Friday Favorites

Trying to get myself back in the habit of regular blogging.  :)

Figured I would try to round up 5 things each week that I'm loving.  Baby stuff, mom stuff, teacher stuff, just girl stuff - whatever I'm feeling at the moment. 

The flip side?  If I'm missing some awesome stuff - let me know!  Always in the market for new must-have items! 

Anyway, here we go.  :)

I've really been making an effort to do more reading.  Not fifth-grade reading for my students...but reading for my own enjoyment.  It's an expectation that my 5th graders read for 150 minutes/week; which is approximately 30 minutes/day, so I've been trying to follow the same expectation.  To be honest, most days - I'm horrible at it.  But on the weekends, I try to make up for it!  I've read lots of really great books in the past couple months since taking on this personal challenge.  I plan on doing a book review soon, but wanted to share my recent favorite.

Amazon

I love everything Emily Giffin writes.  Seriously.  I just loved this book.  An easy, quick read.

I watch alot of reality TV - in fact, it's most of what I watch.  Last year, I was introduced to the Real Houswives and I'm thankful that Beverly Hills and Orange County are on opposite seasons because it just keeps me going...just a never ending dose of shenanigans.  The reunions are always ridiculous.  But this season?  Oh.my.crazy.  And these two?

Just wow.  They need to just pump the brakes on the crazy.  It's alot.

My child will usually eat most anything we put in front of her.  These things though...

Like crack in a can.  She would eat this entire container in one sitting if I would let her.  Girlfriend loves her baby Cheetos.

My morning routine has changed significantly since my husband switched from being on the air in the afternoons to being on the air in the mornings.  Before, I could take my sweet time getting reading without a little someone fussing, into everything she shouldn't be, or climbing up my leg.  Now, time is critical.  Anything I can do to cut down time is my friend.  My hair is thick, naturally wavy, and sometimes hard to manage.  I've spent many years straightening and fighting with it to be something it's not - so recently, I've just been embracing it for what it is.  With the help of this miracle potion:

Amazon

Smells delicious.  Keeps the frizz under control.  Doesn't leave my hair sticky or stiff.  Sold.

Lately my 5th graders have really been impressing me with their technology abilities - they are SO brilliant at ways to use technology to make their lives easier.  For instance, the other day, we weren't done taking notes on a poem but our time was up - so I was quickly jotting things down in my plan book so we could pick up where we left off the next day - meanwhile, my kids?  Well, they were using their devices to just simply snap a picture.  **insert teacher feeling SO dumb**  Anyway, I've been trying to find ways to use tech to my advantage in my classroom and have been playing around with Google Classroom

It's a great way for my kids to make, receive, and submit materials to me...but more importantly, it's a nice platform for them to be able to collaborate with each other outside of the classroom, school, or normal hours.  We are loving it so far. 

Alright, there's my 5 for today.  I could probably rattle off 5 more right now - but I'll stop.  Have a great weekend, friends!

xoxo -

Life Lately

Life lately is filled with this pretty girl!  She has 3 teeth and is more and more fun every single day.  She is starting to interact with people and mimics everything we do - from loud noises to patting us on the shoulder when she's excited to see us.

She loves to play with her toys, listen to music, watch Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and read books.  She will eat most anything we put in front of her, unless it's baby food and we're eating "big people food" - she really wants what we're eating.

She's going to be one year old next week, and I frankly cannot figure out how that happened.  I feel like yesterday I was staring at this:

{1 week old}

I just cannot even believe this was her last week:

She has such a great temperament.  She loves to play alone, but doesn't really like to be in a room by herself - as long as she can see one of us, she's good to go.  She still puts herself to sleep at night - we just give her kisses and put her in her bed with her music on and she goes right to sleep

This is an awful picture of her, but I had to snap it quickly because when I went to get her out of her carseat, this is what I found.  Just so nasty.  And notice how before I corrected her, I snapped a pic?!  :)  Priorities, people.

She has figured out how to stand up with the help of certain surfaces - mostly her crib.  Frequently I come in to her room in the morning to find this.  You might also notice she's showing you another of her tricks...spitting.  Yep.  That's a real treat.

My daycare provider is, hands down, without a doubt, no questions asked - THE BEST.  Kamdyn loves going to daycare and her face lights up when she sees Miss Katie every single morning.  She has friends at daycare that she likes to play with - and even though she's the littlest there, she doesn't really take much nonsense from those big kids.  I'm told she holds her own just fine.  In addition to all these wonderful things about our daycare, almost daily I get adorable-ness like this in my text box...gets me thru many days.  Love that girl!  :)

Here she is in her Easter dress on Easter Sunday.  She just melts my heart.  And those sandals absolutely crack me up.

I'm really missing blogging.  A lot.  And I feel like God is nudging me to hop back on the blog-train...approximately 4 people in the past week have asked me about it!  I've blogged before about how overwhelming it is to me once I've gone months without posting, it feels like I need some sort of big post - but I don't.  The intention of this blog has been first of all, to preserve my memories and second of all, to keep family and friends far away in the loop of our lives - and these little day-to-day things are our life.  So, one little, nonsense post at a time - I'm gonna try to hop back on the wagon.  :)

We're on the downhill slide to the weekend, people!  We can do this!

Monday {Night} Musings

Anyone else holding on for dear life, riding the crazy train, and just really hoping Thanksgiving hurries on up?

Holy wow.  I'm driving the struggle bus lately.  Just trying as hard as I can to keep it all together.

{notice how I just went ahead and slipped on in here without mention of my (yet again) months long absence from the blogosphere?}

Here's the deal.  I've determined a photo dump is what you people want...not listening to my random-ness tonight...so, here ya go.

This kid can eat.  She loves her food.

This is serious.  Those pigtails are a riot. 

matching Halloween outfits, matching pigtails, matching attitudes

Little Miss was a lady bug for Halloween.  It was the cutest bug I've ever seen. 

The weather has gotten SO cold this week...we've had to break out the winter hat.  I hate the cold.  But I love the hat.  And I love the girl even more. 

SEVEN months old.  Simply unbelievable.

I'm really fortunate because we have a live in professional photographer.  I have literally thousands of pictures of Kamdyn.  But of all of them, this one ranks right up there as my most favorite.  I love her in blue.  I love the little mischief that's in her eyes in this picture.  I love her dimple.  I just love her.

That's all for today.  Be back this week with more updates.  Promise.

Happy 6th Birthday, Maicey

I love you to the moon and back one million and one times.  

Now stop growing up.

Love you,

Tante

Monday Morning Musings

This weekend was so perfect in every way.  Our Thanksgiving was wonderful.  We really tried to keep things low key - which was awesome.  To be honest, all 9 of us in my family aren't together in the same room very often - so we soaked it all up.

Friday we went to Dubuque to spend some time with Kevin's family - which we are all in the same house approximately once or twice per year, so that's always a fun time to catch up and spend some time together.

Saturday, my mom, Kim, Maicey and I enjoyed the new Disney movie Frozen.  If you haven't seen it - GO!  It is absolutely adorable.  I will own it once it comes out on DVD.  It's so cute!

This girl spent quite a bit of time during the movie on my lap because there were a few scary parts.  But, overall, she loved this movie!  By the way, I'm not sure she could be much cuter.  Seriously.

After the movie, Kevin and I had a very rare weekend day together without work or Kaitlyn.  While we missed Kaitlyn being here this weekend, it was really nice to spend time relaxing just the two of us.  We didn't really do anything exciting - just hung out.  We did some shopping, some Christmas decorating, some wrapping, and LOTS of cleaning.  There is nothing quite like coming home to a clean, picked up home.  It puts me in my happy place.  :)

On Sunday, after church, we put the finishing touches on our tree.

Pretty darn perfect.  I absolutely love it.

After a day of cleaning, we went out to dinner at my favorite Mexican restaurant.  We did quick work on these delicious fajitas.  Holy YUM.

Once we settled our bellies, we got some Starbucks and drove around to look at Christmas lights.  It's one of our most favorite things to do during the month of December - we love to pick out our favorite houses, dream about our future home, and just take it all in.

And this is how I spent the rest of my night last night - PERFECTION.

All in all, it was a perfect long weekend.  Now we go back to school for only THREE weeks until it's Holiday break!  I'm sure it will FLY by.  :)

I hope you all have a wonderful week -

Miracles

I pray that when people look at my daughter, they always think about this exact quote.  

All throughout this struggle, I have worked really hard to never stop believing in hope.  I will not sit here and tell you that I have always been good at this, because I haven't.  Nor can I sit here and tell you that there haven't been days that I haven't cried myself to sleep or allowed myself to despair about the hand I was dealt.  However, I have always prayed that God would continue to put on my heart that His plans for my life are perfect.  I am so thankful that I never gave up hope.  I am so thankful that God chose me to walk this journey.

I am so thankful that every single day I will get to look at this beautiful child and have a living reminder that miracles do indeed happen everyday.

Keep Hoping, Friends -

Finally Friday: Halloween Style

Welp, regular blogging these days has consisted of my Thursday morning BUMPdates - and while I am proud of myself for at least being on time with those, I am missing blogging about my regular life - so here we go.

I sat on my couch last night in a quiet house because Kevin is still in the hospital.  He had quite a bit of his colon resected on Monday morning to *hopefully* take care of his diverticulitis, which has been flaring up numerous times this year.  He has been in a great deal of pain, but we just keep praying that each day gets easier and he will be back to normal in no time.

I am beyond exhausted today because Halloween in an elementary school will do a real number on the adults in said school.  My sweet fifth-sters were more than a little "off" yesterday and while that makes me exhausted, I try really hard to remember what it's like to be 10...so I try to be patient.  As exhausting as yesterday was, the sad reality is that today is going to be worse.  I will work hard to enjoy my Friday with them.  :)

After work yesterday, I stopped at my sister and brother-in-law's to see these two pumpkins:

It was a cold and dreary day, but that didn't stop these trick-or-treaters.  They came back with a bag of candy and big smiles!  :)  I was just glad that I got a chance to see them - I never get tired of it.  Ever.

My sister texted me today to give me a little sneak peak of what arrived at her door yesterday:

Yippee for baby bedding!  Any of my readers who know me in real life will be SO proud of me.  This bedding is based on the alphabet and has an elephant on it - I swore I would never do this, but I just am in love with this adorable bedding, so with a little coaxing from my mother, sister, best friend Jamie and my 5 year-old niece calmly explaining to me that I could just cover up the elephant if I was scared...I've decided I can move past this minor detail and move forward with this bedding set.

Evidently God is playing tricks with me because the next day I was going through the little welcome bag from my Target baby registry and look at the little toy included

Yep, real funny.  I get it, I'm going to try to move past my phobia - but let's not push our limits, shall we?

And lastly, I got this last night

{melt.my.heart}

So, HAPPY HALLOWEEN {a day late}

from our BOO to YOU.

Have an awesome weekend, Friends -

Mother/Daughter Weekend 2013

What an amazing weekend.  Each year for the past 3, my amazing mama has given my sister {Kim} and my might-as-well-be-sister {Jenny} a weekend away.  We shop, eat, drink, and laugh - it's so wonderful.  Our first year we went to Chicago, last year we went to Minneapolis, and this year we went to Des Moines.

*Warning, picture overload. :)*

Jenny couldn't come up until Saturday afternoon, but Kim, my mom and I left on Friday afternoon.

On our way, we stopped at a wonderful little outlet mall.

Yes, I'm one of those people who enjoy beginning to Christmas shop early.  Last year, I didn't begin early - my December was not even a little enjoyable because I was running around like a crazy person {along with the masses of other irresponsible procrastinators :)}  Then to top it all off, I got extremely sick and my poor husband had to go out and do his own shopping as a result.  It was awful.  So, I've pledged that I will not be doing that again.

I made a big dent this weekend.  Thankfully, my mom and sister also have this same plan...although they both admitted, I got the most done this weekend.  :)  This is all of our packages from the outlet mall...not just mine - I didn't go out of control.  :)

After we checked in and unloaded, we decided to run to Michael's (yes, there is one literally 3 minutes from my house, but it was out of the prized gift).  My nieces are both wanting The Loom...them right along with everyone else evidently because I couldn't find it anywhere.  Clearly Friday was my lucky day because the Michael's we stopped at had gotten a shipment earlier that day!  Behold the goods...

Two people's Christmas gifts...check, check.

That night, on a whim we picked out this Mexican restaurant

I had the most delicious brisket tacos (such a strange combo I would've never put together...but so thankful someone else did!)

As you're all well aware, we're expecting a baby in April...but Margarita, don't mind if I do! {perhaps this surrogacy thing isn't so bad :)}

On Saturday morning, we headed to Buy Buy Baby - OH.MY.OVERLOAD.

We were able to find some adorable stuff in the {extremely overwhelming} baby superstore.  But after more than an hour in there, I was definitely ready for a little

After lunch we did more shopping and Saturday night, we went to a dueling piano bar - ohmygosh, it was so fun!!  :)

And this, my friends, is "Jeffy" {I'm nearly certain this isn't his real name, but whatever}.

You all, I'm telling you - he was tore up.  He was sitting at the table behind us and we became quick friends through our love of the Iowa Hawkeyes and 90's pop music.  Wow, he was ridiculous...and hilarious.  Totally made our night.

This morning, we got up and did a bit of shopping, then tried to go to Scratch Bakery...not open on Sunday's.  FAIL.

Here's where our weekend took a U-turn...Jenny lost her keys.  Not a clue where they could be...anywhere in the mall we walked all the way thru, the restaurant we had breakfast in, the parking lot, no clue.  I felt so bad for her.  Basically, she had to have her best friend grab her extra set of keys and meet her in Des Moines.  Not good at all.

Anyway, now I'm home in my quiet house getting ready for another week, feeling overwhelmed with gratitude for the amazing women in my life.  What an amazing weekend.  :)

I hope you all have a wonderful week -