Festival of Trees

Per our annual tradition, on the weekend after Thanksgiving I headed off to the Festival of Trees with my parents, Sarah and Garon, while Justin went hunting. This year I got to bring my cutie pie Max!

"Come on Mommy.. I'm ready to go!"

 Max was excited to be there.. SO MUCH to look at. : )

 Pop-Pop gave him the best view

Max couldn't get enough of the blinking Christmas lights!

Last year and this year... wow!!

Max was a little angel all day. I cant get enough of this little cutie!

Max loved watching the train and Aunt Sarah was in charge of making sure he didn't try to ride it. I don't think gently holding onto the back of his shirt will be enough to contain him next year...

I wasn't planning on having Max sit on Santa's lap but once I saw Santa and realized he was the real one, not some fake "helper", I decided they should meet. Max was clearly ecstatic about the whole thing.

Our happy boy : )

Max enjoyed our post Festival tradition of Chickfila. 

Can't wait to take Max next year!

Giving Thanks

It's hard to believe that it is already half way through December. I remember last Christmas when I was very pregnant and we would talk about "next Christmas" and how fun it would be to have a 10 month old scooting around. Well its finally here and I didn't anticipate he would be able to scoot around quite this effectively : ) Max loves the Christmas tree, which involves grabbing at the branches and trying to reach the red beads and ornaments that are somehow just out of his reach. He's been really good about it though and we haven't had to barricade him from the tree yet. We are really looking forward to Christmas morning and giving him the few new toys that we got him!!

Before Christmas is upon us, we wanted to share our Thanksgiving with you:

 We were lucky enough to have two Thanksgiving meals in the same day- best day ever!!

       Max loves to help in the kitchen                                                 "Aunt Sarah came to see me!"

 We love attempting to take family portraits haha

Showing Aunt Sarah all of his toys.. she was impressed!

I don't know why I'm offering Max this whole plate of food!

Thanksgiving includes decorating the Christmas tree and Garon gets the honor of placing the star on the top!

9 Months Old!

I"ve decided 9 months is the best age. Max is SO fun right now. He is always exploring and wanting to play with us. He's usually smiling and squealing as he hurries around the house and his laugh is just the best! Max celebrated his 9 month birthday by hanging out with Daddy all day while Mommy went Black Friday shopping! Then he helped Uncle Garon decorate his apartment for Christmas : ) I have a Thanksgiving post in the works, but in the meantime, here's an update on his weekly pictures.

36 weeks- Halloween!

 37 weeks- He's sitting up before I can even lift the camera to my face! : )

38 Weeks- Love those eyes

39 Weeks- Thanksgiving! Aunt Sarah was here to help with this one so Max so extra giggly : )

35 weeks and counting!

I haven't posted Max's weekly pics in awhile but we are still going strong! Here are weeks 30-35.. hard to believe in a few weeks he will be 9 months old. He has two bottom teeth that he is currently obsessed with.. always running his tongue over them and sucking on them. It's obviously adorable. He is movin and groovin. He is making his way around the house exploring every cabinet, window sill and corner. In related news, due to his exhaustive exploration efforts and his starting each day at 5:30am now, he has started taking 3 naps most days. I'm having a mini panic attack about day light savings this weekend.. Max waking up at 4:30am? I dont want to talk about it. We have started our efforts to move his bed time back slowly in hopes that he will get up a few minutes later each day. In a perfect world. : )

 

 

 

This post is brought to you courtesy of Hurricane Sandy

Here comes Hurricane Sandy! Justin, Max and I are all dry and cozy inside, waiting for the worst of the storm to arrive. As much as I am dreading losing power with a 8 month old (i'm picturing nap time and bedtime without a sound machine- eek!), we are really loving today so far. Justin and I are both off work, so we have an unexpected extra day with Max woohoo!! We both said this morning how nice it is to be forced to not go anywhere (for a short period of time). If this were a normal Saturday we would have found several activities to do and therefore probably have made our day hectic as usual.

So far my Sandy experience has included a clean house, sleeping in (absolutely glorious), and a pumpkin spice latte.. all thanks to my dreamy husband. We are stocked and ready for a power outage but hoping against it! Max loves standing at the door or window and squealing at the rain and swaying trees. His current project is assisting me in writing this blog.. super helpful!!

 

Before we started worrying about all this rain and wind, we got to spend a GORGEOUS weekend at the beach with Justins Dad, Gran and sister Meaghan! Justin and Ed fished while the ladies relaxed, played with Max, did some shopping and took walks. We spent Happy Hour on the pier over looking the water one evening.

On our last day, Justin and I headed to Bethany Beach with Max. We had lunch at Grottos Pizza (i know.. yumm!) and then hung out on the beach for awhile. Max liked the ocean when he was almost 6 months old during our week long trip to Bethany and he still loves it at 8 months! He got pretty excited about the waves and I love the pictures that we took. I wish you could hear his happy squeal through the pictures.. its the best : )