Baby #2...

...for our friends within one week! Corinne and Brandon welcomed Reese Amelia Sunday evening and she is precious. Congratulations guys!

Lisa got a big kick out of pushing the epidural release...Corinne looks happy because she is receiving the epidural release. It worked out well for both of them.


I swear Corinne didn't even break a sweat giving birth...I told her she looked like a fresh spring lily!

Bryson Lee Clarke

Bryson made his appearance yesterday...7 pounds, 10 ounces. He's adorable! Congratulations Ryan & Michelle!

And speaking of babies...me and Lisa helped throw Corinne a martini & dessert baby shower. It was SO much fun decorating with all the girly pink & green stuff. We'll have another baby to love on in just a few days!

Growing up...

While I always look forward to Cason's next milestone, it's also bittersweet that he's growing up so fast. He puts a smile on our faces every day with his mischievousness and his humor. We are amazed at how smart he is and how he retains every little detail. When he wants me to explain something to him or he wants to relive a story of something that's happened he says, "Mommy, talk about it. Talk about it." We've found that it's easier to get him to obey us when we explain why we're asking him to do or not do something. He wanted to ride in the front seat on the way home with my mom and after asking him to get in his carseat a few times, she finally explained that if she let him sit in the front and she got into a wreck, the airbag would come out and hurt him. He immediately got up and sat in his carseat and the entire way home he wanted mom to "talk about it" (the airbag) over and over again. If I'm reading him a book and I'm not moving quickly enough for him (or get distracted by an episode of Modern Family for a second), he touches my cheek and says, "Talk about it!" He can be as sweet as he is rambunctious...typical two year old I guess. His hugs and kisses are few and far between, but when I get them, they melt my heart. When he knows I'm upset with him, he'll walk over to the refrigerator and pull off the Valentine Heart he made me, hand it to me, and say, "Happy holidays mommy." How can you be angry after that???

We converted his crib into a full-size big boy bed this weekend. He looks so little in it! We told him he's not allowed to jump on the bed, so he disguises the need to do that by saying he's doing his "exercises." Clever. It took two trips to Home Depot to get the job done. Cason couldn't understand why there was a potty in the middle of HD...

Looking for screws...The finished room...

Cason started 2-Year Pre-K at Burnt Hickory Baptist Church on Monday & Wednesday of this week. I knew this would be a monumental change for him. The excitement for the new backpack and the anticipation of the day wore off quickly when he realized we weren't staying with him at school...he was being dropped off. Queue the Price is Right loser music...whooomp, whoomp, whoomp, whoomp...whoommmmmp. My mom and I dropped him off and quickly said our goodbyes as the tears streamed down his face. We didn't know what to do with ourselves for the next two hours, so we went to Panera at the Avenues and had coffee. We sat there and talked about how we thought he was doing. We were pathetic. I called an hour later to check on him, and he was still crying. When we picked him up, you would have thought he was convinced he wasn't going to see me again. Mom dropped him off again on Wednesday, and although he cried, he had some breakthrough moments where he was okay. He even finger-painted a tree! I'm sure this will get easier each time he goes, as all the other moms have enlightened me. He insisted upon taking his first-day-of-school pictures with his golfclub.

Showing me his backpack...Action shot... Before he realizes Mommy and Nana do not also attend school...

And here is Cason and Autumn...he misses her living next door! We went over to Scott and Emily's to visit their newest addition, sweet Caroline. Cason and Autumn got some good quality time in. We even spotted them holding hands when they didn't know anyone was looking!