A Cupcake Birthday!!

You know how I agonized over a theme for Miss E's 1st birthday party? And, you know how (after much deliberation & lots of sweet suggestions from you guys) I picked ladybugs?! Well...plans changed :) I was looking on Etsy for some favor labels, and I came across THIS sweet store, and more specifically, THESE awesome labels...and a new idea was born!!

So, now the theme is CUPCAKES...which, if Elli is anything like her Mama (and I have it on good authority that she is!), she will absolutely LOVE!! I want most of the details to be a surprise to the guests, but I'm pretty excited about all of the fun things that my mom & I found while she was here visiting :) I will leave you with a picture though...one of the out-takes from our invitation photo session!

4th of July, Memphis, & Other Tidbits

If I thought June was dragging, July has been the exact opposite!! Where has this month gone?! I guess time really does fly when you're having fun! The first weekend of July, we decided to head up to Memphis with our friends and their daughter, Myla. We did all of the typical Memphis things...Graceland, BBQ, the Memphis Zoo, and the Peabody Hotel. It was a quick trip, but it was packed with lots of fun!! Here are some pics of our mini-vacay...

The family at Graceland

Chris & Elli waiting for the ducks at The Peabody Hotel

Our attempt at a family picture, but Elli just wanted to see the ducks!

Sadly, this is the only picture that we got of the girls together! They had a great time though, and we'll definitely have to it again really soon :)

This is what Elli looked like all day at the Memphis Zoo!! She LOVED the animals, and "talked" to all of them while waving her arms. So cute!!

Daddy & Elli swimming in a "big pool" for the first time! She LOVED it!

Our little fish :)

After a speedy trip to the Pottery Barn & Williams-Sonoma outlets, and a very good meal at Carraba's (oh, how I have missed that place!), we headed home just in time for the 4th! Chris's dad & Donna came out to visit, and met us back at the house after church. We had a wonderful three days with them swimming, shopping, relaxing, & shooting off fireworks!

BUBBLES!!

Taking a walk w/ Grandad

An afternoon of swimming!

After the Duncan's left, my mom arrived! We spent the week checking out Columbus & Tupelo, and Chris & I even got to enjoy a much needed date night (LOVE those!). We watched the movie, The Book of Eli, and if you haven't seen it already, I HIGHLY recommend it! So good! And perhaps the best thing we did all week was plan Elli's 1st birthday party! After a theme change, a location change, and multiple attempts at the perfect invitation picture, I think we're done :) I'm so excited, I can hardly stand it! Don't worry, I'll post more about it soon!

Elli & Nana

Eventually my mom had to leave (don't you hate it when visitors leave?! It gets me every time!), but Chris's mom came out shortly after! In fact, she's here now...and so the fun begins again :)

I hope everyone had a safe and happy 4th of July!!

Baby Gourmet I Am NOT!!

To say that have had problems w/ Elli's food from the beginning would be an understatement! I can still hear the nurse at the pediatrician's office telling me (in her sweet Southern drawl), "honey, your baby is starving!". Breast-feeding just didn't work for me. Well it did but only for 4 months...but I digress. And then I thought making home-made baby food would be a perfect idea...and then my food processor broke, followed shortly thereafter by my blender. So, store-bought baby food it was, and to be honest it was super easy so I was happy. But now, I'm just stuck in a baby food rut, and I need some ideas!

So, this is basically what Miss Elli eats on a typical day:

Breakfast ~ Formula bottle, oatmeal & a fruit (mushed up banana or peach usually)

Lunch ~ Sippy of formula or water + apple juice, some kind of veggie baby food, cut up cheese, and some puffs, yogurt melts, or crunchies

Snack ~ Formula bottle, some sort of cracker or wafer, and either a fruit or a no-sugar added fruit sauce thing-y (like that description?!)

Dinner ~ Formula bottle, a little of whatever we are having, and either a veggie baby food or a meat meal baby food depending on what we're eating.

Here's the issue...I know she should be eating more protein, and I'd really like to start steering away from baby food all together. My problem is that since she has 1 lone tooth, I have a hard time giving her anything that isn't super soft. **Note that I said I have the problem...I'm sure it's more my issue than Elli's! Ha!** So, for example, I hate giving her broccoli/green beans/carrots because I feel like they're too hard (even when steamed really well), and I end up just giving her those veggies in baby food form. And what about meat? Oh, and shouldn't she be totally on the sippy cup by now? I keep reading that she should be, but she's just not a big fan of it and I'm afraid she won't be getting enough to drink if I take away her bottle. Oh to be a new mom!! Total stress!! TeeHee!!

Anyway, if anyone has any great pointers (or just some straight out advice) on what worked with your kiddo's, I'd love to hear it :) And I'll be posting about our fab-o trip to Memphis soon...I just feel like time has been flying by lately!

Happy 10 Month Birthday, Elliana!!!

Miss E has been in our lives for 10 months now, and I am absolutely head over heels for her! She is learning so many things these days, and it seems that she has a new "trick" at every turn. Each stage of her short life has been incredible, just like everyone said it would be, and she amazes me each and every day.

We're just about done with baby food, but be watching for a post on that in the next few days. I need some serious help w/ meal ideas! We haven't really found anything that Elli doesn't like, though she definitely has her preferences. Her favorites include sweet potatoes (just like her Mama!), cheese, applesauce and green beans...and she did really well with pasta the other night too! She's still drinking about 20-24 oz of formula a day, and we started incorporating apple juice into her sippy of water last month (she's a big fan!).

She's been teething for the past 2 weeks as well, and I'm proud to say that our Elli Girl is no longer a toothless beauty!! She has ONE bright and shiny chomper in her grin now :) So cute!! And besides her nose being super runny, we haven't experienced any of the typical difficult teething problems. I'm excited that the first little guy finally decided to show up b/c introducing solids is quite difficult with a poor girl who doesn't have anything to chew with!!

She's still in size 3 diapers, and is wearing size 12 month clothes almost exclusively now. She weighed 21.5 lbs at her 9 month appt., and I'm pretty sure that she hasn't gained too much since then. If anything, her little leg roll-y's seem to be getting a little thinner (much to my disappointment!). We're not big on shoes around here, so I don't even know what size she's wearing yet. If she's not bare-foot (have I mentioned how HOT it is?!), she's in her socks. Is that terrible?!

Now that Miss Priss has learned to crawl, she is LOVING her new found freedom! When something catches her eye, she's quick to go exploring. She loves to play "chase", and laughs hysterically when you catch her. She's learned the words "no touch", and knows by the sound of my voice when she's gotten into something that she shouldn't be in...and 9 times out of 10 she'll put whatever it is down and move on to something else. She can entertain herself with her toys for longer periods of time now, and delights in talking to herself in the mirror. I love to hear her sweet little voice, it is such a precious sound! She likes to have her back rubbed at night, loves "Goodnight Moon", and has about a million tickle spots :) Soft, fuzzy things (like minky fabric) on her face makes her happy, and I sometimes find her rubbing her cheeks against her big stuffed animals when she gets sleepy.

Though she's not "cruising" around the furniture yet, she can pull herself up to standing, and will take steps while holding onto my hands. And the other day, thanks to my daily email from Productive Parenting, I had her hold onto a laundry basket while I slid it across the floor to see if she would walk w/ it...and she did!! Not only that, but when I let go, she pushed it and walked on her own! And she's doing this funny thing now where she walks like a crab...not sure if she's trying to stand up by herself, or what, but it sure is funny to watch!

These past 10 months have brought so much joy to both Chris and I. With Elli's first birthday coming up, I can't help but reminisce about all of the milestones & special moments that we've shared as a family this year. Those sweet little hands, those tiny little feet, and that precious little face have embedded themselves into our hearts...and we are better because of it.

Happy 10 month birthday, sweet child. You are so very loved.

Long Time, No Blog :)

Is it just me, or does June seem to be lasting forever?! I don't know if it's the insane heat, or the fact that we have so many things to look forward to in July, but whatever it is I'm sooo ready for this month to be over!

So many things have happened since I last posted, so get ready for a whirlwind update! First and foremost...Father's Day!! We had a wonderful time celebrating with the World's Cutest Daddy!!

Elli and I woke Chris up w/ lots of snuggles and hugs, and a rousing rendition of Happy Father's Day to You (just like the birthday song...what can I say? I'm a bit of a cheeseball!). I had already given him his "big" present, a huge-o-la hammock. I hadn't really planned on giving it to him before Father's Day, but the UPS guy decided to deliver it into our garage blocking the doorway...and it was so heavy, he had to deliver it w/ a dolly! Needless to say, Chris was excited to get his present a little bit early b/c this puny girl couldn't move it out of the way! Elli picked out a really sweet elephant card for him, and made him a book filled w/ pictures of all of the daddy-daughter moments they've shared over the past 9 months...she's a good gift picker-outer :) The sermon at church was absolutely amazing, and afterwards we came home and just hung out as a family for the rest of the day. It was fantastic!!

In other news, Elli has discovered a love of water (or rubber duckies, I'm not sure which!). She's all about bath time now, and LOVES to get in her little pool in the backyard. Her all-time favorite thing though is to get in the "big" pool that Chris got for him and I. She loves that there's LOTS of water for her so splash around in, and she even likes getting her face all the way in! We may have a future-swimmer in our midst :)

Miss E is all over the place these days, but her favorite spot is anywhere there's a window. Does that make me a terrible mother for not taking her outside more? If you had any idea how hot and humid it was here, maybe you would take my side on this one!! It is pretty precious to see her sweet face pressed up against the window pane "talking" to the birds & squirrels though.

Oh, and you know how proud I was of our pretty garden a few months ago?? Yeah...this is a weed that Chris pulled out of it the other day! Sad. So, so sad.

I'm a Guest Blogger!

I love reading blogs written by other military spouses because we share a lot of the same experiences. I know all about TDY's, PCS's, DTY moves, and much more than I'd like to about the anxiety/fear/sadness that comes with the inevitable deployment. But something else that we share is the fact that our lives change constantly, and with that change comes incredible opportunity.

Allison, over at I HEART CHANGE, writes all about how she's embraced the change that the military delivers. Well, she actually writes a lot about her cutie-patootie son Isaac, but her thoughts on change are sprinkled in there too :) The other day she asked her readers to submit a post about why they too "heart" change for the opportunity to be featured as a Guest Blogger. So I did...and I am!!

So if you'd like to check out why I think that change can be a really good thing, scoot on over to her blog and read away :)

Sinking In

I still can't believe that I'm a mommy sometimes. Although my life has changed significantly, and almost every thought I have now has Elli's little face intermingled in it somewhere, there are some moments when the sheer realization that she is MINE still takes me by surprise.

Like today.

My precious girl has learned how to play chase. She will take off around the couch and cast a mischievous grin over her shoulder to make sure that I'm coming to get her. Her giggles fill the room, and when I catch her you'd think I'd just done the funniest thing in the world. When she stops wiggling enough to get serious again, she quickly moves on from being the chase-y to the chase-er...and laughter again ensues.

And I think...she's mine.

This girl, who is learning so quickly that I can't keep up, is mine. All the wiggles, giggles, and snuggles are mine to treasure. And I'm filled with indescribable gratitude.

A year ago I imagined how my life would change once she had arrived. I dreamed of the fun things that we would do, the things that I would teach her, the lessons that we would learn together. And here we are, doing them. She's like a sponge, soaking every single experience up and loving every minute of it.

And it's finally starting to sink in. This is our life...filled with never-ending games of chase, eskimo kisses at bedtime, mushed up bananas, Elmo stories, and more happiness than I ever dreamed of.