Old Navy Adventures

Kaiya's Christmas Dress! I spotted this cute little thing at Old Navy last night and had to get it! :) She is getting her 9-month pictures taken in December, so we'll have her wear this.

The main mission on my shopping trip to Old Navy was to find jeans. And I'm happy to report that I finally found jeans that fit right! I've been putting that trip off since having Kaiya... just too depressing. I have been getting by with my great garage sale jeans -- but much to my delight, they are getting too big! The plumber look has not been the best look for me lately. And we all know that with a crawling baby I am bending over constantly. So I decided that even though I am not back to where I used to be, it was time to buy jeans. I took my trusty shopping guide, Ruthie and we tackled Old Navy. Thankfully it was a quick trip. We found the perfect pair of jeans immediately as Ruthie asks me, "What about trying the new 'curvy' style." I can tell she is treading lightly for fear I lash out at her for insinuating I am "curvy." But it is what it is. And I am glad to report that I now have jeans that fit me right. All my previous jeans have been gaping at the waist but snug on my hips. These jeans fit me perfectly.

I also got this shirt in green and one in black. I'm not sure, but I think I am cooler now. :)

Answer to prayer!

I wanted to post and update about my job situation. Last week I mentioned I only had 15 Mondays left. That has changed just a bit... :) I decided to talk to my employer about my transition out of here. As I've mentioned in previous posts, I have a 300 hour practicum to complete before April 27. Originally I was thinking that I would need to stop working at the end of February so I could be full-time out at my practicum site. And then once my practicum hours were finished I would get to stay at home with Kaiya until we move (wherever we move). Tony enlightened me that preceptorships (internships) are not paid. So... we would be without income from March - August. In light of that, I decided to give David the option of my last day being Feb. 28 or allowing me to work part-time starting next year. He decided that I could go part-time starting in December! So I will have every Friday and every other Thursday off to begin my hours at the practicum site. I will continue to receive the same benefits I did at the full-time level. This is such an answer to prayer! I am able to finish my Master's degree, continue to provide for our family, and possibly get in a little more at-home time with Kaiya once my practicum is finished. Depending on when/where we move, I will probably continue working here until or through May.

The Official Halloween Pictures!

I took Kaiya to JC Penney for pictures in her costume. I also took along a little costume that I found at a garage sale for 50 cents (the lion outfit). Thought it would be fun to get her looking so cute. Don't you just want to kiss those little cheeks? :)

Our weekend

Well, another Monday is here. But for my count, I only have about 15 more Mondays left here at the current job. Of course I had to take out the holidays for my count. :) But there is a light at the end of this tunnel. After this job, I'll go full-time at an at-risk youth treatment center through the end of April to get my practicum hours in. Very exciting!

Wanted to post a link to our weekend activities. Friday night we went to Fortel's pizza parlor for small group leader training and then afterwards everyone went to SkyZone for trampoline dodgeball. :) I'm giggling just writing it. Yes... trampoline dodgeball. It was much more fun than I thought it would be. And... in the words of one of the other participants: "For a mommy, you still have it going on!" (That was spoken by the guy I hit in the face with one of the balls.) oops! Here's the link to what we did: http://www.skymaniafuncenters.com/ We both had fun and got quite a workout -- both of us were sore the rest of the weekend.

On Saturday I went to Kimmswick with my friend Nicole to check out the shops there. Some shops were cute, others not so cute. The worst one was a really slow shop where the lady working pointed out that we didn't go through all the rooms. (We knew we didn't want to after walking through the first room.) I mumbled something about just being interested in candles. Something that she had in the first room, but she made sure to point out that she had a hot chocolate candle burning in the very back room. So... we obliged and walked through to the back room... took a deep breath of the hot cocoa aroma and walked right back out again. After browsing the shops we planned to eat lunch at the famous Blue Owl. We arrived at 11:55 and found out they were taking names to eat between 1 and 1:15 p.m. So we opted for soup, salad & breadsticks at the Olive Garden! :)

After a long day of shopping, I decided that I wanted to soak in the tub. Kaiya needed a bath too, so I filled up the tub and she played for a bit. The water had cooled off a bit and so I drained some out and added some warmer water. I notice bubbles, followed by torpedo poo in the tub. Nice way to end the bath. It's a first for Miss Kaiya -- must have been the warm water. :) We all got quite a laugh out of it. Ruthie's friend Mark was over doing laundry and he announced that he would never be taking a shower at our house again. :)

Saturday night Kaiya got a case of the clingy cries. Clingy cries are were she only wants held by mama and continues whining periodically while being held. If she is put down or given to anyone else the whining escalates immediately to screams. It was great -- couldn't get much done at all.

Sunday was a normal day. Church and then stuff around the house. Only Kaiya still had the clingy cries. When Tony got home from his soccer game he relieved me so I could make a dessert for small group. After arriving at small group I was getting the dessert out of my back seat and discovered that it spilled all over the back seat. I made Lemon Gooey Butter Cake. And gooey is the right word for it. Gooey in my fabric seats. Not to mention we no longer had a dessert for small group. We left Kaiya with the group and ran to the store for a back-up cheesecake. Tried to play games at small group, but had to leave early because of Miss K. I fed Kaiya, gave her a bath and then handed her off to Tony the rest of the night. She was crying when I fell asleep at 9:30 and Tony said she finally went down at 11:30. *Sigh* We have to figure out what's up with her. But hooray for Tony for letting me go to bed early!

That was our weekend. Moments of fun squeezed between moments of insanity.

Costume Party!

Halloween was fun -- even though we only had 4 trick-or-treaters! It just means left over candy for us! We had some friends bring their babies over and we took pictures with them. The cute little duck is AJ (Kaiya plays with him all day while I'm at work) and then little cowgirl is Hannah (Nate & Maurine's little girl -- Nate is in school with Tony.) We also took some cute video. Kaiya is so close to being on the move. We've been trying to capture the first crawl. She can move 2 hands and one leg and then usually bites the dust. :)

I love this one. They both are checking out the pumpkin.
What is this thing that has invaded our home?

Happy Halloween!!

In honor of the holiday, I wanted to post these pictures of the ever famous Halloween bib that my mom made for Kaiya. During Ziggy's recent visit I let him borrow it. :) Have a Happy Halloween!


We are just gonna hang out at home and hand out candy. I'll dress Kaiya up in her costume and a couple friends might bring their babies over for pictures. Other than that... pretty low key.

More pictures

These are pictures taken over the past few weeks. The first set of pictures were taken Friday night while watching the St. Louis Cardinals win the World Series. Our friends, Patrick and Nicole spent the evening with us. Below is Nicole & Kaiya chilling with Cookie Monster. Kaiya has her curly after-bath curls going on. :)



The next picture is from a week & a half ago when Kaiya was home sick with her first cold. I took a vacation day and Aunt Bekah came in for the day and we went shopping. As you can see... the nose is running. Poor thing is probably wondering why we were taking her out and about! :) But Kaiya loved the Kohl's cart where she could ride in the front and hang out with the Grinch. We didn't hear anything except for squeals of delight. We put the Grinch back before leaving... but continued to find bright green hair on Kaiya the rest of the day. :)

These last pics were taken today! She is all decked out in her pumpkin patch outfit. She has now reached the point where she recognizes the camera and gets an automatic grin on her face when she sees me get it out. This is new this morning... so that will be fun. I won't have to spend time making crazy faces in order to get her to smile. :)

Cause for Celebration!

Tony passed his Part 2 Boards!!!

After much sweat and tears, we found out Friday that Tony passed. This is really important because now he gets his license on time. Phew!

Here are a bunch of different pictures that we have taken over the past 2 weeks. The first pictures are from when my parents were in town and we went out to dinner in Old St. Charles. After dinner we took a short walk down Main Street and came up to the horse drawn carriages. The horses, Lewis & Clark (very fitting, huh?) were very friendly, Lewis especially. He put his big nose right in the stroller and gave Kaiya a good sniff. She was delighted, of course! :) This picture was taken this past weekend when Tony's mom met us in Chicago.

It was apparent that Kaiya had lots of fun -- she slept the entire way home -- not even waking up to eat. :)

This picture was taken on Monday with Daddy. She holds onto his hair for dear life and loves riding so high.

And finally, the slippers... Handmade by Grammi (my mom). They stayed on just long enough for a picture. And then... they became wondeful toys. :)

Vote for Kaiya!!

Hi all. Just wanted to ask you to take a quick minute to vote for Kaiya's picture. I just entered it in the Shutterfly.com fall colors photo contest. You have until the end of the month to vote -- the top 50 vote getters will move on to Round 2, and the top three will be selected by Shutterfly. Here's the link: http://photocontest.shutterfly.com/action/photocontest/vote?entry=157268 (Make sure to give her 5 stars!!)

Thanks for voting!

6 Month Pics

I was very pleased with Kaiya's six month pictures. Definitely hard to choose which ones to order. But... they are pretty inexpensive so I got most everything that I wanted. When I get her a halloween costume, I think I am going to take her in to Penney's and get just one picture of that taken. I'm hoping Aunt Ruthie will help us pick a costume out from Old Navy. They have some pretty cute ones. We are off to Chicago tonight after work. I have a church library workshop that I'm attending. Tony's mom and brother are driving over Saturday to watch Kaiya while I attend the workshop. We'll head home Saturday evening around 4 -- so it won't be a long trip, and we'll have Sunday to recoup. (And Tony will appreciate the quiet house for studying!)

My First Lemon!

Over the past weekend Kaiya got the taste of her first lemon. She sucked on it for a really long time before she realized how sour it was. Once we pulled it away from her she puckered up really big! :) The sour look lasted for only a few seconds and then she wanted more of the lemon!

Boys... LOOK OUT!

Here are more pictures of what Kaiya is up to while we are working and at school! So much for Tony needing a shotgun -- I think we are going to have to keep Kaiya locked up inside the house. Turns out she is one fresh woman! :) Grabbing behinds and sneaking in for big hugs. These pictures are too cute.

Caught in the act!

Leaning.... leaning...
Gotcha! Big Hugs!

Fun in the Sun -- Is it really OCTOBER?

Here are a couple pictures taken middle of last week when we had some really warm days. It was in the 80's -- perfect weather for the kiddie pool and a naked baby!

Munchkin Land

We welcome you to Munchkin Land, fa la la la la la la la...

I'm thinking there is the most resemblance to the one on the far right.

Piggy Tails

Here is Kaiya with her piggy tails. When we took them out, they remained in place. Tony mentioned she looked just like that munchkin on Wizard of Oz with the piggy tails on the top of his head. I'm gonna have to find a picture and post it to compare. :) She thinks she is hot stuff.

Here are the pictures. Check out Ruthie's brown hair! Very cute.

1) Ruthie & Kaiya on the hayride.
2) Picking leaves
3) Got it!
4) & 5) Kaiya chowing on the apple
6) Picture by the pumpkins at the market.

Apple Picking

We had a fun Saturday morning out and about in the apple orchard. This is our second time to pick apples this fall -- it makes great baby food, yummy treats, and just good snacking. This is probably one of the last weekends to pick at the orchard we go to, so Ruthie and I wanted to make sure and stock up. And stock up we did... :) 45 lbs of apples later... we are busy busy busy! One of the varieties that we picked will keep through the winter if we store them in our fridge! Amazing... so we got plenty of that kind. Kaiya enjoyed picking very much -- only she was pretty intent on picking the leaves (see pics below). When we were finished and waiting for the hayride to come get us and take us back, I gave her one of the apples to play with. It went straight to the mouth! I decided to bite a chunk out of the apple and give the apple back to her and she went crazy over it. She rubbed it all over her face and just slobbered all over the thing. We got such a kick out of it. After apple picking we bought lots of veggies in the orchard store. Got butternut squash, sweet potatoes, & green beans for making Kaiya's baby food. Yum yum... :) Ruthie also bought a pie pumpkin to make pumpkin pie from scratch. That was her project Sunday evening. It provided us with some good laughs... she was really puzzled that after the timer ran out her crust didn't look done and the pie seemed really soupy. She had me come look and *surprise* the oven wasn't turned on! We couldn't decide which was worse: 1) Ruthie not realizing the oven wasn't on -- even when the pie was supposed to bake at 375 for 15 minutes and then the oven turned down to 350 for the remaining 35 minutes -- which she did. 2) Me commenting on how good the pie smelled while baking -- when the pie really wasn't baking at all. Tony decided that we are both airheads! :) And it gave us all a good laugh.

I have more pictures to post from apple picking but blogger is being difficult. They will come later. By the way... Ruthie says the pumpkin pie is great!