Exploring...

"Exploring" was a nice way of saying, "I'm going everywhere and getting into everything."

"I don't know how these spilled, but they sure are yummy."

box under the kitchen table...hours of fun

Every day pulling up on things easier and easier and better and better.  He's starting to push things in front of him to help him walk

"another chair to pull up on!"

"you guys still back there?"

"maybe I should go play with the recycling stuff mom and dad keep meaning to take outside"

"or maybe I should try and chew on this table leg"

Under our supervision, he's climbed up the 1st 2 steps by himself.  Can we say BABY GATE SOON!

Granny Lynn's halloween treat

Below is a video we took of Triston and Devon enjoying the Halloween treat sent to us from Granny Lynn

Smiles and moves

It's been a little while since I posted...and in true "new mommy" fashion, I'll be writing mostly about our little 8month old. Yes, Triston will be 8 months tomorrow! I can't believe it. I told someone yesterday that the first 3 months went by fairly slow, but now...now time is going by too fast! He is growing and exploring and moving and, and....so much so fast! He keeps us smiling non-stop. His favorite game is peek-a-boo, and now he's taken to being the one who's doing the "hiding." His smiles and laughs are true medicine to the soul. He's babbling all the time with us and starting to copy some of our intonations. His new sound that he's discovered he can do is a little growl. A growl has never been so cute. A little over a week ago he started crawling, and now he has pretty much perfected it. He hasn't realized he can crawl from room to room yet, but he's just about to do that. I'm looking forward to the day when he comes crawling down the hallway to see me :-) He plays mostly all over our living room. It's amazing what he goes for...essentially anything he shouldn't touch. He has books and toys all over the room, but he goes for the books on the bookshelf, the lamp cord underneath the end table, etc. I'm sure he is beginning to recognize the words "no" and "no touch" but he's showing no signs of understanding what they mean, ha ha. It is a JOY to spend days with him.  He's already starting to pull up on stuff!  And a couple times I've gone into his room and he's standing up in his bed.  He's getting so big so fast!   Below are a few pictures from our recent weeks.

Playing outside watching the crew replace our roof

Daddy and Triston.  Amazing how these two have my heart so much.  (sorry about the terrible background!)

Trying to eat the grass while playing outside :-)

Family self portrait

Wearing daddy's App hat!

Ok, so our "playing" outside turned into a little bit of a photo session

I took this pic this morning.  Instead of crawling around this, he crawled under and through it.  It was pretty impressive.

Is he learning to smile for the camera?

This was his first day crawling.  I walked out of the room for a minute and when I came back in he had found this bag (it's the bag I take to/from work with all my pumping stuff)

He loves to crawl up to this mirror and play with the baby

And try to kiss the baby

Thanks for reading my ramblings!!!

a few ramblings

It's been a month or so since I've posted, so thought I'd just ramble a bit.  All is going well with life in Shelby, NC.  Devon and I celebrated our 2nd anniversary several weeks ago.  Triston spent the night away for the first time.  It was definitely harder on mommy than Triston!  He had a wonderful time with grandma and grandpa and Kimberly, Jamie, and Lily!  And Devon and I had a wonderful time enjoying our day.  Funny how easy it is to forget how things were before a baby.  And Triston continues to grow right before our very eyes.  It is  a m a z i n g  !!!    I still am awed that God is giving us the honor of being his parents.  I know everyone says the love of a child is a kind of love you've never had before...they are right.  There are no words to put on how much love I have for this little 6 1/2 month old being. 

Well several hours have passed since I started this post and now I cannot remember things I wanted to ramble about.  Probably good for all of us that things got busy for a while and my memory is bad :-)  I'll put a few pics from the recent weeks.

I know this picture was in my last post about our visit to Wisconsin to see relatives and for Triston to meet his great grandpa.  We are so blessed we were able to go less than two months ago and see him, as he passed away from a short battle of lung cancer on 9/5/11.  We love and miss you, grandpa.

Go App!

Love this picture of my boys! Triston was getting to play in daddy's jeep a little bit... 

and he liked it!

Thanks to a chilly couple days, we discovered how cute these cheeks are in a hoody

Travels and growings

We've had a busy past month. Below are some pics of our travels and our growing little guy:

Skyping in Wisconsin with some cousins in California

Triston and Aunt Nancy

Triston and his Great-Grandpa :-)

Great-Grandpa and the kiddies

Grandpa and the travelors :-)  Robbie, Annie, and Nathanael drove from Shelby to Milwaukee, WI and Devon and I flew with the two babies for a long weekend visit.  Well worth the travel!!!

Next weekend a long weekend visit in Cary, NC to see adopted grandparents, Grandpa Joe and Grandma Betty and my wonderful friend, Erica

Sweet smiles!

Sweet Erica and Sweet Triston

Then to Raleigh to see my great friends (and old roomates) Jeanett and Rosemary, to celebrate both of their birthdays.  Unfortunately the only pictures I have from that visit are Triston in the pool for the first time :-(

found a great deal on the Jenny Jumper so didn't even bother looking for the Johnny Jumper.  We figure he won't mind if it's pink. 

I'm sitting up better and better every day!  And, in other news...I got my 1st TWO teeth and am working on a couple more!  (wow...)

smitten with daddy

So, one of the most precious things I get to observe these days is how smitten Triston is with his daddy.  It really is amazing.  I mean, I get smiles...but daddy...daddy gets giddy smiles and arm & leg flails.  It is PRECIOUS.  Here's an example:  Our night time routine is I feed Triston then read to him and then Devon comes in and prays for us before I lay him down for the night.  Well the other night after feeding Triston he was pretty much asleep sitting up while I was trying to get a burp out of him.  Devon came in to ask me a question and put some of Triston's laundry away.  Triston, with his eyes still closed, perked up and followed Devon's voice as Devon walked around the room.  His eyes eventually opened up and sure enough, gave a beautiful smile to daddy.  Then when Devon prayed for us, Triston was trying to touch his face the whole time during the prayer.  Really, one of the sweetest things I'm blessed to observe these days.   I sure am blessed by my boys...

Update on Triston :-)  We just had his 4mo check up (although he is closer to 5mo).  He weighed in at 17lbs13.5oz and 24.5in.  We've got a little football player on our hands!  He got a couple more shots, and neither Triston or mommy liked them.  These immunization shots stress me out.  He had a rough 24-36hrs after the shots, but by the looks at the picture above that I just snapped, I think he's feeling better this morning :-)

4 months old

It's hard to believe Triston is 4 months old already!  It partly seems like he's been here forever and the other part feels like time has flown by.  I guess that's a normal thing for people to say.

Well, he's had a big past couple weeks.  He's at that age now where he seems to be learning and exploring things all the time.  He's definitely starting to grab and hold things...and most of the time he's trying to put them in his mouth.  Last week alone he discovered his feet and thumbs :-)  Last night on the changing table he was trying so hard to grab his right foot and pull it into his mouth.  I think his belly is what's hindering him there!  He's starting to laugh!  Oh, and it is so precious.  So if he starts to laugh at something Devon or I am doing, you can count on the fact that we do it over and over and over cause we want to keep hearing that precious sound.  I snapped a couple pictures of him this afternoon.

Have I said lately how blessed I am?...

Thanks for reading :-)

cloth diapers

I don't know why this has gotten me so excited...but it does.  Devon was able to put a clothes line up for me last night and today I was almost giddy about getting to hang Triston's cloth diapers outside in the sun.  It's amazing what the sun does to them!  Any stains left after washing are bleached out...and sanitized.  Don't ask me why this excites me so much...i think I'm still giddy.  I just got done going out there to see how they were doing and they're looking marvelous.  We're slowly getting our supply up.  This is all we have so far, so we only have enough for about 2 full days of use, but I've got some more ordered now.  One of the pics below is of the inside of the diapers and the other is of the outside.  I wanted to show off how cute they are.  Cloth diapers have come a LONG WAY since we were babies.  I really did change my little brother's cloth diapers and was always so afraid I was going to poke him with the safety pins.  I remember being amazed at how easy and quick my mom always did it.  Below the pics of the diapers are a couple recent pics of our little (big) guy.  He's starting to actually enjoy tummy time and pushes up.  This is a picture Devon snapped of the first time he pushed himself up with his hands.  The other pic is one Devon sent me this week while at work saying "full and happy" after he had gotten done eating.  I know I've said this before, and I pray I continue to say it every day and not forget...we are truly blessed.

1st day back

Today was my 1st day back at work.  I wore water proof mascara (seriously) and had a hard time stopping the tears the first 15min of my drive to work, but I survived.  I'm blessed that I'm going to an office where I look forward to seeing my co-workers, and I'm really excited about how this new office is going to run.

I just wanted to share with the blogging world how wonderful my husband is.  I got into my car this morning and this was buckled up in the back seat:

We're gonna call the teddy bear Travelor, since I'm traveling to work by myself :-)  Then he also had a box of Lindt chocolates and a wonderful card.  I'm truly blessed.  Thank you, sweetie.  In case y'all are wondering...Travelor is staying buckled in the back seat for a while.  I'm enjoying his company.

last day

I just put Triston down for a nap and was struck with the fact this is our last work week day together just the two of us before I go back to work.  I'm honestly borderline tears.  I told Devon yesterday evening, as I was changing Triston's diaper, that I feel like I'm falling more and more in love with our little boy every day.  Is this possible?  It's like I can't kiss and cuddle with him enough.  He is just too precious. 

I snapped this pic with my cell phone after feeding him an hour ago.  Oh, how hard to leave him and go to a j o b.  I'm thankful for my job, definitely, and I enjoy my job...but it's gonna be hard to focus on work when my minds thinking about this little guy so much and wondering how his day is going.  I'm thankful that I have the luxury of working only 3 days a week.  I know I can't complain.

"run through" day

Today is offically "run through" day for Annie and me.  We are blessed to live 10min from eachother, and therefore be able to help watch eachother's kids.  We have worked out our schedules that when I go to work, Annie will watch all three kids.  Then when she goes to the office (she works from home as well), I'll watch all three kids.  We'll have Nathanael (3), Rachael (6mo) and Triston (2mo).  I'm glad Annie's game for a run through!  And I'm looking forward to spending some time with her too :-)

Also, check out this CUTE picture Devon got of Triston  yesterday.  He's starting to give us more and more smiles.  He's 2mo old today!  wow. 

Well, I better get going, cause I'm gonna start "run through" day off late if I don't.

sleep

So, I am a 1st time mommy...and my mind is full of questions about my son and the way I'm doing things all throughout the day.  Yesterday was filled with questions about why my son would not sleep.  I was up and down with him beginning at 2am until 8am (when he then slept for 2hrs  in my bed after feeding).  Honestly, the entire day he did not sleep more than 30minute stretches, and most of the time it wasn't even that long.  Every time he was layed down in his bed, he would wake up.  So, the question running through my mind is, "what have I done to cause this?"  I wanted him to sleep so badly...not just because I was tired, but because I knew his 6week old little body needed the sleep.  Lately, I must confess, that during the late night/middle of the night feedings I have been so tired that I allow him to fall asleep on my chest for a bit before getting up and putting him back in his bed.  Has this started a bad habit of him not wanting to sleep on his back in his bed?  (His bed is still the bassinet beside our bed)  I also haven't been as rigid on every 3hr feeding, sometimes it's 3, sometimes it's 2.5, sometimes 2 hours apart.  Have I thrown off his little "schedule?"  Is it even possible for a 6week old to have a schedule?

Well after a long day of very little sleep, the little guy did it.  He slept for 6hrs!  But does this count when his daddy put him in his car seat and walked him around the house in it  to get him to sleep, and then we put the car seat in his bassinet?!  Haha!  *note:  this is the 1st time we have ever done that, but desperate times call for desperate measures*  Are we bad parents?  I thought...is this bad for my son to sleep in his car seat? It was positioned in the bassinet to where he was laying back, not sitting straight up, just in case you were wondering (or worrying).

Today is a new day!  We'll see how it goes...
I got a picture of his sleepy smile with my cell phone yesterday...

5 weeks old

So we had our 2nd check up with the pediatrician yesterday (whom we love!) 
Triston weighed in at 10lbs 7oz and is 21in long.  Dr. Hayek said he's the typical breast fed baby...short and chubby.  Things are going well!  The past two nights he's actually given me (and himself) a 4hr stretch of sleep...very exciting!  He's currently napping so I thought I'd put up a few pictures from the last 5 weeks.

On the way home from the hospital

1st time meeting his cousins Nathanael and Rachael

1st time finding his thumb...at his 1st pediatrician's visit

Just had his 1st bath

Daddy changing diapers

proud grandma!

sitting with his wonderful great grandma

cuddled up with granny Lynn