Christmas Time

We are celebrated Christmas tonight as a family for the first time.  We are loading up Miss A and going to the spousal unit's parents for the holidays.  My parents decided they didn't want us up there for Christmas (not in so many words, but I got the point), so we are doing all of the holiday at one grandparents house.  So far I got a baby food making machine, Julia Child's complete set of cookbooks, a necklace with Ainsley's name and birth stone, and a Kitchen Aid mixer.  I definitely call it a win.

We have been traveling so much that I didn't get a chance to send out Christmas cards this year.  Hell, I didn't even get Santa pics done until yesterday.  But they turned out great.  Wish I had done it a little earlier so they could have gone on a card.  oh well.  Here they are...

Merry Christmas

A letter in the making

I feel horrible.... I haven't been doing anything special for Ainsley's big hallmarks... her monthly birthdays, her first giggle, the first time she rolled over.  I really need to be a better mother and keep track of these things more.  So after writing this short post, I'm going to write my LO a letter for her 5 month birthday (which I missed by a day, btw), seal it, and put it in her keepsake box that she can open and read when she's older.  I'm going to attempt to do this every month from now on until her first birthday, then every year after that. 

This is the only picture I snaped of her turning 5 months.  I'm a horrible mom.....

There are so many things I still need to do before Christmas.  We are making handprint ornaments tomorrow.  I'm going to make them in dough and plaster.  I'm afraid the dough ones won't last that long, and I was going to keep her little hand print forever.  We need to go find daddy a small gift from Ainsley.  I was hoping to order this...


But I waited too long, and now I need to find something else.  Maybe I love daddy picture frame for his office.  Argh... I don't know.

Tomorrow we also need to get Baby A's Santa pictures done.  Yes... I am that far behind.  It's going to be a long next couple of days.

Oh, and update on the Cinnamon ornaments...  I made them a little thin, but I went ahead and hung them on the tree.  It's makes the tree smell pretty yummy when you're near it.

Taken with my phone.  It's much prettier in person!

Gloomy, shitty day

We got the most rain in Austin today that we've gotten... maybe for a year or two.  I mean... there were a few minutes there that it really poured.  Everyone else in the US might laugh at that, but it was really something for anyone living here.  We have been in an awful drought for a while now.  But even the downpour didn't stop me from checking my mailbox for fluff I had ordered.  And sure enough... it was there.  I bought a fitted diaper to try under the wool longies I'm in love with, and some diaper solution cubes.

I absolutely love their All in One diaper, so I decided to give tot bots fitted a try.  I'm a little worried they'll stay really wet all night long though, so I might have to add a fleece liner to them, but we will see.  The diaper solution I ordered was in Monkey farts scent (I kid you not).  I'm not really sure what I expected.  The name enticed me though, so I had to buy some.  And yeah... it kinda smells like a floral fart.  I'll still use it, but probably won't buy it again.

So during my morning coffee, I got a call about a job interview I went on a few weeks ago.  I got the job.  It's kind of a double edged sword.  I'm not one to put all my eggs in one basket, so it's kind of important to me to have a job and be able to support myself.  But having to leave Ainsley with a sitter makes me a little sick inside.  And it hurts a little that it's 15k less than I was making at my last job, and I have to pay for my insurance now, and I get a week less in paid time off...  but it's a job, right?  *sigh*

On a lighter note, I made fragrant Christmas ornaments today from an old newspaper article my mom had.

It was super easy.

It's just...

1 cup of Cinnamon
3/4 cup apple sauce. 

Make into dough, roll out about 1/4 inch thickness, use cookie cutters, and cut out shapes.  Don't forget to make a hole to hang them.  Let them dry on a cooling rack for several days, turning occasionally. And BAM!  You have ornaments.

I think I may have rolled the dough a little too thin, but we will see.

Maybe 1 of 2

We got back home today.  I think Ainsley was the happiest of all of us about this.  This is the first night in a week that she's slept for a stretch longer than 3 hours.  She's back in her bouncy chair, and extremely content.

This week had demonstrated to me how absolutely difficult it will be to move her out of her bouncy chair and into the crib.  We were gone a week, and every night only got minutely better.  It's going to be a long journey.  If you notice, we have moved to one arm out of her swaddle.  Baby steps....

I'm really hoping to get a lot of stuff done this weekend, but I don't think that's going to happen.  I need to get all my pictures transferred off my phone and onto my computer, upload pics to facebook, read the directions to my camera, apply for some jobs, and I'm hoping to write a little about cloth diapers.  We just got back today from Denver and will out and about again tomorrow for a Christmas party.  I'm petered out man.  I'm not really looking forward to it at this point.

I will write one little thing about cloth diapering... I love getting fluff in the mail.  I order all my stuff offline.  I have found recently, that etsy is a REALLY good source.  I came home to find some wool longies in my mailbox from Grateful Buns.  They come lanolized smelling like lavender.  My whole mailbox smelled like lavender.  I'm sure my postman appreciated it.  Wool covers are the only thing I will use over fitteds.  I mainly use pockets, but for overnight, wool has become my go to.  Ainsley is wearing her new PJ pants tonight...

I love the buttons.  It makes me want to buy some more fitted diapers so she can wear these longies during the day as an outfit.  I know at night, she is at least warm wearing these pants.

Another thing I can home to was a follow up call on a job.  I'm excited and reluctant at the same time.  I'm ready to start getting a paycheck again =), but I'm not ready to leave Miss A with a sitter.  The best care she can receive is being at home with me.  And I'm afraid that this position won't pay all that well, but the spousal unit is going to push me to take it.  I kinda want to at least stay home with her until my unemployment runs out in April, but I guess we can't always get what we want.

Oh, and I also weighed myself as soon as I got home.  I gained 5 lbs.  Just fucking great....



Pictures are pretty revealing... in not a pretty way

We spent most our day today taking family pictures all over the mountain.  I've sat here all night critiquing them.  Well, this was after going out to dinner and eating too much... of course.  There are three things I've determined. 

1.  My teeth are really yellow. What can I say.... I love coffee! I was going to get them whitened.  I bought a groupon for it, but couldn't use it because you apparently can't get it professionally done while your pregnant or nursing.  So, after July, I can hopefully get this taken care of...

See... my teeth look yellow

2.  I need to loose weight.  Baby weight.... from when I was a baby.  Now... this picture isn't completely fair, because the t-shirt I had on was bunched up around my waist from carrying Ainsley, but I still freakin hate it.

I'm not digging the chunky thighs either... but I'm not sure there is a lot I can do about that..

3.  I don't particularly like my haircut.  She made my bangs too heavy, and they are too short on one side of my part.  I have to part my hair really deep on one side the get all my bangs in.  It's kinda stupid.

I suppose it is what it is.  It's going to be interesting to step on the scale when I get back home.  I had a goal of losing 6 more pounds before Christmas.  I hope that figure doesn't go up at all.  I hate baby weight....

I am very fortunate to have a beautiful baby to show for it though.  For that, I am blessed.

Did you know that one of the Victoria's Secret Angels delivered a baby 6 weeks before doing one of their shows?????  Bitch....

I'm baaaack...

Things have been the utmost hectic the last month.  It seems the holidays have put everything into overdrive.  We put up our Christmas decorations before Thanksgiving (which is typically a big no no in our house) because we realized that was going to be the only opportunity we had until January. 

A short run down of the craziness... I took Ainsley to Oklahoma for a week while the spousal unit went hunting.  I was hoping for some relief from my mom in taking care of Baby A, but she was sick and unable to even hold her.  We went to Kansas for a day, went back to OKC, then back to Austin, to turn around and go to outside of Houston the following weekend.  This week, we are in Steamboat on vacation.  It was Baby A's first time on a plane.  Quite honestly, I was super nervous.  She did awesome though.  We even woke her up at 5:45 am to leave to the airport.  I know I would be pissed off if someone woke me up that early...

She fell asleep once we boarded and didn't wake up until about an hour into the flight.  Once she did, she was super enthralled with the peanuts.  That provided entertainment for a while.

But once we got here... it's been a totally different story.  I really hope it's not the altitude.  I've been trying to nurse her as much as possible to make sure she's not getting dehydrated.  But she's kinda fussy all day and is up once an hour ALL NIGHT LONG.  I finally got her to sleep for a couple of hours today in the swing that we rented and had delivered to our condo.  I must say... that is a must have for all parents traveling with infants.  We had a bouncy chair, swing, and bath tub here when we showed up.  It was awesome.

 Hopefully, she will be in a better mood and we can go visit daddy on the slopes tomorrow and take some good pictures on the mountain.

Her being cranky and us hanging out at the house did allow for us to enter a bunch of online contest today.  I don't think I've blogged about this before... but I'm really into cloth diapering.  It's actually become an obsession of mine.  I love it.  I'm mainly into pockets, but I do have a couple of fitteds with wool covers.  Anyways...  I'll blog all about this later.  But the give aways that Autumn is doing is awesome.  I absolutely love her blog.  Beginning cloth diapering can be overwhelming.  People don't realize how complicated it can be with all the different choices you have and all the different washing routines there are.  Her blog really helped me begin to figure out what was right for me.

Anyways... hopefully things will be better tonight here in the mountains.  Greetings from Steamboat!