Quick trip to Ft. Worth

July 16

My parents made a quick trip to Ft Worth this weekend for a retirement party for Dr. Putnam. "Put" hired my Dad when he graduated from Vet school in 1997 at his clinic in Burleson. My Dad worked there for 3 years before moving to Lubbock to help take care of my grandmother before she passed away. We all loved the clinic in Burleson and our time there and Dr. Putnam will always have a place in our heart!

Gregg had to work Saturday so Cade and I decided to go to Ft. Worth to spend the night with my parents and go to the party.

Checking into the hotel with the most precious of cargo (and a lot of junk!)

We had a great time at the retirement party and enjoyed seeing Dr. Putnam and the rest of the staff from Burleson Equine Hospital!

Cade's first two-step!

After the party was over we went to Papadeaux's for dinner! It was extremely YUMMY and worth the hour we had to wait to get in!

me, my Dad, and Cade waiting at Papadeaux's

Then it was back to the hotel for the rest of the evening. Cade had a great time crawling all over the beds and playing with my parents before tiring out and falling asleep.

all cuddled into his pallet next to my bed

Sunday morning my Dad woke up early and took Cade down to the breakfast area so that Mom and I could get a little extra sleep.

Grumps helping Cade eat breakfast

After Gregg got off work he came to the hotel to meet up with us for the day. We went to Garden Ridge to do a little shopping and then to Mama's Pizza to meet a couple of the ladies (and their family) that Dad worked with at Burleson Equine Hospital. We enjoyed lunch and spent the afternoon sitting there telling old stories and laughing!

We had such a great weekend and I am so glad that we were all able to spend a little time together! I always love any time that I get to spend with my parents and especially enjoy getting to watch them with Cade now. Can't wait to see them again!

Playgroup fun!

July 22

We had another playgroup last Friday afternoon. This time we went out to Crandall to Cheryl, Matthew, and Connor's house. Cheryl has the fun house out of everyone in our group by far! (Of course she is the only one of us with an older kid so that helps) We started out by having lunch and feeding the kiddos before changing everyone into swimsuits, slathering them with sunscreen and heading outside to play. Matthew has a Bounce house and blow up water slide that he let the little ones play on and in for the afternoon! Cade was a little skeptical of both initially but warmed up a little. He loved the swing most and spent most of the time just going back and forth!

Connor, McKensley, and Cade
Cade, Max, and McKenzie

Cade enjoying the swing

Once everyone had enough outside we headed in to dry off, have snack, and hang out in the playroom. It was so much fun to watch all the babies interact with each other and see them play together!

We ended the day with our monthly picture of the kids! Getting 8 babies to sit along the wall like this for a picture is quite a challenge now that everyone is crawling or walking.

Cade, Brinley & Brody, McKensley, Connor, Max & McKenzie

We had such a fun day in Crandall playing with our friends! (I especially loved catching up with all my NNICU girls!) Can't wait to see everyone again in August!!!

Landry visits

July 9

Cody, Misti and Landry came to visit us in July! They were able to visit Cody's family and us all during their mini vacay. We loved having them here with us and enjoyed watching the boys play together! I am so glad that Cade and Landry are so close in age and look forward to watching them grow up and become best buddies.

Landry discovered the stairs while they were here and loved getting to play on them!

pajama playtime one morning
I honestly think Cade was trying to hug Landry here even though it looks like he is choking him!

Double Trouble!

Landry so badly wanted to be in the bouncer with Cade!

We had a fun few days with Cody, Misti, and Landry and were so glad that they were able to visit us! I can't wait for all the holidays this year since both the boys will be a little bigger and more able to play with each other!

8 Months Old

Once again I am behind writing this post! I just don't know where the time goes these days. These last 8 months have flown by in an absolute blur! We are having so much fun with Cade and love watching his little personality shine. He is the most precious boy and has brought so much joy to our lives.

Here are a few things about Cade from this month:

- He is full out crawling these days and therefore is into everything! He easily goes from sitting to crawling and is almost able to go from crawling position back to sitting without any help.

- He is also pulling up and climbing up everything. He loves to climb up and over Gregg and I, the furniture, and is even starting to climb the stairs. We have had to lower his bed again and it is now all the way down to the lowest setting.

- His new favorite game is to climb up the back of the couch cushion (that we put on the ground) and onto the couch and then climb back down. He will wear himself out doing this over and over again!

- He does not like the gate at all and cannot stand to be trapped on one side if we are on the other!

- He is still eating every 5-6 hours during the day and will go 8 hours at night. I am still going strong with breastfeeding! He is eating stage 1 and stage 2 baby foods as well as cereal and puff snacks. (This boy LOVES to eat!) He has mastered putting puff snacks into his own mouth this month also.

- He has been sleeping a little better during the night over the last month. He goes to bed between 9-10pm usually and will sleep till 2-3am and then goes back down till about 7am.

- He is still wearing size 2-3 diapers and for the most part size 6-9 month clothes.

- He loves his bouncer and has so much fun playing with all his toys!

- He has really started babbling more and repeating syllables over and over. He gets so excited when we babble back to him! He has also really started to blow raspberries and thinks he is so funny when he is doing that!

We love you so much sweet boy and look forward to watching you grow even more over the next month!

These chair pictures are becoming near impossible to take with our wild monkey!

His favorite thing to do is try to crawl over the arm of the chair...

...or to crawl out the front of the chair in order to escape!

4th of July fun!

We kicked our fun 4th of July weekend off with dinner Saturday night with our good friends Craig, Susan and Carlee. We ate in downtown Carrolton at Agave Azul Mexican Kitchen. This was the first time that any of us had eaten there we were all fans! After dinner we walked around the square looking for somewhere to get ice cream but were disappointed that nowhere sold it. So, we googled yogurt places and headed off to find that. We were led to a cute little Asian retail center boasting 2 different yogurt stores! We picked the bigger of the 2 locations and snagged an outdoor table where we could continue to enjoy the company along with a little people watching! (There were LOTS of cute Asian babies which made me think of my friend Ginny. She currently lives in Taiwan with her husband James and loves little Asian babies!!!) The yogurt was great and we all had fun chatting and being entertained by Carlee and Cade!

Kisses from the older lady!

Carlee and Cade playing at the yogurt shop
Gregg had to work on Sunday so Cade and I enjoyed a morning at home before heading to the fire station to celebrate our independence with the other families! We made 2 kinds of homemade ice cream (vanilla and my personal favorite milky way), a fruit salad, and a patriotic fruit pizza. They guys cooked burgers and hot dogs and we enjoyed an All American meal!!! After dinner everyone loaded up to go watch the Irving fireworks. We went to the same high spot down the road from the station where we watched fireworks last year. We were able to enjoy several different shows from where we were which made it more fun for the kids! Cade was tired by the time the fireworks started but otherwise did really good.

Our little Firecracker!

Momma's helper!

Yummy Red, White, & Blue fruit pizza!

Hanging out at the fire station!

We had a really fun 4th of July weekend and feel so blessed to live in a country where we are free!

You know you are a grown up when...

...buying a vacuum is totally exciting!!! We bought a new Rainbow Vacuum this week and are loving it! This thing is amazing- it vacuums, dusts, sweeps, purifiers the air- basically does it all and does so much of a better job than a regular vacuum.

The Rainbow doesn't have a filter so it doesn't re-circulate the dust and nastiness that it pulls from the air. We were amazed during the demo at just how much more dirt and other crap this vacuum picked up from our carpets and we had even vacuumed everything in the house earlier in the day!

In the end we were convinced buy how much more clean then vacuum left not only our carpet but also the air- both very important to us with a little one crawling around.

The water in the Rainbow after I vacuumed everything upstairs this morning- GROSS!

And as an added bonus it is fun and easy to use meaning that for the first time EVER I have actually enjoyed and looked forward to cleaning the house! Here is to hoping this new found like for cleaning will continue on for me!

Hello beautiful!

We have a...

... Crawler!

Cade has been trying hard for several weeks to crawl but it has always been more of a army crawl/ scoot movement. Well, on June 22 he officially and consistently started crawling! It is so much fun to watch him go and just amazing to see how much better (and quicker) he gets every single day!

...and a Climber!

This little one is ALL boy and LOVES to climb on everything and everyone!!! He is now pulling up on us, the furniture, and anything else that he can! I have heard that Gregg had no fear as a little boy and would climb in order to get anything that he wanted. I have a feeling that Cade is going to be the same way and will be keeping us plenty busy!!!