Thankful

for a happy, healthy baby whose face lights up when he sees me

for a loving, faithful husband who is kinder to me than I deserve

for a wonderful community of friends and neighbors

for family whom we miss so much today

for a Savior who loves me

for beautiful fall days

for being able to run 

for delicious food that brings people together for fellowship

for sappy movies that make you feel all warm and fuzzy

for a whole 4 days to spend with my boys

for simple joys and pleasures that give you a taste of heaven

for sorrows and pain that make you long for heaven

for a church where the gospel is not only preached every week, but lived out in its community every day

for reminders that the world is bigger than what I see every day

for laughter, especially Caleb's

for forgiveness and restoration

for the hope of Jesus

for a special day to remember how much there is to be thankful for

Ahhh, the life...

Watching Praise Baby sort of puts him in a trace. Every once in a while though, I'll hear him squeal, and when I look over he's got a huge grin on his face as he watches a baby come up on the t.v. screen. Too cute...

He actually started out sitting up here, but slowly slid down and wedged himself in between the pillows.

The Army Crawl

Playing with Jack

This is our sweet friend, Jack, who lives across the street. It's so fun to watch him and Caleb play together because Jack is about 6 months older and has a lot to teach Caleb. Caleb knows it's cool to have older friends.

First Halloween

After a rough, napless afternoon I wasn't sure that the costume was going to happen, but with a few cheerios to bribe him along, we got Caleb into his tiger costume and looking cute. Here's our little tiger before "trick or treating" (a.k.a. taking him door to door in our neighborhood to show our friends how cute he looks).

After having dinner with our friends the Pennylegions (who, sadly, we didn't get any pictures with), we all met up with our friends Janet and Corey and their boys Ty and Drew to walk around. Here Janet and I are with our boys...Caleb already looking sleepy at this point.
Here's Caleb with his friend Hudson. How cute are they?!
And here is Caleb post "trick or treating." I think that we wore the little tiger out with all our socializing. Goodnight Baby!

Fall updates

Oh wow...I can't look at this picture without smiling! 

Can you?

Playing with Daddy...and probably trying to eat the camera. He is sitting by himself now and loving every minute of it. I don't know if he'll ever learn to crawl because now he hates being in every position for very long except sitting!

Trying carrots...and not enjoying it.

All snuggled up for a walk. What a good sport...I drag him around with me everywhere!

What handsome men I have!

"No more pictures, Mama!"

Here he is eating solids...much less messy that the pureed stuff as you can see.

Wow...we are long overdue on an update!

Caleb now has two teeth...ouch! He's also eating a lot of solid foods. He has a thing against pureed foods, so we just skipped the baby food stage and he's a happy camper!

Not crawling yet, but I see it in his eyes...he really wants to. 

This weekend I ran my first 10k with some friends here and had so much fun. I'm definitely up for doing another one (Nashville, Hannah?). I'm not so sure about the 1/2 marathon though, Kristen:)

We are so enjoying this fall weather and are looking forward to Michael having a couple days off this weekend for fall break. Any extra time we get to spend with him in all this seminary craziness is very exciting:)

The Beach

This weekend Caleb and I took our second flight of his short life to Orlando for some beach time with my best friends from college. It was a short, full, and wonderful weekend. From left to right in the picture below are Emily (holding Caleb), Tessa (holding her daughter Nellie), Katie, Leslie, and Rachel. We packed a lot of quality time into a short trip: throwing a baby shower for Rachel who is expecting a baby boy in January, cooking together, playing in the ocean and the pool, watching movies, laughing about memories from college, taking pictures, playing with the babies. It felt like I had never been apart from these girls, and it made me realize how much I miss them! I could talk for hours about all the memories we have together from first semester of freshman year on. I love them and miss them all so much!

Here's Caleb doing his new favorite thing...screaming in the most high pitched voice you can imagine. It's pretty crazy. Here it just looks like he is SUPER excited to be at the beach:)
I didn't want my baby to get sunburned, so I pretty much had him lathered in sunscreen and covered from head to toe the whole time we were out in the water (yes, he is wearing my skirt in this picture...at least it's green). I know you can't tell from these pictures, but he was passed around a lot. It was such a nice rest for me to have so many people excited to hold him and play with him. He loved it too...as Michael says, he just gets to hang out with beautiful women all the time!
Here we are right after he fell asleep on me in the pool...such a sweet memory. He's definitely still half asleep in this picture.
He actually really loved the water (both the beach and the pool) and the sand. Here he is just taking in the ocean. What a cute beach baby!