Fire trucks and Such

Over the past month Maddox has developed an increasing fascination with fire trucks, cars, trucks, and tractors. Apparently boys are just fascinated with these things! He loves to point to these things and say what they are. We are quite impressed that he has started to say "tractor." To the untrained ear it may not sound like much but to us he is definitely saying "tractor."
We were honored to be invited to Maddox's friend Grant's 3rd birthday party...it was at the Fire station!! Maddox, of course, was thrilled and talked about the firetrucks all morning before we went. When we got there he was so excited to see a fire truck up close and personal! He was more than willing to volunteer to drive the fire truck, sit on the stretcher, go in the ambulance, etc etc! He had a blast, and it was so neat to watch him get so excited!







Maddox's vocabulary has shot through the roof!! He tries to say everything we say now, it may not be as clear as we say it, but he is definitely making an effort. Some new words, tractor, all done, thank you, fire truck, cat, bubble, and book. He has also decided to start answering our questions with the response "yea." We are trying to redirect this by saying "yes." "Yea" sounds so junior high, preteen, adolescent!

He is learning new things every day and is understanding and comprehending everything we say. He is very inquisitive and wants to know what everything is. He loves to explore, and has become quite the adventurer when it comes to going anywhere. Let's just say he does not enjoy sitting in the buggy or being held if we are shopping somewhere!

His favorite thing right now is books. We could read books all day long! He loves looking at the pictures and pointing out what everything is. He will bring us book after book after book to read to him.

This past weekend we went to his friend McKenzie's birthday party. It was a swimming party and Maddox had a great time. Apparently we gave birth to a fish! ;)



This month we have a big trip planned! We are headed to New York City, without Maddox! It will be our second anniversary trip! We are leaving Maddox with Jamie's parents. It will be a great time for them to hang out since they don't get to see him very often. He loves it there and he especially loves his uncle E and the swimming pool! We drive to Houston the 22nd and our flight leaves on the 23rd. We'll fly back in on the 27th. We are very excited and nervous! This will be our first time leaving Maddox overnight anywhere. We know we will miss him so much! While we are there we plan on seeing all the sights and going to a couple of Broadway shows. We also plan to feast on some yummy food! There will definitely be a blog post when we get back!


We hope everyone is doing well! Keep checking in for new posts!

PSA: Maddox does really like trucks but this does not mean we now need to be inundated with all things trucks, Maddox has plenty. Thanks! ;)

Family Pictures

Our good friend Crystal took some great pictures for us the other day. We are thrilled with the way they turned out and thought we would share with everyone. We'll scatter them throughout the post to keep you entertained. Surely Crystal won't mind!

We haven't been up to too much lately. The weekend before last we headed down to Houston to see Jamie's family. We had a great time. The weather finally turned nice on Sunday so we all got in the pool and went for a swim before we had to leave. Maddox of course loved the pool. We think he is part fish. He is even starting to move his arms and legs like he is trying to swim. He must have inherited his Uncle E's love for swimming. ;)

It has rained a lot here over the past few weeks and when it is not raining it's HOT. Our outdoor time has been very limited. Thankfully, the last few days have been really nice and even a little cool before it is about to rain in the evenings.

Jamie has been watching a friends little 3 month old a couple of days a week. Maddox has really enjoyed the company, and loves bringing the baby toys and giving kisses. It is definitely giving us a chance to teach him how to be gentle.

Maddox has been doing great! He learned how to catch a ball this week! So now he loves to play catch. He is still climbing like a monkey. If any box is lying around you are sure to find Maddox on top of it, or in it. He has also started saying "da dee" when he wants Brian or sees a picture of Brian. He likes watching his Baby Einstein movies and if it were his choice he would watch them all day, but we limit him to one every other day or so. We are not really tv watchers and we try to come up with other things to do instead of watching tv. Maddox has really gotten into car, tractors, trucks, buses, and anything else that has wheels. He loves to point them out in books. We finally bough him some toy cars to play with and he has really enjoyed them. He likes to push them around and make car noises.

Brian's birthday is Friday. He gets the day off of work! We have plans to go see the new Harry Potter movie! Jamie will of course be getting the final Harry Potter book at 12am on Saturday. She has also said that she is "taking the day off" to read on Saturday. :)

We have been busy his week visiting our new friend Lainey! Maddox's best friend Andi became a big sister on Monday. She is a great big sister and gives Lainey lots of kisses. Maddox likes to look at Lainey but wasn't too sure of her when Jamie was holding her.

That is about all that has been going on. We hope you enjoyed the pictures!

Almost a month

Wow! Has it really been almost a month since we last posted an update?? Sorry about that. Life with a 13 almost 14 month old is pretty crazy. Apparently some people are having Maddox withdrawls! ;)

So now to fill you all in on what has been going on in our lives:
Maddox is GREAT! We enjoy him more and more everyday! His personality is amazing and he is always making us laugh. He is such a sweet little guy. He is walking all the time now with only a few spurts of crawling. He has even started to run. He likes to play chase (we chase him) especially when he has somehing he is not supposed to have.
He is learning new things everyday and is never ceasing to amaze us. This age is so much fun. His little mind is like a sponge, soaking up all sorts of new information! He is doing all sorts of new things, there are too many to list but of few of them are; throwing things in the trash, climbing...on everything, saying new words, playing with anything that has wheels, and the list goes on!


On Father's Day at church we had Maddox dedicated. Basically, it was a ceremony to commit to raising Maddox up in a Godly home and teaching him the ways of the Lord. Besides being a wiggle worm through the whole thing it went great! He was very anxious to get down and explore the stage we were on. In an effort to save everyone from a screaming fit we allowed him to climb the stairs instead. He had a good time, and it allowed all the other participates some peace and quiet.




Jamie and Maddox have been busy with playdates this summer. A great spot they go is the parish park. The is a nice little beach there where Maddox and the other kids love to play. He loves the water and of course he loves to play in the sand.




We have spent a lot of this month picking blueberries. The farm is only open for the month of June so we have been often to stock up. Maddox loves blueberries!!

This past weekend was the Peach Festival but unfortunately we all came down with the stomach flu so we were unable to participate in the festivities. Maddox was supposed to participate in a Diaper Derby but since we were ill he didn't get to. Maybe next year!



Maddox and work have been keeping us busy. Brian has been busy at work with new projects and developments and Jamie has been busy with her purse making business. Her website is finally up. It is www.purepurseonalities.com She designed it herself. It still has some work to be done but at least the majority of the work is complete. Now she just has to get busy makng some more bags!


The summer is flying by and July is almost here! We promise to update more, this post was WAY overdue! We will continue to keep you updated on whats going on in our lives! Do we even still have readers out there?? We would love to here comments from you!

Have a blessed day!

The answer to the question everyone has had on their minds.....

Photo Sharing - Upload Video - Video Sharing - Share Photos

Maddox is walking!!!
He had been taking a few steps but on Friday he just decided to take more! Now he loves to try to walk to things. He is still wobbly and falls a alot, but he gets right back up and tries again.
We have been waiting to post anything about it until we got some good video of it.

That is the biggest news around here. We have been really busy with a lot of different things. Jamie is finishing up a website for her purses. She has gotten a lot of orders for them so she decided a website was in order. It is almost done and we will post the address as soon as it is up and running. Until then, you can visit www.purepurseonalities.blogspot.com to check out her blog. She has also still been making purses and keeping up with Maddox, so her days are pretty busy.

Maddox is still doing great. We are thankful we have not dealt with any sicknesses in a long time! He still has only 2 bottom teeth, the top gums are swollen but they have been for over a month now with no signs of teeth. This whole tooth process is taking a lot longer than we thought.
He loves to climb. He keeps working on how to get onto the couch. If there is something next to the couch he will try to use it to climb up. In this picture he has climbed on top of two things stacked to reach the window sill....we definitely have to keep a close eye on him!



We have had a breakthrough in regards to eating. We have figured out how to get our picky eater to eat foods.....let him eat out of small bowls. Maddox would only eat a handful of foods, never wanted to try anything, and would refuse anything he didn't think looked right, now we put things in a little bowl and put them on his tray and he tries it! It may seem like a little thing, but it makes a world of difference for us.
His new word he can say is bubble. He must like the way it sounds coming out because he says it a lot! He can also use sign language to tell us when he wants to eat, when he wants more of something, and when he is all done. The eat one has been especially helpful in knowing when he is hungry and how to express it. Babies can use sign language to communicate before they can talk, so sign language is a great way for him to communicate to us without frustration.

Jamie has entered Maddox into an Evenflo baby contest. The winner is based on how many votes they get. Voting starts June 1st (tomorrow) you can vote once a day until June 15. Please click here and vote for Maddox!! Please pass it on to all your friends too! You can also access it by going to www.evenflo.com click on the Baby You're a star and then enter photo ID # 12075 in the top right hand of the screen where it asks for Photo ID #. We think he is the cutest baby on there!!

We hope everyone is having a great week and has had a great month of May! This summer sure is going by fast so far!

That's all for now!

Birthday Fun!

Maddox had a great birthday!
His party was Saturday afternoon. He had a great time with all of his family and friends.
We got some good pictures of the event so we thought we would share.

Playing with chalk
Eating chalk

His first birthday cake! (Jamie made it!)



Opening Presents

By the time opening presents was over Maddox was beat! He had gone the whole day with only 30mins of nap so by the end of the party he was exhausted!
We learned that birthday parties are very exhausting for us too! We were also beat by the end of the day and we all slept very well that night.
Hope you guys enjoyed the pictures!
We are doing a good job with keeping up the blog lately! ;)

Love you all

Happy Birthday Maddox!

Our lives were changed forever on this day last year.
Maddox Lee was born at 4:40pm he weighed 6lbs 2oz and was 18.5 inches long. He had a rough start but thankfully with a lot of prayer and medicine our little monster was ready to come home and join our family.


We can't believe it has been a year! Looking back is bittersweet. A lot went on those first few months but amazingly we made it through. We can't say it has been easy, but when is parenting easy? We work on less hours of sleep now and for a long time we worked on no hours of sleep, we don't sleep-in anymore, we go to bed early, and we pick up lots of messes, but it is all worth it when we see our little guy smile every time he sees us.

We have been truly blessed by God. He has allowed us to care for one of His own and we are very humbled by that. He has taught us many things since Maddox has been born, mainly to just trust Him. We are eager to teach Maddox about the ways of the Lord and look forward to the day when he fully understands that God allowed Christ to die for him.

Is he a happy baby you ask...well of course....most of the time! Maddox has a very strong personality, he can go from extremely happy to extremely upset very quickly. He is still very attached to us and has a hard time being left with other people. He has come a long long way in regards to that though and his separation anxiety is definitely easing up. He is also a sensitive baby, not about getting his feelings hurt, but just general changes that go on through the day and with him. A good way to explain it would be to say when he is hurting, tired, sick etc. he will surely let us know!


He still attracts a lot of attention everywhere we go. Most of that attention he has learned how to get by waving, calling, and smiling to people. When we go through the grocery store he "calls out" to people and then when they look gives them the sweetest smile you have ever seen.



Maddox has been thriving ever since he got out of the hospital. We go for his 1 year well-baby check up on Monday so we don't have all his current stats, but we are guessing he weighs about 18.5lbs. We have no idea about height, we can tell you he is not tall.


He took his first step on Monday night. We were both there to see it and get extremely excited about it! Since then he has only tried it a few more times. So, if you are wondering if he is walking yet the answer is no, but he will one day!
He has two teeth, the two bottom ones. No sign of others coming and those two are still not all the way out yet.


If you think his eyes are brown you're wrong. They are lovely mix of blue and brown, not green, hazel or whatever just blue and brown. They are dark and could be mistaken for brown but if you look closely you will see blue and brown. A perfect combination of both of our eyes!


His most favorite thing right now is playing outside. He and Jamie spend a lot of their time outside. He is sporting a beautiful tan that most people only dream of. His hair is blonde.....very blonde and just keeps getting lighter the more he is out in the sun. He plays in his pool almost everyday and loves it. We have to be sure to dump the water out after each time because if we are playing outside any other time he will dive in with all his clothes on. Of course we had to learn that the hard way. He doesn't like for clothes to be on him so unless we are going somewhere he is usually running (crawling) around with just a diaper on. He will pull and pull at his clothes until we take them off of him. We live in the south so at least this is semi-acceptable.


He is obsessed with ducks right now. "Dog" was his first word but now he says duck too. If he sees a picture of a duck or sees the duck at the park he "talks" forever about them and quacks too. He loves animals of any kind and can spot a dog a mile away. He loves his dogs too. They enjoy playing with him as well. He cuddles them, head butts them, pulls up on them, pokes their eyes etc. and they love it. We have two very docile attention hungry dogs that eagerly put up with Maddox.




Today, for Maddox's birthday we plan to have a day filled of his favorite things; going to the park, swimming, sno cones, and macaroni and cheese. Playing in dirt will fit somewhere in there too!
Saturday is his birthday party. We will be excited to have family and friends around to help us celebrate his special day.
We appreciate everyone who keeps up with our blog. It has become Maddox's baby book. We have enjoyed posting about our little family and all the things that have gone on over the past year. We also appreciate your patience during all those long waits between posts! We will continue to post on the blog and keep everyone informed about Maddox and us.


If you would like to take a trip down memory lane you can look back on all of our blog posts from the very first one to today's. They are located on the left hand side of the screen. Just start in May 2006.