Yummy...

Jack's been eating solid food very well for awhile now. I've been making all of his baby food and some of it's fun to make (pears, sweet potatoes) and some of it is not so fun to make (prunes, green peas). The only reason the prunes and peas are not so fun to make is because those particular foods have to be strained after you've steamed/baked them because the skins are lumpy and can be hard to digest for a baby of Jack's age. Overall, though, I'm really enjoying it and I love that Jack will grow up liking food that tastes like the actual fruits and vegetables that he's supposed to be eating. I think the night of these pictures Jack was eating peas, sweet potatoes, and cereal. That's just what the evidence is telling me. :)

By the way, sorry I haven't been posting much lately, but I think I've made up for it because I've posted a ton today! (Jack took a great nap so I had some time to update the blog).
I'll try to be better!

Funniest. Picture. Ever.

Here's Jack "drumming" with Uncle Grant at Whole Foods the other day. If you saw Grant do this with Maggie when she was younger then you know what we're talking about. If not, let me explain it to you: basically, Grant moves Jack's arms like he's drumming and makes the appropriate drum noises along with the arm movements. If you're lucky, every once in awhile you'll get a drum-stick twirl. Jack's not really crazy about those twirls, but he does love the actual drumming part. You can tell he's Jim's son! The second picture shows Jack enjoying the drumming, but the first one was so hilarious that I had to post it!

Reading makes you smart!

...Or so I've heard! Jim took this picture because he wanted to document me reading to Jack. I guess he thought Jack wouldn't believe us if we tell him when he's older, so we needed hard proof to back up our story! :)

He really does love it when we read to him, though. I bet we read about 15-20 books a day and I love that he loves it so much. I've always loved reading so I hope somehow that gets passed on to Jack.

I don't think I've discussed Jack's sleeping habits lately, so let me update you: nighttime is WONDERFUL! Up until the past few weeks, he was still waking up for that early morning (4 or 5am) feeding and then he'd fall back asleep until about 7am. Well, I'm happy to report that he's finally dropped that feeding and is now sleeping continuously from 7:30pm to 7-7:30am. Aah.... Now if only I could sleep continuously throughout the night! For some reason I am waking up at least once, sometimes twice, for no reason at all. I think I've trained myself to not sleep through the night! Yikes! Did any of you other moms go through this? How do I make it stop? It's so frustrating that my kid can sleep through the night but I can't!

Granddaddy & Jack

Two of my favorite men...

The wonderful week with Lindsay...

We flew Lindsay up here for her Graduation present from Tulane Medical School and I can't say her present wasn't somewhat selfishly motivated! We LOVED having her up here for a week and spent almost every moment together having fun and talking, talking, talking. Jack adores his aunt and she has this wonderful ability to make him laugh so hard and for so long...it's so cute!

She and her husband, Jim, (who couldn't come because he was studying for his boards...we missed him!) are moving to Miami next month for Lindsay to begin her residency program at the University of Miami. Jim will be transferring to their med school, as well. We are so excited for them because they will both be a part of really amazing programs, but we are simultaneously bummed that they will be so far away. At least we will have a fun place to visit them and we plan on visiting a lot! We are going down to New Orleans for Lindsay's graduation in a few weeks, so check back to see pictures of our visit later!

Dan & Amy's short but sweet visit

The Landers came up for a quick 24-hour visit on Saturday-Sunday and we definitely made the most of our short time together. It was so beautiful here that we spent a lot of time outside: walking to Radnor and walking to Whole Foods. We got a new camera (yay!) but I don't know how to download pictures from it yet and that's where all the outdoor pictures are, but in the meantime, check out these cute pictures of Jack snuggling with his Aunt Amy and Grandpa, and one of him checking Grandpa out. He hasn't quite figured out what he thinks about that hat! :)

Did you hear that?

Cousins

Can you feel the love? ...and the hug?!

Thirty, Flirty & Fun

Ok, I know that was terribly cheesy, but I do love that Jennifer Garner movie "13 Going on 30." Saturday was my 30th birthday and we had SUCH a fun weekend. Our friends, Amy & JD, came into town and brought their sweet new baby, Charlie, for us to ooh & aah over. Kelly & Josh had a big cookout at their house Friday night and then we all went out for a birthday dinner on Saturday night to Radius 10, one of my favorite restaurants in Nashville.
My cake was the best cake ever except that by the time we got a picture taken the sparklers had burned out.
Have you noticed how in big groups, even though we're not in high school anymore) all the girls always end up at one end of the table and all the guys end up at another end? See, we really are all 13 at heart! :)
And finally, here's a picture of my and my sweet hubby, who is also a fantastic party planner.

Jack & His GrandNonna

LaDonna came into town today on her way to East Tennessee and we had such a wonderful visit (albeit too short) with her. There is no doubt that Jack adores his GrandNonna. The entire time she was here he couldn't keep his eyes off of her (making nursing him slightly difficult at one point!) and she could just make him laugh and laugh. It was really cute to watch and fun for all of us to get to spend some time with her today. Here are some cute pictures from her visit.

I Heart Spring

As long as we've been married, Jim and I have always taken walks around our neighborhood (when it's warm enough) when he gets home from work in the afternoons. The weather has been so nice here lately and we've really enjoyed being able to resume our afternoon walks. It's been especially nice to take them with Jack because he loves riding in his stroller and seeing all the birds, dogs, and creeks that we pass and he'll just chatter along to himself the whole way while Jim and I get some quality "grown-up" time. Here's a cute picture from right before our walk the other day.