Playing catch up...again!

My big girl, just a quick picture before I had to leave for work


LaRae's new horse...an early Christmas present. We stink at keeping things from her!



LaRae got a pair of big girl shoes. She is pretty much obsessed with them. She will take a few steps, stop and check them out and then repeat the process again.




Her hair is finally so long, I have to do something with it. She won't keep barretts in her hair, so this is my crazy solution.





Hey mom! Check me out!

So, I pretty much stink at this photo project. I had good intentions. The last few weeks have been crazy and are only going to get crazier. We're getting ready to go to Orlando for Christmas. I am so, so excited for this trip! LaRae has been a great helper lately. She helps me clean now. It is the cutest thing to watch. She will get a little rag and wipe everything down, including herself. She tries to sweep, as well.
I have all of our gifts wrapped. LaRae thinks that is great. She's taken all of the bows off and puts them on herself. She thinks everything is a sticker. She will bring a present to us and "ooooohhhhh and ahhhhhh!" I can't wait for Christmas!

I can't keep up!

LaRae and her Daddy, goofing off

Playing in the woods

Helping mom decorate the Christmas tree

I just can not seem to keep up with the photo project. I take the pictures, but time slips away from me at night. I would love nothing more than to be a stay at home mom. I would love for my focus to be entirely on my family and my home. I'll post several pictures I've taken over the last few days.

Photo Project

I have catching up to do. I work ten to eleven hour days on Wednesday and Thursday, so I really do not even have time to think of taking pictures, much less posting pictures. So, I am catching up. I had a doctor's appointment in Fort Walton Beach today, so we all went. Nate played hookey today. After that, he played tennis with a friend and LaRae and I played at the park. It was a beautiful day out today. I love Florida...wearing a light coat in December.

CPP, Day Two

LaRae's Grammy sent her the cutest Christmas outfit. We put it on in honor of the December Photo Project. I figured if there will be pictures of my baby, she should be festive.

We had a quiet day today. LaRae went to the dentist first thing this morning, so the rest of the day was hers. She wanted to play in the woods, so this clearing is where we ended up at. It was a cool day today. The sun was shining. The sky was clear. It was a good day.

CPP, day one

I already feel the pressure of the CPP. This is nowhere Christmas related. I do not even have decorations out yet. There is however a story to my photo. I wear animal printed socks to work. LaRae loves to lift my pant legs up and either bark or meow at my socks. She had one sock out in the living room and asked me to put it on her. She then went and knocked on my bedroom door. I let her in and she found the mate to the sock she had on. She was very proud of her socks.

Moments in time...

There are tiny snippets in time that I look at my baby and see how fast she is growing. She spoke her first sentence yesterday. I was putting her down for a nap and she said, "No, no mama, no no." Today she told me, "down, mama, down." I was holding her and she wanted to get down and run around. I had to buy some barettes to hold her hair back. It's still wild and stands everywhere, but her bangs hang in her eyes now. These are the little things that add up to her growing up and changing. I feel a sense of loss sometimes.

Christmas Photo Project

I found this through my cousin's blog: www.wachdorf.com
Her friends host a photo project for Christmas. The idea is to post a picture everyday through December. I love this idea, as it is an opportunity to document this wonderful holiday for LaRae. So I'm participating...I won't promise there won't be tons of pictures of my baby. We all know I have a disease.

Catching up...

I have enjoyed this week with Nate being off of work. We have pretty even parenting roles. We trade off days sleeping in, down time and diaper changes. It is nice. I appreciate that he respects the job of parenting. I see a few friends of mine whose husbands think that the parenting role is left to the mamma...that's just not fair.
Anyway, LaRae is easily won over. The time she's had with dad this week has turned her into a total daddy's girl. She has gone around all week saying, "hey dad, hey dad." She woke him up with a kiss this morning.
Thanksgiving was really nice. We had lunch at Nate's family's house. We ate too much, as always. I think there were a hundred dishes there...not really, but there were at least twenty different dishes and 13 desserts. We went for a walk in the woods and enjoyed the beautiful afternoon.
We braved BlackFriday. It really was not that bad. We were not the crazies out at five am. We bought a new mattress, king size! It is much needed now that we have a certain someone sleeping sideways in the bed with us. I will give you a hint on who it is, it is not Nate or me. One of us wakes up with a butt or feet in our faces. I would not trade it for the world, but more space is going to be heavenly. Nate got a machete. He is like a boy with a new toy. We have 8 beautiful, unexplored acres. Nate is clearing some trails for us to walk through the woods and take the four-wheeler through. The weather has been beautiful and the woods have been inviting to us.

blah...

That's how I'm feeling. Anyway, the weekend was fun. We watched Twilight. My thoughts on it...it was terrible. The book left so much more to the imagination. We had some great friends and a good time at our bonfire. We sat around and played guitars and talked about anything and everything. I drank way too much captain and coke. A good friend of mine, who is nine months pregnant, actually went into labor later that night! She had a beautiful little boy.
Nate is home all week with the baby. I'm jealous. I'm trying to decide if I want to go shopping on Friday or not. It scares me.

Weekend

I got the closet cleaned up some...as much as possible. I feel like the walls are closing in on us in this house some days. It is amazing how much equipment comes with a baby. It only seems to get larger as they get bigger too. We are going to see Twilight Saturday. Afterwards we are having a bunch of friends over for a bonfire. I am excited to have some adult conversation.

Lazy days

It was a really cold morning here, in the panhandle. LaRae and I let daddy sleep in this morning. Her and I hung out in our pj's most of the morning. Once it warmed up and we had a nap, we went outside for a little while. After I got tired of fishing acorns out of her mouth, we went shopping and out to lunch. I love our family outings. We had some good mexican food. LaRae loved it. We went to the mall and wandered around. LaRae has a blast seeing new places and people. We went to Wal-Mart and picked up some necessities. I have a lot that needs done around here. I am not motivated to do it though. We have friends coming over this weekend for a bonfire and I need to get the house in order. Maybe I'll muster up some motivation. I'll let you know how that goes.

Why a blog?

I have a baby site dedicated to my obsession, LaRae. You should check out her page, by the way, sign the guestbook or leave a comment or two on my adorable child. www.babyhomepages.net/jennismith
Anyway, I guess I want a piece of the net to myself. Somewhere to put my happenings and thoughts. I am pretty sure most of my posts will be based around my child, as they should be :) I have a husband and a job and other aspects of life that I can and will write about too. Our lives can be crazy, so keep up!