Thankful Weekend

This Thanksgiving weekend we spent with the people we love most-- FAMILY! We chased Levi around because he does. not. stop. moving. EVER. And cutie pie Caleb slept the weekend away in the arms of anyone who was wanting some extra cuddles. We ate way too much and laughed a ton and thoroughly enjoyed our time together. Thankful doesn't seem to do justice to the way we feel about our lives, our family, our home and our friends but since that is the theme for the weekend-- we are very, very thankful!

Levi jumping in the leaves

Family picture attempt at the Turkey Trot

Caleb sleeping in Auntie Christina's arms

Levi hamming it up for the camera

Caleb sleeping in the middle of noise and people at the Harden family Thanksgiving. 

Levi helping Daddy hang Christmas lights at Grandpa & Grandma Lockridge's house.

Levi helping to pick out our Christmas tree. He's such a helper!

I have a ton more pictures of my cute boys but Levi is usually blurry because he doesn't want to sit still and Caleb is in various positions of sleep. They're very predictable these days and we love them both so much! 

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! Now on to decorate our house for the holidays! Yay!

Caleb is 1 Month!

 Caleb David is 1 month old!

We don't have an official one month appointment so I don't have his stats. However, I did just weigh myself with him on our home scale and it's saying 12lbs. I'm not sure just how accurate that is but I would guess that he's pretty close to that. He's a big boy! He's a good eater and giving us mostly 3 hour stretches and even a couple of 4 hour stretches at night. (After Levi I should be thankful for those long spurts this early but this Mommy is still tired!) I had to pull out some of his 3-6 month clothes this morning because he's filling out those 0-3 sleepers a little too well. He is waking up a little more these days and we're finding some fussiness after eating so I'm thinking he might be dealing with some reflux issues. I've cut out caffeine and dairy so we'll see how it plays out. Hoping he feels better soon. Everyone we meet has opinions on that incredible head of hair he has- some say he'll loose it, others say he'll keep it. Who really knows? So far, he hasn't seem to have lost any so we'll see. He has visited both sets of grandparent's houses, gone to church, a couple lunches and dinners out, lots of walks and even a trip to Sacramento to help Auntie Alison pick out a wedding dress. Caleb is still pretty easy at this point and just goes where we need him to go. We're still getting the hang of this family of four business but every day seems to get a little more predictable. Now if only we could convince our boys to let their parents sleep through the night! Wishful thinking... :)

Caleb enjoying bath time and that cute boy in the mirror.

Working on tummy time. This is usually when big brother Levi hops up to give kisses and head butts!

Caleb's Newborn Photos

A couple of weeks ago we had Jodie Martin come to our house to take some newborn pictures of Caleb. I've been sitting on these pictures because I was waiting for the birth announcements to go out so you'd be surprised at the great shots she got of our family. (I'm actually still holding back a few which you will see on our Christmas cards in a month!) Jodie was awesome and worked so hard trying to get our newborn to do what he was supposed to do and even got a couple great shots of Levi. Just to change things up, these are some great ones that we didn't include in the announcements...

The boy who always slept would not stay asleep! In between each shot we would bounce and shush and use this pacifier, so I couldn't resist showing this cutie with his favorite thing.

My sweet BIG boy. When did he get so big?!

I highly recommend Jodie if you're in the Modesto area. She was so great with my kids and was so patient. And she got our pictures back to us VERY quickly. Thanks Jodie!

Happy Halloween

So I'm a week late, but we did get out and celebrate Halloween last week as a family of 4. We visited the Seefeldts for a quick photo op and then went to the church I grew up in to see our cousins and play some games. I tried to find a costume for Levi that was not very involved because I figured he wouldn't put up with much this year. I thought I had done a great job with the fireman (just a jacket and a hat) but he adamantly refused to wear it all the times I tried to get him excited about it leading up to Halloween. But we got him dressed on Monday evening and he never took it off! He walked all around the carnival and played games and picked out candy and just had a blast. It was a great night!

Family picture:
Our big fireman and our little dalmation.

Fireman Levi

Playing games at the carnival.

Then we came back to our house to hand out candy. We easily had over a hundred kids come to our door trick-or-treating and we still had leftover candy! The cousins came over to play and pass out candy and celebrate this silly holiday together. This is one of the reasons we moved home-- for our kids to grow up with their cousins!

The Bottoms & Lockridge Cousins
Ashley is the oldest and then four boys under 2 1/2: Jack, Levi, Charlie and Caleb!

Two Kids for Two Weeks

We've officially been a family of four for two weeks now and its going great! We're definitely not sleeping very well (between Caleb's 3 hour feeding schedule and Levi's sore, teething mouth) but that was anticipated so it's hard to get too discouraged about our sleep just yet. I'm most surprised that the transition from 1 kid to 2 seems fairly smooth so far. Don't get me wrong, there have been a few moments here and there with both kids crying for something or feeling like I need to be doing twelve things at once but for the most part we're feeling very good about the new arrangements. Maybe it's because we're already in baby mode-- we're already on a schedule with feedings and naps and bedtimes so what's one more? Haha, at least this is how I feel about it today...ask me again in a couple of weeks! :)

Here's a quick catch up of what we've been up to:

Caleb's first outing to Grandpa and Uncle Bryan's new store.

 (BTW-- there's a new running specialty store in town and we know the owners! It officially opened this week and I'm sure they'd love to see you!)

Levi has been just the right amount of interested in his new brother. He's all about giving kisses and pats and points to him when people come to visit. Other than that, he still gets most of the attention because he's such a ham and likes to make people laugh. It just melts my heart to see my two boys together and I hope they're best friends for life.

Brotherly love <3

We've been taking lots of walks in our new stroller. Just like Levi, Caleb enjoys being outside in the sunshine and the weather has been perfect for our excursions to the park. The walks are good for Mommy too!

Our big boy who decided he'd rather use the big swings!

My view during one of our walks.

 And mostly we've just been hanging out at the house and loving on this new little guy. We've been so blessed to have lots of meals brought over by family and friends and our new group from church. It's such a great way for people to show love in this transition and we sure appreciate it.

 Spending lots and lots of time looking at this precious sleeping face.