Five on Friday

I'm linking up with Darci, Natasha, April and Christina for Five on Friday!

We are moving right along with Jackson's big boy room. We have his race car bed bought, I've got his bedding and a red book shelf ordered. I have a few prints made up that I plan to frame and my sister has his two valances and bunting made!! I've also bought a few other decorations here and there that we plan to use. So next Friday night, Jackson will be spending the night with my parents and my Dad is going to come over and help paint his room. Then Saturday, we are going to put his bed and shelf together and decorate his room and surprise him with it Saturday afternoon/evening when he gets back home!

Last Friday I took Jackson and Avery to my parents house for my mom to watch them there while I was at work and Jackson decided to wear his stylish blue sunglasses with his dinosaur hat! It was too cute not to take a picture! Though it's quite blurry, I love it anyways.

I saw this quote on facebook this week and really liked it. It's such a good reminder in this Pinterest/Social Media day in age!

I read this blog post the other day from Finding Joy and loved it so much. It's titled "When you Feel Like You Don't Make a Difference... Remember This" It's such a great reminder for us Moms and may have made me tear up a bit.

I finished up Jackson's 3 year "scrapbook" a week or so ago and got it ordered finally. Better late than never since his birthday was in October!! I love it and can't wait til it arrives in the mail.

Storybook Photography - Maternity Session

This past January, I offered a Maternity Photo Session Discount to 2 lucky winners. I had not ever done a maternity session and really wanted to add this type of session to my portfolio. So I actually ended up with 3 Maternity sessions in January and had so much fun with all of them. 

This was a sunset session in one of my favorite locations near my home. We actually had our family pictures taken here and it's where I took Avery's 9 month pictures as well. The sunset is so pretty here and it's just a few short minutes from my home, which makes it very convenient. The weather was seasonably warm this particular January evening, which made picture taking perfect. :-)

This couple was so sweet! They actually went on to have their sweet baby girl a week later. She was born several weeks early, but looks to be doing very well in the NICU. 

We waited til the very end for the sun to set just right to get this shot. It was definitely worth the wait!

Avery's 10th Month

 Avery,

On February 28th, you turned 10 months old!! How are you 10 months old already?! I can't believe you will be a year old in 2 more months. Cue the tears. It just doesn't seem possible.

(All the pictures below are from your 9 month session. The blanket was made by your Maw Maw (My Mom). She made it for me when I was little. ♥)

At your 9 month check-up, you weighed 20 pounds, 11 ounces (80%) and you were 30 inches tall (95%). Your pedi. was very impressed with how you are doing and how big you are! :-) You are a huge fan of any food we give you. You LOVE to eat!! It doesn't matter if you've just eaten a whole jar or 2 of baby food, if we are eating, you want to eat! Ha. If we are eating a snack in the living room, you will scoot right on over to us as fast as you can and beg for some. It's hilarious. You can eat anything soft now, so you've tried macaroni, bread, carrots, potatoes, green beans, cake and several other things. You love it all!

You are sleeping great still! You sleep all night and usually wake up once for a bottle at some point between 3 and 5 a.m. Then you always go right back to sleep! I love that your such a great sleeper.

You wear size 4 diapers, 18 month clothes and you've moved up to size 3 shoes. 

You are still scooting to get where you want to go and you are cruising like crazy along all the furniture, tables, us... whatever you can pull up on and walk along, you will. You have started taking steps if we stand you up and let go of you, you will walk to us and it's so cute! You don't normally let go to walk where you want to go, but you have been getting braver and braver and will occasionally turn loose of the furniture to walk a few short steps to get to us! I have a feeling you'll be full blown walking by the end of this month!

You can clap, raise your hands when we say "so big", you tilt your head over when we say "upside down", you give your babies hugs when we say "awe baby", you will put your hand up to your ear when we say "hello", you can wave bye bye and you  know where your nose is! You're so smart and I'm so proud of you!

You say, Dada, Momma, Baba and Ni-Ni. I don't think you really associate those sounds with anyone or anything other than maybe Momma. You just say Momma when you are sad. 

(Maw Maw, Avery and Mommy at your 9 month photo session.)

Well, I think that about covers your 10th month. You are getting so big and are so sweet and so much fun.

Pretty girl, I love you so much! You are such a blessing.

Love,

Mommy, xoxo

Our Arizona/California Trip: Days 5-7

Sorry it's been a few days since I posted about our trip. I've been busy and hadn't had a chance to edit pictures. This post will wrap up our trip. If you missed the previous posts, you can check them out here. 

After getting back to Phoenix late Saturday night, we got up Sunday morning and went to the Phoenix Open golf tournament. I had never been to a golf tournament before, so it was fun to experience it. Tiger Woods and Phil Michelson were already out of the tournament by Sunday, so we didn't get to see them, so that was a little disappointing, but we had fun anyways. Unlike any other tournament, the Phoenix Open has a hole, (hole 16) where there are bleachers and you can sit and watch the players on this hole. What makes it unique is that you can yell and be loud, cheer and boo the players. It was where we spent a majority of our time there. 

After a few hours at the tournament, we headed back to Jim's house for the rest of the day. I had some face-time fun with my Mom, Dad and Avery and we spent some time out on the patio!

We also watched the Super Bowl that evening and Jim made some yummy pasta.

Monday was spent just relaxing and hanging out in the back yard again! His back yard and patio are so great! Monday evening, some friends of Jim's came over for dinner and he made BBQ hamburgers and home-made fries! He and Jackson also juiced the grapefruits they had picked a few days prior and Jim made us some martinis with the juice!

Tuesday was the last full day of our trip, so we decided to go back to the Japanese Garden that we had visited the year before because it was so beautiful there. They have a big koi pond there and they sell fish food. So we always buy some and feed the fish, but what's funny is that there are always pigeons there and they will land right on you and eat the fish food right out of your hand! It was hilarious the first time it happened to us last year. So again, we fed the pigeons right out of our hands.

And because I love a comparison, here are our family pictures at the garden in the same spot from last year when I was pregnant with Avery and this year. :-)

Early Wednesday morning, we flew back to the cold and snow in St. Louis. Yuck! We had such a great trip though and look forward to going back!!

52 Project 2015: Week 9

"A portrait of each of my children, once a week, every week, in 2015."

 Jackson: Monday night, I had given the kids their bath, got their jammies on and was putting Avery to sleep. When I came out of Avery's room, I found Jackson on the couch in the living room, already asleep. :-) He looks so sweet!

 Avery: Avery is starting to walk and it's so cute! She takes little steps if you stand her up and have her walk to you, but she typically doesn't let go of things and walk to where she wants to go yet. She's getting there though and getting braver every day!

 (Linking up here at Practising Simplicity)

Five on Friday

I'm linking up with Darci, Natasha, April and Christina for Five on Friday!

 I happened to try this Samoa Coffee Creamer while I was at the hair salon a couple weeks ago and I LOVED it! It's super yummy. I highly recommend it. :-)

We are in the early stages of re-decorating Jackson's bedroom. His room is still decorated from when he was a newborn. I love his room, but it's time we made it for a "big boy"! He loves cars/trains/trucks, so we want to decorate it in a car/transportation theme. These are my ideas and I'm hoping to get everything we need to make the switch soon. I'd really love to surprise him with it. I may have him stay the night at my parent's house while we fix it all up for him. :-) I'll keep you updated on how it all turns out.

 This past Saturday, I introduced Jackson to home-made donuts. We made them as a kid with my Mom and Grammy. They are just canned biscuits with the center cut out. We deep fry them and then add powdered sugar once they've cooled. :-) As a kid, we always used the lid off a salt & pepper shaker to cut out the hole for the center, but I thought it would be fun to use my small star shaped cookie cutter. Jackson thought it was really cool too and when he was eating the little star-shaped donut holes, he said "these are dee-licious"! Day Made! It and so much fun.

 I took Avery's 9 month pictures earlier this month and I am so in love with them. I will post them soon! I got them printed last Friday and I'm so happy with how they turned out. I love having pictures of my kids all over my house. I just love seeing their smiling faces!

 And last, but certainly not least, is there anything better than having a sleeping baby in your arms? I think not! ♥

Have a great weekend!