HBD Weston!

A big happy birthday to Weston!

I love being married to Weston so much.

He is truly the best dad. He is so loving & so tender with Ivy. He also likes to wrestle with her & she loves it. She adores Weston more than anyone. Ivy shares #1 daddy fan spot with me.

He is such a supportive husband & father. Weston is always doing everything he can to help Ivy & to help me with Ivy.  My mom & grandmother are constantly reminding me how blessed I am to have such a helpful husband. I know he is & I know I am blessed.

Weston is always doing his best to do what is best for our little family unit.

He makes Ivy & me a priority even with working full time & taking 8 credits of classes. He is so busy all the time, yet he still chisels time into each day to make sure Ivy & I know how much he loves us. I am so lucky. She is so lucky.

I have loved being married to him. This guy has such a good sense of humor & is ALWAYS SMILING. Really, he is a beam of sunshine. I am always reminded of what a blessing that is when people tell me how happy and loving my husband is.

He gives me the royal treatment always. Seriously, he is so kind & bends over backwards to make me happy.

He is so selfless. I mean, really selfless. He supports me in EVERY goal I set. I am so lucky to have such a supportive husband. He also has told me that he will work 5 jobs if he has to to provide for our family to make it an option for me to stay home and raise our kids.

Ivy, our future babies & I are all so lucky to have Weston. Family is #1 to him & he shows me that daily.

He is such a helpful person. He pulls over to help every stranded person on the side of the road. He regularly gave rides home to people. He grabs doors for every person behind us walking through it, he offers to load peoples groceries into their cars when we're walking back to ours, & he helps every elderly woman down the stairs by offering his arm.

He is the kindest person I know. He is kind do everyone & is no respecter of persons, aka he is equally nice to everyone.

He has an itch for justice. He never would "take advantage of the system," just because he can. He is really big on doing what is right. Lucky me to have such a steadfast husband, with a desire to do good.

He is a very hard worker. Weston works so hard to do well in school.  When school is tough, he takes it on as a challenge.

Happy 27th birthday to my favorite guy, #1 fan & daddy of our baby.

I love you, Weston!

My Anti-Drug

A little bit of what I've been up to.

My sister & I are working on the thing I mentioned previously, but I have also been getting caught up in documenting my family as well.

I am all about photo books. I made the far left book of me & Weston's engagement pictures for a sign in book at our wedding. Well, I lost it right before the wedding. I'd put it in an obscure pocket of my suitcase. Well, I found it later & was so happy I hadn't had people scribbling on it & children poking out our eyes!

For our first wedding anniversary I made Weston that next book. I printed it through Costco as a 12"x12" book. It was simple & a little ghetto on the inside. I treasure it, though. The third book is our year 2 book. I am almost finished with our Year 3 book & am about to print it & am working along with time on our Year 4 book. The fourth book pictured is my most recent project. It's my pregnancy journal of being pregnant with Ivy.  I worked on it all throughout my pregnancy & just had my last couple weeks to finalize to print the book. It is so special to me.  I printed it big as well, so I could have a uniformed book collection documenting our family life.

These books have taken me SO MUCH TIME. & they have each been worth every second spent & so much more.

I have another project I'm working on that won't be done for a few more months, but, guys, I'm really excited about it.

Cute Ivy is doing so well & this week we have mastered taking naps. She & I are both so much better because of it. I have my happy, smiley girl back. & she is back to her old active, smiley self. It's so wonderful.

We are so excited for what our future holds, but honestly, right now is so good. We are so blessed.

& a big thank you to my parents for housing us right now while Weston is working & going to school. It is really helping us save & pay off our NEW CAR!

I realize I never blogged about this.

Weston, with the help of my dad & brother, searched so desperately for a good car for us to buy. Used or (cheap) new. Well, we got one! We got a steal of a deal. & Weston, Ivy & I drove to South Carolina to buy it.  We love our car & are so happy to have a reliable set of wheels!

I'll add pics of that beauty later.

Growing, Growing!

I love taking pictures.

Here are a few of the happenings going on here lately!

She has finally mastered tummy time. She was about 4 months old when she did this. She went from face plants one day, to this the next. She has a "large" head.... and by large I mean giant. She clearly got my noggin & not Weston's!

She still only does it for about 5 minutes, but we're so proud!

She LOVES standing. Like a lot.

& then when she's done with it she'll start to whine.

Also her big head & smaller body make me laugh. I love it so much!

This munchkin is my favorite ever.

Also, I will take a picture & show you all these amazing jammies my mom made. As in, made & embroidered. Its the same pattern she made my sister & I jammies from as babies. The ribbing around the neck & wrists is the exact same fabric she cut our edges from, too. I'm all about that sweet sentimental stuff.

Have I mentioned we've started level 1 solids? We started at 4 months... we started with rice cereal. She hated it, but grew to like it...as in not rejecting automatically.

We also have tried green peas. I heard it takes atleast 10 times for the baby to try it to like it...well she still hates peas. We have been cooking & mashing sweet potatoes for her...she wolfs those down. Go figure.

We have a sweet potato lover on our hands.

Or, if you're from the south, sweet pahtatahs, as they're properly pronounced.

I hope you enjoy this picture as much as me.

She is all smiles EVERY TIME I come to grab her from her crib.

Such sleepy eyes!

I love this babe.

Also, please take note of all the pics of her eyes. I am obsessed with their gorgeous color & lashes. 

Mm, love her.

She really loves that rattle.

a lot.

"Excuse me, we're talking here."

We do nightly family walks. Well....one night it was really cold. I'm talkin 40 degrees people. REALLY cold.

So we bundled up. Walked to the edge of the driveway & turned around as icicles & walked back.

20 min prep time for walk. 3 minute walk.

Have I mentioned my sister & I have been working on something awesome. Note all these bows. & hang on tight.

A warmer family walk. Also, Ivy had diarrhea, so she was on a pedialyte regiment.

Sweet tired baby pre-bedtime.

Her Grandma Joanie & Grandpa Dave gave her this toy for Christmas.

It is her absolute fave!

Sleeeepy sleepy.

Very sleepy.

Remember how I told you she has diarrhea?

One night she woke up at 4 a.m. with a complete blow out. Like for reals it was up to her neck and all over the crib.

Weston was working one of his 3x/week night shifts so I was on single mom duty for this one.

I plucked her out of bed, stripped her down & put her in the tub.

This little fish loved it, as always.

Then she pooped in the tub.

I didn't love that.

I pulled her out, cleaned the tub & then stuck her back in.

She pooped again.

This time I let her sit in it for a minute in case she had to go more.

Deciding that Hepatitis B could be setting in at any second, I pulled her out after a few minutes of no pooping & cleaned out the tub again.

Refilled tub, stuck her in the tub.

She played.

& then pooped.

THREE TIMES PEOPLE.

This time I hosed & washed her down in the sink and laid her on this towel in the hall while I cleaned everything up & then got her all dried & dressed & we were up for the day.

I was so tired.

& the first time or two I was so exhausted & not enjoying it so much.... the third time I was laughing so hard.

Did I mention we were both so tired?

Co-napping. They do a lot of that when he's home.

Poor guy is working full time & graveyards & then goes to school for class or studying every day afterwards. He is a tired guy.

Remember that 3 minute walk?

This is another set of those jammies. The embroidered cartoon character is on the back of this one...it is to die for.

That's a little of my personal life as around 4 months after Ivy's birth!

Sometimes, you're just tired.

Hiatus

Sorry for my absence!

My sister & I have been working on something big for a while & with that & some other projects going on all while playing with Ivy is making for full days!

I will be getting back into it strong again, soon!

4 Month Pictures

Month 3 was really hard.

We had a rough sleep pattern for a few weeks!

Ivy's acid reflux was owning us! 

We finally got her on a prescription & she finally started being able to feel a little better.

Poor thing would NOT sleep because she felt so horrible. & because she didn't sleep she was miserable & pretty much cried all day...every day.

Once we got her on that prescription we began the sequence of crying it out to sleep training!

It took 4 nights & now she goes to sleep on her own all by herself! It was amazing!  Life is so much better & I have my happy baby back, too!

LIFE IS GOOD!

iPhone dump.

Does it show that I'm majorly obsessed with her?

Ivy was helping me prepare my Sunday school lesson. She is so awesome. Now to just get her to teach for me....