I know, I know. I haven't updated in awhile. There really just hasn't been much to update lately. Life has been ordinary and I've been busy getting ready for Madeline's birthday on Friday. Here are some recent pictures to keep you busy until my massive birthday postings to come soon.

I only let her do this for 15 minutes or so. Just enough time to at least get dinner started at night. She really likes the kids shows with singing and dancing.

That's My Girl!

This was the update I got for Madeline from daycare a few days ago:

"Madeline seemed to have a wonderful day today. This morning she went out for a buggy ride with her friend Sophia, when they came in we had a music session with drums and a xylphone (She loved the drums). After lunch we played peek-a-boo and read stories."

Do we have another drummer in the family? I'm probably one of the only Moms in America who would be happy about that.

Here are two more pictures they sent me this week.

Baby Bikini

Madeline is ready for the pool. Hehe We had a good laugh with this. Her top has a bunch of little flowers on it.

Madeline taking some steps!

Look at her go!

Daycare pictures

I love getting my daily email updates with pictures from our new daycare. It really brightens my afternoon. She is adjusting really well to the new place. This is where she eats lunch with her friend, Leo.

They have her doing all kinds of art projects and fun things too.

11 months old

Madeline is 11 months old today! One more month and we’ll have a one year old on our hands. Eek! Here is what’s new this month…

- Her cheekies and large budda-belly are starting to thin out. They are still there, but not as big as they were before.

- She refuses to eat vegetables now. No matter how I season them or try to feed them to her. I suppose I can’t blame her since we aren’t too great about eating them either. I’m hoping it’s just a phase.

- She has her first upper tooth coming in! This will be tooth number 3. It cut through last week.

- She can give you a High Five. Next time you see her, ask her for one. She thinks it’s funny.

- Speaking of funny, she loves to yuk it up now and make us laugh. Her favorite thing to do is crawl over to the dog bed and fall into it (which she knows we hate) and start laughing. She’ll look up at us and just be giggling away.

- And the biggest development of the month…she took her first step! And she is up to two steps now without falling.

Crafty Friends

I have some crafty friends. I don’t have a crafty bone in my body, but their craftiness rubs off on me. Hence the cute homemade water bottle labels and carved watermelon baby buggy for Jackie’s baby shower, to name a few. All inspired by them. So I want to give them some shout outs.


First is Steph. Recently she made me this super cute purse/diaper bag she calls The Favorite Bag. I love it and use it everyday now! It has 6 large pockets inside and it’s also completely reversible if you want the pockets on the outside.

She also makes eco-friendly dish washing soap called Wish Wash Dish Wash, all kinds of baby accessories like bibs and pacifier clips and soon to come is eco-friendly laundry detergent. Check her out at ….. Mada’s Place. (link is clickable)

Next up is Savvy Sarah. Look at these darling onesies she made for me. She has excellent customer service and works with you to create the exact design that you want. I absolutely love how mine turned out!! Look how cute Madeline looks in hers. I got one for Alexis too. Obviously we need to wait awhile before we see her in it though.

I'm sure she can make whatever design you come up with. See all that she has to offer at … Savvy Sarah Designs.

And last, but certainly not least, is my good friend Jan. She does all kinds of stuff from scrapbooking, to sewing, making cute little bird houses, Scented Science guys, blog template designs, and more! She has a really great Crafting Blog with all of her latest projects as well as an Esty site where she sells her stuff. She also maintains Martha Daily, a blog with daily crafting tips.

Whats more, both Steph and Jan will be presenting their wares at The Columbus Craftacular on May 16th and 17th at the Whetstone Community Center. Please visit them and buy lots of stuff! And check out the website too. Jan designed it and is keeping it maintained and updated.

Happy 3 Year Anniversary!

It's our 3 year anniversary today. We got a babysitter and are going out for dinner to celebrate. We are both sick so hopefully we can still enjoy the meal, but regardless, we'll enjoy the time spent together alone.

I love you, Sweetie!

New Daycare!

Madeline started her new daycare center today. Friday was a sad day when we said Goodbye to her teachers. They really were great and I will miss them alot. They have taken really good care of Madeline since she was 3 months old. So they have seen her grow alot! I feel sad thinking about them. But obviously we left for certain reasons; we just need to feel at home at the new center now.

I was nervous all morning like it was MY first day of school. But Madeline and I have been taking short visits recently so she wasn't totally weirded out this morning when we dropped her off. The center takes pictures and emails us everyday with an update. So here we are dropping her off.

And she actually had a pretty good day. Other than a meltdown at lunch, she did great. I visited her at lunchtime which was so much fun. Here she is with her new friend, Leo.


One of her teachers, Miss Heather, rocking her to sleep.

And here is an excerpt from our daily update...

"Today we welcomed a new friend to A3. Madeline is 10 months old and will be an excellent addition to A3. Leo seemed to enjoy having a friend close to his age. Leo and Madeline took turns examining each other.

We let Madeline choose the book selection for the day. She picked You and Me, Baby, by Lynn Reiser and Penny Gentieu. This book is popular with both the older and younger children. The older children pointed out different parts of the face on the photos, while the younger ones enjoyed the faces of the babies.

The older children practiced their walking skills by holding on to Miss Heather’s fingers and wandering around the room. The younger babies practiced sitting while being supported from behind.

Musical instruments were set out for the children to use. The children knew immediately the function of the toys. They shook and banged the instruments as soon as they heard music. Then they searched out new instruments to test their mallets, the favorite was the noise made from hitting the window separating the changing area. "

Busy Weekend

Watch out! This is a long post full of pictures. It was a busy weekend starting with baby shower # 2 for Jackie on Saturday.


This is my beautiful mother getting all the food setup. Now you can see where I get all my good looks. ;)

Poor Madeline got so tired that she passed out while Jackie was holding her.

Madeline and I were quite tired from our jam-packed day in Cincy, so getting up early the next morning was not something we were both thrilled about. But we couldn't not go support Andy in the Fisher 5K! You can tell she is not too excited here.

And he's off.....(he has a white shirt and blue shorts on)

Once the runners started crossing the finish line, Madeline was having fun watching them.

Andy came in faster than I was expecting, so I almost missed him.

First Step!

Madeline took her first step last night!! She fell over once she went for the second step, but she's got the first one down. She was playing with her new walker from Aunt Jackie and she stopped, took her hands off and started doing her baby dance. So we thought we would try and see if she would take a step without holding onto anything. It took some coercing from Mommy and Daddy, but she did it. So you know we'll be doing this the rest of the week. I wonder how many steps we can get her up to by the weekend?

A Baby Shower for Jackie, Part 1

Yesterday, my Mom and I threw the first of two baby showers for my sister, Jackie. We have such a large family that we have to split up the Italians from my Dad's side.

I made custom water bottle labels.

And I carved out this Watermelon Baby Buggy from this tutorial *here*. The scalloping didn't turn out as well as I wanted, but it's still cute. I'll have a second go at it next weekend and hopefully it will turn out a little better.

Jackie received lots of great gifts! And Madeline had to help, of course.