I love my Da Da!

First of all, I have to say that Derek is the best dad and husband in the whole world. Parker and I(and this new baby) love him so much we can hardly stand it! Parker loves seeing him every day and he wants Derek to hold him and play with him every time Derek is anywhere near. Derek is working so hard right now it is unbelievable. Let me just put it into perspective for you. Have any of you physically moved yourself to another house?? Well, my husband does that every day sometimes more than once a day. PLUS, he runs a business. I know that it is not easy for him, but he keeps working hard because he knows this is what God has called our family to do. He lives far away from his own family which I know can't be easy. But, yet, he lives 5 minutes from mine. He is such a blessing and sacrifices for us. God has blessed Parker with a wonderful dad and I am so glad that he is my husband and the father of my kids. They will learn so much about God, loyalty, and many many more things that are so important. WE LOVE YOU DEREK!
On Father's Day morning I made muffins for breakfast and we sat down and enjoyed ourselves. We then headed to church, then to a yummy homemade meal that my sister made. Then we all went to the pool which was a blast. And of all days, Derek and Wade had a small move that evening. But the big surprise was in store for the guys on Monday. Derek, Wade, and Jeremy had no idea that we had rented a boat for half of the day with no kiddos and lots of their favorite food. We had a blast! And we all got a good tan(well I got burned). So, that was our day! So fun! And all because of our wonderful husbands who are great dads. AND OH, I have to give a shout out to my incredible Dad. I am so sad that they were not here in Austin to share in this wonderful day with us. But my Dad deserved every minute of it. Hopefully we can make it up to him. I love you Dad! You are so wonderful...and have always been my favorite my dad! Ha! :)


Derek and Parker on Father's Day

So sweet!

Derek tubing

Ashley and Wade. Ashley is a hard core tuber...seriously...she was giving Wade tips on what to do. Ha!


Kimberly and Wade

Ashley and Jeremy

This is what we do here in the Mills house

We eat popsicles, climb baby gates and play, play, and play some more.

I had this grand idea of giving Parker a popsicle for the first time about a week ago. I thought he would LOVE it! So, I stripped him down after his nap and we sat on the porch eating our popsicles. It didn't go over so well. I think Parker ate too big of a bite...which might have caused a brain freeze...because he was crying hysterically, but wouldn't let me take the popsicle from him. Eventually I got the popsicle and took him inside for an alternative snack. Which ended much better. Who knew a popsicle would be such a disaster with a 1 year old?! Oh well...I got a cute picture out of it. Needless to say...we haven't really had any popsicles lately. :)

Yes, this is my child climbing the baby gate and having a ball with it. Just something he does to entertain himself. He is a good climber...don't ya think?

Just playing.

Happy Birthday Gray Gray!

Gray had his first birthday party a few weeks ago and I am just now getting around to posting some pictures of it. I don't have many. My nephew Tyler plays the drums and he is so good at it. Well, we have discovered that Parker has a love for drums also. He plays them for a really long time every time he goes to Aunt Ashley's house. Derek loves playing the drums also and wishes he knew how. So, we have talked about buying Parker a set when he gets a little older and getting him drum lessons. We definitely see talent in Parker when it comes to the drums.

Sweet Gray Gray

Parker loving the drums!


Aunt Kimberly and Lawson

Lawson playing at Gray's birthday party. Ha! He is so cute!

Go Braves!

Papa K and Mama Lynn sent Parker some Braves pjs in the mail. Derek's favorite sport is baseball, so we are definitely showing off Parker's stylish baseball outfits. :)




Don't look at my belly! :)

Trying to give Daddy a kiss...but his hat was in the way. Parker gives kisses all the time now. Sometimes it is on his own...and then other times you just ask for one and he gives you one. It is so cute!

Just a few things going on...

So...here is a post with no pictures. Booo...I know...but I was just sitting here thinking how I could write a few things but do not feel like updating my pictures because that would require me uploading them on the computer and THEN to the blog. And if any of you know what it feels like to be pregnant in your first trimester you understand why I don't feel like doing it. Parker is around 13 and 1/2 months old. He walks everywhere and "talks" all the time! But, he won't say many words for us. He would rather talk in his language. He did, however, say "cow" for us the other day. And he has said a few things here and there for us...so we know he can talk...but he chooses not to use the English language. Who knows why? :) He is as sweet as he can be. He gives me open mouth kisses all the time. He hasn't quite mastered the whole pucker up and kiss mommy yet. So, I get some wet kisses. But I don't care. It is so sweet and I love it! He laughs at me and his daddy all the time. He loves it when Derek comes home from work. He is just so much fun!
I have pretty much lost count of how many hair cuts Parker has had. That is ridiculous! My child's hair grows at a rapid rate. Therefore, I bought my first pair of haircutting scissors at Walmart a couple of days ago. Yup! That is right...I have started cutting his hair. My mom did it about a month ago and I watched her closely. It looked easy. And it is easy! The key is to not cut too much at one time because you can't get it back if you mess up. I strapped Parker in his hair chair. Gave him a sucker. And started snipping. I only cut the front and his side burns, around his ears. He didn't need it in the back. Derek and I prefer for Parker's hair to be a little long(down to his eyes, shaggy...not girl long). So, I pretty much cut enough off so that in two weeks, when Kellen Coldiron takes his one year pictures, it will be exactly long enough. I am not a fan of the fresh hair cut look.
Anyways, I will post pictures later of Parker. I have some good ones. As for me, I am feeling pretty good. I am almost 6 weeks preggo and at this time with Parker is when I was feeling queasy for about two weeks(thats it!). It is definitely kicking in. At first, it was just coming at night. Now, I have waves of it all throughout the day. Plus, I am so tired. Almost every afternoon around 1:30ish...I crawl into bed after I lay Parker down. My house looks horrible. It is so hard for me to be motivated when I feel this way(did the exact same thing when preggo with Parker).
My cousin, Stephanie and her boyfriend Eric just visited for a few days. We had a blast! They were so easy and so much fun to have around. Parker loved them too. We are headed to B'ham in less than two weeks and I am sooooo excited! My parents haven't seen Parker since he has started walking everywhere. I am ready for Parker to get some good hang out time with his Mama Don and Papa. And honestly, I am SOOOO ready for some hang out time with my mom and dad. Ok...this is WAY longer than I planned. SORRY!
Peace....

Breaking the BIG news!

Here is how we told my parents and Derek's parents that we are having another baby.







Here we are right after I surprised Derek. Can you tell? By his face?? Ha! (He can't be that shocked, right?!) :)

Yup! You heard right....we are expecting Baby #2!

Hello All!

We have great news! We are expeciting baby #2. Parker is going to be a big brother(which I have no doubt he will be great at). I found out two days ago while Derek was at work and I surprised him when we went out to dinner. Then we surprised both of our parents by sending them three pictures of Parker in his highchair with a sign attached to the highchair in each photo. I will post pics later. Then we surprised my siblings by writing it in my nephews birthday card(he had his 1st birthday party last night). We didn't really surprise anyone last time because I was too excited. They all knew we wanted another baby soon, so it wasn't a complete shocker but they were still surprised.
My due date(from the due date calculator at babyzone.com) says I am due Feb. 8th. Last time it was only off by a couple of days. I probably won't go to the doctor for another 4 weeks or so. I am visiting B'ham at the end of June, so after that I will go. This baby is a HUGE blessing! We have loved every bit of having Parker in our lives. We feel so blessed that God has given us another baby to love and take care of. Wow! I will keep you updated.

What's going on in the life of 1 year old Parker Mills

So, here is an updateon what Parker is doing now. Ok, let me think...there is a lot. He is walking everywhere and it is so cute. I still laugh at him everyday because I cannot believe I have a child who walks everywhere. He now eats off of a plate and holds a fork in his hand. He hasn't quite mastered the art of putting the food on the fork, but he tries all throughout dinner. If he can't get it, he holds the fork with one hand, and feeds himself with the other. Ha! His high chair tray is attached to his high chair(it was Derek's grandpa's highchair). So now, we flip it over the back and scoot Parker up to the table. And he has his own plate and fork. He "talks" all the time. And really, we will have a conversation with him but have no idea what he is saying. He still doesn't say a lot of words. We have heard him say about 4 words but he won't say them all the time. He will mimick us all the time, which is hilarious.
He went to the doctor for a one year check up, but I already filed his report and I don't remember how much he weighs. I do, however, remember that he dropped to being in the 5% on his height which is odd. But, lots of kids do that, so I am not worried and neither was the doctor. One thing we do with Parker everyday is we say "Who loves Parker?" and then we raise our hands and say "I do". He will do it with us. We will go down the line on who loves mama, who loves daddy, etc. And he will raise his hand and do some rendition of "I do". It is so cute!! I think my parents started that whole thing when my oldest nephew was a baby. Parker laughs all the time and is so good. He is such a joy to us!! I am about to upload a video of Parker walking. I hope it works!

Memorial Day

On Memorial Day we had plans of going to Hamilton Pool for a little over half of the day. Our family and my siblings and their families all packed up and headed that way. Hamilton Pool is a natural spring with a beautiful waterfall and a beach area for the kids. It is pretty rugged but seemed like a lot of fun. Especially since it is so stinkin hot here in Austin already!! Hamilton Pool is not far from my sister's house which is nice. We were sorely dissapointed when we arrived because there was no swimming allowed because of the high bacteria levels(obviously, we didn't really want to argue with that...ha ha). So, the park personel sent us a couple of miles up the road to a place called Rimer's Ranch. The pedernales river runs through there and it is beautiful!!! We practically had our own private beach area and the kids LOVED it! There was a sand beach area and Parker loved loved loved the sand. He didn't care that it was all over his body...even while he ate. I tried so hard to keep him clean, but it didn't work at all. And he loved it. Here are some pictures from the day. If you want to see a really pretty picture of Hamilton pool and the pedernales river you can go to brother-in-laws blog www.freechapelaustin.blogspot.com.

Just Another Day

New Shoes! Parker got his first pair of shoes last weekend from Stride Rite. We wanted to wait until he was walking. As of right now, he will let go of everything and try to walk. He will walk until he falls. So, we are working on continuous walking. Because once he falls he crawls. We have seen him stand up from sitting on the floor without holding onto anything, but he doesn't do it all the time. I think he will be walking all the time pretty soon.

Don't you love those shoes?? I LOVE the classic white baby shoes. They are so old school, but my fav!

Happy Mother's Day! Here we are on Mothers Day right before church.

This is a picture of Mother's Day last year 2007. Parker was only a couple of weeks old. Crazy how time flies!

I love this picture. Just hanging out. It took me screaming and being silly to get him not to knock this down until I took this picture and the one below. Ha!

Date night with Papa and Mama Don

When my parents were here, we(me, Wade, and Ashley) all decided to get babysitters for the kiddos and go have a "date night" with my parents. It was wonderful! We went to a nice Italian restuarant downtown, and then headed to a really cool coffee shop where we got dessert. We all laughed so hard and just had a nice relaxing time with no rush since we didn't have the kids with us. We also celebrated Mother's day and Father's day with my parents. We will definitely have to do this more often with my family. It was too fun!

Jenny and Nolan visit...

Our good friends, Jenny and her son Nolan visited us from B'ham last week. We did fun stuff around Austin and Jenny was able to visit some of her good friends who live in Austin and San Antonio. Nolan is a couple months younger than Parker so they had a good time! We went out to eat, to the pool, and downtown. Fun fun! Here are some pics:

Parker and Nolan in their pjs.

Nolan in the swing at the park.

Nolan and Parker with their mohawks. Well...Nolan's wouldn't quite stand up, but as you can see, Parker's hair didn't have any trouble whatsoever! :)

Parker and his fabulous mohawk!!! Ha!

Jenny and Nolan at The Oasis.
I just realized after looking through my pictures that I didn't get any of Jenny and I. How crazy is that?? Sorry Jenny!!

Birthday Party #2!

Here is Parker's birthday party with my family. We had a great time!! Although, I will have to say, when you are the one throwing the party for your child it is exhausting. SO FUN! But exhausting! Since we don't know many people here and since my family is so big we decided to have a family party. We were all there including my mom and dad(which was great!). We grilled out hamburgers and had french fries and cole slaw. For those of you who don't know, my husband is a great cook. I know...how hard is it to cook a hamburger...but he cooks for my family a lot. I thank God for him because I would have been so stressed if I had to cook everything else plus wrap presents, decorate, put together goodie bags, and bake. Anyways, Parker was blessed with some great presents which he loves. And he had a great time!! Enjoy the pics. Oh yeah...the theme was bouncy balls.

Cupcakes and goodie bags

Presents

Decorations


Mama Don and Parker

Mom and Parker...I love this picture. Cupcakes everywhere! :)

Parker playing

"Gray Gray"

Little Lawson...AKA LawDawg

Here is the story behind this picture. Parker has become very fond of this bouncy seat. I think my child is a gymnast because he climbs in, out, on top, etc. this thing all the time. It is hilarious! I am amazed how he twists his body just to get out of it. Once again, he was playing in the bouncy but this time he was laying in it the way a little baby would lay it and he was playing with the toys the way it was meant to be played with. He was cracking me up. I had to take a picture. Of course when he saw me, he started smiling. So funny!

Oh my! He is so handsome!

Lighting the candle...

Singing "Happy Birthday"

"Yay!"

Diggin In...well kinda...

Still diggin in...

Almost done...

Mama's kisses right in the middle of enjoying his cupcake... ;)

Took him forever...but I think he is finally done(well...because everyone else was waiting on him to open presents. So, he kind of had to be done)

The whole fam minus mom, dad, and Gray.

Playing with his new truck from Mama Don and Papa.


The boys loved their goodie bags! They had about 4 balls in there, bubbles, and candy.

We all partied hard and now we are pooped! We put Parker in his carseat while we loaded the car and he fell alseep almost immediatley.