Holland's Sixth Month in Instagrams

Holland's Sixth Month consisted:

Chewing on binkies as toys but still refusing to actually use one or take a bottle.

Showing me her toys.

 Watching Dad play the piano. Much more interesting than watching herself in the mirror apparently!

Cuddling with Dad. 

Making funny faces at me!

Chewing on an apple--her favorite food and pretty much the only food she eats!

A ride in the laundry basket with cousin Madison!

The cutest naked babe!

She loves to play cousin Madison's piano and makes the funniest faces while doing it!

 Looking so grown up!

 Move in day! I found Holland's mobile from my sister-in-law and Holland LOVES it!

Playing on the floor while I try to organize her new room!

Holland started taking baths again instead of showers with me.

Wearing hats while playing is the best!

A toy set from Mimo for Holland's half birthday!

Matching!

My birthday!

You can never have too many bows! ;]

Valentine's Day 

Seven Months.

Dear Holland,

Every new thing you have started to do this past month just makes me realize how fast you are growing. I wish time would slow down but I also love watching you learn and getting to see more and more about your personality. Is there a balance that can be found?! I'm not sure if there is! Your dad and I are just having more and more fun with you as you get older. Now that you're crawling you like to follow me around the house and try to stand up while holding onto my legs whenever I am doing the dishes or putting on my makeup. It's pretty dang cute. Everything about you can be described as pretty dang cute.

Here are some of the things your dad and I have noticed about you this month:
-You are sleeping a little bit better. We have successfully moved your bedtime from sometime between 12am and 2am to sometime between 8:30 pm and 12:00 am. You are just not at all consistent with your bedtime which I kind of don't think is going to change. Your naps during the day are pretty normal and I've been getting you up at the same time every day but you just don't like to have a set in stone bedtime. But hey, for the most part you are sleeping through the night so I can't complain!
-You talk to yourself a lot {this isn't new necessarily but you do it a lot more now}
-You are wearing size 3 diapers because you started having blowouts every single time with size 2s.
-You got your first tooth! We didn't even notice you were teething!
-You always want to be in Mom's arms. If you see me you reach for me, cry for me, etc.
-You enjoy listening to Mom and Dad read you books and really enjoy watching our mouths as we read and talk to you.
-You do NOT like any pureed baby food. You like to chew on anything Mom and Dad are eating but if we stick any mushy baby food in your mouth you spit it right back out.
-You clench your jaw when you smile and it looks hilarious!
-You started crawling the Sunday before your 7 month birthday. It was seriously out of nowhere! You had reached for things before but you had never really tried to actually move anywhere. But then one Sunday you made your way across the room to your Aunt Tyne. You really do love her! :] Your crawl is pretty funny though. You only use one leg and it looks like your limping a little bit. It cracks your dad and I up!
-You also learned how to clap on your 7 month birthday! It is just about the cutest thing ever! You clap for yourself when you knock over blocks or crawl somewhere or Mom and Dad say "yay" about something you've done. It's so funny and cute!

I just can't believe you are in the second half of your first year! Time is flying by and it is crazy to think how much more you are going to be learning in the next few months! Your dad and I love finding new ways to make you smile and laugh and those moments where the two of us sit doing absolutely ridiculous things to make you laugh will always be some of my most treasured memories. We love you!

Love, Mom & Dad

One Month.

Two Months.

Three Months.

Four Months.

Five Months.

Six Months.

 Seven Months!

More pictures coming soon from Instagram! {For six months as well since I haven't done that post just yet!}

Special Moments

Holland is not a cuddler, but other day she just laid her sweet little head down on my shoulder and snuggled there for a few minutes. I really wanted a picture of it or for Race to come in and see how sweet she was being but I knew that if I moved or made noise it would break the spell. And who knows when I'll get cuddles from her again! So I just sat there and absolutely enjoyed those precious moments with my sweet baby girl.

I love to take pictures and document all of the exciting things in Holland's life but I learned right then that sometimes it is okay {and not just okay, but good} to just enjoy being in the moment. To take in the wonderfulness that is being a mother and having a little one who wants to be close to you and loves you with all of their heart. I loved that time with Holland and I hope that I don't ever forget to stop recording and taking pictures and documenting for a while so I can just ENJOY her. 

And since I didn't get and adorable picture of her cuddling with me

 here's a picture of Holland cuddling with Race because

 that is something I can take pictures of without missing much!

P.S. As you have seen from my Smashbook posts I do think it's super important to document your life and your childrens' lives, I just learned through this experience that you also need to be in the moment and not be so consumed with always getting the perfect picture. I'm just working on learning the balance! :] 

Smashbook Supplies

If that last vlog wasn't awkward enough for you then here is another vlog just showing you the supplies that I use to make my Smashbook! I hope you enjoy! I embarrassingly recorded this a few times because they were all too long so my voice is tired now! Haha. I'm going to go cuddle with my sweet babe since she's waking up from her nap and give my voice a little break! Have a Happy Wednesday everyone!

P.S. Holland might have come in post nap to say a quick hello at the end of the video!

Race's Birthday!

I love birthdays! Race's was this last Sunday {St. Patrick's Day} and we had a fun little celebration with friends and family. I also got to surprise Race with the gift that he had been telling me he wanted for the past oh, four months! He brought it up about a billion times the week before his birthday and I had him convinced that I had decided it wasn't worth the money so I just got him other stuff for his birthday! I had actually ordered the present {a fancy leather jacket} online but I didn't think it would make it here in time for his birthday. So I wrapped a shirt from Target in a box with a picture of the leather jacket underneath the shirt and a note that I had ordered it BEFORE he started bringing it up this week to say he wanted it. After I had wrapped the shirt the jacket actually got here in time for his birthday so I got to wrap it as well! I made sure to have him open the shirt from Target first. His first surprise was that I had already ordered the jacket! He was talking about how cool the jacket was and telling everyone why it was such an exciting gift and then I had him open the jacket and he was super surprised! Aaand I got a video of it. Maybe it's not cool to anyone other than me but here it is anyway!



Happy Happy Birthday to my favorite person in the world! I'm glad I could make your dreams come true! You are the best husband and father and I am so grateful for all that you do! I love you Race Husbandface!

Holland's Smashbook

I got Holland a baby book and have been filling it out. It's super cute with a giraffe on the front and I fell in love with it when I first found it. The one problem I have with it is it's a little too structured for my liking and doesn't have enough space for the billions of pictures I take of Holland. So I got a Smashbook. You should watch this YouTube video to get an idea of what it is {and then you should go and buy one for yourself or your baby because they are just so much fun}. I have been working on Holland's for a couple of weeks now {and I went and bought one for myself} and I love it! To me it is easier, more laid back, cheaper, and more fun than scrapbooking. When I have scrapbooked in the past I have always wanted everything to look just PERFECT. With these Smashbooks I don't really care if things look perfect {is that bad?}. And if something doesn't turn out quite how I wanted it I just cover it up with something new. Smashbooks seem to be all about finding beauty in everyday life and making sure you grab ahold of and remember the little things whether or not they are "perfect".

So you should all join in on the fun! I posted my pages on Facebook and Instagram and was surprised that not very many people knew about Smashbooks so I just wanted to share the goodness of smashing with all of you! If you post some of your Smashbook pages you should send me a link! I would love to see what you are doing with your books!

First off, I made my first vlog that shows all of the pages in "real life" and you get to meet Holland if you can make it to the end {or just skip over all of my awkwardness and see her in real life}! This is my first blog and I really shouldn't have watched it through before uploading it. It made me so much more self conscious about putting it out there for the world to see! Oh well though! Here goes nothing! And if you don't want to watch my long winded video about Holland's Smashbook you can just look at the pictures below!

Here are some of the pages I have done in Holland's book so far:

This is the front cover and first page. 

I have some cards from her baby shower taped into the front cover 

and then a little intro. page. 

A "Before You Were Born" page

Belly pics, pics of Race and I, gender "reveal" chalkboard, 

"Nesting" pics, Swollen hands/leg.

Baby shower page with cards in the envelope.

The day she was born page. {She was so little!}

Months 1-4 with notes underneath about each month. 

Months 5 & 6 with the notes underneath as well. 

Feed me page. Some funny eating faces. 

Sleeping page. You can literally never have too many pictures of an adorable sleeping baby! 

Halloween/Fall page! 

{You can also never have too many Halloween costumes for you baby!}

A "Get to Know Mom & Dad" page. 

Wedding announcement and 

ten things about mom and dad written on some yellow legal pad.

Valentine's Day page!

As you can see, I just use a lot of wash tape and jot down little notes to Holland about random things. It's super easy and lots of fun. I got most of my washi tape at Target {in the office supplies section} and then I got my Smashbook and some cute supplies at JoAnns when it was 50% off last week. Score! I even ended up going back twice to grab some more things while they were on sale! I love smashing!

***This is NOT a sponsored post. I just love my Smashbook! 

{Although if anyone from the Smashbook company wants to sponsor it 

by sending me some more cute supplies I'd be totally fine with that! ;)}***

This Week I'm Loving

I have been sick for the past few days and Holland has not been sleeping great {she's teething and I'm guessing she's probably a little sick with me} so I just thought I would take some time to recognize some of my blessings from this week in order to try and not be quite so grumpy! 

• The beautiful weather 
• Cute outfits on cute babies {I'm referring to my sweet Holland girl of course!}
• Race and all that he does for me and Holland
• Holland's smiles and laughs 
• Dry shampoo 
• Water 
• Yummy & easy to make food. 
• Birthdays {Race's birthday is on Sunday and I'm so excited!!} 
• Getting packages 
• Extra cuddles with my teething babe
• A clean and {mostly} organized house 
• Soft tissues 
• A comfy couch and bed 
• Warm blankets
• Entertaining movies and books {I just read Water for Elephants and then watched the movie--the book is better of course--and then we watched Life of Pi for Pi day and Race just read Warm Bodies which I think he liked better than the movie--which we both loved--so that is next on my list to read!} 
• Long naps 
• TV shows to entertain me {I've been rewatching Psych on Netflix and watching Catfish: The TV Show on Hulu} 
• Makeup {to help me not look quite as dead as I feel} 
• Texts from/Chats on the phone with/Skype with my family. I talk to my sister and my mom all the time but this week one of my brothers called me just because and another one texted me just because. It has been a good week! :] 
• The night Holland went to bed at 9pm and slept til 7:30 am except for one feeding at 11 pm {This is the kind of night I could get used to! Too bad it only happens once every couple of weeks!} 
• Working on my Smashbook and Holland's baby Smashbook 

It is so nice to sit down and think about all the good things that have happened this week. Despite feeling sick it really has been an enjoyable week! 

And here are a couple of pictures from Holland and my little adventure outside today! 

{I love this girl in overalls! Also, can you see her tiny wispy hairs?}