We have a sneaky little man!

So here's the story:  9:35pm on Sunday the 24th.  John and I were both in the office on our computers after the kids had gone to bed.  Then we hear a loud "cushhhhhhhhhhhhh" sound.  My thoughts were a cat fight? or snake? Whatever it was, John and I both looked at each other and said, "what was that?"  Well, we just chalked it up to something outside.  Then about 2 min. later we hear it again..."cushhhhhhhhh".  This time John goes to investigate because we thought something was in the house!  He then yells to me "Michelle come in here, you gotta see this!"  Of course I think he is going to show me some snake, ummmm nope...the picture above is what I saw!!!  Jackson then said to me, "I tome downstairs, I have snack!"  Yep, you got that right.  Jackson and his stuffed animal dog made if out of his room (we have a child lock on the inside of his door and John had not shut it all the way) then downstairs (I forgot to shut the child gate when I went upstairs)  into the kitchen, opened up the fridge, got out the whip cream...took off the cap and sat down on the couch to watch some T.V & enjoy his whip cream snack.  All we could do was laugh, in fact we laughed about it the rest of the night :)  I will never forget this story and I am sure I will tell him about it a million times :)

Cookout!

 Some of John's best friends, Gary and Chris

Jennifer, Amanda, and Me

 

 This is a great one of Bailey waving "hi"!  I am so excited b/c she finally clapped her hands today for the 1st time and she did it non-stop the rest of the day :)

 Batting her eyes at Chris!

 The kids had a BLAST to say the least!  Then ran around all night :)

 sweet Gavin LOVED showing Jackson how this worked and they all played really well together :)

 Even Bailey Boo joined in on the fun!

 I made her this dress about a week ago and it turned out great :) The pattern was free too!

This is the link to the pattern: http://madebypetchy.blogspot.com/2008/06/free-pattern-baby-dresstunic.html

• A little printing tip for this pattern. Be sure your viewing it at "100%" and then make sure your Print Range is on "current view", and your page scaling should be "none". This took me a while to figure out so I am saving you the hassle!! LOL
• The bias tape I used was extra wide & double fold. (This sounds WAY more complicated than it is...it is super easy!)

Nicole's Bridal Shower

 Me and the Bride-to-Be!

 The food was amazing!!

 Me and my Mom

 Me and Kristin

The whole group!  It was such a fun shower & Nicole got a lot of really nice things!  I can't believe the wedding is only a month away! 

Busy Ballard's

 Last weekend I got to go see some of my KD sorority sisters.  I had not seen Lauren or Lindsey in almost 8 years! Lauren now lives in Vegas so it was so great that we got to meet up after all this time.  We were excited our kids got to meet too! 

 Two weeks ago I went to Alijeh's 30th birthday too!  If you can't tell...it was a "white party".  We all had a great time and it was nice to get out without the kids for a while ;)

 The bride to be-Allie and one of her bridesmaids!  I can't wait!!!  Come on April 2012!!

 And of course we had to take a goofy one...classic Allie and Fish :)

 Two Sunday's ago we went to The Kunkel's house for a BBQ...it was absolutely AMAZING!!  They sure can cook!!!  And the kids had a blast too if you can't tell from the picture below!

 I got ANOTHER night out without the kids 2 weeks a go to the Fox with some of my Sunday School girls. It was SOOOO much fun and I highly recommend going down to the Fox to watch a movie, plus I had never seen Cat on a Hot Tin Roof~what an awesome movie :)

 Here we are at the Vortex before the show, it was sooooo yummy!  I love these girls so much!

 Here is a pic of Bailey doing her favorite thing, makin a mess! LOL  I caught her on film for John so he could see that it wasn't Jackson and he was always an innocent bi-stander on this! LOL

 We also had Kalynn's 3rd birthday last week

 Here is Bailey in a dress I made her :)  I LOVE to sew thanks to Amy (my sis-in-law) and Jessi (one of my best friends).  I have just started to make dresses and it has been a lot of fun!  I ended up making this shorter while she is still crawling so she can get around better (you can see in the pics below). 

 Kelly and Doug (Doug works with John and we have all become great friends) came over tonight and brought their new son Landon.  He was so good and too cute!!

 Here we are with our "little babies" :) I love when Kelly and Doug visit, we always have such a great time and Kelly and I have so much in common!

 Here is one of John, Bailey, and Doug :)

And this is our "older babies"!  They are only 20 days apart and had SOOO much fun playing together :)

How to make your own tutu!

 1. Find something to work around. I used this tall vase. 

 2. Cut the elastic and tie a knot to the size you want the tutu to be.  This is what the professionals suggest...

0-3 months 14"waist 6" length

3-6 months 15” waist 6" length

6-12 months 16" waist 7" length

12-24 months 17" waist 7" length

2T 18" waist 8" length

3T 19" waist 9" length

4T 20" waist 10" length

They suggest 16" waist for a 12 month old...that was WAY too big for Bailey and she is average.  So I just tied a knot to start that was 16" and then cut the knot out when I had tied a whole spool of tulle around it. I saw it was going to be too big then I just put it on her and made it a custom size & tied a knot again :)

 3.  Then you need to figure out how long you want the tutu.  I made Bailey's about 5 1/2" long.  So I cut each piece of tulle to about 12 inches (the tulle fabric comes in a spool just like ribbon does).  I was NOT exact and it doesn't really matter b/c it will end up being so fluffy you won't be able to tell if one is a little shorter or longer :)  I ended up using a little over a spool of tulle.

 4. You fold the tulle over the elastic until each end matches up together. 

 5. You tie one knot.

 6. You tie a 2nd knot.  Then you do this process about a million times all the way around the elastic ;)  It may take you about 2 hrs...so make sure you have a good show on t.v!

And voila...you made your own tutu!!  SOOOO easy!  And a BIG thanks to Jessi for teaching me how to do this and MANY other Susie homemaker projects!!

List of Materials you need:
1. Elastic (I used a thinner one, but you can use any size!)
2. A fabric bolt of tulle-I ended up using a little over 1, so I would buy 2 to be safe. (you can either buy it at Michael's, Joanne's Fabric, or online) HINT: You can buy tulle at other places, but it doesnt come in a bolt.  You would have to cut it not only length (like I did), but you would ALSO have to cut it width too b/c it is much wider.
3. Something to work around to make it MUCH easier!

Bailey's 9 month photo shoot

I can't believe I am writing about Bailey being 9 months old!   Time has flown too fast!  These photo's were somthing I had been thinking about for many months and I made the tutu Bailey is wearing :) We don't go to the Dr. until the 22nd so I don't know her weight and height yet.  But, here are a few things Bailey Boo Boo is up too...

~She is a super fast crawler!

~She has been standing up on her own more and more & pulls up on everything

~She has 8 teeth! (4 on top, 4 on bottom)

~Mimi taught her to wave "hi"! Which is toooo cute for words!

~She LOVES stage 3 baby food, especially the ones with meat!

~She will cry if you take a toy from her :(

~She has sat in "time out" a few times, which is hilarious...and only does so b/c when we tell her "no, no"...Jackson says, "Bailey sit in time out!" and we don't want him to think he is the only one who has to be punished ;)

~She eats a lot of what we eat now and enjoys almost everything!

~Bailey has been feeding herself her bottle since she was just over 6 months old and prefers to do it herself

~She whimpers when your taking her upstairs for a nap b/c she knows what is about to happen...then cries the very second you walk in her room ;)  Funny, that once you put her down she is almost happy to go to sleep :)

~She HATES to have her diaper changed!  I hate that stage b/c it is almost impossible with how fast she can get away! 

~Not to state the obvious, but she also hates to get dressed to for the same reason...she does not want to sit still :)

~Her and Jackson "play" ALL the time together.  They LOVE to chase each other! In fact, he actually says, "Bay-wee...want to pway (play) toys?!?!" or "Bay-wee pway (play) in Jackson's room?!?" "Tome (come) this way Bay-wee!!"  It's funny because he expects a response from her & she just looks at him with a blank expression :)  She just LIGHTS up when she looks at Jackson, it's so beautiful to watch them grow up together!

~She is still taking two 2 or 3hr naps.  One at about 9:30am and one at 2pm with Jackson.

~She has started to play favorites and reach for John or I when someone else is holding her and gets SOOO sad when we put her in the church nursery :( 

Happy 4th of July!

 We had a great 4th...we just didn't have a great 3rd of July ;)  Poor John was stung by a yellow jacket at our house and he is highly allergic!  So if you look at this picture and notice something a little off about him, it's because his eye was completely swollen shut and the left half of his face was too!  He was so sweet to be a trooper and we still went to Atlanta to celebrate the 4th...and we had a great time! **Sweet Hailey (one of Wade & Kelli's kids said to Wade, "Daddy, is he blind?!?" LOLOL  B/c he wore his sunglasses all night so he wouldn't scare the kids :)

 Some of the boys :)  John has known some of them since elementary and the rest from high school.

 Can't wait for Sloane and Kelli to have their little boys!

 How cool is this?!?!  Wade and Kelli have their trampoline dug into the ground!  The kids had a blast on it :)

 Brooke and I :)

 Jackson LOVED doing sparklers!