My BIG boy!

My sweet Brayden is already 16 months old. We went to his well check-up last week and he weighed in at 23 lbs and 2 ounces. (25%) He was 33 1/4 inches long. (95%) So basically our little guy is tall and slim. I'm sure eventually he will even out just like his big sister. Brayden got a new toy this past week too and LOVES it! It's a little motorized 4 wheeler and looks like Lighting McQueen from the movie, Cars. He rides it outside and also rides around inside the house too. Brayden is growing and learning so many new things. He isn't talking much yet, but he doesn't have too. His sissy doesn't quit talking! haha He chabbers all the time. The words he does say are mamma, dadda, sish for fish, uhuuu for uhoh and shishy for sissy. He tries to say cat and other things. He will get it soon....I hope. I wanted to post some of his favorite things right now so I can look back and remember him at this precious stage in his life.

**Brayden loves eating meat. Any kinds, doesn't matter! He usually just eats chicken and likes it, but the other night Matt grilled steaks and I think Brayden ate one all by himself. Seriously. We kept cutting it into little pieces and we couldn't cut fast enough.

**Brayden LOVES to be outside. He loves to play in the back yard in his playhouse, but he also likes to play in the front yard with all the neighbor kids. They girls really like him and he likes it too. He's a little flirt already!

**Brayden LOVES water! Everyday, when I'm getting ready in the morning, he loves to go over to the bathtub and turn the water on and he will stand there and play in it. Usually he will find a cup laying around the house and he will go and get it and then dump water all over himself. I will put a towel down underneath him so he can just play. Sometimes I don't have the patience to deal with the mess, but he loves to do it so much that sometimes I just let him be a boy. But seriously the kid loves water and he would play in the water all the time if I would let him. It's funny because sometimes he will just disappear and we will be looking for him around the house and we always find him in the bathroom with the bath tub water on. It's pretty funny to see him high tail it to the bathroom because we know exactly what he is thinking...."Maybe I can get away before they see me!" haha

**Brayden loves to crawl and stand on everything.....including but not limited to the kitchen table! Yes, he loves to pull out a kitchen chair and crawl up onto it and he stands in the chair and colors pictures. He sees Payten doing it so he thinks that he needs to do it too. He will go and get a crayon and paper and he will stand on the chair and color. He also likes to climb onto anything he can. He is definitely a boy! You will see the pic below...the box that the 4 wheeler came on he was sitting on top of the box. Payten was in the box and Brayden was on top of the box. I had to crop her out because she was playing puppy and didn't have any clothes on, but you can see Brayden climbing! :)

**Brayden loves animals! He loves fish but he also loves birds too! In the pic below you can see him pointing at something....he was distracted because of some birds in the neighbors yard. Because Payten loves animals we record educational animal shows off of Animal Planet so Brayden also gets to watch the animal shows and enjoys them for the few seconds he can stay focused. :) He loves to just sit and watch the fish at my work and he has a lot of books that have fish pages and he will bring the book to me, sit in my lap and turn directly to the fish page. He knows exactly what page it's on and will sit there and try to say fish and point to it over and over. He says, "sish" for fish. It's pretty cute. He's trying to talk.

**Brayden loves dog pile time! Once daddy gets home from work and after dinner we have play time. Matt and I get on the floor with the kids and I will yell out, "dog pile daddy" and both Payten and Brayden will go and tackle Matt. It is so cute and Brayden just loves to play!

Easter Weekend

We had a wonderful Easter weekend this year! We celebrated Easter starting on Friday afternoon with a neighborhood egg hunt and cookout at the park behind our house. The kids got to play on the playground and then hunt eggs filled with candy. They both had a fun time. The kids also got to "help" Daddy wash the cars. Payten and Brayden LOVE water, so they both got soaking wet and had a blast. On Saturday we decided to cook a really good lunch. So we baked a ham, made some homemade mashed potatoes, green been casserole and some rolls. It was SO good and we ate leftovers the entire week. I can say I do not want anymore ham until Thanksgiving this year. :) After church on Sunday we colored eggs, let the kids play in the backyard and again had another egg hunt. Brayden loves to play in the backyard. He LOVES the playhouse and enjoys hanging out in there. Payten loves to hunt the eggs so we probably did 3 or 4 egg hunts. It was fun. Oh, and Daddy got to take a little rest on the couch. :) The weekend was great. I love spending time with the kids and just hanging out. They are such good kids! We also talked to Payten about the true meaning of Easter. I am glad that she likes to get goodies from the Easter bunny and hunt eggs, but I want her to know the TRUE meaning and why we really celebrate Easter. So she knows that Easter is about JESUS dying on the cross for us and then He rose again 3 days later. In her preschool class she learned about the empty tomb and the egg. She told me, "see mom the egg is like the tomb. You open the egg and Jesus isn't in there anymore."....meaning that the tomb was empty and Jesus was no longer there. It was sooo cute! And I am so glad that she is learning all this stuff at such an early age. :) Below are lots of pics of the weekend. What a great Easter weekend.

Payten's First Trip to Sea World

A few weeks ago my best friend and her son came to visit us and we took a day trip to San Antonio to Sea World. It was a BLAST! Payten absolutely LOVES animals, so a day at Sea World was heaven for her. She LOVED watching the Shamu show and she also got to ride her very FIRST roller coaster. The roller coaster was called the Atlantis and she was a little too short for it, but the guy could see that she was so excited to ride it so he let us through. She LOVED it and throughout the day, we rode it 3 different times. We rode the log ride, but it wasn't good enough for her. She wanted the one with the bigger drop. She isn't scared of anything! The day was perfect and here are some pictures to prove it. :) The tickets we purchased are good for one year so we will DEFINITELY be back. IT was a GREAT trip!

When we first walked into the park, we wanted to measure Payten and see if she was tall enough for all the roller coasters. She measured 42 inches tall and was almost tall enough to ride all the FUN rides. As you can see, she needed to measure around 46 inches for the Journey to Atlantis, but the guy let her through, because she was way too excited. He didn't want to make a little girl cry. :) Below are pics of the Shamu Show. It was AWESOME. We watched it twice. The huge whales are just so amazing when they are doing all their tricks and jumping through the air. Here is Payten after her very first roller coaster. You can see that she was sooo HAPPY! I was so proud of her. It was so much fun. I wanted to ride it again just as much as she did. Looks like I am going to have a good roller coaster partner! (besides Matt) :) Since Lacie is pregnant, she couldn't join in on the fun. So she watched all of our stuff and took pics while I took the kids on the coaster. You can see us in this pic if you look closely. We are on the second row and I am wearing a black shirt and Payten is wearing a yellow dress. One of the highlights of the day was getting to feed the dolphins and being able to pet them. Payten LOVED it! It was awesome. They would come right up to you and grab the fish and they would talk to you and just stare at you. Payten almost touched one, but she was a little timid. I touched a dolphin! They are such sweet animals. After riding the roller coaster for the third time, the kids wanted to stand right in the way of the HUGE water splash that the coaster gave off after coming down the huge hill. They literally got soaked, but they were having SO much fun so we let them be kids and enjoy themselves. The water would come towards them and they would just laugh and then take off running! Lacie and I were standing back just cracking up at them getting soaked!