Welcome Alexander!

There was a new arrival in the Helton family Thursday evening in Texas. Congratulations Todd, Stephanie and big-brother Joshua on Alexander Taylor Helton. What a beautiful baby boy! With his parents’ permission, here is a picture of the sweet Alexander:

Happy Birthday to Alice today too! I hope you have a great day despite the dreary weather! And just for old time’s sake, here are a couple of pictures of the birthday girl. Who else thinks this looks like Jacob with blonde hair and a dress??

Thursday I worked in McDonough at our training center which is only about 10 miles from home. I was done about lunch time and met Lance, Owen and Kaylee at Burger King for them to play and eat. It was nice to get home early. I managed to get the last couple of hours of work done at home and then we played outside for a while. Gorgeous day yesterday! Trampoline time, bicycles, sidewalk chalk and when Tyler and Abby arrived to pick up Kaylee a game of hide-and-seek and freeze-tag ensued.

Earlier this week I stopped at the bait store on my way home and picked up some worms for fishing. The boys were more excited about getting the worms out of the can and putting them on the hook than they were the actual fishing, but we had fun. At one point as I was helping Owen reel his line in, I looked over and Riley had laid his pole on the ground and was in the top of a cedar tree. He said he could see better up there (maybe he should have gotten the family name Zaccheus) to know when his float went under. I guess he didn’t think through the fact that his pole would be drug into the water before he could get out of that tree, if he should get a bite. Unfortunately nobody got a bite that night. As you can see, Lance was behind the camera while we fished but I think he managed to cast a few times too.

I almost forgot to mention another momentous event in our house last night. About the time Alexander was entering the world for the first time, Riley was taking his very first shower. That’s right, a big event indeed. He’d been bugging me about it for a while since installing a new shower head in his bathroom Nanny and PawPaw had give him and Owen at Christmas (one with a hose so you can take down and spray). I peaked in a few times to make sure he was washing and not playing. He washed his hair 4 times! After he got out he told me he had bathed 4 times and said, “..that oughta last me 3 weeks, right Mom?” Funny how something so little made him feel so grown up. After he got this pajama’s on he wanted to know what else he could do to be a big-boy. He proceeded to empty out all the bathroom trashcans for us and then he wanted to dip his own ice-cream (although he conceded that after realizing how hard the ice-cream was) and pour his own milk. He is growing up so fast! It made me feel better when Owen wanted me to “hold him like a baby and carry him to bed” later that night. That’s my boy!

I’m running a 10K race in the morning, not sure what else the weekend will hold. Riley was going to go with me and do the 1-Mile fun run, but since the weather forecast consists of a 30% chance of rain and 20-something-degrees, I’ve managed to talk him out of tagging along. If I didn’t need to race to qualify for the Peachtree in July, I would skip it myself. Great weather AND I get to wake up at 5am on a Saturday! Can you tell I’m excited about it??

I hope everyone has a great weekend! Once I warm up and dry-out after Saturday’s race, I intend to enjoy the rest of the weekend!