SMASH CAKE

The weekend before Reece turned ONE we took some pretty great photos of her, and a few of the three girls, at Agritopia.  I thought some place close to home would work out better because I had a feeling she was going to make a gigantic mess with her smash cake.

Here's my fave:

She dived into her cake immediately.  And she loved every bite!
Ava and Adisyn helped out too and once they were done the cake had bits of dirt too.

11 MONTHS

11 months sure have flown by.

This girl has so much personality.  She is different in so many ways than her sisters were.
She is so sweet and loving.  She's a happy baby and also a busy baby.  She loves to get into EVERYTHING! She explores and seems to be in a hurry to grow up.

She now has eight teeth, two of which just barely poked through.

She crawls everywhere even up the stairs.  She stands pretty well on her own too.  It may only be for about 5 seconds or so but everyday she gets more brave and stands longer.  She still does her yoga poses and sometimes crawls with her feet and hands and does what I think is attempt to stand up.  She pulls herself up on anything or anyone she can.

She eats at the table most nights with all of us and usually eats whatever I'm eating as long as its not spicy or hard, obviously.  She enjoys everything I give her except eggs.  She hated them and immediately leaned over her seat to throw them to the floor for Abby.  She doesn't eat pureed baby food anymore.  She only has a bottle when she is going down for bed or nap and first thing in the morning.  For the most part she doesn't want her milk she wants whatever I'm eating.  I now have a little beggar again.  For most of the last month she has woken up once to eat but there have been a few nights that she doesn't wake up until 5 or so.

She yells and baby talks all the time and its the cutest.  She also has a high pitch squeal and loves to growl.  Told you, tons of personality.

She found Abby's food and water and wouldn't leave it alone so it needed to be moved.

She also found her door but hasn't attempted to crawl out yet, surprisingly.

Anytime the fridge is open she rushes over as quick as possible.

She figured out how to open the drawer underneath the stove.

We had to lower her crib too.

 Perfect height for something to chew on just like Ava.

She LOVES walks.  Sometimes I don't strap her in if we're running late.  Then she ends up like this.

I now have to make sure she has a clothes on for nap time after discovering this...
So glad I didn't find poop everywhere.

Trying to find a place to mount her camera has been difficult because everywhere I put it or hang it she knocks it down.  She's such a busy baby!!!!!

Happy 11 months my angel!

ADVENTURES WITH ???

For the past few years Shawn and I have been doing some thinking about our future, the near future and further.  We've contemplated whether we should move into a bigger home, buy a second home, or buy a camper that we can travel many places in.  Each have their own pros and cons so it was a tough decision.  Ultimately we chose to buy a camper.  The minimalist lifestyle intrigues me and I have thought about down sizing even more.  Less stuff, less mess, more memories, and hopefully teach our kids that material things don't mean as much as they think they do.

Once we decided for sure a camper purchase was what we wanted for our family the search was on.  We've both researched in the past but never this seriously.  It took a week to find her (no name yet) after stalking Craigslist and the frustration of many we liked that were already sold.  Shawn didn't want a trailer longer than 24 ft so that limited the options but did help with our budget.  We also decided it would be nice to have a private space for Shawn and I.  We didn't think a "bedroom" would be possible with our budget and the size of the trailer we were interested in but we lucked out big time!

She's a 2000 Sunny Brook.

She is in excellent condition.  We were pleasantly surprised how well she's been cared for. Everything works which was a huge relief.  Well, at least we haven't found any issues thus far.
We knew that the aesthetics were not our taste and regardless of what we bought it would need some sprucing up.  Even new trailers are just gross.  I don't know what these manufactures/designers are thinking.  Brown wood everything is not an updated look!

Here's some before pics.

We told ourselves that we were going to slowly update but that didn't happen.  The next day destruction had begun.
As you walk in directly to the right was a dinette.  The previous owner had removed one of the booths and in its place was a swivel chair.  Above the dinette area were cabinets, a shelf, and built in stereo.


I wanted a much more open feel so the cabinets and the dinette were removed.  Shawn was hesitant but I was not backing down, it had to be done.  After some frustration and doubt it was all removed with only minor patch work that needed to be done.  It looked so much better immediately.
Here's the first pile of trash.

We removed all of the flooring including the blue carpet.  Was this really built in 2000?  How in the world was blue carpet still popular in 2000?  It did look like there was linoleum flooring throughout but a past owner replaced it with carpet for the exception of the bathroom.

Then it was onto primer.  I'm sure some thought we were crazy for painting the entire camper but I envisioned white.  After some research we found a great primer.  I'm all about prime and paint in one but because the faux wood isn't really meant to be pained over we didn't want to take any chances and went with a primer from Home Depot called Gripper.  I get where the name comes from, the final paint color gripped to the primer well and made it so much easier.

See how much more open it looks.  Love!
We decided to go with a darker cabinet on the bottom to have a greater contrast.  I just love how it turned out so far.

We're currently working on painting the cabinets.  I'm so over painting!!!!!!

Just when we thought the stress of all the changes recently were going to improve they didn't.  As luck would have it our truck took a major dump on us.  We knew that it had a ton of miles but it was paid off so we were milking the no payment idea.  Shawn started to notice some major issues and took it in to have it looked at.  Turns out it needed a lot of work that was going to cost at least 4k.  Not to mention the almost 2k we put into it last year.  The costs of repairs were not adding up to the value so we needed to upgrade.  Not only is it nice to have a safe reliable vehicle to travel with our family but a truck is our livelihood right now.  It was a no brain-er.

2013 F150 and she's a beauty!

10 MONTHS

10 Months Old!!!  Can't believe I've already started planning this little ones first birthday.
Oh she makes us smile and laugh so much.  Her personality shines bright!

She's still into everything and is now crawling (not army crawling).  It took her a while and Shawn was convinced she was going to stand before she crawled.  She has perfected her yoga positions and does what looks like she's trying to stand and then she goes to her bottom.  Most recently she's learned to peek her head through to see her feet upside down.  Soooo cute!!!!

She also loves to pull herself up on just about anything.  She will just stand there, but not for long before she falls to her butt.

Another new thing is her laugh and smile.  She now loves to tilt her head back like the picture below. It is pretty much the cutest thing ever and is so contagious.

She still has 6 teeth.  Eating has been pretty much the same except even more solids.  She has decided almost the entire last month that she can't sleep through the night without eating.  She wakes up about midnight and then again about 4 a.m.  I've contemplated letting her cry it out, even though she doesn't cry more like whine loudly, but I just can't let her whine for more than 10 minutes.  Sometimes she will fall back asleep, but most of the time I have to get up with her.  We try not to take her out of her crib at all so she is asleep again in no time.  Nearly every morning I walk into her room and she's sitting up in her crib.  I suspect it will be sooner than later before we have to lower her crib as she's pulling herself up already and is quite the dare devil.  I wouldn't be surprised if she tried to get herself out.  I've also had to start disciplining already, she bites hard.  Nap times have been very easy and bedtime is uneventful as well.  Although, she has been staying up later.

She loves watching baby development shows and any cartoon her sisters happen to be watching. She's much more attentive than her sisters were.

Every chance she gets she's looking for her sisters.  It's safe to say she's obsessed.

She also says da-da-da-da just about all day long.  Shawn is convinced that's her first word and I could agree, but I don't think she actually says it to Shawn.  She says it more when she's playing with her toys or swinging her arms around.  It's cute though.

Another video for documentation.



And more pictures because I just can't help myself.