Finally, an update!.. and a very long blog post ... or a novel, if you prefer

So I haven't even updated our blog in 6 weeks! Yikes! I seem to be getting worse and worse and blogging instead of better and better like I said I would. What a misfortune. The good news out of all of this though is that there is a reason why I haven't been very good at blogging lately, and that reason is.....(drumroll, please...) I now have some hobbies!! Yea! It's so fun. Okay, so my hobbies are kind of nerdy, but, really, I don't even care. So my first hobby that I've really started to LOVE is sewing. I am definitely not a very good sewer, but thankfully my sister-in-law, Nicole, has been soooooooooooo patient with me. Thanks, Nicole, you're the best! So here's how the sewing hobby began: One day Nicole and I went to Joanne Fabrics to look at patterns that were on sale for like $1 or $2 a piece (which is really a pretty good deal, because usually they are WAY more) Anyway, while I'm looking through this book of patterns I see the CUTEST pattern for a little dress (like Adalynn size dress). So I decide, hey, I'm just going to make Adalynn a dress.. how hard can it be? So I buy the pattern, and then I drag Nicole through the material so I know what kind of material I should get, and then I head off to Wal-Mart to buy a sewing machine. Ta da!! Beautiful, isn't it? haha.. so, anyway, I buy my $80 sewing machine (which is super cheap compared to most sewing machines, but Nicole assured me it would work out so great for a beginner like me..and it does). So I get everything that I need, and a few days later Nicole and I have a "sewing day"...or night.. I can't really remember which. Seriously, I think if I were Nicole I would have been ready to kill me by the end of the day. I had absolutely NO idea what I was doing, so seriously Nicole would tell me one step, I would do it, then I would read the directions, have no idea what they were trying to say, and I'd ask her what I was supposed to do next. She'd tell me and I'd repeat the previous steps where I'd do what she told me, try to understand the directions, not understand them, ask her, and she'd have to explain it to me... on and on... I think you get the picture..
I really only took one picture of my work-in-progress, and it is before I cut out the material. This was by far my least favorite part. After our sewing day had ended, I still was not even close to finishing the dress... I had hardly started it! But I decided, hey, why not just try to figure this out on my own? That worked out...not so well... Pretty much all of my time was taken up by me thinking I understood what I was supposed to do, doing it, and then taking out the stitches because what I did was not what I was supposed to do. Sweet.

Perseverance is the moral to this story! After lots of hard work and about four and a half weeks later, we have the finished product! To tell you the truth, I was really quite relieved that the dress still fit her... haha.. My dad was kind enough to take some pictures of Addy, so here is Adalynn and her dress in all their glory!




Cute huh? She is such a funny baby. Next I must briefly blog about my second hobby, which is................(feel free to do another drumroll, if you would like)....................................couponing!!! That's right, couponING. This is not merely clipping coupons, my friends. This is a sport! An art! Finding and clipping coupons and then finding sales on the items you have clipped coupons for and then combining your savings to make the items 1. FREE!!, 2. Close to free (aka very cheap), or 3. A money-maker (through rebates and different things)! Such a fun deal! Couponing can be slightly time consuming if you're an addict like me.. I'll try and post some of the great deals I've gotten later, but for now I don't really have pictures of everything, so it makes it not as impressive looking. Don't worry though...details are coming!!

Well, I have to say that even though I really do love my fun and perhaps slightly nerdy hobbies, there are a few somethings that I love even more: my hubby and baby! Jackson does so much for our family and I'm super impressed how he's taken on this remodeling project and just gone to town with it. He claims that he's never done most of this stuff before, but he is a natural!! We are pretty much down to the painting stage (yea, finally a light at the end of the tunnel!!)... oh, and we have to finish installing our countertops and extending our floor. Okay, that may sound like kind of a lot, but really it truly isn't. These are very minor projects compared to the huge construction project this has been. AND here's the greatest thing: Even though Jackson's super busy with school and family and remodeling and his nagging wife, he still finds the time to just be so sweet. I am very lucky to have him and I just love him to pieces!! (even when he spends the whole day talking to me in Spanish and I don't have a clue what he's even saying to me...or about me.. haha) Love ya, babe!

Adalynn. I swear she is all I ever talk about.. but I secretly love it!! Okay, I just have to say this outright: She is a super hilarious baby!! (she must take after her mother in that aspect... haha.. okay, lame attempt at a joke) She's so much fun; her personality is really starting to come out. First, the factual info, for anyone interested in hearing: Adalynn has officially cut four teeth, and a few of them were rather nightmarish to get. It was sad. She also is now such a big girl in her forward-facing carseat that her Grandma Fish gave to her. We tried to take a nice happy picture of her in her carseat to send to grandma.. not so much luck. Here's what we got:



She looks super excited, huh? Okay, not really. But like I said before, her personality is really coming through. One thing is for certain: This girl DEFINITELY takes after her mother in her ice-cream loving ways. She had her first ice-cream cone, and at first she didn't really know what to do with it. Then she got a good lick (or bite, really), and WHOA, what goodness was in her mouth! She goes from this...
...to this...
...to this... ...in about five minutes. I'm not even kidding. Needless to say, she got a bath afterward. Adalynn also loves to read the newspaper. I know, genius baby. Actually I'm impressed, because she seems to be so talented that she can even read it upside-down!

I wish I could get a really good picture of it, because I find it so funny and she does it all the time. She usually even gets this way serious look on her face like, hey, mom, this is serious business, this reading the newspaper stuff. I think sometimes she does things just to make me laugh.. or to kind of spite me... Like, I don't know what her deal with shopping carts is, but she LOVES to lean down and just suck on the little metal handle thing. Gross! I make sure that I sanitize every shopping cart before I put her in it, and then I try to hide the metal with blankets and toys and hope that she'll get distracted. Nope. The second I turn my back she pushes the blanket aside and WHAMO! just like that she has her tongue all over that. I will turn to her and say in a firm voice "no, no" like they tell you you're supposed to (who is "they?" well, the experts, I suppose), but then she'll just look up and start to giggle and I then I start to laugh, and really the whole situation just turns into a comedy. Gross, yes, but rather funny.

Seriously, I can't even imagine how boring my life would be if I didn't have a little baby finding her bag of diapers in her crib and all of the diapers stacked so neatly in there and then laughing hysterically as she pulls them out one at a time and chucks them out of her crib when she's supposed to be taking a nap... Then I go in, because she's obviously not sleeping, and find a room filled with random diapers scattered everywhere and one little baby looks right up at me and just thinks she's the funniest baby that's ever lived. I mean, really, does life get any better than that? Not for me, that's for sure.