Caleb & Abby Grace Update

Caleb had his 4 month checkup on March 4, and he is doing really well! He weighs 16 lbs and is 26 inches long--no wonder he is outgrowing his clothes so fast! He still continues to roll over from his back to his stomach but hasn't gone from his stomach to back yet. He loves to hold toys and put them directly in his mouth, and he absolutely LOVES Baby Einstein movies. Abby Grace didn't really like them that much when she was a baby, but he will watch them all the time! I think Abby Grace likes them better now than she did then! Anyway, we got out the exersaucer a few days ago and that was definitely a big hit, with both of them! Abby Grace just loves playing with him; it really is sweet! She loves for him to sit in his Bumbo seat and play with his toys with him, and he just loves her! He will cackle out loud at about everything she does--it is just precious! On another note, Caleb is still not sleeping through the night; in fact, he really doesn't sleep that much period, so you would think that he would be cranky all the time. However, he really is a happy baby but going to bed can be a little difficult. So, we are working on getting better naps throughout the day to help his nights and have finally moved him upstairs to his crib. I don't know why it was so difficult for me to do that, but it was! We are hoping this will help him sleep. Caleb tried cereal for the first time the other day too, and I think he is beginning to get a little used to it. Abby Grace was so excited about his first feeding! Anyway, with your second, it's so difficult to keep up with all these firsts! I will try to post some pics of these events soon!

As for Abby Grace, she is something else! She is growing up on us for sure and is really wanting to seem big. She's almost going to the potty all the time on her own even in public places. We are really proud of her! She's really into the Disney princesses right now, especially the Little Mermaid and has begun to take an interest in dressing up! However, take her to a store and ask her to try something on, you would think the world had ended! She also really loves trains, especially Thomas, and will play with her train set all the time. Some of her other favorite things to do include blowing bubbles, playing with her kitchen and dollhouse, and doing any kid of arts & crafts project. Abby Grace is definitely the talker and cracks us up all the time with her comments and vocabulary, and then she will just out of the blue say the sweetests things too!

Anyway, life with these two is definitely busy, but such a blessing! New pictures to come!

Snow!

What a fun day!!! Who would have guessed that we would have spent our first day of March in the snow! I woke up early to feed Caleb and opened the blinds to see the snow coming down. About this time, Abby Grace was making her way down the stairs, and I told her to look out the window. She got so excited and was immediately ready to go outside. However, there really wasn't much snow on the ground yet, plus Brian was on call (he was on call the last time it snowed too). Anyway, we waited to see if it would accumulate anymore, meanwhile I am paging/texting Brian to see when he would be coming home. Then I decided I better take Abby Grace out soon because it seemed that the snow had stopped. However, by the time we got dressed, the snow was pouring down again. We were so excited and began making a snowman right away. Then, Caleb (who was inside) started to get upset, so we had to halt our snowman making for a bit. Abby Grace stayed outside; she was loving every minute of it! Luckily, Brian finally made it home, and the grandparents joined us too. We were able to finish our snowman and call it a day as the sun began to come out.

Caleb's Dedication

Caleb was dedicated at Hunter Street Baptist Church on February 22, 2009. Since Hunter Street is so large, there are usually about 15 children dedicated at each service. One of the pictures below shows us all on stage as Caleb is being introduced. His name means "faithful," and his Bible verse is 1 Samuel 22:14- "Only fear the LORD and serve him faithfully with all your heart. For consider what great things he has done for you."

After the service, some of our family met at Johnny Carino's for lunch and cake afterwards. It was a fun time, and Caleb ended up sleeping through most of it; however, he was wide awake while he was on stage! We just feel so blessed to have Caleb in our lives!

Some Potty Training Success

Last weekend, Abby Grace decided she was ready to go to the potty on her own and has continued to do so since! We have been encouraging her off and on for a while now but haven't really pushed it until the past week or so. She would go but never on a consistent basis. Now, she has shown much more interest in becoming a "big girl" and has gone many times, some with us reminding her and some with going on her own. She has even told her teacher at MDO, and more impressively, she told me she needed to go at an Auburn basketball game and at the circus. She still forgets sometimes, but hopefully we are on the road now to full potty training success!

Peanut Allergy :(

Well, we took Abby Grace to an allergist today, and as we suspected, Abby Grace definitely does have a peanut allergy! Sad, huh, a life without peanut butter! Anyway, this all started back about a year ago when she had some of Brian's noodles from a thai restaurant. She immediately broke out around her mouth after she ate them, and it hit us that the noodles had peanut sauce on them. We talked to her pediatrician about it, and he told us to try something with peanuts in it again a few months later. And so, each time that we have tried peanut butter, we have continued to notice similar reactions including the breaking out, scratchy throat, etc. So, I finally made an appointment today to see if it could be true. Let's just say that Abby Grace wasn't really in the mood to do all this testing stuff, but she hung in there. It made me sad though to have to hold her down while they pricked her back with these different tests. It turns out that she also had a mild reaction to pecans and is allergic to dust mites (who isn't?). So we get to carry an epi-pen around with us now and have to give care action forms to her school on how to treat her if she does have anything with peanuts. However, she has never had any life-threatening symptons when she has been exposed, so I hope she continues to stay that way. The thought of having to use the epi-pen scares me! Also, there is still a chance that she could grow out of it; however, it is a small chance (20% of children do). So, for now, we will carry around our epi-pen, get tested again in about 2 years, and figure out how to avoid peanut butter!

Sweet Caleb

These are just some sweet pics I have taken of Caleb over the last few weeks. He really is developing his own personality these days. He smiles all the time and can laugh out loud too. It's so cute! I am not really sure what schedule we are on because it seems like we are always running around all the time, but he seems to go with it. He slept 7 hours last night without any feedings! This is the longest he has gone yet! Yeah Caleb! He definitely is a mommy's boy and loves for mommy to hold him to sleep. Abby Grace still loves her brother very much and loves on him all the time. She will often give him her blanket/bunny and will run get him diapers or burp cloths whenever he needs them. She says she is the best big sister and helper!

The glow worm--I will have to say this was a great Santa present! He loves it! It has helped him go to sleep several times! I couldn't believe that it would actually work, but it does!

Caleb also loves his Baby Einstein mat very much as you can see from his smile.

Abby Grace's 1st Haircut!

Well, I finally did it! Abby Grace has her first haircut about 2 weeks ago--I mean she's only 2 1/2! I guess it was about time! We just got a little trim to clean things up a bit. Brian's cousin-in-law, Laura, cut it at AURA Spa. Abby Grace did really well. I think she liked it! And I did take the keepsake box to save her first lock of hair in. She really is growing up on us now!

Auburn Basketball

We took the kids to the Auburn/Tulane basketball game a few weeks ago and had a great time with Karen, Tim, and Luke. This was Caleb's first visit to Auburn and first athletic event. He seemed to like it as he took in all the sights and then he fell asleep during the game! Abby Grace had lots of fun too! She especially loves the band, cheerleaders, and of course, Aubie! She had even more fun when Kelly and Jake Dorough came over to visit with us as we watched the game.

Our Charleston Lot

Brian and I traveled to Charleston last weekend and picked out our lot in Carolina Bay (West Ashley). In case you haven't heard, we are moving to Charleston in June for Brian's GI Fellowship at MUSC. We will actually be there for three years! Anyway, here is the lot! Pretty exciting, huh? It has a lot of potential though, and we actually have our own trees in our back yard. We are pretty excited about that. However, we still have to sell our house here, which actually just went on the market today! So as long as we sell our house, this will be our new home.

The picture below shows an example of what our house is going to look like after it's built.

We are really excited about having a screened in porch!
And one of the best parts is that the kids will have a pool and playground within walking distance from our house. Abby Grace will love that it has sprinklers!

Our Christmas

We had a very good Christmas and felt blessed that we were able to spend time with all of our family. It was a little hectic being that we had many places to go but luckily it was spread out over a few days since most of Brian's family gathers together before Christmas day. So we headed to the Tippens on the Sunday before Christmas to spend with Susan's family. One of the pictures below shows Abby Grace with her 2nd cousins. This was the first time this year for Abby Grace to open Christmas presents, but she was really more interested in playing with the dogs they had. We finally got her into opening her presents, but then she was right back to playing with the dogs!

Then on Christmas Eve, we headed to Ross Bridge, Tempie's house, to celebrate with Carl's side of the family. We played Dirty Santa, and it really was a lot of fun! Abby Grace cracked us all up after she opened her gift from Grandma and said, "I already have this at my house!" (It was an Auburn board book) Anyway, we ended up staying there later so the kiddies didn't get to bed as early as they needed to. You know, we had to put out milk and cookies for Santa and sprinkle reindeer food in the yard. However, we finally got everyone to bed so that we could do our elf work and for mommy to finish wrapping presents! This is something that I usually do earlier but having Caleb has made that a little more difficult. I have been used to doing stuff after Abby Grace goes to bed but Caleb has decided that he is going to be a little more demanding then! So needless to say, I was wrapping presents to 2 AM! Luckily, Abby Grace slept the next day until 8:45 and we began all the fun of Christmas! Three of the pictures below show Abby Grace and many of her presents. Her main Santa gifts were a dollhouse, cradle (which my dad made for me when I was little--we told her that Santa got it from my dad so that he would have something to put her new baby in), baby, and high chair. She also got a ball, which was very important because she kept saying that Santa was going to bring her a dollhouse and ball (she actually said a Barney ball but Santa couldn't make that kind this year!) I know I haven't said too much about Caleb, but he got presents too. His main Santa gift was a rocking Giraffe and some other little baby toys. He really spent most of the day doing what he usually does, sleeping and eating!!! However, he managed a few smiles and was really good the entire day (what could be bad about having so many different people to hold him all day!)

Then we headed to Carl and Susan's for lunch and Christmas with them. Somehow we even managed for Abby Grace to take a nap and then we headed to my house, which Brian says is kind of like watching Christmas Vacation. Hey, we have a lot of people, so it is bound to get crazy! We were all exhausted by this point but still had a good time and definitely enjoyed being able to be lazy all day on Friday!