Our Little boy turns 3!

Well I can't believe that my baby boy is now 3 years old!! It seems like just the other day we were bringing him home from the hospital, and now we are celebrating his 3rd birthday!

This is a picture of Brody when he was just 1 week old!

Here he is at his 1st Birthday party. I have always loved this picture and when I look at him I see a lot of resemblance between him and Kaylee.

Here he is at his 2nd Birthday party.

Here he is in his Birthday hat that we made on his 3rd Birthday. He is getting so big and so smart! He talks all the time at home and from what we have heard is a little shy when he is at school or church. Right now he loves to pretend play and will make Ja and I play like we are at school. It is so cute! Most days I look at him and think when did he get so big! Everyone says the years go by so fast and I am here to tell you they really do! How has 3 years gone by already!?

Brody got to celebrate his Birthday with his friends at school. We took up some yummy snacks and were able to celebrate with them. It was fun to see him in that environment!

In our house Birthdays are a big deal and I like to make it a special day! Brody woke up to find streamers hung from his doorway and the house decorated for his special day. I used pictures of some of his favorite things he did while he was 2 years old to decorate with. (Thanks Julia for that great idea!) We stayed around the house and did all of his favorite things, played with play-dough, finger painted, colored a party hat, played trains, and played lots of other fun things! It was a good day and he seemed to enjoy it!

Marmee and Pops were able to come over and celebrate his Birthday with us on his Birthday.

Here is a family pic of us before we sang Happy Birthday to the little guy.

Here he is opening some of his presents.

Kaylee enjoying the Birthday celebration.

Marmee reading a new book she gave them. I think this is funny because you can tell both kids are really interested in this book. She has a captivated audience.

Pops was showing Brody all the different things his new boat can do!

We had Jason's family over the next day to celebrate with us. This is the fun cake I made for that party. I found this recipe online and thought it would be perfect to make for him!! It was so much fun to make and so easy!! All you do is make a cake, ice it, then put kit-kats around it and M&M's on top! Easy as that and really pretty and fun looking! Brody's favorite part of the cake was eating the M&M's. :)

Here he is while we are all singing Happy Birthday to him. He is so funny!!

Lilly thought Kaylee was so funny when she was jumping in her jumperoo. :)

Brody received lots of great presents! He was so cute after he opened each one, he would go and tell that person thank you for the present! What a nice little boy!

Brody with Grandma and Grandpa

We had a wonderful time celebrating our little boys Birthday! We love you Brody and can't wait to see all the fun things you are going to learn this year!

Silver Dollar City-

We were able to go to Silver Dollar City again this past weekend. This time we went with my parents and stayed in a trailer next to their camper. It was a lot of fun sitting by the fire and walking around SDC with them. Ja and I also got to make a quick stop by the outlets while the kiddos stayed at the camp site with my parents!! Thanks mom and dad for letting us do some quick shopping!! As you can see by the picture above it was quite chili outside and we were all bundled up! However that did not stop us from having a great time!

I don't think the poor girl could move her arms because she was so bundled up!

We ate lunch inside and she was so excited to be able to get out of all her layers and be able to move around for a little while! :) I think this is a cute picture! She is such a happy little girl and very content doing whatever! I wonder if she will always be like that.

of course we had to ride the train and after we rode it we had to stop and watch it leave the station again! :)

Kaylee getting ready to take a nap in my arms on the long walk back to the car.

Brody loves riding all the fun kid rides that they have there. One of his favorites are the frogs that they have there. You can tell in this picture that he is having a great time!

While we were out shopping Brody made this fun pirate pumpkin! Cute!

Like I said it was really cold! Luckily our camp sites were right by each other and Kaylee was able to go to bed while we stayed up out by the fire. I think this picture is really funny! She can't move and yet is still looking at the camera!

Pops, Marmee, Brody and Kaylee in the Silver Dollar City jail. This is kind of a tradition with my family. I remember having a lot of pictures taken in here with my sister! It was fun to look back on those pictures and see how much we had changed from year to year. When we were there I was thinking about this time last year and how I was pregnant with Kaylee at the time and had just found out that my sister was pregnant with Drew. Wow where did the time go and look at how much has changed in one year!

When you ask Brody what was his favorite thing he did while we were there he will say riding "Noah's Ark". That is what he calls this ride and boy howdy he loved it! It was fun riding this with him and hearing him crack up when his stomach "tickled".

We had a great time while there and loved being able to go with my parents! It was a great little get away!

Kaylee is now 8 months old! She is such a big girl and yet in my mind is still my little baby! :) I guess that is how it always is with your second child! She is a very laid back girl! Very different then Brody was at this age! She loves to go shopping with me and will fall asleep in her stroller!! Wow that is great! :) She is always aware of her surroundings and loves it when Ja, Brody or I come in the room! Brody and I usually go and get her in the morning and she gets so excited to see both of us! She is now doing two signs which I love!!!!! She does all done and more! It is so cute to see her doing these! I love doing the signs with them and really think it helps know what they want. I know that there are people out there that say it slows down their speech, but in our experience with Brody it helped him learn the meaning of the words and when to use them. He is a big talker and I believe it help speed up his language. After they get the signs down you encourage them to say the words while doing the sign. It helps take aways a lot of frustration on their part and on ours! Anyways....
Kaylee is starting to like to move around to get things and is trying to start crawling but I think she has a ways to go until she does. Like I said she is a laid back little girl and with the constant entertainment from Brody who needs to go get anything to play with! She now only eats big people food and refuses to eat baby food anymore! If we put a bite of baby food in her mouth she puts her hands up and says all done and will push away the spoon! :) This is the time that I really don't like because now I have to be creative and think about good nutritious things that she will be able to eat! She is so fun and we can't imagine our lives without her!

Taking her monthly pictures in her chair are not that easy anymore!! :)

I am afraid that we have a VERY picky eater on our hands with Brody. Picky or stubborn I don't know but I also have to be creative with what he eats. :) It can make for some fun dinners and lunches! Of coures he likes the normal kid food and mac and cheese is his all time favorite! However I try to get him to try new things and to eat food that is good for him, we call it brain food. We play games at dinner to get him to eat and often times we bribe him with a little treat if he eats a good dinner like a pumpkin, starbursts or something along those lines. Some of his favorite things right now are in the picture above. He loves the Mickey Mouse apples! They are freeze dried apples with nothing else in them so I love that! He refuses to eat real apples so these are a good alternative. You can find them by the raisins. They are also a good on the go snack that I feel is good for them! He also loves the Mickey Mouse cheese. Yes I know it is just cheese cut out like Mickey Mouse and over priced because of it, but sometimes I just don't care as long as he eats it! :) I love the idea of the snacks with the letters on it!! It is a fun thing for them to eat and get to practice learning their letters!

My mom and dad watched Brody and Kaylee while we were gone on Sunday night and they did some pumpkin stamping! It was such a cute idea I thought I would share it with you so that you can do it with your kids. A great rainy day activity! Brody helped take the seeds out and the next day we did this with them......

We painted a pumpkin that I drew and glued the seeds on it. What a cute idea, thanks Marmee!
I cut the pumpkin out after it dried and it looks really cute! Brody had a great time doing it as well!!

One thing Brody loves to do is play Ja's trumpet! This will entertain him for hours and I must say he is really good at it! No he does not play songs, he just blows in it as hard as he can and wow he can really do it good for an almost 3 year old!! We have taken him to some football games and he really likes to see the football players and the band. He came home and told me that he wants a tuba from Santa. :) hahah I said they are to expensive for Santa. :)

Our new nephew was born last week and we are so excited to welcome Luke into our family! Congratulations Heather and Drew on a very cute baby boy!!! We can't wait to meet him!! Brody has really liked looking at all the pictures of "baby Luke" as he calls him and keeps telling us that he was in Aunt Heathers tummy and the doctor got him out!

A Visit to my sisters house!

This past weekend we were able to go and visit my sister, Eric and Drew! We all had a great time and enjoyed spending time together and celebrating my sisters Birthday!

Here we are playing on their really cool play ground in their back yard! One day Drew will love coming out here and making it his fort!

We were able to go to a really fun park and enjoy the nice weather! Brody had a blast swinging, running around and eating a yummy picnic lunch! Drew thought Jason was so funny here! He was just bouncing in his bouncer and laughing so hard! It was really cute to watch! Funny how something so small can get babies to laugh so hard! There is nothing cutter then a baby laughing!! :) We came at a time where Amy and Eric had sold their old furniture and their new furniture should be in any day now. So we brought our camping chairs and sat in those in the living room! :)

We painted some pumpkins while we were there. Brody had a good time and is so proud of his pumpkin that he did! This is a fun project for little kids! Good idea Amy!

Here we all are painting them pumpkins! We had a great time while we were there!