We're back!

Our week at the beach was awesome! We rented a 3-bedroom condo and shared it with Heath's mom and Heath's sister, husband, and 2 kids. Then Dedi had a separate condo with her daughter and my parents came to visit for a couple days as well. Everyone got along wonderfully all week. The older kids were very tolerant of Hunter and played very well with him. He loves the older boys. Hunter is now repeating a lot of words so he has names for everyone - Grandma (ma'am-uh), Tiffanie (TeeTee), Ethan (Eee), Ashton (Ash-ah), Uncle (pronounces this one perfect), Grandpa (Papa).

I'm having laptop issues so all my pictures aren't uploaded to Flickr yet. Here is one and about half of them are up on Flickr. This link might work.

This will have to tide you over for the week....

We're leaving tomorrow to spend a whole week at the beach with a whole bunch of family. We're looking forward to lots of sun and lots of fun! I'm sure I'll be back with tons of pictures. Have a great week!

Pointing to Elmo

Peek-a-boo (the scarey version!)

A recent nightly ritual of climbing up Daddy over and over again.

Another nightly ritual, playing 'cave' with Daddy. They get a sheet and get under it and say they're in a cave :o)

Fun with Friends

I think this is the first decent picture I've taken of these three crazy kids in 2 years! They all sat down very cooperatively and said 'cheeeeeeeeeeeeese!'

I took care of Zach today and the boys couldn't have behaved better. They played so well.

We went to a neighbor's house and they played in the yard with water toys, pools, and slides. Lots of fun! We decided against bathing suits and just put them all in swim diapers.

Pictures and Parenting

While in Jax we visited our favorite Aunt and Uncle. Hunter got to play the Elmo game on the computer with Uncle Ronnie. Not sure who loved it more!

Hunter found this hat in the basket of toys there and wore it for quite some time. He found this ping pong paddle and a ball and tried for a long time to hit the ball with the paddle.


Lots of teeth! Only missing the top 2 eye teeth now.

• For those following the not-wanting-to-sleep-in-his-bed saga, I believe it's over. After 3 days of fighting his nap, he's pretty much back to normal and goes to bed willingly and without fussing. Not sure what it was all about, but it was short lived and I'm thankful for that.
• Up until now we haven't following any sort of specific parenting style. We've just done what we think is best as far as discipline. Lately, it's been evident that we need some help and guidance. With Hunter very close to two and talking more everyday, now is the time to mold him into the little person we want him to become. Thanks to my sister-in-law, she gave me this great Christian based book that is full of child training information. (This book is a pro-spanking book so if that's not for you then this book probably isn't either.) I read it in a day and started implementing a lot of it today. There is already a noticeable difference in Hunter. The key is consistency so I've got to (Heath, too) keep it up. I'll report back on how we're doing as time goes on.

Taking Refuge with Grandma

We spent the week with my parents and I got some sewing lessons from my mom. I'll have to share what I made.

But for now, let's talk about this new development with Hunter. I pray it's a phase, a very short phase. Previous to now, Hunter loved to sleep. Ask him if he wanted to go 'night night' and he grabs his dog and high tails it to his bed. More than willing to go to sleep. About a week ago he started protesting naptime and bedtime. It keeps getting worse. Yesterday was the first day in his life that he didn't take a nap. I had a packed day and had to run out the door to get a haircut. I put Hunter in bed screaming and told my mom that I was sorry she had to deal with it. She called me an hour and a half later, Hunter screaming from the bed in the background. No success. No nap all day. I got back and he was pleasant which surprised me. Come 7:30pm I started threatening that it was bedtime. He was not interested though I knew he had to be exhausted. He found safety in Grandma's lap and knew that if he got down I would be taking him to bed. He sat there very still and couldn't help, but fall asleep. Unfortunately, he started screaming the minute she put him in bed. After another round of rocking he was asleep enough to just roll over when I put him in bed.

I have no idea what is going on, but it's no fun for mom! He's definitely not ready to drop his nap, but he has no problem falling asleep in my arms. It's putting him into bed that he doesn't like.

Look, Mom!

I have to say, this is the first big mess Hunter has made. He was in my bathroom and I guess I left him alone a little too long. He opened a drawer and found some old makeup powder that I don't use anymore and proceeded to dump it out all over the rug. What do I expect, right? I vaccuumed what I could, but the washer got out the rest.

Another Beach Weekend

We headed over to the beach house Friday night. Grandma P., Ethan, and Ashton joined us at the beach Saturday as well as Grandma and Grandpa W. There was zero sun, but we managed to escape the rain and enjoy the sand and water anyway. I came home with a cold and Heath came home with a little stomach bug so we aren't doing much this week yet.

Here are the beach pictures. I have some more on a dock by the water when we went out to dinner. I'll do those in another post later. Oh, and I added a few videos to Flickr if anybody cares.

Now that we've been to the beach about 5 times, Hunter is 100 times better about the sand. He doesn't fuss when it gets on his hands and feet anymore.

Hunter wants to boogie board like the big boys! Ashton buried alive

Ethan buried alive

Aside from the fact that this picture looks blurry here (it's really not), this is

probably the best picture of the 3 boys that I've been able to capture.

Mmmmmm...Pudding

A Fun Saturday

We picked up Grandma P. and went to Lake Eola to feed the birds & ducks.

Played on the playground for a while then stopped for lunch.
Hunter took a long nap and didn't wake up until almost 5 so we took him to a bounce house place close by. This was his third time and he gets braver every time we go.

He can climb up this steep set of stairs all by himself.

Here is Hunter doing the BIG slide all by himself!

We finished the night by going out for pizza!

The Teething Blues

We're having a rough start to the week over here. Hunter is getting some (maybe all) eye teeth. I feel like they've been coming in forever. I can see the white nubs on the bottom ones, but nothing has broken through yet. So, here are some cute pictures from last week to help me remember that my sweet baby is in there somewhere and hopefully he'll return very soon.

Hunter still loves shoes

He got an early birthday present from Grandma P, his first tricycle.

He has no idea how good he has it. Sitting outside by the pool watching one of his favorite TV shows.