Easter 2009

Jedd and I spent the early part of Easter doing some not-so-fun things. I had to finish up a grad school project that's due today and Jedd unexpectedly went into work after they had some trouble the day before.

I got Audrey all dressed up and she was such a good girl. As I was getting ready to go, I noticed Audrey's favorite part of her Easter dress was that she could flip it over her head to chew on it. Awesome.

We ate dinner at my parents house and Jedd's mom and my sister both joined us. We forewent the traditional ham and had steaks instead. They were amazing!!! Since I worked the day before and Grandma Gardner watched Audrey, she had already gotten her gift from her--- a white mini rocking chair to put on our front porch with our rocking chairs!! It's adorable and Audrey just loves sitting in it!

Audrey also got an Easter basket from Grandma & Grandpa Howard. Actually, it wasn't a basket at all--- it was a Vera Bradley purse! It's from their new collection and the purse is actually called "Audrey". She loved it!!!

We had a great day with our families and Audrey really seemed to enjoy her 1st Easter!!
Here are some pictures:

Audrey's new rocking chair from Grandma & Grandpa Gardner!

Her new Vera Bradley "Audrey" purse

Her goodies from Grandma & Grandpa Howard

My happy girl

Showing off her pretty Easter dress

She was so happy all day!

Audrey and Mommy

Had to get her the headband!!!

Hope everyone had as much of an enjoyable Easter as we did!!!

RIP Harry Kalas

Sadly, the Phils announcer, and the voice of the team, passed away today in the pressbox.


The Phils games will never be the same.
RIP Harry.

1st day= SUCCESS!!

So, as I blogged about before, I'm starting a new job for some extra "fun" money! Today was my 1st day actually working--- although I am DEFINITELY still learning! I am getting paid $7.50/hour and then anything I make in tips is mine to keep and I don't have to claim. Most customers come in for a drink or two, or to golf, or to gamble. Well, since the rain was still coming down this morning I didn't have a huge golf crowd. But there were definitely gamblers!!! I paid out $640 alone in ticket money!!!!

The nice thing about people that gamble (or at least the one's that come into the Legion) is that they tip their bartender WELL after winning. That definitely helped my tips!!! Most money on Saturdays will come from the golf crowd, but clearly that wasn't happening today. I ended up leaving work with $75 in tips. YAAAAAAAAAAY!!! So, figure that on top of $7.50 hourly wage--- I definitely cleared $100 easily on my first day. Not a bad first day at all!!!

I needed a day like this to talk me into doing this. I already made a list of things I'm going to do with my new "fun" money... but it wasn't easy getting up this morning to go in!!! I'm hoping I continue to enjoy it just as much every weekend.

Now I'm just waiting to snuggle my little peanut when she gets home from Grandma Gardner's house!!!!

Let the 5 day weekend begin!!!

I'm so excited to spend the next 5 days with this beautiful face:

Sleep and a New Job!

So tonight Jedd has his big sleep study. I've been trying to convince him to go for quite some time because I've been worried about his breathing at night. Awhile back he even woke up me up once because I heard him gasping for air! Hopefully after tonight we'll have some answers!

Tonight I started training for my new bartending job. I'm doing it to earn a little extra money and since I don't teach during the summers, it gives me something to do a few days a week! I was only there for about 2 hours and I earned $6 in tips. Ok, so that doesn't seem like much at all--- but there was only a couple drinking (no food), a man drinking (no food), and a man drinking (with food). So for 2 hours, I was pleased! To start, I'll only be working on Saturdays from 7:30am until 4pm. Jedd is pretty upset since it will damper weekend plans, but it seems relatively easy to get a day off if I need it.

Nothing else really new with us. I have 3 more grad school classes left for this semester! Thank goodness!!! Tomorrow is also my last day of work this week. We have a nice, long 5 day break starting then! Just gotta get through tomorrow and then I get a long break with my baby girl!

Some updates!

So this week has been one of the craziest weeks. On Monday morning, on my way to work, I got a call saying that one of my former students had passed away on Friday. I was devastated. I taught life skills for 2 years, and yes, I fully understood that our students walked a thin line with their health, but it's still one of those things you NEVER want to hear. 13 years old. It's still hard to believe. Especially since I saw her in the hallway on Friday and we had a nice little chat. I'm very thankful for that chat and I'll hold onto that forever.

I got a new (part-time) job!! I'm going to bartend 1-2 nights throughout the week (I'm hoping only 1) and then on the weekends to make some extra money. My paychecks took a HUGE hit by taking off on maternity leave, so I'm happy to make up some of that. Also, I have taught every summer for the IU and since I have grad school now, I'm unable to do that. So this is a perfect way to not waste away all summer! I'm also looking forward to putting away some money to help Jedd finish our basement. The poor guy wants his man cave sooooo desperately!

Audrey is still growing! I swear she gets longer every day! She's still a little congested so we tried putting a pillow underneath the one side of her crib to help her breath better at night. It's been working great!! She's still babbling away and drooling like CRAZY! Her gums are starting to feel like little bones so we're thinking the teeth are on their way! I'm just hoping she handles it pretty well. For now, she's been great--- just chewing and biting on things a lot! She reaches for EVERYTHING now too. So, if something is in her way, she'll grab it. Time to start being careful what's around her!


She is also getting MUCH better with tummy time! I think now that she's strong enough to lift her head for a substantial amount of time, it really interests her. I'm sad to say I think our bouncer has lost it's "appeal factor" for her though. She really wants nothing to do with it. The swing seems to be her favorite thing again and she's getting too big for it! I'm hoping she starts liking the jumperoo soon! It's sitting in our computer room VERY unused.


I am going to be heading down to Ocean City, MD for 2 weekends in a row! I'm going with my family on Thursday evening until Saturday evening (Jedd is staying home) and then we are leaving the next Thursday (the 3 of us and even Charley too) to go down again until Sunday! I'm really looking forward to taking Audrey to the beach for the 1st time and going shopping at the outlets!!!

Hope everyone is having a good week!!! I know how much I'm looking forward to the weekend!

Wordless Wednesday

Well, almost "wordless"....



Miss Audrey babbling away.....

23 weeks old!

I can hardly believe it! It's been 23 weeks (or 161 days) since I met my precious baby girl. 23 is one of my favorite numbers (probably because we were married on June 23). Since I've been slacking with the updates, I'll put extra pictures in of peanut today! She is growing like a weed. This past week she's been really trying to babble too. Her voice octave is much higher and she's really babbling away. Mostly it comes out sound like "dadadaddadada" or "bababababa" but she just goes on and on. Of course we're still going through all of the drooling and chewing too. No teeth yet, but I know they aren't far off!

My all-time favorite thing about Audrey is when you catch her staring at you and you glance over at her and a smile just lights up her face! She's so amazing!

So, here she is. My ENTIRE world:

Audrey's 1st St. Patrick's Day:

Drooling everywhere and chewing on everything!

The new talent:

Our happy baby girl:

Blogging Award!

I just got my 1st blog award from one of my blogging friends, Lea Liz. Check out her awesome blog (and incredibly adorable son, Brody): http://rolandbaby.blogspot.com/


I'm passing this award on to:

Jess: http://jessicalynnmiller.blogspot.com/
Amber: http://outofdifficultiesgrowsmiracles.blogspot.com/


Thanks again, Lea Liz!!!

5 Months Old!

Miss Audrey turned 5 months old today. Part of me thinks it has flown by while the other part thinks she's been part of my life for much longer. Either way, my life has changed and I have become a better person because of her. Everything in life suddenly makes sense.

What a miracle a tiny life is!

We tried taking her 5 month pictures and I'm sad to say, I think we may be done with these. The one posted above is the ONLY decent one we got out of probably 50 pictures! Audrey is now 100% fascinated by paper. She grabbed the sign, pulled at it, crumbled it, etc. It was hilarious to watch and we got some great pictures of her grabbing it, but none that are really great for her "5 month picture." We'll try again next month and see what happens...

Here she is:



Look at this innocent face....