11 months

       Gabriella I just cannot believe that you are already 11 months old. The Lord has truly blessed us these past 11 months with you!! You are such a joy and a happy baby. I always wanted a little girl to dress up and do fun girly things with!! Your daddy, Jake, and I love you so much and cannot imagine our lives without your sweet self.

Stats:

The last time we were at the doctor you weighed in at 20lbs. I wasn't paying attention to your length but you are usually in the 85th percentile.

Clothing Size:

I just finished packing up all the rest of your 3-6 month onesies and pants. =(( You are in a lot of 6-9 months clothing and we have started breaking out the 12 months dresses and pants. Unfortunately we have a hard time keeping the pants up on you so we put them underneath onesies most of the time.

Diaper Size:

You are still in a size 3 and probably will be for a while longer

Hair & Eyes:

You have the most beautiful blue eyes I have ever seen. You and Jake both have these beautiful blues and I'm so glad. Your hair is getting so thick and long...it may not be too much longer before I need to trim your bangs because they get down in your eyes at times.

Feeding:

You are getting to where you aren't very fond of purees anymore. You love eating whatever mommy, daddy, or bubba are eating. You eat three meals a day with a couple snacks in between. Also, if anyone around you is eating then you have to have what they have as well! =) You love cheerios and we just introduced you to raisins and you think they are great!! Potatoes have to be your favorite food though. Anyway you can make them you will eat them! =))

Sleep:

 

Sleep has gotten a lot better since you aren't sick anymore. You are going to sleep around 7:30-8 every night and sleeping till about 6:30 am. You take two naps a day..a morning nap in which you go down around 8:30 and sleep till 11:30 or so.....and then an afternoon nap from 1-3 usually.

Activities:

 

You are so curious these days. We have had to put ribbon ties on every cabinet that you can get into, especially in the kitchen. I had thought about installing cabinet locks but since we will be moving into our new house soon I didn't want to waste the money and time doing it.



•  You are SOOO close to walking. You will walk along the couch holding on with just your fingertips, and you pull up on everything you can. You will walk alongside mommy or daddy holding just one of our hands.

•  You learned how to wave about a month ago and you think it's the greatest thing ever. This past Sunday in church I thought for sure you were about to fall asleep so I put you on my shoulder....nope, big mistake...you started waving at everyone behind us! =))

• You are a great clapper and LOVE LOVE LOVE music. You will either sit down and clap along or stand up and bounce your booty along with the music....it's the most precious thing ever!!

• You have got the cutest little personality. You never met a stranger and love getting attention. But there are times when you will act shy and put your head down on my shoulder.

• You will take a blanket and play peek a boo whenever you can. You'll hold the blanket over your face and I will say, "Where's the baby?" And you'll pull it down and just cackle laughing.

• You are very ticklish and I just love hearing your laugh

• You love swinging at the park. We try to go often but the weather is just awful here lately.

 

•  You can say "Mama", "Dada", "Cat", "Hey", "Yeah", "Cup", and sometimes "Bubba".

• You love books...I know you get that from me!! You and Jake both have a love for books that just thrills my heart. You have a little crate full of board books and you will sit for the longest time just looking through each one. You also love to be read to, either by mommy or daddy or by bubba. Jake loves reading to you and I think you like hearing his voice and silly sounds that he makes.

 

 

My Precious, I just cannot believe in 1 short month we will be celebrating your birthday! While I am a little sad that time seems to be flying by, I'm so very thankful to our Heavenly Father that He has blessed us with you!! Birthday party planning is in full force and I cannot wait to celebrate your first year of life with our close friends and family members.

 

We love you Princess!!!

 

Guess what we've got?!

         I really thought when I took Gabriella to the doctor last Friday for her re-check from having bronchitis that we were in the clear and things were going to start looking up in the sickness category. Little did I know that was not going to be the case. Friday, the 8th she had her 9 month check-up (yes, at 10 1/2 months my little one is getting her check-up, it was cancelled before because of all that snow we got in January, LOL), and she met all of her developmental milestones. Dr. Megan listened to her lungs, checked her ears, eyes, and throat. All of them checked out. She did have a runny nose but Dr. Megan noticed that she is cutting her EIGHTH! tooth on the bottom left...so we attributed it to that. We got a steroid cream for her eczema so that we can control her flare-ups.
        Fast forward to Saturday...it was a normal day. We did some housework around the house in the morning. David went to the new house to meet with an air conditioning dude to have our systems checked out....thankfully everything was good with them. When DW got back home I went with one of my best buds grocery shopping. We had a nice 4 hour trip, it was great to get out of the house without the kiddos and have some adult talk. While we were shopping DW and the kids went to the woods and Gabriella slept in the Ergo while they walked in the woods. Saturday night I noticed that Gabriella was braking out in what I thought was hives or maybe she was having an eczema flare-up. I didn't think much about it and put some cream on her.
       We woke up late Sunday mainly because G did not sleep well AT ALL. When we got up we saw that she was broke out all over!!! I immediately thought it was chicken pox but I was seriously hoping that it wasn't. David and I agreed that we needed to take her to the ER, which is 45 minutes away. I took a shower and we got ready. We dropped Jacob off at my parents and headed to Tuscaloosa.
        Sure enough...she has chicken pox. We were immediately taken back so as not to infect others.

 

The ER doctor said that there was really nothing he could do for her. Said for us to give her oatmeal baths, Tylenol for fever (which she did run a pretty good low grade fever for a couple days), and to coat her in calamine lotion.

 



As bad as these two look...this was not the worse of it. I haven't taken any more pictures of the pox because when she is undressed she attempts to claw at them and I don't want her to scar.

 

G enjoyed playing on the hospital bed with her daddy!! We were there for about 3 hours so it was all we could do to keep her occupied and sitting still. She didn't feel well but she also didn't want to sit still. Thank goodness there was a television in the room with us.

After a while she gave up on playing and decided she would much rather nap with her daddy. =)

 

 



My sweet girl! It was so hard seeing her feel so bad.

 

       The hardest day was definitely Sunday night into Monday morning. She just could not get comfortable. I know the pox had to be itching her and making her miserable. David tried to get her to sleep and lay her down in bed but she would wake up each time. Finally, around 11:30 pm I got up and took her. Unfortunately, I started coming down with a cold on Saturday so I my nose was so stopped up I was just about as miserable as G was. We slept for a few hours in the recliner and then she woke up and I coated her in calamine again. Once she feel back to sleep I was able to put her in bed. She slept till 9 Monday morning. =)

         So, I guess the good side of all this is that now the pox are done and over with. She won't get them when she is older and its one less shot she has to get now. I was worried that Jacob might get them but he was vaccinated so the doctor's said he should be fine.

 

        I'm just so ready to be free and clear of all sickness!! =)

 



Random Thoughts on a Wednesday

I, by no means, have what most people would call an exciting life...but I have a very blessed one, that is something I am sure about. I don't really have one specific topic to blog about but I have several thoughts rolling around in my head and I know one day I will want to remember certain things that went on in my life while my children were small.

Last Friday I took Miss Gabriella back to the doctor for her re-check after having bronchitis. She is finally on the mend after being sick for about 2 1/2 months. Praise the Lord!! She has gained 14ozs in one week...I would defiantly say she is feeling better. She refused all purees and table food while she was sick and would only take a bottle. Her appetite has returned in full force and she is getting so used to being on an eating schedule that when it gets time for a meal she will let you know!!

She was eating cheerios while I snapped these pictures!! =)

Jake played Park and Rec baseball for the first time last year. He basically had never picked up a real bat nor had he used an actual baseball glove before. About a month before his season began, David started working with him and he got to be pretty good by the time the season was over with. Most importantly, he had a really good time playing. Well, it's that time of the year again, so last Tuesday David, Jake, G, and I went up to the park to get some practice in.

 

David is such an amazing daddy!! He teaches a night class now on Tuesdays and instead of coming home and resting before having to go back to school to teach, he would rather go to the park and play with his kids!! Thank you Lord for this amazing man!

We couldn't get on an actual field because they have started locking the gates in the off season. I'm sure it's to prevent damage to the fields, but it was kinda sad that we couldn't let him hit balls on the actual field. But he still did an awesome job and knocked the cover off the ball many times.

 

Princess hung out in the ring sling with me on the bleachers, and as you can tell it was very windy that day. She wanted more than anything to get down and go out there with her brother!!

 

Some exciting news on the home front journey is that we signed the contract on our new house yesterday!!! We have been searching for our home for over a year now and I honestly didn't think it would take us this long to find the right one for our family but God had other plans. I have to realize that HE is in control and I am not!! Right now our closing date is set for 28Feb13, I'm not sure that it will stay that but hopefully it will be very close to it because I REALLY REALLY REALLY want to have G's 1st birthday party there.

 

 





 



Couponing

     As the New Year approached I began thinking about things that I would like to work on in 2013. I came up with several "resolutions" but one of them that I am most excited about it couponing. I had no idea how to get started or where I would get adequate coupons from but I knew the Lord would provide if it was something that I needed to get into.
    In the past I have cut coupons and tried to keep them in a Ziploc bag in my purse or in a very small coupon organizer. Well, that just didn't work out for me. I like to have things organized and easily accessible. Therefore, I knew the best solution would be to have a binder.

 So, I started with a binder that I had laying around and went to our local Wal-Mart to look for the photo pages (the ones that you put in photo albums) so that I could organize my coupons. Unfortunately I didn't find what I was looking for...I was frustrated and mad because I was really wanting to get things moving forward with this project....when I was about to walk away I noticed Ultra Pro Coupon Pages and I was so excited!!! The package that I got has 40 pages with varying sizes of pockets on each page.
    I came home and immediately sat down to start organizing coupons. I have them broke up in 7 categories right now: Food, Cleaning/Home Supplies, Personal Care, Medicines, Pets, Restaurants, Baby.

Under each category, I have the coupons broke down into each specific type of item. For example, there is a page for breakfast items, frozen items, drinks, snacks, etc. The tabs at the top of each page state what type of item is on that page.

 

After that I broke it down more...I organized the coupons according to what the item was, example: breakfast sausage, bacon, hashbrowns, etc. That way if I have several different brands of breakfast sausage I can store them all in the same pocket and not have 500 different pockets taken up with the same item. Hopefully that makes some sense. =)



Then I armed myself with the Publix ad and started marking things that were on sale and I had a coupon for. Publix runs many items 1 one get 1 free and that's a great way to take advantage of using a coupon. Also, Publix as well as Wal-Mart and many other grocery stores will Ad Match, meaning if you have a sale paper that shows a specific item on sale...these other stores will honor their sale and give you that same sale price.

 

 

 

    Some great websites to help you keep up with sales at different stores is www.krazycouponlady.com and www.southernsavers.com. They break down the sales at each and every store, including places like CVS and Walgreens.

 

    I cannot tell you how many people stopped me and asked me if I was an "Extreme Couponer" while I was shopping at Publix Saturday night. I told them no, that I was just trying my best to save my family money and keep us on a tight budget. I am only buying things that are on sale or I have a coupon for. If there is an item that we as a family use on a regular basis and I think would benefit us to stock up on...then I will buy it even if it's not needed at that moment. It has seriously turned into a game for me. I am enjoying this new adventure and hope that I do well at it. On my trip to Publix Saturday I saved $41.07....not a huge amount of money but it is a start.

 

 

~Karisa~

Gabriella is 10 Months Old!

It's so hard to believe that my sweet little girl is already 10 months old. Honestly, I don't know where the time has gone. I mean it seems just like yesterday we were bringing her home. She has changed so much over the past 2 months...here's what G is up to at ten months old:

 

Stats:

 

When we went to the doctor on Thursday, Gabriella weighed 19lbs. and 4ozs. I'm not sure what her height is...we will find out on her 9 month check-up which because of the freak "snow storm" we had a couple weeks ago was cancelled and rescheduled for February. 

 

What She's Eating:

 

Gabriella is turning into a great eater!! I made all of her solid foods for the first three months that she was on them. Once the local farmer's markets closed it started to be more expensive to make her food then to just buy it. I plan on making more once the Spring hits and the produce becomes cheaper. She started eating real table food at Thanksgiving and hasn't looked back since. She eats just about anything that we are eating...with an exception of spicy or too sweet things. She will have oatmeal with some fruit for breakfast, a veggie and a fruit for lunch, and a veggie and a fruit for dinner. She will have two snacks during the day that will usually consist of Puffs or Cheerios. She is doing a great job with her sippy cups...I was a little nervous when I started giving them to her because she had a hard time with finding a bottle that she would take. But cups have been a much easier transition. She mainly only gets water in her cups.

 

 

 

 

Clothes:

 

Gabriella is wearing mainly 6-9 months size clothes. She does have some 12 months that I put her in just mainly so that we get lots of wear out of them. She had long legs so sometimes her pants have to be 12 months where as her tops have to be 6 or 9 months.

 

 

Diapers:

 

Gabriella is still in a size 3 diaper and will be for a while. They fit her great and she still has a while to go before she has outgrown the weight limit on the 3's.

 

 

Favorites:

 

Gabriella is at such a fun age right now. She loves playing with her bubba and her toys.  Bath time is definitely a favorite of hers!! She has always loved taking baths but when we let her sit in the bathtub without a bath seat a whole new world of fun was opened up. She loves all her bath toys and hates having to get out.

 

 

 

 

 

One of her favorite toys has to be the ball popper, found here...it was one of her Christmas presents and I'm not sure who has more fun playing with it, Jacob, David, or G. LOL =) She still gets in her swing even though I have considered packing it up several times. But I'm glad that it's still out because that just reminds me that she's still little and I'm not making her grow up too fast! =)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

She loves to play with Jake's toys just as much as she does with her own. Jake got a new table top air hockey game from his Paw & Maw and G was more interested in playing with it then anything else.

 

 

And lastly, one of her most favorites right now is our cat, Sampson. She loves the cat so much! Whenever she's sick and not feeling well, Sampson is right next to her. He will get in the floor and roll around in front of her and she will just cackle laughing.

 

 

 

It's hard to believe that she will be 1 in two short months but I am trying to enjoy every little milestone and moment with her. I know how fast it goes because I can't believe that my Jake is already 6. =( I just thank the Lord for these two sweet babies and try to be the best mommy to them that I can be.

 

~Karisa~

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Finally...I'm in the Blogging World

I cannot tell you how long I have wanted to start my own family blog. I don't really know why it has taken me this long....ok, that's not true....I do know and it's a silly reason and you will probably laugh but here goes: I couldn't think up a name for the blog! =( Yes, it's true. I have ZERO creativity in my body so for me to come up with a catchy, cute title was HARD!! I am pleased with what I have come up with though and hope that I can make this blog interesting.

~Karisa~