We have had a busy month of September. We made two trips to Pilot Mountain and little Hunter is exhausted from all the excitement. I will update everyone on our fun times as soon as my camera battery charges. In the meantime I found this really cute picture! I wonder what they see?

I almost forgot one little tiny bit of news---Hunter has spoken his first word, "mom-ma!" It is the sweetest thing. Now he says it all the time! We have been working really hard on Da-da.

Hunter's first day of school. After warming up a bit, he quickly found his favorite toy.


For those of you that haven't really seen Hunter walk. He loves the new freedom and extra mobility. I will try to get a movie up of him walking toward me, but he gets a little camera shy and just wants to stand still and stare! It is so much fun to have him walking!

Starting school

This has been another big week for Hunter. He has started going to 'school' on Mondays and Wednesdays from 9-12. There are 5 little friends in his class, including himself. They range in age from 10 months to 18 months and they are all girls. For right now I don't think he will mind, but in the future he may not be fond of all the girls. He has two teachers that are extra sweet and Hunter likes them both. On Monday we picked him up a little earlier and made a mad dash home to eat lunch and lay down for the big afternoon nap. Needless to say, Hunter was very tired after his busy little morning. We pack Hunter a snack for the morning and the big lesson for them to learn the first part of the year is how to eat their snack at a special little table with friends (those that are big enough). While Hunter was in school, David and I took advantage of the free time and enjoyed two nice long runs on the Creeper Trail. We are both training for the Shut In Trail Run, which is an 18 mile run that climbs 3000 feet on a mountain in Asheville, NC. Right now the name of the mountain escapes me so I will have to look that up later. I have run the race once in the past and David has successfully completed 5 races. It is a beautiful run with the trail winding throughout the woods. Even though I have only run this once before, it has been one my favorite races. The scenery is beautiful and it is so peaceful--you almost forget that the entire race is uphill....almost. Of course I took pictures of Hunter's first day of class! I will post them soon.

Hunter and I made a trip home to Pilot Mountain over the Labor Day weekend while David worked. It is always nice to go home and see all of our family. Hunter, Chloe, Jenny, Papa, Gaga, and myself all went to eat fish on Friday night. Hunter, of course, does not eat fish so I packed his dinner to take, but boy did he have a good time in the restaurant. Thank goodness they stuck us in a corner room with other children and thank goodness it was a kid friendly place to go. Hunter, Chloe and about 4 other children all played while mommies and daddies ate dinner. We may be in trouble if he thinks all out to eat dinners are this fun and crazy! The rest of the weekend was spent playing around Papa, Gaga and Granddaddy's house. We made our trip back to Abingdon on Sunday so Hunter could have some Daddy time.
David had Labor Day off so he and Hunter had a fun filled day while I cleaned the house. We all spent the afternoon at the pool. It was the last open day for the season so it was super crowded. Hunter didn't know what to think about all the people so he stayed pretty close to David the whole time. This was the first time we had been to the pool since Hunter started walking, so he enjoyed getting in and out of the pool..over and over and over again.
Today was the first day I have left Hunter for and extended period of time with people other than family. We have joined our local MOPS (Mothers of Preschoolers) group and today was our first meeting. It is a chance for moms to get together and share their experiences as moms through fellowship, lecture and crafts. I really enjoyed meeting other young mothers in our community and Hunter had a blast playing all morning with new friends. I checked on him throughout and once he was cleaning off the table with some sort of cloth he found and another time I caught him standing up backwards and jumping in a chair! Thankfully, no one was hurt and the teacher was there to whisk him safely to the floor to play with some trucks. I am looking forward to our next meeting and I hope Hunter is too.

First tractor ride with Papa.

First nap after 15 minutes on our first tractor ride!

Chloe--What a rock star! She insisted she wear her sunglasses--exclusively be DTE (Dora the Explorer)

Gaga and Hunter on the Polaris. He is now big enough to turn the steering wheel.

Hunter and Chloe are standing in the back of the Polaris eating apples they helped Papa pick!

Chloe is convinced that 'Pooh' lives in this hole. She calls him by name every time we walk past it. Who knows, maybe Pooh does live in this hole. Today she was showing Hunter his home.

Over and over. Does this look like fun to anyone?

Hunter helping David wash the cars. I think we went through 3 outfits that day.