one month old

huh, what?!?! a month old? geez. with a second child, time is flying by even faster. for reals. sawyer is such a delight for us. and as much as we feared this child would be the complete opposite of cayden, we've been blessed with another great sleeper and overall even-tempered infant. whew. if we have a third child, they're bound to be wild, right? but we won't dwell on that right now.

sawyer, you're a dream come true for this mama. and just today, you gave me the best open-mouthed grins anyone could ask for. i look forward to the day you coo back to me in response. but for now? i'll take the sweet little noises you make and the awesome grunts too... even though those are usually accompanied by some other noises too. (which as a completely mature adult [ahem!] still make me giggle. even better? when the two year old tells sawyer to say "muse me." too funny.)

gettin' dirty

jeremy and cayden had another little adventure. they went across the street where the neighborhood hasn't been developed yet and got a little dirty. it rains almost every afternoon right now (a nice little addition to our humidity problem; ugh), so it was a little bit muddy. jeremy and cayden both wore their boots. and after seeing them walk back home, i'm glad they had boots on for sure; their feet were dirty enough as it was.

cayden actually took a face plant at some point apparently. he had mud/dirt from the top of his face into his socks! straight to the bath for that little guy. anyway, they apparently had a great time. jeremy tried to teach him to climb hills. for a two year old that still falls quite frequently on flat ground, jeremy said he did pretty well. apparently we're "training" him for some future hikes. or something like that...

wordless wednesday: booboos before 7:30 a.m.

rolling over

so, yesterday, i tweeted this:

and yes, i for sure thought it was a fluke. until he rolled over again last night when jeremy got home. and just now, i caught this little clip. at first i thought he was going to get stuck on his arm (i think we all know getting over the arms are the major issues when trying to roll over), but then? he just plopped on over to his back! crazy. (and no, he doesn't really enjoy tummy time. but that's ok too. )

after looking back through the blog, cayden first rolled over at almost four months old! what the heck? is sawyer some genius kid, or is it really all still a fluke? i mean, he was lifting his head up the afternoon he was born, so i'm not sure i should expect anything different. i knew he was going to be feisty. i think i was right.

cayden's silhouette

{original image}

{finished silhouette}

it's about time, right? i make these for other people all the time but had never made one for cayden. i even have one for me and jeremy already hanging in the family room (and they've been there for months and months). why hadn't i done one for cayden yet? the biggest reason? trying to get a toddler to stand still to get a good profile shot! but i had jeremy shoot it while i had cayden look at me and it worked perfectly. the best part? i also got about a gazillion kisses during the shoot because i was down on his level for so long. made this mama's heart melt just a bit.

sweet boys

finding time to post gets a little tricky these days, but trust that all is going well! we tried a photo shoot with the boys. and this is about all we managed to get. by the time we were about to get just the right shot, cayden was "all done" holding sawyer. but we got a couple. that top shot though? love it.

little adventures

admittedly, we weren't entirely sure how bringing home a newborn would change cayden's world. i think jeremy and i probably both prepared ourselves for the worst... cause really, if you're expecting the worst, there's only room to be surprised, right? and surprised we were! cayden loves his little brother. gives him kisses all the time. wants to crawl up on him and hug him. and always says "hi!" to baby sawyer first thing in the mornings.

of course, we have those moments where sawyer's crying and cayden tells him to "shhhh!" (complete with finger to his nose [?] – it's close enough to his mouth, right?). and if cayden runs into something, or hurts something, he's much quicker to climb into someone's lap now. the whining from cayden has gotten a little worse, but we can't decide if it's the fact that he's two. that his two year molars are coming in. or that we brought home a new itty bitty. my best guess? all three.

so the other night, after we'd put cayden to bed, jeremy was out in the garage working while i was feeding sawyer. i heard cayden's bedroom door open and then close. about 20 seconds later, jeremy came in running for his camera (apparently the clouds from sunset needed to be captured). i mentioned that cayden had opened his door, so jeremy went to look. the sweet kiddo was laying in the hallway outside of his room listening to what was going on. instead of putting him directly back in bed, jeremy scooped him up and took him outside with him. a little adventure – especially since it was way past bedtime! i think these little adventures are something that our sweet cayden is going to need more of. because while it's important to pay attention to the newborn's needs, it's also important for us to give cayden some individual attention too. and these little adventures? are something i'm looking forward to.

then & now: bath edition

just a little side-by-side comparison of our two itty bitties. they most definitely resemble each other, but are so very different all at the same time. and yes, we tried to recreate the original photo of cayden with sawyer so we'd be able to do this just for fun. and hey, maybe one day the boys will like being able to look at photos like these.

fourth of july

having a holiday weekend right after giving birth kind of rocked. i mean, i was off work anyway (as was jeremy), but school was closed. so we got to all spend an extra long weekend together. just the four of us. the four of us. we have children. as in plural. crazy. and so very awesome.

we took it easy. generally we spend the holiday in tennessee with my parents and watch awesome fireworks (that are super close to their house and HUGE), but obviously, this year the traditions had to change a bit. i don't think we got out of jammies until mid-morning, which was really nice.

when we were younger, and my dad's parents were alive, we used to go to their house in the country. we'd all sit outside and eat watermelon out of pie plates and wait (not so) patiently for the 4-5 different types of homemade ice cream that were churning. i can still hear the sounds of those ice cream makers cranking out the goodness.

while we didn't enjoy homemade ice cream, we did continue with the watermelon tradition. the toddler screamed when we tried to take his shirt off, so a watermelon covered shirt and face it was. the watermelon was very juicy and perfect for the hot and humid day we had.

sawyer wasn't quite ready to enjoy the watermelon (duh), but we most definitely wanted to get a photo of our boys (!) in their red, white and blue together. unfortunately, it rained mid-afternoon so all our good light disappeared before we were ready. but hey, we'll take what we can get. cayden's never looked SO. BIG. but what a great big brother he already is. sigh. we're so blessed.

meet sawyer wray

our sweet boy joined the family last wednesday. i had a scheduled induction and it went beautifully. we showed up to the hospital around 5:45 that morning. we were quickly informed by our nurse that we were in a "competition" with the next door neighbors to see who could have their baby first. haha! (it was their fourth baby, so we were pretty sure we were already losers. but we won. by a long shot, apparently!)

my water was broken around around 7 am, and by 8:45 am, i had my epidural. when the anesthesiologist came in, i was sure to mention the leak and blood patch from last time. when i say the man took his time inserting my epidural to ensure that i wouldn't have a leak this time, i'm not kidding. it took so long that my back started cramping up and i was shaking uncontrollably. luckily, he finished up right as i was about to lose my cool. whew. (and best thing? no killer headache the next day. so no leak. yay!)

anyway, epidural in! and i kept the feeling in my lower legs this time. it was nice being able to still move my own legs and feel things. best. epidural. ever. in less than an hour, i'd progressed to 6 cm. and by 11:15, we were ready to push!

sawyer was born at 11:40 am, weighing 8 pounds, 12 ounces and measuring 21 inches long. i'm still not entirely sure where this kiddo was in my belly. it definitely explains the bruised ribs and general uncomfortableness that i just couldn't shake those last few days. we're all so in love (cayden included!) that we can barely stand it. he's a beautiful baby and is treating this mama and his daddy very well.

these are just a few photos from the day. if you want to see more, visit my flickr page!