What's Hudson up to?

My sweet baby boy makes me laugh and smile so everyday! I needed to share some of the many cute things he does and says.

He talks very well and repeats anything and everything that we say--literally. He's a mocking bird.

Vocabulary:
Big truck crashed, or it broke
one more bite please
______'s house (fill in the blank with grandparents' names)--he recognizes the grandparents' houses and our house as soon as we're within a few miles.
Bear bear (who goes everywhere with us)
Buddy eat (when its time to feed the dog)
Buddy sit, Buddy lay down, Buddy stay--he orders the dog around constantly.
He refers to himself in the third person--Huddy eat, Huddy night-night, Huddy up (when he wants to be held), Huddy milk, etc
Thank you, Mommy or Daddy
Please, Mommy or Daddy
I love you Mommy or Daddy
Huddy hug--when he wants to hug you
He knows everyone's name in our immediate families and a few of our close friends and neighbors.
tick tock (for any clock or watch he sees)
Huddy watch Movers (his favorite TV show--The Imagination Movers) or Hot dog mouse (this is the name he came up with for Mickey Mouse. He saw the mouse and then put it with the hot dog song they sing at the end of the show and Mickey was officially named Hot Dog Mouse)
Huddy go bath n bubbles
Huddy want milk or water (but sounds like wawoo)
Huddy bite chick-chick (for chicken nuggets) or cheese, or candy, or cookie, or cracker.
we're here--this cracked me up the first time I put the car in park and he yelled "we're here" from the back seat! Ha!
where'd ____ go? (fill in person's name)
bye bye ______ (fill in person's name)


He can name almost every animal you show him a picture of and tell you what sound they make.

He can name most items around the house--table, chair, vacuum cleaner, toys, plate, cup, bed, potty, book etc.

He's getting better with his ABC's. I hope to post a video of him singing his ABC's sometime this week--as soon as I get caught up on some other things and upload the video to my laptop. It goes something like: a, c, e, d, i, o, p--and he'll repeat letters over and over throughout the song--but he's naming more letters than the original a,c, e that he did a couple of months ago. Haha!!

He's doing well with his colors. He can pretty consistently name red, green, yellow, blue and orange. He gets blue and green mixed up sometimes, but I'm still proud! :)

He is a very picky eater. Grrr! He would live off of chicken nuggets and pretty much does. I never stop offering fruits and veggies, but he's not interested. He won't even think about touching the little Gerber meals or the soup/ravioli meals in the cans. He pushes away his plate if he sees something that looks like its been mixed up or may be healthy. He loves junk food so I have to keep everything hidden and out of reach until he's eaten something decent. I tried the "this-is-dinner-and-if you-dont-eat-you-go-to-bed-hungry" approach and he went to bed hungry several nights because there was no way he was going to touch the corn and greens on his plate. It appeared his will power was stronger than mine. The weird thing is that he ate fruits and veggies when he was an infant, but stopped when we got to solid foods! We try to eat as a family as many nights as we can. Sometimes that just doesn't happen due to work schedules and obligations, but we make a genuine effort. We make him sit in his seat and try to eat what we are having for dinner. Sometimes he'll eat what we're having, and other times he'll take a look at it, nibble on a few things, and then he's ready to get down from the table. If any of you mommies have advice for a picky eater, I'm all ears!!!

He can name all his body parts. We recently graduated from the simple eye and nose to elbow, knee, and hiney. He'll say hiney and point to it from between his legs and it is absolutely hysterical.

He is consistently telling me when he's wet or soiled his diaper and asks me to change him so I have introduced the potty. We bought a training potty and an "Elmo goes to the potty" book, and the "Potty Training for Dummies" book. He has yet to use the potty and I guess its still a little early for that. I figured if he can tell me that he needs to be changed, then its time to start talking potty and big boy undies. He sits on the potty every night before bath time and before bed but no success. No, I have not put fruit loops in the toilet. I figured getting him to use it was the first step then we'll work on the precision and ruining a perfectly good box of cereal at a later date. He doesn't tell me when he has to go yet, so I assume that's the next step. I'm checking with my owner's manual on how to handle all this stuff...wish me luck. Tips welcome!

Hudson LOVES music--playing it, singing it and dancing to it. He plays my FIL's drumset forever every time he's at their house. He loves the drums and will ask to go to their house periodically "Huddy go Poppy house drum-drum?" He's really not bad on the drums either. He can keep a beat and he tears up the whole set, not just the ones in front of him. I know nothing about drums, but my FIL who has played for 35 years thinks he's amazing. He also plays Poppy's guitar. He likes the guitar, but he doesn't seem as interested in it as he does the drums. Our friend, Jason, who is an amazing musician gave Hudson a harmonica one night at one of his shows. We went to see Jason play and let Hudson enjoy the music. While Jason was on stage he found a bad note in the harmonica he was playing so he handed to Hudson. We are now the pround owners of a Herring harmonica and a very loud little boy. Honestly he can play more single notes on the harmonica than I can. He walks around the house playing a tune all the time.

So there's an update of our sweet little man and what he's doing these days. Of course, this barely even scratches the surface of his little mind and capabilities. He amazes me constantly and I fall more in love every second that I'm with him.

Handy Huddy-Ready to work!

Hudson is enjoying his work bench and tools that Mammie and Deedah gave him for Christmas. He's spent enough hours standing at that table to have built at least 4 birdhouses.

Happy New Year

Tina, Lisa, and me on New Year's Eve. Celebrating the end of 2009. Yes, we did wear our head accessories all night--including during dinner.

We had a fabulous and very grown up New Year. Our typical New Year celebrations include us being out way too late and having way too much fun. I guess age and parenthood kicked in this year and we decided to be grown ups. We went to dinner with some fun friends at The Cheesecake Factory and then back to their house to see the ball drop and have a champagne toast. Dinner was great! I forget how overwhelming their 25 page menu is! I can never decide what to get when I'm there, but I've never had a bad dish. This time I ordered shrimp scampi and it was to die for. The shrimp were lightly battered and fried to perfection. It was heavenly. One thing we never have a hard time deciding on is the appetizer--fried macaroni and cheese. OMG!!! Those fried balls of goodness are to die for. We always order that appetizer and it never lets us down. The appetizer, wine and dinner was so yummy I didn't even leave room for cheesecake. What's up with that!? Oh well. There's always next time.

I wish everyone a very blessed year in 2010!!

Christmas Recap

The Hollis Family

Hudson throwing his new football at Maw Maw. :-/ We've since had a serious talk about throwing balls indoors.

Hudson and his great grandmother

Taking a break

Daddy got a new chainsaw. Hooray. Guess I'm about to have a lot less trees in the yard.

Hudson got his first "real" golf clubs which he nearly killed us with.

Playing with his new drill.

I'm ready to build something!

Emma, Lantis and me

Eating some fudge.

Me and my little love bug.

Daddy and Hudson

Lantis Hudson and Bebe.

Santa came and left us lots of great goodies!

Hudson fresh from bed Christmas morning, drinking his milk and trying out his new Pottery Barn chair. (which I ran out of time to monogram and have to take it back to have his name put on it.)

Trying out his new airplane.

What's in here?

I love my chair!

Driving his plane. He loves it!

Christmas day at my parents. Santa left a work bench for all Hudson's new tools. He's ready to work!

Hudson and his cousins--Grayson and Bailey.

We had a wonderful Christmas!! I hope everyone else did too. Unlike some folks, we dont have a thousand places to visit for the holidays so ours are usually laid back and I'm thankful for it. Christmas Eve we had Christmas with Lantis' family and Christmas day was spent with mine. Here are a few pics of the events.

I bring you good news

"...I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord. This will be a sign to you: You will find a baby wrapped in cloths and lying in a manger." Suddenly a great company of the heavenly host appeared with the angel praising God and saying, "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to men on whom his favor rests." Luke 2:10-14

Christmas gathering #1 of 2009

We had a fun little family gathering with my mother-in-law's side of the family this past weekend. I always love opportunities to show off my little man. Here are a few photos from the party.

The Hollis' and Santa

Hudson was very excited about his gift from Santa. Christmas morning should be lots of fun!

I went up with Hudson to see Santa. Check out Hudson's expression! Haha!!

I just loved the way little Eady looked at Santa--such an innocent child-like gleam in her eye.

Santa came to our party! (aka Uncle John--a member of the real bearded Santa association)

Cousin Katie led us in Christmas carols while waiting on Santa to arrive.

Hudson enjoying a candy cane in Auntie Em's lap.

Four Generations--Maw Maw, Becky, Lantis and Hudson-working on a candy cane. Hehe!

The Reaves siblings with their mom and our sweet Maw Maw

My little sis in law, Emma, and her man, Nick. I nearly died when I realized Em was old enough to bring a boyfriend to the family gathering. She was 7 years old when Lantis and I started dating! My how the time flies. Our little Em is growing up.

Let the grazing begin

Hudson found the cupcakes, of course.

Aunt Cherry and Josie

Aunt Nancy preparing the ham. (Lantis sneaking into something-probably chocolate-in the background)

The beautiful Parks girls

Last minute gift

The presents are wrapped and under the tree, the groceries are bought, the stockings are hung--I guess we're just waiting on Ol' St Nick to arrive. Except....for that ONE STINKING PRESENT I have left to buy! I'm not looking forward to being out in the hustle and bustle later today. I ordered my niece's present online from American Girl. I realized several days after it should have arrived at our house that it was no where to be found. I go to the UPS website and track it and it says it was delivered last Wednesday at 4:27 pm to our front door. I'm a frequent online shopper and I've never had a problem with UPS or FedEx. If our UPS guy says he scanned it and left on our doorstep, I believe him. Plus the UPS/FedEx delivery system is pretty fool proof. I have no idea what could have happened to the package!? I'm completely baffled. I cannot imagine someone walking up the big hill to our house to steal a package off the front porch. We live in a nice trustworthy neighborhood. American Girl is hot stuff right now, but my sis says when she's ordered stuff from them there's no indication on the outside box as to what it is. That means they would have been taking a gamble as to what they were stealing. Also, my neighbor probably would have noticed someone making the treck up our driveway and up the front porch steps. If someone didn't take it, what in the world could have happened to it? Lantis and I both have things shipped to the house frequently--especially at the holidays--so we are very accustomed to having boxes around the house and checking to make sure they are empty before disposing of them. Neither one of us picked up a package off the front porch in the time frame that it was supposedly delivered. We have turned the house upside down looking for it just in case we "forgot" that we picked it up or mistook it for another online purchase. We even went out in the yard and looked in the bushes and all around the driveway and garage thinking maybe it was somehow blown off the front porch or the UPS guy put it somewhere else. No luck. So, where ever Bailey's intended gift is right now, I hope its with someone who needs it more than we do. Unfortunately at this late hour I can no longer get a gift for Bailey's American Girl doll unless I want to drive to Atlanta so I'm on to plan B. What is plan B you ask? Hell if I know! I'm going to go on an emergency shopping trip to several stores with bare shelves most likely. Wish me luck, friends!