 30 minutes from home.  We made it home around 5pm.  You were a little cranky that last 30 minutes, but thank goodness you didn't pitch any bad fits because I wasn't going to pull over in the dark by myself.  Daddy was sooo glad to see you when we got home!  He had gone on a trip with school this weekend to the State Soil Judging competition.  His team won 1st in the state!!!  We are so proud of him!  You ate and played for just a little bit and then you were ready to go to bed. 

I hope you continue to be a good traveler because we will be making quite a few road trips together in the future! 

You spit your paci out while sleeping and this is how it landed!

Mommy's little monkey

Just a few snapshots of us.  I am usually the one behind the camera! 

I love love love you my princess!

2 Months Old-November 9, 2011

You are now 2 months old and have grown so much in the last month!  You seemed so tiny before but hit a grown spurt this month and have gotten so big!  For your 2 month well check-up you were 13.2 pounds, 24 inches in height, and 38cm head circumference!  When you decided you wanted to start gaining a few pounds you took off!  You are our little butterball now and we love those little developing chunky rolls! 

To celebrate your 2 month birthday, I took you to the cotton fields for some pictures!  This is the perfect time of year for pictures in cotton fields!  In fact, while we were there the cotton was getting cut in the field across the road!  You could not take your eyes off the tractor and I am sure wondered what that noise was!  You were so good while I positioned you and drug you to different areas for some pictures!  You are quite the little photogenic baby!  Thank goodness you aren't camera shy as you've had a camera in your face since day 1!  You are giving little half grins but nothing big for the camera yet! 

2 month highlights:

• You are now holding your head up like a big girl!  You LOVE looking around at everything and are making more focus on items now! 
• You LOVE bath time still!  You would sit all day in your tub if I would let you!
• You are still eating every 3 hours during the day...hoping to stretch that a bit farther in the upcoming days!  You are still spitting up like crazy.....which drives me crazy!  I'd rather change 100 poopey diapers than to be spit up on! I'm hoping when you start going a little longer in between feeedings the spit up will decrease.  Maybe you're just getting too full?  We will see!
• You have been battling a little constipation lately, or rather not using the bathroom on a regular basis, so I'm hoping that's going to work itself out soon!
• You are following us around a lot more lately, which shows me your vision is getting sharper everyday! 
• We think it's absolutely adorable that you laugh in your sleep.  Usually about 10 minutes before you wake up, you will just giggle in your sleep and it's sooo cute! 
• You are starting to want to hold things in your hands or watch us play with them in front of your face. 
• You are still sleeping ALL night long.  Or what I consider to be all night....around 9-5 every day.  We get up at 5, eat, go back to bed until 9.  That's the BEST snuggle time to me!  I don't let you sleep with me and Daddy at night but after your morning feeding, I always put you in the bed to snuggle.  You're just sooo cute!
• Your Daddy adores you! and you adore him!  The moment he walks in the room from work, you look for him! 
• I have to start back to work the week of Thanksgiving and I"m really sad!  However, there are a few surprises coming our way....stay tuned!

Until next month's update, we love you to pieces.  You are our lives now.  We cannot imagine what life was like before you!  Pretty boring if you ask me!

Going to the doctor with Mommy-November 4, 2011

Today I had my follow up appointment at the doctors office since you arrived almost 8 weeks ago!  I took you with me so everyone could see you!  They thought you were absolutely adorable!  Mommy is now released to go back to work...BOO!!!

Mommy's sweet little princess!  And you were so good that we did a little shopping after my appointment!  I love you princess!

Daddy's Hunting Buddy! November 4, 2011

Your Daddy went to a hunting show back over the summer and he brought you back this little outfit! One day, you'll be in the woods with him hunting right by his side....(if I can manage to let you go!)  He's so excited to take you hunting with him one day and I'm almost certain you'll have a pink gun to carry in the woods with you!

Birds on the Swing-November 1, 2011

Things seem to be coming into focus more for you the last few days.  Something will catch your eye and you will just stare at it forever!  The newest thing that amazes you are the birds that turn around the top of the swing.  You can't seem to take your eyes off of them...until of course you fall asleep! 

You are just so precious to watch and we love seeing you learn new things!