Addie's in the Holiday Spirit!

It has been so much fun dressing Addie up each morning the last couple of weeks for Christmas! Here are a few of our favorite outfits!

Their bear that reads "Twas the Night Before Christmas" to them... she thought he was pretty cool!

Should Have Waited to Send Christmas Cards Out...

Ever since I was pregnant with Addie and knew I would have 2 children so young at the same time, I have dreamt up the perfect Christmas card having our sweet children sitting on Santa's lap looking into Santa's eyes with curiosity. Well, too bad we didn't get to go to our annual Santa visit until late in the season or I think this 2nd picture would have made the perfect picture for our Brown Family Holiday card... well, there is always next year!

The funny thing is, Carter was SO EXCITED all week to see Santa. When we asked him what he was going to ask Santa for, he confidently said, "A basketball," a mil,lion times! Even pulling into the parking lot, I was explaining to him in detail what Santa was going to be like - "BIG and RED... but so nice, he just loves little boys and girls!" We got out of the car raring to see Santa but then Carter saw him and freaked out. So, Addie got some good time alone with Santa.



This is the site Addie and I found when we returned to the car.

We should have known from last year...

#1 for Carter.... by FAR!

#1. HIS "DA-DA"

There was nothing that even came close to this one. This boy is a clear "daddy's boy" and although Carter and I have been spending a lot more one-on-one time together since I have been working part-time, which has made us much much closer.... I am no where near the ranks of "da-da," if he is in the same room. I am so completely OK with it and am just so glad that Carter has the best father as a role-model and one that is amazingly hands-on and completely 100% involved.

Here are some recent pics I have taken of the duo of some common everyday sites!!

#2 On Carter's Top 10 List

#2. BALLS!!! (Surprise Surprise!)

Since 7 months old, anyone that has even met Carter for more than 5 minutes knows his consistent and passionate obsession with any kind of ball.

From strangers seeing him and jokingly asking to sign him as his agent to being stopped in the middle of Toys R Us, Lowes or The Dominion and completely encircled by groups of people watching him dribble the ball at 14 months old, Carter is passionate.

He shoots for at least 20 min regularly every night and we have noticed is unbelievably focused during these times. We NEVER leave the house without a ball & both have multiple balls in our car at any one time.

These were literally his first steps to a ball at 11 months!
Nov 2008

Dec 2007

Feb 2008

March 2008

May 2008

June 2008

July 2008

July 2008

Aug 2008

Sept 2008

Oct 2008 - notice posing with a ball at all times.

Nov 2008

Dec 2008

Happy Birthday to Carter & #3 of Carter's Top Ten List!

#3. THE MOVIE "CARS"/"LIGHTENING MCQUEEN"/"MATOR"

The cutest movie! I am sure it could be much worse of a selection but we could watch this movie 6-8 times everyday and he would be happy! He loves the tractors in the movie when they go "tractor tipping," like "cow tipping." Blake and I pretty much have it memorized.

Sorry to my daily followers for not finishing the TOP 10 list tonight... again, it has been a super long day and we are all hitting the sack.... today at school, they celebrated Carter's birthday with the cupcakes Blake baked and I frosted this morning at 6 AM. We made him his favorite breakfast of cheesy eggs and sang happy birthday to him about 15 times today... he loves hearing it! This morning everytime we said "Happy Birthday Carter," he would run to the kitchen because he automatically thought he got birthday cake when we said that! :)

So now it is off to bed and get ready for Carter's 2 year checkup first thing in the morning at the doctor! And to celebrate afterwards at the big Christmas parties at school! No more baking for me for those... I bought everything! We've made enough cupcakes for a year!

Nothing like a 7AM birthday party....

Even Maverick had to get in on the fun!

Goodnight our big boy on your big day... sleep tight... we love you so much!

#4 on Carter's Top 10 List

Carter is just a few hours from turning and 2 and I am exhausted from a long day, so I am going to leave you guessing on #1-3 until tomorrow. Now it is off to make 2 dozen cupcakes for him to take to school tomorrw... Blake is already in the kitchen baking!

#4. BUSES AND TRACTORS

In the last 2 months, they have come out of no where to become one of his favorite things. If we are driving, it turns into a game to try to find school buses and tractors! His face just lights up and it is a sure way to get my "serious" son to give me a sweet smile as he excitedly says "skue busss.... more... more skue busss!"

#6 and #5 on Carter's Top 10 List at Two Years Old

#6. TALKING AND BEGINNING TO HAVE "CONVERSATIONS"

Carter will talk just about anything now. There are times he will get on kicks and he will just talk and talk and although we will only catch a few words, we will pretend we are having a normal conversation and ask him questions and he will just keep going on and on. As you can see with the list of words down the right side of the blog, in the last 7 months, I have tried to keep up with the major words he completely says by himself with no prodding from us. (because he will repeat ANYTHING we say now) His sudden explosion of single words started well before he was 17 months old, but in recent months, it is quite interesting to see the progress he's making on a weekly basis building now up to 5-6 words together at a time. Currently, he likes to talk about Da da and work, for some reason he thinks Blake "works on a airplane." He also now will say "please" on his own while asking for something around 40% of the time. He threw out a unexpected and unasked for "Thank you" tonight after I gave him some milk. NICE!! It seems to be all about repetition while working on the "please" & "thank you's." After reminding him no less than a 100 times a day for the last 12 months, it seems like he is catching on to the idea.

#5. BEING OUTSIDE

All I can say is he LOVES it. He could be in the WORST mood ever in the morning and once we have breakfast, change his clothes & get outside, his mood changes 180 degrees... AMAZING! Of course, it works in reverse as well. Come in from hours outside and he can suddenly become moody and fussy. So as a result, we spend a TON of time outside. God knew we were going to have Carter 4 years ago when we bought our wonderful home directly next door to a neighborhood basketball court, tennis court, swimming pool and the much used children's playground. We spend a lot of time out there with our new friends Avery and Amelia. And to think, 4 years ago, we almost didn't want to buy the house because it was so close to all those things!!! Always remember things happen for a reason... He has plan!

Speaking of outside, he has a fascination with the moon and literally tries to reach up and touch it. Last Friday night, the moon was at the closet point ever to Earth, so we took Carter outside to see it. His smile on his face said it all as he reached up to grab it. It was much much larger in person than this picture shows... magnificent!

Carter's Top 10 List at 2 Years Old

As the time approaches (3 days) that Carter turns 2 years old, we are trying to document his life now so we can always come back to this and get a clear picture of what Carter's life was all about at this exact age. So here it is.... as David Letterman would say, drum roll please....

CARTER'S TOP 10 LIST (RIGHT NOW)

# 10 - J.D.

His friend that used to go to school with him. I would have never thought that a 2 year old really cares about specific friends... many books say kids don't truly start playing together until 3-4 years old... but I would challenge that thought process. Carter, unfortunately, doesn't get to see J.D. everyday and has only seen him once in the last month. However, we can be doing the most mundane of things... like taking a bath or just playing in the living room and Carter will bring up "J.D." Just precious. Carter will be so happy because J.D.'s mom and I have set up a play date next Monday for the boys to see each other again! By the way, J.D.'s parents have similar stories of J.D. talking about "Carter Brown" all the time at home.

# 9. Addie

Just in the last several days, he amazes us with how tender and loving he is with her, surprisingly, mostly at the times when she is the loudest and crying. For example, this afternoon, I got Addison out the car first and put her car seat with her safely in it inside her room so that I could then return to get him out of the car. I was then loading up all the enormous amount of "stuff" in my car to bring inside and was making the rounds room to room quickly putting things away and I hear her start to fuss. I am talking to her as I get closer to her room and make the corner to find that Carter had come inside from the garage and immediately gone to her room when he heard her crying and was literally rocking her car seat with one hand and had his other hand on the top of her head patting her. I almost cried.

# 8. MILK

We are blessed to have such a good and healthy eater. Partly it is because of the way Blake and I don't allow him to snack alot in between meals or eat too much "junk food," although that is getting harder as he gets older and Uncle Mike and Ella keep giving us yummy cookies! However, one area we have been strict since day 1 (per our doctor's advice) is that he only gets water and milk. EVER. Well, daycare is another story, but we try to limit it. As a result. he has never asked for "juice" or anything else to Blake and I, instead, he asks for MILK about 25 times a day. Last week, we witnessed him go through a gallon of WHOLE MILK in way less than a week! That is a LOT of milk! But NO COMPLAINTS. He will be sad that the gallon of whole milk in our refrigerator will be the LAST one EVER for him... we are moving to 2% later this week (again... per his doctor!) ;)



7. "SKIP," "BEAR" and having a "PACI PARTY!"


Hands down, this boy is THE BEST SLEEPER in the entire world. We now, after 2 years & having payback with a daughter that is much more of a normal baby around going to sleep, can brag. 80% of it was the luck of the draw with Carter himself, the other was religiously following The Baby Whisper, as all my close friend know... thanks Aunt Alli for that random purchase and gift nearly 3 years ago! Getting him to go down since day 1 is a 10 second process of laying him down wide awake in his crib and saying, "I love you," as you walk out of the dark room and shut the door for 12 hours. We can count on one hand the number of nights we have had to go in to his room in the middle of the night. Probably out of guilt of the process being so easy, at around a year, we started giving him "SKIP," "BEAR," and/or "BLANKIE." I had heard some nightmare stories of the one lost item where only it could soothe the child, so therefore decided in our home, there wouldn't be that one item. It's paid off! Now, he does still use a pacifier a.k.a. "paci" to sleep only at night. We just found out last week daycare hadn't used it in several months for nap time. Who knew?!?! So the plan is this week, what we have called the "Paci Party," which is code for "We are going to sleep," is changing to "Party with Skip and Bear!" Yes, we are going to try to get rid of the pacifier all together!

Yes, he is still in his crib and I dare not fix what is not yet broken. He hasn't had any interest in throwing a leg over to escape. I am very aware that our lives will significantly change once he learns he can wake up and instead of go back to sleep, he can now get out of bed and maybe his room... ugh.... let's not even think about it right now!

"Paci, Bear & Skip" all made a rare appearance in this pic!

Tomorrow, I will continue with the countdown! Leave comments with your guesses if you feel like you know Carter well enough!!! ;)