Bottle Rebel

Looking at this picture, and reading my post a month ago, you would think my baby is a pro at taking a bottle. WRONG! Apparently my baby has rebelled against taking one. For some reason I was under the impression all babies take bottles - that they just come out knowing how. We've tried everything! We've tried different nipples, different positions, distracting her, shushing her, walking with her, even putting sugar water on the nipple. Nothing seems to work. Nicole and I have a trip to Canton planned for Friday and I'm afraid I'll have to cancel if things don't improve this week. Please, if you have any advice or encouragement send it my way!!!!

Children

"All husbands and wives borrow their children. Our children are not our own. Our children belong to God. He has loaned them to us for a season. Most marriages contain these borrowed jewels. They are not ours to keep but to rear. They are not given to us to mold into our image. They are not given to us so that we can force them to fulfill our lives and thus, in some way, cancel our failures. They are not tools to be used , but souls to be loved."

- Thomas C. Short

Oh, the Dreaded Day!

The dreaded day had arrived. It was time for the 2 month check up, which included 3 shots in the thigh and a vaccine taken orally. We dressed up our unsuspecting little girl, took our precious baby to her doctor's appointment, and then, before she knew it, WHAM-O, she was choking down a nasty tasting vaccine and getting poked in the legs! This is the stuff horror movies are made of! Our beautiful baby took it like a champ. She screamed during the shots, but as soon as the poking was finished and Daddy put her on his shoulder she was content again. I think she would have comforted her momma and daddy if she could talk. We are so proud of her! Praise the Lord it is over, because her parents were a mess all day! Gracie now has 3 Garfield band-aids to show for the trauma her parents endured today. :o)

The War Wounds

Now for the Stats...

Length - 22 in (35th percentile)

Weight - 11.8 lbs (50th percentile)

Head Circumference (35th percentile)

Our baby girl is growing up!

First Family Pictures

Well, we attempted outdoor family photos last weekend with Nicole and her family, on one of the HOTTEST days of the year. We all dressed up nice, I fed Gracie, and we headed out to get great pictures with a blue couch and God's beautiful creation. I know i know, not conventional, but we are all about the fun creative images! Anyways, I literally gave Nicole 2 minutes to get at least one good shot of our family (we didn't want Gracie in the harsh sun too long), and thanks to Nicole's quick camera skills we were able to get a few great ones. I was able to get some good ones of Nicole's family too which you can check out at www.nicoleandjoey.blogspot.com.

Bright Eyes

I love watching Gracie see the world for the first time. There are so many things she loves to look at, but her favorite thing is "Dusty". Dusty is the name given to our incredible dusty ceiling fan. She will watch that thing forever! Her little eyes light up when she sees it and she smiles and talks to it every day. It is the cutest thing.

It's Not Easy, But It's Worth It

Overwhelming. That is what parenting feels like sometimes. Just when I think I have figured out my baby girl, she goes and does something completely new that destroys all confidence I had. It is so overwhelming trying to parent with no instruction manual. We know her "favorite spots" to help her get comfortable, but those seem to be changing. We thought we had begun to decipher her different cries, and then she goes and adds a new cry. We have her on a good schedule one day, and then the next she makes a new one. We are constantly relying on the grace of God to help us parent Gracie. We know this stage will end soon, so we try and laugh at the hard times, knowing they will make for funny memories down the road. As I type this my sweet husband is trying to get Gracie to sleep, but she is resisting. I am off to help and make a new funny memory. Praise God I'm not in this alone!

Bumbo Baby

Here's my baby attempting the bumbo chair. She is just shy of 2 months and the chair is recommended for 3 months and older, which is pretty evident by the slumping baby in the picture. We're still working on strengthening our neck muscles. :o)

What a FIASCO

Fi-as-co [fee-as-koh]

This is what our first family craft turned out to be. I got this bright idea to get Gracie's hand and footprints on some of her white onesies to always remember how tiny she was. Sounds good right? I found a website detailing the steps of this fun and "easy" craft and got all of the supplies. We decided to do this last night before Gracie's bath. As Jonathan is holding Gracie, I mash her little foot in the wet black paint at which she immediately reacts by flailing her foot. She had black paint all over us, and herself. I managed to control her foot long enough to stamp it on the onesie, but it looked like a black blob. So, on to the next foot. We'll use less paint this time. Her other foot goes in the paint and onto the onesie leaving a very faint half footprint. HOW IN THE WORLD DO YOU DO THIS! Now we have an agitated, squirmy baby with two jet black feet and no good footprints to show for it. We decide to try the hand. This time we use pink paint. First of all my baby is strong. As soon as her little hand went into the pink paint she made a fist and squished the paint through her chubby fingers. I tried to separate her fingers and stamp it on the onesie, but the "handprint" looked more like I let her freelance fingerpaint on the onesie. So now I have a baby with two black feet and a pink hand. I went to wipe the paint off my baby with the baby wipes, but the paint had dried! I scrubbed with that baby wipe and nothing came off! I am half laughing and half freaking out that we were never going to get the paint off! We got her in a warm bath and soaked her in it. We finally were able to scrub the paint off of her (I however, still have it on me). Her bath was about 4 times as long because of all the scrubbing, but Gracie took it like a champ. It's safe to say we will not be trying that again anytime soon. We need a better plan first. Our first craft day was a fiasco, a funny memory, but definitely a fiasco! :o)

My First Baby

Tonight we got to go on a date (thanks to my sweet mom for babysitting). Our second official date since Gracie. We went to dinner and a movie (something we would have taken for granted about 7 weeks earlier. We enjoyed every minute and loved being together again, just the two of us. We love our daughter so much and wouldn't trade her for the world, but kids do change everything. We definitely want to keep our marriage a priority, which is why we are going to continue to find times for dates. Here are some pictures of us together before our sweet baby. I know this blog is dedicated to my baby Gracie, but if it weren't for these precious moments, she wouldn't be here. :o)

This is when we first started dating. Look at all that beautiful blonde hair!

The day he proposed! We just got back to my parent's house to celebrate.

After we were married, after the haircut.

I love my husband so much!!! Thank you Baby for a great date!

My First Mother's Day

What a day! It is still hard for me to believe I am a mom! Gracie has definitely changed my life in so many ways. Even now, I am holding my baby and typing this blog with one hand. There are so many things i have done since she came into my life that i never thought i'd do....

-stay up all night just watching her little expressions and listening to her sweet funny noises

-cry while she cried because i've exhausted every possible way to soothe her

-take millions of pictures of her just trying to capture the innocent beauty I see in her every day

-laugh so hard as Jonathan screamed for more wipes because Gracie was pooping on him

-get so excited over the sweetest smile God ever created!

We have gotten to celebrate Mother's Day all weekend. First, on Friday with Jonathan's family, including Brooke (who was able to meet Gracie for the first time) and then on Saturday with my family. Today Jonathan and Gracie got me a digital picture frame on which Jonathan uploaded the cutest pictures of Gracie. They also got me the sweetest card and a mother's day video Jonathan put together. What a blessing God has given me with this precious family! I love being a mom. It is exhausting and overwhelming at times, but it is absolutely wonderful!

I wouldn't trade this for the world.

Here are some pictures of me and my baby on this mother's day.

Funny Faces

I just wanted to post a few pictures of my baby's cute funny faces. She is so expressive! It's fun!

Little Hands

Gracie has been using her hands a lot more to grab things like the edge of her changing table, our shirts while we hold her, and apparently daddy's nose while she is sleeping. :o) She was stretching while taking a nap on daddy's chest, reached up and felt daddy's nose, and held on. It was too cute!

My Baby Fashionista

I think Gracie has more cute clothes, shoes, and accessories than I do thanks to the great baby showers and generous gifts of our friends and family. Even though we don't get out much, we have enjoyed dressing her up in all her fun outfits. These pictures show off the sweet baby bracelet Nicole got for her. I remember how big this bracelet was on her when we first came home from the hospital. It wouldn't stay on her sweet little arm. Now that she is big enough to wear it we had to take her picture in it. Precious!