fun Archives - Page 25 of 31 - Sunshine and Holly

Graham is 10 months!

By sunshineandholly on August 24, 2013

Graham – I can’t keep up with these posts! We’re busy planning for your first birthday party, which is a week away!

Here’s what’s new in your 10th month:

Crawling!!!!! Yes – you are mobile. And such a busy little guy! You’re getting into everything now. Keeping me on my toes.

You’ve started rolling around at night and now you love to sleep on your stomach.

We’ve cut back on the paci – you only use it at night.

You celebrated your first 4th of July.

You played with a play kitchen for the first time at your buddy Carter’s house. I know what you’re getting for Christmas. 🙂

You also had your first ride in the Ergo on my back. You liked being able to see better than when I wear you on the front.

You are trying your best to repeat words. At 10 months old you learned how to say teeth. We started brushing your teeth every night. You’ve got 8 of them now!

We’ve been saying colors and shapes to you and you’ve said “yellow” a couple of times. Your little voice is so cute.

You got your first pair of real shoes. You love your new kicks and have been trying to say “shoe.”

Getting you to go to sleep at night is becoming an issue. You can fight sleep like there’s no tomorrow! We’re trying some no-cry solutions, but they haven’t been very successful…

You love to eat and you love to feed us bites of your food. It cracks you up. You’re pretty much done with purees unless they’re in a pouch. I make a lot of finger foods for you (organic veggies, meat, cheese and fruit) and you’re also trying more and more of what we’re eating.

Still loving bath time, but now that you’ve learned to pull up, you’ve been trying to stand up in the tub. Slippery baby!

You’ve also been barking a lot – Lacey and Jack have taught you well. 🙂

Love you, my Busy Boo. My little Mister Mister!

Graham is 9 months!

By sunshineandholly on July 22, 2013

So this post is super late. I’ve been busy chasing a baby around! Let me see what I can remember about your 9th month Mr. Graham…

9 months! You’ve been outside of my tummy longer than you were inside! And oh how much you’ve grown. You are 20lbs 4oz (69%) and 30in long (95%) with a big old head in the 96th percentile!! Gotta be big to hold your big brain. 🙂

I’ve been dressing you each day in a 9 month outfit, just to wear them one last time. They’re getting pretty tight – on to 12 month clothes! You’re still in size 3 diapers.

You eat like a champ. (Can’t believe you once were a tiny little thing who wouldn’t eat!) You have 4 to 5 bottles a day of 6 to 7 ounces each. And we’ve moved to three real meals a day. You love feeding yourself, so we mostly do finger foods. (Steamed veggies, cut up fruit, small soft pieces of meat, string cheese, etc.) We’ve also practiced with a few of those food pouches. They’re convenient when we’re on the go. And you love love love puffs!

You’re starting to throw fits when you don’t get your way. Luckily you’re pretty easy to distract. (And you look adorable, even when you’re crying!)

When we went to the doctor for your 9 month appointment, she was concerned you weren’t pulling up yet. She said she’d give you until 10 months and then she might have us do some physical therapy. (Same thing happened when you didn’t want to support your head.) Well wouldn’t ya know, the very next day you started pulling up. Stinker. 🙂

You are a friendly baby – you let anyone and everyone hold you. Sometimes I wish you were a little more attached to me, but at least I don’t have to worry about you crying when I leave you with your grandparents and drop you off in the nursery at church.

Showing some Waumba Land spirit!
P.S. This is one of my all time fav pics of you. 🙂

You love your dada. You say his name ALL the time. You only say mama when you’re upset an whining. (Gee, thanks.) We went to visit him at work this month and you loved playing with his calculator. Are you going to follow in his footsteps and be a CPA?

We’ve always called you “busy boo” (as well as a million other nicknames) and this month you’re really living up to that name. You play play play all day. Toys are ok, but you really like remotes, cell phones, cords and the dogs. You’re keeping me on my toes!

Helping fold a mountain of laundry.

We tried out Gymboree early in the month. (They offer a free trial class.) It was alright. I think we both enjoyed the “mommy and me” water aerobics class we were taking more. And the price is def better for the water aerobics. (Gymboree is expensive!) And, not gonna lie, the clown mascot kind of freaked me out.

You love to play in your baby pool on the back porch.

Oh my goodness – can this pic be any more adorable?!?!

You also love swinging in your swing. Sometimes it’s too much fun and it wears you out. 🙂

I swear we normally put clothes on you when we take you outside!
The baby pool pic and the swing pic were from the same day.

You saw your first Laser Show. I was afraid the fireworks and loud music would scare you, but you loved it! You were mesmerized the entire time.

We finally installed your “big boy car seat” (after letting it sit in the box in our kitchen for a month).

It’s getting a little harder to go out to eat with you. You want to play with everything on the table.

Eatin’ Cherrios with chopsticks!

You had your finger pricked at the doctors. You were NOT happy about it. And then you stared at the band aid for 20 minutes trying to figure it out.

What a fun month! We love you Busy Boo!

Pigeon Forge – A Family Friendly Destination

By sunshineandholly on May 20, 2013

A couple of weekends ago we went up to Pigeon Forge for a little family getaway. We’ve been up there a few times, but this was the first time with Graham. He was awesome the entire trip!

Pigeon Forge – A Family Friendly Destination

We headed up Thursday evening after Josh got off work. Our first stop – Cracker Barrel! I had the grilled chicken tenderloins with mac and cheese and carrots. Graham had some applesauce.

Graham had to try on these cowboy boots we found in the store. He’s a country boy!

We usually stay at the Hampton Inn in Pigeon Forge. We checked in super late. Graham had fallen asleep in the car but luckily went back to bed pretty easily.

Ripley’s Believe It or Not

Friday we woke up to rain. After a quick breakfast at the hotel, we headed into Gatlinburg to see what we could find to do that was inside since it was still pouring rain. We decided to check out the Ripley’s Believe It or Not museum. It was actually really interesting!

Graham got his picture with the creepy two-headed cow.

Then we took a pic with Robert Wadlow – the tallest recorded man that ever lived. (Crazy coincidence – I checked out “The Girl Who Chased the Moon” from the library the week before we went to Pigeon Forge. It had a character that was based on Robert Wadlow. The author even dedicated the book to him! It was a pretty good book and it was so weird that I’d never heard of Robert Wadlow before this.)

Fun Around Gatlinburg

We ducked into a Dunkin’ Donuts to feed Graham, and when I finished the rain had slowed down. By this time we were starving so we grabbed some lunch at Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. Tasty! After that, the rain had stopped completely! We walked around Gatlinburg for a while and ended up at the Ole Smoky Moonshine brewery.

Huge barrel of moonshine a’ brewin’.

There was a bar area where you could try all of the different flavors. (There were 12 in all!) I felt a little wrong having my baby in a bar. I felt even MORE wrong having my baby in a bar while my husband and I did shots of moonshine! Lol! Graham was actually taking a nap in the stroller while we were doing the tasting. A few random guys saw him passed out and started chuckling. Josh said to them, “Yeah, he already did the tasting – he couldn’t handle it.” Ha!

All of the flavors were super yummy! Blackberry, grape, lemon drop, blueberry, pink lemonade, strawberry. Mmmm! We ended up buying a jar of peach and apple pie. Those were the best! I skipped out on tasting the “original” and the “white lightin” flavors – those were the two most…potent. I figure one of us needed to be able to drive!

Dixie Stampede

After that, we went back to the hotel and rested for a bit. Then it was off to the Dixie Stampede! I’ve been before and I LOVE it. Since I know I can’t do it justice by explaining what it is, click here to Wikipedia it. (Scroll down to the “show” section.) I know it sounds a little cheesy, but it’s so much fun!

Dollywood

The next morning was the highlight of the trip and the main reason we go to Pigeon Forge – Dollywood!!! Dollywood really is one of the most fun theme parks. They’ve got award-winning roller coasters and shows, delicious food, and tons of stuff for families to enjoy. Still skeptical? Dollywood won the Applause Award in 2010 – the most prestigious award in the theme park industry. You should go!

Graham loved it!

Looking so cool in his shades!

Family pic time!

I’m such a sucker for these photo ops.

Indiana Graham. 🙂

Playing on the playground!

Riding the carousel.

Right before we rode the train. Such cute boys!

Goats on the Roof

On Sunday, we headed home. On the way, to top off our country-fied vacation, we decided to stop at a little place called “Goats on the Roof.” Which is a store and restaurant with…you guessed it! Goats on the roof!

“Ok mom, I’m over these goats on the roof.”

Our trip was so much fun! I can’t wait for Graham to get a little older so we can take him again. Our next trip is coming up in July – Tybee Island with both sets of Graham’s grandparents. (So they can babysit while Josh and I have some fun in Savannah.) Can’t wait!

Pin it!

Pigeon Forge – A Family Friendly Destination

2 Comments

Mother’s Day

By sunshineandholly on May 13, 2013

I had a wonderful first Mother’s Day! We celebrated the whole weekend.

We had sushi.

Graham said he’d rather have giraffe legs instead of sushi. 🙂

We had crab legs.

If you’re ever in Atlanta, eat here. And then walk around here.
It’s even more fun if you have a few drinks with dinner and then walk around after dark.

I took Graham to meet some animals at a local farmyard.

Billy goat!

We went on the swing set.

I got a card and travel coffee mug with my sweet baby’s hand and feet prints.

Me and my Super-Graham!

We napped.

Be still my heart…so sweet!

Graham fed himself!

The hubby even helped me make a carrot cake. (I’ve been craving carrot cake recently!)

I LOVE being a mommy!

Now Josh is putting Graham to bed and I’m about to relax with a glass of wine, Game of Thrones and Mad Men.

Happy Mother’s Day to all of the mommies out there!

1 Comment

babies | baby | fun | Uncategorized

Baby Boy Blue

By sunshineandholly on May 10, 2013

I don’t care if some would say this outfit is girly…my baby looks adorable!

It took me a LONG time to figure out “my style” of clothing. Awkward middle school years of biker shorts and t-shirts led to a short phase of gothic style clothes, complete with big black combat boots in high school. (Uggg so embarrassing to admit!) Then in college it was sorority t-shirts and whatever I could find to hide my freshman 15, my sophomore 10, my junior 5…man I gained some weight in college! When I graduated, I bought some nice corporate-y work clothes. You know what I’m talking about – black pants, blouses, button-downs, khakis….snore…boring!

When I ended up working in my company’s creative department, I started to be a little bit more adventurous with what I wore. That’s when I finally figured out what I liked to wear. Mostly dresses with fun prints – feminine yet funky. I’d just throw on a cute dress, a cardigan, grab my Coach purse and I was off to work! And man, I had some CUTE clothes! (Gotta loose the rest of this baby weight so I can fit into these pretty things again…)

Dressing a boy is hard. The girl section of the kids clothes stores is always bigger – and the stuff is way cuter. Boy clothes are all graphic t-shirts, animals and sports. Which are cute, but can get old fast. We were blessed with so many hand-me-downs from girls at my church that I haven’t had much of a chance to buy a lot of clothes for Graham. And really, when I have gone shopping, I haven’t found many things that I just have to have in the boy section.

I think Gap Kids, The Children’s Place, Old Navy and Mini Boden have super cute baby boy clothes. And as much as I appreciate the hand-me-downs (it saved us a ton of money) I’m excited about Graham growing out of his clothes so I can buy him some stuff that I’ve picked out. I’d like Graham to wear a mix of preppy, hipster and baby boy blue clothes.

Button-downs, skinny jeans and madras prints – here we come! 🙂

1 Comment