Merry Christmas!

How awesome is it that Carter's very Christmas turned out to be a White Christmas! Actually, a blizzardly-Christmas, but a wonderful one at any rate!

We started our Christmas celebrations by getting together with Brent's mom & dad & brother last Sunday. Carter got tons of awesome stuff, including an awesome John Deere 4-Wheeler!

On Christmas Eve, the weather starting getting pretty bad. We even got let out of work at 1:00 b/c the roads were getting so slick. We were supposed to go to my mom & dad's house that night for the Granger Christmas, but we didn't know if we'd be able to make it home. So we just decided to take all of Carter's presents for Christmas morning and stay the night at the farm and not even risk trying to make it home. Everyone was able to make it out (barely!) and we had a great Christmas Eve!

It was a great Christmas morning and Santa was very good to Carter! It was nice to be able to share the morning with my parents too! We were finally able to make it home Saturday afternoon, just in time to put away the new toys, take baths, and leave again for Aunt Diane's house to go celebrate Christmas w/ the Bryson's. Luckily Aunt Diane only lives about 5 minutes away from our house!

It was definitely a busy Christmas, but it was great to be able to spend it with all of our families. We were sad that we had to cancel our plans to go see Brent's grandma in Osage at noon yesterday, but she understood. We are looking forward to going to see her soon so Carter can give her her gifts!

So Carter made out like a bandit, and now we have all these toys and no place to put them! I guess we should have gotten him a toy box for Christmas! And with his birthday in only about a month and a half, we're definitely going to need one. So I've been surfing the net today, looking for a cool toy box, and I found an awesome John Deere one, but of course it's out of stock everywhere!

Brent had to work today (boo). I was actually hoping he wouldn't be able to get to work and he could just stay home with us! Now I'm worried about him getting home tonight. It's been snowing off & on and it just keeps blowing all over the road. Hopefully the state trucks will be out cleaning the highways and he can make it home safe!!

Since we have so many pictures from Christmas, I'm only putting a few on the blog, but click here to see more on Facebook. I should have more to post next week too, just need to get them off my mom's camera.

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmas and has a happy new year!!

Mid-Week Updates

Hello friends! Can you believe we only have 9 more days until Christmas is here???? I'm so excited! I love Christmas! This weekend, Brent and I plan on making Christmas candy & cookies that we can share with our family on Christmas Eve & Christmas Day.

I wish I could say Carter is excited for Christmas, but unfortunately he has no idea what it is yet! Although, he is fascinated with the Christmas tree & all the presents underneath it. He totally ignored the tree & left it alone until we put presents under it! Now, he's always yanking on ornaments & trying to rip open presents!

We got our first taste of "bad behavior" a couple nights ago. We gave Carter one of my old cell phones to play with b/c he LOVES phones. Well, he and Brent were playing on the floor and Carter had the phone and he kept putting it in his mouth. Brent kept telling him no, and after 3 times of doing it, Brent had enough. He sternly told him no, and Carter threw the phone across the floor and took off! He crawled really fast, like he was trying to get away from Brent! At first I thought it might have just been coincidental, but when Carter got a ornery little grin on his face afterward, I knew he knew exactly what he was doing. Boy are we in for some fun!

In other Carter news, he's pulling up to EVERYTHING now, and starting to cruise around things. He's also gotten to where he gives great big bear hugs and open-mouth kisses, it's so funny!

This Friday will be his last day going to daycare at Amy's house. We're very sad that Amy's hanging up her "daycare shoes" and we'll miss her lots! But we're also excited that Brent's mom is going to retire and begin watching Carter! Starting next week, he'll be going to G-ma Gibby's every day, except Wednesdays, when he'll be going to Meema Bryson's house. I'm very excited that Carter will get to spend so much time with both sets of grandparents. What a lucky boy he is! (Hopefully he doesn't get TOO spoiled!)

10 Months Old & Snow!

Our little man turned 10 months old yesterday and got to experience the first snow of the year! And lucky for me, we got enough snow/ice that the gov closed all of the State offices in Topeka, so Carter and I get a snow day today! Unfortunately Brent still had to go to work :-(

I think we'll wrap some Christmas presents today, bake some cookies, and make something yummy for supper! I can't wait until Carter's big enough to play in the snow, but that will definitely have to wait until next year!

Hope everyone stays nice & warm today!

Santa Claus

Yesterday, I went to visit Santa Claus.

Things started out ok....he had a very interesting beard and shiny glasses that kept slipping down his nose.

He also had shiny bells on his wrist that jingled when he moved.

But......after a couple minutes, I'd had enough, I was ready to get down!

Hopefully I'll like Santa a little more next year....or I might be like my Mommy was and be scared of him until I'm 7 years old!

Love, Carter

Mama!

When I walked into Amy's house this afternoon to pick Carter up, he looked at me, smiled real big, and said "Ma ma!" It was the cutest thing ever! I wish I'd had a video camera!

Carter's fever came back Sunday evening, so I took him to the doctor yesterday and it turns out he has an ear infection. I'm so ticked b/c at his 9 month check-up, his doctor told me that babies seldom get ear infections anymore b/c they get a vaccination for it. WRONG! Poor guy... So she put him on some Amoxicillin, which happens to be an antibiotic that I am HIGHLY allergic too. I told Dr. Heeb this, and she said the allergic reaction could be hereditary but we won't know until he tries it. So I'm hoping & praying that he doesn't have an allergic reaction. I guess we'll know if he breaks out in a rash all over his body!

Something I forgot to mention in the last post is that Carter now brushes his teeth! (well, the 2 little teeth that he has) We got him a little baby toothbrush and he LOVES it! He even knows which one to grab out of the toothbrush holder. We help him brush his teeth & gums and then let him hold the toothbrush by himself for a little while. I'm hoping he will continue this love of brushing his teeth b/c most kids HATE brushing!