11 Months

Eleven months and walking! Well, I might be exaggerating just a little bit. Eliza isn't full on walking yet, but she has taken a few steps, and I don't think it'll be long before she's running all over the place. This month she's learned how to wave goodbye, signal touchdown (thanks to Ryan), and she's learned more sign language. She can now sign eat, more, and milk, and I'm working on teaching her mama and daddy. We are also trying to teacher her to be gentle with the dogs. Sawyer is still afraid of her and runs away every time she gets near him, but Eliza and Belle are big buddies. Whenever Eliza starts grabbing Belle we have tell her to "pat pat" and "be easy." It is so funny to watch the two of them together.

I'm not sure how much Eliza weighs right now, but people still comment on her chunky legs all the time. She wears mostly 18 month clothes and size four diapers. We are trying to give her more table food this month. Her favorite meal is a grilled cheese sandwich. She also really like grits and oatmeal. Right now we give her three bottles a day, but we are going to drop her night time bottle this week, and see how she does. She still sleeps well at night and we try to get her to take two naps a day, but that hasn't been happening at day care. I think she's afraid she'll miss something if she takes a nap. She gets the funniest bed head when she wakes up from her naps. It looks just like Ryan's does when he wakes up in the mornings.

Eliza is such a laid back, happy girl. She "talks" all the time and she is very curious. She is into EVERYTHING. Her favorite toys are cell phones, remotes, phone chargers, and basically anything she's not supposed to have. Eliza makes the funniest faces and keeps Ryan and I highly entertained. I say this all the time, but I cannot believe how fast she is growing! 

First Week of School

This was the first week of school for me and Eliza. Eliza did great. Me, not so much. I had a good week at school with the kids I teach, but I've been at home with Eliza all summer, so it's hard not seeing her all day, everyday. Her teachers are wonderful, and I know that being in day care and around other kids is going to be good for Eliza. It's just going to take some time for me to get used to our new schedule. Eliza's teachers said that she had no problem adjusting and that she had a wonderful first week. I love picking her up everyday and seeing the big smile she gets on her face when she sees me. I think it's going to be a good year!

Getting There (Part 2)

Hey y'all! It's time for part two of the house tour! I won't write as much as I did yesterday about each room because the pictures pretty much speak for themselves. We added two bathrooms upstairs, making the house four bedrooms and three and a half baths. One of the upstairs bathrooms is off of the guest bedroom and the other is a Jack and Jill between Eliza's room and the third bedroom.

The Guest Bedroom: 

Eliza's Room:

3rd Bedroom:

The current state of our backyard. My OCD self cannot stand to look at all this clutter. Ryan assures me that this will all be cleaned up before we move in. :)

Getting There (Part 1)

Obviously we are not in our house yet, but we're getting oh so close. Fingers crossed, we'll be moving in two weeks. I start to get overwhelmed every time I think about the whole moving process, so I'm just trying to take things one day at a time, and remember that everything will get done eventually. I went by our house this weekend to take some pictures of the progress. I'm going to do this in two posts. I'll show y'all the downstairs today, and the upstairs tomorrow (or maybe the next day).  

Formal Living Room:
When you walk in our front door you walk right in to the formal living room. This room really hasn't changed all that much. There were no structural changes made here, just some new paint. The hardwood floors have been done also, but you can't see them because they're covered up so they could paint.  

Dining Room:
The only major change we made here was to open up the entrance from the dining room to the kitchen. We painted this room and we will add a different chandelier at some point before we move in.

Kitchen:
When you look at the "Before" picture you can see that our kitchen was not always a kitchen. Before we ripped out the walls there was a bedroom and bathroom in what is now our kitchen.  We did major demo an made the most changes to the rooms off the back of the house so we could have a more open floor plan. I can't wait to have a big kitchen with lots of storage space.

Family Room:
Our kitchen opens up to the family room, which is also off the back of the house. Before we made it in to a family room it was a bedroom and a bathroom. The view of the "In Progress" picture was taken from the kitchen. 

Master Bedroom:
We added some square footage to the front of the house, which made the master bedroom a good bit bigger than it originally was. When we added space to the master it made the brick fireplace off center, so Ryan put in the built-in shelves on either side of it to make up for the odd spacing. The fire place will eventually be painted white. There used to be a screened in porch off the side of the master, but we closed it in and turned it into a closet. I don't have pictures of the closet yet because there's not much to see right now, but I will soon.

Master Bath/Half Bath/Laundry Room:
The top two pictures here are what the old kitchen used to look like. Now it is no longer a kitchen. We gutted this whole area, and part of the space became the master bathroom, part of it is a half bathroom, and part of it is the laundry room. I don't have "In Progress" pictures of the half bath and the laundry room, but the bottom two pictures below are the master bathroom vanity and shower. The shower is really hard to see because it was covered up for the painters, but I figured I'd throw it in there anyway.
 
The Back:
And finally, the back porch. I can't wait to spend many cool fall evening relaxing on this porch. I think this might be one of my favorite places in our new house. 

The Floor Plan: 
It's hard to explain the layout of the house without actually seeing it in person, but looking at the floor plan may help you visualize it.  Here are Ryan's final drawings of the house. The red lines are the walls we removed and the purple are the walls we added. I know this picture is small, but I couldn't make it any larger without cutting some of it off. If you click on the picture, it should open up in a bigger window.

It's My Blogiversary

My little blog is one year old! Well, actually my real "blogiversary" was on Thursday, but I've been a little preoccupied with getting ready to move, Eliza starting daycare, and going back to work that I completely forgot about it on Thursday. I am so glad that I've been able to keep this up so that I'll always be able to look back on Eliza's first year and everything we've been through. At times it's been hard to find the time to keep it going, but it's also been really fun. One thing I love about blogging, and the reason I started this blog, is that I can keep all of our friends and family updated on what's going on with us. With an eleven month old and a full time job, I don't get to see a lot our friends as much as I'd like to, and this blog has been a great way for us to stay connected. I also love reading other blogs because it makes me feel better to know that there a lot of other people out there going through the same things I am. It's kind of weird to think that there are people I've never met who I read about daily and feel a connection with. (Wow, I am a stalker.) I still have lots to share and say, so I hope that y'all will continue reading for the another year. In honor of my blog's first birthday I would love it if y'all would join my site. All you have to do is click on the link in the bottom of the column to the right. Thanks friends and have a great week!

Happy Birthday Uncle Monty

Happy birthday to my brother,  the one and only Monster Mash! I can't believe you are twenty years old. I hope you have a great day! We love you!

New Recipe

Happy Hump Day everyone! I have a new recipe for y'all. This is one of my mother-in-law's recipes. It's yummy, and quick and easy to make. Have you noticed how every time I post a recipe I say that it's quick and easy? That's about that only kind of recipe I make. I hope you enjoy it!

Pork Chops & Brown Rice:

Ingredients
Pork Chops
*I used lean pork chops to lighten it up, but regular pork chops are fine too.
Canola Oil 
2 boxes of Uncle Ben's Wild Rice
1 can of Campbell's Onion Soup 
1 can of Campbell's Beef Consume Soup
1/4 cup of water 


Directions
Lightly brown the pork chops in canola oil
Place the pork chops in a casserole dish
Empty the brown rice, onion soup, beef consume, and water over the pork chops
Cover and bake at 450 for 45 minutes

picture from here

10 Months

Ten months! Wow! My little butter bean is getting so big. She is very busy getting into everything these days. She is crawling all over the place, standing by herself for a few seconds, and walking by holding onto the furniture. Like I said in the last monthly update, these pictures are getting to be quite a challenge. I attempted to take her pictures by myself this time, and it did not work out very well. I ended up waiting on Ryan to get home because Eliza didn't want to stay still.

She finally has a tooth coming in! She seems to be doing pretty well with managing the pain. She gets a little fussier than normal on some nights, but for the most part, it doesn't seem to be bothering her too much. She still sleeps about twelve hours each night and takes two naps a day. She has three bottles a day and we have been giving her a lot more table food this month. At her last doctor's appointment the pediatrician told us to stop giving her baby food, but Eliza still really likes baby food, so I've still bee giving her some. I'm not sure exactly how much she weighs, but she is definitely a chunky-monkey. I think she's around 22 or 23 pounds and she wears 12-18 month clothes.

Eliza's favorite "words" are mama and baba. We're still working on dada. I've heard her say it a few times, but not as often as she says the other words. She loves playing with the dogs, watching baby sign language, and being out and about around people. She starts day care this month, and while I am really sad and so not ready to take her, I know it will be good for her. Eliza is such a sweet girl and she makes us so happy! We love you little girl!

Random Thoughts

When I was typing the title of this post it make me think of Deep Thoughts by Jack Handy. Remember him from SNL? Nothing about this post is going to be deep. I've actually been in a little bit of a blog rut lately. I don't know what it is. I have so many ideas for posts, but I just can't bring myself to write them. I think that the recovery from my foot surgery is wearing me out more than I realize. I am doing much better, and improving every day, but it just takes so much more energy to do anything. By the time I finally sit down at night the last thing I want to do is blog.

On the plus side, I've lost a little bit of weight since having surgery. I got really sick from the pain medication and anesthesia, and there's nothing like vomiting for three days to help you loose a few lbs. It's actually doesn't feel good at all though. Part of the reason I've lost weight is because I can't work out, and I've lost some muscle. I guess I shouldn't complain. I mean, who complains about losing weight? Check out my fancy new shoe. I'll spare you the pictures of what it looks like underneath all of the bandages.

...and on to my next random thought, the Olympics. I actually have several random thoughts about the Olympics, so here they are in no particular order....


I love watching the Olympics, but it is just killing me to watch some of these athletes being interviewed after they compete. Don't get me wrong, a lot of the athletes are very well spoken, but there are some that are not doing so hot. Ryan told me that I was being too critical, and I just needed to cut them a break, but I mean, they knew they were going to the Olympics, they knew might win a medal, and they knew they might be interviewed. Couldn't they have practiced in front of the mirror or something? To prove to me that I was being too harsh Ryan made me pretend like I was an athlete that had just won a medal, and he interviewed me. He made his point. I did horrible in my fake interview. Whether I think they did well in an interview or not doesn't really matter because they are the best athletes in the world.

Speaking of the best in the world, way to go Fab Five! I took gymnastics until I was eighteen years old, and it is my favorite sport to watch. I was so excited to see them win the gold on Sunday night. It is hard to believe that most of the girls on this team were one and two years old the last time an American women's gymnastics team won the gold in Atlanta in '96. I can remember being eleven years old and watching Kerri Strug do that last vault with a broken ankle.. I don't know if there will ever be another Olympic moment that great."You can do it Kerri!"

I really don't like the whole time difference/knowing the results before the events are aired thing. It just takes the excitement out of the Olympics. I'll admit that I may have looked online to see some of the results before watching an event, but the ones that I didn't sneak a peek for were ruined by the news broadcasting everything early. It's really annoying.

Eliza doesn't like finding out results early either.

Sorry if this post seemed a little negative, but these are just some things that I wanted to get off my chest. I'm working on Eliza's ten month post and I have a new recipe for y'all, so I'll be back soon with some more uplifting material. :)