Celebrating Christmas 2020

Christmas looks a lot different during a Pandemic. We, of course, didn't have as much of the usual festivities. Covid numbers started to rise around Thanksgiving and kept going up. While we weren't as concerned since Nana, Poppa and Garyn had all had it and recovered. We still wanted to be careful for everyone's sake. 

The final week before school was supposed to be out, you all went virtual. So Christmas Break ended up being 3 weeks. You all had some work to do online and packets, but basically more Monopoly and lazy days ensued!

Our first Christmas outing was to see a light show in Chattanooga with the Dalton's.

We have been able to get together with the Dalton's a few times since moving and always enjoy catching up!

Next, we were able to go see lights and have hot chocolate bombs with Nana, Poppa, Philip, Kadie, Emma, Bryson and Levi. 

Also, Nana and Poppa needed a Christmas tree that day. Poppa, dad, Philip and all the boy grandchildren went out in the woods to cut one. Garyn picked out this tree and it barely made it in the house! But it was a great tree!

Another night, we went to see these Bradley lights we kept hearing about in Cleveland. A residential house has all these lights in their yard. The lights flash and change with the music. Another fun night, seeing lights.

Day before Christmas Eve, we made cookies for Santa.

Another fun thing ya'll did this year was have a sleep over in our new bonus/play room. You all watched Star this first night. For the next 6 nights, you all slept in here. I loved seeing you excited to switch tents each night. 

To be continued.........

 

Eclipse Day!

This August we got to witness a total solar eclipse here in Sale Creek! We had totality for 1.5 minutes here at our house, whereas Chattanooga was for seconds and even Soddy was like 30 seconds. For this reason, we decided to have a party to allow people to see the totality for longer. Nana and Poppa threw the party at their house!

It was fun letting the kids see but also worried us moms some. There were lots of news report advising to be extremely careful! It worked great though because the kids were preoccupied with each other and we had to actually stop them to look!

Cool event to witness and good friends to spend it with!

Boys' Birthday!

So this past July, our boys turned one and seven years old. It was obviously a fun and busy time! Being the first birthday for us to have both boys to celebrate at the same time, I felt a little overwhelmed trying to watch both with their friends and their gifts. I did enjoy just one party to plan and get ready for though! However, I wanted to talk a little about each one and where they are right now.

Layne is our little scooter. That's what we call him, literally, "scooter". He is learning so much everyday. Books are one of his new favorite toys. He brings them to you and then very cutely turns to sit in your lap. His favorites are ones with animals. Which brings me to his next new favorite, visiting the horses across the street. We go about everyday to pet them. He starts jumping and kicking. He points his finger and tries to say horse, it doesn't sound much like horse though. :) Now they are gone and he will look up that way for them. I just love watching him soak new things in. You can see it in his eyes, the amazement.

Him in same outfit Garyn wore at his first birthday. 

At his first hair cut, he was 13 months old. He had a second one about a month ago.

Scooter loves to climb on everything right now! He gets on the bar stools, train table, chairs, desk and dining table. We can't keep him off things. He is saying more now and just today I realized he could tell me what the farm animals say. I love hearing those little words and trying to decipher them. He loves his brother and sister and all their toys. We are now constantly refereeing him and Ansley, mainly. And he likes to put up a good fight, too!

His favorite birthday present.

Layne loves to eat. He definitely eats more than Ansley! He is starting to use a fork and spoon, but is still very messy with that. We love how he starts working his lips and mouth when he sees food or drinks in anticipation of them. It just cracks me up cause I can always tell when he is about to go for someones food. He is a little mooch! He doesn't fall asleep as often in the high chair, now! He still eats veggies pretty good but has gotten a lot more picky and demanding about what he wants. He weighed 24 lbs at 12 mos and is now up to around 27 lbs.. He was 30 1/2 inches long and is now 31. He has quickly grown out of 12 mos clothes and is in 18-24 mos clothes. I had been looking at Garyn's clothes from that age thinking they were so big but Layne is catching up to Garyn's size. Garyn was 25 lbs at a year and 31 inches.

We had water toys at the party. I had used this exact slip n' slide at Garyn's 1st party.

 It was all very nostalgic for me and believe it or not, unplanned!

He is finally sleeping though the night! He went through a phase a month or two ago were he was waking around 5:30! Oh, I was so tired everyday. We would try to keep him awake at night but he usually would just fall out around 8 no matter what we did. Thankfully, he has now grown out of that and is sleeping from 8:30-9 ish til 6;30ish. He naps twice most days but can do with just one. We are still having no problem putting him down. He loves his blanket and paci and will just basically let us know when he is tired. He hasn't tried to climb out of his bed yet but has gotten stuck putting his legs up on the headboard part.

He absolutely loved digging into his cake. He started throwing it everywhere!

Now for Garyn, our sweet big boy! He is still so tender hearted and wants to do everything right. School is easier for him this year as far as the teacher and schedule goes. He complains a lot less, at least! He has been doing very well, too, learning addition and subtraction. He taught himself some multiplication and shocked us all. One example was right around his birthday he asked how many months old he was since I'm always talking about Layne's age. I said well 7 years times 12 for each month in the year. Within a minute he said, "84?"  He still loves the WiiU and mostly plays Skylanders. He chose a sports theme for their birthday party because he liked watching the World Cup this summer and playing baseball. We are about to start Upward basketball for the first time. Most of all, he still loves his swords. He doesn't like to go without them for long. As soon as he gets home from school he takes a couple outside and plays as long as I'll let him!

This was the chalkboard I did for him. He has already grown since then!

Playing with his MarioKart toys from his birthday presents.

This summer he lost his first tooth and since has lost his second one. We had to pull the first one because his adult tooth was coming in behind the baby. The second fell out but also had the adult tooth already in. I say this because he never really looked like he was missing a tooth with both of the permanent teeth already in. He is getting so tall, too! He is 4' 5 1/2 " and 68 pounds (He was only 63 at his birthday). I'm gonna be looking straight at him before long. He is also getting big feet. This fall we quickly realized he could no longer wear 3's and needed 4 1/2's!

After losing his first tooth.

Garyn also loves playing board games and card games. He likes for their to be as many players as possible. This leads to him planning game nights. Some times they come to fruition and others he just schemes. He also went through a phase of watching Food Network competition shows. We did a lot of "Chopped" competitions this summer. I will never forget our summer list either. He had a lot of things he wanted to do while he was out of school so we made a list. I loved the items like Creative Discovery Museum and Coolidge Park. Things we did when he was younger and at home all the time. He is still in that phase were he loves to do fun preschool like activities but looks like a 10 year old at the same time. We are trying to get him to do some things on his own but he is always a little slow at it and needs guidance. He takes showers now on his own, finally! He is also a big help around the house and with his brother and sister. I can have him do light chores and he gets some money in exchange. He plays well with Layne, he and Ansley fight a lot. Its hard to have patience with her sometimes, even for me! We are having a lot of good life lessons with Garyn more and more. He is understanding more about how people and things work and likes to ponder on them.

Planning one of his games for us to play.

Every age has its own new discoveries, from the 1 year old to 7 year old, we are enjoying these days with them!

Month to Month: Layne is 8 months!

Month to month this little guy has changed some, but I would have to say this last month has shown the biggest changes!

 Layne is now mobile, fully crawling. And if that wasn't enough to keep me busy cleaning and trying to keep him contained; he started pulling up and pushing things as well. And he even climbed up the steps! Whew, from staying in one area to going up steps all in one month, I'm tired just thinking about it!

(He loves to move all around his bed, I come in often to find him like this)

He has also got those 2 teeth that are popped up well now. We have started giving him more table food, like toast and bread stuff. Also, I have given him some green beans, peas, and cantaloupe to pick up. He isn't so sure about that though. He still seems to like all baby food except peas and peaches, oddly enough. And he will drink water some from a sippy but he really just likes to gnaw on the spout. Nursing wise, he still eats about every 3-4 hrs and once in night, usually.

Night times have started moving to sleeping all night. Instead of being up by 3, he has started pushing it past 4 and usually 5 or later. And we have started putting him down at 8 if he doesn't have a late nap around dinner. Which is usually only when we are home. If we are out, he goes to sleep in car around 6. So there have been nights he has slept from 8-5! But its still random and depends on how the cards fall that day. :) He also likes to sleep face down, sometimes so much that we turn his head because it looks like he can't breathe! Add to it the fact he likes his blanket up near his face.....we check in on him a lot.

Size wise, last I weighed him he was 21 lbs and 28 1/2 inches long. I had a hard time keeping him still for the length but he's somewhere around there! He is wearing a lot of 12 month stuff now and I just bought some size 4 diapers because 3s are getting tight. Speaking of, his allergy to Pampers has gone away. He still has eczema but seems to be getting less and less irritated by random things.
 

Quirky things he does: He likes to stick his tongue out a lot (if you couldn't already tell by the pictures). And he has just started clapping. It's so cute! He loves to crawl under the table where he normally falls and hits one of the chairs or legs. He also likes to get under there and start pushing the chairs while standing up to them. He loves his brother and sister! Just about anything they do gets him to belly laughing. He also likes cartoons and will crawl to look at TV if a cute song is on or something. His favorite song is Old McDonald. Ansley knows to start singing that if he's fussing.

He is still using the paci some but it isn't a must. He still says "mama" and "dada" but is also saying "pp" noises. He is constantly pulling my and Ansley's hair and thinks its a game when I try to pull it away! He has also started blowing raspberries on my arm and thinks that's funny, too.  He is also loving bath time. He gets excited and just starts splashing wildly.

(notice the tongue, again)

Just love this sweet face and am sad to see how fast he's growing!