Conor- 6 Months

My sweet little Conor is 6 months old! How is he already half of a year old? It has gone by so fast! Time slow down!

He is such a happy, precious little boy. He loves to laugh and he is such a good natured little guy. He has to put up with a lot from his brothers. In fact, right before this photo shoot Patrick was kissing on him and playing with him and they accidentally bopped heads. So you will see he has a large bruise on his head in all of these pictures. 

He has had two separate ear infections. He has also been teething really badly. I keep thinking that a tooth is going to come in any day now, but I have yet to see a tooth pop through. He hasn't been the greatest sleeper the past couple of months and will frequently get up in the middle of the night and "chat " to us. He doesn't cry or whine, but just wants someone to hang out with him while he squeals, talks, practices rolling over and chews on his hand. I think its because his ears and mouth have been hurting him. We will see once we get it all cleared up I guess.

At his 6 month check-up he weighed 19 pounds, 2 ounces (75%) was    tall (95%) and his head circumference was 40%. By far my biggest boy! Cannot believe he is in the 95th percentile for height! It is tough to carry him in his carseat everywhere. He loves to take a nap in it, but he is about to outgrow it. It's going to be so sad when he outgrows it in a couple months! I'm pretty sure Patrick was in his infant carseat until he was 18 months old…too funny!

He finally started rolling over this month! I knew he could roll over, but he just wouldn't do it. Well he finally started rolling over and hasn't quit yet. He won't stay still now and wants to be moving constantly! He has also started sitting up this month. He won't do it for long because he wants to grab things and move around, so he always ends up toppling over trying to grab something. I think he could sit up on his own for a little while though if he tried!

He loves to hear himself talk and will talk really loudly! He also started saying his first word this month, and it was Mama! My first child to say mama instead of dada first! yay! I really doubted that he said his first word, but he clearly knows what the word means and says it whenever he wants me. He is definitely a mama's boy!

He started eating this month and has had sweet potatoes, carrots and peas. He makes a funny face with all of his food, but kicks for more. So I think he really likes it!

He is the most precious little boy and I feel so blessed to be his mom. Happy half birthday big boy!

Lake days

Michael's parents just built a beautiful lake house and we have been spending a few weekends there lately. The boys absolutely love it. They love being with family. They also love getting to ride the "G Skets" and riding on the boat. 

The boys love the bunk beds and they were so cute reading their books on the top bunk. The think the bunk beds are really cool. 

Peyton riding on the boat. He takes boat riding very serious :)

A few minutes later he is sleeping on the boat

Me and my sweet little baby on the boat. I cannot get enough of that precious chunky little baby.

Testing out his new ride 

Napping on the sleeping porch

Relaxing on the boat

Conor taking the the lake by storm

This is fun dad!

Riding the G Skets

Peyton loves "my baby"

Nana and Conor

The sunsets have really been gorgeous lately

Art and Mark

Hanging out with this little guy on an early Saturday morning

Conor and Brooks before a morning cruise on the lake

Telling each other secrets

Waving at uncle Mark

The boys beg to have their special treat after dinner

We found Jake's Pirate ship!

Exhausted after a full day at the lake

Eyes glued on the lake

First tubing experience

Patrick also went tubing for the first time. I wasn't there and I am sort of glad I wasn't! Apparently he was thrown off of the tube, which would have made me very scared!

Sweet little bedtime movie at the lake with Peyton and Michael

Mom goals

I am still getting used to being a stay at home mom. One of the biggest changes for me was not having a to-do list every day with a million different work projects on the list.  The first thing I would do every morning I went into work was to write my to-do list. I know it sounds a little weird, but I thrive when I have a to-do list.

I definitely have lots to do staying at home with my kids, but I don't have a to-do list these days. If I did, it would probably have 3 loads of laundry on it, 35 diaper changes, cooking, and cleaning x 100 every day.  I have loved getting to stay at home, but I still struggle with it a little. I know what Michael does for a living and it is hard. I struggle with him being so busy and me not pulling my share. I guess I just have to begin to look at it a little differently. Although I don't have the same tasks on my to-do list that I used to, I have three little people looking at me to teach them and just have fun with them. And that's important too.

One of the main reasons I wanted to stay at home was because I always felt like I was telling my kids no, rushing them and just not having fun with them. I was very stressed and had so much to do that I couldn't be the mom I wanted to be. So I have really been working on being the mom I want to be. One of the changes is trying to be a "yes" mom.  I don't mean saying yes to everything my children request. But trying to do the things they want to do, when we can, really goes a long way. There isn't that much time in your life where you get to go to the park or go swimming whenever you want. But we are in that phase of life right now in my family. None of my children are in school, so we really can do whatever we want whenever we want.

Patrick, Conor and I were running errands today (Peyton was at mother's day out) and we drove by West Nashville park. The sprinklers were all on in the field next to the park and Patrick commented that it looked really cool.  I knew he would much rather go to the park instead of running errands. My first thought was that we couldn't go because we needed to go to Costco. But, since I have really been trying to get in the mindset of being a "yes mom," I asked if he wanted to go run through the sprinklers instead of go to Costco. He looked at me excitedly and said "But we don't have any other clothes and sprinklers are wet." I thought this was the perfect example to teach my child spontaneity. I am not spontaneous at all, but that is one of the things I really love about Michael. And who cares if we get all wet? It's 5 minutes from our house and we can always go home and change and go to Costco later. So we chose to run through the sprinklers instead of go to Costco and it was really fun! Patrick had the biggest smile on his face and it made our day so much happier.

This may seem like a small example, but it is a big change for me. I have trouble being spontaneous and being a "yes mom" but I am working on it. I want my child to look back on his childhood and remember a really happy mom and one that listened to his ideas. So i'm going to strive to say yes when I can (and within reason :) ) and as a result say "no" a little less too.

Summer Fun

I had so much fun staying home with my crazy boys this summer. We had lots of fun at home, but also got out to do a lot of fun things. So here are all the random pictures from the summer that didn't fit in any other posts.

Lots of cuddle time at home this summer

Just lounging around

His eyes are so expressive

Nuts

This boy loves his "krispies milk"

Trip to the Bellevue library. Teaching a child how to use a mouse is surprisingly more difficult than it seems

Cousins at story time

Peyton loved the foam pit

Play date with some high school friends

Fun at the West Nashville park

Chasing birds and bunnies

A trip to bobby's dairy dip with sweet little Peyton

Celebrating Uncle Mark's birthday

so smiley

Popsicles outside

Post nap smiles and crazy hair

Not everyone can look this cool at nap time!

Can you tell he is the third child?

Rain rain go away

Most precious sleeping baby

summer staple food

Loves the baby toys and his sunglasses

Peyton's first movie...minions

The best I could do for a picture outside after the movie

Lots of swimming with big this summer. These boys adore it!

Aunt Denton joined

I told the boys to go play and stop fighting, and they came up with pillow hopscotch. Pretty creative...

The summer heat wears this guy out!

Painting day

Learning to sit up

Trip to Belle Meade to see the fire trucks

Playing with their second cousin, Jack

Peyton riding one of my old horses

My low key days were the days I had at home with Peyton. Sweet little guy is talking on the "phone" to his brothers and dad :)

When I was driving the boys to school one day, I heard Conor belly laughing at Patrick.  He will do anything to get Conor to laugh at him. I was driving, but I still wanted to capture the cuteness, so while still paying attention to the road, I held my phone backwards and hoped I would capture it. It's a little shaky, but so cute.  I'm totally aware that this is not the safest thing to do, but I was truly paying attention to the road, and we were on our street when I was filming this :)