Happy 30th Birthday

Today is Brian's 30th Birthday!!! (Picture from our wedding!) I am so excited to celebrate my husband, best friend and amazing father to our son today (party to come this weekend). I am so lucky to have gotten to marry the man of my dreams. He has accomplished so much in his 30 years and I am so proud of him! He provides Scott and me with so much love and support in all aspects of our life as a family! Brian, thank you for being the wonderful man you are! I love you, you mean the world to me! Happy Birthday!!!!

Hitchin' a ride

Scott's new obsession is pushing his car all over the house. What could be more fun than taking your little cousin for a ride?!

Its beginning to look a lot like Christmas....

Allowed to touch the tree gently (can't put down his remote).

Just a peek at some of our Christmas decor....

Decorating...

Christmas jams, Christmas tree, Christmas music....its pretty fun! Decorating is becoming a long process because Scott is definitely fully involved and loving every minute. I will savor this time that we get to decorate for 3-4 days with the lights on and the Christmas music playing because I know someday it will all go up all too quickly!

9 months....

Our happy guy!

Love the picture below...he just looks like such a big boy!

Please forgive the high water jeans...looks like these will be getting retired after today...oops!

Can you believe it? I cannot! 9 months old today?!?!!!!! Life with a 9 month old is fun, crazy, exhausting, hilarious and most of all blessed! Scott is such a hand full. He is into everything. All the time. Today he didn't even take a nap. At all. Not even 15 minutes. Not even in the car on the way to and from the park. Hello high energy child! He is super interested in everything, especially if you bring something new on the scene...immediately drops what he was doing and beelines for the new thing (toy, car keys, magazine, random piece of scrap paper that falls). His new thing as of the last two weeks is sliding everything along the floor like its a car...wheels or not. Its really funny! He loves eating (no surprise) and we have started him on just a little bit of meat (thanks to turkey day) and he loves that, but he is not a great chewer so things still have to be pretty mushed up. And still no teeth so really who can blame him for not being a good chewer. He like to pick up little pieces of food and put them in his mouth by himself...so that's hours {minutes} of fun! He is close to walking...he can walk all over if he has a car to push but without the car he can only do 2-3 steps at a time before falling on his tushy. But soon I'm sure he will be walking all over like he'd been doing it his whole life. Scott's 3 favorite things (besides mom and dad) are probably Parker J., Charlie, and the park! He also loves loves loves when my sister does her "Scotty P" chant for him...Parker actually loves it too! Next time you see her, make her do it! HAHA!
Even though pregnancy is technically longer than 9 months, you still think of it as being 9 months and it is hard to believe that Scott has been alive as long as I was pregnant. Pregnancy seemed so long (at the time, now it seems like a blink) and these last 9 months FLEW by at warp speed! We just love our crazy little guy!

Christmas Magic...

Just a preview of the Christmas fun to come....
So excited for Scott's first Christmas...

Thankful Thankful

"Bring on the turkey!"


We are so thankful for everything we have been blessed with this year! We have the most amazing son, he is growing well, he is healthy and happy and full of energy. We have amazing families that we get to see often (a lot of friends only get to see their parents, siblings etc. maybe once a year) and great friends!

We had a great Thanksgiving this year. Grandma Karen and Grandpa Ken came down to spend a few days with us and feast on turkey and fixings! Scott tried mashed potatoes (made separate so no dairy...paranoid much?) sweet potatoes (again a separate batch) peas, and a little big of squished up turkey! He LOVED every bite! Are you surprised?!?!!! Grandma Karen, Scott and I spent the day cooking while Grandpa Ken and Brian built stuff in the garage (new work bench for Brian....who's excited?) then we ate and ate and ate. Friday morning it was up early for black friday shopping and a new TV for the Campbell house (if you know anything about our TV situation we were long overdue...special code to get the TV to turn on = not cool, and we were having this problem last year on black friday but we decided to wait it out...for over a year...like I said overdue!) then it was time to get out the Christmas decorations!!! YAY! The mantle and bar are done and the tree is up but not decorated yet...that will hopefully be happening today...pictures soon! It has been a great week so far and its official: Scott loves Thanksgiving!

Turkey Hands

Scott's first Thanksgiving craft! He loved playing with the foam and squishing the paint in his hands! Now for the cooking...

Happy {early} Birthday Brian

Tah-dah! Craftsman tool chest! Yipee!

Brian = super excited!

Bonding over the new "toy"

Brown paper packages tied up with strings...

Look what arrived today!!!!! Just in time for decorating on Friday! I am just about pee-in-my-pants excited about Scott's stocking! I would love to say I am the type of person who could/would make Scott's stocking but I'm not, even if I were I have no idea when I would actually get around to doing it...when he is 15 probably. So thank you Pottery Barn Kids and the UPS guy for making this day possible for us! I can't wait to hang it up!!!

Family Christmas Picture = Fail

Scott is the happiest most smiley boy you will ever meet, except during professional picture taking sessions. Awesome. We finally scheduled a time for Brian to come with us for Scott's 9 month pictures and a family Christmas picture. We didn't get super Christmas-y as far as how we dressed or the backgrounds which was fine. I searched and searched for Santa hats to no avail...until today (two days after our pictures. Awesome.). Needless to say the picture about is the best picture of the 3 of us that they were able to get...the ones where we were looking at the camera we not so great...for any of us...and of course the above picture Scott looks unimpressed with the world. We did get some great ones of Scott by himself in his Christmas outfit and some great 9 month shots (a few days early). Hopefully when we put the tree up (FRIDAY. YAY.) we can get some good family shots in front of it! I bought two really cute Christmas frames so I have to have some pictures for them!! As far as professional Christmas pictures go better luck next year I guess!

The AMAs...

Last night Brian and I had a big night out! We got to go to the American Music Awards (thank you farmers!) We had so much fun! We went down early and had a phenomenal lunch at Rockin Fish (seafood jambalaya and calamari = cardio barre for me today is a must, especially with Thanksgiving eating on the horizon!) then we enjoyed the show. The performers were AMAZING! I had never been to an awards show (Brian has been to the Grammys - whatever he's big time...haha!) and it truly is like going to the best concert ever because its all big name people performing their best songs! I'm now a HUGE Rhianna fan and Pink! We also got to see Bon Jovi, Katie Perry (LOVE HER), Taylor Swift (who I absolutely sound just like when I sing along in the car), Usher, Ne-yo, Christina Aguilera (she sang a song from her new movie Burlesque...can't wait to see it!) and tons more....oh yeah and I'm the envy of teeny boppers worldwide because I got to see Justin Bieber (perform and win multiple awards) he makes me feel sooooooo old! It was such a fun date night! It was all possible because of our AMAZING friends Adam and Crystal who watched Scott from about noon until we got home at 8pm! They are such troopers and we owe them big time! They kept Scott entertained all day and fed him and changed him and got him in his jams and said he barely cried at all! Knowing that he was safe, happy and having a blast allowed us to enjoy such a great date day! Thanks Uncle Adam and Auntie Crystal - ya'll ROCK!

p.s. the picture of the tickets is all you get because no cameras allowed and we don't have fancy phones that take good pictures (I didn't even bring my phone in) so boo to no pictures but they probably wouldn't have turned out great anyways because it was all dark and theatery!

Buddies

I'm so glad these boys are built in buddies! We are so lucky!

"SIT DOWN PARKER J"

Some of us are more aggressive than others...

Plotting their escape

3 more steps...

I saw Scott take 3 steps in a row today!

This Just In:

This guy took 2 steps tonight....while I was AT WORK! But he was with his daddy so that's just as good as seeing it first hand! Brian didn't qualify it as exactly walking because it was SO wobbly but it was two definite steps! I'm sure he will be running before we know it!

Late at night...

Well its super late and guess who can't sleep: HI! Especially annoying because Scott is asleep in his own bed! Way to make the best use of your time mommy! I partly can't sleep due to the weather change I'm sure and partly out of frustration because our baby monitor is on the fritz so I keep having to come down the hall and check on the sleeping munch. Let me just take this moment to say how much I hate Babies R Us (this is inspired by our piece of crap baby monitor that is apparently broken - adios 200 something bucks)! HATE! I can't tell you how many things I have gotten from there that have broken (not that that is entirely their fault, its the shoddy craftsmenship of the companies that make said products) and don't even get me started on their return policy...total crap! And most of the time the employees are rude and not helpful in the least. The most annoying thing is that they are usually the cheapest place to buy stuff and they practically have everything (although I'm learning that I don't really need most of the crap they sell (wow I'm sounding super harsh...I will blame it on the late hour)) and they always send out their dang 20% off coupon...but fool me no longer: I will take my business elsewhere whenever possible...20% off or not. And in case you care I have written a strongly worded email to the R Us company on two occasions only to get the run around saying they were "fowarding it on to the appropriate department" multiple times....really? you are that dumb?, the first person didn't send it to the right people so now you have to forward it again - highly suspect! But fear not, its not all bad news tonight...earlier this evening we went to a show that one of my patients was dancing in, it was for charity and there were different performers, mostly dancing and singing. It was really fun to get out and we brought Scott who did amazingly well. He loves music and was totally mesmerized by watching everyone on stage. It was really cute to see how excited he was, he lasted much longer than we thought he would....and bonus: he was sooo tired when we got home! And last night Brian and I got to out to a birthday party because Grandma Karen and Grandpa Ken were here to stay with Scott. We had so much fun seeing our friends and celebrating! I laughed so hard my face was still hurting this morning! Well.....I guess I will try this again.....

Having a ball!!!

Since we can no longer go to the park after 5 or 5:30 because its too cold and dark (thank you daylight savings) we were wracking our brain's for some new things for Scott to play with in the evenings....so we turned his pack n play into his very own ball pit! Scott was, in a word, elated! Now we play for hours in it morning, noon and night! I think this will also become my new shower buddy!

Below are a few pictures of my silly goof ball with his face pressed against the side! You might not think they are that funny but to me they are the funniest thing I have ever seen in my entire life!

My favorite picture of all time....love the crossed eyes!

"Hello Clarice...."

Peek-a-boo

Where is Scott?


There he is....

Ok what kid doesn't love peek-a-boo?! They all do, I know! This happens to be one of Scott's favorite pass times! He is really starting to figure out how to do it on his own! He will lift whatever he has over his head (blanket, toy, bib) and then pull it down real fast and crack up and that's your/my cue to say: "PEEK-A-BOO SCOTT" and it never fails to produce hysterical laughter! My favorite thing is that when he pulls said object over his head 9 times out of 10 he is not covering his eyes at all! AWESOME!!!

Blustery days...

We are finally having some fall and winterish type weather! It is wonderful but it definitely means we have to bundle up when we go to the park in the evenings (now close to 4 is our last trip because of stupid daylight savings....USELESS!!!) I just love how cuddly my little munch looks in his cozy clothes and the cutest hat ever!

Cutie Patootie

Baby Gap: eat your heart out!

Favorite toy...

Scott is obsessed with the vacuum! Whenever he sees it he wants to go climb on it and play with all the parts! And whenever he hears it he makes a beeline for it...even if we are rooms away! On a bragging side note: Brian is the one who does a lot of the cleaning around the house (vacuum, mop, dishes) major husband points!!! So when the vacuum turns on I'm usually the one with Scott (because Brian is actually doing the vacuuming) and I get to see his face light up as he sets off on his mission to find it! Hilarious! Maybe part of the reason he thinks its so cool is because its something that Daddy does...boys are always so into doing things theirs dads do and I haven't really taken Scott outside when Brian mows the lawn or worked on the car yet! I'm waiting for when Scott can finally talk and tells the world that mommies don't do vacuuming and chores, daddies do! Hey - I cook at least!!!

Matching...

Hilary and I frequently will show up to each others' house and the boys will be in coordinating colors (not planned or on purpose). We just have similar taste I guess. But last week she showed up to my office with Parker and the boys were both wearing matching green tractor shirts from Great Aunt Charlotte...this was the first time either of them have worn it because they just got big enough! It was really funny and cute!

Indoor adventures

Hilary and I found a new fun place to take the boys this past week (because temperatures were in the upper 90s and the park was out) and the best part about it: kids are free under 1 and parents are always free! WHAT?!?! It seems like nothing is free these days so to find a place to take the bambinos to entertain them and wear them out that I don't have to pay for (especially on days its too hot or rainy for the park) is like finding gold!

Scott wasted no time when we got there and immediately climbed into the structure to the second level and through the tunnel!

Scott encouraging his cousin to join him on his adventure!

I just think Parker looks like he is about to start like the 3rd grade or something here...so so big!

Focused on driving!

So excited about driving! (from these two picture it makes me think that Parker is going to be the rational responsible driver and Scott is just going to be stoked to be behind the wheel impressing the girls! ha!)

There was only one other little boy in the whole place when we got there so we took the boys in the "big kids" area. Scott immediately climbed this ramp. To the top. Virtually unassisted (I stayed behind him once he got to a certain height (ie the height that if he fell he would get injured) because he kept looking back to see where Parker was and almost losing his balance giving his mother a heart attack). He was so proud. This was not a small ramp either!

Look how high!

On the second level there were even more tunnels and things to explore! Side note: these structures are not so much designed for adults and there were a few times Hilary and I were a bit stuck - kind of funny/kind of stressful!!!

Back on solid ground Scott was super interested in the play house....maybe Daddy and Uncle Matt can build some for our guys one day (hint hint!).

Parker loves crawling!

Distracted by the big kids!

Then we found.....

wait for it.....


THE BALL PIT!

It was a fun and exhausting day! We can't wait to go back and bring some more of our friends!