Fun in the Carolina Sun

This past week we ventured to South Carolina's Edisto beach for a Turner family vacation! James got to spend some quality time with his cousins, Aunt, Uncles and his Papa and Nana. James had fun in the water and loved all the attention.

Jay's favorite memories:
1. First time in the ocean!
2. Falling asleep in Papa David's arms (in the ocean!).
3. Music time with Aunt Julie, Nana and Cousin Abigail.
4. Cousin Maggie cheering as Jay played with his toys and sat up tall.
5. Playing with Cousin Abigail. James liked to watch her play and tried to figure out how she was able to crawl.
6. Going for walks on the beach in the morning!
7. Playing hangman with Cousin Charlie.




We had a great time at the beach!

Doggie sent first class

This afternoon Zion ate our postage stamps. No I am not joking. We came home from church today to find bits and pieces of stamps all over the family room. I had just purchased one of the super big rolls of 100 stamps from Costco. All that remains is 25 stamps some of which are barely usable. What happened to the other 75 stamps you ask....I have a feeling that Zion ate them. Which means if we do see them again, we will definitely not want to use them.

Lazy summer day

For the first time in a very long while we are enjoying a lazy summer afternoon. Last night we had a little dinner party and the men graciously helped John move our extra large couch downstairs. It involved removing the entire sliding glass door and maneuvering the couch around to the back side of the house. Wow! Below are some pictures from this week: James in his new exer-saucer, getting ready for the party (note James' party shirt), and fun with James' lamb and Zion.

(Click to enlarge collage)

Now I am off to enjoy a "family nap time". Zion, James and John are all almost asleep so I better catch up!

Ever been on a zip line?

Well now is your chance! Check out this video of my brother zip lining on his honeymoon...wow they are brave! Just imagine the wind rushing by, the smell of the forests and the sound of the stream below.

I am very impressed that he had a free hand to film while riding the zip line. I would have needed at least two hands holding on for dear life!


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Just Jacque

Meet Jacque, he is a peacock.


John picked him out at the store before James was born. So far James really hasn't liked this toy too much, he preferred rings or rattles...but yesterday I pulled out Jacque from the toy basket and he was a big hit!


Here is James saying hello to Jacque. Notice he is holding onto him with both hands!

Everything is going (or at least trying to go) into the mouth for further inspection. He managed to get part of Jacque's wing into his mouth. Yum!



And then finally he found the Jacque's beak, and this became his absolute favorite! Poor Jacque. It must be hard to be such a colorful peacock!

What's in a name

Yesterday I placed an add on Craig's list to see if we could get anyone to pick up all our moving boxes. These boxes, you see, were now flattened and in a pile in our front room and had become a nuisance to my husband. It was the first thing you saw when walking in the front door. Not quite the feng shui we were going for.

The response from my posting to Craig's list was amazing! I think I got 15 emails within 2 hours asking if the boxes were still available. Wow! So once the boxes had been picked up I did what any polite craigslister would do. I removed my posting and responded to all the emails that the boxes had been picked up. This morning I got a response from a craigslister:

No problem. By the way, if your name really is Paige Turner, I think that's awesome! :)

I was tickled by this enthusiastic response to my name, and wanted to share!
It is fun to be Paige Turner!

Letting go...

This past Sunday was the first time that we left Jay in the nursery at church. He was totally ready to go, it was me that kept saying "maybe next week". Well yesterday we finally took him and boy was it hard to leave him. I was tearing up at the thought of leaving my baby...but all the nice ladies in the nursery assured me they would page me if he had any troubles. John was there to hold my hand through it all too. He is such a sweet husband!

When we picked him up he had a great report! Jay played and had a bottle in the hour that we left him. They said he was very happy but they could tell that he missed me. Now I don't know how much of that last one is true, but it sure makes a mom feel good to hear such nice things about her baby! It felt so good to hold him when we picked him up. He was happy as can be and was talking up a storm! Also, miraculously he looked even older to me. I can't really explain it, but his face looked older and wiser. I love my big boy!

Maybe next week we will leave him longer and join back into our Sunday School. We'll see if I am brave enough to leave him for that long!

My Big Boy

Jay is 3 months old today! He is becoming so interactive and fun to play with!

Last night John babysat Jay and his friend Eli so I could have a girls night out with some lady friends. It was a great evening to hang with girls! We even called mid-way through to see how John was handling two infants and although I strained to hear any back ground noise it was quiet at my house. When I got home I learned that I just happened to call during the 10 minutes that neither boy was fussy. The boys were very courteous though and only one was fussy at a time. At one point they both wanted a snack at the same time, and somehow John fed both boys at once. He is super dad!




Click to enlarge pictures.

Home sweet home!

How do you know when you are home? For me, home truly is where my heart is. It is almost as if the movers picked up my heart a couple weeks ago and moved it along with our furniture, because from the second we stepped through the door this was our new home. Below is a picture of our front door. The tree blocks the view of the second level, but it is there...trust me. We have neighbors on both sides, but so far they have been nice and quiet (well mostly).

Here is a view from the upper deck. In the corner you can see John's new grill draped with it's green grill cover. This is the same view I get from the kitchen....love it! Next is Zion exploring his new backyard. I am so glad he finally learned how to use his dog door! Most of the yard is decked in, but there are planter boxes all around the border of the deck.

For the first time in our marriage, John and I are subscribing to cable television. Look what happens when I leave John to watch Jay...they both end up in their respective chairs watching "Discovery HD". They even are sitting alike! My mothering instinct doesn't want Jay to watch too much TV, but a little discover channel can't hurt, right?

Welcome home!

Well, we made it! Closing on our new home, moving and flying out to California all within a matter of 4 days…they said it couldn’t be done, and we have proved them wrong. Ok, actually no one told us it couldn’t be done, but we were told multiple times that we were crazy to do so much. That just seems to be our way, lots of big changes at once. We really go for the gusto!

Closing on our new townhouse was very exciting! Immediately after we received our keys the movers transported all of our belongings from the condo to the townhouse. Wow, did we have a lot of stuff! It is amazing to see how much you can accumulate. And watching the movers move our large furniture up and down the stairs (three level townhouse) made us very thankful to not be doing this heavy lifting ourselves. We are slowly moving in…we still have boxes scattered about and I really want to paint. But for now we are taking things slowly and really enjoying ourselves. The biggest news is that John now has a grill on the back deck. Needless to say we have been grilling for every meal except breakfast. Yum!

Also, big news for Zion is that he now has a dog door so he can come and go as he pleases out to the back yard. He was a little skittish of the dog door at first. We would need to escort him downstairs each time he needed to go outside and push him out the door. Now, he had figured out how it all works and he will run outside on his own. He loves it!

James has his own bedroom and play corner in the family room. He seems just as happy as he was at the condo. Really all he wants is his swing and he can be happy. He is so easy to please! As a side note, when we went out to California Grandma bought James a swing so he would be comfortable during our visit! James loves his Grandma; she takes such good care of him!

One off my favorite things is that everything now has its place. Before we had a two bedroom condo, and the second bedroom was the nursery/guest bedroom/ storage unit/ office combo room. Now, we have three bedrooms plus an office in the basement. Everything truly has a place! Also, I love my new kitchen. I love it because it has a bay window that looks out to the nature preserve behind our house. It is lovely!

Ok, that’s the quick news from the Turners. I hope to post more pictures and photos from our travels soon!