My Birthday Girl!

My Cinco de Mayo girl had her 1st Birthday party a couple of days after she turned the big O-N-E. Without rambling on about how much I love her and how she is the most wonderful thing ever, here are my favorite pics of the day!

Love my family!

The birthday girl, who daddy said looked like a rooster! Cutest rooster I ever saw!

Loving her Gigi!

My $20 Craigslist find paired with fun stuff from the day!

First taste of her awesome smash cake! Love it!

The end! How precious is she?

As great as she is and I am so blessed that she is mine, my Father loves her so much more than I ever could. A verse that we have on her wall is 1 John 3:1, "How great is the love the Father has lavished upon us, that we should be called the children of God! And that is what we are!"

A work in progress!

Well, once again it has been MONTHS since I have updated my blog. Genna has turned 9 months, then 10 months, and now 11 months since the last time that I posted. She has been trying to walk for the last couple of months and took off about a month ago. Now she just runs! Life is exciting around our house! Over Spring Break, we started a renovation project. We actually started a few days before thinking that it would only take us the week of Spring Break to complete. We are now on week four and have no end in sight! Actually, we hope to finish it all before Genna's first birthday party...now one month from today. Pray that it happens.

Our original projects included getting new granite countertops in the kitchen, laundry room, and front bath, along with replacing the sinks in each place. It also included taking the 40+ year old tile from the walls (shower and otherwise) in our master bath and replacing them with drywall and new tile in the bath/shower area. We live in a house that was built in the late 60s and it was the thing to put tile halfway up all your walls in the bathrooms. We had a lovely canary yellow in our bath and it was time for it to go!

We started before spring break removing the old countertops in the kitchen, front bath, and laundry room, which meant that we were down to one sink in our bathroom. We also started taking off the tile from our bathroom walls. A day later, we noticed that the carpet in the front hall was wet and discovered that we had a leak somewhere in the wall. We went in under the sink in the front bath and found nothing. We went in through the shower wall in our bath since we were going to take it out anyway and found nothing. We ended up having to take out the toilet and go in behind it in the front bath...which meant taking out tile that we were not planning to touch during the break. I will refer to this as Episode #1. Since we had already taken the toilet in our bath and then the front bath, we are down to one toilet in the half bath. Also at this point, we cannot use our shower/bath anymore since we went in through the wall to check for the leak. So we are down to just a shower in the front bathroom. And since we had a leak and couldn't fix it late at night, we had to turn the water off. Yes, this is my life!

We finally got the leak fixed and turned the water back on, but since we had already taken down one of the tile walls in the front bath, we figured that we would go ahead and try to take out the rest of the tile at some point, except for the shower, because we do have to bathe! We got all of the tile taken down in our bathroom and it was stripped to the studs!

Monday of spring break comes and we get beautiful new granite countertops. The three sinks (gradually) go in during the week with only 16 trips to Lowe's to complete them. Sixteen is the actual number. On Wednesday of that week as my hard-working hubby is trying to put in the new fixtures in our bath, he discovers that our drain pipe for our bath/shower is cracked in the slab. Then somehow it gets broken down in the slab! Let's refer to this as Episode #2. He informs me that if I ever wanted to replace my bathtub, now would be the time to do it. So we make yet another trip to Lowe's searching for a new tub, only to purchase nothing. We ended up hauling our 500 pound cast iron bathtub to the back porch where it still rests. We live in the country, people!! And when I say cast iron, I don't mean pretty claw foot, I mean ugly apron tub! We also had to take off the door frame to get the monster out of the bathroom.

So here we are on Wednesday of spring break and pretty much nothing has gone as planned. We decided that we would do our tile work ourselved instead of paying someone $1000 to do it, but at this point, nothing was ready for tile. Once the granite was in the kitchen, I decided that I wanted to redo my kitchen cabinets. I had glazed them a few years ago, so I redid it in two record breaking days and I LOVE THEM! Finally something accomplished!

I still had to tile the backsplash in the kitchen and laundry room to accomplish. Just about the time that we were going to start that, one of our hot water heaters went out. Episode #3.

Spring break has now come and gone, but the last Sunday before I headed back to work, we started on the tile backsplash in the kitchen. It took us a whole week of working after we got home from our paid jobs and after we got Boo Baby down at night, but we got it finished.

We ended up taking the green tile in teh front bathroom down now so that we could go ahead and drywall everything at the same time. While in the middle of that, we realized that we were going to have to replace some of our floor tiles because there was an inch gap that we could not cover with molding. So when I called to get more tile, it has been discontinued since 2007. We now we have to tear out the tile floor in both baths! Episode #6. We have accomplished that this week!

Also during this, we discovered that the sewer vent pipe that vents from the master bath to the outside was cracked all the way down into the slab! Episode #5. With the help of a friend who is a plumber, we got it fixed last weekend and can close up the wall now.

My parents visited last weekend and before they left on Monday they called me at work to inform me that it was raining there and water was running down my fireplace brick! EPISODE #6!! Really! My husband said that he knew that God would not put more on us than we could handle, but He must obviously think that we can handle A LOT!!

Last night after waiting for the third round of mud to dry on the drywall in the front bath, I was finally able to start to texture the walls. I got three walls done, but still have three to go! We WILL finish that bathroom this weekend if we have to stay up all weekend to finish it!

Now that you have read all of this, you deserve some pictures to prove my point!

Kitchen before (40+ year old formica countertops and backspash, yucky sink, and old cabinet glaze)

Kitchen after

(new granite counter tops, tile backsplash, farmhouse sink, and new glaze on cabinets)

And we did everything, but the granite ourselves!! Hooray!

Laundry room sink before

(again with the 40+ year old formica and yucky sink!)

Laundry Room After

(Granite with farmhouse sink and tile backsplash)

Ignore that bath toys! It is Genna's baby washing sink until we get our bathtub in!

But she LOVES it!!

Front Bathroom Before

(Yucky formica and sink, and I had already pulled the formica backsplash down)

You can see a glimpse of the green tile in on the right side!

Front Bathroom...during!

(not quite finished, but new granite countertop with vessel sink)

You can see the big whole on the right, but that has now be patched and the leak fixed! Woo Hoo!

I will post finished pictures soon!

Master Bath Before

(In all of it's canary yellow tile glory!)

Master Bathroom During!

(Yep, this is how it still looks, four weeks later! Wow!)

4 weeks to deadline! Hopefully we can make it!

And just because she is the most beautiful thing in the world, our Boo Baby! She is the best thing. She has slept through all of our remodeling each night. Even when we hammered tile off walls, climbed over her room in the attic (which I fell through this week! Episode #7), and pulled tile off the floor in the room directly across from her's, she slept! She is one amazing baby! She turned 11 months old this week and her daddy captured this great picture! Just when I think that I cannot love her anymore, I see this and I can! I am blessed to be her mommy!!

New Tricks

Guess what somebody has learned to do...

We don't typically let Genna roam all over the house. She has a big "cage" in the living room that has a lot of her toys in it and most afternoons after work while I am getting dinner ready, she plays in it. But this week, we let her hang out in the kitchen with us and look what she found to get into. Needless to say, mommy bought locks for the cabinet doors this morning!

Things I love right now...

I have fallen in love with so many new things in 2011! I thought that I would share...

1. My sweet Genevieve! I didn't just fall in love with her, but she is always at the top of my list! She has to be the sweetest baby girl ever! She never cries, fusses, and always knows how to make her mommy smile and laugh. Last night, we went out to dinner and we were feeding her things off our plate and finally, I just gave her my plate and let her start feeding herself. She went after it and made her mommy and daddy smile and laugh so much! She also stood up in the buggy at Target when mommy wasn't looking and gave mommy a heart attack! I just love her so much! And she cut four teeth in the same week and didn't fuss! I am one blessed momma!!

2. ZUMBA!! I decided that this year I was going to do something for myself. I needed a night that was mine, but where I could do something fun that was good for me. Zumba is it! I go on Wednesday nights from 5:30-6:30, then stay for abs later...which is painfully worth it (I hope), and am still home in time to put my Sweet G to bed! I am not good at it and my bum will not move quite like the instructor's, but I love it! 3. My iPad, specifically the Kindle, Nook, and iBooks app. I have devoured I cannot tell you how many books in the last couple of weeks. I am addicted and I love it. Makes me wonder how I ever read on paper!! The trouble is that I have a closet full of books, but I find myself wanting to buy the ebooks of those same books instead. I know that I will finish them quicker, but I cannot justify the cost enough to do it! 4. Ebooks!! Just because they deserve their own number! I loved my last two, "Water for Elephants" and "The Help". My super hubby just download thousands more for me over the weekend and I was so excited to add them to my itunes library! Love having access to the library right at my fingertips! Yes, I know I am a nerd!

5. The coolest thing that I have seen in a LONG time. A Book Book by Twelve South! My friend, Lori, who is a wonderful photographer and one of the greatest chicks I know, bought one for her iPad and I just fell in love with it! Had to get one for myself and no kidding, it is AWESOME! I also stole this picture that she took of it! Click on it and check out her blog! She is one happening girl!

6. Weight Watchers! I actually have a love/hate relationship with WW. I'm not going to lie and say that I love them all the time. It is one of those things that I can say, "I love you, but I just don't like you right now!" No matter how much that I dislike WW from time to time, the truth is, it works if you follow it. I started it at the beginning of the year and so far, I am down 12 pounds. Even my hubby, the pickiest eater in the world, is munching on some WW recipes and liking it! And the good thing is, I can still have things that I love, like Buttercup Cupcakes and Whataburger!

7. Budgeting! Now I know that you (if anyone reads this) are thinking that I have lost my mind, but although I would love to have the money not to worry about having to budget, I like the puzzle that my mind goes through when I am thinking about having to budget. When I think about the little things that I can do to save money here or cut money there, it gets me excited. And I have a goal that we are working towards, which gives budgeting a HUGE purpose!8. And because she is just so cute and worth mentioning at least twice! My Genna-Boo!

I took this picture this morning! This was one of the outtakes of her trying to wish her future husband (and my best friend's son) a happy first birthday! Can't resist that smile!

Back again from 2010!

So here I am! Back again to try this blogging thing one more time! Maybe 2011 is my year to keep it going! So far, I am only seven days behind!

2010 was very good to our family, bringing us our little Genna-Boo! She is a gift from God and the most wonderful baby! I can take her anywhere and she is so good! So far all 2011 has brought is a trip to the ER for daddy and her second ear infection! So we are praying that everyone is well soon!

So since the new year is all about resolutions, I have made a few of my own...

1. Keep working towards being healthy! I need to be healthy for my baby girl and she needs to see her parents eating right and make good choices!

2. Work on being content with what I have! Really I am, but it is learning that I do not need all the little stuff when I make a run to Walmart that gets me! I want to purge and simplify! Genna also needs to see her parents making wise financial choices and learn that we cannot have everything that we want!

3. Be a Godly wife! I want to teach myself to respond kindly to my husband and to be nicer to him, especially in front of Genna. We are not mean to each other, I just want her to have a Godly example of what a marriage should be. And I want her to learn what Psalm 19:14 really means, not just towards her mate, but towards everyone and everything that she encounters.

4. To read to Genna more! We typically read at bedtime or when she gets a new book, but she really has hundreds of books and I want her to love to read like her mommy and daddy. She has more of an attention span now, but she also wants to eat the book while we are reading it. I just want her to love to read and get more exposure to it!

That is all of my resolutions...

But no post is complete without new pictures of the sweetest baby girl I know!

Ten Things on Thursday

Here are some random things about this week...

1. I lost a Dillards gift card with about $140 on it and I am sick over it. We have torn apart our cars, house, and anything else that will stand still. It is not life or death, but it just makes me mad at myself. I'm going to try to call Dillards today and see if they can help.

2. We spent a free night at the Gaylord Texan this weekend. Our first trip there was not a good experience for us. When we got there, they were out of king size beds, but then they upgraded us to an executive suite, which was bigger than my first apartment.

3. Genna is moving like crazy. If we put her down in one place, she will scoot or roll her way around to where she wants to go. She is going to be very mobile soon.

4. Hubby has a big race this weekend and we were all planning to attend, but now a 40% chance of rain might keep us home.

5. I have picked out bedding for Genna's room when she is no longer in a crib. Actually, it is her same bedding, but it is just a twin size (and what I wanted to use the Dillards gift card for). I also have plans for daddy to make her a new bed.

6. Genna has been doing great with eating. We have tried rice cereal, applesauce, bananas, carrots, green beans, sweet potatoes, pumpkin, and blueberries. She loves the cereal more than the food, but we are working on that, too.

7. I'm finally getting a Canton weekend next weekend. I'm even taking a day off work to do it. Hope it is great fall weather and Baby G likes her first trip to Canton. Daddy will be hunting.

8. We are doing a four week study on stewardship during Sunday School time at church and I am really excited about it. We made the first one, missed last week, but I am hoping for a DVD, but will hit the next two to finish it out. The first week was great.

9. I have already started Christmas shopping. I have four gifts underway and pretty much know what I am getting the parents and grandparents. I still have four yet to buy, but that will come in time. They may just get gift cards and we will call it a day!

10. Still in a crafting/ creative mood, but still finding it challenging to get things done...wonder why?

Good Eats!

So this week, Genna tried cereal for the first time. We gave her some Saturday night so she would have plenty of time to try it. First I just gave her the spoon and once I held it out, she opened her mouth and knew exactly what to do. We are foodies in our house so she has been paying attention to mommy and daddy. Here is her first bite.

She loved it and would grunt to tell us that she wanted more food. Yummy!

She really did well so we waited a couple of days and tried green beans!

Here is her response to them!

She OBVIOUSLY loves veggies just like daddy. We were hoping that she would get mommy's love for veggies, but looks like she takes after daddy in yet another stage in life. Tonight we are going to try applesauce. If we like that, those green beans are going to disguise their way into her tummy somehow!