Church Clothes

Bootheel Trip, I

Amelie and James and I went down to the Bootheel early for Thanksgiving. Dada had a conference for work, and we'd rather visit than be stuck at home alone. Grandma Doris got to talk to James.

Amelie was not as cooperative as her brother when it came to posing for pictures and so is slightly underrepresented in this post.

Well, "posing" might be a bit of a stretch.

Nana Jana got to hold the baby, too.

Cheese!

The bouncy chair was a life-saver.

Since James was fussy (sometimes!)

  There's the big sis!

Some Stories

No pictures this post, but I will get up the ones I took in the bootheel ASAP.

While we were in the bootheel, Amelie came out of my grandma's room with three fuzzy red slippers over her arm and said, "Look! A thneed!" I don't have a picture of it, but she did look a little bit like she was wearing a thneed from The Lorax:

Walking home from Grandma Doris's Amelie was talking about Santa Claus. When I reminded her that Santa only brings presents to good little boys and girls, Amelie wailed, "Noooo!" Nana Jana told her she still had time (to be good). 

Amelie has an imaginary friend named George, who is Curious George, only very tiny. He fits in her pocket and we have to be careful not to step on him.

She likes to "work" on the computer, and sometimes tells me that she's going to work or checking her email. When I asked what she did at work. she said, "get money."

This morning, when I went into her room to get her up for preschool, she was not in her bed. After a moment of panic, I looked in the crib, under the crib, and all around on the floor. I opened up her closet door and there she was, playing in the dark. I said, "Good morning!" and she said, "I'm hiding!"

James is starting to be alert for longer periods each day, but he's still fairly cranky. He's napping in the swing in the bathroom with the exhaust fan going right now, doesn't that sound familiar?

He wakes up once or twice a night, but he'll give me a five or six hour stretch at the beginning of the night, and except for nursing is sleeping basically all night in his bassinet.(This is a big change from a month ago!)

James doesn't like his carseat, and for that reason we were dreading the long drive down to the bootheel. However, as long as I squeezed myself in the back seat between the two carseats he did just fine.

He was pleasant all day long yesterday, and I'm hoping that by Christmas he's in a better mood generally.

James doesn't like to be wet at all, and enjoys having his diaper changed. (Another big switch from a month ago.)

He's a greedy nurser, and likes to cuddle.

I weighed him on our bathroom scale, and it said 12 pounds. I'm not sure how accurate it is, though. We go to the doctor on Friday for his (somewhat belated due to Thanksgiving) 2-month appointment and will know his official weight then :)

Moustache

The Buffaloe gals have a penchant for just the icing part of a cupcake. They don't seem to be too apologetic about this quirk, either.

Like I said, not apologetic at all.

Ring Sling

James *ahem* likes to be carried. All the time. At this age, Amelie did great in the soft, stretchy moby wrap, but James has done a little better with the quickness of getting in and out of the ring sling. (Thanks for it, Amanda!)

Sometimes he sleeps in it:

Hey, where am I? Who are you?

Oh, yeah, it's that lady!

Reading

I think the candy corn shirt is fall and not just Halloween.

Will you just let me get back to my book, please?

Hangin Out

James, just hanging out on big sister's bed.

Grandma Mary

I've said this before, but I am no photographer. It's a good thing everybody's so patient with me as I snap about a million shots. 

He's looking at her, and she's looking at ... something

She's looking at him, and he's looking at .... something

This one shows their personalities pretty well :) I call that a success!

P.S. James is wearing elephant sweatpants from Cabell and a nifty ribbed shirt from Grandma Mary.

Hangin' Out

Amelie keeps asking to wear the "pumpkin patch shirt." She's also a pretty big fan of sitting inside my wardrobe. Thanks again, Karen!

Oh, and the leopard-print leggings are from Grandma Mary :)

Cousins

Grandma & Papaw holding their newest grandkids.

Hmm... are we starting to get fussy?

I love the look on Mary Beth's face here. "Aren't you going to do something about that, Buffaloe?"

"Sure thing! Plug that baby up!"

Halloween

Amelie's school had a Halloween party on Monday. She's eating a marshmallow (once the head of a skeleton cupcake created by a mom much more talented than I am! I wanted to sign up for paper plates, but when that was taken, I brought ranch dip.) Alas, this was just the tip of the refined-sugar iceburg.

A ragtag bunch :) Amelie's teachers were dressed up as crayons.

There was a parade.

General silliness.

"Rawr"ing like a dinosaur.

Some games.

And then I just let her run around like a wild thing until every last child and parent left the gym.

James sporting his pumpkin onesie.

Amelie is interested in whatever it is he's doing.

Thanks for the big-girl pumpkin shirt for Amelie, Karen S!

The kiddos matched so well, I wanted to get a picture of them together. This is what happened with that plan. I love the indignant look on James's face.

At least James will sit still longer for a picture.

Er, maybe not so much.

Little brother spent the rest of the evening in the handy-dandy ring sling.

Getting ready.

Not the happiest trick-or-treater on the block.

Amelie wanted to be a dinosaur and never waivered from that request. She did switch to a purple dinosaur (she's never even heard of Barney), and that was what she ended up with (more or less!)

She was good about holding our hands.

I went around our block with Sam and then went home to pass out candy. Dada and Amelie ended up doing a lot of trick-or-treating all around the neighborhood

Going up to Annie June's house.

She got mixed up about when to say "Trick or Treat?" and when to say "Thank You."

At home with the loot.

Candy!