Sometimes it's hard to be sweet.

I just love the irony in this picture!

Hattie was throwing a fit because I wouldn't pick her up. That lip gets her daddy every time. This is Sean's new favorite picture of her.

Tutu

I found this red, white, and blue tutu while shopping at Once Upon a Child. It's my favorite resale shop. They have the best bows, and once in a while I find some adorable outfits and shoes for Hattie. I had to buy this tutu. She already has a birthday dress that's red, white, and blue, but since her birthday party is going to be at Tutu's house, I just had to get it :0)! I figure she can wear it while eating her cake.


In other news, our sweet toddler-about-to-be has decided that she is so over being fed with a baby spoon. She will only eat something if she can pick it up and put it in her mouth. Occasionally, she will let me put something in her mouth, but it can't be on a baby spoon. The food I give her can either come from a regular spoon or fork or my fingers.

Her favorite food right now is cheese. Anytime I go to the fridge, and she's in her highchair, she says, "cheeees!" When she's eating her food, she will pick all of the cheese crumbles and eat those first. It's so amazing to me that she has preferences and notices what she's eating.

With her refusal to eat from a spoon, I am finding that meal-time is a challenge. I worry about her iron level since it was low at her 9 month appointment. It's hard to come up with bite size, non-chokeable (is that a word?), healthy, and quick things for her to eat.

I feel like I am starting all over with her eating, especially since she is so over the bottle but won't give her sippy cup the time of day. Yep, there is no way she's gonna be drinking her milk from a sippy cup by her first birthday. She will drink water from it but nothing else. I don't know how to go about this. Do I do it cold-turkey? But then will she get enough? This is our present dilemna. I know it's small potatoes considering what we have ahead of us in years to come. Thank goodness we have a few short precious years at the beginning of life that children just don't remember. I just feel sorry for Hattie. She's our first born and thus has to break us in, teach us the ropes.

Any suggestions about the bottle to sippy-cup saga are greatly appreciated!!!

Happy Father's Day, Dadoo!

I wanted to make something special for Sean for Father's Day. I found this poem on a message board that I frequent. You can click on the picture to read the poem. I had fun taking the pictures and putting it all together, and I enjoyed seeing Sean's face when I gave it to him!

I am so thankful to have married a man who is a great husband, and Hattie is so blessed to have such an active, loving, and thoughtful father. We love you, Dadoo!

YEEHAW!!!

Thank you, Aunt Christie, for the pink cowgirl hat!

Children's Museum in Dallas

Christie and Luke went on vacation this week with her parents to Tyler, TX. They decided to take the 2 hour trip up to Dallas to visit with us for the day today. We had such a great afternoon seeing all of them! We went to the Aquarium, and then we took the babies to the children's museum. They were a little young for most of the stuff there, but they really enjoyed it, I think. Then we got some Mexican food downtown - yum, yum!
They liked playing with the plastic veggies at "the farm."

They were so busy playing that it was hard to get them to look at the camera, so we all started making LOTS of noise, which produced these startled looks from our babies, but hey, we got them to both look at the camera at the same time!

Hattie had to check out the chickens.

Then we decided to ride the rocking horse. Poor rocking horse, I think I broke his back!

Hattie liked the soft fur on the sheep.

Hattie was SO interested in Luke's hands. She kept trying to grab them. Hhhmm....better not be flirting!!! He's your cousin, remember!


Hey, happy boy!

Hattie LOVED the animal pictures that were velcroed to the wall. She took it upon herself to take them all down. I think she liked the sound they made with she took them off, and she never passes up an opportunity to make a mess!

Baby-Switcheroo!

We took so many pictures. I'll have to post more later. I'm tired now. We had a lot of fun, though, and the babies were pretty good the whole time. Good job, Hattie-boo and Lukey-poo!

A Summer Morn

Saturday morning we took Hattie outside to play in her pool before it got too hot. For some reason she was not at all happy about playing in the pool. She much preferred to play with a bucket of water. I think it's because she has recently discovered how to put toys inside of things and then take them out again. It's a new favorite game of hers that never seems to get old.



Hattie still only has TWO teeth. She'll be a year in less than a month. I keep thinking she's teething and that another tooth is going to pop out any day, but nothing. She has also started to show her nurturing side. For Christmas she got a doll, and she LOVES this baby doll. I will cry for the doll, and she'll crawl over to it and pick it up; it's so cute. She's even started trying to mimic my cries for the doll when she "plays" with it. I definitely think I have my girly girl that I always wanted! She's not rough at all. I see these little boys at playgroup and storytime and it surprises me how rough and independent they are. Hattie is content to just sit in my lap and read a book or play with her doll. We took her to the play area at the mall on Saturday and she would crawl off and play for a few minutes, but she was constantly looking over her shoulder at us, and if other babies around her got loud, she'd crawl back to us. Hattie is not a risk-taker. She gets nervous easily, which is why I don't think she'll be walking anytime soon. She gets so scared if I let go of her hands while she's standing - she gives a look of panic, shuts her eyes, and falls over. She's our sensitive, cautious little girl. I only hope she stays cautious when she's a teenager :0)!

Blogahon Endorses the Dyson!

We've been happily married for over three years. But during those three years something has been missing. It took us a while to put our fingers on exactly what the missing piece has been. We initially thought that we needed a baby to fill the void. Well, babies are nice but we still had this deep void which reared its ugly head ever so often. Then we thought we needed a blog. So we started this blog late last year. At first the blog seemed to fill the hole that we troubling our family but after a few weeks of blogging we realized that we had only made the problem worse.

Finally we figured out what it was...we needed a quality vacuum cleaner!

We've plowed through 3-4 vacuum cleaners since our wedding day. The vacuum saga usually goes something like this: We'll buy a shinny and fancy looking model from Wal-Mart. We'll bring it home and sure enough it seems to work ok for the first 2-3 months...but then, invariably, the vacuum starts to loose suction. The result is that we simply get frustrated with vacuuming and give up. We can't do that anymore because Hattie is crawling around and eating stuff off the floor all day. We've tried every major brand...Dirt Devil, Regina, Eureka, Bissell etc. Each cost $75-$125 and all eventually stopped sucking and started sucking at the same time (if you follow me.)

Daddy did a little research and found a British made vacuum cleaner that makes the bold claim that it "never looses suction" and comes with a 5 year warranty. Not too shabby.

Last night we pulled the trigger and purchased what we hope is the last vacuum cleaner we buy in at least five years. Our first use of our new toy yielded tremendous results. The canister which catches the dirt and fuzz balls was packed full of dust that was just sitting in our carpet.

Of course, time will tell if the Dyson proves to be a worthy investment. For now, however, Dyson gets the Blogahon seal of approval.

Hattie's 11 Months & More

Hattie turned 11 months old today. It's hard to believe our little girl is closing in on one year.


Also, we went to Houston this past weekend for my brother's and two cousins' high school graduation party. It was REALLY HOT, but we had a lot of fun seeing family that I don't get to see much.

The Graduates - I remember when they were all babies (minus Granny :0)) and now they're off to college!

My mom and two sisters with me. We haven't taken a picture all together in FOREVER so I was glad to get this shot.


We also went to an evening Summer Fling at Sean's grandmother's retirement community. They had great live music and Hattie was a hit with all of the residents.

Hattie Ruth with one of her namesakes, Gramama Ruth. (Who is that weird guy in the background?!?! :0)!)


Father & Son - This is a great picture because both Sean and his dad are usually the ones taking the pictures, so I'm glad I have one of them both together!

Our little family:


Sunday, my mother-in-law hosted lunch at her house after church, so we got to see everyone on Sean's side again and all the kids. It was chaos, but a lot of fun and great food!

We are home now and tired and have TONS of laundry and sleep to catch up on. We can't wait to move back so our visits won't be so short lived and so far between.