Halloween 2011

We started celebrating Halloween this year long before Oct. 31st

During Caroline's fall break, Dave's car broke down and he had to take mine to work. It was a bummer because we had made plans to go do lots of fun things, but we spent a whole day making sugar cookies, so it turned out all right. :)

Our annual pumpkin painting

Caroline wanted to be Hermione this year, which I thought was great! I made her robe, we borrowed the dress shirt and pants and Dave made the wand from a branch off our tree in the backyard! It turned out perfect. Caroline said Miles should be Ron Weasley, so that was pretty easy to put together too. And now he has a tie onesie that will work for Christmas time too!

I ordered Caroline a Gryffindor tie on ebay, but they sent me a tie from each of the houses! So we all decided to be Hogwarts students! Dave is a Slytherin and I'm a Hufflepuff!

I thought Caroline looked just like Hermione (circa Sorcerer's Stone era :)

Crawling

With a mixture of pride and dread, I can say we officially have ourselves a crawler!

This means lots of floor cleaning and baby-proofing. But look how happy and proud he is!

The weather is turning colder here, so sadly, our baby will start having to wear clothes around the house.

Thankfully, Miles did not get the stomach flu that the rest of us got yesterday. We're thinking that it must have been some kind of food poisoning because only Dave, Caroline, and I got it, and it was BAD. I threw up more in one day than I did in my entire pregnancy. It's so not fair to be sick when you're a mom. I felt so bad - I just didn't have the strength/energy to give him the attention he's accustomed to. Usually I stand in front of his crib and sway with him for a few minutes to put him to sleep, but yesterday I just couldn't. So there was lots of crying on top of the rest of us moaning in misery. It was one rough day, but it didn't last long and here we are the next day, quite recovered. We had our home teachers come give us blessings and another kind friend brought us sick-day essentials (saltines, sprite, coloring books, etc). Maybe sometimes you need to have a sick day to remind you of just how blessed you are to have your health the other 364 days of the year.

Fun Times

We've been having some great weather here lately. A couple of weeks ago, we decided to go to downtown Memphis. We had a picnic lunch by the Mississippi River and flew some kites.

Then we had a great time strolling down Beale St. - which we haven't done in a long while.

We bought Caroline this fan at A Schwab, and she had it in front of her face for the rest of the day! Miles loved all the live music. We got a video of him groovin' to the blues. He even got a shout-out from one of the singers which was pretty fun!

Caroline and The King (and the fan)

My Sweethearts ( and the fan)

This photo is unrelated - I just wanted to post a picture of the bowtie/suspenders onesie I made for Miles. I'm glad I snapped this picture real quick before church, because shortly thereafter it started to fall apart. So much for my sewing skills!

Last weekend we had a great ward activity (no really, it was actually a fun ward party - they exist!) Caroline (and I) made a caramel apple crisp pie for the pie contest.

They had outdoor movies, BBQ, a cotton candy machine and a bonfire. You could tell who had cotton candy because they had blue mouths. Including Miles, who thought it was the best stuff ever!

I love Autumn, I wish it lasted longer!

For Your Eyes Only...

So I decided to give the whole private-blog thing a try. If it's difficult to log-in or something let me know - it's easy to switch back to public.

So... now that the blog is private to only you friends and family, we can really be ourselves:

Don't tell!

Goings On...

Here's what's up with our family these days...

CAROLINE

People ask me how Caroline is liking kindergarten. She LOVES it!

Here is Caroline on "Hat Day". She has cute little friends at school and she loves the teachers. She says her favorite things are computer time, PE, and music day.

Here is Caroline on picture day. She's already learned the YMCA, the Chicken Dance, The Macarena, and "Atooty tah"...so she should be reading any day now ;)

MILES

Miles has been teething this last week. Yeah, no fun.

It's been a rough week, but his tooth broke through and now he looks like this more often:

SUSAN

I've started babysitting these two chuckleheads again a couple times a week:

So far it's working out pretty well. They come right after I drop Caroline off at school and they get picked up right before I go get her. I'm also working hard with my calling in the Stake YW as we have a big youth conference coming up next month.

DAVE

Dave has been working extra hard this month. It's not unusual for him to work 12 hours in a day and come home looking like this:

Tile dust! Things are supposed to slow down this week for him. We're sure lucky to have this hard-working man for our husband/daddy!

PS - I'm thinking of making the blog private soon. Let me know if you'd like an invite!

6 Months!

Our boy is 6 months old!

Miles eats all kinds of baby foods and loves rice rusks. He drinks juice from a sippy cup (with a little help).
I took him to the doctor for shots and check-up, and he weighs 19 lbs and 6 oz. Other than a slight heart murmur, which we'll get check out by his cardiologist soon, he is the picture of health! He wears 6-9 month clothes. We decided he puts the Hunk in Chunk!

He LOVES going out and getting attention from other shoppers. He's kind of a ham like that!

Now that he's taking baths in his bathseat (and not in the kitchen sink!), he loves it! I had a hard time getting him to look at me and smile because he was so fascinated by the water.

Miles doesn't have any teeth yet, but he wants to put absolutely everything in his mouth.
He rolls all over the place, making diaper times and getting dressed a struggle. We don't have a whole lot of floor space though - other than in our bedroom - so he doesn't spend as much time on his tummy as he should.

Miles is (now) a great sleeper! On a good, normal night he sleeps 11 hours! YAY! He still takes 3 naps - one that's about 90 mins and two that are 40 mins. He always rolls onto his side or belly and for some reason always sleeps in the same corner of the crib - no matter where I lay him down.

I can't believe he's already half a year old! We love him to pieces!