Evil Ants!

I've always hated ants. I know God had a purpose for putting them on Earth..but I've never found it. They make huge ugly mounds in your yard. They are destructive. And they HURT! Well, now my disdain for them has grown a million times over.

At 4am on Monday morning, I am awakened to the sound of Brody screaming. I ran to his room and scooped him out of bed bc I could tell it was a cry of pain. He stopped crying and I think "Ok, you screamed like that to get my attention!?" Silly boy! But, it was almost time for him to eat anyways so I went ahead and nursed him. As he was eating, I noticed a small bug or fly crawling on his face. The light was off in the room but I had the hallway bathroom light on so it was just enough that I could see him. I flicked the bug off, not thinking anything of it. A couple minutes later, I saw it again and thought wow, what a pesky little thing!

As I go to lay Brody back in his crib, I see them. Tons of them! Ants crawling all in his crib! I FREAKED! I hadn't seen them before bc my eyes hadn't adjusted to the light. But they were everywhere. Apparently, he had spit up in his sleep and they could smell it and came for it! Matt came running in, we stripped his bed of sheets and everything and attacked the ants with kitchen disinfectant bc I didn't want to put poisonous bug spray in his room. In the meantime, the sweet boy had fallen back asleep on our bed so I didn't really look over his body for bites. I saw a couple but thought, "whew, they didn't get him that bad." He slept with us the rest of the night and I just kept cuddling him and saying I'm so sorry.

The next morning I checked him over and oh my gosh! I was soo upset. He was ATTACKED! He has a patch of 5 bites behind his ear, another patch on his pinky, and then others scattered around his body. These aren't any ant bites..these are FIRE ANT bites! Fortunately he's not allergic bc they haven't swelled up or made him sick. He has been a little irritable bc of the pain and itching, but other than that he's ok. It upset me more than him.

We left town Monday morning to go see baby Cole so we didn't have to worry about him sleeping in his room then. Tuesday night when we got back, we still hadn't sprayed anything so he slept in the pack n play in our room. Today Matt was going to go get some safe spray that we could put in his room and then something we could spray outside. However, a friend of Allen and Dena's who owns a pest control business offered to come over and take care of the problem for free! How amazing is that! He put a very mild spray along Brody's baseboard and then destroyed the ones outside. He said because its so dry right now, they are burrowed underground and are looking for water. Thats why they came in our house.

So needless to say, Brody will probably have a stigma about ants his whole life. Or at least I will from now on!

Sooo Excited!

We get a nephew tomorrow (Monday)!! We can't wait! Matt's brother and his wife/my best friend are having their baby boy tomorrow. We're heading to Houston early in the morning so we don't miss a thing. I am so excited not only to get a nephew and to get to be an aunt, but also because I'm so excited to get to share this time with Leigh Ann. It's so fun that we will both finally have babies and so close together. They will be 6 months apart...6 months and 2 days to be exact. So soo close. I can't wait to watch our sweet boys grow up together, play, fight, and be best buds (we won't give them a choice). Brody is going to love baby Cole sooo much. I hope they let him see him tomorrow.

Please be praying for Leigh Ann as she goes into the hospital at 5am to start her IVs and get things started. We'll be praying for her as she is laboring and especially delivery. Delivery is never "easy" but we'll be praying for safe with no complications and everything will go smoothly. Pray for baby Cole that he is perfectly healthy and ready to take on the world.

We'll have pictures...but I won't be posting any until the mom and dad get to post them on their own blog. They should get to be the first ones to show off their new angel to the world! I feel like I'm having another baby or something..this is too exciting!

Time has FLOWN by!

Our little Brody. We can't believe how fast you have reached 6 months old! It seems like yesterday we were bringing you home from the hospital. You were so tiny in that big ole' carseat. Now I can barely lift the thing when you're in it! You bring us so much joy. Mommy loves watching you play with your daddy...you two are hilarious together! You don't respond to anyone like you do to him..its so precious and the way it should be! You light up when he walks in the room and says your name. He is teaching you little "boy" tricks like sticking your tongue out and blowing. And you are so good at it! You're trying to sit up on your own and you are getting VERY close. We're so proud of you for trying to do so many new things on your own. We're having to keep a close eye on you now since you're always rolling and scooting. Before we know it, you'll be crawling around the whole house. You've definitely showed signs of trying already! You started eating cereal this week and it was quite funny! At first, when you wanted another bite you would stick your tongue out instead of opening your mouth. You wanted to eat it but couldn't figure out how to get that tongue out of the way. Mommy and Daddy couldn't help but laugh.

Brody Boy, you are so loved! We can't imagine our lives without you. Here are some of our favorite photos of your first 6 months!

First Trip to the Zoo

We went to San Antonio this weekend and Brody got to go on his first trip to the zoo. He couldn't really see much because the walls and fences were high so he just played with toys and slept most of the time. However, he LOVED the aquarium. He could see all the bright fish and was smiling and reaching towards them. It was so cute. He could see other animals, but these were definitely his favorites. Here are a few photos of some pretty animals we saw during the day. It was STINKIN hot so a lot of the cool ones were hiding in the shade. But it was still a fun family day!

Who's that Handsome Boy?

Oh, that's right..It's our sweet Brody! I know, I know..every mom thinks their child is the most beautiful child in the world. And its true...they are, right mothers? Brody had an "official" photo shoot today...I try to do one every couple of months but sometimes they don't always turn out so great. He's finally at the age where his little personality comes out in the camera...if I catch him in the right mood. Today I started shooting right after his nap when he's in his best mood. He was soo cooperative and laughed, and smiled and was a total ham. It was great. Here are just a couple of my faves. So should I do like all my friends do and pass out wallets of him? I mean, I love it when I get pics of your children...but would anyone even care as much as I do about having a pic of him? Anyways, here are a few that I love.

Not Much to Report

Not much has gone on around our household lately. Brody is growing and changing everyday..and I am ashamed to admit..but I haven't taken very many photos of him lately. I've been busy around the house and editing photos and he just really doesn't smile for photos. He's not that interested haha. But he is doing so many new things...

-rolling over and all over the place,
- laughs really hard when you tickle his legs,
-grabs at everything in his reach,
-talks to everything..he carries on conversations with his hands
-he finally tried out his jumparoo and seems to do pretty good in it. he can't quite reach the floor so we put a box under for him to stand on. he doesnt really jump but moves around in it and plays with the toys.
-he can put his paci in his mouth..but still can't find it at night when he needs it :(
-he found his toes and it is so cute watching him grab them and try to pull them to his face. this is definitely my favorite thing he's doing right now.


I'm sure there's more that he's doing but that's all I can remember at the moment. He will be starting some cereal in the next week or so, so I'm sure I'll have some funny pics and video to post. I can't wait!

Little Swimmer and More

(This might be a long post..got a few things to update)

Brody went swimming for the first time last Friday, May 30. I've been wanting to go to the pool with the moms, but I wanted Matt to get to be there for Brody's first pool experience so we went for a quick dip after Matt got off work. It was not easy to find a pool to go to! It was the day before all the summer hours started so everyone was having special stuff going on. We thought we could go to our neighborhood pool..we had no idea that our association dues that we have to pay don't even include pool access! We have to pay an additional $80 to use the pool for the summer! And we arent doing that because its a small pool and always really crowded.

So then we decided to be sneaky and drove to our old apartments. We remembered the gate code and drove on in. Not a good idea..it was LOADED with college students who were LOADED with ice chests full of beer.

We kept on driving. Next we went to Thomas Park. As we drove up, we saw a life guard instructing some kids with some noodles and other water toy things so we could tell it was some sort of organized event that we weren't allowed to attend.

So, then we ended up at the apartments I lived in a few years ago. We remembered they had a nice new pool and it doesn't have a lock. So finally we found a pool for our baby boy! (Don't worry...we only stayed for a short time and we are never going to do it again! We just wanted Brody to get in a pool somewhere!)

What we didn't remember about the pool is that it is shaded..so the water wasn't all that warm. We had his cute little Hawaiian swim trunks on him that his daddy picked out and a stinking HUGE huggies little swimmer diaper thingy. The smallest they come is for a 16lb baby..and he's not there yet (more on that later). So he was funny looking..but super cute.

He was a little uncertain because the water isn't as warm as his bath. He loves his bath so we thought he would love swimming. It might take him a while to get used to it. Ok, finally on to the pictures!

Testing it out

I hate this, Daddy!

Momma, SAVE ME!

Ok, maybe its not so bad.

Then on Saturday we went to the Aggie Baseball game with my parents, Matt's parents, and Brent and Leigh Ann. This is the only picture I took. He's wearing my dad's A&M hat. It's too cute! (The Aggies WHOOPED Houston..22-4!!)

Ok, one last thing. I finally took him in yesterday for his 4.5 month checkup. (It was supposed to be a 4 month checkup but they couldnt' get me in until now.) He sadly had to go to a new dr because since I quit my job to stay at home with him, we lost our fancy pants insurance and switched to Scott and White. And for some dumb reason, they won't let Dr. Bacak accept their insurance. So we had to go to a S&W dr. We're sad to have switched, but we really did like the new dr. He was so nice and asked me tons of questions to try to get to know Brody.

So check this out..Brody only weighs 13 lbs 2 oz..at almost 5 months old. And he's 23 3/4 inches long. He's in the 10th% in weight..and 5th% in height!! He's such a little guy! He had gained less than 3 lbs in 2.5 months. The dr wasn't too concerned..but did point out that he seems to be slimming instead of staying on his growth curve. (He showed me on a piece of blue paper with lots of curvy arched things and I'm supposed to know what all that meant. But I got the picture.) He does want to seem him back in a month just to make sure that he's just going to be small and that its not a nutritional thing. We're not going to start him on solids for at least another month since there's more calories in breastmilk than baby food. Plus since he was early, the doc wants us to wait to give his digestive system a little more time to develop. The doc said he's super healthy, is very active and seems to be developing right on schedule. And he did remind me not to worry if he seemed a little slower to start doing things since he was born early.

Ok, this has been long enough. Sorry to bore you to tears.