My Canvas

right back at 'cha!

4 months. 14 pounds - all of them cute as a button. 
 

 

i {heart} chattanooga

So we took a little trip out to Chattanooga on Saturday.  This was our first trip there as a family and we all fell in love with the town!  We really just spent a short while there, at Coolidge park.  It was adorable, beautiful (a bit cold outside) and just so cool... the old brick buildings, cute little eateries, and well... I could go on and on!

We played for a little while in the fountain area (which we will have to revisit in the summer when they are actually running!) The boys had a great time... and I just loved the time with all "four" of my boys.  Shawn behind the camera for this one, and Luke sleeping sweetly in the stroller!

Authentic smile here on Alex.  I just love these boys!

 

 

comparison

who knew he would grow so quickly?   three months separates these pictures:

by comparison... at just about 4 days old...

 
 

three! (times two!)

Boy time does fly.  Or, should I say time flies with boys?  Either way we had a BIG milestone birthday here this week.  Jakey turned THREE!!  It's hard to believe our little guy is three already.  We are celebrating his birthday next week with family, so for the actual day we just had cupcakes and a few small gifts.  And we sang "happy birthday" with a candle on the cupcake on three separate occasions! I don't think we realized how much he enjoys that song until this week!  But it was precious, as is our sweet sweet Jakey.  

  

 Luke turned three months just last week, which I can't believe.  He is starting to make all of these cute little noises and is still the most content baby imaginable.  My sister sent this incredibly adorable hat.... I had this great image in mind.... a beautiful cream cable knit baby bunting coupled with this hat would make the most amazingly cute little snowman baby.  I had it all planned out.  But Luke.  Well, the always-happy-never-ever-fusses sweet boy did not like the idea.  Not one bit.  Every single shot, him crying pitifully to (please!) tak him out of the ridiculous getup (albeit ridiculously cute!) Oh well, that was just not meant to be.  But, when I took him out of the super-warm-sweater thing, he was fine with just the hat...

 

 
 

Christmas was wonderful. 

We celebrated it as a family, just the five of us.   Here are the boys, Christmas morning.  All three of them in footed pajamas, which they just thought was great.  They never got dressed, stayed in them all day long!

 

We made a few different treats over Christmas.  Here is one of the favorites:
the boys had fun dipping the pretzels in white chocolate.... and I will not soon forget just how much fun I had cleaning up the mess. ha! 

 We have been  trying to be intentional about making our Christmas Christ-centered.  Alex really is growing up and he just has such a precious heart for God.  He prays with true thankfulness for the blessings of a Savior for Christmas.   Before break, his school had a Christmas parade, and his class dressed up like candy.  He was the cutest little peppermint stick ever!

 

We enjoyed every moment with the boys and are just loving all of the time we have had together with Shawn being off for two weeks. 

And, during that two weeks Shawn has still managed to find time to paint nearly our whole house,    room by room.  He worked fast and without a ladder because he is daring (and maybe a little crazy!), developing a quick fix for reaching high places with these creative shoe "lifts"... don't even get me started on mixing these with the staircase.  I was not up for seeing that kind of accident waiting to happen this week.  

And... as is often the case these days.... I hear Luke awakening.  Seeing as it is nearing midnight, I had best wrap up this post, tend to my precious son, then head off to bed!  Happy New Year to you all!  (Hopefully I will update again soon!) 

he's not always serious!

Okay, so this is just a quick picture I came across from the same day as the last post to prove that while, yes, Luke does have a serious look to him... he has an absolutely adorable smile, too!  I just had to add that...!  He LOVES his big brothers, and they love to hold him :)

oh-so-sweet :)

 

2 months!

Baby Luke is two months old now!  He is starting to coo, looks at me and gives me a gurgly smile, and is just precious!!!  I think his eyelashes have grown about a half an inch this week.  They are getting longer and darker by the day, as his eyes continue to get blue- er.

 Here he is about two weeks ago.  I have newer pictures, but they are still on my camera...

So here is your daily dose of Luke! We all just L-O-V-E this little guy :)

sleep/study

my muse.... 

I never get a chance to watch Jakey sleep.  He is usually a light sleeper, and even opening up his door will wake him up at night.  But tonight he woke up unhappily.  I don't know what was wrong but I couldn't calm him down.  So I carried him down to the couch, where he promptly fell asleep. He was fine then, just needed a little cuddle with mommy I guess.

There is something truly priceless about watching a baby sleep.  My baby, who will be three in just a few short weeks. 

I could have watched him all night, and in fact - I did just watch him for a while, before grabbing the camera so that I could remember this forever.

sweet sleep tonight, my love

where does the time go???

seriously!  my sweet baby, our precious Luke is six weeks old today!  And, yes - thank you for continuing to check the blog despite my lack of posting! I didn't realize how much time has gone by since the last entry.

So... what have we been up to?

Enjoying the BEAUTIFUL!! fall weather (when it's not raining)

we had a great visit with grandma Lex last week.  since then, really - I don't know what we've been doing!  Of course, there was halloween weekend:  we had a great time at the fall festival at church, then at a pizza party in our neighborhood, and finally topped it off with some soggy trick-or-treating! It rained quite a bit on Saturday.. but the boys had fun!

Alex was a "recon commando" (he really liked the helmet, yet he couldn't remember the name of his costume whenever he was asked!)

Jake was the cutest little tiger :)  We didn't put Luke in a costume, but he did have a sweet little t on. (Although I had several baby costumes... he was still too teeny for them!)

 

Alex has now lost all 4 of his front teeth... here, you can see the two top ones missing - such a cutie!

 

 

yup, that's Jake in a nutshell!

and Luke?  He is still the sweetest, calmest, happiest and most enjoyable baby anyone could ever hope for.  He brings joy to us all, and we are just loving him up :)  Now... having three is wonderful.  I couldn't be happier -  but, definitely having 3 means a little less time (for now anyways!) for things like blogging, etc...!

Today Luke turned 6 weeks... and, just as I did with Alex and Jake when they were 6 weeks old, I took a picture of him in the hand knit outfit that belonged to Shawn as an infant. Hopefully i will be able to find their pictures, I would love to compare them!  Each time, I took the photos in the moses basket... but this is the first time I did the pictures out doors.

 

I couldn't decide which ones to post... so here are a few more :o)

he is looking like both of his brothers these days... what do you think?  I may be biased, but I have to say... precious!!!!

and this is such a sweet one from a few weeks ago...

okay... hope to be back before too long!

it's the best I could come up with...

I can't really seem to take pictures of all three boys together.  the big ones scare me.  This is all I've gotten. it's sweet... but that thing obscuring part of Luke -- it's not a blanket, it's Jakey's leg.  Do I need to say more?  I think I'm gonna wait till baby Luke has another 5 pounds on him.

and here's a serious one of Luke with his eyes open.  On the changing table, not his favorite place!

 

And this was yesterday... does he look any bigger yet?  Such a tiny baby...

when your momma's a photographer...

you gotta learn early how to give her cues that you have HAD ENOUGH!!!!

This is one from the 3rd, 2 days ago ...  I was just downloading it from my computer and it made me LAUGH!  I didn't intend to crop off his head... but I didn't expect to see him with his fingers in his ears either!  i think he's saying  I am sooo over this!"

 

and this one is from tonight...