Thanksgiving in the Mountains!

We celebrated Thanksgiving last weekend in Boone with Brandon's family and had a great time! Landon faced forward for the first time in his carseat on the drive up to the mountains, so that was pretty exciting!

We had a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner (thanks Granny!) with Granny, Gramps, Scott and Charlotte.

After dinner we had another birthday celebration for Landon. Granny made him a chocolate cake with chocolate icing (which did not have milk according to the ingredients), and Landon LOVED it (and we are happy to report that there was no allergic reaction)! I think he would have eaten the whole cake if we let him!

Here are some other pictures from our weekend in Boone!



Here Grady is with Annie!



Here Grady is playing with cars/trucks that were Brandon's and Scott's when they were little!

This is one of my favorite pictures....what an amazing view! (Landon seems to think so too.)

We went to a great park on Sunday, and Grady and Landon had so much fun! They especially enjoyed playing in the model town.

Happy Thanksgiving! :)

Goodbye Sweet Dirkins....

While we celebrated Landon's 1st birthday this past weekend, we also lost a dear member of our family. Our sweet little cat - Dirkins - unexpectedly passed away Saturday night after being attacked outside. Despite our efforts to save her, she died during the night at the emergency vet clinic. This blog is all about our family, and she was definitely a part of us - one of the "Thomas Kiddos-" so I wanted to properly honor her on our blog. She was only 7 years old, and we miss her terribly and have been having a very hard time. I got her when she was a kitten from the Charlotte Humane Society... Brandon and I picked her out together when we were dating - he actually "bought" her for me, so the deal was he got to name her. She was an incredibly sweet cat and one that I completely trusted around Grady and Landon. She would never scratch them (even when their "playing" was pulling her tail, etc.), and often times when we had a hysterical baby/toddler (for whatever reason) Dirkins was the only one that could calm them down. We would actually go looking for her in those situations, and that always did the trick to distract them. She had a very quirky and funny personality, which is what made her so unique. The place she loved in our house was the upstairs hallway and stairs (for some reason), and we always joked that whenever we walked anywhere, she was right under our feet doing figure eights. She was also always my special buddy when I was nursing the boys during the night....we were always up together when the rest of the house was asleep, and she loved following Brandon all over the house (including to the closet and the bathroom) when he was getting ready in the morning. She had such a presence in our family, so our house feels really empty now without her. We love and miss you Dirkins and will never forget you!

 

Landon's 1st Birthday!

Landon turned 1 on Nov. 11! He went to the doctor yesterday for his 1-year check-up...he's now 22 lbs, 1 oz and is just about 32 inches tall. What that tells us is that he's very tall and slender - and growing perfectly! :) We are always thankful for good check-ups.


As he was practically running up and down the hallway in the doctor's office (and getting into everything...the trash can, all the exam rooms, etc.) the doctor commented that he seems more like a 15-month-old than a 12-month-old! Not sure if that is a good or bad thing! :)  He's a very happy little guy though, so his "very active" demeanor is just fine with us! You can also tell from this picture that he already has bottom molars, so he has a total of 10 teeth (soon to be 12 since his top molars are coming in now)....a little bit ahead of schedule in the teeth department!

Since his actual birthday was during the week, we decided to celebrate with an official party this past weekend. Mimi, Popeye, Ma, Carleen and Kevin came for the party, and Landon had a great time! I decided to make his cake because it's just easier to make things yourself when you have a child with an allergy - then you know exactly what goes in it. Somehow I decided on a turtle cake (mostly because it was really basic), and I even substituted bananas for eggs just in case he had an egg sensitivity that we weren't aware of. Needless to say, after all of that he ate about three bites of icing, smeared it into his hair and was done. :) It was still worth it though! Here are some pictures from his party... (He will be having another birthday party at Granny and Gramps' house next weekend!)





Grady helped Landon blow out his candle!



It was getting a little late at this point, so Landon was pretty much over it by this point!



Grady also "helped" Landon open all of his presents! Good thing Landon didn't know the difference!

He perked up when he got this present from Kelly, Louis and Hannah!



The boys loved playing in their new kitchen from Mimi and Popeye! (I told them that girls love guys that cook, so we're training them early!)



It's Official: Landon is Walking!

Landon has been walking for a while now....from furniture to furniture, along the walls, etc., but when he wanted to get somewhere fast he still resorted to crawling. In the past couple of days, however, he is choosing to walk instead of crawl and is doing so all over the house (and even getting brave enough to carry things while he's walking)! Here he is in action....

Halloween!

The boys had a great time on Halloween! Grady dressed up as an octopus, and Landon was a porcupine. We attended a few pre-Halloween festivities and then headed out to trick-or-treat in our neighborhood. We got Landon a wagon for his 1st birthday (which is next week), but decided to give it to him early so we could use it for trick-or-treating. The boys loved riding around the neighborhood in it!

From a little earlier in the day at the neighborhood parade...

Carleen came over for trick-or-treating!Landon decided towards the end of the note that it was a lot more fun to push the wagon rather than ride in it. :)This is post trick-or-treating! Despite the fact that it was past Landon's bedtime, he was still very excited to play in the candy! Grady also made sure to point out whenever possible that Landon could not each chocolate (due to the milk allergy), which meant that Grady got most of his candy as well! :)

More of October...

We've been keeping busy and recently enjoyed a visit to Ganyard Farms (the pumpkin patch) in Durham. The boys had a great time on the hay ride, playing in the corn, watching the goats and picking their pumpkins.

There were of course a few meltdowns! :)We're still debating whether this was an actual hug (or more of an attempted strangulation). :) This time last year I was very pregnant with Landon, so I couldn't help but post a picture from almost exactly a year ago at this same pumpkin patch. It's hard to believe little Landon was curled up in my stomach!

In other news, Grady has been "studying" about farms in preschool, so they had "dress as a farmer" day a couple weeks ago.

Last weekend Brandon ran in a 5K (his first one) for the March of Dimes. We all went to support him and had a great time (despite the fact that it was in the 40's that morning...hard to believe it was in the high 80's this week)! And we were of course all very proud of Brandon.... he came in ahead of 100 people in the race! :)

Finally, here is a picture of Landon in his new carseat. (I'm still wondering how my little baby turned into a little boy!) Special thanks to Granny and Gramps for the early birthday present for Landon!

Going into Fall we have been staying busy and enjoying the cooler weather. Grady started playing soccer and really loves it so far! Of course it helps that his two good friends - Gavin and Grant - play on the same team! Here they are after one of their games....

Here is Grady about to kick the ball!

Carleen and Kevin came to watch Grady play soccer too! As you can tell Landon is having a great time hanging out with them!

In other news, Landon now loves to clap and is picking up new words all the time. He now says ma-ma, poop, da-da, grady, cat, doggie, puff, bye-bye, and ball. By far, the cutest word he says is Grady, which he pronounces "Ga-dy." He is also becoming increasingly more confident with walking and loves pushing his little walker around.

Here is a picture of the boys in a "drive cart" (as Grady calls it) at Harris Teeter. This is, by far, the highlight of grocery shopping for them! (Oh- and I'm pretty sure this exact cart is where Landon picked up a horrible stomach virus that he eventually gave to all of us....and eventually Mimi, Popeye and Ma! Ugh! Look how much fun he's having...still didn't make the 8 straight hours of throwing up worth it though!)

And I just had to include this because it's just so cute. Grady is a very sweet little guy, and he recently adopted this little puzzle piece of a baby elephant because the match (the mommy elephant) is missing. He said the baby is scared because she can't find her mommy, so he's going to take care of her. He even brings the puzzle piece into his bed for naps and bedtime. It's really sweet, so I just had to snap a picture. :)

Weekend in Pinehurst!

We went down to Pinehurst a week or so ago to visit with Mimi, Popeye and Ma! While we were there, we went to Pinehurst Lake, which has a great beach area. In addition to playing on the beach and swimming, we also took a pontoon boat out on the lake and had lunch. It was so relaxing, and the boys absolutely loved it! :)

The next day we went out for ice cream (as you can see from Grady's face!), and Popeye taught Grady how to play chess (at Grady's request). The preschool version is not as complicated! :)