it's beginning to look...

...a lot like Christmas!

Ainsley is enjoying all of the Christmas decor around the house. The tree in her room is adorned with snowflakes handmade by her great grandmother.



Her favorite Christmas item is the stuffed nativity that she can call her very own.



Actually, it's not the nativity she loves so much as it is Baby Jesus. She has latched on to that little guy and takes him everywhere. He gets slobbered on, chewed, and loved by Ainsley more than anything else.



Don't you love the Christmas joy?

why people hire photographers

Just a few shots from our Christmas card photo shoot that included me, Ainsley and Mable in the backyard. Don't worry, I was able to get a shot that would work for the card, despite my lack of photography skills.

trauma room

WARNING: This post contains graphic images.


November 12th was a Wednesday like any other. After the usual early afternoon crawling, climbing, and entertainment from Mable, it was time for a nap.



Ainsley had been changed, and I left her on the changing table quietly sucking her thumb because I needed to refill the diaper basket for the changing table.



We keep the diapers in the armoire across from the changing table, and that's where I was standing when I turned around.



I turned around just in time to see Ainsley beginning to roll off of the changing table. Even though it seemed as if she was moving in slow motion, I did not as I dove to catch her before she fell to the floor.



I landed on my knees, with Ainsley in my arms, and my face smashed into the dresser. Yes, I caught her. My glasses flew to the floor, and Ains began to cry. As I was assessing the situation, I reached to feel my left brow that was already hurting, and when I brought my left hand back down, I saw blood. I got up off of the floor, Ainsley still in my arms, and went to the bathroom. While Ainsley's crying was subsiding, and I could see that she was okay, I attempted to stop the bleeding in the gash to the left of my eye.



Since it was Wednesday, Canaan was in Stillwater. So, I called Carrie for some assistance and assessment of injury. However, she was in a meeting and did not answer her cell, and I left a very calm message with her student worker to have her call. While I was waiting for Carrie to call me back, there was a baby to take care of, and she needed a bath now that she had blood on her from her mother's head wound. By the time I finished bathing Ains, Carrie happened to leave the meeting to check on a few things, and decided to call me. When she called, all I could get out was, "I need you to come look at my head." When she arrived, Ainsley was clean, happy, and talking up a storm. I was not.



Carrie looked at the gash, and suggested I go visit OBU's campus nurse and let her tell me if I needed stitches. So, I changed clothes, put Ainsley down for a nap, put a load of laundry in the dryer, and headed to campus. Sharon, the nurse, took one look and told me I would need stitches. After a breakdown in her office, due to the thought of what could have happened and changing hormones, I headed to Shawnee's AM PM Clinic for further medical assistance. There was no one in the waiting room, and one patient ahead of me at check-in. Miraculous. After waiting for less than 5 minutes, I was taken into an examination room where a very cranky nurse assessed the damage. After she left, I was settling in for a long wait for the doc to come in, and about 30 seconds later, there he was. Miraculous. He decided that the proper treatment would not be a bandage or glue, but stitches. Panic. Anyone who knows me well, knows that I don't do well with anything involving needles. I almost passed out when I got my ears pierced. But, I knew I could handle this. I gave birth, right? So, the doc tells me they will move me to another room for the procedure. Again, I expected a long wait, but it was no time before the cranky nurse was back to move me to the Trauma Room. The gash was numbed and subsequently stitched up, and I was out of the clinic in less than an hour. Miraculous.



Even though she was virtually unharmed, Ainsley did suffer a bruise from when I caught her and my body slammed into the dressser. She did not require medical attention, has had no repercussions from the incident, and is continuing to roll over on the changing table.

i'm pleased...

...for now with the blog's new look.

Below you will see Ainsley eating her new favorite treat, "puffies." At first it was a struggle for even one puffie to make it successfully into her mouth, but now she's an old pro and can handle more than one at a time. Unfortunately for Mable, they rarely land on the floor.

hmmmm...

Well, I'm in the process of revamping the blog a little bit, and have somehow managed to really mess it up! So, be patient while I figure out what I'm doing here. But, here's a cute pic until I can get this thing how I want it!

in a galaxy far, far away

For Ainsley's first Halloween costume, we went for something that was out of this world, and she dressed as Princess Leia.

Leia on her way to the Fall Festival at UBC.



In order to make the costume complete, we enlisted the help of Ainsley's buddy Jake, who dressed as Leia's brother, Luke Skywalker.






I think Luke was practicing some Jedi tricks.



Worn out from the festivities, Leia fell asleep while still at the festival.

happy halloween

Halloween was a pretty low-key day for us. We didn't go trick-or-treating this year, but we couldn't let the holiday pass without commemorating it with pictures. So, Ainsley donned her jack-o-lantern onesie and we took some shots with the pumpkins from the pumpkin patch.

She seems a little unsure about the pumpkin with warts.



Just her size.



Plotting her escape from the photo shoot.



Yes, the bow is huge.

the great pumpkin

If it's fall in Shawnee, that means the pumpkins are out in full force at the pumpkin patch at First Christian on Broadway. Ainsley's first trip was on a beautiful October afternoon.

mirror, mirror

checking herself out...




..."I'm cute, huh Dad?"




Oh yeah!

hat trick

Thought you might enjoy a few cute pics of Ainsley hanging out on her couch.



She's not so sure about the hat...



...but Mable sure is funny!



Still can't believe she has a chenille sofa!

new tricks

1. getting into all sorts of precarious situations involving furniture.

2. making new sounds such as clucking her tongue.



3. eating solid foods.

4. singing as a soprano.




5. sitting up.

6. waking up with a new hair style every day.




7. rolling her tongue.

8. army crawling.



9. square dancing with her john deere boots on.

10. sleeping until 8 am (that just happened once, but we're hoping for a repeat).

cribnastics and other new adventures

At nearly seven months, Ainsley is getting more and more interested in the world around her. While she is not crawling yet, she is rolling over and scooting backwards when she tries to crawl (much to her frustration). At her six month appointment she weighed 14 pounds, 6 ounces, and was 24.5 inches long. So, she's making up for a tiny start.

Ainsley and Annie were playing at our house, and while Annie is crawling and sitting up on her own, Ainsley is not. So, as they were playing with each other, Annie's brother Ethan exclaimed, "Look! They're wrestling!"




Sometimes Ainsley finds herself in a difficult spot during her rolling around exercises. She often ends up under Canaan's grandfather's chair.




Because she is rolling so much, she is all over the crib. On this particular day, she had become unswaddled and and pulled the sleep sack off of the side of the crib and somehow managed to get one arm in it.




During bath time, she often likes to play with the cup that I rinse her off with. No, we haven't started letting her drink sweet tea from Jason's Deli, but we might let her have some from McAlister's when it opens.




She forced her parents to move the monitor from the top of the crib when she started pulling it in with her to play with instead of napping.




While she is generally sleeping through the night, you never know what state she might be in when you go to get her out of bed. One morning I was trying to get her back to sleep after an early morning feeding with little luck. I sent in Canaan, the master swaddler, to see if he could do the trick. Still, no luck. When I went back in after waiting a Ferber-approved amount of time, she was not only unswaddled, but naked from the waist up. She had somehow managed to get her arms out through the neck of her onesie and it was now down around her waist. Maybe we should stick to the sleep sack.