Third Birthday

My sweet baby boy turned THREE yesterday, and we had such a fun day!

The night before his birthday, we made baseball cookies for him to take to "school" for snack time.

Little brother wanted to help! :)

Then Mommy decorated the cookies while Daddy put Case to bed.

(You should have seen my first batch of cookies, they were as thin as crackers and burnt yikes!)

Then, after we were sure he wasn't getting up to go pee pee again, and was actually asleep I blew up a bunch of balloons to put in front of his room...

So on his birthday morning, when Matt and I heard the first "Mooommmmyyyy" we crawled out of bed, grabbed the camera and captured this: 

 

His face is saying all sorts of "It's way too early for a picture with a flash" 

Then, we headed downstairs for his birthday breakfast. 

I made Daddy take some pictures before he left for work :) 

Then the boys and I headed out for school, baseball cookies in tow. 

After handing out our special treat, Case's little class sang Happy Birthday to him, and he got to wear a super manly crown while it all went down. ;)

He had a great day at school, then we headed home to take naps. 

After naps, we waited for Daddy to get home, and for Mom-mom & Grand-dad to come over to watch littlest man so we could take Case to his VERY FIRST movie for his birthday! 

The Lion King was released in 3D for 2 weeks, and we thought that would be a super fun birthday idea, especially since we aren't opening presents or celebrating his birthday until next weekend for his party!

Case did SO WELL! We got him a Kid's Popcorn Snack Pack, put on our 3D Glasses and he watched the entire movie, he kept taking his glasses off and saying "All done" and had to pee twice during the movie (ha!) but he had so much fun, and wasn't wiggly at all! He watched most of the movie without the glasses on, but at the end there is a scene where it is raining, and we convinced him to put them back on, and he held out his hands and tried to catch the rain - it was so cute!

When it was over, he kept saying "I wanna watch it again! I wanna watch Lion King again!"

On the way home, he also said...

"I had fun at da movies"

"I wanna go see Rhett"

"I wanna go see Mom-mom and Grand-Dad"
"I'm sleepy"

Pretty sure our sweet three year old had a very fun day, we are so proud of him and so thankful that God blessed us with such an amazing little boy. 

Matt and I stayed up and watched Grey's Anatomy after Case went to bed, then Matt headed off to bed, and I stayed up for a little while and looked at my old facebook albums of Case when he was a newborn - and not going to lie I teared up! It's just hard realizing that he will never be a baby again, he'll never be one again, he'll never be two again. It's like saying Good-bye to each year! 

Happy Birthday sweet boy, the day you were born was the day I became a Mommy, and I will be forever thankful that you changed my life. 

We love you so, so, so much.

10 Months

Our sweet Rhetter man is 10 months old, which means he's only 2 months away from being ONE?! 

Make it slow down!

I'm not sure I can handle this realization PLUS a third birthday right around the corner!

  

So stinking cute. 

He's still pulling up like a maniac, and crawling at lightning speed. 

He's doing great in the baby room, and I think his Piper is still his girlfriend :)

He's starting to eat some puffs, and the baby Mum mums, I'm still nervous to feed him any other finger foods since he is JUST NOW starting to pop out a teeny tiny top of a tooth on his bottom gum! 

Still the happiest baby ever, though lately he won't let Mommy leave his sight without a fit. 

Still in size 4 diapers, and 12-18 month clothes. 

Usually wakes up around 8-9am (unless it's a school day) and naps twice if he gets down for his first one around 10am, otherwise he takes a big long one during the day and always goes to bed between 7-7:30pm these days. 

Such a trooper dealing with a crazy big brother, and huge dog always in his way :) 

 He prefers to hold his bottle now, and cracks me up because he holds it so close to the nipple instead of further down, makes it a lot harder. I've tried telling him. :)
He's a busy busy little man, you can just see him exploring, and learning new things every day.

Man, these 10 months have flown!


Love you littlest man!!!

Rhetter Man's First Day

Today was my Rhetter man's first day in the baby room! 

I woke up early to get ready, and to my surprise I had to wake up both of my boys to get going this morning. Usually Case is up at 7:30am on the dot every single morning but he was still snoozing away, and my Rhetter man was still rolled up in a sweet bundle of baby in the middle of his crib. 

It was a chilly, rainy morning a huge change from the near 100 degrees this past weekend. We were all moving a little slower this morning, but eventually all got going, gave Daddy kisses Good-bye and piled into my truck. 

Why does he look SO grown up here?? Such a handsome little man. 

I spent the morning labeling his bottles, wipes, bibs, wipe box, all sorts of things. I used painters green tape with a navy sharpie...it was actually pretty cute! 

It was of course pouring the rain when we finally pulled into the nursery school parking lot, and of course my dinky red umbrella broke as soon as I put it up. Rhett's hood kept falling off and I was trying to hold three bags, hold a two year olds hand, hold a baby and run into school! Good times!

We finally made it into the baby room with Rhett, signed him in, and put his things in his cubby. Luckily, I'm just across the hall with my bigger man so it wasn't too hard on me ;) 

Here he is with one of the teachers. :) 

After "school" I went back over to pick up my littlest man and got the biggest sweetest smile ever! 

They told me he did great, and could tell that he had an older brother because he didn't mind at all when another baby kept taking his toys! Mellow Man. 

I think Rhett had fun on his first day in the baby room :) 

Such a big boy.

Mr & Mrs Banner

So, one of my very best friends is getting married in 3 WEEKS! Woo hoo!
She will be having an unbelievably beautiful, simple, perfect back yard wedding, and after being SO motivated from Pinterest I decided to whip up a little present for her Bachelorette Party this weekend.

I wanted her to have it for her wedding pictures, and couldn't wait to give it to her! 

I decided to make her a "Mr & Mrs banner"

 (and I thought I would share how I did it, so fun and easy!)

Here's a list of the supplies I used: 

• Burlap
• Sharpie & Pencil
• Banner Template (I used a cardboard cut out)
• Black Fabric Paint
• Foam Brush
• Freezer Paper
• Tiny Scissors (I used nail scissors)
• Iron
• Hot Glue
• Twine
• Aluminum Foil (just to make clean up super easy)

I started by using my cardboard cut out of a triangle, (Tip: Leave a "lip" on top of the triangle so that you can fold it over onto your twine when you assemble the banner) and traced it on my burlap with a sharpie. 

Then I cut out 6 triangles.

Now, here's the part where people laugh at me. 

I literally just pulled up Microsoft Word on my laptop, typed in a M, R, &, and S found a font I liked and changed the size to about 290...took my freezer paper, put it on top of my lap top (hello it's lit behind it so it was SO easy!) and traced the letters! (Very lightly of course, and with a pencil!) (Tip: Make sure the letters will fit nicely in your triangle though!)

After you have traced all your letters, cut them out with your teeny tiny scissors. 

Now, you iron your new stencil onto your burlap...

Now, after you have ironed them, you have a stencil that will not slip! 

Here's where I put some aluminum foil down on my table, and painted my letters. Remember burlap has lots and lots of little holes so it could get pretty messy!

 I wiped it down after each letter so my burlap wouldn't get all sorts of messy. 

When you are finished, let them all dry. 

When they are all nice and dry, you just peel off the freezer paper and VOILA! 

This is where the "lip" of the banner comes in handy, I ironed mine down so it will be super easy to attach to twine (or whatever you wanted to use)

Then, glue a line of hot glue in the folds, I used a paint stirrer to help press it down so I wouldn't burn the fire out of my fingers. :) 

Then, when it's all finished, you have this...

I just love how it turned out, and the ideas are endless! 

I'm thinking "Happy Halloween" for my porch this year, "Christmas" for us to hold up for Christmas Pictures, "Family"... 

Thank you Pinterest for so many ideas and inspirations!

First Day of "School"

Well, Maxwell Street Nursery School has started back up this year. The same one that I worked at a few years ago, and the same one I worked at while pregnant with Case. Then, I decided to stay home with my baby boy, and didn't return the following year. I have always kept in touch with the Director and the teachers though, and subbed for them when I could.

So, I e-mailed the head teacher a few days ago and told her not to forget to send us a Open House Letter for Case man this year, and that I could sub! We started e-mailing back and forth a little bit, and she asked me if I would be interested in teaching on Tuesdays & Thursdays if their numbers went up. I quickly responded "YES!"

Well, days went by and they still weren't sure what the numbers were, she told me she would let me know as soon as possible. The Open House rolled around, so I brought my boys, Case dove right into the toys, and Rhett was wiggling like a crazy monkey trying to get down and play with everything! By the end of the open house, the director offered me the job! Woo hoo! It is SO perfect for us. It's only Tuesdays/Thursdays from 9am-12pm. Case gets to come for free, and Rhett gets to stay in the baby room while we are there for a ridiculously discounted rate. 

Such an amazing blessing for us!

I, of course was SO stinkin' excited to be a nursery school teacher again. I just love it. I still remember all of my little babies from all of the classes a few years ago. I'm already in love with our little class this year, the program is for 2-4 year olds, but this class is full of little babies that just turned two. Case is the oldest one in the class! There is one little boy is just a few months younger than him so I think they might become little buddies. 

I'm also excited to get my creative juices flowing again for crafts, and decorating the classroom.

I am just so thankful! 

 Rhetter bug stayed with Kelli and my Mom the first week, but he'll start coming next week, I think he is going to have so much fun being around little guys and girls his age! 

Case and I's first day was Tuesday, August 30th and let me tell you, I had one excited little boy. 

I found a little backpack at Old Navy on clearance, and the boy wanted to sleep with it on. 

Found this idea on Pinterest (my new addiction) and would LOVE to keep this going through the years with our boys! 

He did SO great on his first day, he played so well, helped pick up the toys, sat nice and still for snack time, and had a blast on the playground. I'm hoping that he will continue to share his Mommy like he did the first week, I'm sure we'll have a day or two or fifteen (hope not) that he will realize his Mom is there and not paying him 100% of her attention. My sister also taught at Maxwell when her boys were little, Griffin was about Case's age in the class with her, and she said there were some days where it was pretty hard. (Another reason Amy and I are total twins! Ha!)  I know we'll have some tough days, and probably some sick days getting exposed to all kinds of new germs. That's just part of it though! :) 

Here's the little man after his first big day at nursery school: 

So much fun!