Cool Contest

If you are into scrapbooking you could win $150 worth of great papers and accents just by commenting on this blog before Jan. 2. Even though I haven't gotten around to it in ages, I have a pipe dream that one day I will return to my scrapping! Jack will probably be in college, but a girl can dream, right?

Click here to view the contest & information.

A must read...

So, I'm still up catching up on reading all my fellow bloggers posts and such from the past week. I found one that summed it up pretty well, the 12 Steps to Recovery.

Merry, Merry

I'm hoping you all are just as exhausted as I am. It was a wonderful week of celebrating Christmas and being with family and friends, but it was also an exhausting week. The car has been completely loaded, unloaded, loaded again & unloaded again of luggage, gifts, etc. Although nothing is back where it goes yet. Our dining room table and foyer looks like Target, Toys 'R Us and Macy's threw up. I hope I don't seem ungrateful, because we appreciate all the wonderful things we received, but now it's time to find a home for each one.

We spent Christmas Eve with my family. A couple of hours with my parents, sister, brother & sister-in-law. Jack was pretty fun and even opened a few gifts. Maybe he was in such a good mood because he took a monster nap on the way to Grandma & Grandpa's. Notice the lovely hair.

Afterwards, we headed to my grandparents' for dinner and more fellowship with cousins. It is always a lot of fun and we have a sort of non-traditional meal (low country boil, fried shrimp, hush puppies). Mimi grew up in South Georgia so they always had a coastal Christmas complete with shrimp and anything that goes with it. It's certainly nice to enjoy something other than the typical turkey and ham for once. While we were pulling up, we realized this was the first time Josh had been in 3 years! He has worked the last 2 Christmas Eves in the ER (here last year and in S.C. the year before.)

Christmas morning Josh, Jack and I woke up and celebrated together. Jack was very excited about the car Santa left and kept making his car motor noise. He was pleasantly surprised to find he could get in this car. My parents and sister came up for a laid-back lunch (sandwiches) and movies. The weather was so nice we took Jack's car out for its first road test. He seemed to enjoy it. He loves pushing the button that plays a little song and then dancing to the song. I also made buckeyes (one of Josh's favorites).

On Friday morning, we left at 6:30 to head toward Rome to spend some time with Josh's family. We left early because we had several stops to make. We did a little bit of shopping and then met Carsten & Sarah in Atlanta for an early lunch. Carsten & Josh went to high school together. We went to their wedding in Philadelphia back in May. They live in D.C. and were on their way back. It was so great to visit with them. They couldn't believe how much Jack had grown. (I guess they don't read the blog...lol! Hard to believe? I know.)

Our next stop was Kennesaw to visit with 2/3 of the Pucketts. Wendy had to work, but we were able to hang out with Ben & BJ for a couple of hours. Jack loves playing with BJ. It was a great afternoon. Finally, we made it to Rome. We enjoyed a wonderful dinner with Josh's parents and sister and brother-in-law-to-be. Before it got too late, we opened gifts. Jack really liked the rocking horse. Although, he'll have to grow into it, he will really be rocking it soon!

Early Saturday morning we left to head to Chattanooga to spend the day at Josh's aunt & uncle's house. All his cousins were there, including Derek & Joy (who live in Brooklyn) with their new baby, Emi. It was exciting to meet Emi. We've been admiring pictures for months. She is a real sweetie, and she'll have to be one tough cookie to put up with all these boys around! We managed to get this shot of all the grandkids.

On the way home we managed to share a meal with all of the Pucketts, Wendy included, as we stopped off the interstate. We enjoyed all the time with family and friends, but are always glad to be back home. I got photos uploaded yesterday while Jack took a monster nap after church. I should be working on sorting and putting away all the new gifts, but instead I'm updating you all on our week. Hope yours was just as blessed!

It was too quiet

I've always heard other moms say they knew their little ones were up to something because "it was too quiet." I thought it might have been just one of those things that moms say or was at least a year or two off from our vocabulary. We'll if it didn't happen twice today with Jack.

Jack really enjoys exploring and happily plays with his toys with or without you (although there is usually a lot more laughter if you join in!) Today I was trying to get a million things done. Needless to say, he did a lot of independent play. This morning as I was on the computer checking messages and paying a couple of bills, he was happily playing in the upstairs living room. Batting his balls around the room and then it got quiet...too quiet. I walked into the room to find him playing with the remote to the television, which is off-limits to him (and he knows this!) He looked at me so innocently, as if he hadn't been caught red-handed!

Then, this evening just after Josh got home it got quiet again! Josh was changing and getting his things together for his night shift, and I was in the kitchen preparing a dessert for our Sunday School Christmas Party. Jack was crawling back and forth between our bedroom and the kitchen. In his defense, it was his dinner time; and I was again trying to get too many things done at once! After playing in the living room for a while, he got too quiet. I walked in to find that he had pulled the tissue box off the side table and pulled 20+ tissues out of the box and was happily sitting in his mess of tissues! I wanted to scold him until I noticed he was trying to eat them! The poor kid was hungry! So, I sheepishly pulled my poor starving child's dinner together and discarded the half-eaten tissues, but not before snapping a photo to share with all of you!

Hope you all are enjoying your holidays! I'm looking forward to a fun week with family and friends. Safe travels to you all!

A couple of photos...

Star in the Making?

I haven't had the opportunity to blog much this past week. It has been a rather hectic week around here. Our church was putting on a Christmas production on Saturday and Sunday evening and our family was responsible for two of the actors. Josh played the role of Jesus (as an adult, of course) and Jack was young Jesus (a one-year-old Jesus...not much of a stretch, huh?).

Anyway, the production took us to church every night Wed-Sun for rehearsals and then the actual performances. It was important for Jack to be at each rehearsal because they were recording them for a DVD they are putting together. I was really proud of how well he did. Not so much as an actor, because he really just had to sit there and play with some blocks and look at the Three Wise Men and Mary & Joseph, but as a one-year-old staying up way past bedtime 4 nights in a row.

The Sunday evening performance began at 6, so we actually got home in time to put Jack in bed at a normal hour. He was a little grumpy this morning, but that could have been because I dragged him shopping and to the grocery store. Anyway, hopefully we'll be getting back to normal this week. I like to think he's wondering why he didn't get dressed up and play with any wooden blocks tonight (for the first time in 5 days)....ha, ha, ha! I wish I had gotten a picture of him during the show, but I was waiting off stage. Here's a picture of him in his costume.

Tis the Season

Tis the season for baking goodies. Here's what 10 dozen cookies look like! That's right, 10 dozen.

I was invited to participate in a cookie/treat swap. For the swap we were asked to assemble 20 bags of treats or cookies with a 1/2 dozen cookies in each bag. All the baking was worth it, I came home with 20 bags of treats which I'm sharing with all the sweet folks who take care of Jack at church (Sunday School teachers, Early Steps Preschool teachers, Nursery workers).

What a Difference

What a difference a year makes. What a difference a day makes. What a difference a couple of hours makes. Yesterday was full of rain. This morning started out much the same. I'm not complaining because we sure needed it, but rainy always makes me just want to stay inside. I had a couple of errands to run so this afternoon we ventured out. I soon noticed the sun was brightly shining and the temperature was hovering around 60 degrees. Pretty nice for December...especially since this is the same town where it snowed last week!

Once we got home, I couldn't resist taking Jack out for a stroll. I plopped him in his wagon and off we went around the neighborhood. It was so nice. As I was pulling him, it occured to me that we had a stretch of 2-3 pretty warm days in early to mid-December last year. Believe me, I remember...it allowed me to get out of the house with my 2 week old and stroll around the block.

What a difference a year makes.

The Proofs are Here

Less than a week later and our fabulous photographer has our proofs from Jack's photo shoot online. Anyway, they are so incredibly cute that I couldn't help but post the link here. I hope you all enjoy these adorable shots as much as I do!

Link to Jack's proofs

Say Cheese

Saturday we took Jack to have some photos made, sort of commemorating his first birthday. A great gal I grew up with does photography in our hometown. I've been admiring her images for months on her website and facebook profile. I was excited for the opportunity to have her photograph Jack. The shoot took us to Athens, actually Winterville (which is right outside of Athens). We even managed to get some Christmas shopping done and squeeze in a home-cooked meal with my family. (Thanks, mom!)

Anyway, Sue Ann (our photographer) posted a few "sneak peek" shots from Jack's session on her blog. There's one shown here, but hope you'll take a look. We are so pleased with what we got. We can't wait to see the rest. Thanks, Sue Ann!

I guess it's also been several days since an update, so I'll fill you in on some fun things that happened this week. First of all, it snowed here on Monday! Fun, right? None of it stuck, but it was so pretty! Here's a picture of it coming down in our backyard. Jack wasn't nearly as interested in watching it fall as I was. Maybe once there's some to play in, he'll be more into the snowfall. Anyway, how cool is it that we have snow here on Dec. 1? "Very" is the expected answer!

Our final MOPS meeting of the calendar year was on Friday, and it was a bit silly! We had a game where each table had to make one of their members into a reindeer with only the supplied materials. Somehow I was selected to be the guinea pig...I think I was a pretty good sport. What do you think?

We also brought cookies to swap and share with the lovely and sweet volunteers who keep our children each meeting. I wasn't in the baking spirit and instead assembled these reindeer cookies I spotted in the Family Fun magazine. I've posted new pictures on the Picasa site as well. Hope you all are enjoying your holiday season.

One Year Old...Can it Be?

Yes, we are officially parents to a one-year-old. Friday marked the first anniversary of Jack's birth. We spent part of the day putting up Christmas decorations and preparing for Jack's party on Sunday. Friday afternoon we headed to Gwinnett and had dinner. The day also marked a year of mothering and fathering, so we treated ourselves to a tasty meal at one of our favorites, Carraba's. Here's Jack showing off his birthday attire, which I made thanks to some serious encouragement from a great friend ;)

Afterwards, we went to Bass Pro Shops for Jack to have his photo made with Santa. He had his photo made last year, but of course was barely a month old. He didn't really smile for the photo and seemed a little leery of this white-haired dude, but I'm just proud he didn't cry.

Sunday was the big party. Lots of family and special friends joined us to help celebrate Jack's first birthday! It was a hectic day getting everything ready, but it all turned out really well. Jack seemed to have fun, and Josh and I sure felt blessed. It was so neat to have so many people from so many different aspects of our life come to support us and share their love with our little one. Thank you all for being such wonderful grandmothers, grandfathers, great-grandmothers, great-grandfathers, aunts, uncles, great aunts, great uncles, cousins and friends! Jack has a lot of people that love him, and for that we are blessed.

What a year it has been. Josh and I have been caught up in the "this time last year" game for a few weeks now. "This time last year, we put up decorations wondering when you would go into labor, or this time last year, we were bringing home a brand-new baby!" Mostly I would say it has flown by, but strangely in some ways it has been a long year. Weird, I know.

What a fun kid Jack is, and the excitement grows each day. We have enjoyed our journey into parenthood (just like everyone said we would) Then again, everyone said it would change us. I guess it has, but only for the good. We're much more thankful people; much more patient people (I think); and much more easily entertained people!

You can view many more photos from Jack's big day here.