Thanksgiving 2009

What an event! This year, we traveled to Saluda, NC, to celebrate Thanksgiving with the Hamilton family. In attendance were Doc and MyGoo, the Trey Hamiltons, the Gregory family, GGMama, the Williams family + Rene (Mary Canon's boyfriend) and, of course, us. My little brother, Robert and his wife and kids couldn't make it this year. Robert just recently started a new job, and he wasn't able to take time off so soon. It was, to say the least, a very full house. GGMama literally slept in the closet. (She refuses to take up a whole bedroom by herself, so MyGoo and Doc put a twin bed in their enormous closet to appease her!).

There was never a dull moment. We arrived about midnight on Wednesday and were happy to see so much of the family still awake and waiting for us. Thanksgiving day was full of movement as people took turns cooking, cleaning, and entertaining young children. Canon and I were not very involved in this part of the day. Instead we let Barry represent our family in the festivities while we took a two-hour nap. We woke up just in time for the big meal. I unintentionally packed some Turkey & Veggies baby food for Canon, so he was able to enjoy the meal with us. He also had his first taste of real sweet potatoes.

I can't be certain, but I think he enjoyed it.

He was pretty pooped once it was all over, so he took another nap with MyGoo.

The next day was reserved for the Iron Bowl. We did some mild shopping in downtown Saluda and lunch at the Purple Onion before returning home to watch the game. All the kids donned their Alabama attire for the event. Roll Tide! I should mention here that all of the men in the house (excluding my uncle who grew up in Georgia) are rabid Alabama fans, while MyGoo and her sister, Deborah, grew up just outside of Auburn and share GGMama's love for the Tigers. Things remained civil, however, and there was an enormous sigh of relief when Bama scored with less than two minutes left to pull ahead by 5. I think even the Auburn fans would agree that the Tide's win made the rest of the weekend much more pleasant.

After the game, it was family picture time. MyGoo wanted one good picture of all her grandchildren for her Christmas card. Of course, Graham and Avett will be added later, but we made it our mission to take one decent photograph. When a camera is pointing at Canon alone, he's generally pretty happy. He'll smile or at least do something interesting. When Canon is with a small army of people and cameras are flashing, his cheeks get heavy and pull his mouth into the deepest frown you've ever seen. Case in point, the Halloween pictures and now . . . Thanksgiving. At least he didn't cry in any of these.

This is all of us trying to get these poor children to smile.

MyGoo and Doc with the grandkids. GGMama with her grandkids. Several years ago, Trey missed a Thanksgiving gathering because of some commitment he had while in college. My grandmother is notorious for the singing toys she collects from year to year. That particular year, she received a singing turkey. Because Trey wasn't there, we posted a sign on its belly to remind us in the years to come that Trey did not make that particular Thanksgiving event. As fate would have it, this same turkey somehow made it to the mountains this year, and wasn't it fitting that we needed him to represent our baby brother for this year's family photo?

After pictures, the young children opened a few Christmas presents from the family, and we celebrated GGMama's 89th birthday. Aunt Deborah baked the most delicious cookie-dough cupcakes!

About three weeks ago, my dad had emergency surgery to remove his galbladder. As he is still in the recovery phases, he is not able to lift heavy loads or do any strenuous activity. For those of you who do not know my dad, this is a real challenge for this man who never sits still and does everything on his own. I was surprised to see that, for the most part, he obeyed doctor's orders and delegated responsibilities to the younger generations. I think it helped that Canon wanted to spend some quality time with him. If you haven't already noticed, Canon and Doc hung out quite a bit.

It was really a great weekend. The only thing that would have made it better was if Robert, Dauren, and their boys had been able to make the trip. I guess that's what happens when a family gets this big . . .

Just Because

Nothing exciting to write these days, but I wanted to share some cute photos of our Big Guy.

Canon has been falling a lot lately, hence the bruised forehead.

Hanging out in the park with Colt.

Getting ready for football on a Saturday morning with Dad.

Luke let us borrow his walker. This is him teaching Canon how to use it.

And He's Off . . .

It's official!  Canon is mobile. He's been working on it for weeks, and now he's finally crawling.  It has made for some eventful evenings (and lots of extra bruises!). He's always been pretty laid back, and his crawling is no different.  He's not in a hurry - just cool and steady.  He's also pulling up on things - again, causing plenty of extra bruising.  It's interesting to watch him figure all of this out.  It's not just a matter of him grabbing hold of something and pulling himself up.  He has to figure out how to get the perfect distance away from it before pulling up.  He has to maneuver his feet to allow for maximum support (he looks like he could roll his ankle at any minute).  Then, once he's finally up, he has to figure out how to get back down.  I never realized what problem-solvers babies are.  I'll let him show you. 

Bath Time

I have loved each new phase of Canon's life . . . maybe more than the previous ones. I don't think that it's because each new phase is actually better than the ones before. I think that, just like Canon, this is all new for me. When he does something for the first time, it's the first time for me, too. It's just so exciting to watch him do new things, so those new things feel more exciting than the things he's already mastered. Having said that, this stage in his development is the best so far, especially at bath time. While he tolerated bath time in the first couple of months of life, he has started enjoying it more and more as he is able to do more. Now that he is sitting up on his own, he loves to splash and kick and have water poured in his face. It's one of our favorite times together! I think the pictures and video speak better than I can.

Mr. Independent

You know how before you ever had a baby, you imagined what it would be like to rock them to sleep at night or hold them when they were upset? Maybe how sweet it would be to feed them a bottle or let them fall asleep on your chest? Not this baby. Not Mr. Independent. When this baby cries, it means "Put me down!" or "Give me the bottle!" or "Leave me alone!" or "Let me go to bed already!" This baby only cries when he's held.

It started a few weeks ago when I went to pick him up from Mrs. Sharon. She mentioned that he would not take his bottle earlier in the day (not surprising). He would drink a little, then push it away and try to sit up. She decided to lay him down and let him try it on his own. It worked, and we've been doing it ever since. He's still getting pretty bored with the whole bottle thing, but at least this is another way to get some fluids in.

He treats it like a sippy cup. He'll lay on his Boppy and sip for a couple of minutes, then put it down and play. After several seconds, he'll pick it back up again for another swig! He's quite the grown-up. I thought I would be upset by this new independence, but this morning I realized how great it is. I was running late, and Canon woke up on his own at 6:30. I put him in his highchair, leaned the seat back, and gave him the bottle. Then I sat down and ate a bowl of cereal. Our first breakfast together!

Eating isn't the only thing Canon does independently. He also plays alone. This isn't to say that he doesn't LOVE Barry and I to get on the floor with him. He loves to be tossed around, tickled, held by his feet, and hit in the face with a pillow. However, he also loves to sit by himself and play. This, of course, is wonderful for me. I can do laundry, unload the dishwasher, pay bills, whatever needs to be done, and never hear a sound from the little man on the floor. Will life always be this easy?

He's even trying to get out of bed on his own . . .

Hello, DHR? My Mother is Out of Control!

If our babies could talk, this is definitely what they would have done today. In a valiant effort to get the best Halloween picture ever, six Moms joined forces to set the perfect scene for a brilliant photograph. It included a black sheet, pumpkins, (TONS OF) candy, and of course, seven perfectly costumed children. To make it absolutely perfect, all the seven children needed to do was smile and look at the camera . . . all at the same time. I don't know if we really thought this would happen, but you can easily imagine that it never did. In fact, I think a total of three pictures even caught a partial smile from any of them.

This is probably the best picture we got all morning. From the left is Luke Chavers (monkey), Colt Parrish (bear), Ava Grace Yates (ladybug), Jack Peacock (dog), Canon (lion), and on the trunk is Julia Blank (peapod) held up by her brother Alex (Spiderman).

The whole ordeal was pretty hilarious. Not one single child was in a good mood when we started our photo shoot. They were all either due for a nap, a feeding, or just hating life at that particular moment. At one point, Canon, Colt, and Luke were sitting together. Luke and Colt were fussing, and someone said, "Hey, D. Do you think you could make Canon cry, too?" It wasn't long before he was fussing, and we got an excellent picture to show for it.

Poor Jack missed a few pictures because he just couldn't handle the chaos. This is the class of 2027 (minus Jack).

Alex (our almost-three-year-old veteran) was trying so hard to take care of his baby sister, Julia. She passed out in the middle of everything, and Ava leaned over on several occasions to check on her. As our neighbors drove by on their way to pick up last-minute Halloween gear, they slowed down at the corner to watch the crazy "newbies" trying to force happiness out of some very cranky babies. We haven't heard from DHR yet, so we're thinking we're in the clear.

Canon was seriously pooped!

After the photo shoot, we called in reinforcements from the Dads who had previously agreed to take care of the kids while the Moms had craft time. My mother had given me a Cricut machine for my birthday, and I was eager to play. All of the girls (minus Erica, who had plans with her in-laws) decorated picture frames to display our Perfect Halloween Picture. It took almost as long to pick out a good picture as it did to decorate the frames. We literally worked all afternoon, but we had a great time doing it. We're already planning a Christmas Craft Party to expand our creativity even further.

This is Alicia's - voted Cutest Picture Frame Ever!

This is Mary's - voted Best Gluer of All Time!

This is Mandy's - voted Most Meticulous Cricuter! I don't know if you can tell, but the bag at the top has "Luke" spelled out in tiny letters!

This is Erica's - hers was made by Mary & me, but everyone contributed ideas.

This is mine - voted Most Quickly Made Frame & Most Boring.

I missed getting an individual shot of Tuan's, but hers is at the top of this highly creative pyramid.

As if our day was not full enough, more of our friends came over to help us pass out candy to our neighborhood Trick-or-Treaters. At our old house, we had dozens and dozens of kids (some adults, too) who came out on Halloween night. Our new house (which is in a slightly more private sector of the neighborhood) did not prove to be as exciting. I'm guessing we had about twenty-five kids show up. We were giving them handfuls of candy, just trying to get rid of the 10+ bags everyone had contributed.

I think Canon really enjoyed Halloween, despite the trauma I put him through that morning. He loved playing with Alex in his Spiderman costume. And he and Luke made up after fussing at each other during the photo shoot. I'd say it was a good First Halloween for the King of the Jungle.

Lots of Stuff Worth Remembering

Over the last few days there have been lots of things worth writing about, so I'm just going to put them all in one short (yeah, right) post. First is the fact that we have gotten all of the babies together so much recently. Colt was Christened at church on October 11, and Josh and Mary had lots of people over for lunch. Of course, the moms wanted a picture with all the babies in attendance. I normally wouldn't do this, but I really wanted Canon to be in the picture . . . so I got him out of the pack n' play (where he was napping) and joined the group. He slept right through it, so I didn't feel that bad afterward.


Shortly after this experience, most of the babies were together again just for fun. Mrs. Sharon was unexpectedly out of town and Mary was home sick. Though I was back in school after Fall Break for Parent-Teacher Conferences, I cut out early to take care of the little boogers. Alicia was so sweet to keep Colt and Canon (and Ava) while I met with my last parent. I was only gone for about an hour, but 3:1 odds for any amount of time is never ideal. Thankfully, all three were pretty well-behaved and Alicia didn't have any problems. We called Mandy to bring Luke over and spent the rest of the afternoon chasing Luke as he crawled all over the house, tending to Canon's bruises from falling over, and rotating Colt and Ava from floor to jumperoo to chair . . . and repeat. It really was a fun afternoon.

This weekend we all got together again to watch some college football. This is Colt and Canon with Lola. She helped out a lot by entertaining the babies.


We had a really fun weekend with Canon. His upper gums are swollen and he's been pretty fussy, so I'm thinking a 3rd and 4th tooth are on their way in. We broke out the teething ring, which he loves. He also loves to chew on his Alabama pacifier.

And I have to mention Canon and Barry's new trick. Barry took Canon to the nursery this morning while I checked him in. When I walked in the nursery to drop off his bag, Barry called to me from across the room to "Watch this! Watch this!" He then held Canon's feet and balanced him in the air. Canon shrieked with glee - he loves everything Barry does! After church, Barry and Canon practiced their new trick every chance they could - in the parking lot, in the bedroom, in the kitchen. Barry made me take a picture, then spent the next twenty minutes on the computer looking at it and giggling with delight. Of course, I have to share.

Don't worry. He didn't almost drop him in the second picture - though it looks like he could have.

Finally, it is with great sadness that I report that Canon is turning into a little boy. I know he's technically still a baby, but he doesn't seem like it anymore. I put him in a t-shirt and blue jeans the other day and felt a slight twinge when I realized how much he has grown.

Because it has gotten so cool down here in the last couple of days, I went shopping for some warmer clothes. I had to go to the Toddler section. It's so strange to buy him pants and shirts rather than onesies. Barry and I can see in his behavior that he is so ready to grow up. Though he's still very mellow and content, we can tell how eager he is to move around more easily on his own. He is just learning to go from laying down to sitting up, and he's regularly rocking on his hands and knees. He just can't quite figure out how to move forward (though moving backward is as natural as drooling to him!). It won't be long now . . .