Today

Crafts
The blankie for Baby Lucy is in the mail (just so you know Rebecca!) and so here's a little sneak peak of it.





It was also fun to make something girly and pretty. I love the bright pink with the green. I was tempted to wrap Max up in it to try it out, but Adam would have had a fit!

The weather today is dreary and rainy and makes me want to crochet a scarf. Actually knit a scarf, but since I can't knit... I need to find one of the older ladies at church to just sit me down and teach me once and for all instead of complaining about it all the time.


Also I'm back on this project, which in my head thought I would never complete, and here a year and a half later I'm still working away on it. I'm "sewing" (with single crochet) strips and strips of grannys together. Then there's just one or two round of single crochet for the border to give it some substance around there. I know I'll love it on the guest bed when I'm done, I just.... have... to... finish.... Luckily I still like the colors, my luck I would have finished it to find I'd rather have different ones.

Max
He put himself down for a nap yesterday, last night for bed, and again this morning for a nap all on his own. Last night to go to bed he cried for 20 minutes and I only had to visit him once to give him his binkie back (at the 10 minute mark) and this morning he didn't cry at all.

The best part about all of this doesn't even have to do with his naps. Last night he slept from 8:30 to 7:30 this morning. That's the second time he's done that. I did hear him once or twice last night, but before I could even get out of bed he had quieted himself. Oh man, I try to not let it spoil me in case it's not the norm. Then this morning so far he's slept for two hours and is still going....

He had his first go at cereal this morning. Of course it was so runny, it could just slip out of his mouth and he tried to suck on the spoon, and then ot frustrated towards the end because he wasn't getting enough and couldn't figure it out. But we'll try it again tonight before bedtime.



I saw this picture today and it reminded me of something...


Oh wait I know, it was a picture taken one year and one month ago in Tampa.


Blogging
I'm thinking about a major overhaul for my blog, but can't decide if I really want to but the time into it. I'm normally a small change a little at a time kinda person, new header here, new sidebars there, you know that sort of thing.

Childlike
Food around this house has been interesting since the move really. We've had a number of events and things where sometimes we don't even eat dinner at the house for almost a week. It's been a little hard to plan for the grocery (which I do or else I buy a bunch of random things that you can't make a meal out of).

But this week is actually a week where we are home (at least for dinner) most nights. So earlier this week at the grocery I noticed a trend in my purchases. I was resorting back to kid food, comforting things that don't take a lot of prep (which is great for me and Max) but are sure to please. This week we've had or are having- mini corn dogs, chicken fingers and oven fries, hamburgers and mac and cheese, and pigs in a blanket (chicken though instead of hot dogs). And I have been snacking on Goldfish crackers this week. Strange...

I've also had the chance to bake this morning while Max is sleeping. Pecan Pie anyone?

Last bit of food, I didn't make it, but you know it's close to autumn when these start popping up in the store.

I couldn't resist.

Also don't forget to comment on my last post to let me know you read my blog. I'm wanting to try and make a map of my readers. You don't have to think of anything witty to say, just let me know you are there!

Curious

You may have noticed I put a new tracker on my blog.... Well it shows some curious places where I can't place who they are and that makes me curious.

I wonder who reads my blog? There seem to be quite a few of you besides my mom and inlaws and brothers and sisters and grandparents. Lot's of people tell me they do, so I'm guessing there are more who do and I don't know about it.

If you read my blog (whether I know about it or not) leave me a comment here so I know you do.

If I don't personally know you, let me know how you found my blog, I'd love to know.

Just click on "leave a comment" and make sure you sign your name if you don't have a google account and are logged in.

Thanks for playing along with me and satifying my curiosity.
:)

The three "M"s

Mom
My mom came out to visit this past weekend with my cousins, we had a grand time together. The girls just loved to help with Max. I'll post when I get all the pictures of the camera and into a slide show.

Max
Today we saw our new pediatrician. I really liked her. Adam got to go along as well.

I was a little concerned about Max because he's still so skinny. I expected him to chunk up, and he really has since he's been on formula, but he really hasn't gained a lot of weight. Today he only weighed 11lbs7oz and so the doctor said to continue feeding him all the formula we have been (32oz a day) and to start him on cereal and solids. There's really no explanation for him to be so skinny, he loves to eat, and doesn't vomit or have diarrhea, and doesn't have anything wrong with his heart. So we'll just keep feeding him and she wants to see him again in a month for a weight check.

He also had his first set of immunizations today. He wasn't happy about that, but was a trooper and just cried for a couple of minutes. It wasn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be.

The ped is also a big fan of self soothing and the child putting himself to sleep (so am I, to tell you the truth) and so she suggested we start letting Max put himself to sleep. We have some guidelines and I'm sitting here listening to the poor thing crying while he's going down for his nap. I commonly put him down while he's still groggy anyway so hopefully the transition won't be so hard. I'm glad to start this now because Max has been waking up earlier and earlier in the middle of the night. It used to be 5 and now it's more commonly 3 am. So the hope is that self soothing will cause him to sleep better through the night, I think that along with having cereal will be a great mix for him. (Hopefully)

As I'm writing this I'm thinking of all my close friends and family who have had children recently and how funny it is how we all raise our babies a little bit differently and it makes me laugh. I'm sure they will all turn out just fine in the end and we all just do what we can handle.

Ministry
Nobody said ministry would be easy. I knew it wouldn't be, and besides we've done a lot of ministry in the past, just not full time, even if it felt that way.

We've completely enjoyed our new position in life but of course something are more fun than others.

School started last week or the week before and so along with the rest of the world we are adjusting to new schedules.

We do havea couple of things that we never figured we'd be doing but are excited about the prospects. Tonight begins AWANA. Adam and I were never exposed to this as kids (Adam was in Grace Brethren Boys and I was a Girl Scout, but that's as close as we get) but we are going to be leaders this year and we have Sparks, luckily all of our kids are second graders (the oldest of the Sparks group) and are veterans, so we'll see how that goes .

Second, we are temporarily leading the senior high youth group. This will start the 21st of September and we're not quite sure yet exactly what it will look like as we just were official about it last night. We're hounding our youth pastor friends big time though as we never thought we'd be in this capacity.

We are looking to the Lord and hoping that all of this is most of all honoring to Him. He knows the plans He has for us even if we don't understand it at the time.

We've had a busy one

We've had a busy day with lots of fun and lots of kids.

Today our friends John and Patricia visited with their little boy Alex, we haven't seen Alex since he was a couple of weeks old and now he's ove a year old. He loved to give Max hugs and it was great to catch up with friends we used to see every week and haven't seen over a year. John is a youth pastor in Iowa and they only live 2.5 hours away, if you don't get lost. :)

We also babysat our friends' little girl Elin today. Elin's daddy, Dave, went to M*ch*g*n. Well in honor if it being opening day of college football we took this pic amongst others.


Then my mom came into town to visit for the weekend and brought along with her two of my younger cousins, Amber and Cailynn, 7 and 8 years old respectively. I had a dish drier, Max watcher, and toy pickerupper. We also made chocolate chunk chocolate cookies. They didn't look very good but they are delicious. Each girl got a pan and a spoon and Adam got to lick out the bowl. Fun was had by all.

So now we are watching Mary Poppins and the girls are trying to keep their eyes open as they've never seen it. How could you be 7 & 8 and never have seen Mary Poppins? My guess is they've also never seen, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, The Greatest Show on Earth, or Gidget. How sad.

Chairs, Slings, Visits, Max in two containers

Parents
Adam's parents were here this weekend and we had a great time. Both Grammy and I forgot the camera all weekend. But we had lots of fun going around town and spending Sunday at church.





In the shops on the square we found an old fashioned high chair (we are unsure whether it's an antique or not) for us to use with Max. I just have to fashion a belt for him to use it. I may even paint it black so it matches our dining room chairs. We'll see.


This weekend my mom will be in town with a couple of my little cousins. Should be fun!

Crafting
I've also been a little crafty this week. Two little girls at church have both shown interest in the sling I carry Max in every Sunday at church. One little girl (a first grader) made her mom tie a towel around her so she could carry her baby doll around like Max. And the other (almost two year old) put on my sling while I was in the nursery and I showed her how to put a baby doll in it. She didn't like that, and took the doll out and walked straight over to one of the ladies that was rocking Max at the time and kept saying, "Baby Max" over and over wanting him to get in the sling. At least she knew who belonged in it! :) So this week I took some of the large amounts of fabric that I have and made each girl a little sling of their own. They are really cute, I hope they like them.

I've also been working on little baby girl stuff. :) Since I don't have my own, I've got to make cute stuff for Baby Lucy being born in Texas around Thanksgiving.

Max
This past week we've had to move Max to mostly formula, he's been gaining weight alot since he's started. It was a tough decision but he really made it for us. He refuses to nurse except at night and in the morning. He's been also getting juice once a day and absolutely loves it! We go to the doctor next week for his checkup (and to meet his new doctor) and we'll be asking about starting rice cereal. He's getting so big!

He's a mover and a shaker now. He kicks himself around in a circle and rolls over everytime he's put on his tummy, even though he enjoys being on his tummy a lot more now. He's also grasping toys intentionally and giggles when we talk to him now.

Playing with the monkey


Hanging out with Daddy


Just like Daddy, playing in the laundry basket


For those of you who loved the mixing bowl. He's too big for it now, but he loves to pretend he's soup.

My Community Weekly

Here are some pictures of our current home. No pictures on the walls or anything like that but I've been trying to use what I can as I open boxes, which means that most rooms do not have things that coordinate, but oh well, that's always kinda been my style anyway.

View from across the street at the mailbox


Our Living Room- Complete with Adam talking on the phone with our friend Lenny. Hi Lenny and Steph!



View from the livingroom to the dining room and kitchen



The kitchen



Our bedroom (it's laundry day, that's why there's no sheets on our bed



Max's bedroom (taken quickly while he was taking a nap



The spare bedroom (and craft room)



We call this room "the box room" because it's where we are keeping all of our unopened boxes

I'm so bad at this...

I know it's Friday, but I didn't take pictures of our house and anything I take now that it's late will be poor. So I'll take the pictures tomorrow and post then, but just in case you are checking, there is a new header featuring my model son. He likes to talk to the camera now when I get it out. He hams it up when he sees the orange warning light before the flash.

In other news about me, I'm discovering it's hard being a mom. Gosh I'm just tired, and when Max decided he needs to be up all night (which isn't often, but he is a baby afterall) it's just a drain on me all day and I get frustrated when I don't get things done that I think I need to.

Today when Adam got home from work and done spending an hour and a half on the phone with Verizon, just to find out that they can't fix our voicemail and we need to take our phones to the store, I gave him Max and put in my headphones to my MP3 player and actually enjoyed 25 minutes of doing the dishes (as we are without a dishwasher) and not being able to hear him cry or scream or anything. Just me and my music and some soap. Sadly, that was the best 25minutes I had all day.

It's also hard, because I've got all these great creative ideas and projects I would like to complete and no time to complete them, Max's good naps are spent catching up on laundry (which is never cought up on) and trying to pick up toys and blankets and binkys strewn about. Maybe I just need to start a sketchbook because I'm never going to remember these by the time he's od enough to not need constant care.

I love motherhood, sometimes I just wish it was only a 12 hour a day job instead of 24. But then as every mother says, when he smiles at me or is sleeping contentedly in my arms, it's all worth it. I just hope tonight he sleeps contentedly, in his crib, until say, 5-6 am.