15 months

Tuesday morning I packed Beckett and his favorite "ba ba" up and we headed to the pediatrician for his 15 month check up.  When I scheduled this 3 months ago I patted myself on the back because I had timed it perfectly with Emery's school drop off, but of course Tuesday rolls around she is still on Christmas break, duh!  So thankfully I have fabulous friends who will let her hang out at their house while I take Beckett- I like to be able to focus on him & not have to wrangle a 3 yr old at the same time (although I must say, Dr. D is fantastic about saying hi to Emery and making her feel like they are old friends).  Anyway, so everything went smoothly at the ped's office, I just wanted to post his stats:

At 15 months he is 31.5 in tall (62% , really?!?!) and 23 lb 6 oz (32%).  Everything else went really smoothly.  He had a little fluid on his ears, but he's been fighting a serious runny nose for a couple of weeks now.  Dr. D gave him an antibiotic to help kick that and keep away any infection.

He's such a funny little man.  He is absolutely obsessed with his ba ba, (pink) panda, cars, and balls.  He loves his sister and they crack each other up all the time- zerberts are hi-larious especially at dinner.  He is just the sweetest ever and we love, love, love him!!!

(he is also super obsessed with the phone & he was NOT happy I wouldn't let him have it)

Successsss!!!!!

We don't have big plans for this week which always seem to end up being really great or really boring (hopefully great though, right?!).  Monday I decided to finally bite the bullet and take everyone to Costco.  We don't go often, but when we do it's exhausting!  It's a good half hour away and then there's the whole issue with shopping with little ones.  Everyone is always excited when we get home because of all the new big boxes & big packages of toilet paper & paper towels to jump on and I am OK with that!  So, it wasn't the smoothest trip but we made it, no one bled or cried too much.  I try to go really really over prepared so everyone is happy- tons of food & books and this works for a while then Beckett starts the "I'm done, I'm done!" and that means wrap it up, HE'S DONE! :)  So, here's our loot:

(she's a fantastic car unload-er btw and she was DYING to climb the boxes!)

 

After naptime we ended up at the park (again) and most of our neighborhood friends were outside and every one had a bike or a car or some type of moving toy and before we knew it they were riding/ driving in circles around our little track.  It was fantastic and everyone had a great time (and it killed a good hour & a half before dinner, bonus!).  I LOVE a great Monday!!!

It's just a phase... and I LOVE it!

One of the biggest lessons I've learned since becoming a Mom is that everything is a PHASE!  Good phases, bad phases, really bad phases (haha!) they come and go without rhyme or reason or warning.  Right after we got home from our Christmas travels we seemed to be in one of those bad phases- Emery was constantly begging for new toys (seriously, was it not JUST Christmas???), Beckett needed SO much attention that he just didn't seem to be getting but then it just -CLICKED- .  

I don't know what changed or how it happened, but everyone seemed to be back in a good groove this weekend and I am so thankful we could really enjoy our time together.  Friday afternoon/ evening I was pretty pessimistic about the idea of having a good weekend, but we did and it has carried into this week, woo hoo!!!

Saturday morning we all ate breakfast together, which is always nice after a crazy week of eating at odd times and never all together.  After we ate we all loaded up & headed to the gym.  Apparently our gym had an open house event and so the place was PACKED!  Matt was hoping for some treadmill time, but every piece of cardio equipment was taken (crazy!).  BUT, it also meant they had kid's activities in the gym (the gym gym, sorry, I digress!).  There was bounce houses, face painting, art, hair painting, basketball, and music.  This was such a relief since it has been cold and rainy and cloudy for several days- we played, and played, and played.  And then we napped and napped and napped, yay!

Sunday was my turn to work childcare at church and I ended up in Emery's class.  She loves to stay with me in whichever class I am working in so I was glad she got to be with kids her own age.  We had 6 girls and 1 boy and they were precious!  We played with pla-doh, colored, talked about what Jesus did as a little kid like them (some super fabulous answers by the way) and on our way home, the sun came out!  It's been cold & rainy & blah for several days and the sun was so wonderful to see!  After naps we went on an adventure- Emery rode her bike and Beckett rode in the stroller.  We ended up at the park where they were having some kind of big dog meetup/ playdate and we all loved watching them play- Beckett gets so excited every time he sees a dog!

So, I have no pictures from our weekend of course.  Every picture worthy moment was so random & unplanned.  Like I said, I love me a good phase!

Two years... a look back

So, I figured the best way to get myself caught up on everything that has happened in the past two years is through pictures.  I only have 1,000 plus on my phone so this shouldn't take long. :)

Emery grew, grew, grew like a crazy lady!

She rode on an airplane for the first time in October 2010.  We all headed up to Chicago for a little thing called the Chicago Marathon thank you very much!

 In November 2010 we packed up all our belongings & our first house in Tyler and made the move to Houston!

 Celebrated our first Christmas in Houston

 Bought a house (and moved in May 2011)

 Went to the park... A LOT!

 Matt ran the Houston Marathon (and we cheered him on!)

 Found out #2 is a B-O-Y

 Got our first haircut

 Swam, swam, swam!  We are so thankful for a fabulous pool to get us through hot summer days!

 Found a new church!

 Celebrated Emery's 2nd birthday- we all got sick at the last minute so it turned into a cousin/ family party and it was tons of fun!!!

October 3, 2011 we welcomed Beckett Matthew to our little clan!

 Thanksgiving 2011 we met the latest & greatest Kirksey- Easton Lee, born 7 days after Beckett

Christmas 2011

 And since then we've been doing a lot of things...

Snuggling

 Smiling...

 Traveling (to Carrollton!)

 Push up (ing)

 Playing...

 Hosting...

 Celebrating (Aubrey's 2nd birthday)

 Splashing...

 Shopping...

 Drumming...

Celebrating...

 Lounging...

 Learning...

 Operating (he's OK, just tear duct surgery in 9/12)...

 Posing (at the Rose Festival 2012)...

 Eating (at Emery's "special place" Clay's)...

 Trick or Treating...

 Sleeping...

 So, that wasn't too bad now was it!  Stay tuned, Christmas pictures and more to come!

Let's try this again...

OK, so I'm really going to give this blog a shot again.  We have had some big changes in the past, ahem, 2+ years and I want to be better about keeping a record of what we are doing.  For now, I've added our newest member Beckett to the picture on top (welcome, Beckett!) :).  I promise, more posts to come!

Hello...???

I would like to greatly apologize for my lack of blogging for the last 6 months. I am having computer issues in the house and I don't have a way to upload pictures onto the blog. Let's be honest here- we're all just wanting pictures of Emery and not a bunch of words! :) For those of you periodically checking on the Madison's- THANK YOU!!! I still don't have a way to get pictures up here, so I'll tell you what we have been up to (yay, lots of words!).

Emery has grown and changed SO much- she turned a year old on August 17th and we had a birthday party at our house the weekend before. It was so fun and we are so thankful to our families who came to celebrate our baby girl with us. Emery loved all the attention and presents and food- she was such a ham! If you want to see pictures you can look here and here (big thanks to my Mom and Sister for being good bloggers!).

Miss Emery is definitely keeping us busy- she started walking at 11 months and her new name is Torn-Emery. She is somehow able to scatter all her toys throughout the house in a matter of minutes! It is so much fun and I love every day with her.

Hopefully soon I'll figure out this picture situation. Just give me another 6 months... :)

Need a laugh?

It's so funny what random noises will make my child laugh, but I'm willing to do anything to hear that sweet sound. You should know a couple of things before you watch this:

1. No video is ever complete without a dog fight in the background (or Friend's on the TV for that matter).

2. Red sweatpants are a must have for any fashionable mom this season!

3. I've been a little sickly lately, please ignore the coughing- I promise I didn't cough on the baby.

4. This video might not be for you if you are the sea sick type, my video taping skills aren't up to par either. :)

Enjoy!