Carter's Post

I realized I posted yesterday a whole post without pics of Carter. What was I thinking? :)
Here he is playing with his monster:

And hanging out with his owl friends:

It's Official... We Moved.

We left our little house in Orange and are now officially living in Lake Forest with Dave's parents. They have been kind enough to let us live with them for 6 months or so, as we search to buy a house. I am a bit nervous as Dave is thrilled to be saving money and I think he wants to extend our stay for as long as possible!

It was very sad to leave our house. Even though we were only renters, we lived there for 5 years and had so many memories. It truly felt like our home. I remember right after we got engaged, we started looking at listings in Orange. We visited a few places and some rental homes but none were that great. We decided just to drive through the neighborhoods to see if we could find anything and we stumbled upon 526 Washington Avenue! It was so cute and we loved it immediately. Here is the day we got the keys:

We spent a lot of time and effort making that house feel like our own. And when we found out we were pregnant with Carter and Grayson, we spent lots of time decorating their nursery. Harmony painted a beautiful mural on our wall and it was very sad to have to paint over it.

We loved living in Old Towne and I will miss all of our favorite restaurants and I will miss taking Carter on walks through the Circle. I am thankful though, that Dave's parents have been so supportive in letting us stay with them. My goal is to be celebrating Christmas this year in our new home that we will officially own. I can't wait!

Tummy Time Success!

So tummy time is not Carter's favorite time. I find this strange, considering when in the NICU, he only ever wanted to sleep on his tummy. He also used to love to take naps while laying on our chest. But lately he gets so frustrated when I put him on his tummy. Until now! So we went from this, where he could barely lift his head (usually he would remain face down screaming):

To this!

Now that he can lift his head, he is pretty happy on his tummy, at least for a short amount of time. I think he is proud of himself and is pretty excited until he realizes that it is hard work and then he gets mad and ends up face down again! Now that he has good head control, I let him sit in his special big boy seat:

And one last picture that is just too cute... and no the elephant on his shirt does not make him a Republican!

5 Months Old!

Yesterday Carter turned 5 months old. So much has changed in such a short amount of time. He is happy, healthy, smiley, and extremely talkative. This is a picture I took of him, mid laugh:

We had a few great days where he slept from 9PM to 2AM, then 3AM to 7AM. It felt great to only have to wake up once! But... this week was crazy. For some reason, Carter has been refusing to take his morning nap and then ends up taking a really loooong nap in the evening (from 4:00 till 8:00) and then the nightime schedule gets all out of whack. However, I am keeping my fingers crossed for tonight, considering it is 9:30AM and he is happily napping in his swing. Hopefully the schedule that I love has returned! The other night when Carter woke up at 2AM to feed, he simply would not go back to sleep. I took a video of him playing with his daddy--it is hard to be angry when he is so darn cute, even at 3AM!!

Vegas and Utah Adventures!

Our trip to Utah went much better than I had anticipated. Carter is a champion traveler--he slept in the car, woke up to eat, and was basically an angel the entire trip. I think he did better than the rest of us! It felt really nice to get away from it all for a few days... especially because this month is so crazy for us. We are moving in with Dave's parents for 6 months while we look to buy a house. Sounds like a great plan but we have to be out of our house by the end of the month and the packing is overwhelming! So a little vacation away was just what I needed!

We arrived in Vegas on Wednesday night and stayed at the Orleans hotel. We got a room with two queen beds and we let Carter have his own bed. I think he enjoyed it:

We woke up the next morning and had the breakfast buffet at the Paris hotel. Words cannot describe how much I LOVE their food. I am totally a breakfast person (but Dave is not!) so I usually suffer through a bowl of cereal every morning. But to have orange juice and waffles and eggs benedict and potatos and pastries and fruit... mmmmmm. I still can't stop thinking about it!

We walked around the Paris hotel for a bit and took some pictures. Carter was mesmorized by all the casino lights and sounds. I felt guilty about having a baby in a casino (I soooo did not want to be "that parent") but whatever. He had fun and even got to take his picture with Jerry Seinfeld!

We left Vegas with full tummies and made our way to Utah. The mountains still had snow on them and it was actually really beautiful. We spent Thursday and Friday night at Dave's aunt Marsha's house (Linda's twin sister.) Carter adored her--I think he thought it was pretty cool to see "two" Grandma Lindas!

It was really nice to meet all of Dave's family! Their family is gigantic! I couldn't believe it! I think his grandma has like over 30 grandkids and almost 50 great-grandkids. It really made me realize how wonderful big families are--I came home trying to convince Dave that we need to have 4 or 5 kids of our own! Despite the sad circumstances, it was great to learn more about Dave's grandma and her life. I am so happy to be a part of this family.

We spent Saturday night at Dave's uncle's house in St. George (which was absolutely beautiful) and then left at 5 AM Sunday morning to drive home. We were sooo tired when we got home. Carter immediately fell asleep with his arms straight up like a zombie!

So overall, we had a good trip, but it is always nice to come home. Here are some fun videos of Carter from the past week:

Happy Easter!

We had a very busy, but fun-filled Easter weekend. We took a trip to visit Grayson. Someone came and put Easter eggs all over the children's section of the cemetery. It looked very festive. We spent Easter with family and Carter participated in his first Easter egg hunt! He made off with $34. Not too shabby!
Carter is recovering from a slight cold this week. And of course, as his mommy, I have to make all the sacrifices. Dave got to go to a concert and opening night at Angels stadium. I stayed home to take care of Carter. I think I see a spa day in my near future!
We leave tomorrow for Utah (Dave's grandma's funeral) and are a bit stressed about getting everything ready. How do you pack for 5 days for a baby that goes through 10 diapers a day and probably 10 outfits as well!? Also, Carter hasn't been in the car longer than 2 hours straight so I have no idea how the drive to Utah will go. We are stopping in Vegas tomorrow night. Maybe Carter will gamble his $34 and win us enough for a down payment for a new house! :)