A Bowling Ball Belly

I was honored to be the one to host Gini's baby shower!  It was a labor of love.  When I say labor I mean it was a ton of work, and by love I mean it was so much fun putting it together and was totally worth it.  

Gini loves books, so I thought a library themed shower would be perfect.  I didn't receive many books before Grace was born, and I went crazy buying books for her because I was dying of boredom reading the same dozen over and over to her.  This should not happen to a book lover such as Gini!  I stole a lot of my ideas from Martha Stewart, including this invitation template.  It was originally in pinks and purples, but I photoshopped bright colors more conducive to baby boys and more importantly Gini's aesthetic.  I attached blue ribbon to the bookmarks and wrote the invitee's name on them.    

I made these book garlands that I also saw on the Martha Stewart website.  I sacrificed book pages from one of Jason's old fantasy novels.  I hot glued silk flowers, ribbons and paper stars to the string and attached the books with multicolored miniature clothespins.  

I also did a nursery rhyme theme for the food and games.  These were called Goldilocks and the three tea sandwiches.  They are moon shaped with paper star toothpicks.  

We also ate Humpty Dumpty deviled eggs, Jack Horner thumbprint plum cookies, Mary Quite Contrary fruit skewers, Jack and Jill's pail of mango iced tea and Sugar and Spice cake.  The cupcakes have images of Golden Books as toppers, thanks to the blog Aesthetic Nest which provided the template.

Our wonderful friend Anne was my cohost for the shower, and provided among other things the cake and cupcakes.  Here she is putting the finishing touches on the frosting.  

But enough of that, on to the actual shower part!  Gini was really excited to receive "Go the F*$& to Sleep!" from a pastor friend, no less!  She is surrounded by her aunt and mother who made a long drive from Ohio for the shower.  That is some serious pressure!  Luckily they seemed very pleased by the whole thing and even INSISTED on washing all of the dishes for me afterward.  Grace and kitty, her favorite stuffed animal, approved of the gifts from a perfect vantage point.  

I tried to catch everyone on their way out the door so that they could receive these lamb shaped sugar cookies I made as favors.  I discovered sugar cookies are hard!  Or maybe I was just impatient.  They tasted good I thought, but they only sort of look like lambs.  The little poem helped get the idea across.  

Gini is so absolutely gorgeous with her bowling ball belly.  We love you so much!  

Playing Ball

We have been working on playing pass the ball and she is starting to get it!  Jason caught the tail end of our playing session on camera yesterday. 

She has also started to clap a little bit!  

Bunny is soooooooo big!

Thought I'd post some cute pictures for you all!

Our Grace is still working on her standing and walking skills.  She has perfected her cuteness skills as you can see.

She LOVES hanging out with Daddy and gets super excited when he walks in the room.  It is so fun to see!

She enjoys reading and pulls books out all the time.  Apparently, they are just as good upside down.  We read these books so often that we have much of them memorized and recite them in conversation.  Sorry to our non parent friends because we probably sound like crazy people now.  Our favorite as many of you know is from Pat the Bunny.  "How big is bunny?  Bunny is soooooo big!"  Grace loves Pat the Bunny too.  She likes to wave at Paul and Judy on the last page!  It says "Paul and Judy are waving bye-bye to you."  

She is so curious and loves getting into everything!   

She'll be Comin' 'round the Coffee Table

Grace likes to stand.  A lot.  In fact, she much prefers to stand while holding onto a piece of furniture than crawling.  Crawling to her is just a way to get somewhere where there is nothing to hold on to, a last resort if you will.  She is especially motivated by cell phones.  I hope no one thinks this trick is mean!  I did let her have it eventually.

She is getting pretty good at bending down to pick things up off the floor from a standing position.  She even took one step letting go of the coffee table once, falling immediately of course.  She REALLY wanted the lens cap to my camera and forgot that she can't really balance by herself yet.  We know that is only a matter of time, however!

9 Months Old!

Our sweet baby is 9 months old already.  She is getting so big!

She is pulling herself up on the coffee table constantly and enjoys dropping whatever she grabs on the floor.  We have to be careful what we leave on the table!

  

She can even stand with only one hand for support!  She is starting to take a few steps while standing.  She is especially motivated to take some steps if she can reach my cell phone.

One thing that hasn't changed is she still thinks Daddy is hilarious!

Hoppy Easter

Somebunny wants to wish you happy Easter!

How many shots does it take to get a smiling baby in a bunny hat? 

I'm not going to count

But believe me

it's a lot.  

Enjoying Spring

This is Grace's first spring!  We are trying to do more things outside so we can all enjoy this beautiful weather together.  

This morning it was a little chilly and breezy so I dressed her in this GORGEOUS sweater made by my talented friend Amanda!  I especially love the Beatrix Potter bunny buttons that are perfect for Easter.  

Grace was in awe of everything going on outside.  There is a lot of construction going on on our street so she loved watching the big trucks going by and waving at the construction workers.  They enjoyed her too!

  At one point she just fell over and looked at the sky for a while.  Childhood at its best!

We also bought a zoo membership and plan to go frequently.  Yesterday we saw two baby giraffes only one and two weeks old!