Miss K's 1st Birthday Party!

 K is one year old already! It is hard for me to believe.

First a little bit about the party:

We wanted to keep the meal simple, and I think we did. 

We had:

Personal pizza's done on the grill,

Lemonade, 

Ice cream, 

and Cake.

Titus offered to fix the main food for me. Well, who am I to stand in his way! He did such a great job (like he always does) and had the toppings all prepared before hand. Everyone just had to assemble their own pizza and then wait till it was done on the grill.

They turned out delicious! 

I mixed up the lemonade and forgot to add the sugar. 

Open packets, add to water, add sugar, stir. 

Easy right? 

Nope.

The cake turned out good though. 

It was (notice how I said was? We ate all of it

) delicious. I had made a white cake a few weeks ago to practice and Titus mentioned that it would be good with jello in it. So, when I made this one I added strawberry jello to it. It made it very moist. Between that and the cool whip frosting it was a hit! 

The ice cream was vanilla, and strawberry swirl.

` 

K's smash cake.

Her big cake.

She got really excited when we started singing to her.

She kept looking around giggling.

Cake? 

Yum! There was no question as to what she would do with her cake. 

She dug in as soon as I put it in front of her.

K's newborn picture is behind her. 

She has changed so much! 

I love looking at the older pictures and being able to see the difference. 

So much fun!

Focused on cake!

She is my little crumb maker.

Little K started walking ten days before her birthday. 

She has also figured out how to get big brother in trouble.

If he comes close to her when she is in a bad mood, she starts shreiking like he has hurt her. It does make life very interesting.  She does love him though, and looks for him if he isn't around.

Oh, and food, I cannot write this without mentioning how much she loves to eat! She can out eat T some days. Of course, I am never sure if she has more in her tummy than what is all over the floor, the high chair, under the high chair tray, the table, in her hair, and anywhere else that she can touch. She is messy, but she sure has fun!

   A whole year ago I was scared, really scared that I wouldn't be able to be a good Mom to Two children, (especially with them being so close in age) but you know what, I made it! Were there hard times? You bet there were, but I did it with the help of God. Sure I wasn't perfect at it, but I love them more than I can even explain. Children are AWESOME! They truly are a gift from God.

  In the past two years I have grown in so many ways. Sometimes I get discouraged at how far I have to go to be a great mom, then I realize how far I have come and I am amazed. I can't see how God would trust me with these innocent little lives, but he does and I sure don't want to let Him down. 

These children are not just little cute accessories that I wear on my arm, they are human beings and I was given the job to prepare them to meet God.

  

 Dear K,

   I am so glad that God gave you to us. You have changed my life and made it better in so many ways. I want you to know that whatever happens I will always love you, and God will always love you. I don't understand how He could love you more than I do, but I just know He does. I will fail at showing you how much I love you at times, but it will never change the fact that I do love you. God on the other hand, will never fail in showing you His love. 

  Grow up little girl, grow up and serve Him, The One who created you and loves you more than you or I could ever imagine. I pray that you will grow up serving the One that loves you so much, and that you will never turn away from His love. He may ask you to do some hard things, but I can assure you that it will be good things.

  God created you for a purpose! Go, and fulfill that purpose! 

                                                                                                 Your imperfect, loving Mother.

Here is the only picture that I got of K with the bib off, (don't look at it too long or you will go cross eyed) The focus is on the door behind us. :(

Sticks

Just in case you didn't know it, T. loves sticks!

..and his racoon.

The other day when he was playing outside I went out and found this.

If the stick was too big he just pulled it over as close as he could to the porch.

(this one was probaby 4-6 ft long)

So, if you come to our house, try not to trip.

 We are making memories here.

Our Potato harvest and the Chicken Coop

We dug potatoes the other night, and T. picked up a whole row of potatoes all by himself.

He is getting so big!

The chicken coop. 

It only cost us about 20 dollars. We had to buy the hinges and chicken wire.

K. is getting braver and braver...

So thankful for what God has given us.

Miss K is 11 months

Here we go... 

another month is gone, and K is another  month older. 

Time sure does fly. 

K has a tooth now! 

She is such a happy little girl.

I told her to be quiet the other day and she put her finger to her lip and said, "Shhh."

She loves her Brother and Daddy so much, but Mama still is her favorite.

 She loves to wrinkle up her little nose and grin at everyone.

When she wants to see something she points to it, and it doesn't matter if it is a toy or a person, she points all the same. 

I finally weighed her this month, and she weighs 18.6 lb. 

She loves to dance, or wiggle when she hears music, even me singing can start up a little jig from her.

She can almost out eat her brother. 

I took the top pictures when she just turned 11 months and I took the bottom ones a day or so ago, so the bottom ones are not exactly her eleven month pictures, but they were too cute not to share. We are going to have to go over to Grandma V's house and get pictures there more often. I was getting tired of taking pictures in the same place everytime. There is not a lot of different options at our house.

Little K, Mama loves you,

 and I pray every day that you will grow up to do great things for the Lord!

Miss K is 10 Months

Miss K is ten months old. Can you believe it? 

I sure can't! The time has flown by. We will be celebrating her birthday before I blink.

She is such a little, mischievous girl, with big sparkly eyes.

I don't think anyone could have any more expressions than she does.

She has about 5 different smile for all of her moods. (I am serious!)

And, nope she doesn't have any teeth yet! 

I am glad, because the longer she waits to get them in the better they will be.

(I love all of her fat rolls.)

She thinks she is pretty much grown up, can't you tell?

She is pulling up, standing and climbing on everything, but not walking yet. I am fine with that, it is hard enough to keep up with her as it is.

Oh, and she does like to run. Boy, she like to run. If I hold her up she will run around the room as fast as she can, giggling constantly.

She loves to eat, and throw things off of her high chair when she is full, or bored.

If she is grumpy, she usually wants to be put in her bed for a few minutes.

 I guess she needs her quiet time.

She is still co sleeping with us about 25% of the time. I nurse her if she wakes up, Titus gets her for me and puts her back in her bed. (I've sure got a great husband.) You know the saying "I don't want to sleep like a baby, I want to sleep like my husband"? Well, I am one lucky Mama, because I get to. There are times that I never hear her, and Titus gets up and brings her to bed and I hardly notice. Ahhhh.... Sleep!

We are starting to train her to come to us if we call her, and so far she has been doing really good at it. 

She is learning to pick up toys too. I had only tried it a few time before she started right in. I hand her a toy and she drops it in the basket. She doesn't play with each one like a certain little boy like/likes to do. I don't think I started working with T at this age though, so that probably makes a difference. There weren't as many toys out then, as there is now.

Being this little girl's Mama is so much fun!

Happy ten months K, we love you!

big brother/little sister . speech/talking

Sometimes I have crazy photo shoot ideas, I try them, and well,

 they don't turn out like I had pictured in my head.

Then there are some that I am so glad that I tried.

Here is one that actually turned out just the way I wanted it to. 

I will always cherish these pictures.

They show exactly how T. treats his sister (most of the time). 

When I saw this picture I was a little disappointed that they didn't have any clothes on. 

They are posed so perfectly. 

Of course, they always pose when I am not ready, or I don't care if they do or not.

I can just hear him now: "Uh oh, Mom mom"

T. loves to feed K. 

He has been trying to help me change her diaper by bringing me wipes and diapers.

They are teaching each other so much. 

I am not sure who is going to be putting sentences together first.

K. has taken off and has said "Hi Dad"

and "Hi Ma maw" She pretty much shocked us with those...

If T. says something she will try to repeat it. 

Sometimes it is the other way around though, T. repeats everything she says/does.

T. seems to be improving a lot lately. I have been really working with him and trying to get him to repeat anything I say, and sometimes it is just the first sound of the word, but that is an improvement to what he was saying, and he seems to be gaining confidence just by me doing that with him.

We recently discovered that it might have been the vaccines that we gave him last Aug and Oct that  caused him to stop talking. (He has only ever had those two rounds of the Dtap vaccines.) Not only did he stop talking, he went backward for awhile. 

We have been praying a lot and researching what we can do to encourage him. 

In just a few weeks though, I have seen a big improvement! 

I am curious to know if anyone else has heard of anything like this happening before?

It was only his speech that was affected.

I have heard that vaccines have been linked to autism and, I am wondering what T would be like if we would have had all of his shots given to him "on scedule"...

I would also like some ideas on how to work with him.

books/puzzles/games/dvds?

Anyone else had a late talker?

T's Second Birthday

T turned two on the 23rd of July.

I cannot believe it...

TWO whole years has flashed by in what has seemed like a few weeks.

Wow! I think I will reminiscence for a little while. Sorry if you bore of this..

 (I am going to ramble) 

He was born on a saturday at 2:30 in the afternoon after only a 9 hour labor. 

It was love at first sight for his Daddy and me..

Titus talked of building him a sand box only hours after he was born. 

I remember the next 6 weeks being so absolutely awesome, and hard, as we learned how to be parents.

There were many sleepless nights, and so many more joyful moments. 

At first I had a hard time nursing him.

We finally figured out that we both had thrush.

Once we found that out, being a Mama wasn't so hard.

The Joy Of So Many Firsts.

first smile

first laugh

first tooth

first time sitting up

crawling

I remember it getting hard when he was about 9 mounths.

 He would nurse and nurse and fuss and fuss. He got to where he wasn't taking more than fifteen minute naps every little bit. He would go to sleep and then just wake up wanting to nurse. 

I could not figure out what the problem was....

After about a month of him fussing, we realized that my milk supply had dropped because I was pregnant.

Goat milk came to the rescue, and there he was, my sweet, happy baby was back in just a couple days.

first time standing

first birthday

walking 

talking 

new baby sister

growing

signing please

changing from a baby to a little boy

 giving up his nightime bottle

sharing

loving

 the list could go on...

Being a mama has been lots of hard work and tears,

 but it has been more rewarding than anything 

I ever could have imagined.

I absolutely love being a mama, 

and I absolutely love my little boy

Without further adieu I give you T's second birthday party 

(Which he shares with his wonderful aunt L)

                                     The menu: (thanks to Titus, the chef)

smoked meatballs

new potatoes

salad

cake

I am so glad that the weather was nice enough that we could eat outside.

Our house was in shambles...

Redoing floors tends to make it that way. (more on that in a different post)

It took them a little while trying on hats and figuring out what color they wanted.

Their hats cordinated with their clothes and we had nothing to do with it.

When it was time to pray they all joined hands...

So glad that T's cousins and best friend could come!

 The conversation at their table consisted mostly of moos, growls and giggles.

It is so fun having little friends for him to grow up with!

Mamaw and K were having a fun time! 

Little O's big eyes are so big and blue.

(I think he liked the meatballs.)

T's cake

Cute, in a first time Mama's ever tried to make a birthday cake way.

I think I need some more practice.

Aunt L had an angel food cake and T had a devils food cake. 

Smarties from Grandma V! 

I have to tell you that as soon as he got the paper off of them, he got up with a big handful and passed them out to several people.

(Whew, all this child training will pay off someday) :) 

T's gift from Uncle T and Aunt R 

     Thanks!

Aaannnnd last, but not least, his trycicle!

 Thanks to every one who put money in for it!

 He loves it!

We had such a fun time.

Happy Birthday T!