April at Preschool

Carter had a great month at Preschool.  They started the month with their formal class picture (3 kids are missing).  Don't they all look so happy ;)

They had several fun units this month:

Flowers - made stain glass windows and hand print flowers, read books about gardening and learned a new song "I am Special"

Farm Animals - made a barnyard with all the animals and even a tractor, went gardening in the sensory table and made sheep

Teddy Bears - painted teddy bears using chocolate pudding, sorted bears based on color, counted bears and matched to numbers and even got to wear their pajamas to school and bring their favorite lovie for show and tell.

Here are some pictures from April.

Proud of his Painting

Art class with Charlie, Talia and Jack

Class on Pajama Day

Carter picked out his Micky Mouse pajamas and a pair of leggings to wear

All the classes book-bags lined up with their lovies

Visiting Aunt B and Baby Wren

After a quick 24 hours at home, mom jumped on a plane with Mimi to go visit baby Wren!  (Oh and Aunt B/Uncle C too :))  Wren is just the cutest little thing and I can't wait to see him grow up and play with the boys.  We spent the weekend shopping, eating and generally smothering Wren (mom/dad too).

Here are some pictures of the adorable little guy!

Mimi and Wren

So excited to see us!!!

Walk around the block

Waiting on Aunt J to finish shopping!

Lazy afternoon in the backyard

Lady killer!

He thinks he is pretty cute too

Wrapped in a blanket, baby legs on, wub-nub in the mouth

He slept like this all through breakfast - good thing I am a master of eating with my left hand

More shopping - poor baby

Burgess Family (including Felix!)

It was way too quick of a weekend but it was great to meet the little guy and see Aunt B turn into Mama B.  We can't wait to see them when they come to Atlanta later this summer (now if we could only convince them to make the move permanent ).  

Grandparents in from Wisconsin

While Mom, Dad and Carter were at Disney World  Grandma and Grandpa Holden came to town to watch Parker.  From the looks of their photos, it appears most of the week was dedicated to Grandpa and Parker making funny faces with each other.

Judging by all the smiles from Parker, it appears he had a great time with the special one-on-one time with his Grandparents

He also enjoyed their Dog, Nougat, her crate was especially intriguing as it was just the right size for little P man 

Once the whole family returned to the ATL, Carter had some serious sleeping to catch up on.

Soon he was back at it an having a great time catching up with Parker and telling his Grandparents all about his trip.

Carter had a small birthday celebration with Grandma and Grandpa (here are his new City Blocks which have created a lot of activity -  and some sibling frustrations as Parker seems to think any block tower is a target for destruction).

Carter and Parker also enjoyed some decent weather with their Granparents and did an excellent job helping update some of the front yard landscaping.

A trip to the farmer's market and a fast stroll through the Taste of Marietta (fast due to rain) as well as some fun front yard playing rounded out a great week with Grandma and Grandpa.

But after a little snuggle time...

and a much needed bath...

We had to say goodbye to our grandparents.  Their help was greatly appreciated and the boys both had a blast.

Hollywood Studios

After a good night sleep... (with Ribbit, Bear, Lion, Mickey and Francesco while sleeping in his Mickey PJs) 

We were excited and sad that it was our last day at Disney.  Carter has the drill down by now and woke up excited to see what Mickey left him (a coloring book for the plane ride home).

Then we spent a while deciding where to go.  We had been planning to spend two days at Magic Kingdom but we actually got every ride/activity done the first day we were there.  Mom and Dad wanted to go back to Epcot for more yummy food and Carter wanted to see the Animals again.  So we decided to go to the bus stop and see which bus showed up first.  While there we talked to a nice Disney representative who suggested we go to Hollywood Studios.  We had completely ruled that one off our list because there didn't seem to be a lot for kids (few rides, mainly shows and Carter has NO attention span).  But since we had been everywhere else and the little guy was pretty exhausted after 5 days with no nap, we decided that a low key day was probably just what the family needed.  

When we got to the Park, we decided to go see a few characters right away. 

Carter refused to get out of the stroller so we were going to take a mom and dad only picture when Chip grabbed the stroller and rolled it over to us.  Carter thought it was hilarious!

Not sure about these outfits.  Circus Donald/Daisy were much more fun!

Sully loved dad's Sullivan's Island shirt

We went on a few rides but Carter wasn't a fan of either... The Great Movie Ride has a scary 20's gangster gunfight scene and a reenactment of Aliens and the Back-lot Studio show had a stunt fire explosion (one thing we learned this trip with Carter, the dark, fire, and loud bangs are terrifying), we decided some fun was in order.  So we hit up the Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground.  Carter has no idea what that movie (I am not sure he will every understand he is sliding out of a film canister) is but he loved playing (he made us go back twice).

Giant Slide

Riding an Ant

Then we hit up the Toy Story ride.  It is a 3D arcade ride where you play various arcade games to see how many points you can get.  Carter thought the glasses were pretty fun ...

And had his game face on...

but gave up on the game part about 1/10 of the way through.  Afterwards we went over to the Disney Junior area to try and catch the show but it was full so we met up with a few of Carter's favorite characters... Handy Manny.

And Jake from the Neverland Pirates!  Carter picked out his Jake shirt to wear that day so it was a perfect match!

We were all beat so we decided to take a break for lunch.  Carter made some new friends and played hop scotch for a while. 

We also had found a pin on the ground so he decided to trade it.  He wanted a pink pin so he ended up with a paint brush from Beauty and the Beast.

After another trip to the playground, we decided to visit a few characters.  Up first were Phinius and Ferb.  Carter loved the personalized attention.

And he though Percy peaking over the fence was pretty funny (silly Platypus he kept saying).

Then we went next door for the main attraction... Lighting McQueen and Tow Mater!

Next we hit up the Muppet 4D show (which petrified Carter before it started due to the Bugs Life issue at Animal Kingdom).  So we decided the Disney Junior show would take his mind off it.  Everyone sits on the floor and the show revolves around the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse where the Characters go visit 3 other Disney shows... Sophia the First, Doc McStuffins and Jake and the Neverland Pirates.  It is extremely interactive and Carter loved singing around, dancing and grabbing the fun stuff they dropped from the ceiling.

Carter was really excited while we waited for it to start

Grabbing for a Gold Doubloon!

Next we took a trip to see Sorcerer Mickey...

But all Carter wanted to do was play with a touch screen painting game next door.

During the rest of the afternoon, dad rode some of the big kid rides while Mom and Carter watched the Beauty and the Beast Musical (Carter LOVED it but was devastated when the Beast turned into a Prince), watched some street performers, sat through 2 minutes of the Indiana Jones show before Carter freaked out at the fire (Indiana was carrying a torch and Carter could not understand why he wouldn't put it out "it hurts" he kept saying) and instead watched the Junior Jedi show while dad rode Star Tours.  Soon it was time to head home but not before one last family picture with the trade mark park centerpiece.

Carter was obviously beat so it was definitely time to head home.  We waited for our bus while Carter watched some Chugginton on his computer.

Our flight was slightly delayed due to weather so we didn't get home until 10:30pm.  Luckily it was an empty flight and Carter laid down and passed out as soon as we took off!  It was a wonderful family vacation and so nice to focus so much individual attention on the little guy for his birthday!