Carving the Pumpkin...

This is the first year since we have had kids that we actually carved our pumpkin. When we lived in Auburn, without kiddos, we used to get together with our Sunday school class and carve pumpkins together (what fun memories!). Before this year, Will never mentioned it so I guess you can just say we have been lazy. This year Will was pumped about carving his pumpkin. He was excited about everything-the $0.97 kit we bought with the little knife and the scraper, the pumpkin cookies we bought to bake along with our pumpkin carving festivities. We weren't home from school 10 minutes and he was ready to start!

I felt kind of bad after seeing everyone's cool pumpkins on FB and instagram that we didn't really give him the option of a spiderman pumpkin or mickey ears or just something he is into....He decided on a traditional Jack O' Lantern face and we went with it. Y'all he scooped the entire thing out by himself.

I was so proud of him! I figured he would be disgusted and lose patience after a few minutes, but he didn't. He kept working until most was out. I only had to scoop it out a few times.

Alex participated in the pumpkin carving party by doing his part and eating Banana Pumpkin yogurt :) He had a pumpkin cookie too! Maybe next year he will be up for the challenge. Sadly, after one pumpkin was carved, we went back into lazy mode and didn't even carve Alex's pumpkin. I forgot how much work they are!!

Will was pleased with the finished product and that is all that counts! He loved the way it looked all lit up :)

The BIG 6-0

My mom turned 60 on Saturday! We celebrated by having family pictures made and dinner at Kiki and Pops house! And we just might have almost burned the house down with all those candles :)

 This picture cracks me up....it looks like Sutherlan is the look out for Will as he sneaks icing off of the cake...both of them had their fair share before they were busted :)

 Alex LOVED the cake!

 And he loves his Kiki too!

 Mom's gift...60 Reasons we love Kiki-each grandchild came up with 15 reasons they love Kiki. It is a frame.

 Clearly I didn't check my camera settings before taking this pic...

My dad did good this year and bought this cute car for my mom earlier this month. To say they have enjoyed it would be an understatement. My mom has wanted a convertible for a very long time and she finally got one!

The Pumpkin Patch

 A few weekends ago we went to the Pumpkin Patch. It was fun this year! It has been fun every year, but this year Alex could basically do everything Will could do. After looking at pictures, I am sad that I didn't get outfits that matched for the boys to wear to the pumpkin patch. Silly I know, but I figure I only have a few years to get away with it :)

 Cheese face...

 Hay Ride to go pick out a pumpkin!

 Who knows..... :)

 Family Pic

 Teepees were a hit this year!

Tonight we are carving our loot from the pumpkin patch....We shall see how that goes! :)

2,555 Days and Counting!

Today marks SEVEN years that John and I have been married. For several years after we got married, we would always watch our rehearsal dinner/wedding video on our anniversary. We haven't watched it in a few years...I guess after kids, life got a little busy?! :)
Tonight we started what might be my favorite family tradition to date...after dinner we had warm brownies and ice cream while watching highlights from the rehearsal dinner and wedding reception. Tears streamed down my face as I watched with my family that has doubled in size since our wedding day. God has blessed us for sure! It was just fun watching Will take it all in and hearing his hysterical comments. Two of my favorites were him telling John and I that "we looked cute," and also asking why I was wearing a hat (he was referring to my veil). He thought it was absolutely hysterical that both fight songs were sung at our reception and that we left in a sea of crimson/white and orange/blue with everyone shaking their shakers. What a fun memory it was then, and even more fun now to share it with our boys. Life can get so crazy that it is easy to forget all the intricate details that made that day so incredibly fun and special. What a blast we had making a very important commitment to one another in front of all of our family and friends and then dancing the night away!

Here is a list of seven things I have learned in seven years of marriage....

1. All aspects of life, good and bad, are easier and way more fun with someone standing by your side to share it with you.

2. There will never be enough money. Ever. But we will always have what we need.

3. Date nights are essential (especially once kids are in the picture). No excuses. An uninterrupted dinner filled with adult conversation, and actually tasting your food, is sweet to the soul.

4. Laughing at ourselves or our situation is better medicine than arguing about it.

5. Men and women are made SO differently. God made us different for a reason. You can't change each other. You marry the whole person.

6. Marriage isn't always "happy." Some days it is very easy to love your spouse, other days not so much. If you love on the good days and the bad, you'll find even your worst days aren't really that bad.

7. Marriage is easier if Auburn is winning. Just sayin' :)

Happy Anniversary to my husband! Thank you for giving me the BEST life and the most precious boys! We are blessed beyond measure for SURE!

Will's First Auburn Game

We have taken Will to Auburn several times, and he has attended A-Day and the National Championship Celebration in the stadium, but he has never attended a regular game. We took him to the first home game this year vs. Louisiana-Monroe. I guess it has taken me so long to blog about it because it took me about a week to recover from this experience :) I told Will on the way home, we would try again when he was 7...

As our luck would have it, he was up ALL night the night before the game. He was coughing, running low grade fever, miserable! We were up basically once an hour with him and had we not already bought tickets and planned on going with our neighbors, we would have probably ditched the whole trip altogether. He finally got good and asleep at 5am, but we had to drag him out of his bed at 6am to leave (Kick off was at 11:30, and John wanted to be sure we made it to Tiger Walk). We just put Will in the car in his pjs, swung by Chick-fil-A drive thru for breakfast and we were on our way. He was so excited about going to a game and had been talking about it all week, so he perked right up once we were on the road. He didn't eat much, but he wasn't running fever anymore, so I was just praying he would be okay and we would have a fun day.

In Alex City he started saying "My poopy, my poopy" which is what he always says when he needs to poop. Keep in mind that he has been pee pee trained since January, but only just started pooping on the potty at the end of July. He has yet to poop anywhere but home. We knew this was not good. Basically at this point we felt like the stars were all aligned against us-first he was not feeling 100%, now he needed to poop and we are no where near home. I knew he would never go in a gas station. He is just so hard headed when it comes to the potty. I looked and John and just told him to go buy some pull ups. I can't believe we did that, but we basically had 2 choices-force him to only poop in a potty, which he would not do, so he would be whining and miserable the whole day, or we could just break down and spend $14 on pull ups that we would use 1 out of the pack, be done with it, and get on about our day. We bought the pull ups in Dadeville and then pulled off right when we turned on College Street in Auburn at a gas station and let him just stand up in the backseat with a pull up on and poop.

He seemed to perk back up after he pooped. We parked and headed toward Tiger Walk. We met up with the McClearys at Tiger Walk. At this point, Will was exhausted, whiny, and wanting to be held at all times. I thought we were just going to leave and head back home before the game even started. See we thought we were being smart in telling Will what to expect about the day, so all week we told him about Tiger Walk, the eagle flying, the players running out.....so of course in three year old land, he expected all of these things to happen simultaneously as soon as we got out of the car in Auburn. He definitely didn't understand why we had to wait on anything. Finally Tiger Walk started and like father, like son, Will loved it. He had this super intense face as each player walked by. He kept his hand out and high fived everyone. His favorite was Aubie!!

On the way to the stadium, we stopped for a photo opp in the same place that John first introduced Will to the stadium at 2 weeks old. What a difference 3.5 years makes!!

Once inside the stadium, Will loved it. He loved taking in all the sights and sounds. He was amazed by the crowd in the stadium and all that was going on.

However we were in the game at least an hour before kick off. You can only expect a 3 year old to sit in the stands for so long. He almost missed the eagle flying because he was completely melting down and just as John was about to take him out, it flew right over our head!

That excitement only lasted a minute and I ended up taking him out and we basically spent most of the first half sitting on the concrete in front of the concessions. He was tired and hot. He wouldn't eat or drink anything which I know made it worse!! He fell asleep on me for about 45 minutes or so and woke up just in time to see Auburn score right before half time. The nap definitely did him good. He started cheering and was more tolerable. We spent the 2nd half in and out of the stands. I thought I was going to scream when it went into overtime. Will was doing much better by this point but it was TIME.TO.GO.!!!

After the game, we took a few pics at the Heisman statues and headed to the car. We stopped for dinner before getting back on the road and we were SURE Will would sleep all the way home. Nope!! I seriously thought we were going to go nuts. He talked the whole time and he was so tired that he wasn't speaking in coherent sentences. On 280 at the Colonnade exit which is the one we get off at to go to our house, he fell asleep. GO FIGURE.

Despite the drama, the pictures look like we had the perfect day :) And we did have fun-but it was just a roller coaster-happy sometimes/miserable sometimes. We definitely had envisioned it differently, but I have found like most things in life with kids are that way. You build it up and create this experience in your head, and it never quite measures up. That isn't a bad thing-just different than what you pictured. Will's first game was definitely different than what we thought it would be, but we loved sharing the game day experience with our precious little boy.

Fifteen

Alex was 15 months old on September 1st. We had his 15 month check up Wednesday. Our sweet little boy is just perfect. He weighed 28 pounds 6 ounces and was 32 inches long (75th percentile for both).

Alex is a man of few words....most day no words :) He can say Mama and Dada but I can't remember the last time he did. I *think* he said uh-oh last night, but I am not positive. I dropped something and said "uh-oh" and he repeated me (at least that is what it sounded like)...we'll take it! He mostly just grunts. It cracks us up because he has various grunting sounds with all different inflections and we generally can decipher between them to figure out what he wants. So why would he talk....he doesn't have to!
He can clap now and anytime you say "Yay!" or "good boy!" he claps for himself.

Alex is doing AWESOME at school. Makes this Mama SO happy and calms my heart. He hasn't cried at drop off in about a week and a half. He has even smiled the past few mornings when I handed him off. He loves his teachers and I think he loves school. It keeps him busy and entertained. The other day I picked him up and they were sitting at the table eating snack. Alex was lounged in his chair to the point that his bottom was almost off the end of his seat and his chin was just resting on the table. They were eating cheese balls for snack and he wasn't even picking them up off the table, he was just scooting them forward directly from the table into his mouth. His teachers laughed and asked if he didn't sit at a table at home. I told them not really, he is in a high chair during meals and the only little table we have is in Will's room and it is a bit taller than the tables they have at school. They said they have to watch him closely because sometimes he just slides right out of his chair :) Sweet boy! He is learning though!!

My most favorite part about Alex right at this very moment are his kisses. He gives you a kiss anytime you ask for one and his kiss is of the open mouth variety :) He just opens his mouth and leans in to your mouth or cheek or whatever he can reach. It is absolutely precious and I cherish those kisses!!

He has obviously fallen into his role as an Auburn fan quite nicely...taking notes from big brother!

Alex is still a great eater and a great sleeper! He is so easy going and has found his perfect place in our family. I think he and Will have their own language. It is hysterical to listen to them playing together in Will's room. Will will talk to him and Alex will grunt or yell loudly. He definitely wants to be heard....even if he isn't speaking with words!