My First Baby

I can't forget Carter in all of these posts so this one is dedicated to him. I want to write down some of the funny and some of the horribly naughty things he does before I forget them.

Carter is the classic "First Child." At least classic as to what I imagine all first children to be like. Not spoiled per se, but waited upon and had my sole attention for 2.9 years. He doesn't really want to be independent. And I REALLY need him to be more independent now that Jackson is here and requires a lot of attention. I have had to really bribe and threaten him to start doing some simple tasks by himself. Dressing himself, cleaning up his toys, putting dirty clothes in the hamper, and etc. I really don't want to be putting his underwear on him when he's 11. This morning I told him we needed to get his teeth brushed before we put his clothes on for the day. I came into the bathroom, and to my surprise he had started brushing his own teeth! I'm not ready to relinquish complete control on teeth brushing yet but he is allowed to start brushing his teeth, and I finish.

He really loves his baby brother. We have lots of nicknames for Jackson and Carter has adopted them all and uses them frequently. He uses a high pitched voice he reserves just for Jax and Jax really eats it up. Jax loves to watch Carter and loves the attention Carter gives him. He saves some of his best smiles and coos for his big brother. Carter copies a lot of what I say and uses that with Jax. I don't realize what I say until I hear Carter repeat it.....Some examples: "Hi Honey bear, do you have any smiles for me? That's a good smile Jax!"

Both of my boys posing in their pajamas. Which I am really trying hard to have us all out of our pajamas before lunch some mornings!
He likes to be affectionate with Jackson and wants to give him hugs and kisses before I put him down for each and every nap. And if I forget, he calls me on it. He hates to see Jax cry and if he's in bed crying, he will sprint into his room and turn on his little mobile that's attached to the side of his crib. He's such a great helper and knows the names of all the supplies so I can tell him to please get me a blue flush, a saline flush and an alcohol swab please! He really wants to help me flush Jax's PICC line but that is a sterile procedure so no go on that one!

We bought an IPAD during our long stay in the hospital. Mostly for entertainment purposes and Carter is obsessed with it. He knows his way around and through that thing better than I do. He begs to play games and watch movies on it. I have to hide it when he's spent enough time on it because he will sneak it and play it forever! But man, it does keep him quiet forever.

Carter is really into practicing his photography skills. He's getting a lot better with heads only being cut off about 25% of the time. I don't even remember him taking this lovely picture of me.

Carter is really into riding his bike. He has a scoot bike, which has no pedals that he is a pro on. We bought him a regular pedal bike and he is terrified of it. Which is exactly how he was with his scoot bike at first. My cautious little boy. He gets that from me. This picture is from a bike track in Park City that we went to a couple of times during our stays in SLC. He loved it.

Here are Carter and Neil playing "demolition derby" on their bikes. A game made up by Carter. We took him to 2 demolition derbys during the summer and he fell in love. So now he plays demolition derby all the time. On his bike, just running around the house and with his toy cars. Keeps him entertained for hours.

He's great at playing alone but does occasionally want me to play with him. But really, he just wants me to sit there and watch him play. Example: He has a road rug in his room that he loves to drive his cars on. He'll ask me to play and I'll come in and sit down but I'm not allowed to sit or kneel on the rug. Only he is. Then when I grab a car and start playing along, he tells me that he wants to be that specific car....so basically I just watch. But it makes him happy.

Trying his pedal bike.....while whining the whole time!

He has got quite the attitude lately. He is getting sassy in his 3rd year of life. If I ask him to get in bed he will respond "You get in bed mom." No idea where he learned to be this sassy but I'm trying to nip it in the bud. When he gets frustrated with me or what i'm asking him to do his new phrase is "Momma, you make me tired(or crazy, or mad)." Said while giving the biggest sigh. I may or may not have said that to him before!

This boy is all about the food. I'm not sure where he puts it all because at his 3 yr check-up the Dr. said he was actually a but underweight for his height. He wants to eat constantly and I always have to tell him no. This night we were having his all-time favorite meal. Meatballs and rice with cornbread. Menu planned by Carter. He is so messy....granted cornbread is crumbly but it looked like a cornbread massacre after he was finished. I contemplated just bringing in a hose and hosing down the kitchen.

Here he is after drinking another love of his....a smoothie. He refuses to leave one drop in the cup and so his face ends up looking like the Joker. He had no idea why were laughing at him this day and why I was snapping his picture. It's even in his eyebrows if you look closely. While staying in SLC with Aunt Linsey, she spoiled him rotten by making him her famous smoothies almost every day.

While in SLC we had the opportunity to attend the Ringling Brothers Circus. He had no idea what a circus really was but he quite enjoyed himself. He kept his "ticket" clutched in his hand almost the entire show.

His favorite part was the elephants. Mine was the Tigers.

Me and Carter at the Circus. We forgot to get Neil in the picture but we all had a fun time, but missed having Jackson with us. He liked the circus so much that we are going to a different circus later this week. In Logan!

He has been such a great little boy through out this whole time in and out of the hospital. He is so patient and so adaptable. He is really growing up right before our eyes. He has always been a very clear talker and rarely mispronounces anything. But there is one word that he has always messed up. He would says GRILLS instead of girls. And so Neil and I (and others even!) would use the word grills too, just because it was so cute and fun to say. Then one day, while in SLC he started saying GIRLS. We were so sad because it was our favorite word to hear him say. We even continued to say GRILLS and he would correct us. He's growing right up.

We decided earlier this summer that maybe naps were a thing of the past. He was having such a hard time going to bed at night so we decided to try not having naps. This is what I found almost every day. A sound asleep little boy about 4 pm in the afternoon. He would fall asleep playing or watching TV or whatever he was doing. Which isn't like Carter at all. He is very much a sleep on in the bed kind of boy. And if we were able to keep him awake til bedtime he turned into a very grumpy boy about 5 o'clock and we could barely stand him. So naps are back on. They are only successful (him falling asleep) about 50% of the time, but either way I get an hour break.

Carter keeps us laughing daily at all his new tricks and phrases. Sometimes we have to try and hide our laughter as he is throwing a fit or sassing but we sure love him and his spunk!