Happy Mother's Day

Mother's Day 2008

Mother's Day 2009

Oh, how things have changed in a year. Last year at mother's day I had about a two week old baby. I was not expecting to be a mother on mother's day. But my little guy decided that he was going to come five weeks early. This year was less stressful. We had a good time at my in-law's house. Chad was very sweet to buy me flowers for my flower bed, and then he planted them for me yesterday. He also got me a purple orchid. I hope I can keep it alive. I will have to take pictures of my flowers and post them soon.

This is our silly picture. Mitchell has started making this scrunched up nose face. It is hilarious. Everyone had a good laugh at it.

This was one of Mitchell's highlights of the day. He loved bouncing in this toy.

His other highlight, whip cream!

Happy Mother's Day!

First Birthday

Mitchell turned 1 on April 23rd. This was a Thursday, and we had his party on Saturday. I wanted to make his actual birthday special. I thought about taking him to the zoo, but it ended up being a 90 degree day. I just didn't want to get him out in the heat. Also he did not sleep very well the night before. I don't know why, but sometimes he goes through these spells of not sleeping through the night. So, he ended up being kind of tired on his birthday and took two good naps. We ended up going out to eat and then to the park. Which I think that he enjoyed.
We went to this new restaurant in Norman called Cheddars. This was more of a treat for mommy and daddy. But Mitchell did get some green beans from mommy's plate.

Mitchell seemed to enjoy the swing more this time, but we found out he did not like the slide. Maybe next time he will do better on it.

Then I had to get him a cake for his actual birthday. I bought this small cake at Wal-Mart, and it had some balloons on the top of it. I did not get a picture of it before we gave it to Mitchell. I was planning on giving him just a small piece, but Chad gave him the whole thing. Then I tried to cut a piece for him and took some of it away. He did not care because he just dove right in.

He had a blast!

He had to go right in the tub when it was all over.

We had Mitchell's party at my in-law's house. Their house is good for parties because there is more room than our house. This is Mitchell with his friend Kylie. I could not get him to smile. Kylie is two months younger than Mitchell, but they are about the same size.

We had lunch at the party. I got croissant rolls from Sam's and turkey and ham. My mom also made chicken salad.

I made some car and train peanut butter sandwiches for the older kids. I also used the same cookie cutters to make some cookies.

We also had some fruit, veggies, and chips. Everything was very yummy!

Here are some of the kids that came. It was mainly family but a few friends came too. The two blonde's are my friend Laura's daughters. The dark haired girl is Mitchell's cousin.

This is my brother-in-law's dog checking out Mitchell's new dog. Thanks Brenda for this cute picture.

Opening presents was kind of a disaster. After sitting in his high chair for lunch and being held, Mitchell did not want to sit and open presents. We only got a few pictures of him with his presents. I ended up sitting on the floor and opening all of them. Next year this will probably change. At least I hope so.

We got him a bongo drum set. He seemed to really like this.

His grandparents got him a riding car. He liked it, but he has not figured out how to push it around yet.

My friend Brooklyn made the cake. She did such a good job. The theme of the party was trains, cars, and airplanes. I gave her the napkin and she was able to copy the pictures onto the cake. The cake was yummy too! Thanks Brooklyn!

This time we just gave Mitchell a small piece. It did not have to much icing, so he really did not get to messy.

Thanks to Great Grandma Davis we had a bubble blowing machine for entertainment. Overall it was a great party. Thank you to everyone that came and helped.

First Hair Cut

Well, I finally did it. I took Mitchell today to get his first hair cut. It was getting pretty long and just looked kind of scraggly. I decided to take him to this place called Snip Its. They just do children's hair cuts. When we got there only two ladies were working, but they only had one customer. So, we got right in and it did not take long. Mitchell did not cry. He was a perfect angel. I thought that he was getting tired, and maybe that is why he did so good.
Here is the spike look. We decided against this and went more traditional.

Looking pretty good. In the end, I thought that she did take off a little to much around the ears. But really I don't know because I don't have experience with boy hair cuts.

Here are the end results. He looks like such a big boy in this picture. I liked this place, but I don't know if we will always go there for hair cuts. It is kind of far from our house. After the hair cut, Mitchell got to put this card in a machine and out came a prize. It was a bottle of bubbles. There are so many firsts in a baby's life. You just want to cherish all of them. In just two more days he will have his first birthday.

Easter

Our Little Easter Bunny!

Our Easter weekend started out with a visit to the Easter Bunny. My mother-in-law is apart of a junior service league that puts on Breakfast with the Easter Bunny. We went and got Mitchell's picture taken there. As you can tell, Mitchell did not cry but he also did not smile. I'm not sure what he thought. We really could not do much else. He was to small to do the egg hunt and the games. Maybe next year he can participate more.

After church on Easter we went to my in-laws' house. Mitchell got a train basket from us and another Easter basket from his grandparents. I just put empty eggs in his basket. He likes to play with them, and he can't have the candy.

Mamaw decided to put Cheerios in Mitchell's Easter eggs. He loved them!

Nana gave him a cute bunny that matched his outfit. It was kind of cold and rainy outside, but he did alright in his overall shorts.

He also got a duck filled with graham cracker treats. I love the look on his face in this picture.

He also got new p.j.'s. It looks like it is Christmas.

I love this picture. If you can tell, Mitchell is holding up his pointer finger. I say that he is telling us that he is almost one. Or that we are a number one family. Mitchell will be one next week. I just can't believe it. The time has gone by fast.

11 Months

Yes, my baby is 11 months. I am already planning his first birthday party. It has all gone by so fast. He has four teeth, but you can only see the bottom two in this picture. He is always on the go. He has not taken any steps by himself, but will cruise around things.
He got an early birthday present from Mamaw and Papa. It is a toy that you stand up and push. He loves all the little gadgets on the front. I have gotten him to pull up and hold on to the handle, but he has not made any steps yet.


This toy came with some blocks. Mitchell thinks these are the greatest, and they fit in his mouth too.

March Madness

Well, like always I am a little behind in blogging. Last week was spring break. Really things were not that different around our house. But we did get to see Chad more often. He did not teach any classes, but he had to write two papers, grade mid-terms, and do some tours at OU. We did manage to squeeze in some family time. One day we went to Mazzio's for lunch. Mitchell just loves peaches. I got him some off the salad bar and put them on a plate. He went at them with both hands. He loved it. I am not sure how many peaches he ended up eating and how many pieces ended up on the floor. The weather last week was just beautiful, at least the beginning of the week. On another day we took Mitchell to the park. We put him in the swings, and you can see by his expression that he was not sure about it. He loves his swing at home, but I guess that this was a little different.
I love his little expressions. When he is exposed to something different, he just has to take it all in. I could not get him to smile.

I think that this is a great picture of his hair as the wind is blowing it. It was nice outside but a little windy. I guess that is what you always get in OK.

Mitchell even went down the side. Still that same confused look.

It has been March Madness in our house. Mitchell found this basketball the other day and has been glued to it. That is until he dropped it behind the dresser. Daddy needs to get it out for him. The basketball is really a dog toy, but don't tell Mitchell that. We went to Chad's brother's house to celebrate his birthday and watch the OU basketball game last Saturday. Go Sooners! They are doing really well.

March Madness really takes it out of a baby!

Robots!

I am very, very behind in posting this, but I did not want to pass up sharing this. For the past few months Chad has been a mentor at a local high school. He has been working with a robotics class. They have been building a robot to compete against other high schools in the state. This has turned out to be quite a project for Chad. He has put a lot of time into this. He had to spend several evenings and every Saturday for about a month working on this. It is kind of apart of his job, but it is more of a volunteer opportunity. The high school kids help build the robot, but they get a lot of help on the technical issues. That is where Chad comes in. He worked with two guys from Dell to do all the computer engineering. When I first head about this I pictured a small robot that you get from the toy store. Boy was I wrong. As you can see from the pictures, the robots are massive.

The competition is like a game. They put several robots in a ring, and they try to get balls into the other robot's trailer. The one who gets the most in the other trailers is the winner. Then the winners of the matches play each other. In the end, the one that wins the most is the final winner. I am proud to say that Chad's team came in second. Then they were able to go to a regional competition in Texas and got second again. This was very amazing, and Chad was very proud.

He got a medal for coming in second. Mitchell really liked it.

Of course Daddy shared his medal with Mitchell. He loved it!