Standing Tall

Lately Adalyn has had the urge to stand for a while when we put her on her feet. SHe usually keeps her balance for a few seconds and then flops down and starts crawling after a toy, phone, or something else she shouldn't be going after. Well within the past week or so, she has been standing longer and longer each time we practice with her. Sometimes long enough that if I'm in a different room Adam has time to call me and I run in there and she's standing looking right at me and laughing. It's like she knows she is doing something!We were eating dinner the other night and had Adalyn in her pack n play and we look over and she is standing up in the center of her play pen! We got so excited. I finally got a good picture of her standing abilities. Im one proud momma. Keep it up Adalyn!
Reaching for some blocks...

Ah, now im standing!

2 "firsts" in one day...

So, yesterday (Sunday) was such a nice, relaxing day. We woke up to beautiful weather and got ready for Church. As usual, we sign Adalyn in at the nursery and take her to her room to drop her off. Daddy was holding her and when he went to put her down, she started crying! I can tell you I have been dreading that day ever since we started taking her to the nursery. People would tell us that it would eventually happen and I definitely was not expecting it to happen so soon. But, she is almost 9 months old and she definitely likes her momma and daddy best. ;) Anyway, it absolutely broke our hearts. We quickly left and headed up to Sunday School in a hurry since Adam was teaching. I admit, I left during class to drop off the attendance and of course I had to peek in at her. She was fine. Sitting there looking around at everyone. Shew. Made me feel better! So after Church I had to go into work for a few hours, came home and even took a 2 hour nap!! Thank you Adam!! Man, i have always loved taking naps but now a nap is like gold to me. I wish I could nap like that everyday. After i woke up, we headed to Wal-Mart for our weekly grocery shopping. As my title states, "2 firsts in one day" I will now tell you what I mean. First, as most of you know, I can not STAND anything with "Princess" on it. haha. I am just so not into that. Definitely not my thing. Don't ask me why because I really do not have a good explanation as to why I dislike it so much, I just do. However, Adalyn does have ONE onesie with the word "princess" on it and the ONLY reason she has it is because it says "Princess on the farm" and has a John Deere tractor on it and it's pink. Obviously, that's for her daddy. I must admit, it was cute, but that will probably be the only thing she wears with princess on it for a while until she gets older and realizes she likes all the Disney characters, which is fine. I'll have to get over it I guess. So, "first" number 1, Princess on the onesie. Sigh. On to number 2. While at Wal-Mart, Adam and I decided to buy Adalyn some baby food- organic peas. Why is this considered a first? Well, we have made ALL of Adalyn's baby food thus far! Thanks to a good friend who gave us an awesome book telling us step by step how to do it, we absolutely LOVE doing it. It's so much fun and SO much CHEAPER than buying baby food! Man if people only knew how much you could save! Anyway, we decided to buy some peas for her because we weren't really in the mood to make them or read up on how to do it. Bad excuse, I know. We spent $1.25 for 2 jars of peas! crazy I tell ya. For all of her other foods, we will continue to make, just skipped on the peas!

So, as I mentioned, we had 2 "firsts" in one day. Adalyn loved the peas by the way. We weren't real sure how she was going to react to them considering green beans aren't high on her like list so we were assuming peas wouldn't be much better.

Sadly, I did not even get a picture of Adalyn in her princess onesie and eating the peas for the first time. What kind of mom am I?

Leaving you with some fun pictures of our precious baby.
waving at daddy...

Bath time!


Nice shot of her teeth

First time eating watermelon

love her laughing smile!

Finally...

I was able to put a bow in Adalyn's hair!

Adalyn, at 8 1/2 months, I was finally able to put a bow in your "hair". You have been absolutely bald since I gave birth to you! For all of you who know me, you know how BAD I have wanted to put a bow in her hair. I LOVE bows on babies so much. I can't wait until her hair actually gets longer and she will have a bow in it everyday! I did as a child, so why not her? However, I do recall that when I was at the age where I knew what a bow was, I HATED them. My mom and grandmother dressed me up like a doll and I had poofy dresses and HUGE bows in my hair everyday. But I must admit, I was a cute little thing. Adalyn, I can promise this, I won't put you in a dresses with poofy sleeves and itchy elastic! haha. Ah, memories.

This picture is for uncle christopher.


and check out her pajamas... momma loves them

waving at us.



Last but not least, I have to add this photo. Adalyn, when you are older you will understand but this picture shows you definitely have Anderson in your blood!

Sticking your tongue out and thinking really, really hard! =) Love it!

Blah

I don't really have much to blog about today so this entry will be fairly short.
First of all, Adalyn and I are SO glad daddy is back home!! 4 days without him was tough! Here they are right before bed time.

ah, so sweet.
Anyway, as I have mentioned, Adalyn is EVERYWHERE all the time. For example,waving at the TV one second...

two seconds later, trying to eat the DVD player

She keeps me on my toes, that's for sure! =)

After chasing her around the living room, I finally decided to put her in the pack n' play and she somehow managed to take her off her pants. My kid has skill.

8 months old

Adalyn, my dear, you are growing way too fast! You are now 8 months old and getting into EVERYTHING that your little chubby hands can grab. You keep mommy and daddy VERY busy when you are crawling around and pulling up on things! We constantly tell you "No" and explain why we are saying "no". Not that you understand a word we are saying, but it's mainly for our benefit right now. Just so we can get in the habit of explaining things on your level and to sharpen up our parenting skills!

For some reason you aren't exactly sleeping through the night anymore! Mommy and Daddy definitely do not like this. Now don't get me wrong, you sleep great and have since you were 11 weeks old, but you were sick about 2 weeks ago and ever since then, you wake up 1-2 (if not more)times during the night now. I know you are in the process of cutting your 4th tooth, so I know your gums are probably irritating you. Some times when daddy or myself walks into your room during the night, you are standing up looking around your dark room. We immediately tell you its bed time and put you back on your tummy and pat your back for a few seconds. However, sometimes it's not that simple! (We are determined to not take you to bed with us because that would definitely solve the problem, but we don't want you to make a habit of prefering to sleep with us and not in your own pretty crib.)When you are standing up and we reach for you to lay you back down, you start grabbing our shirts and you try to pull yourself out of the crib while attached to our neck. It is the sweetest thing EVER, but at 2 AM, we would prefer you wait until the sun comes up to hang all over us. With that being said, lets get that 4th tooth through and SLEEP! Please and thank you. =) Aside from sleeping, you are eating great! You have tried some new foods lately. For starters, daddy picked green beans from the garden for you. At first you weren't real sure what to do with them, but as days went on, you decided you might like them a little bit. As for carrots, you are really starting to like those, and you sure are messy with them. It has stained a few bibs so we make sure to put bibs on you that mommy doesn't mind getting stained. =) I, on the other hand, cannot stand cooked carrots. Yuck. I even tried some before feeding them to you, and it just reminded me how bad I can't stand them. So, needless to say, I am glad you are liking them because they really are very good for you. We also introduced Tofu to you! Yup, tofu. According to our book, it is full of protein and very good for you so we mash it up and mix it in your porridge. Because the consistency is some what lumpy, you make the funniest faces and push it back out with your tongue. We tried it for a couple of nights, but we are giving it a rest for a bit and will try later. We also got your 8 month pictures taken in Murfreesboro. It was so hot but you smiled and laughed the entire time!! That's my girl. I am going to start calling you little miss photogentic. We changed your outfit 3 different times and you looked so darn cute in all of them! So anyway, my sweet little Adalyn, you are getting so, so big and you have the best personality. You are becoming more of a little girl and not so much my itty bitty baby anymore. Makes me happy and sad at the same time. You will understand that feeling when you have a baby one day. I Love You Adalyn Clark.
Love,
Momma

Visitor...

Adalyn had a visitor Wednesday night. Her cousin Autumn came to spend the night with us! Which is a good thing since Adam left early Thursday morning to go out of town for a few days. What a HUGE help Autumn was! Adalyn absolutely LOVES her. She just played, laughed and climbed all over her. Thursday morning we woke up, did our usual routine, then headed to the great-grandparents to spend the day with them. Everyday is a repeat to Adalyn. Play play play, eat, nap, play play play, eat, nap, so it only made sense to do the same there. Thank goodness for Autumn. While I helped in the kitchen, Autumn played with Adalyn and kept her entertained. Im sure Adalyn was glad to see another face in front of her instead of mine! ;)
Playing...




Yummy carrots...



After spending most of the day in Hillsboro, we packed up, went home, then got ready for Adalyn's swim lessons. Autumn joined us so she was able to see Adalyn kick and splash!

Thank you Autumn for being such a great babysitter!

...and just because I have a cute kid.

Celebrating a Birthday

Last Sunday we celebrated Adalyn's Great-Granddaddy's 76th birthday at Granna and Granddaddy's house. After Church we spent the afternoon grilling steaks and swimming!


The card Adalyn picked for granddaddy. She already has a sense of humor.

My grandparents just celebrated their 56th Wedding Anniversary. What a great example!

Mommy and Me Swim Class

That's right! Adalyn is taking swimming lessons! The Rec Center offers a Mommy and Me Swim Class to ages 6 months - 36 months. I definitely wanted to take advantage of that. It is NEVER too early for anything! =) That should be my new motto. Anywho, Adalyn LOVED it! I know I have mentioned before she really likes the water, so I was hoping she would do great in class and so far she is really enjoying it! She gets the biggest smile on her face as soon as her little feet touch the water. She knows exactly what to do with her legs... KICK! and she flaps those little arms so fast. We also experimented with putting some of her face in the water yesterday and she loved that too! She ended up swallowing a good bit of water, but hey, it won't hurt her! She kept opening her mouth and putting her face in the pool like she was trying to eat the water. It was so cute. The swim class is everyday for 2 weeks. Im just glad I have an excuse to get in the pool! =) Check her out!





We barely made it out of the parking lot before she fell asleep!

4th of July

We celebrated Adalyn's 1st 4th of July! Even though she will not remember any of it, I made sure to take lots of pictures (surprised?) to document all of the festivites we encountered. On Saturday, Memaw and PawPaw came to babysit Adalyn while Adam and I made a trip to Vanderbilt Children's Hospital to visit sweet Carter. Quick update on her: she's is doing great! She had her surgery and is now recovering. Praise the Lord! Carter is just so darn precious. I can't wait until she's home so I can get my hands on her! ...anyway, On the way home, we ordered Pizza and hotwings from the best pizza place in town, Pizza Hut. (my opinion). When we got home, pizza was delivered shortly after, we packed up a few things, and headed to Granna and Granddaddy's to eat and swim for the evening. They were out of town so we had the pool to ourself. We swam, ate, and played then went back home to get ready to watch the firework show! We made our way to the park, plopped a big blanket down, then watched Adalyn as she tried to crawl everywhere.
Enjoy some pictures!

Not real sure about crawling on the grass...




Watching the fireworks!
Check out this face







Shew, glad she didn't get momma's nose.


After that, we headed home and hopped into bed!

Sunday we woke up and got ready for church. I of course had to dress Adalyn to coordinate with the Holiday and boy did she look cute!! Would you expect anything otherwise? haha.






We ended up taking her to Sunday School with us. Last Monday she came down with a runny nose and a low fever. Ah, poor baby! Last week seemed very LONG because of that, too. Poor thing could not breathe and she absolutely hates the "bulb". She ended up sleeping with us for 2 nights due to the fact she would wake up and discovered she couldn't breathe well, then she would start crying. We layed her in her boppy so she could be elevated. She woke up a few more times throughout the night and we would check her temp and attempt to clean her nose out. I felt like we had a newborn all over again! lol. Let's just say on the 3rd night, we were so glad she was back in her crib! She sleeps ALL over the place and its really annoying. I don't see how parents let their kids sleep with them! Maybe if we had a bigger bed it wouldn't have been so bad, but with a queen bed, a husband who is 6'4, and a baby on a boppy who still ended up sideways, is not my idea of a good night sleep. 7 days later, she is all better! Thank goodness. With all of THAT being said, we took her to Sunday School because we didn't want to chance her getting any of the other babies sick. HOWEVER, we have come to the conclusion that she either got sick from a baby in the nursery, (if this is the case, leave your sick kids at home PLEASE!) or because she is teething. When she was 5 months her 1st tooth came through, and a few days later, the second. She was sick then, too. Sooo maybe it's because she cut her
3rd tooth last week. I sure hope every time she cuts a tooth she doesn't get sick like this! Whew, talk about wearing a momma out!

After church we headed back over to Granna and Granddaddy's to eat, swim, eat, and swim. Dustin, Christina, and baby Levi joined us for the day! It was such a beautiful day with good friends. It was so nice to be able to relax all day!







We got home around 8, fed the little one, put her in bed, then we sat on the couch and watched some fireworks on TV. Hope everyone had a great 4th of July, too!