Project

(Didn't get a chance to answer my questions? Click here to see them.)

When we moved in, the house had an interesting feature. (Ok, it has lots of interesting features, but I'm really focusing on one for now.) You can see on the left side of this picture (isn't Emily tiny and cute!) the "bar."

Once we figured out how to get the faucet off (since we weren't going to use it), I thought this would be the perfect place for my recipes and cookbooks. We put a piece of plywood over the sink and the recipes (and picnic basket) have been here since the beginning.

After measuring and several trips to Lowe's to figure out what would work best, we decided on adjustable track shelves. Sometime before Christmas, I had Phillip cut the shelves, but since the Christmas tree was in the way, I had to wait until later to put them up. That was one of my projects this week. I knew it wouldn't take long and, with the right help (see below), it didn't.

Here are the finished shelves with the cookbooks on them. I still need to go through them and organize the loose recipes, but that's for another day!

33 weeks

Don't have much time today...we're off to Abilene.

Questions

I'll admit it. I'm a question person. I like to know about things, about how other people do things, about the "best" whatever. So, here are my questions for you. Answer them, don't answer them, but if you have an answer, stop lurking and answer! :-)

• What's the best laundry stain removal product you've found? (and what didn't it get out?)
  
• Do you use coupons? Where do you find the best ones?
  
• How do you plan your meals? Around the store circulars? Around ingredients in your kitchen?
  
• When did you train your kids to use a sippy cup?
  
• Did/do you make your own baby food? What have you found that works well/doesn't work well?
  
• If you use cloth diapers, what kind do you use?
  
• How do you know how much/what to feed your baby? (especially if you're still nursing?)
  
• When did you wean your babies? (Or did they do it themselves?)
  
• If you could stock up on food, what would you stock up on?
  
• Do you keep a routine for cleaning your house? (i.e., mop every Tuesday, bathrooms every Wednesday, etc.)
  
• Are you overwhelmed by the number of cool blogs that are out in the blog-o-sphere?
  
• How do you keep your freezer organized?
  
• How do you keep your life organized?
  
• Do you have a household notebook?
  
• Do you remember to send birthday cards to your relatives?
  
• Do you feel like your life is organized?
  

Okay, I could keep going for a long time if I let myself, but then I'd never get any answers. And, isn't that the point (sometimes) of asking questions?

You never know what you'll find

I was labeling pictures that had been in the camera for a week or so and came across a few I'd like to share.

We've had a visitor around our house lately. I'll hear Oso barking and go out to check on him and find this in our front flowerbed. I guess there could be worse things!

Back here, I talked about reorganizing our Christmas decorations. I finally finished last week so here's what I came up with.

Before

After

Sometimes Emily is a messy eater. Sometimes not so much. This particular night...she was MESSY! It's all over her face, hands and bib!

I just love this face. This was the, "What did you just put in my mouth?" face we got when she tried carrots for the first time. We haven't tried them again because we were leaving town and needed a food that wouldn't keep her stopped up (we went with squash instead). We'll try carrots again when she's back to normal.

That's all of my randomness for today. Thanks for listening.

(And, in case you were wondering, Emily and I are both doing better, but neither of us is back to 100% yet. Hopefully soon!)

Better

Emily and I are both better today. Thanks for the prayers. We took Emily to the doctor last night and got medicine. We have to go back today because she had lost weight since her visit in December. They were a little concerned about that, but nothing else. Hopefully today's visit will go well. Continue keeping her in your prayers until this is all gone.

32 weeks and feeling puny

Emily & I (& my mom) have caught some kind of bug. All three of us have been sick since last night. I'll spare you the gory details, but it did involve changing the sheets twice on Emily's bed in the middle of the night. I think I'll go back to double-layering the sheets & mattress pads again!

Weekend

Family is wonderful! It's amazing how you can cram 5 adults and a baby into a 3-bedroom house and the house just comes to life! We spent the weekend with my sister in Dallas...no agenda really, just a few stores we wanted to go to. I got some things at Babies R Us (too bad Abilene doesn't have one!) and my sister and dad both bought new computers! I know this is a short post, but, really, it's all I have right now.

31 weeks

Usually, I have something to say when I write these posts. Today, however, nothing is coming. So, you just get a picture. (And see my post below for Works for Me Wednesday.)

Ornaments

As I've been putting away my Christmas ornaments (yes, I'm just getting to it), I realized that my family has done something that most people don't. Every year, my parents would let me and my sister pick out an ornament. We would also each get an ornament from our grandparents. I know that's not out of the ordinary. However, my mom (or grandmother) would always date them. Now, we can look back and see just when it was that we got each ornament.

What made me think about this (and how unusual it is), is that my cousin's wife had asked if we knew when we got each ornament. I didn't think too much about it, but made a list of the "grandparent" ornaments as I decorated the tree. When all was said and done, there were only four years (out of 30) that I couldn't account for. As I was putting away the ornaments today, I was on the look-out for ornaments for those years. I came across one that didn't have a date on it, but thought it might be from my grandparents. So, I asked my other cousin, Lauren, for her help. She said she remembered the ornament, but had no idea what year it was from. I guess we're the only ones who dated all our ornaments!

(For more WFMW posts, go to Shannon's blog here.)

7 months

As everyone says, where did the time go? Emily can now sit up for long periods of time, get where she wants to go by army crawling, eat rice & oatmeal cereals, be okay in the nursery at church and just generally be a happy baby. This week she's had a few fussy days, but for the most part, she's happy all the time (unless she's hungry or sleepy). I know, you all wish you had a kid like her!

Moby Wrap

If you have a small child (like under 35 pounds) and don't have one, go get one! I had been using a Baby Bjorn for the past 6 months and, while it does its duty (especially in NYC with Emily's snowbear outfit and over heavy coats!), the Moby Wrap is amazing. Phillip and I went on a walk tonight for about 35 minutes. We went approximately a mile and a half. When using the Baby Bjorn, I could never have gone that far. I know I was carrying 14.5 pounds more that my normal weight, but I could hardly tell! My shoulders never hurt, my back never hurt and Emily enjoyed it (though I think she'll be facing out from now on!).

P.S. Thanks to Granddaddy for this great Christmas gift!

30 weeks

Emily is now 30 weeks old. She can sit up very well, with no support, and even reach for toys while doing so. She's starting to scoot around, but isn't crawling all-out yet. She loves her Exersaucer and has started eating rice cereal, which she kind of likes. :-)

(Yes, that is our Christmas tree in the background. No, it (obviously) hasn't been taken down yet. However, I've moved most of our other Christmas stuff into plastic tubs! I just ran out before I got to the tree and ornaments!)

New York

Mommy's been busy getting us resettled at home after our trip to New York, so I thought I'd share the highlights with you. (You can read more details at my Aunt Jenni's blog here, here, and here.)

Our trip started in Abilene, with a visit to Granddaddy. He loves holding me!

I opened a few presents from Grandpa & Pearlie. (No one else had any because the trip was their present to each other.) I love my blocks!

I took my first airplane rides and did pretty good on them.

Here I am in the Baby Bjorn. I spent a lot of time in here on the trip and took lots of naps here too!

Mommy & Papa just had to get a picture at Toys R Us. This was the only place in the store we could stop...I guess two days before Christmas is a bad time to go to a toy store!

Here's me with Aunt Jenni in front of the Statue of Liberty. This is as close to it as we got.

We got a little lost (okay, maybe not really), but I sure helped Pearlie & Aunt Jenni figure out where we were. Good thing they had me around!

I turned 28 weeks on the trip so we had to take my picture. I like the signs now so it's a little harder for Mommy to keep the signs looking good for long!

Santa found us in New York. I even knew which stocking was mine!

On our way to see the Rockettes in the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall, we found these fun ornaments. I wish Mommy would have let me play with them!

I was pooped after a long day and slept for two hours on Grandpa!

I decided that we needed to see a basketball game so we went to a New York Knicks game at Madison Square Garden. Too bad they lost!

We went to FAO Schwarz...

...and rode the carousel at Central Park...

...and I got to swing at Central Park. I LOVED it!!

On our way home, we visited Mommy's cousins Todd...

...Teresa...

...and her Aunt Neva. They were fun people. I hope we can visit them again.

Ross even let me hold on to his jersey.

Papa and Ross played football while Mommy & I watched.

I met Grandma Trietsch and we took another four-generation picture.

Noah wanted to play with me too, but I was just too tired so I sat in Pearlie's lap while he played with me.

Hmm....Mommy's cousin Randy looks a lot like Grandpa!

I think I've figured out this Gravitation game.

Grandpa read me a really neat story called Santa and the Christ Child.

Once we got back to Grandpa & Pearlie's house, Mommy did laundry and put me in the basket!

Now we're home again and Mommy's ready for school to start so we can get back to our routine. We did add one thing, though. Mommy & Papa decided that I needed to start eating cereal. It's okay, but I think I still prefer the good stuff!

(Remember to pause the music on the right before you start the video!)