Baby's First Christmas

We celebrated our first family Christmas with our sweet baby boy. Even with all of the traveling and forgetting important baby items (I'll get back to that later), it was an amazing first Christmas. Santa visited Landon and brought WAY too much. We need another house just to store all of the new toys, books, movies and clothes that Landon received.

Every year since Paul and I got married, we have alternated holidays with our families. So this year was the year we spent Christmas Day with my family and Christmas Eve with Paul's family. So Wednesday morning, we drove down to Loretto (an hour later than we had planned - traveling with a baby is much more difficult than we imagined!). Paul went hunting with his brother Luke and we hung out watching Landon most of the afternoon and night. On Christmas Eve, we celebrated Christmas with the Lamm family with a late lunch and presents. Then we packed up the truck and headed back to our house for our first family Christmas. It's our tradition to watch "A Christmas Story" and "It's a Wonderful Life" over and over on Christmas Eve, so we did just that until about 2 in the morning! I'm sure this is the last year we'll be able to do that since Landon will be a year old next year and will likely want to watch Christmas cartoons. We got up early Christmas Day and cooked breakfast while the little man slept, then fed him and opened presents. Landon got his Mommy and Daddy some great gifts, but he is obviously the best gift we could receive!

After the presents were opened and we packed up, we headed out to my parents' lake house at Center Hill Lake. As soon as we arrived, Landon woke up and was starving. So we unpacked the car and looked for his bottles. We had packed 8 bottles - half of which were already prepared - but they were no where to be found. It finally dawned on us that we had left them sitting on our brand new kitchen table (thank you Mom and Dad!). Since we were in the middle of no where on Christmas Day, nothing was open around us. My dad graciously volunteered to drive 30 minutes away to Lebanon to a 24-hour Walgreens that was open to purchase a couple of bottles. Meanwhile, we had formula that we left at the lake house (not sure why we didn't think to leave bottle too though) so we mixed some up in a bowl and began feeding him with a 1/4 teaspoon measuring spoon. But that was not getting enough in his little belly fast enough, so we grabbed a nasal aspirator (unused), washed it, and filled it with some formula. It was odd but it did the job until the new bottles arrived! Because of this setback, we had to wait almost 2 hours later to eat. Paul, my sister, her friend and I were going to the Titans game that night, so when my dad got back, we ate really quickly, opened presents and then quickly changed to drive to Nashville to pick up Melissa's friend and headed to the game.

All in all, it was a wonderful Christmas, albiet eventful and busy, but it wouldn't be a Paul and Nicole Christmas without the craziness! Landon will get used to it!

We hope you all had a wonderful Christmas and hope your New Year is just as fabulous. Pictures of Landon's first Christmas to come soon!

One Month Old and Meeting Santa

December 5th was Landon's One Month birthday, so we took his first monthly picture. Since we received this outfit in every baby size, we will be able to use it for every picture! He wasn't too happy about posing so this is the best shot I got...

Yesterday, Paul and I took Landon to Cool Springs to do some Christmas shopping and to meet Santa for the first time. There were so many kids screaming and crying while we waited in the long line, but Landon slept right through it. Once we got up to see Santa, we took his paci out, which woke him up, but he was fine with that. He even looked towards the camera! First meeting was a success!

Newborn Pictures

The wonderful Shea Halliburton just completed Landon's newborn shoot. She's so sweet and creative and her work is pretty amazing!

Just click on the link below...we hope you enjoy the first of many pictures of our little man!

P.S. Shea picked the BEST song for the slide show. It's the same song my mom used to sing to me and my sister when we were younger! So sweet!

www.byshea.com/landon

Growing up every day

Landon is growing so quickly, almost as if before our eyes he is changing. On December 1st, Landon reached two huge milestones. We were shocked that he did either of them so quickly, especially since he is not even a month old!

After a morning feeding, I was changing Landon and being silly to keep him entertained. After he got a dry diaper and a change of clothes, I was showing him things around his room. A friend of mine painted some pictures for his nursery as a gift, and as I scratched at one of them to get his attention, Landon gave me the biggest, toothless smile! It was the most adorable thing and while it lasted just a few seconds, my heart felt like it stopped for minutes. His whole face lit up, his eyes were squinty and his little dimples were the cutest things ever! He will definitely break some hearts with those! I was sad that Paul missed his first smile, but Landon gave him another one later that night.

But, apparently Landon did not want Daddy to feel left out of the "baby's firsts" so that night after Paul changed him and put his sleepy clothes on, Paul laid him in his crib on his tummy. I'm not really sure why Paul did this since Landon sleeps in our room right now or even why he put him on his tummy, but I'm so glad that he did. I was in our bedroom folding the laundry when Paul ran in to ask if Landon had ever rolled over. Obviously, he had not, so I grabbed the video camera and we put him back on his tummy to see if he would do it again or if it was just a fluke...he did it not one more time but two more times before he got tired and started crying! So glad that we got that on film...now if he will smile when I have the camera ready, we'll be good to go!

We are so surprised that he did both of these baby milestones so early and in the same day. Maybe we have a genius on our hands but we certainly have a very active baby boy! It's so much fun to watch him grow every day!

Pictures of our precious baby to come soon!

First Post

So many friends and family have asked about a blog, especially since we have our new addition to the family, so here it is...

To begin, Paul and I met while in college at APSU (Let's Go Peay!). He was a baseball player and I was on the dance team. We quickly became best friends and then 3 years later, we were married. Now, we live in the Columbia/ Spring Hill, TN area and absolutely love it! Paul is the head baseball coach at Spring Hill High School. It is so much fun to watch him doing what he loves. I graduated from law school in May 2008 and after working at a law firm in Columbia for most of law school until May of this year, I became adventurous and opened my own practice and title company in Murfreesboro in June. It's been one of the most scary but rewarding things I have done for myself but knowing I have the support of Paul, my family and friends helps push me to continue.

Paul and I always knew we wanted to be parents and on November 5, 2009, we welcomed our first son, Landon Alan, by adoption. It was amazing to be there for his birth. It was one of the longest days but certainly the best day of our lives! And having our parents there to support us made it even more special! We are thrilled beyond belief that we were able to be there from the beginning. Landon is truly our gift from God!