First time at the park!!

    Leeland went to the park for the 1st time today! It wasn't exactly what I expected, but it was nice to expose him to some new things.  We went with my sister-in-law Shelby and her 1 year old daughter Hopelyn and also Daniel's cousin Erika and her 2 year old daughter Rachel.
    Leeland was kind of fussy just before we left, it was pushing nap time, but it's really difficult to coordinate 3 baby's schedules when they are all very different.  So cranky he went to the park and it didn't really fare all that well.  My mother-in-law describes Leeland like a cat.... I used to just laugh at that and think that she was being silly, but now I truly do get it. He's like a cat because it takes him a minute to warm up to people and places. Dogs aren't shy and aren't typically afraid of much-- they just run right up to anyone. But cats stay back, and wait to get to know you a little before they approach. Leeland does the same thing!
    When we first got to the park, Leeland acted like he was terrified, he was very clingy and scared of everything. He screamed in the swing, he screamed when I set him down, he screamed when I tried to walk him around holding his hands. We did go down the slide together once and he did okay. After an hour or so (and a little snack) he got back in the swing and liked it somewhat. He cried, laughed, whined, smiled and then cried again. We'll try again soon when there is pretty weather and he is rested-- I also think that he will like it a lot better when he is walking on his own. None the less, here are some photos from our trip.....

The debate is on.

    So we've got less than 2 months to complete planning of Leeland's 1st birthday party, which I think is kind of a big deal.... maybe it's just because I was the one who went through 9 months of agony and the labor, I'm pretty proud that he is here, happy, healthy, and turning ONE!
    Who knew there were so many things that you have to consider when planning a little kid's birthday party-- I've got the invitations and many of the decorations pretty much planned out, but I can't buy any of those things until I know how many people to expect. So who do I invite?? Do I make it just a family event? There are some friends that I would love to have there, but I don't want to exclude anyone? Do I invite all of my friends? Would my friends even come?
    Then depending on how many are invited, where are we having the party? Our apartment is WAY too little, my parents have said that I could have it there.... but what if a lot of people end up coming? Where would I put up my decorations?
    After all of that, I even have a dilemma with the date of the party.  Leeland was born on April 14th which falls on a Thursday this year. Naturally we should have his party either the weekend before or the weekend after-- I prefer the weekend after because then he really is one years old..... unfortunately though there is a conflict with work. On the Saturday after his birthday is the "walk for life" at work which is a huge fundraiser for us and I have to be there to work it (and honestly, I want to be there). Soooo, do I have his birthday on a Sunday? Traditionally Sundays are people's family days, when they go to church, relax and prepare for the upcoming week. If I have it on a Sunday would anyone come!?

Too many decisions!!!

And those who know me, know how bad I am at decisions....

Thoughts, tips, or advice is welcome :0)

Valentine's and 10!

    Happy Valentine's to everyone, and happy 10 months to my little man Leeland!! What a great 10 months it has been too. Daniel and I decided to celebrate Valentine's this past Saturday night-- we've gotten SO good at celebrating birthdays and holidays before they are actually here. We went out to dinner as a family to Olive Garden, and I had gotten Daniel a card. Leeland got me a card, and Daniel got me a card, some chocolates, and some flowers. It was perfect!!!

The older Leeland gets, the more I see his personality come out and it is such a pleasure! He is HILARIOUS! Here are some things that he has been up to--

* Leeland is not walking on his own yet, but he will run holding onto the couch or his dinosaur walker. He will stand all by himself for a minute or two but seems to be afraid to take a step without support. We're working on it.
*After trying several brands, we have finally found a sippy cup that he is getting the hang of and learning how to drink out of, soon it will be time to start weaning from his bottle.
*He wants to hold his own bottle ALL the time now.
*We're introducing more solids (diced foods) now, he LOVES avocado, bread and crackers. He has also tried tomatoes, carrots, Olive Garden bread sticks, and apples with cinnamon.
*Leeland is taking a bath in the "big boy tub" now. He had an inflatable duck that he always took a bath in, and a while back I tried to give him a bath without it and he screamed like crazy, he was scared of the actual bath tub by itself.... but now he has gotten the hang of it!

*He is growing, growing, growing! He is still very low on the chart for his weight but he has gained. He only weighs 18 pounds and 7 ounces which is considered the 20th percentile. However he is very tall, he is 29 1/2 inches long and that is the 85th percentile.
*He is very ticklish and has the CUTEST little cackle!

   Well, it's after midnight and WELL past my bedtime.... that's all that I can think of to write now, other than Leeland is the cutest, sweetest boy I have every met! And I am SO happy the Lord blessed us with such a great baby! I really enjoyed having 2 Valentine's this year-- Daniel and Leeland <3

My weekend.

    What a wonderful weekend I have had FULL of creativity! Remember my last post about itching to sew, well I got my hands on a new sewing machine that was supposed to do sewing and a little embroidery also. It was a VERY complicated little booger and I ended up returning it. I wanted an upgrade from my old, cheap broken one, but that was too big of a step--- so I got a cheaper one and I am in LOVE! It's a Singer. It's a little more computerized than old faithful but it runs so smooth and is much more quiet.
    Before I got to catch up on all my sewing that I wanted to do though I had to make 4 dozen cupcakes. We were doing a Volunteer Appreciation Event for work Thursday night so I offered to bring the cupcakes. Our logo is a teal butterfly so I topped them with some butterfly candies I made-- I also brought my cupcake tree.

Both pics from my phone.

  Once the cupcake project was out of the way, I was ready to break in my new sewing machine! WOO HOO! My brother-in-law's little girl is turning 1 this week and we are celebrating next weekend, so to start, I got to work on some presents for her. I made her a "pillowcase dress", though it is called a pillowcase dress and can be made from one, I just used cute fabric I found at JoAnn's. (Ties in the back, we don't want a 1 year old little girl undoing her dress)

And apparently she really likes elephants, her birthday party is going to be pink elephant themed, so I saw that it was only fitting to make her a little elephant stuffed animal.

And after all that, I still had some of the fabric left (which I won't use considering I have a little boy...) so I decided to make a little diaper clutch for them as well.

Once the birthday girl's gifts were completed I had to make a cake for my parents.  My Dad and Step Mom were married on Valentine's day 15 years ago! 15 years is kind of a big deal so the whole family got together for lunch and as usual, I made the cake. I wanted to make something special for them and I wanted to branch out a little from my norm, so I made them a strawberry cake and covered it in a buttercream rose design! I'm pretty happy with it!

Once all that was done, I finally got to make our curtains for our living room! YAY! I mean, we've only lived in the same apartment for almost 2 years without curtains in the living room. I had some extra fabric from that project too so I made some matching throw pillows.

Well, that is all for now. Next on my list is making some more cloth wipes-- I have plenty more receiving blankets in Leeland's closet to cut up into squares and sew together! Hope everyone else had a fabulous weekend!!

Itching to sew.

Well, I was feeling quite ambitious this weekend and headed out to JoAnn fabric store Friday night with baby in tow pushing his bedtime.  I have come across SO many neat blogs and free patterns online recently and just want to sew ALL of these cute little things on top of sewing some basic curtains for our living room-- I mean, we've only lived here for a year and a half.
So I got back from JoAnn, got Leeland to bed and started cutting and pinning, I got half of a little dress sewn together for my niece's 1st birthday present before my sewing machine started going nuts.  It's about 11 years old and my Grandmother purchased it for me after I took a home-ec class and expressed great joy in sewing.  She was very excited for me and bought me the $50 Kenmore sewing machine I own today.  It's been messing up a lot lately, it has some serious tension issues.  The thread can be set at the same tension and within a few inches of sewing it goes from loose to tight to broken thread to having to start over.  Quite frustrating to say the least!  Last time I was working with it, I was making cloth wipes so it didn't matter what the stitches looked like- they were just for a baby's butt. But the cute little things I am making for my niece need pretty stitches.
With all that said, I can't wait to get my hands on a working sewing machine-- SO many things I desire to create.  Will keep you posted on my creations, and will post some pictures once I have complete projects.

My One Word.

     So I heard on K-Love sometime at the beginning of the year this new idea about choosing one word to focus on throughout the year.  They call it the "Un-Resolution".  As you all know, I already had chosen to do a new year's resolution so I shrugged this one word thing off and decided it wasn't for me.  And then they continued to talk about it-- several of the hosts were talking about what their word was and lots of listeners called in sharing their words and stories.... I got to thinking and looked up the website for more information and the concept slowly grew on me. One Word
     Little did I know, that God was really working on teaching me something.  This past week I have been pretty stressed and down about our financial situation.  Sometimes, we women, let our emotions get the best of us and we don't think-- Or at least I feel like I'm this way sometimes.  The Lord took care of me and my family for 9 months while I wasn't working, I don't know why I would sell him short now.  He's got us covered, we always have exactly what we need..... but as the story goes, I ran out of make-up this weekend and we couldn't afford to buy some new until Daniel's payday.  I was going to go a week without my make-up, I was devastated and I threw myself a pity party.  Apparently I was the only one invited to the pity party, and enjoyed laying around the house crying and being emotional about how "poor" we are.  Ridiculous right?  (For the record, I regret ever using the word "poor" even if it was only in my mind, because we are not poor... we are BEYOND blessed)
     With that said, it caused a little heart to heart with my mother-in- law and also with my hubby about our current situation.  Daniel didn't go to an expensive private school and get a degree to work retail the rest of his life.  It works for some, but we need to pay the bills.... And if I may indulge and be selfish for a little moment, I want some more babies!  :0)  Daniel has a dream of becoming a football coach (preferably at the college level) but that is going to take some time to pursue, and hard work.  In the mean time, he is looking for something full-time with benefits for our family...... So now that you know a little bit of the financial stress, I've been under, back to the "one word" thing.....
     I've blogged previously about my love for Proverbs 3:5-6.  The part that I loved so much previously was the "lean not on your own understanding".  It was so fitting for 2010, and how the Lord blessed us and took care of us while I wasn't working.  I don't know how it worked out, but we always had food and always had a roof over our heads.  So when I initially started thinking about my word, I thought it should be "trust", but I was reading over the verse again last week and was slapped in the face by another word-- "SUBMIT".  The NIV version of the two verses reads like this, "Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding;  in all your ways submit to him,  and he will make your paths straight." I don't think the Lord could've hit me any harder with the word submit.  When you are a control freak, a planner, very much type A, it is SO difficult to submit to someone else... even if it is God. I find myself repeating the word over and over and reminding myself that I don't need to make our family's plans for the next 6 months, I need to follow the path the Lord has set out for us and see what's in store.  This past Sunday at church we talked about the book of Joshua and how Joshua and his people were headed to the promise land.  However a couple of the tribes stopped just shy of the promise land and settled saying that the land was perfect for crops and cattle. They literally settled but they also sold themselves short-- although that land was suitable, it wasn't the promise land and they missed out on something even better! I don't want our family to settle and miss out on a blessing just because I'm a control freak.  I'm trying to SUBMIT.....