Not Cool, Wires.

I told Steve he's not allowed to do anything that made Evelyn look like she was growing up! Whenever I have a night out, Steve gives Evie a bottle, and apparently she's getting good at holding the bottle herself. Say it isn't so! I would like to go back in time now, please!

Look at her, all grown up! I can't believe she can do this by herself!

Backyard Camping

We kicked camping's tail! When Steve got home on Friday night, I had some food and supplies ready and he got started on the tent. I had to document our first time in the "wild" with a ton of pictures!

 Halfway there! I was very thankful that Steve was feeling so manly with himself; I'm not sure I could have figured it out. 

Success! We are obviously not "wilderness campers". I think camping should always be done with an air mattress close by. 

Dinner was hot dogs and quesadillas with s'mores for dessert. I used a skillet to make quesadillas, but Steve roasted the hot dogs and marshmallows on skewers. Note to self: bamboo sticks that are intended for shish kabobs do not make very good camping skewers.

Mel joined us for dinner in between a meeting for her Not For Sale internship and karaoke night with girlfriends. (She has a much more exciting life than we do.) This is her "the fire is really hot!" face.

A three-year old with what my mother calls a "big personality".

She reeeeeeally liked the s'mores!

Evie getting settled in her "bunk". She has just started rolling over, which happened to be bad timing for camping. I brought the mattress out from her crib, but was super-paranoid that she was going to roll off and get stuck between her mattress and the wall of the tent. She finally laid still once she fell asleep.

Initially, Bella was not convinced that we were actually going to sleep outside. We were excited that she settled in so quickly. We brought all of her quilts and blankets down from her room, and let her chill with Steve's iPhone. We'll force her to get in touch with nature next time! P.S. Bella's "special blanket" is the one that her Great-Grandma Ferguson made for her and the quilt is from a wonderful lady at church, Leslie. They are so beautiful, and Bella never sleeps without them!

Steve and Evelyn having some bonding time. We did eventually put away technology and pretend we didn't have access to a 4G network. 

Bella and I spending our daylight hours reading...and reading and reading.

Bella really wanted to take a picture of the horse on the back of her book. Notice that I'm not looking - she said, "You no look at the camera, Mama." I had to look away, but still point at the horse for her documenting purposes.

While taking the previous picture, she noticed my blue nails. "Hands up, Mama!"

Our view from bed. Since there was no forecast for rain, Steve agreed to leave the rain-guard off and we got to sleep all night while looking up at the stars! Very romantic...minus the toddler and baby in there, too.

When she refuses to smile this often, it helps to keep your sense of humor.

The Divine Miss E's set-up. Oh, and a box fan, so Mama stays cool. I need to add that to my "must have while camping" list: an air mattress and a fan.

We finally got both girls asleep! It was about two hours later than normal, but we had a great time! We read books, played on the bed together, watched a movie, and looked at the stars. It was warm when we went to sleep, but we had pants and long sleeves with us just in case, and it definitely got chilly over night! Waking up to nurse Evie, I finally brought her into bed with me because her hands and ears were cold.

We survived! This is us first thing this morning. Bella woke us up at 6:30 and then played in her "room" with the flashlight.

Celebrating our return to civilization with breakfast at Cracker Barrel. Chicken fried steak and scrambled eggs. 

We will definitely try it again this Fall in the real wilderness...or at least a real campsite.



Blessings

I'm a planner. It keeps me sane. Especially where money is concerned. Our income is a set amount and I know where the wiggle room is, so it's fairly easy to look ahead and figure out what needs to be saved for. I've been setting aside money for Steve's birthday since July, I'm already planning Christmas presents, you get the idea. It helps to have a plan when you're on a tight budget. I've also learned throughout my marriage that Steve sees it as a sign of respect to him that I stay within our budget and don't "surprise" him with spending. Okay, sometimes I still struggle with this one, but anyway...

The reality of a tight budget, though, is that you can't plan for everything. Something will come up that I've forgotten or didn't know about, and we have to get creative or do without it. I used to think the "do without" option wasn't an option, especially if it was something small. I'm not talking about a Caribbean cruise, but if I wanted to spend $100 on new Fall clothes for Bella, I didn't see the big deal. Thankfully, God has humbled me, inspired me, taught me...and taught me some more.

On to our blessings! As I was looking ahead at the next few months and planning for things that would come up, I knew we didn't have money for Halloween costumes. Now, this isn't really a big deal in the grand scheme of eternity, but since having children, I have come to LOVE Halloween! We didn't really do it as a kid, so I enjoy dressing Bella up even more! I was originally thinking about convincing Bella (bwahahahaha!) to be Fancy Nancy, but a store-bought costume wasn't an option. Enter God, Grandma, and Cinderella! When we were in Ohio for Labor Day, Mom gave us some princess dresses that she had found at a garage sale. There was a Cinderella dress in beautiful condition, and I knew right away that it would be our Halloween costume! I put all of the other dresses in Bella's playroom, and kept the Cinderella dress on our closet so that it wouldn't get ruined. Bonus: Bella just happens to be a dead-wringer for Cinderella. Not sure how I would have pulled off Fancy Nancy's red curls!

This scenario has happened over and over! I already have all of Bella and Evelyn's Christmas presents, and 90% of it is hand-me-downs from friends whose kids had outgrown the toys. It is a wonderful gift to see how God provides for us, even beyond our needs to our "think we need." I had a friend give me a bunch of sweaters that she didn't want anymore, and it came right at the time when I was looking at my closet and feeling a little stuck in between maternity clothes and not quite fitting into my pre-Evie clothes again. Whitney has passed down a ton of baby clothes from Charli that I got to look through for Evie and then pass on to other women the clothes we couldn't use! It's a blessing to give when we have received so much!

“And why do you worry about clothes? See how the flowers of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own."

Matthew 6:28-34

I Need Something Stronger In My Tea

There's a reason I beg Steve for alcohol. So far, he hasn't given in...

While Bella and I were watching a movie this morning, she knelt beside me on the bed and started rubbing her face on my shoulder like a cat. I tried so hard to sit still, but she did it over and over! Oh, and she had Cheetos residue all over her hands. I tried to gently move away, and she yelled out, "I want to rub on you!" The kid is so weird! I love her hugs, but there are days when she tries to caress me in the creepiest way. That's right, I said "caress". It's what she does.

Bella apparently felt she wasn't getting enough attention yesterday, because she copped a squat in the middle of her bedroom and peed on the floor. Steve would have been very proud of me, because I stayed super-calm and just told her we only go tee-tee in the potty.

Walking into Wal-Mart yesterday, she looked at me sweetly, and asked, "I lick you please, Mama?" I sweetly replied, "Um, no thank you, that's okay."

Every Sunday, the Sunday School teachers reinforce three main statements to the kids: God made me. God loves me. Jesus wants to be my friend forever. Steve has been reminding Bella of these every night as he tucks her in. He says the line, and Bella repeats it. So far it's been a week or so, and Bella's version is a little off. She says, "God made me. God loves me. Rex will be my friend forever!" No matter how many times we say it, Rex always comes out at the end.

Car conversations are the best. My favorite one this week was Bella saying, "Mama! Mama! Peter Pan was flying, and he pinched my bottom! He's so silly!"

Clothes can be so cumbersome when you're trying to get your sweat on.

Hope everyone is having a good Wednesday! I'm dreaming about pedicures and margaritas!

Saturday Was Busy...

Today was fun and busy! The house has taken a minor hit for the sake of new projects and fun!

I actually went around the house on Friday afternoon and took pictures of the rooms. Every single room had some sort of disaster going on...this is our bedroom...for some reason, it always seems to look the worst! I know you're going to say that it doesn't look that bad, but somehow the picture doesn't do it justice.

The space by my bed...it's still not clean (as of Saturday night), but I've thrown away the McDonald's cup!

One of my projects on Friday night and Saturday morning. This is our entryway; I don't know if you'd call it rearranging or re-doing, but we changed it! I have to give a huge shout out to my design-savvy husband. I hung the pictures and then I was totally stuck about which table I wanted in the space. I was thinking of painting one of our tables white, but Steve suggested this little white table and aqua blue chair that was sitting in our bedroom. It adds a fun pop of color, and I feel like the space is very "us" now. (Simple pleasures!)

Steve working in the garage on sanding and painting a new shelf for Evelyn's room. My next project that I'm slowly saving for...painting our front door yellow! Our extra money over the next few months is going towards Christmas, so I may have wait awhile on any new projects. Hopefully, our yellow door will be able to make an appearance in January!

I spent some time with our Family Pastor, Todd, on Thursday, asking him a lot of parenting questions. We need all the help we can get with our wonderful, defiant, energetic, opinionated, little kumquat. One of his suggestions for my type-A personality was to chill and have more fun with Bella. So today while I was working in the dining room, I spread a tarp on the floor, stripped her down, and let her share my paint. She had a blast! And she handled the messy paint really well, too! One step at a time...

Daddy getting some work done while Bella and I worked on our paint projects.

Evelyn chilling with Auntie Mel. I took the picture right before she actually smiled. Bummer!

Her eyes still haven't decided if they want to be brown or blue, but I think they'll end up brown. Look at her cute little lips! I could seriously just kiss her all day long!

This is Evelyn's new trick...if your hand gets anywhere near her mouth, she acts like a little pirahna, and lunges for it! Then she starts chomping down...I think she's close to teething.

Daddy working on "I Am Second" and getting his turn with Evelyn.

This was my project today - painting canvases for Rex's mama. Well, technically, it's for Rex's new little brother! Jen asked me to paint some wording on canvases for Zac's nursery, and I was so nervous! She wanted the top phrase to be in cursive and the bottom to be in block lettering; this is how it turned out. I was really happy with it, so I hope she likes it, too!

Okay, so all of that was just Saturday morning. I didn't have time to take pictures of the rest! We spent the afternoon at Charli's 2nd birthday party! She was an adorable little vision in pink, and we loved spending the time with our friends!

Steve and I actually got to have a date night, too! We took the motorcycle to a place we haven't tried yet called Marlow's Tavern. The food was "eh", but we had a great time and laughed a ton! Always a win!

Whew! So that was our Saturday!



Bottle Time With Daddy

This isn't Steve's first time giving Evelyn a bottle, but we finally got a picture! I love nursing Evie, so it's fun to give Steve a chance to feed her, too. Plus, he gets some serious staring time with her.

Making Memories

One of the only benefits of not living near family is that wonderful "coming home" feeling. I get this feeling whether we're at Steve's parents' or mine, and this weekend was one of those times. It usually hits me when we've unloaded the car and we're just sitting around, catching up. I just love having the whole family together! We spent Labor Day up in Ohio; it's the first time we've been up there since Evelyn was born, and it was great that Matt and Julie could drive up from Dayton and be there, too!

These pictures aren't in any particular order...just a quick glimpse of our weekend.

Maddie and Bella on Sunday morning. I rarely leave Bella's hair down, just because there's so much of it, so it felt like a special occasion to leave it down when we visited "Grandma's church".

This is such a great picture of Mom and Evelyn on Sunday morning!

Our whole family...usually our official family picture is taken inside because it's over the holidays and incredibly cold outside, but this one turned out so great outside! All of our nieces and nephews are getting so big! It's so much fun to spend time with them and interact!

Just us. I love Ohio in the summer; it's all so green!

All of the cousins in their Cousin Camp t-shirts. I also learned this weekend that their shirts were homemade! Everyone got to design their own tie-dye design - I was so impressed and I love the design Mom chose for Bella and Evelyn's shirts!

Bella was stinkin' thrilled to be with her cousins all weekend! This is the first time she's learned the word "cousin" and who to associate it with. All weekend, we heard, "Cousins, c'mon! Let's play!" Our little girl was rarin' to go the entire time; she didn't take a nap for 3 days straight! 

We went to a county fair on Saturday, and Bella loved seeing all of the animals up close!

A wishing well at the fair. I passed out pennies to the cousins so we could all make a wish!

Steve and Evelyn taking a break with Maddie, Kelem, and Aunt Julie.

We've been telling Bella for weeks that she would get to ride on Grandpa's tractor. She was so excited, but in normal three-year old fashion, she took one trip around the yard and decided she was done.

Maddie and Kaylie chasing Bella around the yard. We are so thankful for how sweet and patient her cousins were with her. Bella wanted to be near them at all times, and even the boys were so playful with her!

Evelyn got to meet her Great-Grandma Ferguson for the first time! We don't get to spend enough time up in Ohio, and it was a crazy, but fun and special weekend!