My Beautiful, Beautiful Baby Shower

Pictures say a thousand words.

This is good because there's A LOT I could go on and on and on about.

But, for your sake, I will let the pictures speak for themselves.

Can I just say I have the most thoughtful family in the world?

Honestly.

I am so, so blessed.

My two wonderful sisters who put the whole thing together.
I love and appreciate these two women.
I am so grateful for their gift of a beautiful baby shower.

Adorable center pieces. 

And yes, this yard is incredible - complete with a GORGEOUS waterfall.

Marin was on baby duty and did a fantastic job.

 I love the expression on Scarlet's face! Ha!!

All the while Berkley was just chillin' in her carseat.

Setting up all the yummy deliciousness!

Everyone commented on the refreshment table.

Isn't it lovely?!

Proof of the incredible generosity of others.

 Aunt Alicia gave this ADORABLE giraffe-printed dress. 

She'll be so cute in it. 

Ah!!! I can hardly contain myself!!

 Blessed with so many cute, cute, CUTE outfits, dresses, shoes/socks, headbands, etc! 

Both Trav and I are overwhelmed with gratitude. 

People are so giving.

We are so blessed.

 Marin, the fashionista, made sure our little lady had PLENTY of fashionable items

including, but not limited to a zebra print bib!

Love it!

 Thanks Dad & Mom [Braun]!!!!

This will DEFINITELY be put to good use!

Marin was crazy about the hippo.

She just HAD to get her picture taken with it.

(on the other side of the waterfall there was an enormous giraffe)

Family is everything, peeps.

Family is everything.

Baby Project - Day 7

Just to clarify, when I post "Day 1" or "Day 7" or whatever the "DAY" may be

I hope you understand that I'm not meaning an actual day.

I'm meaning HOURS and HOURS of pure hell.

So, please be slow to judge when I tell you we are still in the process of finishing things up.

But we're happy to report it's coming together nicely.

BATHROOM

Is complete!

Everything is re-installed.

We have new tile on the floor and shower, freshly painted walls and trim, and no leaks!

YAY!!!!

FAMILY ROOM

is clean and usable again!!!

Sorry for the spots on the picture. 

I think I need to clean the lens on my camera.

If you look down the hallway you can see a few bins.

That's all that's remaining from our enormous project.

Totally do-able!

FOOD STORAGE ROOM

is nearly done -

just a bit of organizing and rearranging remaining 

and it'll be COMPLETE!

It looks tight and crunched but that's because of the large buckets on the left. 

We plan to put those under the shelving on the right, which will open things up.

But for now it'll work. :)

And presenting.......

BABY ROOM

We tore out the old, ugly brown linoleum 

*vomit*

and had the room re-carpeted.

We then had my dad put on some BEAUTIFUL trim.

As you can see we're starting to move some of our baby stuff in.

 The baby room doesn't have a closet 

so off to IKEA we went and picked up a simple little thing and assembled it.

The assembling was a nightmare but Trav handled it like a pro.

I helped where and when I could.

After trying to relieve him - his back was killing him - I decided to be an assistant rather than a leader.

You see, when trying to screw in a screw all I seemed to do was drop the screw and lose it.

When I tried to put parts together all I seemed to do was put it together crooked.

When reading instructions I seemed to lose my place or confuse the poor guy.

I'm grateful he was able to laugh at me rather than roll his eyes and get annoyed.

I was honestly trying to be helpful but failed. 

Miserably.

So, hand him this, hand him that. 

Hold this, move that.

Take out the pile of garbage, organize various [small] pieces...

Sure, I can do that without messing up. ;)

He's so patient.

I sure love and appreciate him.

The finished closet, 

[It's there for now but we're not going to keep it in this corner]

a mirror I want to refinish and hang

[for safety reasons it won't happen until after the pregnancy]

 and a cedar chest I made in high school. 

[It will probably be used as a toy chest]

The room is small but I think it will meet our needs perfectly.

Now all we have to do is:

1) Clean out my brothers room and bring all-things-baby down to her room

2) Wash & organize her clothes, shoes, accessories, etc

3) Arrange and finish the room

The past few months have been a little...tense...to say the least.

I've been overwhelmed by these projects.

Going into it I knew it was going to be hard.

Let's just say I was 

Clueless.

Oblivious.

Blind.

Lacking in judgement.

Thankfully Travis helped with the majority of it.

He stuck by my side and took things head on.

Had I not had his help and energy I would have quit a long time ago.

Forget it.

I'm done.

I quit.

But!!!

I'm feeling much better now.

I'll post the finished projects once we have everything set up and ready. :)

Baby Project - Day 6

While Travis and I were with our nephews for a few days
my mom surprised us by cleaning out what was left in the baby room
(the old food storage/catch all room). 

I know I already blogged about this, but I STILL can't express how grateful we are for her help.

Here's what we left:

Click Here!

*You'll need to scroll down to the
OLD FOOD STORAGE / NEW BABY ROOM
portion of the post*

I had done some work in there between days five and six, I just didn't take pictures of the progress.
But still, my mom did A LOT down there!

And here's what we came home to:

Corner 1

Corner 2

Corner 3

Corner 4

View from the doorway



What a huge blessing!!!

40 Going On 25

Trav's sister, Alicia, celebrated her 40th birthday in style. 

Rather than dread the big day, she threw herself a birthday bash!

My kind of a woman!!!!

 (Marin, Trav & Berkley)

 I don't just love this picture - I FREAKIN' love this picture! 

Bahahahahahahahahaha!

He wasn't camera-shy in the least. 

Love this kid.

 (Ashley and Scarlet)

I only got a few pictures, darn it, but the room was full: 

family, friends, neighbors, and fellow autism-moms. 

All who love Alicia and wanted to celebrate her.

I deeply, deeply admire this woman. 

She's an incredibly strong, determined, patient, forgiving individual.

She never expects anything from anyone yet she's always giving of herself and her blessings. 

She is a fantastic mother - I can say this honestly as I have observed her with her children.

I truly think we could all learn a little from this beautiful 40 year old. :)

Happy 40th, Alicia!!!

Chillaxin' with the Smith Boys, Part II

The last time I posted about our weekend with the Smith boys 

(our wonderful nephews) 

we were in the middle of our weekend with them.

Things have started to calm down a bit since then so I am now just posting the remaining pictures.

SATURDAY SWIMMING

We took the boys swimming at the local rec-center. 

They loved it. :)

Grayson was so excited to show us his tricks off the diving board.

He thought about going off the high dive but wasn't comfortable with it...that's okay. 

One day.

Keegan stayed in the kiddie pool area.

It was a pretty rockin' kiddie pool with slides, toys, etc. 

Braxton floated around what I calleded "the donut". 

He swam around this big circle over and over and over again. 

He loved every minute of it as you can see.

Sunday Morning Shaving

Trav was getting ready for church Sunday morning when Keegan came in 

and started asking questions about 

what he was doing, 

why he was doing it, 

how he was doing it, 

etc. 

Rather than talk about it, Trav decided to show him. :)

Here's a step-by-step pictorial showing you how cute the whole things was.

Step One:

Apply shaving cream

Step Two: 

Make sure shaving cream is correctly and thoroughly spread on ones face.

Step Three: 

SHAVE

*Trav had Keegan shave with his finger rather than a razor for obvious reasons*

Keegan kept his eye on Trav to make sure he was doing it the way Uncle Trav was doing it.

Step Four:

Wash off remaining shaving cream

Step Five:

Check your work

Uncle Trav gave him an "A+" for his good work. ;)

I had to include this picture because I thought it was so cute. 

Each morning Keegan would come into the bedroom and cuddle up to Trav, quickly falling back to sleep. 

I'm assuming Keeg's does this with his parents but I still thought it was cute!

We had quite a bit of fun with these boys!