A Fresh Fall Day

I am just amazed at what a big girl Natalie looks like in these pictures that Katie took of the girls playing outside earlier this week! I think sometimes it takes someone else's pictures to see how much your child is maturing!

Our Little Ladybug

Here are some pictures of Natalie in her Halloween costume!

Proverbs 15:15

Every day is a terrible day for a miserable person, but a cheerful heart has a continual feast. Proverbs 15:15

I just received this verse in an email from someone at the children's ministry at LifeChurch, and I thought it was so good! It really makes you stop and think - and realize that your outlook makes such a difference on how every day turns out. It also reminds me that although we think that times have changed SO much, people in the Old Testament were having the same basic "problems" that we have today.

God is good . . . all the time! I hope anyone who is reading this has a cheerful heart today! :)

Sneak Peek of Baby A

Here are some pictures I took today of our friends' new baby! He's a week old today and is sooo precious! I couldn't believe how light he was compared to what I'm used to! My arms expected him to weigh so much more when I first held him! I'm still working on some more photos, but these are the ones that quickly caught my eye when I started looking through them.

What's Going On

Just thought I'd post a little update on the things that Natalie's been doing lately!

• I've been singing/saying the ABC song to her lately, and she loves the letter "s." Once I get to "s," she goes, "sssssss" and keeps on doing it. Katie heard her just playing and making "s" sounds, so she asked her what sound a snake makes. Now when you ask her what a snake says, she says "ssssss."
• She loves to dig in the laundry (clean or dirty, ugh!) and find something small like a sock or baby washcloth and just carry it around with her while she does other things. This will be her favorite item for a whole day.
• A couple days ago, Brad saw her playing with one of her dolls and a washcloth (see above! ;)) and he asked her if she wanted to give her baby a bath. He took the washcloth and washed the baby's hair, and now she'll do it if you ask her to.
• She's been doing this a LONG time, but she loves to get a plastic ring and crawl around with it in her mouth. It looks so silly!
• She immediately pulls on her ear if you ask her where her ear is.
• If I ask her to stand up, she'll stop what she's doing and stand up! It still is a big effort for her, but she usually works at it until she gets it!
• She likes to "brush" her hair with her hairbrush while I'm changing her diaper.
• The reason I gave her the brush mentioned above is that she now can totally take her diaper off by herself. Fun, fun! She only messes with it while she's on the changing table, but it's annoying to get her all fastened up, then reach for her pants, only to have the diaper completely unfastened again!
• She's enjoying walks outside in the stroller instead of napping when we go out, which is great! Sometimes she'll get a little fidgety, so we take her out and we figured out that she likes to push the stroller! She's just the right height to use the basket as a handle. It's pretty cute, but we're not too fond of it for very long. She doesn't really walk quite fast enough! ;)
• Her baby toothpaste must taste really good, because she enjoys having her teeth brushed! Hopefully this habit will stick, but I'm kind of doubtful . . .
• She calls shoes and socks "shuussss."
• She's not too fond of shoes and socks or hats - well, at least not while they are on her body. She'd much rather take them off and play with them. I'm getting a little frustrated with that with the weather getting colder!

I'm probably leaving some stuff out, but that seems like a pretty good list, so I'll leave it at that for now. :)

Girls' Nights (& Days!)

Well, Brad left today for a short trip to D.C. for work, so I guess it will be just the girls for a couple days - me, Nat, & Casey (aka "Ase!"), of course! We've got quite a few things going on that will keep us busy, but Natalie has seemed a little out of sorts the past couple days, so I am little nervous about being without Brad. It just seems like sometimes she gets bored and fussy when there's only one of us around if she's not in the best mood. She took an awesome nap at Katie's today, though, so hopefully she'll be happy this evening and we can have some nice quality time. :) Both of her top teeth next to the middle ones (not sure what they are called?) are right on the verge of coming through, so maybe that's what's getting to her - I'm just glad for all of us that she's still sleeping ok!

She's still working on the walking, but doesn't do it too often unless we initiate it, and then it's only 2-4 steps at a time. We've had her walking back and forth between us while we're sitting on the floor, but even if she's still balancing fine by the time she gets close to one of us, she just lunges into our laps! So she still needs a little more confidence!

Oh, and I think that maybe Natalie is starting to call me Mama! Yesterday afternoon, she said what sounded exactly like "Mama" and started crawling towards me. I laughed and said, "Yes, Natalie?" because she's never really called me Mama before, so I thought it was a coincidence (I try to keep my expectations low so as not to be disappointed!). She said it again and kept crawling toward me at lightning speed. I picked her up, and it became obvious VERY quickly that she needed a diaper change! Ha!

A Few More R Family Pics

Here are a few more pictures from yesterday because I couldn't resist. I had to make sure that all of my favorites were represented. :) It was lots of fun! Now I'm looking forward to doing some family pictures for some more of our LifeGroup friends in a couple weeks!

Sneak Peek for Sam & Elisabeth

Here is a sneak peek of the pictures I took of our friends Sam, Elisabeth, and Aiden today. We had fun scoping out the Myriad Botanical Gardens in downtown OKC. I'm working on the rest of the pics now - I feel like we got a ton of good ones, and I'm having fun putting some of my new skills and knowledge to use!

Pictures in the Park

Natalie and I went to the Mustang park this afternoon for a little photoshoot so mom could get some practice and Nat could enjoy the fresh air. Here are some of my favorite pictures from the day. Brad met us there when he got off work so yes, those are, in fact his legs and arms that you see in the second one.

Steps - Part 3

Well, I can't say that Natalie is officially a walker yet, but she is doing lots of practicing! She is definitely getting better and more confident, but she won't do it all the time. It's so cute to see her working on it! She's also been practicing going from sitting to standing on her own, which is really fun too. Here are some walking pics from the park today.

Steps - Part 2

Well, Miss Natalie has really started to take off! She took 5-8 steps a few times throughout the day today, then tonight she took about 12 at one point! I'm just amazed at how quickly she's progessed with this! I took some pictures during the 12-step venture - they are not great pics, but you get a bit of an idea. She was really fussy and ended up going to bed almost an hour early tonight, so I guess this walking thing is really taking it out of her!


Oh, and you'll notice her birthday present - the pink polka-dot chair - is upside down on the couch. It spends 50% of its time like this because Natalie won't obey when she's told to SIT in it! Hopefully someday she'll decide to listen!

Steps!

Miss Natalie took her very first two steps on Sunday! Yesterday, she did the same thing a few times. She's definitely getting more brave, which is good I think. She's getting much braver in standing on her own, too, and she can do it for 30-40 seconds at least. She doesn't usually fall down, either, she just really carefully sits herself down. It's kinda funny. :) She will even start to sit down and then stand up again, too. I know once she's walking it'll be even more work for us, but it's so amazing to see her making this big milestone. It will probably still be a little while before we officially have a true walker on our hands, and that's fine by us! It would be fun if she were walking by Halloween, but I know she'll do it in her own time. I've been so caught up lately with realizing how big she's getting, and I was shocked at how little she looked again when I saw her taking steps on her own!

Sweet Prayers

No pics to add to this post, but today and yesterday, I realized that Natalie is doing two kind of related things that made my heart melt!

After reading her a few bedtime stories, we always sit forward in the chair in her bedroom, and I say a very short little prayer. I have always held her little hands in mine while I pray. Last night, she took hold of my thumbs when we sat forward, and I looked at her and saw her sitting with her eyes closed, waiting!! How sweet is that?!

We always says a prayer before we eat, and we hold hands. This morning at breakfast, Natalie was getting really fussy and fidgety, wanting her food. I said, "Natalie, just a minute, you know we're going to pray first," and I took her hand. Brad wasn't sitting down yet, and she held her other hand out to him and looked in the direction he was coming from! She did the same thing at lunch too!

I know she's not able to understand the meaning of prayer, but it's definitely a huge step in the right direction that it's becoming part of her daily routine! I'm just blown away every day by seeing her do things that show me she understands so much more than I thought she did at this point!

What a Difference a Year Makes

I meant to do this yesterday, but it just didn't work out. Yesterday was exactly one year from Natalie's due date, and one year since this one month picture was taken! It's hard to believe that Miss Nat is 13 months old and that it's been a year since she looked like this. Well, it's actually hard to remember that she ever looked like this!

Being a Big Girl

Tonight, Natalie was not being a very good eater at dinner - which is really odd for her. She kept asking for more, but there was some of everything on her tray already. Finally, Brad got her a spoon. That seemed to pacify her for a little bit. She would poke at a piece of food with the spoon, then pick it up with her other hand and eat it. :) She still wasn't totally happy, and she kept asking for more. We finally figured out that she wanted to eat off of a plate like us! Guess we'll have to pick up some plastic plates for her since she wants to be a big girl! :)

Eatin' Waffles

Natalie's having a Daddy Day today while I'm at work. Brad just took this picture of her eating breakfast - one of her favorites: bananas, a blueberry whole grain waffle, and milk. He decided to hand her a whole waffle and see what she did with it. She ate the whole thing by taking bites and tearing off pieces. Pretty cute!

Pumpkins Galore!

This evening right before sunset, Brad and I took Natalie to TG Farms to get some pictures with the pumpkins there. Natalie fell asleep on the way, and then she was a little clingy when we got there. She finally let go of us, but she wouldn't stand - she would only sit with the pumpkins. She was pretty entertained by her daddy dancing around beside me, and as you can tell in a couple of these, I've finally got some pictures of the scrunchy smile where she shows her teeth. ;) I'm sure next year she'll be running through the patch!