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Sunday, January 30, 2011

Barbie the Barber?

Well, I might not be taking quitting my day job to take on my new persona, "Barbie the Barber", but I must say, I'm happy how my first-time as a barber worked out.


In the spirit of saving money, reducing debt, and only buying the basics (that's quickly taking on the theme-of-the-year...or the next five years), one way to save a small amount each month is for me to give E. J. a haircut.


Honestly, the thought of me cutting E. J.'s hair was nothing less than nauseating. Soon after we woke up (you can see from E. J.'s bedhead in was early morning) neither of us wanted to eat breakfast just so we could get it over with.
He was equally nervous. (Rightfully so...since he was the one who had to live with the results)

User-friendly razor set we purchased with part of a Target gift card. Color coded guards included (phew!)

The aftermath (we plan on doing this on the front porch in the future,
but today's weather was yucky)

Ta-da! Finished product! Turns out, I did a pretty decent job. (I had visions of giving E. J. the unfortunate "mushroom" look or bald patches)
Showing off the new hairdo during some after-dinner calisthenics


All-in-all, my first time as a hairdresser ended pretty well - E. J. doesn't look like a freak show. So, success!


In Kathryn news...
Waking up from a late morning nap!

It looks like the blackberries for dessert today were a success.

Mobility = Trouble

Saturday, January 29, 2011

A day of new experiences

Today was a big day for Kathryn. She retired her original car seat now that she's getting too long for it and the straps are stretched out to the max.
Here she is a couple of weeks ago in her now retired car seat
With a new car seat comes some new experiences. Now that she's in the larger one, that also means that we can't carry her into places while still in the car seat (which was also getting crazy heavy to carry around lately!).

My car needed some things done to it, so we dropped it off and ran some errands in E. J.'s truck. First we stopped for some lunch and Kathryn tried out her first high chair in a restaurant.
What a pro
Then, it was off to Target. First time flying solo in a shopping cart.
Then, my favorite part! E. J. and Kathryn dropped me off at the day spa and I cashed in my Christmas gift from K - an hour massage! A-M-A-Z-I-N-G! How can I arrange that to happen every week? The lotto, perhaps? Just did...I spent the only dollar I had in my wallet today on a lotto ticket and found out I was issued the wrong one because I didn't get a winner.

Back to reality.

After picking up my car, we had to drop off E. J.'s truck at the dealership because he discovered a leak in the backseat when he was installing K's new car seat this morning. Great, more money...

So that required a car seat-install change to my car for the ride home (once we have both cars back, they'll each have their own, permanent car seat).

All this running around really wore someone out. So much so that she removed her socks and got herself into a really uncomfortable sleeping position.
After taking a bath and eating dinner, it was time for trouble...
Hope you had a great Saturday that was much less expensive. Arrrrggggg!!!

Thursday, January 27, 2011

The sippy cup...

We decided last night to give the ole' sippy cup a try. Although it wasn't completely successful, I was impressed that Kathryn knew what to do with it right away.
She went right for the handles

Brought it up to her mouth

And then decided it was time to play. Take this, mom.




Little miss innocent :)

Such a smarty pants. She will purposely look at us, hang the cup to the side of her high-chair as if she's about to drop it, and make a sad little face to try to push the limit and drop it.
The face

K is still working on the sippy cup technique. Although she puts the cup right up to her mouth, she still hasn't gasped tilting her head back a bit, but she's almost there!

Monday, January 24, 2011

The Baby Mullet

Our sweet little girl has a bad case of the baby mullet. (Sssshhh, don't tell E. J. I said that. He's got to admit it deep down, but he hates when I mention that his pretty little girl has a mullet hehe)!! But if anyone can pull off a mullet, it's her. Sure, we live in a small rural town, but she's taking the small-town look stereotype to a whole new level.

Really though, it's long enough that she can have a little pony tail! I don't have plans to cut her hair anytime soon (I think most people wait until the baby reaches a year old) but I'm curious to see how this mullet manifests...
It's all party in the back...
...and more party from the side
And of course, serious business in the front

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Hanging around

Today was a blah day - chilly and gloomy outside, so we just hung around the house. Kathryn stayed warm today in her super cute leg warmers as she scooted all over the house. (Wow, things are suddenly much different now that she's mobile!)
Had to add mismatching socks to keep those tootsies warm
One of her favorite funny faces
And now it's Sunday night again. Boo. Time for me to start catching up on the pile of magazines I haven't had time to read!

Thursday, January 20, 2011

Country Livin'

Since E. J.'s mom watches Kathryn during the day, he normally does an easy "chore" for her each week that saves her time and an extra trip into town...picking up feed for the horses. As I mentioned in my last post, his mom and step-dad have over 30 horses, so yeah, that's a lot of food.

E. J. will usually go to the "feed store" also know as the "co-op" after work, however, last week we had a unique vehicle situation. E. J. was able to bring a patrol car home from work because he had a conference to attend. Although the conference was only about 50 min from our house, it was in the opposite direction his work, which allowed him to take home a car.

So at the end of last week, I took his truck to work so that I could pick up the weekly feed order after work. Although the truck is 100x bigger than my car, I have fun driving it since you're so high off the ground. I feel "in charge".

Of course, I had to document my trip to the feed store. Sure, I've been there over a dozen or so times, but this time I was alone and was determined to act like a natural. Of course, a local would never think to document their trip to the feed store because it's old hat, but this New England girl was definitely out of her element.

I pulled up to the feed store and looked the part in my Dodge Ram 1500. The Burberry jacket may have thrown off the "look".

You can tell Friday is payday for the farmers because it's a crowded place. You could get lost in a sea of trucks and trailers.

Here's what I call the "Feed Menu Wall"
I confidently walked up to the counter and looked down at the text E. J. sent me with the items I had to order: 14 crimped oats, 8 14% sweet textured, 8 12% sweet textured, 1 sack of stall dry, 1 hen scratch, 1 game bird started, 1 sack lay pellets.
Of course, I had no idea what any of this stuff means, but I'd like to think that the girl behind the counter thought I knew what I was talking about. I, like most people, don't want to look like I don't know what I'm talking about. I fooled her.
Can you see the bottom...yup, that's 950 lb of food to last one week!

Cute (and very polite) cowboys load the feed for you. It's actually really easy to do this errand. I didn't have to lift a finger or even pull out my wallet because we just bill it to E. J.'s parents account. Maybe I misspoke. It's an easy task for me. When I pulled in the driveway, I'm not the one who has to bring the feed to the barn and unload it all...that's what the husband is for. I may not be a born-n-bred southern girl, but I played the part for about 15 min.

And I threw this one in for fun :) K all bundled up to brave a chilly morning!

Happy Friday!

Sunday, January 16, 2011

An unexpected pregnancy...

Oh vey! No no, it's not me...one of our horses had a baby. Eh...

A little back story. A couple of years ago, E.J. adopted a mustang horse, something he had always wanted to do. So, we he went for it and adopted "Barney" (I got a free t-shirt out of the deal, which has proven to be the least trouble of all).

His mom also ended up adopting a horse too, "Farrah", although Farrah ended up at our place since she has a little over 30 (yes, 30!) horses.

E. J. had to be at work early Saturday morning. As he left the house around 5:30 a.m. to do his usually morning routine (feed the horses) he shined his flashlight and noticed a baby horse (a foal)! Needless to say, it was more of a shocking than happy moment...not something either of us were expecting. E. J. told me Saturday that about a month ago he noticed Farrah was a looking heavier...but he wanted to be in denial and hoped she was just getting fatter.

Farrah, the mother, isn't the friendliest of horses. She runs from E. J. every time he has ever tried to work with her. So naturally, she isn't the easiest horse to work with now that she has a baby. In an attempt to make the baby a friendlier horse, E. J. has been going out twice a day to "capture" the baby in hopes she'll be friendly than her mom and trust people.

I give E. J. a lot of credit because it's certainly no easy task when you have crazy Farrah trying to protect her baby and Barney chasing E. J. around because he thinks they are playing.

Here's what I've captured of the first "capture"
Gotcha!
It's a little girl!
Kathryn enjoyed watching it all unfold while hanging in her Ergo Baby :)

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

little bath, BIG BATH!

Last night we retired K's little bath that she's been in since about 2 weeks old. Now that she's more active and loves to splash around, along with her getting too long for the tub, it was time.
Here she is last night in her last little tub run (with her ducky - she doesn't let this thing go the entire time she's in there. She gets her love of ducks from her daddy!)
And tonight in her big bath!
"Check out all this space!"

As you can see, most of these photos have too much flash. I recently got a new camera and I'm still learning the settings. Someday I'll be a pro ;).

Monday, January 10, 2011

We have a crawler!

Miss Kathryn has hit a BIG new milestone...crawling!! We saw her crawl for the first time this past Friday night, but when I went to record it, the battery in my Flip camera went out as soon as she started doing it. Oh well! So last night after she took a bath and ate her din din we went in her room and she demonstrated her new skills!

She's still working on the mechanics to perfect it, but we think she's a little star :).

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Kathryn's baptism

Kathryn was baptized today! It was a special day for quite a few reasons.

We didn't know that we would be able to have Kathryn baptized at today's mass until the beginning of last week, so it was a bit last-minute. Our good friends, Paul and Margie, are Kathryn's Godparents. Because Paul is in the Navy and will be deployed soon, we were able to expedite the paperwork and found out about the approval just days before.

Paul and Margie made the almost 8-hour trip from Mississippi for a less than 24-hour trip. Needless to say, we're very lucky to have friends that would come that far and Kathryn is lucky to have such great Godparents.

After dinner last night we sat around and talked until after midnight. It was fun catching up and sharing funny stories. Around 9 p.m. Kathryn woke up because she probably felt like she was missing out on all the fun :), which actually worked out nicely because she got to open gifts from Margie and Paul.
Love this beautiful charm James Avery bracelet!
Cute new outfit and fun talking bear!
Shortly after Kathryn was born, my mom sent down the baptismal gown that has been in our family for almost 70 years. My dad and all his sisters wore it to their baptisms, as well as my cousins, and my brother and myself. It was really special that K was able to wear the gown as well.
(These were taken post-baptism, hence the greasy hair from the anointing oil)
Because there were two other baptisms along with Kathryn's, mass was about an hour and 20 minutes a.k.a. a long time for a infant to sit in her parents lap :). But, I must say, she was really well behaved! She didn't cry at all, just wanted to talk, sing along, and clap. One of the other baby's who was being baptized sat behind us and there was a little while when she doing some serious crying. I felt bad for the parents, but I must say, I'm so glad it wasn't K doing that crying. I think Kathryn was trying to "talk" to her and telling the baby to calm down because she was looking at her over my shoulder and trying to "talk" over her :).

There was a lady who came up to us after the service to tell us how well-behaved K was and how cute she is. She makes her parent's proud!

The baptism bib and candle. A lady at our church makes one of each baby who's baptized and they put it on her during the ceremony.
Officially baptized!
Kathryn with Uncle Paul and Aunt Margie
I look tired...
A big thanks to Margie and Paul for making the long less-than-day trip to Texas and being such great Godparents to our sweet little girl!