Spring is in the air!!

Except for the random 6 inches of snow we got on Sunday, we have been having some beautiful spring weather! Carson and Avery have been spending lots of time outside, and they love it!! It's so nice to be outside after such a cold winter. One of my favorite things to do in the spring is to go to the Dallas Arboretum to see all the tulips that are in bloom. It is so pretty! We've been a few times in the past couple of weeks. I can't get enough! Here are some pictures of the babies in the flowers:

They were more interested in eating the flowers than posing in front of them!

Such a pretty smile!

My sweet boy!

Yay for spring!!

One Year Ago

What a special day March 10, 2009 was for us.

We had our appointment for our first sonogram that morning. Shane had taken the day off, and we headed out to the dr's office. I can't even describe the excitement/anxiety/anticipation we felt that day as we waited to see if we had a healthy little baby growing inside of me.

Shane held my hand as we both looked at the black and white screen. The sonographer said, "there's one heart beat, there's two heart beats, there's....(we both held our breaths as we waited to see if she was going to say

"three heart beats")....that's it, it's twins."

Two little perfect hearts beating inside of me. Simply amazing!

Wow!! We were having twins!

It never stops amazing me that these

two little fuzzy blobs turn into

This:

What an awesome God we have!

Thank you Lord for my perfect little blessings!

5 months

Avery and Carson are 5 months old!

And they are busy, busy, busy! My attempt at taking their 5 month picture. They didn't want to sit still for the camera.
At 5 months they are:

-Rolling all over the place

-Smiling at just about anything

-Giving us an occasional giggle

-Loving sitting in the jumper and exersaucer. It's their favorite place to play. They love all the attached toys. It's so fun to watch them discover new toys!

-Still just eating rice cereal (I think we are going to try baby food this month).

-Love touching and grabbing our faces and have discovered how to pull mommy's hair.

-Able to sit up for a few seconds (while leaning foward on their hands) before falling over.

-They love to pull their paci out of their mouth and try to put it back in. It's really cute to watch them try and figure it out, but it's also a little frustrating in the middle of the night when they keep pulling their paci's out and screaming for us to put it back in!!

As I said earlier, Carson and Avery are very busy! My days of feeding them at the same time are over, they are just too wiggly now. Hopefully it won't be long till they are able to hold their own bottles.

Sleep continues to be our #1 battle these days. We are making a little bit of progress, but still have a long way to go before we have two babies that sleep through the night. Pray for us!!

Avery:

Sweet, happy Avery!! She smiles at everything and is so playful. Avery has discovered her feet and her ears and loves to play with both. She is scooting foward and backwards on her belly. It won't be long before she is mobile. She is also getting a tooth, I think. For the past three weeks, she has had a hard, white spot on her bottom gum. I'm pretty sure it's a tooth, we'll see. Avery is still only eating 3-4oz at a time. She gets really distracted during her bottles and cereal. We have to give her a spoon to hold to keep her from grabbing the one we are feeding her with. Avery has such a sweet, open-mouthed smile. She melts my heart!!

Carson:

My sweet boy! He wakes up every morning with a smile and is so happy to see us! Carson is a little more selective with who he gives his smiles to. And he is starting to have a little stranger-danger. We took them to Joyland (our church nursery) for the first time this past Sunday and Carson starting crying when we handed him over to the nursery worker. It was so sad!! Carson is good eater. He's eating 4-6oz and loves his cereal. He kicks his legs when he gets excited about something. Usually when he sees his bottle or between bites of cereal! So cute!

We finally had some nice, warm weather this past weekend. We took the babies out to play in the yard for a while. They love being outside.
Makes me excited for spring!

5 Years

Happy five year anniversary to my sweet husband. It's hard to believe that we have been married for 5 years. We have lived, laughed, and loved over these past 5 years. We have done a lot, learned a lot and accomplished a lot together.

We have a fun date night planned for tonight. Carson and Avery are going over to MiMi and PaPa's house so Shane and I can go to dinner. Can't wait! It's been a long time since we have had a date night.

My sweet, strong-willed girl. This shirt just about sums up the week we have been having with Avery: DRAMA! This little girl knows what she wants, and she knows what she doesn't want. And what she doesn't want to do is sleep in her own bed. We decided that it was time for Avery to move out of our room (and our bed) and into her own bed. She's not a fan of that idea, to say the least. Last night was night 4 of trying to get her to sleep in her crib. Lord, give me strength and patience. I'm trying so hard not to give in, but it's hard!

I love her determined spirit, she is going to do GREAT things in life (including sleeping through the night :)

Carson, on the other hand, slept 11 hours straight the other night. I told him he needs to give his sister a pep talk on sleeping.

Here is a video of Carson talking/singing. I love hearing his sweet voice.

Happy Snow Day

Wow!! I can't believe how much it snowed here yesterday!! Some areas in Dallas got almost a foot of snow.....crazy! I had to work yesterday, but enjoyed watching the beautiful snow fall from the 12th floor at Children's.

Today Carson, Avery, and I bundled up and went out to play.

They are looking at each other like, "what's the big deal about snow?"

Our snowman. He's a little wimpy. I had to build him quickly, my audience was fading fast.

The dogs went CRAZY in the snow!
The trees were so pretty!

On a side note,

we started rice cereal this past week. They didn't really know what to do with it at first but they quickly figured it out. Carson seems to love it! Avery will eat it, but makes a funny face everytime you put it in her mouth.

And finally, here is the video of Avery rolling onto her belly. Such a big girl!

Snow Bunnies

Our first vacation with the babies was a success!! We went to Beaver Creek, CO with my parents, Shane's brother Travis and his wife JJ. We had a great time. We were able to ski while
MiMi hung out with Carson and Avery. (we have the best MiMi!!) The babies did GREAT on the plane. I was so proud of them. Avery let out a couple of screams, but they mostly just slept the whole way.

Carson helping MiMi craft
On a walk with MiMi and PaPa

MiMi brought the babies out to the base of the mountain to meet us for lunch.

The weather was so nice. Only snowed one day.

Cutie

Uncle Travis and aunt JJ

Me, my dad and Shane. He insisted on wearing his Texas painted overalls from college. A little redneck, but I still love him!!

And finally, here is their 4 month picture.

At our check up yesterday, Carson weighed 14lbs 12oz (50%) and was 25 1/4 inches (50%) and Avery weighed 13lbs 9oz (50%) and was 24 1/2 inches (50%)

They are getting so big!!

4 Month Old Jumpers

Well, I guess I should say 4 month old sitters because their feet don't quite touch the floor yet. But they still love their new jumper!!

They love being able to sit up and look at the toys and lights. The long strand of plastic rings are their favorite toy right now.

Happy Babies!!
Carson and Avery turned 4 months old yesterday. Where have these past 4 months gone?
At 4 months they are:
-rolling front to back and back to front. (Avery just rolled from back to front as I was writing this post. I knew she wouldn't let her brother show her up for long. Video to come!!)
-reaching and grabbing their toys that hang above them in the activity gym
-they can spot us from across the room now and follow us with their eyes
-they love, love, love bath time. I'm going to have to move them to the big bathtub soon because they are sloshing water all over the floor in the kitchen when they kick.
-they love when we talk and sing to them. And they don't even care that I have a terrible voice!
-their favorite thing right now is their hands
Avery has become quite the little sleep fighter. She is WAY too busy to nap. There is just too much to do and see, that sleep is just not on her agenda. She does OK during the night, still getting up at least once to eat. During the day she usually just catnaps in her swing. Her favorite things are her paci, her hands, and her silk lovey that MiMi made her. She likes to rub her face on the silk while she's falling asleep. It is so sweet.
This is her latest thing. She puckers her lips and blows spit bubbles.
Shane calls it her Zoolander look.

Carson has started fighting his sleep some too during the day. He likes to be rocked to sleep. But once he's out, he'll take a good long nap. He has slept through the night a couple of times, but usually gets up once to eat still. He usually wakes up so happy and is so excited when we come to get him up from his nap. His favorite things right now are his paci, his hands, and his green knit blanket his great-aunt made him. He is such a sweet, cuddly boy.

Our 4 month check up is next week, so I'll post all thier latest info then.

We leave for Colorado today for our ski trip. This will be Carson and Avery's first time on a plane. I'm a little nervous, but I think they will do ok. Please pray for a safe trip and happy babies on the plane ride.