First Christmas

I can't believe that the boys' first Christmas has come and gone. We had a great couple of days with family. The boys got totally off of their schedules but were troopers. They even were perfect angels at the 11pm Christmas Eve service.

The boys were spoiled beyond belief, as were Garrett and I. We spent Christmas Eve with Garrett's family then headed to my Dad's on Christmas day after we opened gifts, just the 4 of us.

I got lots of great gifts, but the most special came from my mom. Yes, she has been gone for over 3 years now, but she had bought books for her future grandchildren that were to be given to them on their first Christmas. My dad had been holding onto them all these years. These books, along with the quilt she had made, is just a small insight to the amazing heart my mom had. She was always thinking of others and thinking ahead. As my Aunt Frances says, "how could anyone have not liked that lady?"

My other favorite gift was a ring for my right hand that has an emerald stone in it. The emerald is the birthstone of the boys.

Our home has also been inundated with toys. We still haven't quite figured out what to do with them yet. I think some will go up into the attic for a couple of months until we outgrow some of our other toys. I told Garrett we would outgrow our house quickly and I think I was right. I just want a home that has a game room!!!

I hope all of you had a wonderful Christmas with your families as well!


Every year we have been in this house, Garrett has laid out a blanket on the floor and lit a fire in the fireplace for us to enjoy while opening presents. This year was no different. Here are the boys with their morning bottles in front of all of their presents.

Jack is ready to rip into his gifts.

Here they are on the wagon that Santa brought.

Jack resorted to gnawing the ribbons off.

Sweet Blake.

Blake was tuckered out after the gift opening extravaganza.

Ahh, my sweet boys playing nicely after opening gifts.

Here is Jack at my dad's in his "My First Christmas" hat that Mrs. Foley gave them.

Blake's hat was almost too small.

The boys playing at my dad's.

Blake and my goofy brother.

Jack and his look-alike.

The boys playing with the farm my dad gave them.

Our boys are baptized!

This past Sunday was a very special day for our family, our sweet boys were baptized! I have been looking forward to this day since they were born. We had a great day full of family, friends and Mexican food.

Garrett and I have been talking for a long time, before the boys were even born, about who would be their Godparents. We struggled with the idea of family or friends. We decided that family, i.e. aunts and uncles, already have a special role in the boys' lives. Thus leaving friends as an option. We decided to name our two closest friends, the Anderles and Samfords, as their Godparents.

These two families have not been in our lives for very long, only a couple of years, but will be in our lives forever. We all live within a mile of each other in the same neighborhood, have kids the same ages and have so much fun together. They have been taking care of our boys since before they were born by taking care of me. When going through the heartache of trying to get pregnant I could pick up the phone and call Mary or Georgia to cry, vent or talk about ANYTHING else. Once I got pregnant they were just as happy as Garrett and I. They hosted baby showers for us and helped me with decorating ideas for the nursery. Most importantly, when I was put on bed rest they went into full speed of taking care of me. Buying clothes for my boys in preemie sizes that I wasn't able to get myself, making returns and making sure I had everything I needed to welcome my two handsome boys home. They would also come over in the evenings, cook dinner in my kitchen so we could visit as I layed on the couch and then everyone would sit on the floor around me so we could eat together. Are they the best or what?!

The Anderles and Samfords are both very strong Christians, have great morals and parent the same as Garrett and I. These were all things we wanted for our children's Godparents. The role of a Godparent is to model a life honoring Christ and we couldn't think of any better people to do this for our boys. Thank you Seth & Mary and Matt & Georgia for becoming such a special part of our boys' lives. We are so thankful to you and love you guys!!

About 3 months ago we invited both families to our house for dinner. I had the boys in their swings covered in a blanket. I then asked Mary and Georgia to grab a specific child for me. The boys were wearing onesies that asked if they would be their Godparents. Of course, we forgot to take pictures that night. So a couple weeks later we were at the Samford's and we reenacted the big question.

Here is a 3 month old, tired Blake wearing his onesie that was already too small.

Here are Matt, a very pregnant Georgia and Blake.

Here is bug-eyed Jack modeling his onesie.

Here are a pregnant Mary, Seth and Jack.

Now, not only did we pick these two families to be the boys' Godparents because of their great Christian influences but also because...

They will teach the boys how to be cool (or shoot a gun). I'm not quite sure which one.

They will ponder deep-thoughts with the boys.

And I will always be able to depend on them to get the boys to go to sleep.

Here we are on their big day. Aren't their outfits so cute? They are white rompers with their initials monogrammed on them. Thank you lady on etsy!!

Blake and his Godparents, Aunt Georgia and Uncle Matt.

Jack and his Godparents, Uncle Seth and Aunt Mary.

My dad with both boys. It's getting harder to hold both at the same time. :) Doesn't Jack look just like him?

Garrett's parents with the boys.

Stockings

Before my brother and I were born my mom made us our "First Christmas" stockings. They were much smaller than our regular stockings (that she also made) but hung on our mantle every year. When I was pregnant I kept looking for stockings that I could make for my boys. I couldn't find any that I liked. When I was telling my mom's friend, Mrs. Sutton, she told me that she had a pattern from when her son was a baby. She sent me the pattern and I started making them about 2 months ago. I cross-stitched them and Mrs. Sutton was so kind to help turn them into stockings.

They are so cute and I am very proud of them. Now I am looking for large stockings to make in the coming year. I figure with a year timeline, surely I can get them finished.

Here is a close up of each stocking.



Here are all of our stockings hung by the chimney with care. Excuse the blue wall, it is definitely not that blue in real life. The flash made it much brighter.

The little Santa and Mrs. Claus were made by my grandmother. The base of them is an old Coke glass bottle. I think she made them in the 50's.

Here is our ginormous tree! I love it but it takes up a ton of space. There are lots of presents around it but you can't see them due to the expanse of this tree.

On a side note, Garrett was holding both boys tonight before their dinner and I looked over at them to find this.

Yes, Jack is sucking on Blake's head. Boy are they going to hate this picture later in life. :)

Here comes Santa Claus...

Saturday was our neighborhood Christmas party with a special appearance by Santa!! We really only went to see the jolly old guy since our boys are quite old enough for bounce houses. It was really cold on Saturday so we bundled the boys up in the jogging stroller and headed to the club house.

I was a little concerned about the temperature and wanted to put a hat on the boys, but seeing the size of their heads we didn't have any. Then I remembered...I found Santa hats in the dollar bin at Target! I ran to their closet to get them and this is what Blake thought about it.
I love this picture!!!

Here is Jack after getting his Santa hat.

On our way to see Santa. No worries, I covered them with blankets after this photo op.

When we got to the party there was a line to see Santa, so we headed straight to it. We waited at least 30 minutes which was kind of annoying but then we realized that people were taking their own pictures, so we didn't mind. We were happy not to wait in a long line where the only picture you get is the one the teenager hired takes and then charges $10 for it. So, we were able to get quite a few pictures with Santa. Of course Blake didn't care to smile. He is so serious.

When we got home we decided to take pictures with the boys in front of the tree. They were dressed so cute so we couldn't resist. Unfortunately, sometime between leaving Santa and getting home the setting on our camera was switched and these didn't turn out so great. The camera decided to focus on the tree instead of us. These pictures turned out so cute though that I have to post them.

Blake and Mommy.

Blake and Daddy.

Jack and Daddy.

Jack and Mommy.

I love this one!

6 months & snow

Is it just me or is time just flying by? How on God's green earth are my boys six months old?!! Technically they have been 6 months for almost a week now but, after hosting Thanksgiving for 14 people (which I was so busy I forgot to get out my camera; just go on and give me the Mother of the Year award for not documenting my boys' first Thanksgiving), getting up my Christmas decorations and running tons of errands, I'm finally blogging about it.

We headed to the doctor for their six month appointment on Thursday.

Blake is 17 lbs. 1 oz. (32%), 26 inches long (23%), and his head is 44 1/2 cm around (63%). Surprise, surprise that his head is in the largest percentile out of the three. :)

Jack is 16 lbs. 4 oz. (18%), 26 1/2 inches long (41%), and his head is 42cm around (60%). It was a huge surprise that Jack's head wasn't that much smaller than Blake's.

Both boys are in perfect health and just doing so well. It seems like they are changing every day. I have a feeling this month will be filled with milestones.

I don't remember if I already blogged this, but Blake is finally rolling over from his back to his tummy. The best new news is that Blake can hold his bottle now and feed himself!! Hallelujah!! Having just one hand free is wonderful. Jack is not in the least bit interested in doing it, so we will continue to work on it. Jack is just days away from full-blown crawling. I have found myself buying anything that has a monkey on it for Jack. He is definitely my little monkey, so this is now his theme. :)

Garrett and I are just so proud of our boys and we are just crazy about them. God has blessed us in so many ways!!


My little monkey, Jack.

I think Blake may have gotten his Daddy's red checks. I love it!!

While the boys were napping today I was trying to get some presents wrapped so my tree wasn't naked anymore. I didn't get them finished before it was time to feed the boys, so I just left them off to the side and fed them. After Jack ate, he spotted the stack of gifts. So, like he does quite often, he flipped over on his boppy and tried to crawl off of it. I was able to document this.

Here he is after he has flipped and on his mission to the gifts.

Head diving onto the carpet and reaching for the gifts at the same time.

Finally, destination reached! Do you think he knew some of them were for him?

As many of you Houstonians know, IT SNOWED TODAY!!! It didn't just kind of snow, it really snowed. I was able to get some pictures of it falling in our backyard.

I know that none of us are in jackets, but we had to get a picture of the boys' first snow!!

Holy cow, look at that snow!