early christmas with the hastings/love clan

the week before christmas, we went down to katy/houston to have our christmas with charlie's side of the family.  we had beautiful weather and a lot of fun with the cousins.  smith and london (our niece) played so very well together.  she is just 3 months older than him and they were pretty much inseparable.  it is so fun to watch them and to see how different they act in certain situations, with the boy/girl dichotomy.  the plan was to draw and exchange gifts between all adults so that we could focus on the little ones.  and oh man....everyone did such a good job.  we appreciate all the love and gifts our boys received.



our matching stocking stuffers---headwarmers



one of the gifts i made the girls....a crayon roll, tutorial found here



bode loving the gift opening



the blocks i made for baby ben



tatum wearing the backpack i made for the girls



best buds, checking out brianna the horse



the fun chaos from above


papa and gigi with the babes

**i need to find one of us who took pictures at mema's house.....we had a blast, but i didn't take any pictures.

bode upddate

bode....my little angel.  he is great, as always.  he now has 7, going on 8 teeth and at 7 months was weighing 19 lbs. (75%) and 27 inches tall (50%).  he continually smiles at most everything and very little upsets him.  he is eating lots of solid foods....although we are having some trouble adding more 'textured' food as he seems to have a sensitive gag reflex (so fun).  he is doing great with fine motor, which we practice while eating puffs, tiny bites of fruit and cheese, and yogurt bites.  he is interacting more with smith and gives him a piece of his mind when smith is annoying him.....by yelling...loud!  i really find it so funny when he does this, because finally he is getting a say in play time.  he cuddles, which melts me...loves his pacifier and stuffed giraffe (thor) for nap time.  he is such an easy baby, i feel blessed and cannot wait to see this little, chill guy grow.

"bye bye paci"

one of our goals after smith turned two was to get him off of his pacifier.  he only used it at nap time and bedtime, but we felt like the attachment would only thicken if he continued on using it.  so, i had heard of this idea somewhere...can't remember...that you get the pacifier stuffed into an animal at the build-a-bear workshop. smith was really into it.  we kept telling him that this animal (stuffed one of his choosing) would "eat" his pacifier.  he had done great.  occasionally he will ask for it, but we remind him that ruff-ruff (what he named the stuffed dog) ate it...and he's cool with it.  good job smithy!

my smithy boy is 2!

just so happened that baylor played ttu in dallas on smith's birthday.  my dad bought tickets and we decided we would throw smith a little birthday luncheon with some of our college friends that live in dallas.  it was a 'baylor bear' themed party and i think smith really enjoyed himself.  smith is all about the baylor bears and will go around saying "sic em bears" all the time.  it is so cute.  at his 2 year check up, smith weighed 32 lbs. (92%) and was 37 inches tall (97%).  he is a big and good-looking boy!

love making cakes for my boys!



my mom made these adorable cookies as take home gifts.....delish ginger bread!





a fairly good attempt getting a picture of all the kiddos!



watching baylor win against ttu at cowboy stadium



doc is still happy....even though his team lost

thanksgiving

we got to host thanksgiving this year!  charlie's mom (mema), step-dad (papa), brother cody, sister-in-law sydney, and their daughter london drove up from houston to share a yummy meal and have a good time.

baylor homecoming

this was our first baylor homecoming in a long time.  we went with our good friends, the kohlbachers and enjoyed beautiful weather and a great football game.  smith loved it and bode was a very good (and handsome) boy.

busy season...lots to catch up on...

my excuse this time is the business of my november and december.  we were so, so busy.  i felt like i was constantly preparing for the next thing and had no time to sit down and blog.  i loved it all: homecoming, birthdays, thanksgiving, and christmas, but part of me is ready for this new year....just to have nothing specific on my plate this month.  sprinkled into all of these large events, i hosted 3 'interviewee dinners.'  this means i had all the pediatric interviewees over for dinner the night before their interview at S&W along with their spouses/significant other as well as current residents and their families.  getting ready for 'events' is so different than it used to be.  now that i have 2 small children, i feel i have to begin preparation for things more than a week in advance, but i love it all...so much fun!  i am going to hit the highlights of these past 2 months in pictures......AND, here we go.....

pumpkin patch time

today we had a chance to visit a farm that does pumpkin sales this season.  smith was really into it....and kept repeating his new word 'pumpkin' over and over.  we went with some friends from our 'spouse alliance' i have joined while surviving the life that is a resident's wife :)  good day...smith was so well behaved which makes life so much easier in public.  love my boys!

a few out-takes :

2011 fall fun weekend

this past weekend was our annual fall fun weekend/thanksgiving with charlie's family.  we had so much fun and luckily had really nice weather...not too hot (because it can be in texas in october...crazy annoying that it is still hot this time of year!) but beautifully sunny.  the party is always at our aunt kathy and randy's house.  they live on a bit of land that they have decked out with a great pool, poolhouse, and party barn.  this year instead of the usual softball game, randy set up game stations where we competed for combined points.  we will not go into the details of who won....we will just suffice it to say..the hastings need some work!  we also got to visit charlie's mom and spent sunday hanging out with her and getting to eat some Frank's Pizza!!  

mama and bode, pre-party at papa's swing set

charlie got to meet our nephew, ben (3 months) for the first time!

aunt yaya teaching smith how to putt putt

bode and his cousin, tatum 

smith and papa on the slide

loving life and relaxing in the pool after lots of yummy fried food :)

uncle cody and bode

papa and smith with cousin london

bode and aunt sydney (whose nose bode wanted to constantly bite) with aunt yaya

ending a fabulous day with a great texas sunset 

group shot before heading into houston

bode and mema hanging in the backyard

smith and cousin london....a note on these two--they were so adorable together this trip.  they would have full on discussions in baby language and played so good together.  london is 3 months older than smith and she is a doll...so well behaved and so sweet.  we had a blast!

my handsome hat boys

a funny story about charlie and hats.....

so at baylor, one might say i was a bit boy crazy :)  not that i went on dates with many boys, but that i had many 'crushes' that constantly changed.  so, freshman year, i had a couple of guys on my radar that i knew nothing about except that i would see them on campus often and they would each wear the same hat everyday, respectively.  i had a 'maroon hat boy' and a 'yellow hat boy'....each of whom i thought was a looker.  nothing ever came to fruition with either of them.....so i thought.  but, then once charlie and i started dating end of sophmore year....i saw the yellow hat....which he no longer wore everyday...thank goodness because he had amazing long hair (he will hate that i said that).  and come to find out, he was my 'yellow hat boy' and now, i love him and am married to him.  so, the moral of the story is.....be a little boy crazy, have crushes and you never know who one of those may turn in to :)

oh what a weekend.....

so we have had this weekend scheduled for some time now.  we scheduled reinforcements to come visit (my mom, dad and charlie's dad and s-mom) and assist!  the floors had been ordered, you tube DIY videos had been watched, and many instructions had been read.  it was time to attack the floors and change them out for wood floors.  this would be the first time for every one of us to attempt this task.   it really went so very well, thanks to our parents being there to do anything and everything we asked.  we worked their tails off and probably made them too sore.....we have no way to thank them enough.  the floors look beautiful!  it all started on friday as my dad, mom, and i discussed the many ways to make sure we were getting a 'straight' floor.  we spent about 3 hours deciding on a good reference point, but soon enough we were in a rhythm and things actually got accomplished.  here are some pictures from the weekend that has me limping around today:

ripping up the old floors...with smith's help!




dad and i laying the 'first few rows"...the most important foundation for your floors :)  (many hours of you tube told me this)




making progress friday night...



 early saturday morning for all




smith's premonition of pulling his hair out before it even began...and wearing knee pads like the rest of us!




into the den we go....glue, hammer, saw, glue, hammer, saw.....etc.....etc....




the man of the saw...he worked it many, many times!







by saturday night, we were all loopy, but still having fun.

i didn't get a good picture of gigi,  but she was jack of many trades!  she was gofer, babysitter, and overall support.

we love you mom, dad, bill, and susie....thank you so, so, so much---we would have never finished this without you!