Look who's ONE

I know it's said over & over again, but honestly, how did one year pass so quickly? 

Here are a few pictures from this last year with our little Jae Bird.

60 hours of being hooked up to an IV during labor gave us one water logged little meatball!  At 36 hours old she had already lost a pound of fluid & was more to what our Pediatrician figured was her true birth weight.

Two weeks old ~ picture was taken in the cradle my dad made for my dolls when I was a little girl.

 

3 months old

4 months old

5 months old ~ Celebrating with Grandpa after he finished the  Coeur d'Alene Ironman race.

6 months old ~ Grandma's Little Firecracker (4th of  July in Idaho)

7 months old ~ I love watching my Uncle Reggie play football!

8 months old ~ Hanging out with my uncles!

9 months old

10 months old ~ my first picture with Santa

11 months old ~ My first Christmas

BIRTHDAY GIRL!!

Christmas Dress

Ainsley was such a good sport & smiled lots during her photo session a few days ago!

As always a HUGE THANK YOU to our friend Bethany Shaver for taking the time to capture such sweet moments with our little girlie! Here's a link to Bethany's blog, so you can check out her work & get her contact information! 

9 months

well almost 10 now! How does it all go by so quickly? There were more than a few 24 hour periods where I was sure I would not survive, but then the months have just flown by. I've not made much time for blogging, but I  do need to make more of an effort. Here are a few pictures from Ainsley's 9 month photo shoot with Bethany Shaver. Bethany has an AMAZING talent for capturing little ones & families! Check out her blog if you are in need of photos for your family or little ones.

SEW . create . CHANGE

In an attempt to keep this blog mostly centered on our family, I've started a new blog SEW . create . CHANGE to chronicle my crafting successes and missteps. I've posted a few things already and have a few more in the works, including a tutorial for the headband I made for Ainsley out of one Gap knee high sock. I am also going to start a Monthly Project Challenge on June 1st, all details will be available on SEW . create . CHANGE, so you can join in on the fun. I have several goals that lead me to the monthly project idea & I'm excited to have 7 completed projects by the end of the year. 

Linking Up ... Idiosyncrasies

I've been working on some new posts with plenty of pictures of the cutest member of our family, but to get me going I'm linking up with Laugh Until Your Cheeks Hurt and posting a few of my idiosyncrasies...

Idiosyncrasy-from Ancient Greek ἰδιοσυγκρασία, idiosynkrasía, "a peculiar temperament", "habit of body" is defined as an individualizing quality or characteristic of a person or group, and is often used to express eccentricity or peculiarity.

~As a girl I used to take weekend trips to Caldwell, Idaho from our home in Moscow, Idaho (about a 6 hour drive) with my Grandma to visit my Great-Grandma. Those trips began when I was just starting grade school and as a school teacher my Grandma would take those opportunities we had to teach me lots of things like math facts and the Counties and their Seats for the entire state; many things I have now pushed to the depths of my brain. But there is one thing I learned that I will never forget and that is how to spell the word CONSTRUCTION. There was always a ton of construction on Hwy 95, so needles to say I saw that word a lot. Even to this day if I need to write or type the word CONSTRUCTION I spell it out in my head, just to prove that I know how...

~I LOVE patterns & will usually jump through an irrational set of hoops to continue a pattern or to avoid making a pattern all together. It took me over 4 years of trying, to carry a baby full term & during that 4 years I created every pattern imaginable with the list of names we had agreed on. Had our first initials not spelled a word (T+A+G), it may have never become a concern, but since they do, here are the hoops I jumped through... 1st boy starts with T, 1st girl A & then the middle name starts with the other parent's middle initial. The 1st hoop was no biggie, but now... Do all boys start with T, all girls with A? Do we swap the rules & give the next girl a name that starts with T? Our 1st son will have a middle name that is also a town in Idaho; so do we give all boys  a middle name that is a town in Idaho? Are you thoroughly confused yet?  

~I get totally irritated when I find the toilet lid left up; we're not even talking about the seat folks, the lid is enough to make me crazy. ***I am only this critical and irrational at my house, so don't feel like I am going to go crazy at your house***

~I've mentioned this before, but it's worth mentioning again... I almost always sort my french fries by length before eating them in even number groupings. I group them according to length, because it makes for even, less messy dipping - especially on that not so kosher double dip that I do if the sauce has my name written all over it!

~I love love love IKEA, which if you have ever been to my house and know IKEA you would figure out right away. Twice a year I am allowed to go to IKEA with a decent chunk of change and purchase items that Travis and I pick out together for the rooms that need the most work. This works because it forces me to think outside the box and really use what we get and make odd things work to create the best house on a less than you would think budget. That twice a year does a lot for me, but then there are 363 IKEALESS days left for me to suffer through; so to get me by I came up with this game... I am allowed to go to IKEA anytime as long as I follow the rule of the day. That rule must be communicated to Travis beforehand and approved by him. The rule of the day changes based on our budget & my mood, but here are some rules I have used: $25.00 limit & no single item can cost more than $5.00, $20.00 limit & you can only purchase items that begin with whatever letter you pick, $50.00 limit & you can only buy things that are a specific color... I turn most everything in to a competition with myself... 

~My name is Alicia and I'm an Excel Spreadsheet Junkie... If it can be organized via spreadsheet, it has been at my house. Our movies, food storage, cleaning supplies, addresses, schedules and many more items have fallen victim to my crazy need for organization.

~ 1.9.2011 ~

Ainsley Jae born at 4:28 pm
9 lbs ~ 20.5 inches

Mom & Dad call me their "Little Triangle Baby".  I rarely spent any of my "womb time" in the correct position, so why start after being born. I rarely default to the standard "fetal position" instead I opt for a more comfy sprawled out position.

1.12.2011 ~ Here I am all ready to go home from the hospital.


I have accounted for the events that led up to her arrival, but at this point all of the hours & discomfort pail in comparison to that moment when Travis announced to the surgery suite that the fruit I had been carrying for all those weeks was a healthy baby girl. My tears began not too long after that & didn't really stop for a few days after we got home. Some of those tears were irrational hormonal tears, but most of them were my "Spirit Tears". I am not typically a crier, so really early on I learned that tears were the physical manifestation that Heavenly Father provided, so that I would pay more attention & REALIZE that I was feeling The Spirit.
What an AMAZING experience this has been thus far! We are truly grateful for this opportunity to be parents. Ainsley has been such a joy to have in our home! Since it took me so long to do this post, I hope to have another up for you real soon, but alas me & my one free hand are still getting up to speed.

~ 6 Weeks ~

I hope this surprises some of you as much as it surprises me; I cannot believe we will have a baby of our own in such a short time. I've had a few aches and pains in the last few weeks, but overall I cannot complain about this experience. We've wanted to be parents for so long & I think that has really helped me keep a positive outlook on this experience as a whole & avoid some frustration over the things about being pregnant that are inconvenient. I get asked almost daily if I have a "feeling" about the gender of this baby & I honestly must report that I do not have a feeling one way or the other. My little sister just had her baby this last week & now it seems everyone is even more excited for our little ? to arrive. I am excited as well, but I am feeling a bit overwhelmed at all the ways my/our life will change once the baby comes. We've had 6 Thanksgivings & will soon celebrate our 5th Anniversary & 6th Christmas together just the two of us & as much as we have prayed for little ones to join our family, I'm just not sure I am ready to share Travis yet. Travis is an AMAZING partner in life & he will be an AMAZING dad! I am excited to watch him teach our children the principles & values he governs his life with.