SAHM

Yesterday was my first official day as a stay at home mom (SAHM)!  I turned in my EY laptop, badges, etc on Friday afternoon.  It was such a great way to start this new year!

I've worked for EY since January 2008, and during those years there were many, many, many things/ideas/trips that I had put on a back burner thinking to myself if I wasn't working I could _____ (fill in the blank) or I would have time to _______.  So now that, the day has finally come I'm overwhelmed by all the possibilities and opportunities to spend my time!  

Seriously all weekend I was anxious about all these ideas and how and when I could get them all done/started.  So I decided to make a list (type A for sure)! I took a spiral notebook with easy year out pages and then cut the pages into thirds approximately.  The top section is for my daily to do lists, at the end of each day I can tear off that section of paper and write down anything that didn't get done on the next days paper underneath it.  The middle section if for my weekly to do list. The bottom is a monthly to do list, more like larger goals that are still visible to me everyday.  Anyways it's working great so far except there is a lot on those lists so I probably need to start writing smaller!

Some things on my lists are simple like laundry or dishes, some things on my weekly list may be appointments or organizing projects, and my monthly list has things such as sewing a pillowcase (my mom bought me a sewing machine for Christmas!).

This stay at home mom stuff will definitely take some practice! Yesterday I burned the bacon I was going to use for bacon bit toppings on the crockpot potato soup I was making for dinner (easy dinner recipe thanks to Pinterest). Usually I bake bacon in the oven as it's way less messy and just generally easier than frying it, but for some reason I didn't yesterday. Then when I went to pour the grease out of the skillet into a glass jar (usually I keep pickle jars on hand for this) I couldn't find a glass jar, so I used the next best thing a red solo cup, bad idea!  That cup sizzled and frizzled up so fast, it was actually pretty cool to watch, but I don't recommend trying it at home ;). 

Anyways the baked potato soup turned out delicious and thanks to Pinterest tonight we are having chicken and fried rice, I already made the yum yum sauce. I'm pretty sure it's called that because the two main ingredients were mayonnaise and butter =)

Happy new year!

Maternity shoot for my sis

My lil sis is expecting a baby boy May 2014! I took these photos for her on Christmas Day.

Dora the Elf 2013

I just learned how to posts blogs from my phone!  So glad my husband is such a techie!  Be expecting many more posts and photos now :) 

Here are just a couple of photos of Dora the Elf 2013!

 Roasting marshmallows 

Chillin'

Drinking pancake syrup

Our decorator with our first family of four pic with Santa

Cameron's Late Birthday/late 13 month blog post

We celebrated Cameron's 1st birthday on 11-16-13 before the Baylor v. Texas Tech football game with family and friends at our new home.  We had a football theme party which included blow up 12" footballs, chocolate cupcakes I frosted to look like footballs, and lots of green and gold balloons and decorations. 

Stats
Weight: 20lbs 9 oz

Height: 28 1/2 inches
Clothes size: 12-18 months
Diaper size: 3

Words used in right context: Dada, Momma, more, byebye, dogdog, Dora (this was the name of our Elf on the Shelf), something that sounds similar to deer, and also something that sounds similar to Thank you
Favorite things to do: Get into things, laugh, dance, wrestle, play with remotes or iphones, snuggle, and play peek-a-boo

New Experiences:

• started walking everywhere on his 1st birthday, 11/16/13
• starting to drink some cow's milk
• signs milk when he wants to nurse
• learned the motion for 'stomp your feet' portion of "If you're happy and you know it"
• takes steps backwards to scoot into someone's lap if they are sitting on the floor
• drives Duck Dynasty 4 wheeler he got from Nana for his 1st birthday
• turns and slides feet first on his own to get off a couch or bed



Happy Birthday Cameron!

Aunt Jackie has moved to Heaven

My Aunt Jackie has moved to Heaven,

 

We will miss her humor, 

 

 

We will miss her encouraging spirit,

We will miss her touch,

We will miss her joy and undeniable love,

We will miss her open arms,

We will know that she is watching over us now.

How old is Cameron....

I'm really awful at blogging! Truth is I want to keep record and cherish these memories I really do, but when I finally get a second to sit and jot down a few thoughts I get distracted by emails, facebook, or other people's blogs instead!

Anyways its October 7th and in 9 days my baby will be 11 months old and I haven't posted his 9 or 10 month updates : /  so lets give this a shot...

On Aug 16th we went to the dr for his 9 month check up and shots.  He weighed 20 lbs 6.5 ounces (64 percentile) and was 28 inches long (88th percentile).  Shots haven't ever seemed to bother him much at all.  I don't even give him tylenol and he doesn't even seem to get a fever. 

Cameron's favorite game is peek-a-boo! He's super ticklish and has the greatest belly laugh of all time!  He gives hugs and kisses and is still the world's best cuddler, just ask the ladies in the church nursery!

On September 29th he took his first steps all by himself. Daddy hooked up some new speakers in the living room and Raegan and Cameron both love to turn up Pandora and throw a dance party. He's learned how to clap and cheered Baylor on to victory at his first BU footgame on October 5th.

He can climb the stairs! He absolutely loves crawling into the pantry.  He's into EVERYTHING! I can't take my eyes off the kid for a second without finding him licking a usb cord, or trying to unplug something from the wall, or pulling everything out of the kitchen cabinets.  He's truly a handful, but always has such a great attitude even when I don't let him do these things.  He's sleeping much much better than before, from 8pm to about 5am most every night.  He still takes two naps a day and nurses frequently.  He adores his big sister and squeals with joy when she gets home from school!  She likes to play school upstairs and writes his name in the 'hot box' when he's not being a good student, but this doesn't seem to bother him ; )

I've just started thinking of ideas for his first birthday, can't believe it will be here so soon!

Kitchen cabinets and walls painted

The picture above is our kitchen before any paint, the painters were doing their prep work when I took this picture. The cabinets had a faux finish oil based stain on them and looked a tan/beige color.

This picture is after the cabinets were painted antique white, so much brighter.

 

This is what the kitchen looked like when we selected essential gray as the wall color.  It looked lavendar, so we went back to Sherwin Williams to try again.

This color is Earl Gray and we like it much better, it looks a little darker in this picture than it really is now that it is dry.

The island is now stained Ebony, but this was a picture I took while the work was in process.

 

I wish we could say we had a lot of time and talent to do this ourselves, but we didn't.  We've been lucky to find a lot of great contractors to come out and help us.  More home project posts to come.