Time in Texas

In mid February, I had the opportunity to fly with James to Texas to see my sweet twin sister, Melanie, and her precious new baby, Lucas Paul Mammina. Wow! What a busy and super fun trip. With three small children, different nap times, different feeding schedules, and different bed times, Melanie and I had our hands full. But we loved every minute of it since we don't get to see each other that often! James did great on the plane, except that he wanted to crawl all over the place. It was hard to restrain him to my lap, but at least the flight was only an hour.

James sitting in his own seat on the plane before take off.

(There were only about 10 people on our flight there)

Moving much faster at this point!

Precious, Precious Lucas (just a few weeks old)

Enjoying our time in Tx

James with Uncle Mario!

James with Aunt Melanie!

James thinks Aunt Mel is pretty cool.

We tried sooo hard to get a picture of all three boys looking at the camera.

James was so interested in his two cousins that he had not seen in awhile.

He kept looking to the right at Anthony....

...then looking to the left at Lucas...

then...Finally...kind of looking at the camera!

being a goober

Yay! We love reading books!

(ps... James copied just about everything Anthony did, and Anthony copied just about everything James did.... it was a hoot to watch)

Big cousin teaching James how to work a puzzle

(or, Melanie, was he taking the piece away from James?? :)

Attempting to get another picture in matching outfits.

James couldn't get enough of Anthony!

Hugs!

Anthony was such a good sport..... we just couldn't get James to keep his hands off of him! Ha

That's pretty cute, ya think?

Ok, yes, I have always had HUGE feet growing up. Anthony kept finding my shoes and tried walking around in them. I guess they looked like a Giant's shoes!

Oooh.. the Giant left her slippers out today!

Aunt Melanie blew bubbles and the boys loved watching them fall into the bath.

Trying the mohawk pose. James' mohawk didn't work so well.

On the flight home, all James wanted to do was lie down. I got him comfy in the seat beside me and he got very relaxed and just kept smiling at me. So sweet. What a big trip for a little boy. James did great and we will always remember his first flight to see his aunt and uncle and cousins! Thanks for a great time, Mel!

Snow Day

I am not sure if this was our January snow or our February snow, but I thought I would share the cute pictures anyway!

8 Months...and on the move!

James is eight months old and keeping us on our toes. He is so much fun and makes us laugh all the time. We think he is looking more and more like Mandy, but every now and then we see some facial expressions of Justin. James can't sit still any more. Here are some attempts of his eight month pose. It took two tries on two different days for us to finally get a decent picture!

Day 1, Attempt 1

Day 1, Attempt 2

Day 1, Attempt 3

Day 2, Attempt 1

Day 2, Attempt 2

Well, he is not smiling, but it will do!

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James has been having a little trouble with napping lately, because he has been trying to fall asleep sitting up!!! I lay him down, and then I watch him through the video monitor as he rolls over, sits up, plays with his pacis and lovie, and then after twenty minutes starts nodding off... while sitting up!! (hmmm.. who does that sound like? Maybe his mommy?) I feel so bad for him watching him do this. Sometimes he finally lies back down to sleep. Other times he just finally gets so tired that he falls face forward and sleeps with his head between his legs. So pitiful.

I took this picure of James through our monitor. He is nodding off at this point... I could tell because he started swaying back and forth and then "catching himself" so he wouldn't fall over.
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Here are some random pictures we took throughout month 7 through 8.

Famous Kramer position.

James pulling himself up on his knees to see what is on the table.

He always claps when he is happy about something :)

Hmmmm... what can I get in to now?

Having fun in the hall way, riding in his Radio Flyer

Daddy had fun too!

Our sweet pea

James is eating really good as of lately. He eats sweet potatoes, carrots, squash, green peas, green beans, mixed veges, zucchini, pears, apples, mixed fruit, mashed bananas, yogurt, beef, puffs, and cheerios. He also still loves his rice cereal and oatmeal. He eats his solids three times a day.

James still sleeps best when he puts his puppy lovie over his face

Practicing my sippy cup!

Sooo big!

Practing being on our hands and knees.

I helped James practice a little bit with crawling because I could see how badly he wanted to do it! Justin kept telling me, "Are you sure you want to do that... you know it will change everything!"

Well, sure enough... the day came! James is officially crawling! He is just adorable and so happy now that he can get around. I went for a 6 mile run while it all happened. Justin was watching James and actually got it on video! I am so glad Justin got to see James crawl, because in just a couple of days I was headed to Texas with James to see my sister and her new baby.

Mom Payne's Birthday

This past month we traveled to Franklin for Justin's mom's 60th birthday! Because I have so many pictures to share, I will be breaking things down into two posts. The first group of pictures is the birthday lunch at Cassie Fish's house (Justin's sister). We had so much fun and loved spending time with the whole family there!

The Birthday Girl!

The amazing lunch

(3 pasta dishes, 3 desserts)

Time for dessert!

We joked around telling Mom Payne not to blow germs on the cake.

She was very considerate! Hahahaha.

Watching Justin's dvd creation of special memories.

Good work hubby!

Everyone worked together on a special photo book for Nonie.

Can you tell she enjoys it! The laughter was contagious!

Nonie and James

(This picture needs to be framed!)

Chewing on the special wedding bell (from mine and Justin's wedding)

(looks like between Cassie's six kids and cousins like James, the white paint has been eaten off!)

Leah (Cassie's 3rd) LOVED playing with James

Sweet picture of Ruth (Cassie's 4th)

Julianna (Katie's 3rd) being silly with Ruth

Sweet picture of Josiah (Cassie's 5th)

Josiah was cracking me up trying to balance this ball on James' head

Papa Blair with Lydia (Cassie's 6th)

Precious little Addelyn (Rachel's 1st) was as cute as she could be :)

Did Leah take this picture?

This is one of my few pictures of the big kids.

Justin played football outside with them for a long time (brrrr).

Does someone look like he is lonely for attention?

Kramer actually did very well at the Fishes'

He even got tuckered out from all the excitement and chaos!

Nonie and Pops with the eleven grandchildren

Papa Blair with the eleven great grandchildren