Happy Halloween

Aunt Lauren bought Chase this cute onesie for his first Halloween. Isn't it cute? More monkey pictures to come... :) Happy Halloween!

Costume party

Anna Grace turns 1 this Friday 10/30 so to help her celebrate, we went to her costume/birthday party yesterday afternoon. Chase dressed up as a Teething Monkey. Poor little guy. The 2 teeth that came in on the bottom didn't give him quite as hard of a time as these coming in on the top. He has 2 that have already broken through his gums and one more on top that you can see working it's way through. As a result he was unusually fussy and out-of-sorts for most of the day yesterday. He slept a lot, too. On Saturday night he slept 13 (!) hours, then took a 2-hr. morning nap Sunday morning and another hr.-long nap in the afternoon before Anna Grace's party. I was hoping that all that sleep would help him have a good time but I think it was a little too much for him unfortunately. He hung in there for about an hour and a half, though. (Don't worry, I only put the furry hat on for pictures...) :)Here's the birthday girl in her cute duck costume.

Brian (and Kelly) helped me entertain Chase for most of the party. It looks like he and Chase are having a pretty good conversation here. :)

I wish this picture below had turned out a little better. We were trying to get all the kids to sit together on the couch so that we could get a picture of them all together. It was really funny because they all kept trying to wiggle down at various times. The best part (for me anyway) was that Chase just sat there the whole time by himself just watching everyone else. It looked like he was trying to figure out what all the fuss was about and why they kept trying to get down. He literally just sat pefectly still, taking it all in. That's my boy.

This is what we ended up doing so that we could get all the kids in the picture together, at the same time.

Bedtime must be funny

Chase has been doing so well with bedtime and sleeping through the night. Pretty much ever since we started him on solid food he has been sleeping all night, on average for about 12 hours each night. Labor Day weekend was when we decided that we were going to start letting him cry it out in an effort for him to "learn" to sleep all night. It was pretty rough getting up every night with him, then getting up at 6am and having to work all day. Luckily we didn't have to implement "Operation Cry-it-Out" because ironically enough that was when Chase decided he was ready. For the last few months or so he has been going to bed pretty early (6:45 or so) but he sleeps until about 6:45 am. There's even been a few times on the weekends where we've gone out to dinner, kept him up a little later and he's slept later on a Sat./Sun. morning. We still have the occasional night where he'll wake up but not very often.

At this point the only struggle is that with Chase having such an early bedtime, Matt doesn't really get to spend too much quality time with him on a week night. I think it frustrates Matt that when he gets home Chase is fussy, rubbing his eyes and ready for bed. This doesn't really allow for much play time Mon.-Fri. On this particular night, however, our little man was in a silly mood. His squeals and giggles were so funny that we had to pull out the camera. It's a shame he's not a happier baby. :)

Happy 7 months, Chase!!!

I couldn't let this day end without mentioning that Chase is 7 months today! I can't believe it. In addition to the 2 little teeth on the bottom, he now has 2 MORE teeth coming in on the top. He also can now sit up on his own. He still wobbles a little bit but when he topples over he doesn't crash with quite as much force. :) He's starting to do a better job of catching himself and just rolling over. I'm sure he'll be crawling before long.

Beach photo session

Before we left Wrightsville Beach on Sunday we walked down to the beach to get some pictures of Chase actually ON the beach. I was ashamed of the fact that we've taken Chase to the beach twice prior to this past weekend and never actually stepped foot onto the sand to get pictures of him. So even though Matt was whining about not wanting to go (it was REALLY cold and windy), we still managed to get some pretty good pictures.
Chase was fascinated with the sand. We had a really hard time getting him to look up because he was so intent on touching it.

I love this expression.

Katy, do you recognize this polo shirt?

I wish the weekend wasn't over!!! :(

All dressed up and someplace to go.

I love this frat-tastic outfit on Chase. He's a little stud.

It's been a while since Matt and I have had a reason to get dressed up, so thanks to Champ for being that reason. This was before the rehearsal dinner on Friday.

This picture was before the wedding on Saturday. Chase was a trooper because he was pretty tired. He had a hard time taking good naps pretty much the entire weekend. I think he was afraid he'd miss something.

Champ and Chase on the Big Day. Congrats!!!

Weekend at Wrightsville Beach

We had an amazing weekend at Wrightsville Beach with Matt's parents and sister. We went down there for our friends Champ and Angie's wedding. Back when I was pregnant we were planning on this weekend being our first weekend away from Chase. However, I didn't know at that time that he'd have a milk allergy and that I'd still be breastfeeding at this point. Luckily Don and Betty Ann knew that this was important to us so they offered to come with us to the beach rather than make us leave our little man for the weekend. It could not have been a more perfect set-up: we got to spend time with Chase during the day but we had babysitters to help us with him during the rehearsal dinner, wedding, and wedding reception. They even rented a house so that we could all stay in one place together. (I think they enjoyed spending some quality time with Chase as well...) It was the perfect weekend. Betty Ann and Don, we thank you so much for everything!!!

The story behind this picture is that Chase is now mesmerized by everything he sees us drinking and eating. If you're holding him while taking a sip of a drink, his eyes light up thinking that he'll get some, too. I have started giving him water every now and then out of a cup or bottle that I'm drinking out of and he absolutely loves it. The other night at dinner he dove towards my glass of wine and about knocked it out of my hand. Don't worry. He didn't get a sip of that. Anyway, he loves to also chew on the empty water bottles.

The house has a really big, nice front porch with a hammick hanging in the corner. Chase had a blast swinging on it with his Pops.

He even used the pillows to push himself up to a sitting position. He's been doing really well with the whole sitting-up-thing.

BOO!!

Sorry I have been bad and not posted anything in awhile. I haven't felt like we had any new pictures that were "blog worthy." However, after a great weekend in Wilmington we have a bunch of new pictures to share with everyone. But first, here is a video of Matt & Chase playing.

Little man

Here's a couple of cute pictures we took last Sunday after Chase and I got back from Winston-Salem. I wanted some pictures of him in this outfit because he looks like a little man. He's looking at Matt sitting beside him on the couch.
Then Matt got him to smile... What a sweet picture. I swear, this little boy melts my heart.

Brunch with the girls...and Chase

Yesterday I met my college girlfriends for brunch in Winston-Salem. Since it's about the half-way point between Raleigh/Durham and Charlotte, it was the easiest place for us to meet for a day trip. It's unfortunate that our weekend get-aways are becoming more difficult since life has become busier for everyone with babies, careers, husbands and other things dominating our free time. Not that any of these things are bad, of course. They just make it a little more difficult for us to escape on a regular basis for weekend trips. Here are some pictures that we took after we ate. We'll start with the two youngest additions to our group. :)

We were excited to have Callie visiting all the way from Boston. It was the first time she'd met Chase and Anna Grace. She looks surprised that Laurie handed her both babies so she could get her camera out.

Then she smiled and thought, "I got this."

Chase was excited to meet Leslie for the first time, too. I don't think he minded too much that he was the only guy there. He liked the attention. :)

Ma Ma

This past Wed. Chase said his first word...Kind of. He's been making noises over the last few months that sound like "Ommmm" and "Maaaaa". Well he decided to put those noises together and said Ma Ma (ma ma ma). Granted, it wasn't like he was reaching out for me while saying it. I'm pretty sure that he has no clue that's who I am. But it's a start.

Teeth...Take 2.

The picture we took the other day of Chase's teeth didn't turn out as well as we would've liked...So here's a picture of our little man cheesin' it up and a more clear view of his new additions.