It's Fall, Y'all!

Ady has become a new baby this month. It's like I blinked and once again she's growing way, way, way too fast. Last Friday, (October 7), she took her first "for real" steps. I was sitting on the floor playing with magnets on the fridge. She was over by the pantry. I looked up and she had her daddy's old Snuggle bear in her arm and she was walking! I started to scream and clap. She was giggling. She just kept coming. I kept scooting backwards. It was one of the most precious things I've seen. I will never, ever regret choosing to stay home with her. I have not missed one ounce of these milestones. Such a sweet, sweet memory I will cherish forever.


Last week we went with Gramme and Caden to the pumpkin patch. Ady has been obsessed with pumpkins since we see them at the grocery so frequently. She loved waving to them, being outside, and seeing all the animals.


She sure does love Caden :)



She loved swinging!


She loved the apple cider slushie :)


I love how sweet her expression is here!


At 13 months she's into everything! She loves to talk...all the time! She's a true girl. And...for those of you out there who were predicting she'd make the choice to get rid of the bows. She actually likes them :) She will sometimes cry when I take them off her. But, she did practically come out of the womb with one on :)


Ady loves to eat goldfish, graham crackers, chicken nuggets, fries, peaches, pears, cheez it's, carbs, carbs, and carbs :) I can't get her to eat her veggies well, so we make up for the veggie intake in the Puffs sweet potatoes :) She still loves her Bible. It's her favorite. She's starting to let me read to her now. Somedays she wants to rip the book up, but on a good night I can get her to listen :)


She really loves stuffed animals. Our house is being overtaken by them.


She has truly mastered the art of climbing. Everywhere. And she's FAST!


Did I mention she loves pumpkins? :)


The fall fun continued last weekend as my lifegroup went to a pumpkin patch and Monday night we decorated our pumpkins :) I am very, very blessed to know such Godly women. The Lord has been so good to us!


As we enter into this fall season, this season of thanksgiving, my heart is overflowing. Ady brings my life so much joy. The Lord has answered many prayers for us and many times I am overcome with emotion as I hold my sweet little miracle. This gift that, after two painful surgeries and assurance would never be possible, will always bring me such joy. God has pulled us out from the bottom pit. "Weeping may endure for the night, but JOY comes in the morning!"-Psalm 30:5


"Let us enter His presence with thanksgiving; let us shout triumphantly to Him in song. For the Lord is a great God, a great King above all gods. The depths of the earth are in His hand, and the mountain peaks are His. The sea is His; He made it. His hands formed the dry land. Come, let us worship and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker. For He is our God, and we are the people of His pasture, the sheep under His care."-Psalm 95:2

The Regression.

I'm not really quite sure what's going on in little Ady's world. But....for the past almost 2 weeks, her sleeping patterns have taken a huge turn for the worst. I may have a 12 1/2 month old, but I might as well have a 12 day old baby girl. Which, by the way, I do desperately miss. I miss waking up with her. I knew what to do then...feed her. Now...I'm stumped.


It's a good thing I've managed can get by on little sleep. Because, for the past 14 nights I don't think I've slept more than a total of 3 hours consistently. Sleepy mommy. (And I"m willingly taking any Starbucks giftcards you'd like to share :)) But, what's wrong with Ady?

I can't really remember exactly what it was that started these late night screaming escapades. But, they're painful to hear. It's a screaming, ear piercing, heart breaking, cry. She's on whole milk now and Prevacid still. I don't think that's the issue, since she's happy during the day. For the first several nights, she found relief laying in our bed. They would start about 2-3 am and then she'd be up at 6:30 with us. The problem is....Ady sleeps worse in our bed. She is incredibly sensitive to light or sound. If a dog shakes, a cell phone alarm goes off, you roll over heaven forbid, she's up. So, I have not been a fan of her sleeping with us, as much as I love to hold her. I know it's not best, but what else do you do when you have a screaming baby? How can I tell when it's just normal seperation anxiety awakenings and when it's something painfully wrong? I must have missed the chapter in the Parent's Manual :)

Then...she started these screams earlier, around midnight. Which led her back into our bed even earlier. Are you with me here? Ady has been losing roughly 2 hours or more of sleep every night for 2 weeks. That's a lot of sleep. And, nap time is suffering too.


.....my once very good scheduled napper has regressed. Sigh.....She's been getting 40 minute naps again. And she wakes up screaming. I'm at a loss at what's wrong. She is getting a mouth, and I mean and entire mouth full of teeth! Her top two are in, looks like 2 more up there coming, as well as her molars. I've heard those can be painful. Is this what it is? I'm giving her Tylenol off and on. I don't really notice a difference. Anything else I should try?

Last Sunday we pulled into church at our regular time for 8:30 service. Ady had another sleepless night and she had fallen asleep in the car. I figured she must have a bug, and I told Joseph to go on in and get a seat and I'd just drive around a minute and decide what to do with her. I knew she wasn't going to the nursery; knew something wasn't right. I hadn't so much let him out the door, then she opened her eyes and vomited profusely. At first, I was thinking it was spit up, but as I watched her in the rearview mirror, I saw that something was not right. As I'm panickly trying to find a parking spot in church just so I can stop, she continued on. Once I found one, I immediately tried to catch Joseph. I knew there was no way I was going in there with her. Luckily, I reached him and he came out to help me. I'll spare you the details, but it was a 2, really needed it to be a 3, man job to clean up. Poor baby girl. I called the doctor and she just had some nasty tummy bug. Said to come in on Monday if she had another sleepless and screaming night. So...I did just that. Sunday night=no sleep.

Monday the doctor said she was fine. I was getting mixed signals. He said she probably just wanted to sleep in bed with us (even though I told him that past 5 nights prior she screamed even in my bed & that she's been soothing herself to sleep for quite a while), then he said her ears looked fine, but later said she may have pain between her ears. Well, it's Friday and we've yet to have a restful night of sleep. Last night she came in our bed from 2-6. At 6 I carried her into her bed, screaming. She screamed for about 20 minutes and Joseph went in 3 times to give her the paci (If I go in...it's all over. Thank goodness for daddy!). She fell asleep and it wasn't anytime before she was screaming again. Back and forth for almost 2 hours.

Can anyone shed any light on this? I love my little baby girl and I want her happy self back. She is very happy during the day. She laughs, giggles, waves, talks, babbles, loves to walk, etc, etc. But...sleepy time=no happy time. I'm not trying to complain at all. She's worth everything, but I"m wondering if there is something here I'm missing? Is it just teeth? Night terrors? Any mommies out there, I'd love your advice :)

Splish Splash.

Ady has disliked the "big girl" bathtub f-o-r-e-v-e-r. I tried when she was first able to sit up. She didn't like it. I bought a bath mat. Still didn't like it. So...we continued to bathe her in the infant whale tub. She wasn't over the weight limit and she could have stayed in it longer, but...come on she's 12 months old now. :) I started to have a "mini" panic that this child was going to have to bath in this tub until she was 10 years old. :) So....after some facebook friends advice, we decided to jump on in!

She loved mommy in the tub. (Daddy thought it was so funny, so he snapped a picture).
She loved the bubbles :)


The next night I made daddy jump in and this time mommy snapped the picture :)

And....tada....by the third night...she was bathing by herself. NO tears. She, thankfully, got over her fear of the big scary tub. So...Mr. Whale went into the "baby" closet. No tears from this mommy. While I am sad at how quickly she is growing, I am very proud of my little girl for conquering a fear. Bathtime is much more enjoyable and fun now. Now we have lots of more time to splish and splash :)

lADYbug, lADYbug....

Ady's birthday party was a huge success. Thankfully, there was no rain (since it was an outdoor party). The only problem? It was about 100 degree heat index! Thank goodness Joseph's dad had a very large fan that helped cool things off outside. We had fans inside too and it was perfect :) Check out some pictures of the decorations:








I wish I could take the credit for this idea, but sadly I can't! My sorority sister did a party similar to this for her daughter's 1st birthday several years ago. I "copied" (with permission!) the ladybug idea :) I tweaked it a bit and added the "polka dot effect" on the fence using balloons and a paper plate.



Ady was loved, and loved, and oh so loved! Her cake and the cupcakes (from Aunt Heather's sister again!) were perfect.

She was such a little lady she didn't even get messy. I guess she wanted to preserve the sweet little cake :)


I was surprised at how well she did considering ALL the people around her, but no tears! That's my happy girl! Her Tatay smocked her the perfect dress for her party! !


Her Aunt Stella got her a UK chair and it was a hit! (We're just going to add some Tennessee orange bows to it and daddy and mommy will love it too!). :)


She sat there while I opened her gifts. It was so sweet. No surprise, she got the same Disney princess card by 3 people. It was too funny! The day was absolutely perfect. And finally, about 10:30, Ady was partied out. She fell asleep with people still around, no crying at all, right in her Tatay's arms :)


We are so blessed to have so many people who love our little Adybug! :)

Bye, Bye, Baby

I can't believe it's already here. My baby isn't a baby anymore. She's changing with every blink, growing so very fast. I can remember many people saying after her arrival "enjoy it, it goes by so quickly." I didn't believe them. It's not that I thought they were lying, I just couldn't imagine how fast the sleepless nights, the coos that were so sweetly made by Ady, or the sweet days spent just rocking her, would go.

This was one of the last pictures taken of me before Ady arrived. I was growing rather large :)

Our last picture right before "showtime!"

And then, the grand arrival.....

1 Month

2 Months

3 Months

4 Months

5 Months

6 Months

7 Months

8 Months

9 Months

10 Months

11 Months

12 Months

Her birthday was spent (as birthdays should be!), doing exactly what she wanted to do.


We went to McDonald's, Orange Leaf, and went for many rides around in her new car :)



Gramme, Bampe, and Caden came that night to celebrate and brought more gifts!

Ady loved her purse cake made by her "Aunt" Heather's sister.

She was so funny trying to eat it off the tray. Then, she picked the pink up all around the handle of it so sweetly. She even ate the fondant tube of lipstick. Afterall, she was born on 90210 :)



It was a sweet day of memories for Joseph and I. I can remember every little detail of the day she was born. As I kissed her goodnight late that evening, I had tears just pouring down my face. I never could have imagined the joy that she would bring me. The blessing that I never thought I would be able to have. She is growing so fast. I wish I could just bottle up time. My prayer is that this next year I will enjoy the ride and know that this too shall pass, far, far too soon.....