ARE YOU READY?!?!

We have waited many months for Helen Grace's first Hotty Toddy event, and it finally came on Sunday! Ole Miss football is back! We all gathered at Bubba's for our family birthday cake and to celebrate the start of football season with our game against Memphis. Bubba smocked HG's red and blue dress for the Rebs, and Helen Grace watched the game from behind her eyelids...as usual. Hotty Toddy!

Happy Birthday to Us!

This week of September is always busy for our family. My mom's birthday is the 4th, my dad's is the 7th, and mine is the 10th. I also have cousins and an aunt with birthdays on the 5th, 6th, and 28th, so we eat LOTS of birthday cake around this time of year! We went to the Hollywood Cafe to celebrate my fam's big week with Jeanne, Peg, and Emily, and we sang along with the awesome guitar player and ate and ate to our hearts' content! Gosh, their steaks are so yummy, and the company was even better!

Lions and Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

We have been looking forward to taking Helen Grace to the zoo for the first time. Saturday was absolutely beautiful, so off we went! Emily was in town for the weekend, and bless her heart, I think she would have rather been at home watching all the season-opener football games, but she came along for the ride (although she was stubborn about having her picture taken). She kept John up-to-date on all the scores though!

Family of Three…I still get little butterflies when I think about being a family of three now :)Giraffes Zebras HG checking out the zebrasSea Lion HG watching the polar bearHe was HUGE!We couldn’t get over how big his paws were.Mama had to get a little squeeze from the baby girl.ElephantThe pandas were no fun- completely zonked out…like HG.Some kind of monkey that was supposed to make a lot of noise but was mute the whole time. More monkeysLook at the adorable mama and baby monkey! She was giving the baby a spit bath just like I do to HG! The only pic I could capture of Em…she was elusive all day. Notice the cell phone in her hand for constant score updates.CheetahsMeerkatsHelen Grace wasn’t too impressed.PumasBeautiful TigersAnd finally, lions, oh my!

A Walk to Remember

The weather has been so nice lately that we set out for a walk around the neighborhood after dinner one night this week. Since there was a little chill in the air, we put HG in her first pair off PANTS! She is such a happy baby, and we had a great time just playing around. Helen Grace soon got bored sitting in her stroller, so her daddy picked her up and carried her around the whole neighborhood. We are loving this fall, football weather!

Rice = Sleep?

The last few nights Helen Grace has started waking up in the middle of the night and screaming for a bottle. She has been sleeping through the night for months now, so this was very odd- and exhausting! I thought desperate times called for desperate measures...it was time for rice cereal. Since I didn't do a ton of research about feeding before HG's arrival, I've really leaned heavily on my doctor's recommendations for our every move (thank goodness, he's a really laid-back guy). He thinks it's best to wait until four months to try rice cereal; however, people have been telling me for months that I should start her on it sooner than that to help with sleeping. etc...and I finally gave in.

We started with a spoon. At first, she wasn't really sure about it and screamed a lot. I'd plug the paci in really quickly and she'd calm down. Then I'd shovel another spoonful in.
And then she started to kind of like it. It was neat to see her processing the feel of the spoon and the cereal and taking it all in. She was so cute gumming the cereal! Although some of it ran back out of her mouth, she luckily never really spit it all back out. Let's hope that means she will be neat and orderly like her mama. :)
Eventually, she'd had enough of the spoon, so we switched to the bottle. She ate a few ounces of the cereal in the bottle before I gave in and switched to plain formula. I was worried I was going to wear her out with all this new stuff in one night! I kept her up late too, so we'll see if this rice cereal stuff will do the trick for our growing girl!

“Weight”

I wrote the words below a few nights ago and really hesitated to post them due to my high emotions at the time, but when I turned on the Today Show yesterday and saw a segment on women dealing with miscarriage, I knew I had to share this post with my blog friends. After my miscarriage last summer, I promised myself that I would be an advocate for miscarriage so that people wouldn’t feel ashamed or insufficient or guilty if they were to experience one themselves. So, here it goes…

Tonight I am feeling very clingy, to put it lightly. I don’t want to put my baby girl down. I don’t know where all of these emotions came from, but I have been reminded tonight that I am surrounded by friends who want so desperately to have a baby and have worked for years to try to get pregnant to no avail. And friends who have conceived a child and are now fighting for the chance for the baby to live and breathe when it’s born. And friends who have lost a baby to miscarriage. All of them would give anything on this earth to hold their baby. And what have I done to deserve this precious gift laying sleeping in my arms? Why me? I passionately wish that I could do something to help these parents experience the life of their babies. I have lost a baby myself, and I understand the grief and loss that hits you like a brick wall and physically hurts your heart. For those of you reading this that are hurting, please know that  I pray for you daily; that you will have peace and comfort and hope and strength. This is not your fault, and there is nothing you could have done to have kept it from happening. Many weeks after I miscarried, I finally realized what upset me the most was that I wanted my baby to have weight in this world; to have existed and been known and made a difference in someone’s life. Know that I also pray that you realize that your baby does have weight in my life, as well as many other people’s lives. Your baby has weight. Finally, I pray that you realize that you are a very, very strong woman who, when God does bless you with a child one day, will hold onto that baby long, long after she falls asleep and cry tears of joy over her smiling face.

Look, Mom, No Burrito!

This weekend, we tackled lots of firsts…a night without the burrito, HG’s first mass, and her first Sunday lunch at Bubba’s.

So we have always put HG in a onesie or a gown for bedtime, especially since she’s been hooked up to the monitor, and mostly due to her mama’s laziness in the middle of the night to deal with pjs with legs. But I have been worried that we are getting too attached to our beloved pink burrito and wanted to try a night without it. I dressed her in footed pjs to keep her warm, and she looked like such a big girl! We have been putting her to sleep on her wedge since her head cold is still lingering, and she woke me up at least three times during the night because she scooted all the way down to the corner of the crib and knocked over her monitor! Tonight I took her wedge out of the bed but let her get back into her burrito. We’ll wait until a non-work night to try that again! And p.s., we have way exceeded the length of time that the doctor recommended wearing the monitor, and since we have had no alarms, I am going to call the doc tomorrow to see if we can stop using it. I am half excited and relieved and half scared to death…

I have been absolutely terrified to take Helen Grace to mass. I hate to admit it, but in the past, I have been one of those people that glare at parents that have screaming children in church. I just can’t stand it when the kid is going nuts, and the parents make no effort to take them outside so that the rest of the congregation can enjoy the service. When we got to church this morning, we headed straight to the cry room where I had planned on hiding out for the service so that we could all enjoy ourselves BUT the cry room was CLOSED!! Who closes a cry room?! The guy that worked at the church told us that children’s voices were sounds of joy and ushered us into the sanctuary, while I stood dumbfounded with my mouth hanging open. I couldn’t believe my ears! Luckily, HG slept for the first half of mass, and we were able to keep her entertained for the second half. I was exhausted afterward from being so nervous that she was going to squall. At least we have one mass behind us now with no catastrophes!

After mass, we went to Bubba’s for Helen Grace’s first Sunday lunch. I am thankful that she isn’t old enough to eat solid food yet so that all the deviled eggs were mine!! Can you tell the grandparents and great grandmother are absolutely nuts over our little girl??

Helen Grace and I were pooped this afternoon and got in bed to cuddle and nap. What precious time with my baby girl! I wouldn’t trade anything in the world for those smiles, laughs, and coos we shared.

We are so excited about Helen Grace’s first Ole Miss football game (on tv) and Auntie Em’s visit this weekend! Hotty Toddy!

On a side note, I have been inspired to finally do something that I have always thought about for years…I have signed up for smocking classes! Bubba is so proud! The classes are on a Monday and Tuesday night in late September, and I can’t wait to get started with my new addiction!

And finally, we need your opinion…what should Helen Grace be for her first Halloween? We have it narrowed down to a lion, bumble bee, or a butterfly. Let us know what you think!