Week 25-Anika

There is nothing that compares to welcoming a sweet newborn into the family. 

We were so excited to meet our sweet niece baby Anika (Monica - "M") Erin, born June 16th.

Couper went down to nanny Anika's brother and sister for two days while I took care of some things in Logan. Em and I were so excited to meet her two days old! We were in awe of her tininess and the special Spirit that was present in her hospital room. She was born into an amazing family with outstanding parents, and we already love her to pieces!

Seriously? What a doll! (So sad Couper didn't take any pics with her or the kids!)

It was a very special/unique week otherwise as well, which I feel important to note. 

Events including but not limited to:

*Celebrating Father's Day and the amazing Daddy my eternal companion is!

*Lots of prayers and love sent out for Logan Bear and his delicate heart

*Bees game with outstanding company and a loopy Em

*Cousin fun and more Anika time after the Gelter's arrived home from the hospital

*Sleepover at Uncle Ben and Aunt Lissie's

*Kalia and Ryland's baptism at St. John the Baptist's Parish

*Soccer/authentic gordita celebration in honor of the World Cup

...quite a week I tell ya!

Week 13: Personality Board

Emelia is 15 months!

Here is a glimpse of her adorable personality that we can't get enough of.

*My favorite things about Em this month are the consistent, free-giving hugs and kisses directed toward me. Whether I'm bent down putting something in a cupboard, cooking dinner, or folding laundry, she'll scoot over give me a hug and a pat (accompanied with an "ahh") and sometimes add a kiss, then scoot along her way. It melts my heart every time. I also love her increased desire and ability to communicate. We basically have full-on conversations everyday, in our own way. I love her spirited, wide-eyed nod.
*Coup's favorite things are the way Em blows kisses (especially when voluntary), and the way she'll sit on his lap and snuggle while watching Curious George. (Never having been much of a snuggler, if we find something that makes her snuggle, we gravitate toward it!)
*We both love that she folds her arms during prayer (or at least at the beginning). She has even reminded us to bless the food on one or two occasions. And we have all loved being able to go on walks (when it's not snowing intermittently...) and spend more time together with Coup's more relaxed schedule.

(She's just trying to get the hat off, not amputate.)

*Em has picked up so many new signs this month it's been hard to keep track. Many of them are to do with food (not surprising, this girl is a bottomless pit, and thankfully loves most food) or the weather/outside. A couple of my favorites that are just too cute are "thank you," "carrot," "balloon," and "potty."

*She is trying to say more sounds and words, but it's still mostly just babble. When she does try a word it's in a raspy whisper. Some new words we're quite positive we've heard more than once are: "look," "dog," "baby," & "duck."

*Her love for dolls continues to grow, and it feeds on her obsession with babies in general.

We haven't mastered the art of "selfies" like her and her dad.

(Forgive me for my inability to make my black and white pictures look the same color, sigh...that's just silly.)

Week 9-Not a Leap Year

Did it not feel like February came and went in the blink of an eye?! How is it that a month only being 2 or 3 days shorter can feel like you just went over a small speed bump, and then just as quickly it's behind you and you've forgotten about it? I'm kind of perplexed it's over, but I welcome March and the hopefulness of spring it brings.

~    ~    ~

We had a spontaneous visit from cousins Annie and Charlotte. Annie and I are just a few months apart in age, and so are our girls (you may recall seeing them here). Living almost two hours apart, and leading busy lives, has left our play-dates few-and-far-between! So grateful for some sunshine and Annie's willingness to leave her house at 6 in the morning so that we could have a breakfast/morning play-date. Seriously, doesn't that just make her the most awesome cousin human being on the planet? It felt like it to me. I sure love her and our sisterly/cousinly bond. Can't wait to watch a similar friendship unfold with our girls.

(Side note: Em loves balls and would play with them all day long. She's getting a pretty good arm, so, we're grateful that warm weather is approaching and we can prevent any major damages by playing outside.)

With every tearful episode there needs to be giggles and smiles to exceed the sad, or at least even it out. We finally had to cave and purchase Em a convertible car seat this week (is this a painful experience for anyone else?!). The jumungo box the car seat came in was the perfect size for Em's first cardboard house. (Some of my best childhood memories were made in such houses.) Said house was the perfect remedy to a tearful afternoon. Throwing balloons in and out and playing peek-a-boo through the window were just what the doctor ordered.

In other news, Couper had his last home game with the WBB team Saturday night. Before he left, he leaned over to kiss me goodbye and said, "It's weird, tonight is kind of like my "Senior Night" too." Very surreal. I'm glad they could pull a fun win and that Em and I, along with many family members could attend to support our Coup.

(This pic was taken before Christmas.)

Our 14 month Em


*Getting sillier and smarter everyday.
*new signs: bread, bird, poop (which we joke looks like "ole!"), and she created her own signs for binky and music/dance, I think they both fit the mold quite well.
*words noises: "bye," "da-da-da," "mam! (amen)," "kkkhh (yuck)," "wussat? (what's that?)" but..if we're going to be honest here she mostly grunts and uses her signs.
*She cracks us up with endless jibber-jabber and fake laughing, usually on car-rides.
*She's a little too good at the stairs (only up, still working on down).
*She is skillful at testing our patience: standing in the tub, getting into the fridge, baby-wipe parades, food confetti off the highchair, all of which provide good learning opportunities.
*She is fixated on remotes and phones and can locate them immediately up any room she enters.
*Two of her top teeth are trying to make an appearance but are being bashful, so she still only has two teeth!

Week 5-books

We have several bookshelves in every room of this little condo; 

each stuffed with more than it's fair share of reading material. 

I took a good look at our makeshift nightstands this week as I was cleaning our room (I should take a picture). I found that the weak plastic shelf that makes up the top is concave due to the weight of stacks of books. Some may call it clutter, but I call it refreshing & enlightening. We like having the one book you can't put down (so it's constantly changing), the...2 or 3 books you can read here and there for inspiration or a good laugh, scriptures, a journal or two, one from the library, the one borrowed from a friend, a kid's book or two...seriously, made me smile all that we had going on on our about-to-collapse bookstands nightstands. You can probably tell a lot about a person by what's piled next to their head where they sleep. (You should take inventory, what did you learn about yourself?)

We're so glad that Emelia caught the bug.

It is not uncommon to find Miss Melia sitting in the midst of a pile of books, thumbing through each page and talking/signing to herself.  She's been this way since she was about 7-months; who needs toys?! We absolutely love sharing this part of life with her.

13-months

Some fun things to note this month about our little Em:

*She is still completely obsessed with dogs and signs it well

*She trys to bark like a dog...hilarious

*She most clearly says: "Uh-oh!" "Hi!" "Wow." "Ma-ma-ma."

*She says an airy, "Aahh!" after EVERY time she..or anyone else, takes a drink, how refreshing!

*She has THE BEST belly laugh; every cell in her body is helping to produce that beautiful sound, I'm sure of it.

*She can point to 6 body parts when named, on herself and others-sometimes

(nose, hair, belly-button, ears, knees, toes)

*New signs she has added to her vocab: banana, car, up, bus, cat

*She has often signed 2 or 3 phrases! (cold snow, more banana please, etc)

*She is only nursing mommy's milk two times a day

*She loves mommy so much she has to be hugging her legs constantly :)....even when mommy's going to the bathroom :(

*She loves daddy so much she plays all sorts of fun games with him

*Em is such a good helper! When she signs "all done" with an activity we sign "clean up, please" she signs "clean up" and happily helps us put her toys away. Her chores include putting her diaper in the bin (she started this on her own, signing "help" one day and never looking back) and her clothes in the hamper (I have to note that she cannot have even a string hanging over the side of the hamper, it's very serious work)

*Still too nervous/cautious to walk alone but is a pro with her birthday stroller!

*She loves balls and is getting really good at pass; good thing warm weather is coming

*We actually think she has an obsession with circles of all kinds

*We love when she does "kooks" to show affection

*She's getting really good at blowing kisses

*She hates getting messy diapers changed and will only eat meat when it's disguised

Little WofW

"If you eat a penny and poop it out, will it still be a penny when it comes out?"

--Amber-9

Context: Over dinner at my house, Kionna and Amber were asking me what I thought it would be like if I had triplets. Before I could even really give an answer, they were spouting off what they thought the pros and cons were. (Really wish I could have just recorded this whole conversation.) One question Kionna-13 asked was, "Would you rather have four-girls the same age, or three-boys?"

Amber's-9 reply, completely confident in herself, "Well, the girls, duh! Guys are 20% more likely to do stupid stuff than girls." Oh really? Where did you hear that statistic.

"Myself."

Babies!

What a time to be pregnant! 

I was looking through my pictures and was reminded of how I was unintentionally pregnant at the same time as many, many loved ones. I don't even have picture with all of the friends and family that now have little friends for Em, this is just a portion that I was actually able to capture on camera.

What a fun season of life!

My dear cousin Annie.

Annie & Charlotte, Me & Em, Valerie & Reagan

We three cousins grew up playing together and now we all have girls
about the same age distance apart as each of us. Love it!

        Allie & Me                                            Three of my besties from HighSchool! We all had a baby within 4 1/2 months

                                                                of each other! It was Chelle's 2nd, and Aida's 3rd, but we all have one the same age! :)

  Logan,  Carter, Eli, Em

Michelle and I are the only ones that live near each other, but we were all able to get together for an evening when Em was about 5 months old. Love these girls, and their babes, SO MUCH!

          

Prego the same time as some close friends from DownEast!
(I was only 13 weeks, I announced I was expecting at our picnic)
Raquel, Me, Janet

Bestie Janet moved to Arizona for her hubby's Dental School in the midst of
both of our pregnancies. We've been DYING to give each others babies cuddles
and for our girls to meet! They visited Logan for a day this summer and we were lucky
enough to spend a little time with them.

The girls didn't quite know what to think of the grass...or sitting that close to each other.

But they gave each other the giggles and seemed to enjoy each other :).


Wish I had pictures with the many others of you that were prego at the same time as me! Em and I are beyond lucky to have such good friends!

per request

Many people have asked me why I haven't been blogging lately, and also to post pics of projects. While there are many reasons I can give for not blogging, I'll spare you and shower you with pictures of projects. The majority of my projects have been either cleaning/organizing projects...of which no pictures were taken. And sewing projects. Can we say "BABY FEVER!?" Yes, I have the fever, always have and always will, but the baby fever I speak of is the fact that eight close friends or family members have had babies in the last THREE MONTHS! Now, that's a lot of babies, and that means a lot of sewing for me! I didn't take pictures of all projects, but here's insight! I've loved learning new things and picking out fabrics to match people's

personalities or preferences :).

I made another nursing cover, personally love the fabric, and it wasn't nearly as intimidating the second time around! Found the pattern here on makeitandloveit. I see it get put to use quite often seeing how it was for my sister, so that's fulfilling :)

*car seat covers! (LOVE this fabric!!) I used a mixture of a pattern my sister-in-law gave me and tips from ginabean to get end results for these trendy doodahs.*

*car seat cover and matching burp cloth*

*car seat cover*

*I especially liked this matching burp cloth idea because it was entirely "make it up as you go." My mom always used the cloth diapers as burp cloths when I was growing up and I'm noticing what a good idea it is because they're thick and durable through many washes. I decided to spice this one up a bit with scraps left over from the car seat cover so they were matching :).*

*the ruffles turned out pretty cute if I do say so myself!*

*I've started making burp cloths and bibs with terry cloth on one side so that they're more absorbent...seems to be a success, however they are NOT fun to turn right side out!*

*My cousin had an adorable baby boy in December and she LOVES giraffes, so I made her this set of cuteness.*

*I couldn't resist this adorable polka dot fabric. This green and blue set turned out quite fun! and the "pee pee tee pees" are always a hit! They get loud laughter every time..totally worth it.*

* one year old gift. Toddlers seem to love to take things in and out of ..things. So I fashioned these fun bean bags from some scrap fabric and buttons and paired them with a small bucket to make a fun and inexpensive gift! I haven't done much free-handing when it comes to small and intricate sewing, which is perhaps why my car looks like an armadillo on wheels, but hey the one year old didn't seem to mind.*

*This diaper pouch, decorated wipes case, and peepee teepees make the perfect gift when paired with a package of diapers. They were quite fun to make! The pouch is lined.. which was a first and quite the challenge for me, but me and trusty Ken made it through that ordeal together.*

*Last but not least, a tricky and very specific project. I was asked to figure out how to make nursing pads. I think they turned out pretty good...but I wouldn't know seeing how I wasn't the one that needed them. I can't seem to find the website I used to make them, but I will not take credit for making these on my own! I did find a tutorial ;)*

*Baby Rain and Auntie Kaleena*

You may be asking yourself if all of these baby projects help cool the baby fever. Let me tell you, it does not. If anything the fever increases!! However, being able to go visit all of these little ones and have some cuddle time helps more than hinders :).