Halloween 2012

We had a lot of fun Halloween events this year, so I'm going to throw them all in one post and just warn you this is very picture heavy. But cute picture heavy....at least I think so!

The first Haloween-y thing we did was go to pumpkin carving party a couple threw from our church. They have an awesome backyard and it was set up with tables for us to eat dinner and then carve away. Ruby did wonderful even thoguh it was waaay past her bedtime.

The Luksys. They sit where others stand.

They had glow bracelets...Ruby was in love.

Thought the pumpkin gunk would be a fun sensory experience. She wasn't having any part of it.

Somehow this didn't win her over either....


Baby girl's first Halloween costume! She even left the hat on, which was a miracle, I think she knew how cute it was :)

Our little strawberry!



A couple from church threw a baby Halloween party. Basically a chance for us to get the babes together and oh and ah over their incredible collective cuteness.

 

Seven babies under 2 years old- craziness!

Okay, fast forward to actual Halloween day. While we were waiting on Andy to get home from work and get our fun night started we took a few pics in the yard....

Had to take a few pumpkin pics of course!

Snuggling with frankenstein

After we gobbled down a quick dinner, we headed out to visit our friends. A lot of our friends live in the neighborhood about a mile from us and Ruby still does pretty awful in the car so we decided to bike. It made it even more fun!

Right before we headed out to trick or treat

A few of the friends we visited.....

ps. i know my captions and spacing is all wonky. i cannot figure out blogger these days and have kind of just given up....anyone who knows how to fix any of this please msg/email me b/c I definitely don't have the time or energy to switch to another publisher.....

4th of July 2012

We had a fabulous 4th. A few friends came over for dinner and then we went to the Cedar Park fireworks. I was really excited for Ruby to see the fireworks. She definitely noticed and watched them but didn't get too excited about them, but it was also waaay past her bedtime and she only had one nap that day. She was a trooper though!

Boys doing what boys do, acting cool and grilling meat

Catch phrase!

Yea America!

Memorial Day Weekend

Two weekends in a row you get to hear about our wild weekend- the question is....can you handle it?
Trust me, you can...

Friday night was great.....for me. I got to go out to eat with two girlfriends and Andy stayed home and put Ruby to bed. It was great for me because normally if I get to go out I have to be back by 8:30 at the latest to put Ruby to bed (stinker still refuses a bottle). But she has been terrible at naps lately (ie: not taking them) so she's been going to sleep around 7:30. That means this mama gets to get the heck outta the house for more than a few hours at a time (seriously, 8 months of not being able to do that was starting to wear on me). So we had a wonderful night and had two blissful hours of girl talk. Meanwhile, Andy spent two hours trying to get the girl to go to bed. So yeah, not the funnest night ever for him.

Saturday morning we got up, made french toast (again), and lugged around the house, switching off trying to get Ruby to take a nap. She has decided nap aren't for her and now that she can pull herself up, she just stands in her crib and screams bloody murder. Finally we decided to that she would have to stop and we were going to stop going in there and trying to comfort her, well an hour and half later she was still sobbing. Not good. I felt horrible, of course she felt horrible. We are just at a complete loss for what to do. Anyways, my friend Katherine came over and we had a yummy grilled lunch of citrus glazed prok chops, roasted corn, and quinoa salad.

Then we went to the pool and hung out a little bit.

That night we went really nuts and splurged on a red box (New Year's Eve) and a liter of Coke to share. It was just a nice little quiet evening.

Sunday we went to church and then came home and battled Ruby with naps. Not a great day.

This girl loves her some play time on the floor with her daddy

This face melts me into a puddle of love

Baby climbing obstacles- uncle bt would be proud!

Monday I got up early (6am) and made banana pudding and potato salad (I felt very Memorial Day-y). Then when Ruby and Andy got up we headed down south and did some thrifting! It's kinda become our little tradition, this is our fourth year to do it. Our favorite thrift stores do 50% clothes, so you can get some really good deals.

We spent $36 and got:

Ashley: 2 tops
Andy: 2 collared knit shirts
           1 button up dress shirt
Ruby: 2 shorts
          3 skirts
          6 pants
          5 tops
          2 dresses
          2 sleepers

Our Loot!!!!

 Then we rushed home because we had a bunch of friends coming over for lunch. We did potluck and man oh man did we have some good food. Love our friends, it's just an added bonus they are all such good cooks.

Our yummy spread

And we finally got a picture with Ruby and her future BFF- Rylee (who is a whopping three weeks old!).

Then we put Ruby to bed early (she literally only slept an hour all day and that was only because I was holding her) and lugged around and watched some tv. So, there it is- our memorial day weekend. It was nice to get Andy for an extra day and get to do some fun things. Hope everyone else had a wonderful weekend too!

Easter 2012

Okay, so I'm in a blogging slump, but at the very least I wanted to to post some Easter pics! Since we don't live around family so Easter's never been much a holiday for us (as far as celebrating with ham and hard boiled eggs sort of way). This year was fun! And although she would of been just as happy with a big pile of newspaper (the girl loves her paper that's for sure) I went ahead and did an Easter basket. Because I am finding out buying your kid is just as much for you (if not more) than it is for them. Miss Ruby in her pretty dress.....

Our little family

Goodies from the Easter bunny

It was a wonderful day and to think that next year Miss Ruby will be able to go look for eggs- so fun!

Christmas 2011

I'm a Christmas freak, love it and everything about it. Add a baby into the mix and my Christmas freak flag was flying higher than ever. So we loaded back into our very packed car (first time in my life I saw the awesomeness that is having a mini-van) and headed north.

First we had to pack up all our gifts! We had one particularly cute one...


Our first stop was in Waxahachie to spend the night with Andy's mom.

That evening we went over to the Mapes house for dinner and letting Ruby hang out with her only cousins- Daisy and Tessa.

Getting some love from Aunt Kari


Then we drove up to Tulsa to visit my family. It was three days of rest, fun, and eating. Totally worth the drive. And of course, Ruby got lots and lots of attention.

Molly got a little attention too, poor pooch has been on the back burner the past couple of months so she gets so excited when someone will play with her.


Uncle Brian is an old pro with babies now...

Christmas eve there was a very intense game of Monopoly. And when I say intense, I mean INTENSE. Lies were told, alliances were made, a wrestling match almost broke out at one point. It was awesome.


Christmas Day

My loot, I felt like such a hippie with my cloth diapers, reusable produce bags and sandwich bags.



One of the days my grandma came for a short visit, I swear babies know who the grandmas are, cause Ruby was smiling up a storm for her.


The McBrides and Jenkins visited one day. Always love seeing Sara and Drew but it was a real treat to get to introduce Ruby to Sara's family too. I definitely consider them all my extended family. It was doubly exciting because it was the first time I got celebrate with Sara since she found out she is having a little girl (aka: Ruby's future BFF) this spring. I'm ridiculously excited meeting Baby Girl McBride.



And it goes without saying that we ate and ate and then ate some more. I took a bunch of food pictures but thought I would just show one, the most simple meal we had but probably my favorite. Good ol Okie cooking- mac-n-cheese, cornbread, and pork and beans with chow chow on top. Mmmmmmmm....