Hudson 7 months, Boo @ the Zoo & Pumpkin Patches...

This week Hudson turned 7 months old! Here are shots we took of his growth in respect to the glider, pillow & his little bear. I wanted to keep this to like 2 shots but I think these 5 shots capture his personality. He is just a really pleasant kid. He is such a content baby. We have started feeding him more varieties of baby food and we have also started giving him puffs. He is doing really well with all of that. He is kind of crawling and is very mobile. He can sit-up if we sit him that way but still hasn't gotten into the situp position on his own. He seems to spit-up a little more than he used to but I guess that's just because he eats more. And so far, he still never meets a stranger. He seems to love attention from anyone.

This week we worked a lot and we also had fun. On Saturday we went to Boo at the Zoo and then we met Mimi & Granddad at a Pumpkin Patch. On Sunday Hannah had her last Alta match for the season at our home courts. So the kids and I got to go down and watch and play on the playground. Below is a slideshow walking through this past week.

Crawling, New office space, Fall parties & costumes...

This week has a few things to share. But first I forgot to mention something from last week. I ran across this picture I took from my Blackberry at the Catalyst Conference I went to last week before we left for Boston. It was a huge conference with many Christian speakers and worship music. My brother was there too so I got to sit with him. This picture shows you how big the conference was.

Back to this week. Tuesday night we had small group. We've been doing a study by Francis Chan called "Crazy Love". It is really good. Hannah had a girl's night on Saturday night to celebrate her 30th B'day. And she had tennis on Sunday afternoon - she won.

Starting Wednesday night and then really late on Friday night, I helped with the move of 250 PCs from our main Chick-fil-A corporate office to a new facility across the street. We've outgrown our current space and for a while now they have been fixing-up this rental space to help handle all of our people. This space is really modern (current space is traditional) and has an almost IKEA look to it. I really like it.

One of my favorite things is their furniture. Have you ever been frustrated by all the cables and cords wadded at your feet under your desk. Checkout the two shots below.

Mess of cables...

...now they're hidden behind the door... genius! (maybe only those of you who are OCD like me will care about this)

Anyway... if you care to get a glimpse of the new building from shots taken from my Blackberry, see this slideshow. These picture are the calm before everyone moves in on Monday. So it will probably never be this uncluttered again...

On Saturday morning, we went to a neighborhood Halloween party hosted by Drew & Tyler. Hudson wore Raegan's first costume... a cow outfit. See below... which one is Raegan from 2 years ago and which is Hudson? OK... they don't look that much alike...

Below is a slideshow of a few pictures I took at that party. After the party, I went to a dance ministry service project with our small group. I didn't really get to do anything but I got to watch some cool dancing. See the slideshow...

Lastly, here is a quick silent video of Hudson's forward motion. He's not quite crawling yet. And last week it looked more like an army crawl. This week it looks more like the worm. But he can definitely get to what he wants now. (it's silent because there was too much random noise in the background of the videos...)

Tomorrow Hudson turns 7 months old!

Weekend in Boston

This past weekend we went to Boston for Hannah's 30th Birthday. Granddad & Mimi stayed at our house with the kids for the first half of the weekend and then Nana came for the second half.

We had fun in Boston. We stayed at the Liberty Hotel (which used to be the Charles Street Jail). It was very nice. We got to visit Heather (Hannah's sister) & her family in Hull. We got to see their Coast Guard base. We tried to see a lot in Boston in our short time there. We didn't really have time to get history on a lot of what we saw - or to even know what it was we were looking at. But we got a taste of Boston. Speaking of which, one of the main things we did was eat. I've tried to narrate some of the slides below. I don't know that we did the best with our picture taking but this gives you a slight record of our trip.



One of the best stories we have from the weekend is that getting back into our hotel at night was like trying to get into the most popular night club in town. Luckily we flash our room key and they let us through. So our lobby was very popular and you had to be on the list to get in. To make a long story short, we were in the area between the elevators to the guest rooms and the club scene lobby. Out of the club scene came Tom Cruise & Katie Holmes to go to their room. Security held most of the crowd back from the elevator area where we were. So we were standing 2 feet away from both of them. They both made eye contact with me. But... I was too star struck to speak or get a picture. Oh well. But it's cool that they were staying in the same hotel as us!

This is a slideshow of pictures from the grandparents with the kids. They all seemed to have fun. We really appreciate our parents for staying with the kids so we could have a get away!




Other interesting things are that Hudson seems to be almost ready to crawl! He definitely can drag himself forward. And now he is putting his knees under him and doing the rock. And even moving a little that way. It's crazy!

We have a squirrel problem. We have a lot of columns around our porch. Hannah discovered that we have a family of squirrels living in the one by our swing. See these pictures.

Finally, the other week was Grandparents Day at the kids' school. Hannah's parents went and they just gave us copies of the pictures they took. Below are some of those shots.

A weekend at home...

This past week was spent working and staying around home.

I thought this past weekend would be spent with me trying to get a handle on all the things I've let slip. I did some of that but I also got to have more fun than I originally thought I would.

One thing we did was managed to transform our breakfast room with a new light fixture and a smaller table (that was my parent's first piece of furniture ever bought when they got married). I think it makes our breakfast room seem bigger and is better for the four of us to eat meals together.

Hudson seems so close to scooting toward objects on the ground and is sitting-up better. Raegan is getting more and more confident. She is really friendly to people that she used to be shy around. She is even initiating conversations with them. And where she used to stay away from the playground if other kids were on it, she now runs up and plays - And talks to the other kids.

Below is a slideshow of some of the things I mentioned (& I'm starting to add captions to dialog).

Grandparents Day & the Lake...

This has been a good week. Tuesday was Grandparent's Day at the kid's school. Granddad and Mimi were able to make it. They have more pictures that I don't have yet... but below are a couple shots the daycare gave me. They had a good time and Raegan was proud to show-off her Granddad & Mimi! (thanks to Granddad & Mimi for taking time from the middle of your day to make it to this event. I know Raegan & Hudson were very glad you came!)



On Friday, Hudson had a doctor appointment. He is healthy. He is cleared for starting Stage 2 baby food! Also, he is now 19.9 pounds! Still heavy for his age! He got shots & Hannah said he did really well.

Friday night we went to the Lake. Below is a slideshow. Nana as usual helped me gain about 10 pounds of good food. Nana makes irresistable food. Raegan did her usual playing Papa for his attention the whole time. We did something we haven't done in years. We went to one of the islands on the Lake and we tied-off the boat and played in the water. This particular spot is one where the sand goes out under the water a long way before it gets very deep. So it was perfect for Raegan to play in shallow water. She did really well with swimming (w/ water wings on). Hudson just chilled on the boat with Nana. The dogs really liked this little "beach" too.

Some of the shots I added to this slideshow are just because Raegan makes funny expressions sometimes. I can't help but post so many pictures.

Hudson is 6 months old!!

As promised in last night's post, below are Hudson's 6 month pictures. He's always been a big boy but we think he is starting to grow into his age.

He is still very pleasant. He has his moments of frustration but over-all... a pretty low-maintenance kid who smiles a lot. He loves his sister, Raegan. He lights-up anytime she shows him attention.

He is eating more and more solid foods (Stage 1 baby food) and so far, he has no allergies and is very healthy!

He is becoming more and more mobile. I think we better enjoy these last days of us not worrying about him getting into everything!

Rae dance class, Lewis family gathering & DC Trip...

We had a busy week. On Monday, Raegan had her first dance class at school with Ms. Gilda. Below are a couple shots from that - she loved it! Since starting school as an infant, in every transition, Raegan has had her friend Alana with her. And Alana is doing the dance class too. Also... on Thursday Raegan had her first Spanish class.




I don't have a shot of this but Hudson is pretty close to sitting-up. He can also do a little backward scooting. And rolling to get things. We think he will really be doing some new stuff in the next couple weeks.

I went to Washington DC for a planning trip for our annual Chick-fil-A seminar. In February, we'll be hosting all of the Operators to the Gaylord National Hotel & Convention Center in DC. This property is really nice. We had a few meetings but we also got to do some site seeing. (these pics are from my Blackberry so not great quality)



I'll share just one story from that trip. And I'll try to make it quick. Chris Waddell & I walked the National Mall area on Friday afternoon. Chris wore an Auburn T-shirt to see how many "War Eagles" he could get. I kind of gave him a hard time for wearing a T-shirt & trying to run into other Auburn people. Within an hour or so, we had already gotten 2 "War Eagles". We were walking on the back side of the White House when a Secret Service agent walked out of a booth and said "War Eagle!". We talked for a few minutes and he is a big Auburn fan. He also went to a rival high school of my high school (T.R. Miller). I guess we all hit it off... because then he asked if we had a tour of the White House scheduled. We said no... we're just wondering around on a little free time we had. He said that if we want to tour the White House the next morning, he could probably arrange that. The cool thing about this offer is that you usually have to write your Congressman at least 30 days in advance to try to get your name on the list for this. We weren't sure he would come through for us... but he did! So the next morning, we showed-up to the White House at 7am for the tour. He took us in ahead of the line of 100+ people waiting to get in. Chris & I were the first to get into the White House for a tour that day. Our Secret Service buddy gave us the tour along with about 20 other people. He told us that they come to Atlanta often and he would try to get us into the next event they come to Atlanta to do. We also told him we would host him and his secret service guys to Chick-fil-A for lunch. Below is a shot of us with our new buddy. I guess being a part of the Auburn family is a good thing!


While I was in DC, Hannah had her sisters over to spend the night. Heather has been in Boston for a while now and Hannah hadn't seen her in a long time. Heather also had her daughter, Skyla with her. So Raegan & Hudson were getting to meet their cousin really for the first time. Below are a few shots from that visit.

I got back from DC & on Saturday we just hung around the house, watched college football & got ourselves back in order.

Today, we went down to Mimi & Granddad's house for a Lewis family gathering. It was a fun time and most had not seen Heather, Mike & Sky in a long time. Below is a slideshow.

One really big thing that happened 2 days ago is that Hudson turned 6 months old! We failed to take the 6 month pictures in the chair like we normally do. So we plan to do that tomorrow night and I'll add a post for that.

Happy Birthday Granddad!!

Week at St. George Island

On the last post we shared a few shots from our first day at St. George Island. We spent the rest of the week there and had a good time. Granddad, Mimi, Uncle Jacob & Uncle Aaron were all there.

We had a nightly visit to the roof deck to watch the sunset - where Raegan loved being our entertainment. We made visits to the beach where we played in the sand and the waves. Made lots of sand castles and holes in the sand. We saw a ton of dolphins one day and they were just a few feet away from where everyone was in the water. We played games at night. I discovered that between me & the other guys on the trip, we all have a serious addiction to Coke Zero. We couldn't keep enough of it on hand. I should probably learn to cut back.

Hannah and I had a date night and went to the Gibson Inn restaurant. Then we went to the Blue Parrott beachside tiki bar for dessert and a walk on the beach. On our last night, we went with Aaron & Jacob to Harry A's courtyard style open air bar with live band. It was nice. We couldn't stay long because we had to pack. (that's right, the restaurant's name is Harry A's)

Raegan had the most fun & longest time in the pool ever. This was on our last day and she and Hannah played for a long time in the pool. At one point, Raegan even told Hannah that she was swimming over to the floats on the other side of the pool by herself. And she did (with water wings on). Other than all of that, Raegan watched a lot of Elmo when she could fit it in & she played with toys.

Hudson didn't really care for the beach or the pool. He slept both times we took him to the beach. He seemed to require someone holding him a lot more than usual. So he got good time with all of the family. Mostly, both kids slept through the night every night.

Enough of my rambling... below is the slideshow that will take longer to go through than reading my words! Most of the focus is on Raegan because she was usually doing something interesting (at least to her parents).



One last thing... as I mentioned, the dolphins were really close to shore. This is a quick video clip showing how the dolphins were right behind the guys in the water. It may not be that big of a deal to some people but I have a slight fear of ocean marine life. I wouldn't want to be that close to even a friendly dolphin.

Labor Day at St. George

It's Labor Day and we're at St. George Island with Granddad, Mimi & Uncle Jacob. We got here on Saturday. It was a long car ride but we made it & the kids were mostly good. You can see the ocean from the house we're renting and there is plenty of room for everyone. Uncle Aaron is coming tonight or tomorrow.

Below is a slideshow of some of the pictures we've taken so far. We'll be here all week... so I know I'll have plenty more pictures to share later. In this slideshow is the picnic Hannah made for us on the way down. And there is a picture of a giant cow from a gas station where we stopped. Pictures of Raegan playing with Granddad & Uncle Jacob on the beach. Hudson sleeping on the beach. Raegan & Mimi making pancakes. Hannah, Mimi & Raegan playing in the pool at the rental house... & more...