One Month

Here is the one month post for Pate! You turned one month old on November 24th...Thanksgiving! We are so very thankful for you! You are getting to be such a little chunk! And oh so handsome!!!

At your two week appointment, you already weighed 9 pounds 2 ounces and were 21 1/2 inches long. The day before you were 1 month, you weighed 11 pounds!!!! It really is no surprise since you LOVE to eat! You are still eating about every 2 hours...even at night! Sometimes you will go three and a half but that's it. You wear mostly 0-3 months clothes now and a size 1 diaper.

Here are the newborn pictures I took. These are a couple of my favorites!

 Everywhere we go, people stop and comment on how beautiful you are and how much dark hair you have!

 You sister, Alabama, loves you so much! She wants to kiss and hold you all the time. She loves to make you clap and wave at me. She always comes to tell me Pate's crying. We just have to watch her to make sure she doesn't try to pick you up! Really the only time she is jealous is when Mimi or someone comes over and they are holding you. She will tell them to put you in the swing so they can come and play with her! ha!

 This is a picture of your first bath. You hated it. Actually you hated the first several baths. Just now you have gotten a little better with it. When you were screaming at the top of your lungs in this picture, Alabama was in the living room saying, "I don't like that noise."

This month you went on your first trip. We went with Papa and Aunt Judy to Greenwood to visit and Aunt Ann and Uncle Phillip.

 You did a lot of new things this month. You went to church and stayed in service with us. The first time you went was the evening service on the 30th. The first place you went out was actually to Target after your first check-up on Friday the 28th. You slept through all of it! We went to a family reunion in Gibson and we even went to the fair!

At first, you were a very fussy little baby, but you seem to have gotten happier in the last two weeks or so. I'm so very glad!!!! :-) It's funny to see the differences in you and Alabama.

Here is a picture of your first bath with Alabama. She was so excited!

It's been an adjustment having a new baby but I am so thankful for you and for a healthy baby! We love you, Pate!

Love, Mommy and Daddy

Happy Halloween!

Pate and Alabama were a Georgia cheerleader (of course!) and a UGA football player for Halloween this year! Here are a few pictures of them!

 This is the "cheerleading" before she went to school on the Thursday before Halloween. They had a party at school and got to dress up. Adam was off that week since we'd just had Pate on Monday so he got to go to the party with her!

Usry Pate Smelts is here!

Our sweet baby boy was born last Monday, October 25th at 7:47 am! Here's the story of his birth. We got all the last minute things done (like baking and decorating cookies, packing, and Georgia coming to pick up Alabama) and headed to the hospital on Sunday night to be induced. We were supposed to be there at 6 but, of course, like last time, they told us to go eat and come back at 7. So we went downstairs to the "grill" and since it was Sunday...Chick fil A is closed...boo. At the time, I didn't really feel like eating a lot because I was having some contractions already so I just had some strawberries.

When we got back upstairs, they took us to our room and got everything set up to start the cervadil. They monitor was showing the contractions I was having, but they weren't too painful yet. Our nurse's name was Olivia and she was very sweet. They put in the cervadil and I took an ambien to go to sleep to rest for the big day tomorrow...or so I thought! The contractions got worse all night long and it is all a big blur to me as to what happened when. They also gave me demoroll for pain and I think that with the ambien made me c.r.a.z.y! I told them that I was feeling a lot of pressure and pain and the charge nurse told me I had to wait for Dr. Serrano to come check me before I got an epidural. Long story short....I never saw an epidural! It went a lot faster than anyone thought it would and he was born at 7:47 am. None of our family was at the hospital because Adam didn't have time to call before the baby was here! After he was born, I basically passed out and Adam called everyone to tell them to come while he held the baby. I finally came out of the daze I was in and got to hold him and nurse him while we waited.I couldn't believe how much he looked like Alabama!

We wanted to make sure Alabama was there before Adam took him to the nursery so she could see everything and so there would be someone to take pictures! We stayed in recovery probably close to two hours.

Here is Alabama seeing her brother for the first time!

 They took him to the nursery and gave him a bath and weighed him and got him ready to come back to our room. Here he is on the scale weighing 8 pounds 2 ounces. He was also 21 inches long. Alabama was only 6 pounds 14 ounces but was 21 1/2 inches long.  

After we moved to the other room, Alabama came in first to see us and to meet Pate. She brought her little stuffed duck that she picked out to give him. She also got her "big sister" present. She got some Big Sis pajamas, zebra pajamas, tinkerbell notebook, princess coloring set, and some stickers!

Here is the first picture of our little family of four!!!

We had lots of friends and family come and visit us while we were in the hospital!

I think they came to see us, but maybe it was just for the UPS cookies! haha!

Adam and I feel very blessed to have two healthy children who are also absolutely beautiful!!!!

Go Dawgs!

Alabama is slightly obsessed with football (or actually just the cheerleading part) right now! We have game day every day at our house! She gets her pompoms and cheers and dances and wants you to cheer with her for the Go Dawgs (not Bulldogs!ha!). She also usually calls herself Jacey while she is a cheerleader (I mean cheerleading...that's what she calls the person and the act!) or sometimes Jacey will be there with us and we watch Jacey and clap for her. It's all a big mystery who Alabama is each day! (BTW..I have NO idea where she got the name Jacey!ha!) We went to the border bash to see the "cheerleadings" when GA played SC. She got to take her picture with two cheerleaders and she was so happy! (Alabama just walked in while I was typing and said "Look, it's Jacey! I don't know the other one, I just know Jacey" when she saw this picture with the cheerleaders!)

She loves to have GA stickers on her face and was very proud to get one at the border bash.

She also wants "that boy" to hold her up like the boy cheerleaders did at the Border Bash. "That boy" is usually Adam but could be another boy...like Andrew the other day! She will wave her spirit fingers and say "Go Dawgs, Number One!!!" She's a natural!

We've also been to two Thomson football games and she doesn't really cheer a whole lot while we are there, but she is so excited to go, doesn't want to leave, and talks about it forever after the game! Oh, last week, Jacey was a THS cheerleader! "Mama, see Jacey?! See her blonde hair??!" haha! I don't have a picture but she has a THS bulldog shirt that I made her and she has to wear it to the games but was upset that I suggested she wear jeans with it...."Mama, cheerleadings not wear jeans, they wear skirts!" Oh, I'm sorry! What was I thinking???

Oh, I almost forgot, we also have Hairy Dawg, UGA, and sometimes T-Bone join us at these "games" at our house! Her imagination is beyond anything you could dream up!!!

A few random things

I wanted to post about a few things we've been doing lately and then I'm going to do a few separate posts about specific things that I want to share!


First of all, Alabama is cracking me up all the time! On Thursday, they had Dad's day at Preschool so Adam went in to work late. He wanted us to go eat breakfast at Waffle house. Well, while we were there, a man with a scruffy beard, a long ponytail, a ball cap, an orange work vest, and a dangly earring walks in. Alabama sees him and says in her mad voice "Hey! Pirates not 'posed to be at Waffle House!" hahaha. Thankfully he was not close enough to hear her, however she does say things in the store all the time that people can hear....such as..."Why that lady got crazy hair?" Oh, my goodness!
She also had to go to timeout at school for the first time last Thursday. She said she was making noises in the gym and waving her hands(I don't exactly know what happened, the teacher didn't tell me, just her!) but on Tuesday, I said, Alabama, did you go to timeout today? She said, "No, but Laura Lane did!"


We were in Wal-Mart a few weeks ago, and Alabama had on a dress (as usual!) and kept putting her feet up in the cart and "showing everybody what she's working with" so I told her to put her feet down because that's not lady like. She turns around and points at a woman walking by and says "That lady likes it!" haha!!!!


She also hates to get her feet dirty. I mean like, meltdown in the yard until you take her shoes off and clean them off. Adam told her that's what it's like living in the country! You can't be a country girl if you can't get a little dirty.


We went to see the Winnie the Pooh movie last month and she did really good! I didn't like it that much....the voices of the characters were different, and that really ruins it for me! ha! But hey,I still got to eat popcorn and M&M's!



We finally have a name for our new baby! We can't wait to meet....USRY PATE SMELTS! I've got about two and a half weeks until my due date. We are going to call him Pate and Alabama is so cute when she says his name! Love it!

1st Day of Preschool

Alabama started preschool this past week! I can't believe she is old enough to go to preschool. She's going to the same preschool that my sisters and I went to. She was going to be in the two year old class, but they asked to move her up to the three year old class so she will be going 3 days a week. I am praying that she loves it and learns a lot! Her teacher is Mrs. Anita and there are only 3 girls in the class besides her! :( Not so sure about that part! The first thing she told us when we picked her up Thursday was "That boy hit me in the head and pushed me down!" Not good.

She said she had a fun time though and can't wait to go back next week!!! I couldn't wait to go get her from school...I missed her and it was only 3 hours!

She has been looking forward to going for months now! She kept saying, "When I be big, I'm goin' to school?!" So on Tuesday she asked me if she was going to school today and I said, Yes, we're going to meet your teacher tonight! She got so excited and said, "I big now?" I told her yes, she is a big girl and is going to school. Then she asked "I brush my hair by myself?" She couldn't wait to wear her 'pack pack' and wanted to get a picture of it! ha!

Soo silly!!!

Sunday Funnies!

The imagination of Alabama is extreme to say the least! Many days, she pretends to be her cousin, Morgan. I have to call her Morgan, she walks up to me and says, "I'm Morgan." I say I know, then she tells me, "My Mama name is Georgia. My Daddy is Chris." I say okay, then she talks about the dogs. "There's Ginger. What's my big dog's name?" I tell her Jake. "Oh, okay. Where's Jake?" She takes the shelf out of her play refrigerator and uses it as the gate for the "dogs". She says, "Mama, you want to come see Ginger?" If I call her Alabama, she quickly tells me with the funniest and most serious look. "I not Bama, I Morgan." Oh, yeah....how did I forget. Well, this morning, she told everyone in the nursery that she was Morgan and her cousin's name was Alabama but she left her at home (this morning she was carrying around a crazy gymnastics doll my Nana gave her that she said was Alabama but I wouldn't let her it take to church!). Adam will usually tell her, "No, you're Alabama! I'm your Daddy, not Chris." She gets so upset and comes to get me to say I know she's Morgan! ha!

Alabama's favorite song right now (besides the ones she makes up herself which usually include "I lub you" over and over and over again) is Zaccheus but she calls it "Ikea!" ha!


We went to the open house at her preschool last week, and they had a whale by her name so she would know where to line up, sit on the rug, etc. So I was asking her to tell Mimi and Papa what animal she was and she wouldn't tell them. So my Daddy said, "Is it a goat?" She says, "Yeah, a goat!" Ever since then, everytime I ask her, she says it's a goat! Thanks a lot Papa!