Fun Weekend

I hate to jinx myself, but it seems like we may have a baby who has decided to sleep through the night.  I can hardly believe it!  After we let him cry it out on Thursday night he slept until almost 5 on Fri night, then 5:40 Sat night, then 6 this morning!!!  I can't believe it.  I'm not sure what has changed, but I am just hoping that it's something that will stick!  It feels so weird for me to be able to sleep.  My body just feels odd getting so much sleep for the first time in so many months.  What an answered prayer!

We did not do too much this weekend.  Bama lost to Florida (boo) and John Michael did not know what to think of his parents jumping up and yelling!  He had the most confused look on his face and he looked a little scared.  We had to reassure him after we yelled at the TV!  Saturday we went to the big open-air mall and  went to Gymboree to get socks for JM's stocking.  They are the only place that has socks that will fit his chunky legs!

Eating pears at the mall.

We now have a lovely exersaucer thanks to the Thurmans!  They are letting us use Braxton's and JM really likes it!  He loves all the little animals and things around it!  Notice his tongue sticking out in the picture.  He does that all the time now!

Exersaucer is fun!

Earlier in the week we had playgroup and we had a wonderful time.  Sarah Kate is sitting up pretty well now, so she and JM can actually play together instead of just laying and looking at each other!

Deep in thought!

[caption id="attachment_232" align="alignnone" width="225" caption="I'm in love with this cute snowman outfit...oh yeah, and the baby in it!"][/caption]

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that Sunday morning was hanging of the green at church!  We were late, as usual, and there were NO parking spots!  We had no idea what was going on.  That place was packed out, I mean standing room only.  We finally squeezed in the balcony and I'm glad we were up there.  We could see the whole church draped in lights, gold ribbon, garland, beautiful fruity ornaments, and tons of wonderfully lit Christmas trees in the choir loft.  I wish I could describe it, but it was beautiful and the music was just fantastic.  The little kids cracked me up and I also teared up a bit thinking about JM in just 2 or so short years singing up there.  It was a wonderful service and the choir and orchestra outdid themselves.  What a wonderful way to end a weekend!

Verse O' the Day:

Do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.

Nehemiah 8:10

Family Ties

A few weeks ago we took our very first family pictures!  I am so trilled at how they turned out!  I want to post them all, but I am going to wait until we send out our Christmas pictures.  I want it to be a surpirse to our family.  I love surprises.  I will post one super-cute picture though. 

What a cutie pie!

Tomorrow is the big Alabama/Florida game.  It should be a good nail-biter.  I know that we will be watching.  We have the flag flying out front and we put the AL flag on our car!  Roll Tide!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Also, I took some great advice from my other long-suffering, sleep deprived mom, Laurie.  She finally got her baby girl to sleep well during the night by using some tough love.......lots of crying.  I started on Thursday afternoon with naptime and he slept over 2 hours.  Last night JM woke up at 1:00a and I let him cry for a whole hour.  Don't worry now, I comforted him and patted him and I was in there, but I never actually picked him up.  I hated it but he eventually went back to sleep and slept until 6, then Jordan put him in bed with me and he slept until 8:45.  He took an almost 2 hour nap this afternoon and he has been so happy and playful and sweet today.  We're going to try again tonight and see how it goes.  Someway, somehow, I've just got to be able to sleep more than 2-3 hours at a time.  It's killing me.  I look awful a lot of the time and I just need some sleep!  Let's cross our fingers and hope it works!

*"Who, me...I would never wake my mom up 3 or 4 times a night!"*

It's Santa!

We went to visit Santa really early so that we could tell him John Michael's wishlist for Christmas!  Santa told us that JM told him he wanted a BMW!  Ha!  I just hope he gets his two front teeth for Christmas!  As for me, I'm wishing for 8 straight hours of sleep.  Ah, now that would be a Christmas present!

It's Santa!

Gran, Jordan, JM and Aunt Janna

 Later in the day we rode the carousel at the mall.  MeMe and I held onto each side of JM and put him on a horse.  I think he really liked it.  I started feeling sick going round and round.  I guess I'm old now because I can't ride rides without getting sick!

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John Michael has discovered his tongue and so he's sticking it out all of the time now!

Why Not Wednesday

I am blogging while I should be getting dressed!  I am watching JM on the monitor moving all around the bed and not taking a nap!  I am also sitting on my bed watching our little fluff do his bichon blitz all around the backyard.  All I can see is a white streak of lightning going back and forth in the back yard.  He's so funny!  I feel bad that I can't always go play with him, but he's a dog and I'm busy!

Back to Why Not Wednesday.  On the long trip back home I was reading through Y'allmagazine and came upon an interesting article.  (You can't get that magazine up here, so I always swipe them from my parent's house!)  The article was about this family from Mississippi (I think) and how they were keeping the old family home place up by moving back from NYC to live in it.  IThey're a family of artists and there was so much stuff in that house, but it was kinda cool.  Paintings, road signs, portraits, and tons of pictures were stuffed in that old house.  One thing they talked about was how they use their china and silver service EVERY SINGLE DAY...gasp!  Being from a (probably very rich) southern family, they were just chock-full of silver and old family passed-down china.  Their silver pattern was the same as my mom's, Chantilly by Gorham; so pretty!  They had the attitude that if a piece got broken or chipped, it didn't matter because it was being used.  The lady stated that by using that fancy china doesn't make that cup of tea taste any better, but it brings her a little closer to her grandmother everytime she uses it.  They don't even bring paper plates into their home AND they used the china the whole time their kids were little.  That is very, very brave!

So I got to thinking, why DO we never use our "nice" china and flatware?  I grew up using it only a few times a year.  It's such a shame because it's so pretty and in a lot of cases, it means so much to us.  My mom has her grandmother's china and one day I am going to get my grandmother's china.  I love her china because I will be able to mix and match it with our own china because they both have gold edges.  We now own Jordan's grandmother's flatware along with the flatware from our wedding registry.  I love both!  I can just picture our kids eating off their great-grandmother's flatware and their other great-grandmother's china. 

Our flatware

 

Our wedding china

I am going to try and make a BIG effort (and try not to cringe) to use our china and flatware, and perhaps even crystal, this Christmas season.  It will be hard but I really am going to try and eat that breakfast biscuit on a piece of fine china!  What a way to start your day!  So, why not?  Why not drag that china out and use it and think of your mom or grandmother, or if not, think of how you will pass it down one day.  YOUR great-grandkids could be eating off of your china for Easter or Christmas dinner one day!  If you don't have any, you could pick some pieces at yard sales.  I see them all the time!  Just check out Rhonda from Southern Hospitality!  Wow, what that woman can do with some yard sale finds!

Easiest centerpiece I ever made!

The table is set!

Oh No! Snow!

We made it back from Thanksgiving holiday and it was NOT A FUN TRIP.  We left about 4:30a and got home about 4:30p.  The first couple of hours of the trip went well because John Michael was asleep, after that, he just was not happy to be in his carseat.  He cried a lot and on top of that, I still have a cold and so I had a really bad headache for most of the trip.  His screaming made it worse!  I'm just trying to block out the whole car ride.  Not fun!  The last stretch we drove through snow!  I can't believe it's already snowing!  Just enough for a dusting.  It was so neat to wake up this morning with snow falling.

Part of our cute house! Notice our AL flag!

I'm so proud of myself for driving to the store in the snow!  I'm a southern girl and so I don't go anywhere when there's anything white falling!  I had to run to the store after we got home because we had nothing to eat!  I did fine driving and made it home safely.

Today is one of those days where we are going to stay in and not do too much of anything.  JM is in cute footie pajamas and I'm hanging out in sweats.  I'm going to ignore the two open suitcases, piles of clean and dirty clothes, and bags of bottles/sippy cups to put away and just enjoy the snow and being in the warm house with my own snuggle bunny!

Why does my child suddenly look like he has red hair???

We decided to move JM's bed down a notch since he's sitting up so well now.  I also took out the bumpers so that he would have more room to move around.  His bed looks so weird moved down and with no bumpers!  I guess he really is growing up!  He played so well in his bed today while I unloaded his suitcase and unpacked his stuff.

Oh my, that hair is looking especially red today!

Verse O' the Day:

Jesus said to her, “Did I not say to you that if you believe, you will see the glory of God?”
John 11:40