We have been receiving boxes of Christmas gifts from my family this week. I let Coleman open one from my sister and Steve. The present is actually from 1 month old Brooke, so clearly she's a genius. Coleman understands the concept of unwrapping presents, so Christmas will be fun.
Notice our living room no longer has dark, shiny brown trim. I've been on a mission to get our living room trim painted, and I finished last week. Hurray!
My Mom and Dad sent a box our way filled with pre-Christmas gifts and Christmas gifts. One of the gifts from my Mom is a Mickey Mouse Club apron and chef's hat for Coleman. Its perfect! Just what I wanted for him. :) He loves it and it'll keep him clean now. Thanks Meemaw and Peepaw!
Lastly, here is a prego picture of me and my belly. It is always amazing to see my body change shapes and distort so amazingly to house a baby. She's kicking away now, and if I lay still I can even see my belly move. Only 3 months left to go.
When I was eating salad and Coleman was watching, he cracked up when the salad stuck out of my mouth. Of course, I had to keep him laughing so I continued to eat like this perhaps teaching him some bad manners. Jared had found his tiger hat and surprisingly, he liked wearing it while he ate.
Coleman loves to help me bake. He'll push his chair up to the table so he can stand at the end and help me mix. He is an enthusiastic cook. Just in time for all of the holiday baking. He just needs his own apron now. Anyone have some good cookie recipes?
This is one of Coleman's favorite games to play currently. He loves to be startled. Very unlike me, ha, ha.
Coleman got his first haircut last week. He looks like a different boy now. He looks more like a boy than a baby now. Its a little bit sad. He's growing up so fast!
I can now feel our baby girl kicking inside me all the time. Soon enough we'll meet her.
Yesterday we went to an early Thanksgiving with our neighbor's and their family. There was a 3 year old girl there, Regan. She and Coleman took to each other right away, chasing each other around the house. Then she'd give him kisses and he'd grin and look so pleased with himself. He was a like her little puppy dog following her around everywhere. I think it was his first crush.
We took Coleman to the McWain Center Saturday to see the Train Exhibit, here for the holidays. Coleman loved it, but was very serious as he took it all in. The model trains are amazing, especially all of the detail work put into the towns around the trains.
Coleman figured out how to sit on top of his dump truck and will show off his new trick to any visitors we may have.
I am officially halfway through my pregnancy and feeling more energy and less sick. Hurray!
On Sunday Dad Fulton made a visit with us. It was a long drive for him to come all the way up here, so it was greatly appreciated. Coleman took a while to warm up to him, but at the end of the day he was quite comfortable. After dinner, Coleman was holding Jared's hand and reached up to take Grandad's hand and walk together out to the parking lot. It was very sweet! He then had lots of fun sliding off the truck into Jared's arms.
The temperature has dropped at night, and we didn't have any heat on, so in the mornings we would all be cozy in our sweatshirts until the sun warmed up the house. Jared got Coleman to walk around with his hands in his sweatshirt in this video. We got our heat turned on since then so our house is cozy now.
Sue came up to visit for a few hours yesterday. Coleman was so cute with her. He'd be pushing his stroller and then stop and come back and give her a hug. He was specifically showing off for her.
Coleman is showing signs of liking order and cleanliness. If his hands get dirty he'll show them to me and say "Owie" so I'll clean them. When he sees something on the floor like a piece of paper, or food he'll say "Uh-oh" and point it out to me. Then he'll say "Clean up" and won't stop showing me until I clean it up. He also likes his seat to be clean before climbing into it for a meal. He'll point out to me any food bits I missed so i'll clean them up. He also likes telling the dog and cat "No, no". Sadie has bitten several of his toys and when he sees a toy with her bite marks on it he'll say "No bite Sadie".
Today Coleman successfully used the potty after dinner! What a celebration. He is wanting to be more of a big boy, like spooning his yogurt, or pudding into his mouth by himself, or holding onto the banister and walking down stairs.
I made it to 12 weeks pregnant! That's the little nugget causing me so much misery. That's not an actual picture of our nugget, just one i found on line. My suspicion is its a girl since I've been so much sicker this time than I was with Coleman. I turned a corner this last week and suddenly feel my energy back and very little nausea.Coleman's new favorite thing is Bob the Builder videos. He calls them 'Bob bobo'. All day he'll walk around with the DVD in his hands and say "Watch Bob bobo" and I'll say "no watch' so he'll say "no watch bob bobo". yesterday Jared built a desk so we called him Daddy the Bobo, and Coleman was his little helper. He had eaten a ton of raisins and apricots that day and had just filled his diaper prior to helping Jared, thus the comment at the end.
A funny story about Sadie: I went out for the afternoon with Coleman and left Sadie in our back yard. I was pretty sure our gate was securely closed, but had a fleeting thought that maybe it wasn't. When Coleman and I got home Sadie was at the back door ready to come in and greet us. When she ran in I saw, and smelled, that she was muddy from the middle down. She stank like pond muck! I saw the gate was open, and figured out that she had walked herself down to the park where the duck pond is and had a field day. Then she walked herself home like a good girl. She got a bath that night and it was dirty water.
Coleman is mimicking us more and more and learning to make sentences. Here is saying "Back in the bag".
Yesterday we had a huge thunderstorm with hail, trees blowing down and a loss of power. I wonder what hurricaine season will be like? We lost power before dinner last night and didn't get it back until mid-morning today. It was a hot, miserable night of sleeping last night.
We finally got our Alabama license plate today. We are officially Alabamians...Alabamites?
This is a video of Coleman saying Hi to a cat sitting in the driveway. Coleman is learning how to walk on the sidewalk, and not on the grass or someone else's property. He is also learning how to listen to me better. For a while when I would say "Stop" he'd just laugh and run faster away from me as if it was a game. So, the fact that he is mostly listening to me here is huge! I am also teaching him to say "bye-bye" as a signal that we are to move on. Usually this works, but not in this case.
I love living in Birmingham. I haven't had one day where I thought the heat was too much. I spend most of the time outdoors too. Today Jared found a plastic kiddie pool in the garbage as he was rummaging for wood. We've been wanting a pool for a while, so this was a find! One man's trash is our treasure. :)
Coleman and I went to check out the local lake at
Oak Mountain State Park. He loves playing in the sand and dirt. He was very brave getting in the water walking in (with my help) almost to his chest. He is learning to kick as well while swimming. Before hitting the beach we did a short hike. The woods here are so beautiful! Coleman loves to hike with me too. When the path gets flat and even he'll pat my shoulder and say "Down" because he's ready to hike. He hikes well, stepping over roots and rocks, saying hi to all the trees, and helping me find ditches. He loves saying this new word: ditch.I caught Coleman hugging Sadie last night. She is very patient with him. He loves to hug her!
