Christmas Parties and Nate on the Move

Nate got to go to a Christmas Party with mom and dad and he loved crawling over to the crackling fire

Nate's cousins Anna Claire, Matthew, and Oscar sent Nate a few things to help him get into the Christmas Spirit so we let him open it early for a little practice so that he would be ready for the big day. He knew exactly what to do.

Tis the Season! and SNOW

Our very own Clark Griswold hanging lights in the snow



Nate's very first snow flake touched his sweet face was last weekend. It was just a quick flurry and no white stuff on the ground but he was still pretty interested as to why he was out in the freezing cold.

7 Months Old

I can hardly believe that Nate is 7 months old already. Everyone told me that when you have kids time flies and it is the truth! We both are both still in shock that we have a real live baby living with us. And now that baby is on the move. Nate starting crawling the day he turned 7 months old. Nate only likes to crawl if he is really motivated. If you put a cell phone or a remote control down in front of him he is gone. Go figure. He also clapped for the 1st time this weekend. He loves it when we clap and over the weekend he was trying so hard to get his little hands to make the clap sound. I would do just about anything to get him to giggle (and I do since it gets me every time). Hearing his laugh if the best thing that my ears have ever heard.

Thanksgiving

THis is Nate's cousin Jacob and even at this young age this boys are buds! Nate got super excited whenever Jacob came to play with him,

All the old ladies at the pool were checking out my boys.

We all had such a great time spending Thanksgiving in Florida with Oma and Papa.

It was warm enough for Nate to hit the pool and boy did he enjoy the swim.

Let the Season Begin!

THis week Nate went to meet Santa for the 1st time. I know a little early but when I went to make and appointment this was all I could get. He was a little skeptical of the jolly ole man but he really liked the bright lights on the CHristmas tree. Nate asked Santa for his front bottom teeth and some wrapping paper.I also included a few videos of our day to day activites. The bottom video has a clip of Nate "waving" he waved goodbye when Eliva (the Nanny) left and we both got really excited. However I am not 100% that it was an intentional wave. What do you think?

Growth

This post may be a little philosophical but the past week deserves a little reflection.

This week presented some challenges that stretched me as a mother, a wife, a professional, and as a person trying to do all of these things at some level of success. I consider myself very blessed and lucky to have such a charmed life. I have everything I have ever wanted (and then some). All this contentment makes me happy just where I am and gives me little reason to push myself or head towards some new challenge. Sometimes God has different plans. We all need challenges to stetch us and help us grow however sometimes the challenges in the growth process are not so fun.
An opporunity came across my path at work and it was a situation that involved a lot of work, traveling out of state to meet a client, and taking a risk. I decided that I would go for it. In order for my efforts to be successful I needed to put in a lot of extra work preparing and a lot of preparation to make sure that Nate would be all set while I was gone. It was a tight schedule and everything was going to have to go according to plan.
Well, that did not happen. Nate's little cold got worse, he started waking up at all hours of the night, the nanny has to cancel last minute which put me behind at work, Rob had a conference and he was gone nights and over the weekend, then I started to get Nate's cold. I also needed to be at Rob's conference for a few wife events. I was hanging in there and then my cold turned into the terrible sinus infection and since I am still nursing my body could not get over the cold quickly like normal it just kept getting worse. I am the kind of person who operates on the understanding that if I just work harder or push myself a little more than I can get through something. However this attitude is conterproductive to illness. The more I kept going the sicker I got. I had a very tough time because I could not control it. I was up in the middle of the night rocking my sick baby and I felt like I was at the end of my rope. I was physically so weak and I realized that I could not do this myself. I started praying that Christ would give me strength to get through the week and make it to the appointment and that I would rely on him and not myself. I clung to Philippians 4:13 " I can do everything through Christ who gives me strength" . The rest of the week was an up hill climb. I will spare all the details but I know that the Lord carried me through. Friday arrived and I made the drive to meet the potential client and I realized a few things.
- Our health is such a precious gift. I am so thankful for a healthy growing baby boy
- that challeges are a necessary part of personal and professional growth
- These challenges that I faced this week are nothing compared to some of the struggles that other mothers go through and I am so thankful for my countless blessings.

Rob spend his 1st 24 hours alone with Nate so he also had an adventure and a growth experience but since he is more private about his personal growth you can just ask him how his week went.

Halloween

Nate spent Halloween morning at Mimi and Granddad's house and he got to go trick or treating in the the golf cart to all of their friend's house. He loved the golf cart ride and he got lots of candy that Granddad ate! Good thing that he went that morning because by Halloween afternoon poor Nate was full force into his first cold :(

He got better mid week and then it came back and now we are all sick so we have been trying to rest all weekend. Poor Nateis experiencing the stuffy nose and it is just pitiful

Hopefully we will be better soon!

6 Months Old!!!

Nate is 6 Months Old!!!

We are all loving this age. Nate seems to love it to. He is a champ at rolling over and scooting all around. He moves all around the room however, he has not launched into a full fledged crawl. He makes all kinds of noises and he is enjoying his first few tastes of FOOD. So far he seems to like the fruit and vegies.

His hair is getting long enough that he wakes up with some serious bed head on some mornings. Last week we had to take a picture right when he woke up because his hair was sticking up. It is so adorable.

We tried to take some pictures of Nate in his Halloween outfit last weekend when it was nice and warm. We could not get him to sit still but he sure makes a cute Giraffe. Here is Nate trying to eat the pumpkins.

This is my 2nd post this week so if you missed it, check out the last post- Road Trip

Happy Halloween!

Road Trip

Nate was fasinated with Jay and Quinn!

And of course he LOVES Traci's new house and he always enjoys visiting with Jessica

We had a whirlwind of trip this week. Dad went to see the new private practice that his buddy from Duke opened. Rob and Joe were Rheumatologists together at Duke and now Joe has his own show in Raleigh. It is quite impressive. I also had a client meeting in Raleigh and managed to squeeze in a few visits. Nate was a great sport as we managed to fit all of this in one and half days. On our way back to Atlanta we had dinner with GiGi (great grandmother). Nate put on quite a show for her and his great aunt Jane. He loved the soft carpet at GiGi's house and he was almost crawling.

It was a long car trip for a super short visit but we got a lot of good visits in!

Check back mid week or so for some halloween posts!

THe videos are found!!!!!!

I have officially lost my mind. For the past five months I have been trying to keep it all together; Having a baby, attempting to keep house, entertain family, maintain a career, and show up to places looking like I have gotten some sleep. For the most part I feel that I have done a decent job. However, yesterday I did something that made me feel like failure. I lost my flip video camera. I suspect that I lost it prior to yesterday, but it was yesterday that I realized it went missing. This video camera has some of the most precious memories of my baby and yes, I do put the highlights on the blog but for the most part there is tons of footage that had not been saved on a computer. I turned my house upside down. I looked everywhere. I looked under every piece of furniture and this only made me feel worse because I realized that I do not clean under the couches and soon Nate will be crawling to these dusty dirty locations. My mind kept repeating, what kind of mother loses the video camera with all the memories on it. I entered into a deep self loathing. (thank you mother for taking my desperate phone calls). I obsessed about for the better part of 24 hours. I lost sleep over it, and I really do not have any extra sleep (or energy for that matter) to be giving to anything like this. In a last ditch effort I decided to dig through the trash. So like a mad woman I got out there this afternoon with gloves and went through the big out door trash can and pulled out garbage and after a few minutes I FOUND THE FLIP CAMERA!!!! I was elated. I was not a terrible mother after all. I left like willy wonka with the golden ticket. I cannot believe that I almost threw away my precious memories, but I am not going to go there. I am just going to be thankful that I have the camera and some more precious memories to share with you.

Happy 10-10-10 Birthday Daddy!

Happy 10-10-10 birthday Rob!!!!

We have had a week full of celebrations. On Tuesday Nate attended his 1st happy hour. One of Rob's fellows (rheum doc in training) had her 30th birthday on Tuesday and since it was early Nate came along to wish her happy birthday.

Then Friday mom and dad went out for a Date night to celebrate Rob's birthday. Thank you Mimi and granddad for watching Nate.

Mommy's sippy cup

Nate says Happy Birthday!

5 Months Old

Nate is 5 months old already! He is so much fun and he is a jumpy, squirmy happy little boy.

He loves his bouncer and moving all around. He is an expert turner on the playmat and he loves to roll and roll. No official crawl yet but he is close. I had a hard time getting his 5 month kermit picture because he kept moving all around and trying to eat kermit.

Warning: the video make make cause motion sickness, Nate likes to move all around in the bouncer

Smiles, Giggles, and a special visitor

This is Nate's great-grandfather. He came all the way from Florida to meet Nate. We had a great visit and Nate really enjoyed spending time with him. The 1st picture is 4 generations. This is my mother's father.

Nate is all smiles these days and it is so much fun. Smiles are actually really difficult to catch since my camera is not fast enough and once the flash goes off Nate gives me a funny look but I have been determined to capture them so that everyone could see how smiley and happy he is. Nate loves play time and he is ready for action!

Nate's Baptism

Nate is wondering why he is wearing a dress :)

But this is not just any dress, this is the Baptism Gown which has been passed down for generations from Rob's mom's family. Rob wore this very gown a few years ago and the family tradition of faith continues to be passed down to each new family member. Nate was honored to be wearing such a special piece of family history. A big blue N was stiched next to his cousins's J (for Jacob) to symbolize his baptism. The gown has to make way to Germany soon for Rob's cousin's new baby.

We had a great weekend with our family and Nate enjoyed spending time with everyone. He had so much fun that Sunday night he was so worn out from all the company that he slept from 7pm- 4am which is a lifetime record for the Boy!!!!!! After nearly 2 half weeks of sleepless nights we were thrilled to get a few zzs