Wow, this is super late!

Ok.. I realize that I'm officially the last person ever to blog about father's day. Wow, where have I been?! But, I didn't want to NOT post about Vaughn's first father's day.
Better late than never right?

Vaughn is such an amazing daddy to our precious Ava, let me prove it with pictures: 

 1st time daddy getting Ava all buckled up safely :) So sweet.

Ava's first Christmas

 

 Bedtime routine, reading Ava her bedtime story

 Working with daddy

 Playing with daddy on Valentine's day

 Bear Lake

 

 I LOVE this photo, melts my heart :)

So for Father's day, I made Vaughn breakfast in bed and Ava was so excited to wake him up and wish him happy daddy's day. 

Take notice of the adorable sign Ava is wearing for her daddy: 

(it reads: I have the best daddy in the whole world!)

 

I love you so much Vaughn and Ava loves you so very much too :)

You have awesome daddy skills!

3 years

Happy anniversary to us!

I love Vaughn with all my heart.

View our wedding day post   

HERE

8 months

 She's our little peanut!

15 lbs 13 oz   

(18th percentile) 

26 inches  

(27th percentile)

She's got spunk and a sweet, bubbly personality :)

sleeps just like her daddy, mouth wide open. so cute.

love her tiny toes

She woke up really sweaty, just like her daddy!

a little mischievous...

Ava loves to play with anything BUT her toys. I just don't get it?!

She's an old soul, wise beyond her years already.

Love you baby!

my first mothers day

It's very strange yet wonderful to be included and honored on Mother's day. 

I still can't get over the fact that I'm a mommy now.

I'm so grateful for our little sweetheart who made me a mommy, I love her so much.

just looking at these photos of her birth, the day I became a mommy for the first time, makes me fall in love all over again.

That day, every detail, every moment will forever be dear to my heart.

she is the most precious, pretty thing I've ever laid eyes on.

What a beautiful miracle she is.

 (I can't believe how puffy and swollen my face was in these hospital photos. That was the only part of me that swelled up my entire pregnancy, why did it have to be my FACE?!)

 anyway..

we have so much fun together

I just wanted to document a few more details from Ava's birth and the days following:

Motherhood/parenthood is a wonderful blessing but, it's also a lot more challenging and difficult than I ever thought possible.

Needless to say, we've had some challenging moments in this journey of becoming parents for the first time. 

The first 4 months were really hard for me (and Vaughn) to adjust to having a baby around. We were used to it being just the two of us. I would get so frustrated when Ava would scream for long periods of time and there was nothing I could do to help or comfort her so I would cry (or scream)  right along with her.

I was set and determined to breast feed her for the first 6 months. However, I was only able to breastfeed for 2 months. This is a really difficult subject for me to talk about. Many, many tears were shed in the whole process. One of my favorite things I did when I would breastfeed Ava was to whisper in her ear, "mommy loves you". She would look up at me with her big, heavenly beautiful blue eyes and that innocent angel face and I would just melt. Oh, just thinking about it makes me emotional. I love her so much.

Let me just say that breastfeeding is NOT easy, it is extremely hard. I thought it would come so naturally but, that was not the case. I desperately wish that I could have done it longer. It makes me feel like a bad mother that I wasn't able to for very long. I feel like I let Ava down. I felt like other mothers would look down on me for not breastfeeding my baby and I wanted to tell them that I desperately wanted to, I tried everything, I tried so hard.. My body just had a really hard time and Ava would cry because she was having a hard time too.

I blame most of it on not being able to hold her at all for the first 4 hours of her life. I was literally passed out and didn't know what was going on so there is no way I could have held her. 

I hate that I couldn't hold her. 

When I woke up around 3:00 am, I remembered my baby and I wanted to hold her immediately. So Vaughn called for the nurse to bring her from the nursery. I wanted to snuggle with her in my bed and just lay there with her next to me. Vaughn was really hesitant because he thought I would roll over on her, which I wouldn't have. So I compromised and said I wanted her to lay next to me for 10 minutes. 

That first night in the hospital was so far from what we were used to. Poor Vaughn was out of it too. Having to sit sleep on those hospital chair beds. I woke up in the middle of the night needing to use the restroom in a mad way. I paged the nurse to come help me because the epidural was still wearing off so I needed help to walk. I waited in extreme discomfort for 5 minutes but, still no nurse. I couldn't wait a minute longer so I shouted over to Vaughn that I needed his help. By then I was already standing, using the bed to help me stand. As I took a step, blood went everywhere. All over the floor. 

 To further explain this story, let me just describe in one word how Vaughn acts when he's awakened from sleep:  crazy.

Not in a mean way but, in a he-has-no-clue-what-the-heck-is-going-on way.

Vaughn was absolutely distraught. 

To the point where it was almost comical. It's hilarious now!

He wasn't mad at me in any way, he just could not believe that there was a mess on their floor.

How were we going to clean this up? Where were the paper towels? Where was the cleaner? How were we going to explain this one to the nurses? He kept saying these things over and over and pacing back and forth. I almost had to slap him back to reality. This is what the nurses do, they will take care of it. We don't have to clean it up, don't worry.

By now, I was getting embarrassed and appalled that I had made this mess and I really wanted to help them clean it. I just kept apologizing but, they were so sweet and acted  like it was the most normal thing in the whole world. Alright then?

Although it wasn't at the time, it's such a funny memory now!

Here we are with sweet baby Vivian (Kyr's 3rd girl) who was born on May 26th. 

 Ava looks big compared to her:

Look how sweet, their first photo together:

Dearest Ava, 

even though your birth and the days and months following have been somewhat difficult and challenging, I would do it all over again in an instant.

I love you my beautiful baby daughter.

isn't it romantic?

From a recent wedding I photographed.

I love when I'm able to capture sweet, simple images such as this:

Love the feeling this image portrays.

See more HERE

Blood Boiling Neighbors.

We have lovely ones. not.

No, they really aren't that bad but, once in a while they do not make me happy.

Today I sent Vaughn this email:

"The darn neighbors had some fool zoom in blaring their horn 10 times and it woke Ava up. I hope they're happy. It makes me so mad. Why can't people be considerate? It just so happens that a mommy just might have a baby that she works hard trying to get to nap so she can try and get something done for once. The horn-honking fluff brain has no clue that they just woke her up. I wanted to yell out the window at them and say: "These windows are paper thin and your stupid horn that you honked because your too lazy to walk to the door just woke up my baby that was only asleep for 1/2 hour and now I won't be able to do the dishes because she's awake", but then I would feel like I belonged in the ghetto if I did that. So I sure hope their lazy legs are fat, jiggly, happy and satisfied since they didn't have to walk the long 10 feet journey to ring the doorbell".

Vaughn responded with:

"If there’s any bacon grease in a pot on the counter, I would suggest throwing it off the porch at them right now!  That’s a bummer, im sorry that happened. I hope their legs turn into giant noodles and that their brains fall out!!!" 

That's my man :)

We've had several annoying"episodes" similar to the one above:

smokers 
  (unfortunately we have 2 of them as neighbors)

On occasion we have had our window open to enjoy the refreshing, cool air and more often than not, my nose gets bombarded with the repulsive scent of tobacco. Not to be a goody-two-shoes but, the lease agreement clearly states that smoking is absolutely prohibited at all times. I called Jeff the landlord and promptly reported the tobacco smoking rebels. He left each tenant a warning on the door. It helped for a little while but it still happens every now and then. 

One time I had the screen door open and as soon as I got a whiff, I went to hastily shut it and rather loudly exclaimed, " Ugh, someone is SMOKING again".

Oh no, I sure hope they didn't hear me..

Oh, they did? Good.

Not to mention:

LOUD noises/people in the middle of the night

Our lovely rugby playing next door neighbor has his buddies over at all hours of the day or night and they never go inside, they stand on the porch and talk. Really loud.

Like I said, our windows are pretty thin so we can hear every word, clear as glass.

Not to mention screams coming from the bedroom on the other side of the wall which wake us up at 3:00 am.

Need I say more?

Anyway, my first episode mentioned may seem like a silly thing really but, not for you moms out there who know what I mean when it comes to finally getting your baby down for a nap so you can get at least one thing done and then some crazy person decides to honk their blaring horn and wake her up. 

Job well done, I really appreciate that. No really.. thank you.

Ugh! some people..

Sprucin' up my Space

After lots of research and shopping, we finally purchased our sofa set! It arrives June 14th. Until then our living room consists of.. well, nothing. Just an armoire, two ends tables, two lamps and a rug. We either sit on the floor or use the blow up mattress. So unfortunately, no visitors or guests until after June 14th unless you want to sit the two ways previously mentioned.

Here's our new sofa(s)!

 I'm going for a "modern, sophisticated, elegant, colorful funky peacock flair" look.

Tying in the colors, peacock blue, champagne/ivory, gray/silver.

I think I'm pretty much gonna love it once it's all pulled together.

 I've been hunting down these finds throughout the last 3 weeks:

Peacock arrangement, lovely pillows (they look way better in person), 2 gray lamps (found these for an awesome price) and two expensive end tables (did not find these for an awesome price and they also look way better in person too. They better!)

We refinished this armoire/wardrobe (which actually serves as our tv closet) back in April. 

You should have see it before the makeover, hideous!

I love it now :)

Can't wait to see it all completed and put together once the sofa's arrive!

Come on over and visit us after June 14th :)

7 Months!

Ava's stats:

 15 lbs 3 oz

 25 in

 

 She learned to clap her hands this month:

 She makes ferocious scary monster noises, arrrr!

Her hair is so long the top and sides, we can even do pig-tails:

She LOVES her daddy:

 She also LOVES walks:

 She has big beautiful blue eyes:

Ava is very patient

Again, the pig-tails. so sweet.

You are so precious to us Ava!

In the Market . . .

 for one of these, gray in color.

isn't this just gorgeous?

 The one below is a bit more realistic price wise and the one we will more than likely end up purchasing but, I love it nonetheless:  

Oh and THIS bedroom?

It's elegant, subtle, dramatic and delicate all rolled into one.

Completely in LOVE.

My bedroom will look exactly like this someday very soon :)
(the frames above the night stands will be replaced with black and white canvas prints.
One of our wedding day and one of Ava)

This antique armoire is making me drool...I want it:

 and this adorable wall table in robins egg blue, love!

Also...

 

3 birthday's are being celebrated today!

 

Happy Birthday

  to 3 people that we love dearly:

 

Both of our dads: Bill & Rob

 

&

 

our cute niece Jaycee who's 2 years old

We love you!