I Love Fall

I never really appreciated the awesomeness of fall when I was growing up. I always loved Spring, I loved the blossoms on the trees and the snow melting, I also loved my birthday which just so happened to be in the spring time.

I have a new appreciation for fall though, I love the changing leaves here! They are just starting to change and it's beautiful. I hope I don't miss the best part when I'm in Utah, hopefully I'll still get a good view of the vibrant leaves before I leave. I also love the flavors of fall! mmmm, sweetbreads, and pumpkin (just about) everything! I love warm yummy soups... mmm! I'm not the type to change my wardrobe drastically with each season... but I think the fall fashion is very cute, even though I don't really participate in it. Maybe I will when we're rich... for now I'll take my wardrobe for all seasons. It works for me :)

I'm glad that there are changing seasons, it helps keep things fresh and non boring.

oatmeal

Look what my oatmeal made for me yesterday...

Just showing me a little love. I love hearts, they just make me feel good

 

Our House, in the Middle of the Street

Ok ok... I know we have lived in our house for two months now. And I have no excuse for a video tour to take this long to post... sorry. Click here to watch it on Youtube

We love our house and we'd welcome any visitors. We do have an extra bedroom after all :)

If any of you are confused about the comment I made about our ugly kitchen chairs in the video, click here to read about that post.

Yes there are some quirks with the house (the washer and dryer being in completely different parts of the house, and the shower instead of a bath tub). If any handyman family or friends want to come down and help us out in fixing these quirks we'd offer free room and board, along with all your meals... free of charge ;)

7 Months

Cambria turned 7 months old last week! My baby is growing up!! Just so you get an idea of how big she is here are a few pictures :)

[caption id="attachment_813" align="aligncenter" width="640"] This is one of Cambria's newborn pictures. Same tutu as...[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_814" align="aligncenter" width="640"] this... she's kinda grown up.[/caption]

Some of her major accomplishments this month:

- sitting, she could do it before, but now she's getting good enough that I feel comfortable walking away for a bit if she is on the carpet
- getting on her hands and knees
-rocking on her hands and knees
-her tongue thing

Too cute!
- babbeling! I have an adorable video that hopefully I'll post soon.
- she still doesn't like solids. I have tried lots of fruits (not baby food, but letting her suck on them and the only ones she likes to eat eat eat... apples and bananas (catch the song reference?)) and I can only get one bite of cereal in her mouth before she isn't interested in the spoon (she'll eat it out of a bottle just fine)
- screaming! This one I'm not too excited about, but alas, what can ya do?
- Peek-a-boo! She loves this game!
- laughing - she has been doing this for months, but she is doing it a lot more! She's adorable.

I love our precious little miracle! She brings me joy every day! I am so grateful for her!

 

Long drive

We went to Georgia this weekend to spend some time with R&R and kids. Baby Brynna was blessed this weekend. We had a lot of fun, and Jonathan did a lot of spinning :) The kids realized that it's really fun to be spun around, and it's even more fun to be spun really high and really fast. Needless to say, he got his workout, and he spent a lot of time recovering from being dizzy :). We also played cars, and go fish, and chatted. Don't forget a late night game of phase 10 Twist. As the night went on, dad got more and more punchy! It was so funny!
The trip is a ten hour drive one way. Luckily for us, we have an amazing baby that can handle trips like that.
On the way home, she informed us that she wasn't too happy about taking another ten hour drive... but two blowouts, another poopy diaper, five hours of crying and maybe three hours of sleeping later. We got home, and she was HAPPY to get out of that car seat.
All I can say is that I'm grateful that babies are so forgiving.

Extremes on the Spectrum Today

Today, before I put Cambria down for her first nap, she fell asleep while nursing. She never does this anymore. She even stayed asleep while I tried to burp her. There's nothing as sweet as a sleeping cuddly baby.

Then she woke up. And screamed. Not just cried, but literally screamed, loud and shrill enough to make one's blood boil. No joke. Not only did she do that, but she did it for twenty minutes straight, right after she had a blow out, so I had to change her bum. All the while she was sticking her hand in her dirty diaper.

She may have been left on the floor, in only a diaper while I did all I could to keep from crying, pulling my hair out, and maybe even having a screaming session myself.

Needless to say, I have felt both extremes on the mommy spectrum today.

** why do I put this in my blog you ask? Because I want to document real life... not just the joy filled moments. Maybe I'm not the only one who has gotten to that horrible breaking point. And I think there's something to be said about admitting that I have hard moments. **

Fave's from the Temple today

Today was our monthly-meet-up-at-the-temple with J&S. We did a baby swap with some friends first, and then met up with J&S. I just love how social Cambria is.

[caption id="attachment_793" align="aligncenter" width="300"] This is Cambria's friend Levi, they had a fun few moments of just staring at each other[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_794" align="aligncenter" width="300"] "Guess what Levi, in 15 years and 9 months you can take Cambria on a date" Says Jonathan... I guess he likes Levi ;) (Levi just turned three months yesterday)[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_795" align="aligncenter" width="300"] "COUSIN!" on of their first moment's of reuniting - Photo Bomber: James[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_796" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Photo Bomber: James[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_797" align="aligncenter" width="300"] "I missed you!"[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_798" align="aligncenter" width="300"] awwww... Loves![/caption]

[caption id="attachment_799" align="aligncenter" width="300"] Struggle: stand in the shade and not be able to see our faces, or stand in the sun and get the squinty eye'd look? I think next month it'll be the squinty eye'd look.[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_800" align="aligncenter" width="225"] This is what happens when daddy asks if we have enough diapers and she says yes without checking... she has to wear a burp rag, and she has to be naked because I only want to wash one thing rather than an outfit too... Maybe in the coming hours, days, months, or years it'll be funny :)[/caption]

Getting into crafting

There are so many things I feel like I could blog about right now. I think I'm going to talk about my awesome projects that I'm going to work on.

I spent a significant amount of time last week shopping for fabric. I did it online at fabric.com. I am quite impressed with them! I got the fabric yesterday and man! It's cute!! I'm so excited! So... what am I going to make out of it? Well... let me tell you. I'm going to change this... 

into hopefully something cute :) I bought some yellow and white fabric for the back, and I'm going to buy some white vinyl for the bottom! I'm so excited! I think it's going to be cute!

I also bought some ADORABLE fabric for a carseat cover for J&S's baby coming in December.

Then yesterday I went to Joann's and bought some fabric for a blanky for R&R's baby that we're going to see this next weekend!

Let the sewing begin!!!

My Full-Time Job

On Saturday we went to a social gathering for Jonathan's entire college, there were lots of people there. I was asked several times what I did, I would consciously hold my head up high and tell them that I stay home with our baby. I noticed that there was a lot of respect in people's reactions. One lady who had a ten month old of her own responded "wow! That's awesome, I couldn't do it. I tried for two months and then had to get out of the house." Another response was "wow! That's a full time job!" to which I responded "yep... 24/7 with few breaks."

I'm really glad that people are respectful to my decision to stay home. Often times there is a misunderstanding that you are a lesser woman if you stay home with your kids. I have wondered if we sometimes bring that upon ourselves. It's not uncommon to hear (especially in the professional world) a wife of a professional to say "I'm *just* a mom" or say "I used to do _____ before I had kids." To that response I want to say "No, it's a blessing to be able to stay home and raise your children. It's the best place you can be... your kids need you." Granted, there's always exceptions to the rules, but for the most part, this is where I need to be, with my baby, nurturing, loving, and teaching her at home.

Memory Lane

My screen saver is just a reel of my pictures. It's so fun just sitting and taking several trips down memory lane. It's crazy how many memories are attached to one picture.

Some memories are great ones, like our "fort night" date, where we made a fort and slept in it, or James and Sadie's wedding, or OUR wedding... some aren't that great, like previous pregnancy pictures that didn't last past the first trimester. Other's are just silly, like the picture I took of Jonathan's first "preppy" shorts I made him buy, or the time we balanced Easter eggs upright on Adam and Janelle's counter top.

But... all in all, I have loved my life thus far. I am very blessed, and I hope to never forget that.

Amazing First Date

I have a friend in Utah that I used to visit teach that would tell me about her dating adventures with her husband. One of them was to go on a first date with your husband. She would often tell me how difficult it was to not grab her husband's hand, or talk about the frustrations of work/school etc. She would go as far as having her husband drive around the block just so he could pick her up at the door. We couldn't do that because we thought the baby sitter might think that a little weird. We did, however, go on a first date. It was a lot of fun, it was really hard and very weird to not hold hands on our way to the restaurant. It was kind of fun to hear the answers from Jonathan to questions I already knew the answers to. It's just a reminder that I don't know everything about him.

We had such a good time, and it was a lot of fun! I highly recommend it. It's also quite refreshing to have a rule that you can't talk about babies, house stresses etc. on your date. At first it was hard to find things to talk about, but I'm sure with more practice, I'll be able to ask more thought provoking questions.