Matthew's Farewell

Over Memorial Day weekend, Steve, Carson and I flew home to Virginia for a quick trip.

And I do mean quick.  We got there Saturday afternoon and flew back Monday morning.

It was all worth it to say bye to my brother, Matthew, and see his farewell talk in Church.

He is going to serve a LDS full-time mission in LA speaking Spanish.

I am so proud of him and the decision he made to serve the Lord for two years.

What a great example to all of us, and especially one day to Carson.

Here are some highlights from the trip:

Carson loved those biscoff cookies (notice his sweet Delta pin).

He was so hard to get down for a nap on the plane, but eventually he fell asleep laying across our two laps on his tummy.

A little bit of sibling love.

 

 

 

 Right before Steve's 3 hour nap.  Can't stop laughing at this pic.  It was an exhausting trip.

First time Carson met my brother, Jason's, dog.

Nothin better than a little Ukrops cake.

Grandma and Carson.  I think Carson was only put down about 5 minutes the entire weekend.

This documents the plan ride home well.  Biscoff cookies smeared on his shirt, and me trying to distract him with toys from screaming the whole flight.

Bye Virginia!  Until next time...

 

10 Months

Well Carson started off this month sick and ended it sick. Stinks for him but means lots of snuggles for me :)

Carson has by far learned the most this month. 

Steve and I have been soaking up every moment because he is so fun and happy all the time. 

We love our little boy. 

This past month...

Carson has made huge strides in mobility. He has been doing the army crawl for a long time but the past few weeks has figured out the normal way to crawl. He still prefers army style though. 

He has figured out how to pull up. This is his favorite thing to do but probably the most annoying. He has successfully ruined his beautiful crib with bite marks from pulling up throughout the night and when he wakes up. 

Carson has learned a few more gestures. He points to things, usually when he is feeling something, and shakes his head yes and no.

He can finally hold his own bottle!  Yay!  He needs a little help from us getting it back in his mouth now, but it is still so nice.

He has gotten a little more interested in real food. He loves his Cheerios, pieces of bread, and bites of bananas. He has gotten a lot better at picking food up and putting it in his mouth. He will sometimes take quite a few bites of our dinner but definitely still prefers puréed food as his main source of calories. 

Toys are all of a sudden becoming a lot less interesting now that he can get to whatever he wants in a jiffy. One toy he does like though is his walker. He has figured it out and likes to take baby steps with it. 

Carson is quite the social little boy. He tries to pull up on all of the older kids to stand next to them and loves attention from just about anybody. He loves the little baby I nanny and tries to crawl all over him.

He is moving up to size 4 diapers and into his 12 month summer clothes.  My baby is all grown up :(

Here are some photos from the month.  Please ignore the big black eye and scabs all over his face!  It was a rough month for Carson. And sorry there are so many...I just can't get over how cute he is.

Learning how to walk.

Like I said, sick twice this month.

Figuring out how to eat finger foods.  This is a typical Carson face.

Doing hw with Dad.

First couple of times he pulled up.  He could not have been more proud of himself.

Sill faces with mom.

Pure joy.

Summer is finally here! (well it was in this pic...it is in the 50s today)

New fav toy...my keys.

 Loves flipping through his books.


Grainy pic but I think he looks hilarious.

Carson has like 30 different faces, this is one of his new favorites.


I just love him.

Impromptu Photoshoot

The other day my friend, Stephanie Hyde, met me behind my apartment and ended up taking some adorable pictures of Carson.

I had been trying to take some and he wouldn't smile or pose for me.

But as soon as Stephanie came out, he was a little model.

 

Isn't she amazing? And isn't he cute?

Utah friends--Stephanie will be in Utah for the summer starting this coming Monday!

Check out her blog-- stephaniehydephotography.blogspot.com

A Boy and His Ball

Carson's new favorite thing may be his soccer ball.

He loves to roll it back to his dada and he even kicks it back sometimes!

Our little soccer player.

(Don't mind our extremely messy home)

Spring Happenings

It was Spring here in Minneapolis for a few short days.

It is now back to rain/snow for a while and then hopefully it will warm up again.

We took advantage of the nice weather and went outside and did summery things a LOT.

One night we took a nice stroll in the 70 degree weather with Steve.

That was a lot of fun because it's normally just Carson and me (and the boy I babysit).

Carson dozed off for a snooze for a few minutes as we enjoyed the nice weather.
Afterwards, we took him to play on the playground that is literally directly behind our apartment.

This past Saturday we headed to the zoo near where we live.  We had heard rave reviews from all of our friends.  It is definitely perfect if you have kids.  It is pretty small and a good length for the little ones.  The only thing we didn't like was that all of the animals were still inside.  This made for a lot of traffic inside with the crowds of people and we didn't get to enjoy the weather as much as we wanted.

Our first stop was a conservatory that was so beautiful! We wished my mother-in-law, Arliss, could have seen it.  She would have loved it!

Our next stop was the zoo.  It was so fun because Carson actually liked looking at the animals! (if he could find them...) The orangutan exhibit was neat because a mother and her baby came right over to Carson and started playing in front of him.
 

That's all for now folks...until Spring meets us again.