THE BIG BROTHER

Over all Boston has been a great big brother so far! He is so sweet to little Hudson and always loves to give him kisses, come and say hello, "read" to him and touch his tiny hands. I LOVE it and it melts my heart every time. Poor Boston started to get the shaft whenever Hudson was born though and was stuck inside for FAR too long which left him a LITTLE edgy at times. Thankfully, I have a wonderful mother who stepped up to the plate since I was down and out and did LOTS of fun things with him while she was here. I'm glad she brought her camera along to capture the moments so I could steal them!

These first pictures are from the last Sunday without having Hudson in our lives. Krew and Boston had such a fun time playing together! We miss him!

Papa and Mimi with 2 of their grandsons

The Combe family

The Hoopers....with me 9 months pregnant and SOOOO ready to P.O.P.

When I was in the hospital still, my mom and Kari took the boys to Monkey Business to jump and release some energy. I heard Krew didn't love it at first but then didn't want to leave by the end of it all!

Boston has become our little go to boy for trash. He literally LOVES to collect EVERY BIT of trash he can find around the house. I have to admit, for me its quite nice when he goes on the trash hunts.

One day my mom went with her BFF Nena, with her grandson Peyton on a play date to Bunches of Fun. Boston LOVES this place and could play there for hours! The boys got spoiled and also got hooked up with Chick-fil-a lunch+ice cream and playtime as well (I got hooked up with an oreo milkshake).

My mom PROMISED Boston at Thanksgiving time that she'd take him bowling. Boston has a HUGE love for this "sport" and was THRILLED when they got to have a date at the bowling alley while she was here!

Apparently my mom almost became a human bowling ball when Boston's ball wasn't rolled fast enough and came to a dead stop half way down the lane. My mom decided she'd try to retrieve it and found out how slippery those lanes REALLY are! I so wish I could have been there to see THAT!

For Christmas Boston got this play-dough set that makes fries, ice cream, popcorn, etc. He LOVES it and had been asking to play forever. He played this for days straight and would even wake up early in the morning and we would find him downstairs staring at the box waiting for us to open it so he could play some more!

Here's a snapshot of my boys after their first bath together. Boston loves to help by pouring water on Hudson's feet to help keep him warm and calm in the tub.

Since Hudson has been born, this is Boston's common pose. Whenever Hudson is crying, Boston curls up and covers his ears. He told my mom one time that he needed "earwigs" so that Hudson's crying wouldn't hurt his ears any more!

My BIG BOY became a SUNBEAM at church this year! I felt lots of emotions about this! I can NOT believe he is old enough to be in primary! Where does the time go! I was even MORE emotional that I couldn't be there to take him into primary his first week!

Luckily Mimi and Daddy were there for the big day though!

He came home with a HUGE grin on his face and LOVED his first week! We've been practicing how to sit reverently and constantly reminding him to raise his hand to speak and to not goof off with friends for weeks now. He said he listened and did just that...guess we'll see if it continues throughout the year! He came home with this special crown that he made and wore it ALLLLL day (its still sitting on his dresser). Later, we caught Boston laying next to Hudson and talking to him while we were prepping for dinner that day! Love it!

Boston stepped up as mom's assistant and baked cookies one day (one of the MANY treats we had while she was here....thought I was supposed to be LOSING baby weight...she was NOT helping).

All THREE of my boys! Aren't they just adorable?

My mom was the BEST for the month (from Christmas til 3 weeks post baby) that she was here! Boston loved her here, Hudson loved her here, Kent loved the help and so did I! I don't know what we would've done without her! She really was amazing in every aspect.

Thanks for EVERYTHING!!!!!!!!!!!! I'm blessed so much to have a Momma like you!

SWEET, SWEET BABY!

I had Hudson's newborn pictures taken a few weeks ago and fell in LOVE with the results!

MERRY CHRISTMAS (a month ago....)

Yes, I'm finally getting around to posting about Christmas! It may be a month late but at least its getting done!

Christmas this year was a little different for us for a few reasons:

1. It was our first Christmas NOT going home to Louisiana.

2. My family came to US in Houston (minus Kristin & Chad....so sad).

3. We spent Christmas at my Uncle Mike and Aunt Jill's since they were out of town and my house is TOO small to host.

So it was a little different but we managed and it turned out to be a great Christmas (even though I was HUGE and 9 months pregnant). My aunt had taken down their Christmas tree before they left & we decided we couldn't do without a tree for Christmas so we brought over our small, dinky artificial tree and did a little decorating to it to make it a little more Christmasy around the house. And yes, that's Krew moving around all the presents to a new and "better" spot!

This was the first year since Kent & I have been married that we've spent Christmas Eve with my family. We usually do the Hooper Christmas on Christmas Eve in Louisiana so this was a first for us. Every Christmas Eve my family makes taco salad for dinner (its easy and simple for a busy day/night not to mention YUMMY).

There's Krew still rearranging the presents right before we opened up our annual Christmas pj's.

Another Christmas tradition my family has done as LONG as I can remember is my dad reading to us "Twas the Night Before Christmas." He has the whole thing memorized and puts alot of animation into it. I told Kent he has to do the same for our family (he can't imagine ever having it fully memorized). Luckily, this year my dad was so sweet and found the book where you can record yourself reading it and it will play it back to you. So we have Papa to read it to us EVERY year if he's not around!

The annual reading...

Boston & Krew in their Christmas jammies (we missed Rylee, Sophie and Charlie). I love how MASSIVE Boston looks compared to little baby Krew!

My parents also let the boys open ONE other present Christmas Eve. They got their GARBAGE CAN TRUCKS! This was a last minute request that Boston asked Mimi & Papa for and we're SO glad they pulled through. It is Boston's FAVORITE toy. He constantly tells us he wants to be a garbage man when he grows up....Kent told him to go for being the CEO but he wants to be the man who runs behind the truck throwing the trash in the truck! We'll see if he changes his mind as he gets older but for now, he's our trash picker upper and collects trash all around the house (its quite nice).

We also had our annual baby Jesus birthday cake. Yes, to some this is a little weird but we've been doing it since we were little to help us better understand whose birthday Christmas REALLY is.....so the tradition continues.

The next morning was Christmas and to say Boston was THRILLED is an understatement. I don't know if Krew really understood a TON what to expect and what was going on. I think he was still half asleep.

We sit and wait, just like every year, for the video cameras to be set up and ready for us to enter!

There was lots of gift giving and Christmas lasted until after noon!

Boston got a cool new race track from Santa

Another one of his gifts from Santa were his BIG bowling pins. This was his MOST wanted gift and he was THRILLED to get it!

Kari was in awe at her new camera that HOPEFULLY she'll take advantage of so we can get more pictures of our sweet little Krew!

We were shopping one night and walked into an "As Seen on TV" store and found this (practice putter while on the toilet) that we just HAD to get my dad for one of his gifts! So if his putting gets better this year, you now know why!

Boston got totally loaded and spoiled with gifts this year.

Usually EVERY year I can think of the PERFECT gift for Kent. This year, I struggled so I resulted to some tools he wanted. He was pretty excited about it thankfully!

That face of Kelli's is PRICELESS!

Kent brought me to tears with his gift. It was sweet and sentimental. Do you love that he's LAUGHING at me as I'm getting so emotional?!?

Krew fell in love with his ball pit from Auntie Kristin. Don't you love his hair standing straight up?!

When all the presents were finished being opened, we had daddy's annual Christmas breakfast! Its my FAVORITE breakfast of the year that we usually always end up eating at 1 or 2 pm since Christmas takes so long but its TOTALLY worth the wait! Later that day after we had cleaned up Christmas, the boys found it the MOST fun to play with the trash bags with all the wrapping paper and act like they were trash men filling up their garbage trucks.

We topped our evening off with our nice (and delicious) Christmas dinner!

We had a GREAT Christmas! I'm so thankful my family is so wonderful and willing to make sacrifices and to have come to US this year since I couldn't travel to them! It meant alot and made the holidays so special!

MERRY CHRISTMAS (a month later...)!!!