No more naptime:(

You know when there is that little voice in the back of your head telling you to make a change, but you resist because you think that the benefits of leaving something how it is far out weighs the benefits the change will bring and then suddenly you reach a point and without any warning at all you make the change...do you know that feeling? Well, for sometime now I have been having that little nudge telling me that it was time to cut out naps from our daily routine. I have been ignoring it and ignoring it because it was really nice to have 2 hours everyday to get things accomplished around the house, but this week I reached a point and could no longer ignore the "voice." After night after night of JP staying up until 9:00 every night and waking up between 5:30 and 6:00 every morning, I finally had enough and decided that from now on we are going to have 45 minutes of rest time in their rooms where they can play quietly, read, or whatever. So we are trying this and so far things are going better. JP definitely falls asleep more quickly at night and he is sleeping until about 6:45 every morning (I am hoping that this improves 'til atleast 7:00 or so...please, please, please!). Well, yesterday afternoon JP hit a wall. He was watching golf with Pratt and all the sudden he was snoring on the floor. It was so cute that I couldn't resist taking a picture. If you remember from a while back, JP fell asleep on the floor in nearly this exact same spot after getting up particularly early one morning.

In other news-last week was my birthday! It was a great week! Pratt and I had plans to go on a date, but as we have learned and continue to learn, you need to be flexible when you are a parent because you never know what will come up. Unfortunately Shelby got hit hard with a stomach virus and we had to cancel. Hopefully we will get to reschedule soon! On my actual birthday some girlfriends took me to Outback for dessert and let me tell you, we ate our weight in dessert and it was sooooooooooooooooooo good!!! The night that we had planned for our date we ended up doing an "in house" date night. It was nice and relaxing and we really enjoyed catching up with each other and catching up on some of our shows. My dear friend Erin whose creativity is always flowing gave me one of the best gifts of all....it combined two of my favorite things...cake and High School Musical!!! She made me a High School Musical Guitar cake and I loved it! "High School Musical???" some of you might say..and I say "yes! I love those movies." Musicals one some of the best movies around. Also, it is a love story of a couple in high school (the cool dude and the new girl) which kind of reminds me of my love story with Pratt. So here is a picture of my cake!!! It tasted delicious!!

Finally, Pratt surprised me at church on Sunday with the flowers. This is one of the biggest and most beautiful arrangements I have ever seen and I was truly surprised and felt so loved when I saw them.

I don't really have anything to report on Shelby right now. She is growing and learning and really enjoying school. It is hard to believe and doesn't even sound right when I tell people that she is almost 5, but no matter how weird it is, it is true. One quick story about her....last weekend I was going to mom and dad's for dinner because Pratt was out of town. On the way down I called Lauren to tell her we were coming and we chatted for a little bit. When I got off the phone a million questions came out of Shelby with regards to our conversation. I politely told her that she didn't need to know everything to which she replied, "Yes, mommy, I do. I want to be the girl who knows everything all the time." Oh dear, looks like I am going to have to figure out away to know everything all the time as well in order to answer all her questions.

Christmas Pictures...FINALLY!!!

Finally...here are some pictures from Christmas and once again I managed to upload all of them in reverse order so we will do a rewind of Christmas. By the end of the day, I hate to admit, I was so tired that I didn't even think about getting out my camera to take pictures at my family's house so unfortunately we have nothing from our fun evening together, but we do have the memories in our hearts and hopefully my mom got some great shots that she will share with me (hint, hint).

We will start with our Christmas at Papa John and Grammie's....here is JP, Uncle Jake and Shelby all getting into one of JP's favorite things of the day, the tractor bike....He was so cute with this. At one point he had on his hard hat, his rain boots, his tool belt, and got on the tractor like he was ready for work. We just died laughing at him all afternoon!

Then rewind a little bit more to our fun Christmas at Aunt Suzy and Uncle Patricio's with Meme. Every year Meme makes this wonderful breakfast of Monkey Bread and Country Ham Biscuits. It is so delicious and here are all the children around the table enjoying the yummy food.

A family shot in front of the tree with Meme....

This picture is particularly cute for me because everytime I see it the memories of that moment become so vivid for me. It is almost like it is happening all over again. After we opened all the presents under the tree we moved on to our stockings. JP and Shelby got some really great gifts and quit frankly I was a little shocked over the joy with which JP was overcome when he opened this....He unwrapped it and triumphantly held it up and exclaimed, "A fashlight! Yes!!!"

Here is a before picture from Christmas Eve when Shelby and JP were still in a room together and excited about their sleeping bags. Notice how JP is all tucked in and Shelby isn't...that girl, I am telling you, it could be 20 degrees and she still wouldn't sleep with a blanket over her. She definitely subscribes to the less is more philosophy when it comes to clothing and covers.

Shelby and JP were so excited to open a gift on Christmas Eve. Again, note Shelby's outfit....she is wearing one of her spring dresses from last year (thankfully we convinced her to wear a long sleeve shirt under it), no tights/leggings/socks, and her light up pink cowboy boots. Not exactly your traditional Christmas Eve dress, but she loved it. I am telling you the girl has her own sense of style!!!

Before the picture above we spent time at Papa John and Grammie's for a Christmas Eve dinner. The children were so excited to see their Uncle Jake and had the most fun playing with him. This is a great picture the captures the essence of the evening with Uncle Jake.

And to close...last year at the Christmas Eve service we got a picture of Shelby very similar to this one where she was holding her candle and so I wanted to try to get one of JP this year. I tell you, is there anything more innocent then this!!!

Silent Night, Holy night. All is calm, all is bright.

We hope that everyone had a wonderful Christmas filled with lots of joy and great memories. We pray that as this new year gets under way that you will find peace and comfort in Jesus!

Conversation with JP

Today as I was putting my sweet buddy to bed this was our sign off.....

Mom- "Night, night JP. Have a great nap."
JP- "Night, night...no wait, I mean, Merry Christmas."
Mom- "Merry Christmas, JP."

So funny that he is still saying Merry Christmas!!!

Happy 3rd Birthday Buddy!

There is so much to blog about, but right now I am going to take time to blog to my little buddy who turns 3 today.

To my sweet JP: I can't believe that you are 3 today, 3!!! It is just crazy, happy, and sad all at once that you are growing so fast. It seems like just yesterday we were terribly sleep deprived and nothing would get you to stop crying. Now you are a happy sweet boy who is gaining more and more independence everyday. You love to be outside riding your bike and your scooter; you love to climb trees and play in the dirt. Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that time would go by so fast. You are our sweet son and Shelby's dear brother. We love you so much!!!

So today is the day that JP turns 3!!! It is just amazing that he is 3! I think that if I say it enough it will sink in; but also, the more I say it, the more strange it sounds. To think that three years ago today it was a Saturday. Pratt and I were at Wild Wings watching Clemson go for the 19th win verses Maryland to open their season 19-0 and before the game even ended Pratt and I went to the hospital and later that night we had our baby boy. All along I thought we would have a girl and even 30 minutes before he was born we were only talking about girl names; and then to our great surprise we had a boy and what a blessing he is to us. It is an exciting day, but also in a way a sad day to think of how big he is getting and how he really isn't a baby anymore. Don't get me wrong, I am glad that his baby days are over as he proved to be on the difficult end of the baby spectrum, but at the same time I do miss all those moments with him and strangly enough sometimes I miss the middle of the night feedings with him when the world is quiet

We have had a day of celebrating so far. It started this morning at 7:00 when JP woke up. I went into his room, gave him a great big hug and said, "Happy Birthday buddy! You are 3 today." He looked me straight in the eye and said, "Happy Birthday!"-kind of like you tell someone Merry Christmas after they say it to you. It was the cutest thing. When I put him down for his nap I told him happy birthday again and he said it back to me. Then as I was walking out of his room he says, "Hey, hey, hey, hey mom...Merry Christmas!" with the sweetest little grin that anyone has ever seen. So, back on track. We went to Moe's after CBS, as is our routine every Wednesday, with the Usserys and Alberts. It was so much fun. My dear, sweet friend, Erin, made a guitar cake for JP and we all sang "Happy Birthday" to the birthday boy. Afterward Erin asked JP which part of the cake he wanted and he said the middle part with all the sprinkles so Erin very neatly cut out the center of the guitar and lifted up the middle piece without messing anything up. Of course, JP just ate the sprinkles and icing off the top, but he enjoyed every last bit of it.


I looked and looked through pictures from last year and really couldn't find one that gave a whole shot of his face, so this one will do. I don't feel like his face looks all that different than it did a year ago, but you can definitely tell that his hair has gotten thicker! I am telling you, his hair grows like weeds and I love every last curl on his adorable head. So much has changed in this last year...he goes to school now, he talks all the time, asks questions non stop about anything and everything, loves to be with his friends, sleeps in a big boy bed, sleeps through the night more nights than he doesn't, loves to sing, plays pretend with Shelby all the time, and on and on.

When JP turned one we were on a family trip to the mountains. The hat in this picture is probably familiar. He still loves to wear this hat and I am getting nervous about what we are going to do when his head finally grows out of it. Funny that the hat still fits two years later....

And now to the picture that always makes me get a little emotional about how fast time really goes. It just doesn't seem right that three years have gone by so fast and this little, helpless baby in my arms is now my sweet little monkey boy who even climbs stairs with one foot on one step at a time. I mean, he couldn't even hold his head up three years ago!!!

JP-never forget how much God loves you and how much we love you. You are a sweet precious gift from God! Thanks for all the laughter, joy, and love you bring to our family.

PS-in case you were wondering, Clemson lost the game against Maryland three years ago and I still maintain to this day that if Pratt had let me stay to watch the end that they would have won:) (oh come on babe-you knew I couldn't finish this post without mentioning that....love you!)