Merry Christmas!

Parker's Announcement

Just in case I missed someone....

Hannah's Scooter

Hannah got a new scooter for Christmas.  Here is some pictures and video of her trying it out.

Here comes Santa Claus!

The terror of Santa:

So here is my take on why kids are scared of Santa. He is a large man, a stranger with an obscene amount of facial hair. His suit is old and smelly and we hand our children over to him to sit on it. We tell our children that this man (he is a stranger remember this) watches you all the time to see if you are good. This is pretty creepy. Also this man who essentially stalks you sneaks into your house in the middle of the nights and eats your food.

All of that to say, Hannah has conquered her fear.

She told Santa that she wanted a "Bigger Dollhouse" this year and she was excited to do it! Thank goodness the need for new toys outweighs the fear of strange hairy men.

Parker didn't care either way, he is familiar with being passed off to any friendly face.

Gingerbread house

Hannah and I made our annual Gingerbread house today and I think it is the best ever!

This year she really wanted to make it look good, instead of just play with the candy.

I still can't get a good smile!

FYI it is the Target brand gingerbread house. By far the best one we have ever purchased. I usually have to make extra icing but not this year! It wasn't on one of those silly plastic trays, it was pre-attached to this cardboard.

Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving!

We had a great Pre-Thanksgiving at Granmommy's house then on Thanksgiving day we went to Aunt Donna's house.

It was Parker's first! He enjoyed eating his fist.

Hannah and Parker posing together.

Playing outside with Pappy and Uncle Eric

posing by the scarcrow

ready to go home! Sitting in Daddy's lap!

Parker - 2 Months

Parker is 2 months old!

The time is flying by! My baby is holding his head up, putting weight on his legs, jumping, cooing, laughing, smiling and having "conversations"

He has found his toys and loves them! His favorites are all mirror but especially the one on his changing table and the mirror elephant on his bounce seat. He loves the same 3 toys his sister absolutely loved, a stuffed cow with a mirror head, a worm that lights up and make silly noises and a "catterpod" a caterpillar music player.

He also is starting to like rattles and enjoys them a lot more than his sister.

Here are my sweet kids sharing the couch.

Parker LOVES his reflection. He can spend a pretty lengthy amount of time playing on the changing table with his mirror.

Parker Stats:

11lbs 11oz

24"long

I'm Thankful for this Turkey!

Three things I am thankful for today!

***LOVE this Annalee!! thanks for the idea***

it's THREE days until thanksgiving, hooray!

i hereby declare a THREEs survey is in order.

(friends attempting to blog everyday in november, here's your easy post!)

THREE NAMES I GO BY:

1) Donna Jo

2) Mommy

3) Deej

THREE BEVERAGES I DRINK FREQUENTLY:

1) water

2) cherry coke

3) coconut coffee

THREE THINGS I WOULD LIKE TO LEARN:

1) how to knit

2) how to use the apps on my phone

3) how to put a baby on a schedule

THREE SONGS THAT GET STUCK IN MY HEAD:

1) “shoo fly don’t bother me”

2) “my favorite things”

3) “blues clues theme song”

THREE MOVIES I COULD WATCH AGAIN AND AGAIN:

1) You’ve Got Mail

2) Old School

3) Cinderella

THREE TV SHOWS OF MY CHILDHOOD:

1) Seinfeld

2) Full House

3) Duck Tales

THREE CAREERS I WOULD ENJOY DOING:

1) interior designer J

2) american history teacher

3) librarian

THREE CAREERS I WOULD NOT ENJOY DOING
(but i'm thankful someone else does them):

1) house keeper/maid

2) masseur

3) IT professional

THREE THINGS I AM WEARING RIGHT NOW:

1) white t-shirt

2) wedding ring

3) glasses

THREE THINGS I CAN HEAR RIGHT NOW:

1) rain

2) embroidery machine

3) lullaby lamb on the baby monitor

THREE THINGS TO-DO TODAY:

1) make a bazillion Christmas shirts

2) make Parker’s first Thanksgiving outfit

3) drive Hannah from one place to the other

THREE end.

Amateur Photographer

So I would love to be an amazing photographer.

I don't believe God has blessed me with that gift.

I am pretty average with my new camera and still sleepy babies :)

I played around some with my camera and my baby today while Hannah was at the grandparents and I finally had a free moment to figure out my camera.

Love this one! Can you believe he is only 5 weeks?!

Nursery Picts

So I never posted pictures of Parker's nursery.

Here it is!

We decided to go with a nautical theme since I found PBkids bedding and a matching PBkids rug for super cheap.

I had grand plans of light blue and light green (we were not going to repaint the walls) beautiful toile bedding mixed with menswear prints, but that didn't happen. One it was going to cost more money, and two when was I going to make all of the bedding, curtains and accessories when I was busy embroidering for everyone else? :)

I am super impressed with myself on how much money I saved creating this nursery.

-Blue Dresser- pulled it out of the guest room

-white crib- craigslist, Preston and I distressed it ourselves

-red shelf- was white from JBF

-changing table- was the entryway table but replaced that with a nicer piece last year.

-ottoman- Target

-glider- Target

-curtains- leftover from Hannah's nursery

-wall murals- beautifully done by myself and my wonderful sister-in-law/Art teacher Carleen

-white shelves- free stolen from my office

-Lighthouse lamp and shade- furniture liquidation store and re purposed from remnant ribbon and fabric.

-Nautical accessories and letters- Hobby Lobby

Hope you enjoy it! I know I am!

One Month!

Parker was one month old yesterday!

The time is going by so fast!

Fun Facts:

He weighs 10.4 lbs

is going about 3-4 hours between feedings (his sister NEVER did that)

He is content and happy about 95% of the day

He loves to play in his crib and wiggle and he loves to JUMP!

We are all so in LOVE with the precious new joy!

..and he is still getting used to sister.. :)

Halloween Fun

Hannah and I decorated Halloween cookies Wednesday. She loves icing and decorating the cookies with candy.

Then she loves eating the icing and candy, not the cookie part :)

Here is Parker feeling included in the fun.

Professional Photos are here!

Jessica Did a great job. Click here to see the rest!

To order prints, click the link above, then click Prints->Order Prints. On the page that shows up, remove the ones you don't want, then pick a company on the left to have them printed. Snapfish is probably the cheapest, but the slowest. Shutterfly is in the middle, Walgreens is the most expensive, but you can have them printed at a local store and go pick them up. After you choose who will print them, it should take you to the page where you can choose sizes and quantities.

Professional Pictures Part 2

They should be ready really soon!

Professional Photos

Here is a sneak preview. The full set should be available in a few weeks.

Pumpkin Patch

We haven't braved it to Hall's pumpkin farm yet... but we did make it to the farmers market to buy some pumpkins for the house.

Such a sweet big sister.

One week old

Parker is HERE!!!

Baby Parker is finally here!!!

After 296 days of pregnancy it took 3 different induction methods, 16 hours of labor and 1 epidural ;)

On October 2nd at 3:11am God gave us an 8lb 2oz 19 inch amazing beautiful baby boy!

We could not be more delighted!

Hannah meeting her brother for the first time.

Hannah figuring out the bottles are not as necessary as she thought.

We are loving our new family of four!

Baby Parker

So...I am getting a lot of people asking me if baby Parker is here yet. He is not.

Since we are doing this all natural I will not be getting induced, or get to have my water broken or any other "fun" things they do at the hospital so everyone will have to wait patiently with me.

Preston created a new site, http://isbabyparkerhere.info, so that you can stop asking me if he is here :) You can check it as much as you obsessively like but I am sure I will post to facebook and on this blog hours after he arrives.

www.isbabyparkerhere.info

40+weeks pregnant

Here are some fun pregnancy facts about me

Sleep: not a lot. I have insomnia until about 12-2am and I wake up every two hours to go to the restroom

Maternity Clothes: they are getting snug J

Movement: All of the time. A lot of stretching his shoulders and kneeing me in the side.
Cravings: I haven’t had a lot of cravings this time. Things with cinnamon, graham crackers.

Aversions: Salads, eggs, especially smelling eggs cooking.

Labor Signs: Irregular contractions for about two weeks or so. They are gradually getting stronger but not consistent.

What I Miss: Bending over. Having any significant amount of energy. Walking like a normal person. Wearing my wedding ring.

What I'm Looking Forward To: His arrival!

Weekly Wisdom: No matter how much I want this baby to come now, he will come when God wants him to.

Best Moment This Week: Wii step aerobics trying to get contractions to speed up. If someone had videoed it, it would have been hilarious!