Peyton's 1 Year Photoshoot

Here is Peyton's one year photoshoot! I can't believe he is already one year old!! Time really does fly!! Peyton is such a blessing to our family and we couldn't ask for two sweeter boys than we have. God definitely gave us two happy, sweet boys! Here are a few pics that Dada took of Peyton at Abernathy Park in downtown Clemson the week of his birthday...

Some of Peyton's favorite things right now...playing with all of his toys, especially "BAAA" or BALLS!! (any and every kind), EATING (any and everything), playing with Hunter, crawling anywhere and FAST, standing upstairs and calling "DAAAA" at the railings to downstairs to Dada, watching Mickey Mouse, taking a bath in his duckie, and playing with our family and friends! What a fun kiddie!
We took Peyton the first week in August for his one year appointment and well things didn't quite turn out to be the best checkup. He was 21 pounds 13 ounces and was 29 1/4 inches long which when you look at him would think he is very healthy and I still believe he is but the doctor was just a little concerned about him not growing like he did the first six months. He fell from the 75/80% to 20/30%. Which I am convinced that just maybe Peyton may be short like me and not 6'4" like his Dada! :) haha....Also his iron level was still low like at nine months. :( So they will check him again in six weeks after he has been given iron supplements every day to see if that improves. I'm sure it will but in the mean time we are eating a lot more iron enriched foods!
Peyton is a great sleeper! He goes to bed every night about 7:30 or 8:00 and sleeps until about 7am every day! He still takes two two-hour naps every day but has begun to sometimes just take one longer nap.

This is my favorite!!!

Then of course we needed a few of pics of both of our boys together on Peyton's first birthday...
These two boys have so much fun together! They love to hug and kiss on each other and Peyton loves waking up from naps and seeing Hunter! Peyton thinks he can do anything Hunter can and even if it something he can't do, Hunter will help Peyton accomplish it while Hunter tells Mama and Dada to leave Peyton alone!

My favorite one of them together!...

Peyton's 1st Birthday Party!!

This was the first birthday party attempt at our house. While it was a little crazy to have so many people in our house at one time, I think it turned out great in the end. I know that Peyton LOVED it and had a great party! Thanks to everyone who made it such a wonderful day to celebrate our little guy turning one!


Before the party when we were getting everything decorated, I realized all Peyton really wanted for his birthday was balloons! We had gotten two balloons and one of them was shaped just like Mickey's face and he loved them both!!

Here are a few things from the party...
I had made the party favors for the kiddies. I had seen it online and decided to try it out. It was an oreo that I dipped in red colored melting chips and then I attached two chocolate melting chips on the top for the ears and then added two dots of white icing for the buttons. Then I added a stick through the oreos to make them into Mickey Pops. It didn't take too long and both Peyton and Hunter were excited over them and so I knew they had to resemble Mickey at least a little bit!
Here is one of the cakes - a Mickey face cake. Since Hunter had a whole body Mickey for this party, we decided to try this one out for Peyton's party. Michael and I both helped out and got this accomplished the night before the party.

I had also planned on having cupcakes since I knew that just the Mickey face would not serve everyone that had said they were coming. Mimi graciously decided to take this home with her and make them and I think between Mimi, Pop, and Granny Ruby, they came back with some great tasting and good looking cupcakes! They were even able to find some Mickey sprinkles!


While I debated about making Peyton his first year birthday smash cake, I determined that I may be able to save some time and stress just to let someone else do the cake. While I thought the top could have looked a little more professional, it was very much like the picture I took in that I wanted. I think the thin fondant Mickeys and red balls turned out really good and of course Peyton was happy with it because it had Mickey on it!

A family pic in front of part of the party decorations!

I thought this was a cute pic Dada got of Peyton looking at his cake and candle while everyone sang Happy Birthday to him. It was soooo cute to see how he loved having that song sang to him. This is totally the opposite of Hunter. When it's Hunter's birthday, he doesn't like for people to sing Happy Birthday to him!

These are some great pics of him "smashing" his first birthday cake! Needless to say, he LOVED it!! In fact, he loved it so much, I had to take some of the fondant balls off of the cake because we thought he was going to choke on them as many as he was inhaling at once!

He, along with Hunter, got so many great gifts from people! Thanks for all of the presents! Peyton and Hunter have both been enjoying them all! Even though it's hard to believe our baby is one now, it's so much fun to see how he is changing and growing every day. We love you so much Peyton! Happy First Birthday Peyton Isaac!

A Few Pics Dada Took

These are a few pictures that Michael took for us to have some more up-to-date pics for Peyton's birthday invitation. They were taken around the house but I still thought they turned out cute...

He loves to scoot around on our hardwood. Why would you learn to walk when you can crawl like that and that fast!?!

Our happy boy!

He loves to peek around the corner of the bottom of the steps!

Peyton's 1st Birthday

While some may remember Hunter having a Mickey Mouse 1st Birthday party, there is something about that mouse that makes our boys smile from ear to ear! I think it was even more special for Peyton since he had actually been to Disney to visit the real Mickey before his party. This is the invitation that Dada designed for us!

Dollywood with Mimi and Pop

Just a few weeks after going to Dollywood and Splash Country with Nana, we got to go back with Mimi and Pop. Although this time Dada had to work and couldn't go with us! :( Peyton really gets excited these days to get to ride on his own rides - the ducks, pigs, and bees! Right now he is still a little too small so I have to end up squeezing in with them to hold on to Peyton. We really enjoyed our visit to Dollywood with Mimi and Pop! It's always great to go and take short vacations to the mountains!

Missing Little Bro

Since Hunter loves getting to go to Pop and Mimi's house, this summer he got to make a couple of trips to Fort Mill by himself. While it seemed like a quite house with only one kid, we really missed Hunter...especially Peyton. We would ask where Hunter was and he would look around trying to find him. Even though Hunter didn't really seem to miss Peyton so much, we found out when he got home that he really did miss him. In fact I'm pretty sure he missed him more than he missed Michael and I! He couldn't wait to get inside to sit and hold Peyton! It's great to have boys who love each other so much right now!

Driver in Training

Peyton is growing up so much! He just loves getting outside and playing with Hunter's big boy toys! Watch out other drivers because Peyton is now on the road! :)

Our Little Fish in Action

Here is what Hunter can do now after four days of swim lessons!! We are so proud of him and we hope that it will continue into next summer!

Our Little Fish!!!

Last summer we had some friends take swim lessons from a lady that will travel to pools and give lessons and after watching Sam and Troy swim, we thought it would be great for Hunter to take some lessons this year. Since we have a neighborhood pool and swimming is what we do a lot in the summer, learning to swim was not an option but a requirement! Not only as enjoyment to learn to swim but also for safety around water.


We were very nervous about how Hunter would do since he is definitely not a social bug or even able to be around other adults or kids without hiding his face! The first day, along with most of the other kids, he did not want to try anything without crying. Although cruel sounding, the instructor would not allow the kids to back down and get out of anything. Even the twelve month old did everything the three year olds did!! This may sound cruel to some but I know if Hunter was not forced into this, he would probably never do it. So after the first day that he did wonderful at, he woke up NOT wanting to go back for the second day! In fact, he cried the entire way saying I don't want to go to the swim lesson pool! But after day two of lessons, he found out he really could do what Ms. Laura was asking him to do and he was so proud of himself! From then on, he has not wanted to swim with swimmies and loves to show people how he can swim. It was like a light came on and he could do it! We were all amazed! He even jumped off of the diving board on day two of lessons! The next few days he did great with the lessons but still did not want to go off of the diving board, even at the end of the week! That's okay though because I would rather him learn how to swim than be able to jump off of a diving board. We are so proud of him!!

Our First Visit to Splash Country!!!

For the past several years we have had season passes to Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, TN but have never tried out their waterpark called Splash Country until this summer. It was great and we had so much fun! Hunter loved it, especially after he learned how to swim this summer. Above is a picture of the boys on a turtle in one of the kiddie pool areas.

We were worried that Hunter and Peyton would not enjoy it too much and that they would be too small to really have fun there but we were definitely wrong. Those two could have stayed in one of the many kiddie areas all day and had been happy! The above and below of the yellow slide was definitely one of Hunter's favorites! Even Peyton enjoyed the ride down with Mama, Dada, and Hunter!
Hunter thought he was big stuff getting to go down the slide with Britt and Caleb! It is great because at the end of the slide is only two feet deep so it was a good drop off for Hunter.


These next few pics are of all of us at the cabin. We had a great time together and really enjoyed the cabin, even if it felt like we were up in the clouds. It was in a great location for the summer in Pigeon Forge but I'm not too sure about booking a cabin there in the winter! Hunter liked seeing the TOPS of the trees below our cabin!!! Needless to say, they weren't allowed to play too much on the porches of the cabin!

I love this pic of the boys all together! How cute!

Hanging out with Friends

What a great time we had swimming and playing with the Harrington family! Hunter really had a lot of fun playing and swimming with Cai and Caleb. Caleb did great for his first time in a pool! Even though we live closer to them than we have in the past, with two kiddies each, it still seems hard to get together. So we try to get together and let the boys have fun and enjoy the company of friends as much as possible!

A First Attempt at Milk

When Peyton was about 11 months and two weeks old, we tried whole milk for the first time. I guess I just assumed it would be the same as with Hunter and he would hate it. Luckily I was wrong. He did make a little bit of a face, like "what is this," but he quickly caught on to it and was happy to have a big boy cup just like his big brother!

Both boys with their milk! I just love waking up and snuggling with two boys while they drink their milk or in Hunter's case, chocolate milk, and we watch cartoons! I am so thankful it will not be a battle to get Peyton to drink his milk! Yeah!! But what a big boy we have now!!

Wanting to be Like Big Brother

Well we definitely have two computer experts on our hands! Hunter is so good at doing pretty much anything he wants to do on the computer and Peyton is not far behind. Although we have to distract him with the smaller kid friendly computer or we will not be able to have any keys kept on the real laptop. He tends to rip the keys off if given the opportunity to get close enough!

Like Father, Like SONS!

Into Mischief...

Near the end of June, Pop had a few days off of work and so Hunter, Peyton, and Mama took a trip to Fort Mill to visit. These are a couple of cute pics from the visit. Hunter was being silly and proud of his block stacking and Peyton was trying to get into trouble by getting into Mimi's scrapbook drawers! What a HAPPY boys, even when they are being silly and getting in to trouble! :)

Sunset Beach - June 2011

The beginning of June we went to Sunset Beach with Mimi, Pop, and Aunt Amy! We had a great trip but poor Dada didn't get to stay the whole trip! We did make the most of the time we had with him before he had to go back to work though! We stayed on the second row in a house called Sandtrap. It was perfect because we were able walk right down the walkway to the beach right across from our beach house. Although it was a little worrisome sometimes to see snakes and rats along the side of the walkway in the dunes!

This was Peyton's FIRST trip to the ocean! This is his first foot into the Atlantic Ocean! He wasn't quite sure about the water but was willing to try it for us...haha.


He really did like two thing though. He REALLY enjoyed eating the sand! We would keep trying to keep his hands out of the sand but if he was able to get to it, it would go directly into his mouth and didn't seem to bother him at all!

Secondly, he LOVED the sound of the ocean! We had bought a tent to take with us in hopes of Peyton taking some naps on the beach and sure enough, the ocean must have sounded just like his sound machine we use for his naps. In fact, sometimes it seemed as though he slept better on the beach in his tent than he did back at the beach house! The tent was a great way to go with a little one at the beach!

In fact, the boys liked hanging out at the tent, even when Peyton wasn't napping!

We walked on the pier one night after dinner, but the wind was really crazy and it was hard to stay on the pier for very long. Hunter wanted to make sure he was seen in this pic...cheesy Hunter!

Before Dada left, he built a cool sandcastle - a tiger paw sand castle!! In fact, it was so good, it was there for the remaining four days we were there! I would take a picture of it each day and send to Dada to show him what was still left!

A couple of beach bums...

We kind of had the same routine each day at the beach. Wake up, eat breakfast, go to the beach, stay till midday, come back eat a lunch/snack, nap, and then do something in the evenings such as shop, eat out, walk on the pier, etc. But what Hunter thought we needed to do EVERY afternoon after our nap was to....PLAY PUTT-PUTT!!
We ended up playing putt-putt several times that week we were there, but Hunter constantly asked about "going to the volcano!" He really likes the volcano course in North Myrtle where you can play inside or outside the volcano. He is actually really good at it too! In fact, at the course in the photo below, in Calabash, NC, Hunter made a hole-n-one! We were so excited that we jumped up and shouted and ended up scaring Hunter as soon as he did it! Hunter definitely associates the beach with putt-putt, even now that we are back home. He still asks if we can go to the beach to the volcano!

This was a view from the very top of our beach house. We had a great view of the ocean, even if it took a little bravery from me to be up there! Mimi and Pop and their boys!

Mimi made pancakes one morning and made Peyton and Hunter one of their favorite characters with the pancakes...Mickey Mouse!

While we were there as a whole family, Dada took some pictures for us! It is always so great to have such wonderful pics of our families at the beach. Thank you Dada!

Sweet!

It is really hard to get a picture of all four of us looking at the camera and looking happy! At least this one is pretty close!

A couple of great whole family pics...

Awww...Aunt Amy with her boys!