Christmas Festivities Part II: Christmas Eve

This year we had the 2nd annual Christmas Eve Dinner at our house. We started off the evening by going to the Christmas Eve service at our church and then back home for food and presents! We had a TON of food and a TON of fun! Mark's mom and his sister, her husband and our 2 nieces came over. Clay loves spending time with his cousins so he had a blast! I took a ton of pictures, so I'll just let them tell the story!

Clay's cousins, Grace and Ellie.

About to break into the first present. He was excited about the Elmo wrapping paper!

He loved his new PJs... especially the Elmo ones!

He also loved his Toy Story book his Nan got him.

His Nan also got him a big Thomas train set. I had been holding off getting him anything Thomas since I knew he'd be getting a lot of it for Christmas. He will not stop playing with his trains!

Grace got a new North Face jacket.

Ellie got a Cam Newton jersey...

And Justin Bieber's Life Story... amazing a 16 year old can already have a life story book!

Clay got a Thomas shirt from his Nan and had to wear it immediately.

These are body pillows... but they look more like flotation devices.

Clay helped his Nan open the book we made for his 2nd year.

He also helped Aunt Lee Lee and Uncle Ray Ray open their gifts.

But I think his favorite gift of the night was Uncle Ray Ray's coffee cup. Not sure if it's a good thing that he knows how to "turn it up"!

Clay was exhausted from all the fun and more than willing to go to bed. Before we went to bed we watched his video from Santa one last time and then made sure we told "Ho Ho" all the presents he wanted before he went to sleep.

Christmas Festivities Part III: Christmas Day coming up!

Christmas Festivities Part I: Clay's Christmas Party

This year I volunteered to help out with Clay's Class Christmas Party. I made Oreo Truffles, got some Christmas cupcakes, Cheeze-it's and Elmo juice boxes... everything 1 and 2 year old's love! It was a lot of fun watching them devour their treats and have a good ole time!

Clay was very serious when it came to drinking his Elmo juice! He didn't want to waste a drop... until he discovered how funny it was to squeeze it and make juice go everywhere!
This is sweet Jiselle. She and Clay have been in the same class almost since he started at this school.

Here's all the kids enjoying their treats. I think it's so cute how they all sit at the little table!
Cute little Cadence... She LOVED the Oreo Truffles!
Clay was a mess when he was finished!
Clay with 2 of his teachers, Miss Haley and Miss Ashley. Miss Haley is his girlfriend and he LOVES her! She's been his girlfriend for quite a while now. I thought his love for her would fade, but it's still going strong! I keep telling him that she's engaged, but I guess he just doesn't care.
More to come from our Christmas Festivities as soon as I can get the pictures downloaded to my computer!

27 Months

Clay... You are now 27 months!

This month your language has REALLY taken off! You are so cute when you say things. I can ask you your name and you say "Ca-Lay". The other day when I picked you up from school, I said "Hey, Buddy" and you said "NO, Ca-Lay!" You talk in full sentences now and say all kinds of words I didn't know you even knew! The other day we were looking at the Christmas tree and one of the many Aubie ornaments was turned the wrong way and you said "Aubie is backwards". Everything you see now you say "I need (fill in the blank)"... "I need that book", "I need that hat". You know so many colors, shapes, letters and numbers it's hard to even keep up. You even recognize you name when I write it out for you.

You LOVE the Christmas tree and are obsessed with looking (and touching) every ornament. There is an ornament that plays "Grandma Got Ran Over By A Reindeer" that you love! You press the button to turn on the music and dance around the room. You like to find every Aubie ornament and turn on all the ones that have buttons. You are very excited about "Ho Ho". He sent you an email video the other day and you had to watch it over and over. You couldn't believe that he had pictures of you and knew that you wanted Thomas the Train stuff. Every night before we go to bed, I always ask you who we are going to talk to... typically you say "Jesus"... but now you've added "Ho Ho" to the list. We talk to Jesus first... and then you have to tell Ho Ho what you want for Christmas. This list always consists of choo-choo's and movies.

You're starting to move on from Elmo and Sesame Street and replacing it with Veggie Tales and Mickey Mouse. You LOVE Mickey Mouse and would watch it all day long if we'd let you. You still like to watch Thomas and anything Dinosaurs. You love Christmas shows... I think we've watched Merry Madagascar 20 times! You love the Charlie Brown Christmas movie and can pick out the Charlie Brown theme song whenever you hear it. You have also made your mother proud this month... I played you the Hippo Christmas song (I Want a Hippopotamus for Christmas) and now you request it over and over. You are definitely my child!

You're going through a touch of the terrible two's and sometimes DRIVE ME CRAZY!!! Time-out is still working pretty good for you and counting to "3" (with a 2 1/2... 2 3/4 thrown in there) usually gets you to stop what you are doing.

You like to play with your Toy Story people and Mr. Potato Head. We've also pulled out your Little People Christmas Village and you love playing with that. You love it when we give you the Toys R Us or any Toy magazine from the newspaper and will sit there and look at it forever! You pick out what you want us and Ho Ho to get you. One time you told us you wanted "Barbies" and we said "No, that's for girls"... so now you think it's funny to tell us you want Barbies. Sometimes we'll ask you if you want Barbies and you say "No, girls!".

One cute thing that you've started doing is calling dada, "Daddy". You will occasionally call me "Mommy", but most of the time it's "Mama". You've even started telling us "Love You". Melts my heart every time. You've gotten really good at saying "Please" and "Thank You".

You still let me rock you to sleep and I love that! You like to sing while we rock... you are quite the singer! You must get that from your Mama :o). Your favorite song is "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star"... although, you think it's "Pinkle Pinkle Little Star". You also sing the Barney theme song and the "ABCs". You continue to be a great sleeper - you go to bed at 8:00 and I get you up at 7 on school days and you sleep in usually until about 8 on the weekends. You still even take your 3 or 4 hour naps on the weekends. Please don't EVER change that!

You've been so much fun and there's just so many new things that you do each month! Can't wait to see what happens next month!

Christmas Parade

Last night was our small city's Christmas Parade. It was absolutely FREEZING outside, but that didn't stop us from depriving our little man of seeing the big Christmas Parade. We bundled everyone up and headed down to freeze our butts off!

Clay was a little bored waiting on the parade to start.
I got him his first pair of gloves and he was very excited about them... until he discovered that he could pick up more candy if he took them off!

And I know there are haters out there that look down on people who use the backpack leashes, but let me just tell you... that thing saved my child's life! Ok, that was a little dramatic, but it did help keep him from getting trampled by the band, some horses and Santa. It was dark outside and I definitely did not want to have to go running down the street after my crazy two year old! Thanks so much to my friend Jen who had this in her car!

And Clay didn't even mind it. In fact, he didn't want anyone but me to hold onto the leash! Such a Mama's boy!

He did let Daddy hold it for one picture, but then leash duty was back to me. His poor little teeth are probably chattering which is why his smile looks a little funny in this picture.

We hung out with the Harris family. Jack and Clay were racking up on the Candy!

Everybody on the floats, tractors, trucks, etc. would throw candy as they went by. Clay would get so excited and say "Yay, Candy!" and run out and pick it all up.

Clay loved this choo-choo!

And finally Santa showed up... on his fire truck!

Clay was VERY excited to see "Ho Ho"!

I'm very glad we decided to go even though it was freezing! Clay had a great time!

Happy Turkey Day!!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving! This year we spent it at my Granny's house and had the best time! My mom and dad, sister and her family came over from Atlanta. We ate WAY too much and played WAY too hard! I'll let the pictures tell the story!

Ever since we carved pumpkins for Halloween, Clay has been obsessed with them! My Granny had a bunch of fake pumpkins that he and Cady had a good time playing with.

My sister and my little niece, Hailey.

The guys doing what they do best after eating a HUGE Thanksgiving meal - watch football and sleep.

Clay and his G watching some football.

My sweet Granny and my sister, Juli.

It was impossible to get everyone looking at the camera at the same time. This was the best I had!

The weather turned out gorgeous, so we took the kids outside. Cady got to go fishing and then played with Clay in the leaves. They had a great time burying each other!

And chasing each other...

Clay loved to lay down in the leaves!

After a fun day of good food and lots of play, it was time to head home. Clay did not have an afternoon nap, so as soon as we got in the car, he was OUT!

One cool thing that happened while I was at my Granny's was that I got to talk to my cousin who is over in Afghanistan. He's been over there for a couple of months now and probably will be there for at least 4 more. It was good to hear his voice and know that he was safe and sound... for the moment. He said that he had gotten to eat some turkey... although, it was definitely not as good as Granny's!

We have so much to be thankful for! Hope everyone had a fabulous Thanksgiving!!!

Merry Christmas to Me!!

Santa delivered my Christmas present a little early this year... most likely because it would have not fit on his sleigh. We've been wanting to do something in our family room that would hold the TV, all the components as well as ALL of Clay's toys that were taking over that room. We decided to see if our cabinet guy could make us a wall unit to accomplish all of this. We got our designer friend, Leigh, to design it and come up with all the dimensions and it turned out PERFECT!!! I LOVE it!

Here's a before picture...
That was a sad little TV stand! I'm so glad to pass it up to the Racing Room Mark has upstairs. And look at all those toys on either side! They were driving me crazy!!!

And here is my BEAUTIFUL wall unit!!!

Yes, I know it looks a little sad with just the TV and a couple of pictureless picture frames, but one day it will be glorious!

And the best part...

All of the toys fit inside the doors!!! I can't tell you how thrilled I am about that!

And Clay loves it too!

Now I just need to get Leigh over here to help me fill up the shelves!

26 Months!

So I’m about a week late in posting this, but it’s been a little wild around here.

What’s up with Clay this month??

Clay’s vocabulary has really taken off in the last few weeks! He’s combining words into sentences and he’s really picking up on his letters. We’ve got a Fridge Phonics toy that helps him with his letters and he knows about 18 of them! He likes to pick out the letters he knows when we read books and still LOVES his books! He also loves to sing. He can almost sing the whole alphabet and he loves to sing Elmo’s World, the Thomas the Train theme song and Old MacDonald. When we sing Old MacDonald, I always let him pick out the animals we are going to sing about… Old MacDonald usually has a farm full of Dinosaurs and Aubies.

Speaking of Aubie… Clay loves to watch Auburn Football! Anywhere we are that has the AU symbol, he has to point it out and says “Auburn”! He’ll say “War Eagle” and “Touchdown, Auburn”. Every tiger that we see is now “Aubie” and if we try to call it a tiger, he will correct us and say “No, Aubie”.

He’s also growing like a weed! I think he’s at least grown 2 inches since his 2 year well check! He has to wear a 3T in pants for the length and a 4T in top because he’s so long-waisted. His hair is finally starting to fill in really well… it’s almost time for his 2nd hair cut!

He’s eating pretty good… actually, I’ve just given up on trying to get him to try new things and let him eat what he likes. I do try to sneak new things in occasionally and sometimes he goes for it. The main things he likes are Nutri-grain Bars, chicken nuggets, peanut butter crackers, cheese puffs, yogurt, fruit, and any kind of cookie or cake. He’s actually started eating green beans from a can and will occasionally eat broccoli… but other than that, no veggies!

Right now he is REALLY into Toy Story, Thomas the Train and Dinosaurs. He still loves his Sesame Street and hasn’t completely given up his Elmo obsession. His new favorite thing is looking through all the toy books that come in the newspaper for Toys R Us, Target, or other stores and pick out all the Toy Story, Dinosaur, and Thomas things he wants. He will look through those magazines a gazillion times!

I think he’s been having a touch of the terrible two’s lately. Sometimes I think the only word he knows is “NO”. He’s a very strong-willed child when he wants his way and it’s hard not to just give in. Time out has been working pretty well. Sometimes I can threaten it once and he’ll stop. If he does get time out, it breaks his heart. He does not like to be taken away from the action.

He has been battling an ear infection for the last week… his 2nd one in 4 weeks! He’s got tubes, but one is clogged which is the one he’s been getting the ear infections in. We’ve been told that if he gets a 3rd we may have to look into getting it fixed. I have a feeling that is going to be a given. Especially since it’s not even winter!

He’s getting to be such a big boy and so independent!! He’s at a fun age where everything is exciting and new and we love to see how he reacts to things. Can’t wait to see what all he learns this month!

Here are some pictures from this last month!

He likes to wear hats... Dada's Auburn hats are the best, but sometimes his Easter basket will do!

He's got a great fashion sense... oversized fuzzy house shoes, dinosaur pants and grey hoodies are all the rage for this winter! (And he insisted on leaving the house like this! Thankfully, we were only going to Sonic to get me a drink.)
Takes after his dada... likes to help out with sweeping the floors!