Santa Claus is coming to town

Luke & Ben met Santa last night! Ben was content and Luke was as social as we would expect! We prepped him quite a bit, walking by Santa and waving for the past several weeks and then finally getting to sit on his lap was a total treat for Luke! It helped that Santa new he wanted trains and tractors!

Merrick Family Christmas 2011

We kicked off our Christmas 2011 festivities this past weekend. We had a work party Friday night and spent Sunday in Pekin celebrating with Sean's family. Luke had a lot of fun playing with his cousin Connor and Ben loved that he was held mostly all day! He spent a lot of time hanging with daddy watching football. The weather was gorgeous, almost 50 degrees so Sean, his dad, uncle, and cousin took the boys outside for an afternoon game of football.
It feels like Christmas around our house, minus the snow on the ground. I am not a huge fan of snow, but I certainly love having a white Christmas. It doesn't look like its in the forecast. I love getting the mail everyday and seeing all the beautiful Christmas cards from family and friends! I have them all hanging in our dining room! We are looking forward to doing a progressive Christmas dinner with friends tonight, and celebrating this weekend with my family in Waukon.

Ben and Daddy hanging out watching football
Luke & Connor sitting still for just a few seconds for a picture

Luke opening his presents

Roller

We have a roller....both ways! Ben started rolling from his tummy to his back several weeks ago, and this morning the little guy went from back to tummy three times! He is one strong little boy! He loves to spend time on his tummy and I have a feeling when he can sleep on his tummy he will be one happy little boy. Ben's fist is permanently in his mouth...wondering if he will soon discover his thumb or if he just likes the whole thing! I am also happy to share that Mr. B is back to his normal sleep habits....Thank you Lord! I am wondering if it was a growth spurt or just a little extended weekend party session!
Pretty quick post today but just wanted to highlight our little roller for our blog book!

Around the clock

"Yes mom, I do like to hang out just the two of us, at all hours of the night"

Growing up way too fast

The boys are keeping us going all around the clock, literally! Luke is a sponge, busy as ever, vocabulary expanding by the minute, and has the funniest personality. He is into making us laugh and then he will continue doing whatever it is and he has the most obnoxious fake laugh to accompany his funny behavior. He has really picked up on "Thank you mommy, Thank you daddy, No thank you". So much in fact, when it is time to change his diaper he will politely say, "No thank you mommy"! Lately when he really wants something he will say "Please please please please" he thinks the more he says "Please" the more likely he will get what he is asking for. We are working on keeping him in bed until 6:30 a.m, that is when his 'alarm clock' turns green. So each night when I lay him in bed I remind him wake up happy and when your light turns green you can call for me nicely. So each morning when he gets up, if his clock is not green, we will sit with him until it turns green before he can leave his room. He is getting better about waiting for it to turn green. The past several days he has been sleeping in until 6:45!!!! Wow, did I just say, sleeping in until 6:45 and I even got excited about it:)

Ben is growing leaps and bounds, I swear the little guy stretched out overnight, he is barely fitting into his 3 month onesie PJ's because he is getting so long. He is a very happy, talkative little boy, that likes to party all night long! The past few nights, I am not sure what has been going on, but he has been waking around midnight or so and doesn't want to go back to sleep, he wants to hang out with mama! Last night around 3 a.m, I asked him what it was that he wanted and he just smiled at me and babbeled. As frusterated as I was, I couldn't help but laugh, seriously Ben, you want to have a conversation with me at 3 in the morning!!!! ahhhhh! He finally went back to bed at 330, in his swing:( I was desperate. I am hoping this is a minor phase because just a couple of weeks ago he started sleeping through the night! His early evening nap is critical and has been boycotting that a bit because there is just too much action going on in our crazy house and he doesn't want to miss a beat! He is going to have fun keeping up with his big brother. For now, I am trying to remind myself this is just a phase and before I know it I won't get to rock with him, literally, in the wee hours of the night. As much as I want and need sleep, I will keep reminding myself of this. Until then, we just keep moving around the clock to the beat of our boys and their energy gets us through!

Week in review

We survived...this week I had my first overnight travel for work since returning from maternity leave, my first nights away from Ben...AND Sean was gone too! We called in reinforcements, my mom, aka Nannie! What would we do without Nannie and Miss Judi?!!? I had to travel to Memphis for work and Sean had to be in Omaha for meetings, so my mom stayed with the boys, Miss Judi was here during the days, and Uncle Mitch and his girlfriend Kolbi came to visit and help out during the evenings! I had a big sense of relief knowing my mom was with the boys, but it is always hard being away, especially when Ben was just 13 weeks old. I had a very hard time being away and staying focused, but I survived and so did everyone else. When Thursday came and I could hug both of my boys, it felt oh so good! They had fun with Nannie and Luke was so sad when he woke up from his nap and Nannie wasn't there, boy, does he love his Grandma. Ben brought back the sleepless nights to my mom...unfortunately he didn't sleep so hot one of the nights for her. We are still trying to figure out what works best for him, about every third night he will sleep through the night from 730pm-530am, but those other nights, it is hard saying if he will be up at midnight or 4 a.m??? One of these days we will get it down. It is amazing how much little Ben changed in the three days I didn't see him, I felt like he was bigger when I came home. He is laughing a lot, having longer alert periods throughout the day, and absolutely loves to be talked to. The other day I was in the toy room with the boys and Luke was pretending to shoot bucks and does, I would ask Luke what he shot, he would tell me and I would relay to Ben, "Luke shot a buck" and he would just giggle! Luke got a kick out of it too, he loves to make Ben smile and laugh. Friday night Sean and I had an Ugly Christmas Sweater party to attend. I am so bummed, I never got our picture but I will describe, Sean wore a women's mock turtleneck sweater in red with white snowflakes. I, on the other hand, sported a red and white striped collard shirt with small santas on it and a red cardigan sweater with green holly. I could have passed for a waitress from Happy Joes! It was so much fun with our wonderful friends, we are so thankful for! The rest of our weekend spent lounging in front of the fire, listening to Christmas music, playing lots of hoops and football, baking Christmas cookies, and making smores over the fire. We enjoyed our weekend at home with the boys and cherish these special times. Tonight we let Luke stay up a little late to watch the Polar Express, he loved it! We have been talking about Christmas a lot, even though I think he might be a little young to understand it all. We are enjoying this holiday season and getting into the Christmas spirit with our two sweet boys!

Getting bigger everyday
Last weekend we visited "Camp Bop & Nannie" so Sean could deer hunt with my dad. Luke wanted to hunt too, so he hunted from the comfort of the warm living room! He loves to stand at these windows and watch all the excitement on the farm.

"mom, Luke go to gym"

This picture is funny to me because Luke actually goes to the gym more than I do!!!! Monday night as I was getting everything ready before my trip to Memphis Luke was walking around in my gym shoes and hat saying "gym, bye-bye"

off to the gym

Cutie Pie, just hanging out watching all the excitement

My two boys "playing"

This is funny to me...this was my four paged typed notes for my mom and Miss Judi while I was gone! I might be a bit over the top...but it made me feel better

Does it get any cuter than Mr. Ben?!

This was Luke tonight, apparently he thought my cabinets needed to be reorganized. Or he was just bored from being cooped up in the house all weekend?

Sean had a fire going all weekend and it felt so cozy!

I love Christmas time and having our trees lite up. It just makes our house feel so warm and comfy!

Capped off the weekend with smores! Sean making our first round of smores for the season on the fire.

3 months old

Mr. Ben is 3 months old today and changing into a little boy so much. I love that he still likes to cuddle up on my chest, but he is getting so strong and growing out of his newborn stage so quick. Our house is full of excitement and Ben adds such a sweet personality to our family. He definitely likes to be heard in our noisy house, making lots of noises, starting to laugh a lot more, and kicking like crazy. Luke loves on his brother and enjoys making him smile and laugh! We have to remind him every once in awhile to be nice, but for the most part is very good with him. We have had two incidences where Luke has thrown a soft toy at him, that made Ben upset, other than that...cross our fingers, he plays very nice! Luke loves to help Ben roll over:)We are looking forward to celebrating Ben's first Christmas this month, we couldn't feel more blessed to have the sweet gift of baby Ben to celebrate with!
So Ben, what are you up to these days???
-well, first off, Ben had his 1st full night sleep last night!!!!!!! YAY Benny!!!!!!! Ben went to bed at 7:30p.m and woke at 5:30 a.m=ONE HAPPY MAMA! Now, I write this and I am very well prepared that I may have just jinxed myself but its worth noting that he has made it through the night and I know he has it in him to do it again, hopefully on a consistent basis.
-Aside from last night, Ben has been waking one time during the night anytime between 12:30-3:00, then up at 5:30 or 6:00 a.m and usually likes to start his day around 7:00 a.m with his first nap coming shortly after he wakes around 8:00 for a good two and a half hours or so.
-You like to take two very good naps in your swing (of course) and a very critical cat nap around 4-5pm ish
-You are wearing 3 month clothes, some 0-3 and some 3-6 depending on the brand
-Still wearing a size 1 diaper but I have a feeling not for long
-You celebrated your first Thanksgiving in November and one that we are so Thankful for!
-You are rolling from tummy to back consistently
-Enjoy tummy time
-You love to be swaddled, although you sometimes fight the first few minutes depending on your mood. We tried putting you down without being swaddled and you were a hot mess
-You love to suck on your fist, I have a feeling you will be a thumb sucker once you consistently find it
-you take a pacifier well
-I get anxiety thinking about taking you in the car because you 100% dislike your car seat after 15 minutes or so...you scream bloody murder and there is nothing we can do to soothe you, it breaks my heart and I hope you grow out of it very soon because we are a family on the go!
-Your nights have been a little rough getting you down, although we have had a couple good nights recently where we have laid you down awake and you feel asleep on your own. Otherwise, it hurts me to write than many nights it has taken us nearly two hours to get you to sleep. Just when I think you are asleep and lay you down 10 minutes later you are screaming out for us to pick you up. I hope that we have found a better night time routine and you continue to go down well
-You are a very happy baby, smiling all the time. You love love love to be talked to and will whine a little bit until someone comes to have a little chat with you
-you are still nursing, however this was your first week without mom around all day because work awaits here. You are taking a bottle very well from Miss Judi
-You are growing leaps and bounds and your personality is starting to shine. You are quite the social, happy little boy!
-We can't wait to see what this next month has in store for you and will cherish each and everyday because you are growing way too fast

Happy Baby Ben
Ben, this is one of your favorite things to do...lay on the living room floor and laugh and the ceiling fan!

Ben, your Big Brother loves you so much and we absolutely adore watching him love on you and make you smile! Keep smilin' buddy, it melts our hearts and brings joy to our days!

Friday full of pictures