Mystery Reader

Michael and Rowan

Several months ago, Michael's sister-in-law, Camie, asked if he would lilke to be a "mystery reader" in our nephew Rowan's first grade class.  It sounded super cute!  Michael would go to his classroom, and his teacher would give 5 clues to all of the kiddos, and they would try to guess who the reader is.  After they guess who it is, Michael would get to read a story to the class. Isn't that precious? 

Given the time of year, Michael decided to read "The Polar Express", one of my absolute favorite books!  We were trying to come up with a list of clues, but it is difficult to know what type of clues to give a 7 year old.  Our list started off fairly vague, but was incredibly specific for the last clue.  We just hoped Rowan would guess it was Michael.

Charlotte and I decided to go along to take pictures... and just because I couldn't stand to miss this!  We checked in and waited for his teacher to come get us.  When she finally did, we waited in the hall, and Rowan came running out!  He seemed very surprised!  When we walked into the class, his teacher told us that she read all of the clues, but no one seemed to know who it was.  Keep in mind, the last clue was that his wife's name is Katie and he has a daughter named Charlotte!  She looked at Rowan and asked if he knows anyone like that, and he said he might.  After that, it all started to click!

Rowan was absolutely precious!  He introduced us to his classmates.  I just love hearing the way children explain things.  He told everyone our names, and asked if they would all like to come look at Charlotte.  He said he hoped they all liked Charlotte's dress, and hoped they thought my earrings were pretty.  His teacher asked how we were related to him, and after a minute, he said we were his uncle and aunt, and that Charlotte was his cousin. 

Michael, Rowan and I sat on a sofa, and all of the kids sat in front of us on the floor.  They had a few minutes to ask us questions.  I'm not sure what I expected them to ask, but it was very sweet.  They wanted to know our favorite food, if we went to the same school when we were little, what our first grade class was like, who our teachers were, what types of places we have been on vacation.  One little boy told me the last baby he saw pulled his hair, so he didn't want to get to close to Charlotte. They were adorable! 

After the Q&A, Michael read them the story.  They were so attentive, and loved the book!  We had so much fun!  Rowan, if you ever read this, please know that we love you so much, and are very proud of you!

Tennessee Turkey Day

I have been looking forward to Charlotte's first Thanksgiving for the longest time!  I love the food, the weather, the college football... But most of all, I love spending holidays with our family.  My mother's side of the family live in Nashville, and we have been counting down the days until Charlotte's first trip to meet everyone. 

Originally, we planned on driving up Tuesday morning and staying through Sunday.  About a week before we were set to leave, Michael had a few meetings pop up, and he wasn't going to be able to leave until Tuesday night.  Charlotte and I couldn't wait any longer to see everyone, so we decided to drive up on Monday to surprise Marmee (my Mom)! Michael would then fly in Tuesday night, and stay through Sunday to drive with us back to Dallas.

 My Mom and I talk on the phone every day, and usually email back and forth a few times, so it was VERY difficult to keep this a secret.  We all woke up bright and early Monday morning, and Michael made breakfast... very sweet!  We finished loading up the car, packed Charlotte in with toys hanging from everything that would sit still, and headed up to Tennessee!  I was a little nervous about the drive up, as it takes about 10 hours without accounting for stops to feed Charlotte.  She does very well in the car, but our longest trip up until this point was a 2 hour drive to Waco for Baylor's Homecoming.  This trip was a little longer!  She did so well!  It was rainy and overcast all day, which only seemed to help her sleep.  Other than a bit of traffic outside of Little Rock, everything went smoothly.  She slept, played, and babbled the whole way!  We pulled up to Marmee's house around 6:45pm after 12 hours in the car,  and we couldn't wait to see her face!  I put Charlotte in her car seat on Marmee's front porch, rang the doorbell, and hid.  She was so surprised!  I think it took a few minutes for her to realize what was going on!

Tuesday, we took Charlotte to meet her great grandparents, Memama and Big Daddy.  She is their 24th great grandchild... we have a big family!  She did so well!  We played and played, and then went to dinner.  I loved seeing them hold her.  They are two of the most precious people in my life, and I am so sad that I don't get to see them more often.  They have been married for almost 75 years, and are such a great example for our family.  After dinner, we picked Michael up from the airport.

Charlotte with Memama



Snuggling with Big Daddy

Wednesday, Michael, Charlotte and I had breakfast with college friends of ours that live in Franklin.  That night, my mom and her husband, Bob, invited lots of our family over for a casual dinner.  The entire family gets together every other Christmas, but we don't all get together for Thanksgiving each year, so we wanted to make sure we saw everyone we could while we were in town.  My cousin Chris has a new little girl, so Charlotte got to meet her newest cousin Stella!  She is beautiful!

We woke up Thursday ready to watch the Thanksgiving Day Parade and cook!  My grandparents came over around 1, and we had loads to do!  Everything came together beautifully, and we had a great time. 

Watching the parade with Daddy

Having fun with Big Daddy

Friday, we had a second Thanksgiving at my Aunt Patsy and Uncle Randy's house with their children and grand kids.  There were so many kiddos, and Charlotte couldn't get enough of her little cousins.  They were so sweet with her!  She was so worn out that night from all of the commotion!



4 Generations of Rudolph girls



Sleepy girl in her Christmas PJ's

Saturday, we shopped around town, and squeezed in one more visit with Memama and Big Daddy.  Their last name is Rudolph, so I dressed Charlotte in her reindeer outfit!  She was precious!!!  Sadly, we had to pack up and head back to Dallas Sunday morning.  We had such a great time in Nashville, and can't wait to see everyone again very soon!

Charlotte dressed as Rudolph!

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Baylor Homecoming

Charlotte had her first road trip this weekend!  Over the past several months, we had gone back and forth about going down to Waco for Baylor's Homecoming.  We had a wedding in Dallas Saturday afternoon, so if we went, we knew it would be a very quick trip.  Friday afternoon, I got a text from my friend Jen asking if we were coming down.  She lives in Waco with her husband, Kurt, and 2 precious kids.  I told her we thought about it, but decided it would be too quick to drive down for the parade and basically turn around to come back to Dallas for the wedding.  She asked us to come stay the night with them, and go to the parade the next day.  Baylor has a great Homecoming parade, and Kurt and Michael's fraternity always builds an amazing float!  I have loads of pics from college of Michael with a full beard wearing overalls when he was a float chair.  They take it pretty seriously, and always do a great job!

Flashback from '03: Michael is on the far right!

We are not always very spontaneous, but we decided to pack up really fast and drive down!  I'm so glad we did!  Their daughter Audrey is just a few weeks younger than Charlotte, and we hadn't seen her yet.  We couldn't wait for Charlotte to meet her new buddy!  We didn't get to their house until about 8 that night, but we stayed up to chat for a while.

Audrey & Charlotte

Saturday, we grabbed breakfast, and headed downtown to campus.  It was pretty chilly that morning, but nothing a little hot cocoa couldn't take care of!  We had so much fun catching up with old friends, and seeing all of the festivities.  It was strange being on campus with a stroller!  We had a great time!

KOT's Float won!

Funny... there was guy in there acting like Mario!

Thank you Kurt & Jen for inviting us to stay with you!

Charlotte's Nemesis

When Charlotte turned 4 months old, I was very excited!  I have been looking forward to seeing her use her activity jumper and her exersaucer for a while now.  I think babies look so precious playing in them!  At first, she was way too short, and even with books underneath her, it just didn't work very well.

Her jumper has a higher back, so even if her feet cannot touch, she can have fun playing.  I'll pull it into the kitchen while I get dinner ready, or sit with her in the floor and play... we have a great time!

Last week, I tried her exersaucer again.  She still can't reach the base, but her balance is much better now, and she can sit up and play with all of the toys.  The seat spins around, so we would try out one area at a time.  She was having a blast... she loves the spinning parrot, see-sawing pandas, and the bobbling giraffe.  She especially loves the little piano that says colors in different languages, nature sounds, and cute little songs. 

We finally got to the cute little penguin that spins around, and I thought this would be another hit.  Boy was I wrong!  The first time I pushed it down, she made a really strange face.  What did I do?  Pretty much what I always do when we're getting a cute reaction... I grabbed the video camera!  Why not try a few more times to see what she does?  I pushed it down again, and she looked scared.  I tried one more time, and she freaked out!  One large scream followed by hysterical crying.  I am a terrible mother!  She will probably hate penguins for the rest of her life!  Michael tried the next day, and got the same response.  We aren't too sure why this bothers her so much.  She hasn't been bothered by any other noises so far.  Maybe it's just a phase!  Just to be safe though, no spinning penguin for a while!

Happy Labor Day!

I am embarassed to say that, until today, I was not exactly sure what Labor Day was all about.  Here is how my conversation with Michael went:

Katie: "What is Labor Day?"
Michael: "Ummmm..."
K: "Is it patriotic?"
M: "I don't think so."
K: "But I wanted Charlotte to get one more use out of her American flag bubble."
M: "Well... it's never a bad idea to celebrate America."
K: "What do we celebrate on Labor Day??
M: "Workers???"

He was pretty close!  Please tell me that we are not the only Americans that did not know the meaning behind Labor Day.  Well, thanks to the wonder that is Wikipedia, I am now well versed on Labor Day!  Just in case you are as clueless as we were, here is a little refresher:

Labor Day

• federal holiday that is observed on the first Monday in September
• celebrates the social and economic contributions of workers
• the first Labor Day was September 5, 1882
• commonly celebrated with parades and barbeques
• symbolic for the end of Summer
• marks the beginning of NFL and college football
• very important: last day you can wear white =)

Charlotte and I are always excited to have Daddy home for a 3 day weekend!  We planned to be very relaxed and low key.  I always get excited for Labor Day weekend, because it means that Fall is not too far away.  I LOVE Fall and Winter!  What's not to love?  Beautiful weather, college football, Thanksgiving and Christmas, lots of time with family... I could go on and on! 

The weather was perfect all weekend!  We were fortunate to have a nice break in the 100+ degree heat (I'm pretending the heat is gone for the rest of the year!), and finally spent some time with Charlotte outside.  Here is a little recap of our weekend:

Thursday, Michael went dove hunting, and Charlotte and I had some fun Mommy and Me time!  Friday, we headed to Baby Bounce at North Park with a couple of Charlotte's buddies, and Michael surprised us by coming home early.  Thank goodness he did!  He made it home in time for us to cheer Baylor on to victory in their season opener against TCU!!!  It was an exciting game, and it's great to see the Bears start the season off strong.  Sic'Em Bears!

Saturday, I had a volunteer shift at the DMA, and Michael spent some time with his little girl!  They had a blast!  She supervised while he smoked a pork shoulder and corn, made mashed potatoes and a peach cobbler.  It was so yummy!  Michael's brother's family came over for dinner and to watch the LSU vs. Oregon game.  We had a great time!

Sunday, we went for an early morning walk... it was so nice out!  Later, Charlotte and I had a play date with one of the mom's we met in our childbirth classes.  Our daughters were born a couple weeks apart, and they had a great time playing (ie: lying on blankets next to each other).  We walked around Willow Bend and chatted.  It was great to catch up!  When I got home, we watched the US Open and relaxed.

Ready for a walk!

Monday morning, Michael went to hit golf balls with Brandon.  We gave him new golf clubs for his 30th birthday, but his back has been bothering him, and he has been dying to use them.  Charlotte and I went for another walk.  We picked up a pair of baby sunglasses last week, and she was very excited to wear them.  Sadly, she looks a bit like Elton John, but it's still pretty cute!  When Michael came home, we watched more tennis and took a little afternoon nap.  For dinner, we made BBQ pizzas and listened to Frank Sinatra. 

Dancing to Sinatra tunes with Daddy

Resting after a long weekend!

It has been a perfect weekend!

Sitting!!!

I can hardly believe it!  My precious baby girl can sit all on her own!  Over the past couple of weeks, I have been working on sitting with her more and more.  A little bebePod time, playing while sitting in front of me, etc.  She was doing really well, but was she wasn't quite confident enough to try it all on her own.

I was out running errands today, and came home to this:

I walked in the door, and saw her on the floor with Michael... just sitting like it wasn't a big deal!  Michael didn't even think to mention it!  I flipped out, cried a little, and grabbed the camera!  She is growing up so fast.  At first, she was sitting with her hands on the ground in front of her, but now, she sits hands free.  We are so proud of our sweet baby girl!

Here are a few highlights of her evolving sitting skills:

Under Lock & Key

It's official... I have had my first super scary moment as a mother.  Charlotte and I were having a fantastic morning, and were about to head out for our weekly playgroup at Willow Bend.  Due to her nap schedule, I usually feel rushed getting out of the house, but she woke up early today, and we were actually leaving early!  I felt so proud!  We walked out the door into the garage, I put the door up, started the car (putting her diaper bag and my phone into the passenger seat), and put her carseat in.  I closed both doors and walked around to my side of the car to jump in and head off to playgroup.  Small problem: my door was locked!!!  All of the doors were locked, my daughter is in the car (that was turned on THANK GOODNESS), and my phone is in the car. 

I am FREAKING OUT!  We don't have a house phone line, and I don't have a spare set of keys (long story...).  I run into the house looking for anything that might possibly open my car.  I unwind a wire hanger, shove it in between the window and the door (I've seen too many movies).  I consider running to a neighbors house, but can't bring myself to leave my daughter in a running car alone.  I check to see if she is okay, and she is crying hysterically in her little seat.  I would be too if I heard lots of scratching and screaming outside the door. 

Just as I am about to break open a car window using a hammer, I remember that my car was broken into several months ago using a screwdriver.  I run over to Michael's tool box, select my screwdriver of choice, and run back to my door.  I had no idea what I was doing... I'm not at all experienced at breaking into vehicles.  I shove the screwdriver in, wiggle it around for a while, and hear the sweetest click imaginable!!!  The door unlocked!!!  I still can't believe it! 

I ran around to open Charlotte's door, and couldn't stop kissing her!  I realize the car was turned on, but it was still so scary!  We were a little late to playgroup today...

Sweet girl... home safe and sound!