I was starting to update my facebook status about the nice Sunday that our family had yesterday, when I realized the status was going to be waaaaaay too long, and I decided that a blog entry might be better. Obviously I've been behind in my blogging since Avery was born and I began watching Dayton. I will try to catch up on them and our family after I talk about our nice day yesterday.
We started our Sunday off right with a trip to church. Michael played in the band this week, so he was there at 8am (I do not envy him). Avery and I showed up around 9:20. She looked adorable yesterday in a black and white polka dotted dress that Mama got for her. It looked like something you would take a baby to a wedding in. Mama has a nack for finding them at garage sales. They make perfect Sunday church dresses. Everyone at church always comments on how cute Avery is always dressed. :) Michael and I could look like total slobs, but as long as Avery looks cute, no one would notice. :P Yesterday at church the African Children's Choir was visiting. They were AMAZING!!!! They sang and danced. Some songs we knew, some were songs that came from their area of Africa: Kenya, Uganda, etc. It was such a blessing to see them. They have the most infectious smiles and beautiful voices and souls. Made me crave more time in Yaoude. It was a joyous way to begin our Sunday!
When we got home from church Avery was asleep and napping in her carseat. Michael and I took this opportunity to get started on some house and yardwork. While Michael began ripping up the crabgrass that is attempting to take over our front yard, I started some dishes and laundry. I checked in on Avery to find her still sleeping, and I headed out to my flower bed to begin weeding. I've weeded the flower bed onced already this season, so there wasn't too terrible much to do. I had all of the weeds out and the sidewalk swept off in no time!
After we finished up in the front yard, we came in again to check on Avery, who was still sleeping. I took the apples and bananas that were in the baby food maker and put them in a container to go in the freezer. I am LOVING my baby food maker! It's so inexpensive to make Avery's food, and I know everything is fresh and preservative free! :) By the time I was done with the food, Avery had woken up. We got her fed and changed, we smothered her in the kind of sunscreen that would keep the sunburns away if you were going on a trip to the sun, and headed out to the backyard. I worked on weeding the garden while Avery and Michael laid on a blanket and playing in the yard. Avery is beginning to crawl more and more and quickly made her way to the edge of the blanket so she could get her hands in the grass. :) Harlee and Gabby love being near us, whether we're in the house or outside. So even though it was warm out and they could have gone inside (the doors were open), they found the shadiest spots in the grass near us and settled down for naps. :) They are too sweet.
Eventually Avery got hungry again. We went back inside to eat, and then laid her in her crib to play with her toys and piano while we went back out to work. Michael helped me with the weeding of the garden while I got to work planting my tomatoes and peppers. This summer I'm only planting the ingredients to salsa. I will see how well they grow, and maybe next year we'll add some other veggies. But for now I think I'll have more than enough to keep my hands full. I planted 4 tomato plants and 4 pepper plants. My tomatoes are: Beefmaster, Better Boy, Celebrity, and Roma. I went with a variety to see what I like best, and will plan accordingly for next year. For peppers I planted red, orange, and green bell peppers, and one jalepeño plant! I already had my onions in the ground. They are growing up really well! I have 4 different varienties of onions as well. I have generic red, yellow, and white onions, and also a yellow Walla Walla onion, that I was told is great for cooking with. I am soooo excited about the garden! I hope I actually get some veggies and they don't all die. :P We shall see!
After all of our yardwork we went to the store to get some supplies for Danielle and Luke's party that night. I got brownie mix, pudding, cool whip, and toffee pieces. But I realized after I got started that I gave my mom back her trifle dish, so I would have to layer things in a baking dish instead. But I ran into problems when I realized that I accidently bought the pudding you have to cook. Long story short, the pudding never set up and we never ate the desert. :( I haven't checked on it this morning, but hopefully it's better now.
Danielle and Luke's party was fun! There were lots of us from Beldens and also from Furniture Row where Luke works. Everyone also had their significant others and we had Avery. There was great food, great music, and everyone had fun hanging out and talking. It was a really nice evening. As a Mama who stays home and in the house a lot, it was great to get out. :) Avery got a little overwhelmed when we got there and there were lots of people all shouting hello to us. But she calmed down quick and was the life of the party with her happy, silly faces, her dance moves, and her crawling straight for Danielle's watch repeatedly. :P She let lots of people hold her, and no one seemed to have a problem with her being there. People especially loved feeding her small pieces of pasta from the pasta salad. She gets so excited with the anticipation of food, she's hysterical to feed. :)
We were home by 11 and all worn out. Michael had to get up and be to work by 8 this morning and I was up at 7:15 ready for Dayton to arrive. Avery enjoyed sleeping in this morning, which I think she deserved and needed after our exciting night yesterday. It's been a slow start this morning, but with a couple cups of coffee, I've finally managed to get some life out of my exhausted body.
All in all, we had a wonderful day yesterday! We could not have asked for a better Sunday with my friends and family. :)
Now a short update on what's going on in our lives...
Michael - Michael is working hard, as always, to bring home the bacon. He really loves his job at AeTR (Aerospace Turbine Rotables). He reverse engineers airplane parts. He takes a broken part, figures out why it broke, fixes it, makes a new one that won't break the same way or as easily, mass produces them, and then sells them back to the airplane companies for a substancial profit. The company CEO loves Michael and the engineering department because they are making him a ton of money. Michael likes the job because he gets different projects, always stays busy (unlike at Dell) and has job security. I like his job because he's happy with it, his coworkers and bosses like and appreciate him, and it's a stable lifelong sort of job (so hopefully he won't have to be job hunting again for a very long time). In about a month (beginning of June) he will celebrate his 1 year anniversary with the company! :) They have been so good to us. We are blessed. In other news, Michael is working on making our yard beautiful. :) Last year the summer was so severe we would take anything in the yard, so long as it was green. This year Michael is a little pickier, prefering the actual lush green grass over the rough crabgrass. He's effectively killed off all of the weeds and is now focusing his attention on removing the crabgrass and filling in the spaces with new grass. He's getting quite a nack for getting the yard in nice order. :) Some of you may be wondering why he's putting so much attention and effort into the yard... Well, in a neighborhood like ours, simply having something covering the dirt is not good enough. Now, our HOA doesn't regulate our lawns or anything, but a good number of yards in our area are prestine. Michael takes such pride in our home, he wants to have that same pride for our yard. Thus, all the work. :)
Avery - Our sweet girl is almost 7 months old now! She is eating solid foods like a champ! She usually has lots of vegetables: sweet potatoes, green beans, carrots, squash, and broccoli. Yesterday I made her some more baby food including zucchini and peas! She has had a bit of fruit, but usually mixed in with her vegetables. She also gets little bites of what we're eating as well, like bread, pasta, or manderine oranges (she made a face at thosed yesterday, but still ate them, lol, she's great!). We waited until she was 6 months old to start solids for 2 reasons, 1-I was worried about what poopy diapers were going to be like since we use cloth diapers, and 2-The latest research encourages parents to wait until 6 months to begin solids because that is when the child is more developmentally ready, and because it can reduce the risk of childhood obesity by delaying solids just a couple of months. Mostly I didn't want to fight her with food, so I waited until she showed interest in it, then we slowly eased her into solids. She is a great eater! She's never spit anything out. *knock on wood* She is just a fantastic baby! We are so blessed to have her in our lives!! She is also an extremely chatty baby. She's been babbling for months now, but recently has mastered the "ma" and "ba" word segments. So her talking is usually "Mamamammamama mamamamama bababa mamamama". Not super impressive, but I love it! She sometimes gets the "da" segment in. We've heard "dada" a few times, but she definitely says "ma" the most. :) She's also crawling great now! She's been working on crawling for about a month now, but in the last week or so has really made some strides and is picking up both hands and her knees and really getting going. She can move from a sitting to crawling position, sometimes without faceplanting in the carpet. ;) She is very close to going from crawling to sitting, but is not quite there yet...
