CATCHING UP

Christmas morning - as you can see, Santa was very good to us!!

The only thing that could possibly be cuter would be this picture without Paci in his mouth.

Laughing with Daddy.

Playing with some new toys on Christmas afternoon.

Brushing his teeth with his first tooth brush from Mimi.

His new trick is sticking out his tongue - he does it all the time and it's adorable!

Making the rounds through the neighborhood on Christmas day.

Riding his new truck.

Playing on the living room floor with his tongue sticking out.

Relaxing in his chair.

On our way to the Pulaski's for our annual Friendship Dinner.

We hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas!! As I'm sure you can tell from our lack of blogging, life around here has been a little nuts. We had Christmas parties, Christmas dinners, getting sick, Christmas shopping, wrapping, decorating, etc. We celebrated Andy's birthday, D-Daddy's 60th birthday, Grandma's birthday, Jesus' birthday, our 6th anniversary, had tons of family in town for Christmas, went back to work for a few days, celebrated New Years Eve with friends, then Andy and I went on a short vacation while Nana and Aunt Lou Lou came to Charleston to hang out with Grady. That's the short story. We had a great Christmas and loved the time we got to spend with our family, but it wore us out! Andy got me a camcorder for Christmas so I'm going to figure out how to get video on here so that everyone can see Grady in action, but it's not gonna happen on this blog, so enjoy the pictures for now.

I walked into Grady's room at school to pick him up a few weeks ago and realized that I was no longer picking up a baby, but a little boy. He's not quite crawling, but he's so close. He watches everything and everyone so intently and tries to mimic sounds and movements. He babbles and talks nonstop and never stops moving. He's got 2 teeth now and he feeds himself puffs and yogurt melts. As you can see, he is definitely a paci baby - I'm not sure how we are ever going to wean him off of the pacifier because he will go to sleep just about anywhere as long as he has his Paci and Maggie the Monkey. He just lights up our life and there's nothing more wonderful than hearing him laugh and seeing his huge smile.

Things have finally seemed to slow down a little bit, but we still have a busy January! We can't wait for Mimi and Granddaddy to visit, I'm headed to Memphis for a girls weekend, and Grady's Godparents, Patrick and Lindsay, are due to give birth to their son Max mid-January so we're hoping to be traveling to Seneca for that. We promise to keep posting pictures though! We hope you have a wonderful new year!

SO BUSY

Having a 8 month old boy during the holidays keeps us very busy. We have been trying to finish our christmas shopping, get the tree up, wrap presents, make travel plans, get the house ready for guests, and attend a bunch of Christmas parties. So please forgive us for not posting lately. Here are a few pictures of our boy. I am sure we will have more as it gets closer to Christmas.

Grady eating his first "Puff".

Watching the Jackets play on Saturday.

His 8 month picture in his chair.

Grady eating naked and demanding more food.

"Thank you for my outfit Aunt Jen, but I am going to Georgia Tech."

HAPPY TURKEY DAY!!!

And you wonder why he is so cute.

Hangin with Aunt Lou Lou.

Grady's first Thanksgiving in Asheville.

"C'mon Mom, enough with the camera already."

"Pop, I want a BMW too."

"Hey wait, this is not my tub."

Grady got to me his Aunt Jeannie while in Asheville.

GT BEAT GEORGIA. Grady's first in a long line of wins against the Dogs.

We went and picked out our tree. Grady wore a silly hat. (Thanks Mom)

Grady hung out on the floor and played while we decorated the tree.

He has so much fun in the bath.

The finished product.

KDS Photography

Everyone knows how much I love the pictures that my friends Natalie
(http://s-portraits.squarespace.com/blog) & Heather (www.hdportraitsonline.com) take, but unfortunately they live in Atlanta and it's hard to get together with either of them to get updated pictures of Grady. I've been on a hunt to find someone in Charleston who takes pictures like Natalie and Heather and have had a hard time finding someone. But now my problem has been solved! Our sweet friend Kayce has always been interested in photography and has decided to take some classes and slowly build a photography business. Fortunately for us, she wants lots of practice and we are more than willing to offer up Grady as practice material. She got a new flash and wanted to play with it and figure it out so she came over last night and took these pictures. I love them!! Her website is http://kdsphotography.blogspot.com/ and I think she's off to a really great start!

JUST A CUTE PICTURE

First time wearing shoes!

FIRST HALLOWEEN

Despite an ear infection, Grady was a trooper for his first Halloween! He had an extra special Halloween because he got to stay home and play with D-Daddy and Grandma all day. They rushed into town Thursday night to take care of a sick baby so that Andy and I could both be at work on Friday. After a fun day with Grady we convinced them to stay Halloween night. We put Grady in his little Pumpkin costume (and the most adorable pumpkin shoes that I've ever seen from the Pulaskis) and headed to our church for the Fall Festival. We didn't stay long because it was chilly outside, but we were glad we went because Grady seemed to love seeing everyone all dressed up. We went to Ryan and Gillians after the festival and played Wii, ate roasted pumpkin seeds and hung out for a little while before bringing the little man home and getting him in bed.

VEGAS BABY!!!

We went on our first vacation since before I was pregnant - it was much needed and a great time even though we REALLY missed our boy - thanks to Grandma and D-Daddy for taking such good care of Grady and letting us go have fun without ever having to worry. We went back to Vegas and spent a portion of our trip with the Pulaskis and another portion of our trip with the Jen and Paul celebrating Paul's 30th Birthday - (Jen pulled off the trip as a surprise birthday present!). We had a lot of fun gambling, eating, shopping and just relaxing with friends.

I'VE BEEN TAGGED. . .

8 things I did yesterday (I did this portion on Monday):
1. Went to the Pumpkin Patch with Grady, Andy, Kayce, Jason and the Petersons.
2. Straightened up the house.
3. Gave Grady a sponge bath on my lap while I was fully clothed - yes, I got soaked.
4. Talked to Mom on the phone.
5. Ate biscuits with honey for dinner.
6. Almost bought a new playgym for Grady, but I was a good girl and put it back on the shelf (I went and bought it today instead : ))
7. Organized and reframed some pictures.
8. Searched Craigs List for black patent Danskos.

8 favorite places to eat:
1. Ippolitos!! My favorite hole-in-the-wall Italian restaurant in Atlanta.
2. Tommy Bahama Restaurant in Hawaii.
3. Tao in Las Vegas.
4. Chick-fil-a - favorite fast food.
5. Juanita Greenbergs - best margaritas in town.
6. Jim n' Nicks
7. My kitchen table when Andy is cooking.
8. Longhorn.

8 favorite TV shows:
1. Grey's Anatomy
2. Private Practice
3. Desperate Housewives
4. Barefoot Contessa
5. CSI
6. Friends
7. King of Queens
8. Giada at Home

8 things I'm looking forward to:
1. Grady's first Christmas
2. Celebrating our 6th anniversary
3. Thanksgiving in Asheville
4. New Years trip with Andy
5. Cooper to arrive - I copied Elissa!
6. Girls weekend with Jen and Nat in January
7. Crawling into bed and snuggling with my husband tonight
8. Any time that I get to spend with Grady

8 things on my wish list:
1. To stay home with Grady again one day - even part time would be wonderful
2. Enough time and energy to do the things I need to do and the things I want to do
3. That Grady would feel better - he has a bad ear infection and high fever. : (
4. A remodeled kitchen
5. An improved economy
6. A family vacation to the beach with Grady this summer and a vacation somewhere tropical for just me and Andy
7. A few more hours in the day
8. That I would have better business sense so that I could actually make one of my crazy crafty creative ideas profitable

GO JACKETS!!

The Jackets didn't win against VA, but Grady sure looked cute cheering for them! Our good friends the Dahlbys gave us this outfit for one of our showers and I have been counting down the days for Grady to be able to wear it - there's also an adorable jacket that goes with the outfit, but it was a little too warm for that (yes, I know it's October but we live in Charleston!). The hat that's on backwards is also a GT hat. I'm going to have to ask Heather where she got it so that we can buy it in the next size up for the coming years because I love it that much!! Thank you Jim, Heather, Meg and Kate!