Awwww....

I just saw these pictures that Hope posted on Facebook from the 4th of July at the Schneiders, and of course I had to post them on here also! I LOVE THESE 2 SWEET BOYS!!!

16 months!!!

Colby had his 16 month birthday in Florida!! What a lucky little ducky. I know I've said this before, but every month just keeps getting better and better!!!!

16 months is my all-time favorite age so far!!! Colby has changed so much almost overnight. He runs everywhere he goes, he understands what we say, he can follow directions we give him (if he wants to)...for example: "go take this to daddy" or "come sit down so I can put your shoes on" or "find your milk".

He's talking up a STORM!!! He tries to say so many new things. Right now his favorite things to say are: mama, dada, nona (nee nee), pappy (boppy), DJ, Zia, Pops (Pa), Bubba, bubbles, lawn mower (yes...I'm serious), beach (beee), please (eeeee), bye-bye, bye (bi!), more (moh), Big (guh), Elyse (E), Hey!, pancake (cancay), Deedee, mamaw, papaw, and I'm sure there's more I can't think of.

He is still opening and closing ALL doors he can get his hands on, he can open all of the doors in our house all by himself. He's pretty good about staying out of trouble though. He just likes to go in and out of rooms (and bring us trash that he finds along the way)

Our made-up sign for "I love you" is patting or rubbing our chest (over our heart). We learned this from Joy and Princeton Schneider and it's adorable! The true hand sign for "I love you" is a little too advanced at this point, so the made-up sign is perfect! (he won't actually try to say the words yet either)

He's sooooooo sweet this month also. When I wake him up in the morning or after a nap, he'll drink his milk from a sippy cup and snuggle for 15-20 minutes. It's the best!

We are definitely having our moments dealing with the lack of communication we have with him. He can get very frustrated when he can't tell us something or when he doesn't get what he wants. I know this is normal. Most of the time he just tries to get us worked up, but if we ignore him it doesn't last long.

When he gets fussy, it's almost always because he's tired and 9 times out of 10 he'll go right to sleep with his lovey and paci. He's been a great sleeper lately.

For breakfast we usually feed him 2 scrambled eggs or a bowl of oatmeal for protein, also sometimes he'll eat some mini pancakes, a cereal bar, yogurt or a banana

For lunch he'll usually have a sandwich (pb&j, grilled cheese, or deli meat and melted cheese) and maybe some green beans or a banana or some yogurt

For dinner, he can usually eat whatever we're eating or chicken nuggets or fish sticks. Also some sort of veggie- he loves most vegetables.

He snacks on any and everything. Some regular snacks are goldfish, crackers, cookies, yogurt bites, cereal bars, bananas, apples, and he loves ICE (thanks to Reagan Stahl :))

Since he is only in the 25th percentile, I really don't have to worry about over feeding him or making sure he doesn't eat too much. That's a battle we probably won't have to face....at least for awhile.

We feel so blessed that God has given us this little gift of joy to take care of. I pray every night that he will give us the tools we need to raise a happy, healthy, loving Christian boy. I'm also feeling thankful for the time that Travis and I have had off to spend time with our baby boy this summer. God is good!!

Supper Club

We have missed the past couple months of supper club, and then we were out of town for a few weeks, so it seemed like it had been forever since we'd seen our supper club group. It was our month to host, and Travis made his parents' homemade lasagna- YUM!!! It was so awesome. Our group was small, but we still had a great time catching up and watching the little ones play. Sadly, poor baby Grace ended up going home sick with a little stomache bug. :( And even more sadly, Jenna Mae had it when she woke up the next day. Thankfully, both girls made quick recoveries!!!

Jenna Mae and Colby

ok girls, let me show you how this works...

checking out Buddy

(I'm sad I didn't get a picture of sweet little Grace in her cute outfit before she left!!)

POPCICLES!!

Last week we enjoyed a fun night at the Stahl's house. Colby especially loved his first popcicle experience!! I'm glad I thought to strip him down before we started. He looooooved it and it will definitely be a new family favorite activity of ours (if you consider eating popcicles an actual activity)

thank goodness he had his fashionable denim diapers on!! :)

so sweet!!

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OK, I know Colby may kill me for this someday, but I couldn't help it!!!!! After popcicle time and bath time, Colby was ready for BED. I didn't even think to bring pajamas, so we borrowed some from Reagan. At least they were blue...

I don't think he was very excited about the glitter butterflies :(
Sorry Colby!!

Family Photos

We got some awesome family photos on the beach thanks to my parents entertaining Colby and snapping the shots. I'll have to post them later because they're on another computer. :)

More Florida Favorites

THIS is why I love this place so much. This was the view from our balcony.

Look at these tiny footprints!!! We could get enough of them!!

The carousel at Baytowne Wharf was a HUGE hit with Colby!!!!!!

This is an awesome hair day!!

Before dinner at Poppy's Trav took Colby for a walk at the Marina. There were huuuuge yachts and an incredible sunset!

loving the live band on the patio at Poppy's Seafood Factory in Baytowne Wharf. So fun!!

The BP cleanup crews were on the beaches all day and all night. Oil really wasn't an issue for us, really the big problem was the bright green seaweed....thank you clean-up people for picking up all of the tar!!

Colby loooooooooved Elyse....especially because she has the coolest shades ever

I think this picture speaks for itself....this is after the hour and a half worst plane ride ever from Panama City to Houston. We all finally CRASHED on the short flight from Houston to Austin. Thank you dad for capturing this memorable moment. :)

The Sure Lure

On Tuesday, the guys talked Elyse and I into going deep sea fishing with them. (thank you mom for staying with Colby!!)

I had nooooooooo clue what to expect. We had so much fun though. The Sure Lure boat that we went out on was pretty big...it even had a bathroom (thank goodness!) The Captain "Double D" was quite animated, and the guy that helped us with the rods and stuff was great. (I'm sure my dad was relieved that he didn't have to be the one putting the bait on my pole and taking the fish off...he actually got to FISH) First we fished for our bait....which was seriously hard work!! Then we went out in search of the big ones. I took 2 Dramamine that morning, but I don't think they were strong enough for the waves that day. I was not feeling too hot at all. I was good to go for our red snapper catching, but then I had to lay down inside the boat. I took a good 30 minute nap, and I woke up just in time to catch an amberjack! I felt MUCH better after my little nap. I had no idea how hard it would be to reel in those fish....it was one of the hardest things I have ever done and super intense!!! If you ever get the chance to do this, you definitely should. It's a bonding experience for everyone involved. :)

I even fell asleep with my fishing belt thing on....I had to be ready to go at a moments notice! :)

Travis was seriously afraid that Elyse was going to fly over the edge of the boat at one point

when someone would get a fish on their line, the captain would crank up some jams, scream and shout, and totally pump us up...it was so fun!!

HOLY MOLY! I almost forgot to mention the SHARK we saw!!!!!! We were headed back to the harbor when the captain cut the engine off and pointed to what we thought was a dolphin....sure enough, the closer we got to it, the more we realized it was not a dolphin....it was a huge hammerhead shark!!! The captain said it was at least 10-12 feet long. We tried to catch it using one of our snappers as bait, but we were kind of in a hurry, so it didn't work out. CRAZY!!

Here we all are with our red snapper- the deckhand cleaned them for us and we took them back to the condo. The guys ate fried snapper and baked snapper for the next few days