My Sweet Baby Girl

Because of Mackenzie's love of the camera these days I haven't had much to post in the way of pictures of my sweet girl... These days this is all I can get out of her when I try to take a picture these days...

Occasionally I get one eye... And I consider that a win. Ha!

On a good choices/bad choices update: As of this morning she was so proud... "Mommy, I have something really important to tell you! My name has never ever ever even been on the board this week!!"  Good job baby! I'm soooo proud of you! "Oh Mommy, I have something else really important to tell you! I haven't even been bossy one day this week either!!" Good job baby! You're making such good choices! We're so proud of you!


Thank you Father for helping us to make the right choices as we parent our kiddo thru this rough patch!

Red Hiney

My poor baby boy has a problem... He has a REALLY red hiney!! (The pics don't do it justice... couldn't exactly photograph the worst part.) This kid is a super pooper! But when he's cutting teeth it's EVEN WORSE! I've literally gotten a text message from Wanda at 2 in the afternoon saying that he has already pooped 5 times! I mean the boy eats but really where does he get all the poop from?? Ok so I got sidetracked, sorry!

Anyway, his hiney is so red that I wanted to let him to try to air out a little bit. So tonight after dinner and his nap I let him run around without a diaper for about 45 minutes. And guess what?!?! We survived the whole time without him peeing everywhere! SCORE!!

I think that naked baby hineys are sooooo cute!! So here are some precious cute pics of his naked hiney! (On a side note... it's much easier to take pictures of naked baby girl hineys, because you don't have to be conscious of "other things" getting in the pics.)

Reverse Grocery Store Feet

Until today I didn't realize it was possible to get "reverse grocery store feet"... But when I looked at Dylan's feet tonight at dinner I realized it was possible...

In case you've never heard the term "grocery store feet" let me explain... It's what kids feet look like whose parents let them walk around in the grocery store with no shoes on. You know what I'm talking about now don't you!!

And so "reverse grocery store feet" is what happens with crawling babies whose Mom needs to mop the floors and who has been crawling into the corners of rooms and who has also been crawling around the nursery at church.

Consider yourself lucky... you've learned something for the day. My job is done.

What a way to spend a Sat afternoon!!

WPS!!! My Hogs and My Hubby!!

Pumpkin "Carving" (aka Drawing)

This year I decided to make a pumpkin with Mackenzie for the first time. In the past she hasn't really shown interest and last year I was in the midst of feeling really good while pregnant. So as one of her "good choice" prizes I suggested making a pumpkin.

I decided since she's four and I'm a clutz and kinda like my fingers we'd just draw the face on the pumpkin. When I went to get groceries on Saturday I meant to buy more paint pens but forgot, so we had to make due with what we had at home. Black, Silver, and White... oh well she didn't care!

To help her out we decided I could draw out the face that she wanted and she would trace it.

Then she colored in the face.

She was working on it SO intently!



This is our good smiling pic.

(She decided it needed eyelashes and I suggested the lips so it wouldn't look so wierd.... Ha!)

For this pic she said "Wait Mom!" and then had to make this goofy face. It tripped me out!

P.S. I used the Pioneer Woman's 70's Photoshop action on these pics.

Be careful what you blog about...

See below.

After forgetting this post for almost 2 weeks even though a reminder email was in my inbox, I finally remember to post it and the same night we experience it all over again. Good times.

Screams

This is a simple recap from a couple of weeks ago...

Screams from the baby's room at 10:45 = A Mommy who just thought she was going to get extra sleep
Not just normal baby fussing... red faced close the door so we don't wake up the 4 year old can't figure out why he's screaming snot shooting screams.

1. Maybe he's uncomfortable? Wake up the thoroughly exhausted hubs to put the still warm from the dryer comforter back in the baby bed while I hold the baby and try to calm him down.

Still screaming.

2. Maybe his teeth/gums hurt? Ask the still exhausted hubs to get the Tylenol and Teething Tablets while I try to keep the screaming baby from waking up his sister or falling out of my arms (not really, but he was flailing BIG TIME!) while freaking out.

Still screaming. And now stopped up.

3. Maybe he can't breath because of all the snot. He's already FURIOUS and FREAKING OUT so why not suck out his nose? Still exhausted hubs holds his hands and head while I suck out his nose while trying not to wake up the 4 yr old next door. (Whose bed is right up against her brother's wall.)

Still screaming. However, its a totally different level of screaming now... Like blow in the face to start him breathing again screaming.
4. Maybe if I rock said screaming baby it will help calm him down. (and keep me from crying.)

Nope. Still screaming.

EUREKA!! All the sudden I realized what the problem was!! (Thanks for the clue Dylan!) If you're a parent you know what I finally figured out...

GAS!!

5. Carry the screaming baby past the 4 yr olds room into my room to ask the even more exhausted and now aggravated hubs to get out of the bed and pretty please with a cherry on top get the gas medicine. (As you can imagine there was no way I could hold him with one arm, get the medicine, measure it, and administer it while he was screaming hysterically.)

Rocking the baby who doesn't like to be snuggled or rocked? Makes it all better!

Kissing his sweet baby nose while rocking him? Makes it all better.

The lack of extra sleep is not as important now.

Then I thought, I'm gonna miss this... And I teared up.

Calm and snuggled baby started to get restless... So I reluctantly put him back in bed.

Rinse. Repeat. Sleep.

Oh wait! Wrong Instructions.

Remember?? No sleep!

My Best Friend

My best friend and I doing what we love... Watching our Razorbacks!! It's always been our thing and we hope in a few years to we can make it a family affair!! Awww... be still my beating heart! :) Love that cute man!

My New Loves (Non Family related...)

Over the last few months I've discovered two new loves... Sadly for me I don't have near enough time to do either like I want. (But hopefully with BK starting his new job and awesome schedule I'll have more free time for me.)

One of my new loves is blogging! (duh!) Back when Mackenzie was little I started this blog just for the heck of it and to keep up with hilarious stories and the normal stuff that happened in our house. Now not only do I love writing on my blog but I also have quite a few blogs that are my daily reads that I have withdrawals if I don't read on a daily basis!! Again, I wish I had more time...

My other new love is photography. I have two precious little subjects running around my house that I just cant seem to get enough pictures of! I've been a crazy picture taker ever since Mackenzie was born, but back before her birthday I got a Nikon SLR and I LOVE it! I just wish I had more time to figure out how to take the pictures that the camera is capable of taking! And now lately... I want to learn how to edit my pictures to make them even better! I downloaded some Photoshop Actions from one of my favorite blogs and now I'm playing with them and hope to learn how to create them myself... but again, lack of time! :) If you are interested check out Pioneer Woman's Photoshop Actions here.

Here are some of the simple things I've done to one of my favorite pictures of Mackenzie from the 4th of July.

Straight out of the camera (SOOC)

PW Action Sets - Sharpen This & Bring Out the Eyes 

Soft & Lovely (plus actions above)

Heartland (plus the others)

BW Beauty (And guess what...)

Walking and Chores

Yesterday my baby boy turned 8 months old! He also decided he was totally over crawling after a couple of weeks and decided it was time to start pulling up on everything and walking anywhere we would go with him. A couple of weeks ago Dylan started pulling up and wanting to stand all the time and even trying out cruising a little. I gave him 2 months before he started walking. After seeing the video below you'll understand why I now give him a month. We're in for it now!!

A few weeks ago I mentioned how we had made a "Good Choices Chart" for Mackenzie to help with some issues we were having. Well I am thrilled to say that the chart is working big time! She has been doing so good and we're so proud of the good choices she is making!! She sounds so mature when she talks about "making good choices". She's 4 so of course she still has her moments, but she's doing so good!

I say all this #1 to give an update but #2 to talk about the 2nd chart we're using these days... Mackenzie has always helped out around the house in age appropriate ways and in the last 6 months or so we started calling them "chores". I had been planning to make her a "Chore Chart" to track how she was doing on chores and also to hold her accountable. A while back Mackenzie saw a pillow pet in Wal-Mart and said she wanted one. She didn't need one and there was really no reason to get one, so I told her she could do chores to earn money to buy the Pillow Pet. But... we got sidetracked with life and with the beginning of school. However, right after we made the "Good Choices Chart" we also made the "Chore Chart". We have 6 different chores she helps with and when she has earned 20 stickers she'll have earned enough money to go buy her pillow pet. My goal is to teach her what it means to earn the money to buy something and also how she needs to do her chores. I don't always remind her that she has earned a sticker because I want her to do chores because its her responsibility and not just because she wants to earn something. She has already decided which Pillow Pet she wants so hopefully when she has earned the money Wal-Mart will have a Ladybug Pillow Pet in stock!!

(By the way, I think this is a pretty common thing in kids this age... Check out my friend Ashley's blog to see a pretty similiar story. Random how it's all happening at the same time too! And its for the exact same thing! Ha!)

Mommy Confession

So in the effort to be up front and honest I have a confession to make.

Tonight after Brian picked up Mackenzie from church he went to put air in my tires. While he was gone Mackenzie's dinner was finishing up in the oven and I put his in for him. (It was nugget and fish stick night in our house) On to my confession....

In the midst of trying not to burn their food I discovered an unappetizing smell coming from my son. Being the good Mommy I am, I immediately went to change his diaper. What I found was a mess! Let's just say the unappetizing surprise that was waiting for me was escaping out the top of his diaper and halfway up his back. (sorry there is no un-gross way to describe that!) I immediately decided that it would just be easier to go ahead and bathe him rather than waste a million wipes and a diaper that could be saved for another day!

Back to dinner... At this point the hubs still wasn't home and its not like you can put a baby in the bath and go pull your family's dinner out of the oven and come back to the baby. So I did what any mother in this situation would do... (ok maybe not) I cleaned up the immediately affected area and pulled his ones around his "business" and carefully sat him down on the bathroom rug while I quickly ran his bathwater. Then I took the same clean/dirty baby and sat him on the kitchen floor while I pulled dinner out of the oven. Now for a immobile baby it might not be such a dangerous game of poo-poo poker but when your baby is into everything you don't really know if the onesie is going to stay "stuck" or come "un-stuck" and create a bigger mess! But apparently I was in a gambling mood so I chanced it!!!

And ladies and gentleman I won that gamble!! I successfully didn't burn dinner, kept the mess from spreading, and got the baby clean! And what did I win you may ask??? A load of laundry that had to be done immediately!! What?? Doesn't sound like a win to you?? Think back to the million wipes and diaper I saved! I'm frugal here people!!!

"Bop" (Paci) Baby

For some reason I thought about this picture last night... And since it was pre-blog of course I knew I needed to blog about it! I remember this night really clearly. It was Christmas night after we had survived our first Christmas as a family. (Which is probably why Mackenzie still has the clip on her paci...)

I went to check and make sure Mackenzie was asleep and this is what I found... One paci (with clip still in place) in her mouth, and one in each hand. Of course I had to snap a pic before I took the paci with the clip away! 

This is a great picture because it is a perfect example of how Mackenzie LOVED her "bop"!! We always called it a paci but one day she started calling it a "bop"... Neither us or Wanda had any idea where it came from, but obviously it stuck! That's what we still call it to this day!

My Little Man

My baby looked like such a little man for church today!! Precious!

Now if only his sister would let me take her pic these days...