Mother's Day 2009

It was a good 3rd Mother's Day for me! Besides the fact that I had to work. It started early because Grace woke up at 5:30, but luckily fell right back to sleep once I put her in bed with me. I heard Gene come in a little after 7 and was trying to wake her up. He kept saying "Grace wake up, I need you to come help me." He just kept saying it and she by golly wasn't budging! She was nestled up right against my back and it took him 3 tries before he finally picked her up and she woke up. About 20-30 minutes later they came back into the bedroom and Grace kept telling me to wake up. She handed me a card and when I opened it up Gene had put her foot and handprints in the card!! That was why he needed her help! How cute is that?! I thought it was really sweet!

He told me to get out of bed because he'd made breakfast! I never got a picture of me and Grace together yesterday so I took this one this morning to put on!

Gene made biscuits and gravy and Grace ate them up! She's so cute and I'm so glad that God chose me to be her mother!!

My handsome chef husband! He's so good to me!

Sausage gravy and biscuits! And of course some orange juice!

She learned that from her Daddy, definitely not her Mama! :)

Here's the sweet card!

Her footprints!! They're getting so big.

Handprints! Most precious hands and they've definitely touched my heart!

Gene also got me a really pretty big hanging plant to add to the front porch! Everytime we're out somewhere that sells the big ones with bright flowers I talk about how much I want one, so he bought me one and had it hanging this morning when I got up! He also bought some small chains so he could lower the other plants we have so now it looks better!

Here's a view of the whole thing, but it doesn't really do it justice. I couldn't get a good picture of it to show the colors!

And another view of it! Gene had to leave shortly after breakfast to go to the police department and do some paperwork that had to be turned in and Grace and I were going to go to church but Mom and Dad were out of town and I didn't want to go by myself and drop Grace off in the nursery for an hour and a half and miss spending that time with her before work. I really hate that I missed, but I am glad that I got to spend all morning with my girl. I wish all my kids would have been home, but it was Deanne's weekend with the boys so they weren't here. :( At least they got to spend the day with their mother though!

I hope everybody had a wonderful Mother's Day!!!

My Little Monkey

I have a really funny story to tell you about my crazy little girl! This picture was taken back in July, but I love it so I posted it since I don't have one that shows about my story!!!

Let me start by telling you that this past weekend my mom and I drove to Stuttgart, AR for the funeral of our dear friend's mother who passed away. Leah if you're reading this, I'm so glad I got to see you, even though the circumstances weren't the best. You guys are still in my thoughts and prayers!!

My wonderful Granny and cousin, Courtney, agreed to watch Grace Saturday while we drove down for the funeral because Gene was working and the boys were with their mother. Thanks Granny and Courtney!! So, we dropped Grace off that morning and headed out. On the way down, of course Grace came up in conversation and we were talking about potty training and the prospect of moving her to a toddler bed sometime in the near future. I had asked Mom once before what she thought about it, and she said as long as she wasn't trying to climb out of her crib then just leave her in it. The thing I'm most apprehensive about is the fact that her room is upstairs and if she woke up and got scared or something and tried to come down to our room. We have a gate at the top of the stairs, but it's broken at the moment and she definitely has not mastered the skill of coming down them on her own yet. I can just see a broken bone, and that scares me!

So, I told Mom that she had not ever tried climbing out of her crib. Not that I had seen anyways. Normally she's just standing at the end close to the door staring and waiting for someone to come get her! Either that or she's sitting there holding Nemo!

Well......that all changed this morning!! She had woken up a couple of times and fussed a little but got quiet again shortly after and I could hear her snoring. The last time she woke up I could tell she was ready to get up, so I went upstairs to get her. Oh my goodness, let me just tell you that I opened that door and she was hanging on the OUTSIDE of her crib! It was so funny though, because she looked like a little monkey holding on! She had one foot sorta resting on her diaper sack and the other was in between two of the slats resting on her mattress. She had a scared look on her face, and I couldn't help but giggle at her!! Who knows how long she had been working on escaping.

I sent Mom a text message telling her and she wasn't really surprised! I told her I guess we'll have to start contemplating converting her crib into the toddler bed a little sooner. There are a few issues we have though, 1) Grace still has to be rocked to sleep, she's not exactly good at going to sleep on her own. I know....it's horrible, but I loved rocking her so much and we were never strong enough to let her cry herself to sleep. 2) I really didn't want to switch her to the toddler bed until she was potty trained, because of getting up to use the bathroom, etc.

So, I'm stuck between a rock and a hard place. I'm open for any suggestions anyone might have!! I really wish I would have had my camera this morning to snap a picture of her "hanging out" but I didn't so maybe next time I'll catch her in the act again. Even though I really don't want to!!

Anyway, I just wanted to share that with you and I hope everyone is having a good week so far. I'm ready for mine to be over!!

Taylor