A little crafty...

A few weeks ago I got tired of digging through Adley's bows to try & find one for her to wear.  So, I decided to make a cute little bow holder display so that I could easily find what I was looking for.  I'm not sure why I bother with bows because she generally yanks them off her head in 2.5 seconds, but she just looks so cute in them I can't resist!  Anyway, here's how I did it in case you would like a bow holder of your own...this project was super easy!

Supplies: a staple gun, fabric, ribbon, and canvas

I decided to use an 11x14 canvas, although I'll probably need several more this size to hold all of the "big girl bows" that Adley already has for when she actually has longer hair!  But for now, just one works.  Thanks to Hobby Lobby sales & coupons, I was able to get the necessary supplies for pretty cheap!

1. Cut your fabric to extend a couple of inches beyond each side of your canvas.

2. Wrap your fabric around the canvas and secure on the back with a staple.  Start in the middle of one side & work to the corners, then move to the opposite side.  At the corner, fold the fabric like you would when wrapping a present.  Secure with a staple.

3. Decide on the spacing you want for your ribbons & cut ribbon to extend a couple of inches past each end of the canvas.

 4. Secure the ribbons on the back of the canvas with a staple.  Check the front as you go to ensure that your ribbons are straight.

5. Add the bows to the front & you have a cute bow storage!

A prayer...

I was perusing Pinterest (in lieu of picking up toys or doing the dishes) and I found this picture, with a great prayer for parents.  I feel like it's a great reminder to ask God to guide us as we strive to raise Godly children.   Just wanted to share a little inspiration today.  Love to all!  

Adley's First Easter

Well, in spite of the moving chaos around here, we managed to get dressed up in our Easter best for worship on Sunday.  Adley was absolutely adorable in her floral dress and she thought the little hat that matched the dress was absolutely hilarious!  She wore it almost all morning without trying to rip it off her head, which is a rare occurrence considering the bows I put on her last all of 2 minutes!  There was a little Easter egg hunt on the playground after church.  Matt helped Baby Girl "find" two eggs...and she has had so much fun with them since then.  Who knew two plastic eggs could be so entertaining?

I also missed posting her 8 month and 9 month pictures.  These monthly pictures are becoming more of a challenge because that little rascal just won't sit still.  For her 9 month pics, I was able to use a singing bear to distract her long enough to snap a couple of pics.

She has been a busy little bee over the last month.  She is pulling up on anything and everything these days, and she finally mastered the art of crawling without her head on the ground!  She loves to eat, and prefers to eat whatever we are eating more than baby food.  Some of her favorite foods are avocado, green beans, chicken, mushrooms, and cheese.

At her 9 month check-up, she had lost some weight, so she had to have some blood tests done just to make sure everything was OK.  We went to the Texas Children's Hospital, and they took 5 vials of blood from her tiny little arms!  They had to use both arms because she squirmed too much and pulled the needle out of the first arm.  It was absolutely heart breaking to have to hold her down and listen to her cry so hard while she was staring at me with this "why are you letting them do this?" look.  All I could think was how thankful and blessed we are that she is not one of the children that have a constant place at the Children's Hospital.  Thankfully, all of her blood tests came back fine, so the doctor said she is just small for her age.  We went back to the doctor yesterday and she had gained 11 ounces in 2 weeks, so she is back on track with her weight gain!

Meanwhile, on the moving front, the unpacking and organizing is moving along at a snail's pace!  I had papers to grade this week, so that put me behind.  Adley loves to "help" unpack, which generally involves her undoing everything that I have just done, so it's one step forward and two steps back on the organizing.  Oh well...I'm sure that it will get done eventually!

Moving Again...

Don't worry.  We aren't changing cities again, just moving out of our apartment and into a house!  Woo hoo!  I think this is move #1568, give or take a few! Sorry to be dramatic...it is actually only move #10 for us since we got married.  Thankfully, most of our stuff is already packed up & in a storage building.  We only brought the "bare essentials" to the apartment, in hopes that we would be able to sell our house in Dallas & buy a house here in Houston quickly.  Thankfully, our house in Dallas sold in February & we closed on the house in Houston a couple of weeks ago!  So...here we go again with another move: packing, moving trucks, and eating off paper plates for a few days!  We are praying that we will stay put for awhile, but you just never know what God has in store!

7 Months...

I can't believe Baby Girl is already 7 months old!  I've decided that she's growing up a little too fast!

She now has 4 teeth...the top 2 middle ones are peeking through, in addition to her bottom 2 that she got back when she was 4 months old.  She can sit up on her own pretty well now, although she occasionally still topples over & gets a little irritated.  She's also still working really hard to crawl...but she still just gets on her hands & knees and rocks back and forth.  This past week she has apparently figured out that she can "talk" very loudly, so at times she will just sit and make all sorts of funny noises at the top of her lungs.  She thinks it's hilarious & it cracks me up!  It is so much fun to watch her change & learn new things!

The most exciting development (for Matt and me, at least) is her decision to start sleeping through the night!  Just after she turned 6 months old, and had not come close to sleeping through the night, this momma decided that she couldn't take it anymore!  6 months of not getting more than 3 or 4 hours of sleep at a time was really starting to take its toll...call me a wimp, but I need my sleep!  I knew that she was old enough to sleep a long stretch without eating, but with all of the traveling that we were doing, and Matt being gone so much for work, it had just been easier up to that point to feed her when she woke up because she would quickly go back to sleep without a fight.  I knew that training her to sleep through the night would possibly cause us to get less sleep at first, so that had me a little nervous, since I already felt like I never slept!  Anyway, a couple of people recommended the book The Sleep Lady's Good Night, Sleep Tight, so after Christmas Matt & I were both going to be in the same place for a week or two, so we thought we would give it a try.  I liked this book for a couple of reasons: 1) It was a quick read & had sleep training advice broken down into months, so you could skip to the part for the age of your baby, and 2)It was a "less tears" approach to sleep training than the strict "cry-it-out" methods.  Again, call me a wimp, but the thought of closing the door & letting her scream had my stomach in knots.  All of the nervousness and stress over the thought of "sleep training" was apparently for not...it only took us about 3 days & she was sleeping all night.  In those 3 days she would wake up just a couple of times & Matt would go in (if I went in she would get too mad because she wanted to eat & knew I had the food) and "shh" her and pat her and she would fall back asleep in just a few minutes!  Since then we have been getting hours of uninterrupted sleep & I'm starting to feel more human and less zombie-like!  We have had a few "set-backs" in the sleeping all night realm (her recent teething episode & a trip to Colorado), but overall I am so thankful that we finally broke down & convinced her to sleep all night.  I didn't intend to ramble on & on about sleeping, but clearly it was a big deal for me!

Now for the real reason anyone reads this blog...pictures of that sweet baby girl!  First, some of her 7 month pictures.  I love all the cute expressions she makes these days!

Then, I thought I would give you a look back at the last 7 months of pictures, just so you can see how much she has changed!

Baby's First Christmas

I'm a little late with this post, but Adley's first Christmas was so much fun!  We had several different celebrations that stretched over a couple of weeks.  Of course, she wasn't spoiled one bit!  She just has enough new toys and presents to last her quite a long time!

Our first Christmas celebration was two weekends before Christmas in Broken Arrow with Matt's family.  We had a nice, relaxing weekend where we enjoyed finger foods, unwrapping gifts & going to see some Christmas lights.  Adley was completely mesmerized by all the lights!

Christmas in Duncan was the following weekend with my mom's side of the family, and then we celebrated on Christmas morning with my immediate family, and later in the day with my dad's family.  We certainly don't skimp on the Christmas celebrations!


Although Adley certainly enjoys playing with all of her toys & reading her new books, she was really  more interested in the bows and tissue paper while we were unwrapping presents.  I'm sure she'll be right in the middle of everything next Christmas!

Christmas has always been my favorite holiday.  I'm sure it's due to the beautiful decorations at my parents' house, and all the fun celebrations that we have with family and friends around the holidays. And I love cold weather, so that's just an added bonus!  But, celebrating Christmas this year with Adley was by far more exciting than any Christmas in the past!

Friday Favorite Things

I get a daily email from Finding Joy that always has an encouraging thought, especially for stay at home moms.  Every Friday she posts her "Favorite Things" from the week, which is her way of recognizing the everyday things she is grateful for.  I thought I would give it a go today.

Here are a few things I'm thankful for this week:

1. This sleepy baby who slept most of the way home on our flights from Colorado on Sunday.

2. Selling our house in Dallas so we can begin the search for a house in Houston.  Although we will miss our house in Dallas, and I'm a little sad to see it go, it is a blessing to have it sold!

3. My sweet girl trying so hard to crawl and sit up on her own.

4. A nice, relaxing week at home.  After all our travels over the past few months, and moving yet again, it was a welcome change to just spend the week in one place with our little family.

I hope you all enjoy your weekend!