teddy bear, teddy bear.

Just a few years ago and feels like just a few months ago, I took these pictures - A good friend.
Quinn with her teddy bear and they were some of my favorites from that baby stage for sure.
I thought I would try to recreate.  try.

At the time of these photos, Quinn was almost 7 months, and Andie is almost 7 1/2 months.

Quinn:

Andie:

Andie is a little more aggressive with bear. :)

Andie wanted to look at me and smile the whole time.

Despite their big difference in size, Quinn was always a stable little sitter at this point and even crawling, little rolly Andie is a great sitter but still has occasional moments of just tipping right over.  During this little 5 minute shoot I saved her from a noseplant and a backdive. :)  I think she just likes to tip right over to be quite honest and is rather silly.  Quinn was always our serious girl who took everything she did seriously.
We LOVE watching both of these little personalities grow.
Andie, your smile and your silliness is contagious, we are so grateful that you help us all be a little more silly.


Oh, since Andie didn't quite recreate Quinn's original picture, Quinn said "I'll do it again!".

I was dying laughing.
(this time with her very loved Rainbow Bear)

delicious.

all sorts of cuteness here today.

A juicy little baby to give your day an extra smile. :)

the custom media center.

My husband is awesome.

He is a jack of all trades and knows a lot about everything.  When we first started dating I learned quickly that he had experience fixing, building and putting together just about everything.

We both love a good project.  Todd loves a good woodworking project.
So when he was the one that said "How about we tackle the custom built-ins for the living room?"  I was all "heck ya! that would be awesome!" :)

He recruited some help from our good friend Jeff Hoerner (whom we are SO grateful to) and began to tackle one of the biggest projects he has ever done.  Every little bit of this big masterpiece was handmade.

It is a beauty.

We typically tackle a project together, but this one all goes to Todd.
I can only take about 1% credit - the decision making stuff (finding an example picture of one I liked, measuring out sizes and picking features (beadboard, drawers, hardware, etc.), and the most fun decorating it!).
Todd probably has a good 80 hours into this.  A lot of hard work and great craftsmanship and now it will be in our family room forever. Really forever, it is secured to the wall and cutout of the baseboards as built-ins are. :)
We LOVE it so much!  It made a huge impact on the entire great room.
There is a little room to upgrade our tv if we would like to one day.


Here are a few before and afters from Christmas time.

We will put up a big post over on our DIY page very soon with all the details.

Including how it all began:

and all of the beautiful features including custom built drawers, cabinets and the gorgeous hardware.

awesome.

my husband is awesome.

little buddies.

This is Kirsten, one of my best friends and one of the most kind and generous hearts I will ever know.

A few years ago we had these little squishy cheek babies just 8 weeks apart.
Talan & Quinn

those little babes are now these two adorable kiddos and they love each other.

This past year we decided (or as luck would have it :)) to have two more little squishy cheek babies just 8 weeks apart.  We are so excited to see these two grow together!
Andie & Savi

(Kirsten and her husband Jeremy have three adorably sweet kiddos.  We missed the boat to have one join Austin their oldest. :))

Good friends are one of the greatest blessings in life.
I'm so glad my girls already have such wonderful blessings in their lives.

Christmas jammies.

It's the middle of January, it's time to get the final post about Christmas up!

My mom is very talented and so crafty.  For Christmas she likes to make jammies for all the kiddos, and this year the count went up from 4 kiddos to 6!  My family all came together for several days following Christmas.  We had a wonderful time together, hours of present opening and ate lots of yummy food too of course.  We managed to squeeze in a few photos of the kids in their jammies.
It's so fun to watch all of them grow up together.
(Aidan - 8, Liam - almost 6, Quinn - 3 1/2, Brynn - 3, Andie - 6 months, Noah - 6 months)

the market.

If you have been waiting for some kind of Christmas project reveal, well then you know us well. :)

This year we decided to make a more defined playroom space in the bonus room we have upstairs.  It's still a work in progress, but we are loving it.  It also helped to make our little playroom downstairs totally baby friendly so there would be one space I wouldn't have to worry about a crawling baby running into tiny little doll shoes or alphabet letters everywhere.

Quinn loves to take our lunch orders and play kitchen, so only naturally we thought a little market/cafe/bakery would be perfect!
Quinn loves it - we have her reaction on video that I'm working to compile into a Christmas video.
For now, here is an overload of pictures, and soon I'll get all details and scoop about it posted over on our DIY page.

Come on in.
It's our Christmas morning reveal.

a little reading corner.

The Market.
Groceries on one side, bakery items in the front. :)

Paper menus and guest tickets for the server to use are also available.

We play Market every single day.  We love it!  I do mean "we", I'm pretty sure this must have been a present for mommy too.  Running a little bakery/reading book store is my dream!  And the cash register is too fun!

I'll get more details up on the DIY page that went into the creation of this.

andie - six months.

We are almost creeping up to 7 months already! Ah! So, this will be a little update on our sweet peanut until a big 7 month post coming very soon.

Andie @ 6 months.

A few quick facts.
Andie at 6 months:
Weighs:  18 1/2 pounds
Size:  6-9 month clothes, Diapers size 3
Eats:  Breastfed (pretty sure the new bottles I purchased prior to her arrival will never be used :)), but   I absolutely love my time nursing her.  She is starting to practice using a sippy cup.  Foods she has tried:  apples, pears, sweet peas, green beans,    sweet potatoes, zucchini, squash, butternut squash, peaches, banana, prunes, avocado.  She now picks up little Puffs to eat and loves those.
Teeth:  no teeth yet!  Quinny had 6 at 6 months and 8 at 8 months so this is new, but truthfully her little gummy smile just keeps her looking younger (time is going so fast so I'm perfectly fine with that!)
Sleep:  She has always been our catnapper, she takes about 3-4  thirty minute naps a day. At night, she still varies a bit, but she wakes 1-2 times in 13-14 hour window.  Bedtime is 6-6:30, wakes for the day 7:30-8:00.
At 6 1/2 months she naturally started moving to 2 naps and thankfully they are stretching out a little so she gets a decent nap.
Personality:  Andie is our super smiley, happy as a peach, joyful little angel.  She shows all of her emotions on her face, there is no hiding them with her.  And luckily most of the time it is pure joy you see in all the dimples on her cheeks.  She giggles like crazy, especially at her sister.  It's pretty rare to hear a cry from her, but if you do it's 100% because of being tired.  She fusses a little when we put her down to sleep, but it always is very predictable and short-lived.
Andie is my thoughtful little listener.  When she is looking at you, she is really looking at you and her eyes just stare deep into yours.  It is one of my favorite things about her.  That and she is into giving the most amazing little squeezes right now.  She grabs my shoulders pulls herself in and lays her head on my shoulder and I never want to let go.  It's the sweetest and it melts me every single time.  I never want to forget that.

No crawling yet, but this girl will logroll across a room in seconds!

Andie, you are the most delicious, joyful baby and we love you to pieces.  We can't get enough of you!  Instead of hoping for the nights you stop waking or waiting for teeth to come or your little knees to pick you up and take off crawling, I find myself embracing every sweet little moment and hoping all those milestones don't come too quickly.  I love my moments with you in the quiet of the night.  Since you were born you always have woke just babbling for mommy to come, never with a cry or scream.  We are so lucky to be your parents sweet girl.

And, we aren't the only ones who love you to pieces.
Your big sister is so in love with you.

Christmas Eve.

On Christmas Eve, we spent the day with my parents.
The girls love when Grandpa and Grandma are visiting from Florida.

We had many days of cooking food and baking in store over the week with many house guests arriving, so we decided Christmas Eve dinner at Texas Roadhouse sounded perfect.

A few early gifts were opened.

Cookies and milk were put out for Santa Claus.

And the reindeer were not forgotten.  Quinn made some special reindeer food and made sure to put plenty of it out for the reindeer to enjoy.  It was the very first thing she checked in the morning...and it was all gone!

Christmas Eve 2014

Someone said to me in passing one day "Oh, you have a matching set - how amazing."  She went on to tell me that all of her kids looked completely different from each other.
These two little sisters are definitely a matching set. :)