Pictures With Grayson

A friend of mine took these pictures when Grayson was 3 weeks old.  I love how they turned out.

Grayson At 3 Months

The little things I want to remember about Grayson:

He is our little old man.

He sleeps through the night (YEAH!)

He doesn't nap but takes about 3 half hour cat naps during the day...this makes things hard.

 He smiles at one of the kids if they even come into his line of sight...he loves them so much.

Bret call him "Gray Gray"

I call him Mr. Bubbles...and you can see why

He loves his momma!

He hates the car and screams anytime we go anywhere.  Which sadly for him and the rest of us in an awful lot.

He is a mover and a shaker...constantly moving his arms when he's awake.

 He is constantly chewing/sucking on his fingers, it doesn't matter which one it is as long as it's in his mouth.

 He finds so much enjoyment out of eating, he is one noisy nursing baby.

It's hard to tell from this picture, but his eyes are still blue and I'm trying to get as much enjoyment from them as possible before they turn the inevitable brown. 

 We call this his straight jacket...he has to be velcro'd in nice and tight in order to sleep.

 He giggles when he's tickled under the chin.

He loves to be played with.

He smiles with his whole body.

 It's impossible not to smile from ear to ear when this cute little thing is beaming at me.

Bret's Visit

Bret was able to come home for a visit this last weekend.

It made for THE BEST Mother's Day present ever!

We had so much fun that I didn't even want to pull out the camera (a rare event around here!)

We went to soccer games and ballet recitals.

He killed any flies that got in the house.

We played games.

Gavin was attached to him like glue.

He did the dishes and took out the trash and every other little thing he does to help that add up to lots of big things.

We stayed up late and slept in.

We watched movies.

He plunged clogged toilets.   (we have some serious toilet issues)

I would fall asleep on the couch as he worked late at night.  And then he'd wake me up when he was done so I could feel like we were going to bed at the same time.

We kept the kids home from school on Monday and he took them to see Avengers.

The kids were happy I was cooking real food again.

He held Grayson and was the one to get the first little giggle out of him.

We played outside.

There were lots of wrestling matches.

Our home felt different with him back.  Our family felt different with him back.

It was wonderful.

Zachary's Yellow Belt

Zachary had his yellow belt testing on Saturday for Karate.  He was so excited and nervous about it.  In fact, he decided that he was going to fast breakfast for it on Friday.  It was very sweet.

 Just look at his face here...don't mess with him!

I love his focus and concentration...one of the many reasons why he so successful in Karate

While watching him test I couldn't tell if he was doing things right or wrong.  So when the board stood up at the end to go over each individual I was very pleased with what they had to say about Zachary.  They told him that he was a rising star and had a very bright future ahead of him if he continues with it.  The Sense said that he just enjoyed watching Zachary and was very impressed with his technique and form.  Zachary stood there beaming.

Receiving his yellow belt from one of the Sense's

 He's gotta be the cutest yellow belt around!

Bret and Grayson

Have I ever mentioned how wonderful Bret is with babies?

Playing With Dad at the Beach

Playing with Bret in the water looks something like this...

(I just love these sequences)

First it was Abby

Then Zachary...

And McKenna taken by surprise...

Myrtle Beach

**WARNING:  SERIOUS PICTURE OVERLOAD!**

Before Bret headed out West we took a little family get-a-way to Myrtle Beach.  It was SO wonderful.  In fact we both thought it was one of the funnest family vacations we've ever had.  We just missed the spring break crowd...which made for very cheap hotel rooms and no crowds wherever we went.  The weather was perfect and we were able to swim and be in the sun but not get hot at all.  And even though we had a new baby that we were dragging along with us, we were able to do some really fun things.  Our kids are at such a great age.  Every night we were out until about 10:00 just having fun, (it was nice not to have to worry about early bed times) and then they'd sleep in until about 8:30.

We arrived on a Sunday night and spent that night walking along the beach and having races on the sand.  It wont be much longer until Bret is no longer the fastest one amongst us.  We timed he and McKenna and she is .1 second behind him.  The next morning Bret got up early and made a trip to Walmart and bought the food for our meals.  He came home to discover the freezer space was not what we thought so everyone had ice cream sandwiches for breakfast.  There were no complaints.  After breakfast we went down to the pools where we spent about 2 hours in the lazy river.

Of course there was lots of chasing, throwing and dunking involved.

After eating lunch in our beach front little condo we spent the rest of the afternoon on the beach.  The kids loved finding all the jellyfish.  Their favorite thing to do was to save ones that just washed up and throw them back in the ocean.

It was even warm enough that the kids ventured out into the water a little.

  Gavin was Mr. Sandman...he was in heaven just playing, digging and creating

There were lots of paddle-ball games between Bret and myself, Bret and McKenna, and McKenna and Zachary...   

Lots of searching for sea shells and little ocean creatures...

Saving one of the many jellyfish...

Late afternoon we headed back and got cleaned up and then got something to eat and went miniature golfing.  We realized it was the first time we had gone miniature golfing with the kids and we had a blast!  McKenna and Bret were even in the hole in one club.

The next morning the kids got up and after breakfast they went out to look for shells that the tide had brought in.  They ended up with some really neat looking shells.  We spent the entire second day on the beach.  Sand castles, paddle ball, catch with the football, warm sun, cool sea breeze, kids laughter...it was simply perfect.

Bret had a coupon for a banana boat ride, and surprised the kids with it.  They even saw a sea turtle when they were out on their ride.

And despite the warning, I stood on the beach and waved as off they went...

They had a great ride and the kids LOVED it.  McKenna kept saying faster and Gavin kept saying slower...so they had a nice variety.

I just love watching my kids interact with each other enjoy being together

Eating lunch on our balcony overlooking the beach...

Grayson spent the days sleeping in the shade

On the second afternoon we built a great sandcastle and even had it protected in the moat by jellyfish...

We found a crab, named him King Crab, and put him at the top of our castle

And just then, when we thought he had built the best little castle for King Crab and everything was perfect, the tide started coming in and we feverishly worked together to build a wall of protection around our castle to see how long we could keep the ocean at bay.  I have to say that we lasted longer then I thought we would.  These kids worked hard to protect what they had made.

That night we got something to eat and then went to a museum called Wonder Works.  It was amazing and so much fun because we were just about the only people in the place.  There was a room that we could go in and experience hurricane force winds, water we could put our hands in and it was as cold as the water when the Titanic sank.  There was a bed of nails to lay on, roller coaster simulators, mind wave games, baseball pitch, basketball, lazer tag and I could go on and on.  But the neatest and most unique thing that they had was this ropes course that was three stories above the ground that you harness yourself in and attached yourself to these ropes.  Sadly I happened to be wearing a dress so I was not able to go up.  I've never seen anything like it before.  I was surprised at how long Abby lasted, being afraid of heights like she is.  McKenna was cruising all over the place and I even saw her walking across some beams with no hands holding on to the rope.  Zachary loved it and stayed up there the whole time and Bret came down and said that it was very intense.

The next morning we got up and spent some time at the pool before heading back home.  It was a great couple of days and we just had so much fun...just what we needed before saying goodbye to Bret.