Thanksgiving and 4 Months

We had a nice relaxing Thanksgiving at my mom's house in Georgia. It was a small crowd. It was just our family, my mom, and my little brother. Aiden loved spending time with Grandma and loved getting to play with new toys and play outside in the warm weather down South.

Playing in the kitchen while Grandma cooks.

Finger painting with pudding

 The feast! So delicious!

Poor Ryder all he can chew on are his beads.

The post-feast stupor...

Ryder also turned 4 months on over Thanksgiving on November 25th! He is getting so big. Starting about a week before Thanksgiving he could roll both ways front to back and back to front. He is a very wiggly and mobile little guy. He is also very vocal and loves to babble and laugh. Oh and his favorite thing in the whole world is getting his diaper changed/being naked. At his doctor's appointment he weighed 14 pounds and was 25 1/2 inches long. He LOVES to watch and interact with Aiden. Of course Aiden doesn't really know how to respond to this attention from his little brother. But Aiden is so sweet to his little brother. Anytime he cries he comes up to him and says "It's ok baby Ryder, it's ok." And he likes trying to give him toys now that Ryder can grab things. And just yesterday Ryder started sleeping in his crib in Aiden's room. So they are now sleeping in the same room together....we will see how it goes, but so far so good! He did amazing the first night and did not wake up until 5 in the morning. It was the most sleep I had gotten in I am not sure how long.

Autumn in Kentucky

I had been dying to go hiking before it got too cold, but Brad had been so busy with the last few weeks of one of his classes that we just hadn't had time. But finally last weekend was the perfect weather and Brad finally had a weekend at home so we decided to go hiking at natural bridge in Slade, Kentucky. It is a hike up to a bridge made out of natural stone. It was a beautiful hike and was difficult enough to get some decent exercise, but still not too hard with kids. Aiden had a few break downs on the way up over goldfish snacks, but was happy the rest of the time. We missed the the full color of the trees  because lots of the leaves had already fallen off, but it was still really beautiful.

 I am king of the tree stump!

 Yeah the sun was directly in our eyes...

We didn't have any pictures of the bridge from a distance, but here is a picture I found on the internet so you can see what we were standing on top of.

 Daddy's are the best :) Especially when they pretend to be a race car with you the entire way back down.

Halloween Arrgh

This Halloween was so much fun for Aiden. I asked him if he wanted to be a ghost or a pirate and he chose a pirate (much to my delight!) I bought a costume online, but it did not come in time for our church Trunk or Treat, but it came in time for Halloween hence the two different pirate outfits in the pictures. Aiden was so excited. When I asked him if he wanted to go get his pirate costume he yelled "YEAH!" And ran as fast as he could towards the stairs. It was so cute :) I found great pirate accessories such as his sword and eye patch at target for a dollar! The accessories also included a little pirate telescope, pirate hook, and pirate coins (he carried those around in his bucket.) Ryder was supposed to be a parrot for Halloween, but all I managed to make for him was a orange beak for his head that he wore to the trunk or treat and I wanted to make more for his costume before Halloween....but what can I say? I failed. I was just so busy and I realized last minute that the fabric glue I needed and thought I had somehow leaked and dried up in my craft box so....Ryder had a beak at Trunk or treat and he just wore a cute raccoon beanie on Halloween and that was his costume. I know...lame. 

But we all had fun and on Halloween we went with our friends Matt and Mallory and their cute little girl Gatlin to go trick or treating. She was a cupcake and they had fun riding in the wagon together. For days after Halloween Aiden kept asking to go trick or treating again. He loved it!

Give me yer booty ye scallywag!

We also had lots of fun carving pumpkins and Aiden was also SO excited for this Halloween activity. He had fun helping Daddy carve out the gooey insides and drawing the outline of the face on the front.

 Eww...slimy.

 I think I want Dad's lollypop.

 easy success.

Growing Boys

Just thought I would post some recent photos of Aiden and Ryder.

Ryder is now a little over 2 months and at his six week check-up he weighed 11 1/2 pounds. He is getting so big and it is so fun to try to get him to smile and to coo. He has not given us a full out laugh yet, but he sure loves to smile.

Aiden is becoming more and more independent and he loves to try to do everything by himself. Which is sometimes a little frustrating, but that is part of growing up I guess. He also has discovered the fun of dancing and the other day we had him dancing to Maroon 5 for at least an hour. We also got him his first pet the other day- a blue Beta fish he named Blackhead. He changed over to a big boy bed a while ago, but here are the pictures I never got the chance to put up of him in his bed.