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Wordless Wednesday: My Frog Prince

Things I'm Loving These Days...

There are certain things that, as a new mommy, I'm loving something fierce these days.

Or, as a fabulous pal often says, "Pink Puffy Heart-ing" something. 

These things make my life easier, more economical, and give me a good giggle every once and a while.  They may or may not do all three, but usually they hit at least two out of the three. 

1.  AmazonMom.com - um, hello lovah.  I've signed up for the Subscribe and Save for their diapers.  You save 30% off by being a mommy and by signing up for regular shipments.  They are - by far - the cheapest route to go.  And since H goes through 10-12 diapers a day, my hoarding stash dwindled down in a hurry. 

And, if you don't need your monthly shipment, you just log right in there to ole Amazon and say "Wait until next month folks." 

And it's not just diapers.  They have everything, so we subscribed to a monthly toliet paper delivery as well. 

It's an exciting day when Pampers and Angel Soft visit our home. 

Don't be jealous of the glamorous life of the Smiths. 

2.  Publix.  I've managed to stay on track with the New Year's Resolution of couponing and saving moola, and I have Publix - specifically Iheartpublix.com - to thank for it.  I've gotten it down to about $50/week for groceries.  Still a long way to go, but I'll take what I can get right now.  Sitting there cutting out coupons and planning meals bi-weekly isn't easy with an adorable Pork Chop watching from his lamb swing. 

3.  Friends with buns in the oven.  Obviously I'm not going to name names here, but apparently Mr. Smith and I are contagious.  If you're thinking about jumping on the Baby Train, eat or drink after one of us.  I am LOVING the fact that so many of my nearest and dearest are jumping aboard this adventure (whether planned or not). 

4.  Russell Brand.  Why?  I have no idea.  I've commented on my adoration for him before, but we recently watched "Arthur" and I almost wet my pants from laughing so hard.  Russell, call me. I want to hang. 

5.  The USA Network.  I'm usually not a big fan of cable television, but with the absolute drought in good TV these days, I've been leaning on USA a lot.  Cue Covert Affairs, Necessary Roughness, and Suits.  I'm a smitten kitten.  Obviously we're not getting out a lot these days, so I've built up quite the routine with USA. 

6.  B-feeding with my Medela Freestyle Pump.  Yes, there's a post coming about this topic; I'm just trying to edit it so I don't simultaneously scare potential b-feeders away/horrify my mother for talking so candidly.  However, since H acts like we're trying to feed him cat urine when we try to sneak in a formula bottle, this is what we're sticking with for now.  My pump is amazing, and I will be forever thankful for Mrs. Wagner for this slice of heaven.  And the ability to freeze and store for the future.  And the ease of using a bottle with it.  And that it is free.  God sure knew what He was doing in this department!  I could go on and on, but I'll save it for later. 

7.  Dee Dee and Nanny Suz at-home daycare services.  Everyone should have grandmother and bestie like these two.  They have single-handedly provided us with a precious gift this summer by watching H.  Dee Dee drives down from Cullman almost every single day to spend time with her special fella, and on the days she couldn't, Nanny Suz (that's Mrs. Carroll, to everyone else) eagerly opened her arms for some daytime snuggling.  These ladies bought us 6 weeks of fabulous one-on-one care for H-Man, allowing him to get a little bit (or a lotta bit) stronger before big daycare starts.  And it hasn't hurt that's it's been free, either. 

Social Butterfly

Over the past few weekends, H has been initiated into a proper Southern summer:  weddings and wedding showers. 

It's a hard life.

A couple of weekends ago, we celebrated Mr. and Mrs. Rett Grover with a lovely Reception at The Club, which overlooks Birmingham. 

We skipped the ceremony.  I didn't want to be "that girl with the crying baby" in Mrs. Grover's wedding video.  Just in case. 

We were pumped to hang out with these squirrels:  Mr. and Mrs. Dudley. 

Even if they are Auburn fans.

P.S.  Update your blog, Dudleys!

H was the life of the party. 

Until these bad boys started up... 

... which woke him up, but thankfully didn't upset him.

So we headed to the dance floor, where we boogied with Mrs. Searson.

Being the rock star that H is, all that did was put him to sleep.

Last weekend, H and I ventured out to celebrate these crazy kids at their Luau-themed wedding shower. 

Aren't they cute with H? 

Do I hear a nomination for a honeymoon baby? 

Anyone? 

One guess as to what we're doing this Saturday.

Pics to come.

Three Months!

Dear Harrison,

You are 3 months old!

You are a little over 24 inches in length, and weigh 12 lbs. 6 oz.

You wear Size 3 months and Size 3-6 month clothing, with Size 2 diapers. 

You're developing more and more, and I swear to Bear Bryant you said "elephant" the other day.

You are sleeping in your pack and play in our bedroom, but still prefer to sleep all snuggled up to Momma. 

You can take a bottle like a champ, but Momma is still your dining preference of choice. 

You are such a wiggle worm!  I'm confident in the next few weeks you'll be rolling over and solidly holding up your head. 

Your favorite things include staring at the ceiling fan, your satin lovie, and taking baths. 

You're also at your best self in the mornings, and daddy and I loved to lay there in the bed with you smiling and baby-talking. 

And just when I think my heart cannot expand anymore, it does every single day with how much I love you. 

One of those days...

Yesterday I had "one of those days." 

You know them - when you just can't catch a break. 

The Smith's have been feeling like this a lot lately - we're gearing up to put our house on the market.

Who knew you had to spend a fortune getting it ready for this? 

To say we were blindsided by the endless "To Do" lists is a bit of an understatement.

We've heard both good and bad stories about the current real estate market, but the truth is we're bursting at the seams in our little home. 

We're trying to remain realistically optimistic about everything. 

But it's hard when days like yesterday happen. 

The best part of yesterday was starting to run home for lunch, to b-feed H, when a car pulled up beside me at the red light, motioned for me to roll down my window, and yelled "Gurl, your tire is completely flat."

Awesome.  And you know the whole tire had to be replaced.

So I spent my lunch at Goodyear Tire, which wasn't that bad because they did replace it super fast.

But still. 

We're not exactly growing a money tree in the backyard or anything (we can't even grow tomatoes...).

And I count on my little lunches with H these days - both for the "ladies" sake and my sake mentally.  

The gals were not prepared for such a delay. 

(I've got a post coming soon... maybe titled "Adventures in B-Feeding" that is sure to have y'all laughing hysterically.  Because you know if it can happen, it's happened to me.  Probably more than once.)

But... being realistically optimistic, I managed to squeeze out a prayer of gratitude for the mystery woman/guardian angel who sounded the alarm for my flat tire. 

I'm sure I-65 would not have been so nice to me at 70 mph with a blown-out tire. 

Hope y'all are having a wonderful day... and not "one of those days." 

Wordless Wednesday: 12 Weeks Old!

Farmer Smith

Earlier this year, Mr. Smith got a wild hair and decided that he wanted to plant some tomatoes.

Farmer Smith loves him some tomatoes, so I thought... why not?

Sounds easy (& frugal) to me.

Farmer Smith has battled bugs, the heat, his own weed-eater, and The Pooper with his mad agricultural skills.

Alas, we have produce. 

Behold:

A pear.

Yep, that's right. 

Farmer Smith is so good that somehow his tomato plants have sprouted a pear.

No tomatoes as of yet, but just this solitary pear.

We will not be quitting our day job anytime soon...

Two Years!

Happy 2-Year Wedding Anniversary Mr. Smith!

"I thank my God whenever I remember you." - Phil. 1:3

Harrison's First Fourth of July Holiday

After our romantic night at Ross Bridge, Mr. Smith, H, The Pooper and I headed down to T-Town for the long holiday weekend.  Our SUV literally looked like a bedouin tribe; I swear I packed enough for a week. 

And don't think for one minute that The Pooper didn't have shotgun, and H & I shared the backseat. 

Upon arriving, we quickly dropped off The Pooper with the grandparents (thanks y'all!) and headed over to arrange a betrothal between these Falcon babies. 

As you can see, Mary Charles is a smidgeon older than H. 

But I think H may like cougars, as his daddy did, so we'll go with it. 

Falcons:  The Next Generation

Rehearsal Dinner Picture: Year 2036

I was also glad to run into this lovely lady this weekend!  And by run into to, I may or may not mean that we drove past her family on McFarland Blvd, and I proceeded to stick my head out of the window and flag them down, whilst yelling "Hey y'all!"  Classy, I know. 

They're from Connecticut, so I'm sure they were slightly alarmed.

Miss Burch-soon-to-be-Mrs. Wetmore is a cherished sorority sister. 

Grand-little sorority sister, to be exact. 

I take these things seriously. 

Isn't she a natural?

Is it just me or does H look like The Godfather?

The Tour de Baby continued on to the Smith's Neighborhood Block Party.

H was clearly the life of the party.

As you can see.

However, he did wake up, absolutely hangry.

(Angry b/c you're so hungry.  Get it?  You can use it if you want to.)

So we headed to the grandparents' and put on our new froggie footed pajamas.

Sunday morning, we attempted Church and were successful again!

Ignore the bags under my eyes.  I've got an 11-week-old, you know. 

You're lucky I've got matching clothes on, ok?

H did great sitting behind the fabulous First Presbyterian Choir, until he pooted - quite loudly, might I add - during silent prayer time. 

I'm pretty sure people thought it was me. 

You sign up for things like that with mommyhood, I guess.

Cute outfit right?

Praising Jesus exhausted H and Mr. Smith, so they took a little nap afterwards.

Later that day, I changed H into his Fourth of July outfit, and he quickly hammed it up for the camera and family members at the scrumptious dinner the Smiths have been preparing all day long.

My attempt at a Family Picture.

Hey - we tried, right?

I wanted to make sure I captured both my boys' patriotic looks. 

But H was "over it" very quickly. 

I mean... who doesn't like to have 23459 pictures taken of oneself? 

This boy.

So his Grandpa T rocked him to sleep and talked some baseball... and all was well with the world.



Two Year Celebration!

This past Friday night, Mr. Smith and I celebrated our 2 year wedding anniversary with a little getaway at Ross Bridge.  My parents spent the night at our house with H, which we were very appreciative of, so Mr. Smith and I could have a romantic night to ourselves. 

Which is hard, because when a certain cutie patootie has been taking over your lives, it's hard to remember how "the good ole days" used to be...

I decided a nice glass of bubbly would help put me at ease.

Eating a scrumptious chocolate tort courtesy of the restaurant didn't hurt either...

But when you've been in baby mode for almost a year, it was a tad difficult. 

I feel about as sexy as this gal 98% of the time anyway.   

And try as we might, we couldn't get past this favorite conversation topic:

Can you blame us? 

We did, however, have a fabulous time relaxing, eating, and sleeping in.  Mr. Smith did a wonderful job planning the night's getaway, but I was like a bullet tearing out of there Saturday morning to get home to H.  First night away was hard, y'all! 

Wordless Wednesday: Thank you Olay for making my life just a little bit easier with these!

Hot Child in the City

Last weekend, us Smith's decided to live the "city life" with our pals, the Searsons, who are always talking up city life in the 'Ham on The Shuffle. 

We wanted a taste of the cool life, so we met them for some delicious pizza at Cosmos, in 5 Points, followed by drinks and dessert at their place. 

If you haven't made Mrs. Searson's Cookie Slop, you're missing out.

Well, what really happened was that H stole the show, as clearly seen here:

Here:

(Time Out:  This was mere seconds before H lovingly spit up his bottle all over Mrs. Searson.  She's a trooper though and the snuggling continued...)

And here:   

Just in case you didn't get the memo, teal blue cotton sundresses were the uniform last Saturday night.

Please ignore the fact that I look like Casper the friendly ghost. 

Somehow, tanning takes a back seat to raising a child. 

Sunday, Mr. Smith and I ventured to church for the first time with H. 

I may or may not have put on deoderant twice that morning, as I was so nervous about it.

H rocked it out though in the sanctuary, seemingly mesmerized by the Choir (or his pal Mr. Searson's vocal talent in the Choir???), until he started making, what I call, "The Poop Face." 

H clearly felt at home at Church, as he proceeded to blow out his diaper, right there in the balcony, for all the world to smell witness.

Mr. Smith thankfully hoisted up the carrier and walked H out to the Nursing Mothers' Room, which is conveniently located in the back of the balcony.  At the close of the service, we walked back to find Mr. Smith and H, as we were confused why they didn't appear (and I was praying Mr. Smith was not fast asleep in there...). 

Apparently, it was a Code Red (Code Brown?) situation, as H had not only blown out his diaper, but the adorable smocked outfit (read: expensive), his lovie, and even a little on the carrier.  Mr. Smith, who had shrugged off my suggestion to take the diaper bag with him earlier to the room, had attempted to change his diaper, but the only available ones in the room were Size 4's.  Needless to say, H was completely covered in the Size 4 diaper.  We quickly changed into our appropriate Size 1 diaper and back-up onesie, and headed to family lunch...

... where we got to celebrate a very happy one year anniversary to Mr. and Mrs. Whitfield!  

Doesn't Sister look pretty in her white?  Just like a bride!

 

This squirrel, having used up all his energy with the above-mentioned activity, quickly tuckered out on Daddy for the meal. 

Aren't they cute?

Take away lessons from today's post:

1.  Don't stand next to Malibu Barbie when wearing the nearly the same dress, particularly 9 weeks after giving birth.

2.  Put a bib on your child when your pal is feeding him.

3.  Force your husband to take diaper bag with him, wherever he goes.

4.  Always have back-up outfits in case of Code Brown situations.

5.  Don't get upset when your 9-week-old damages the expensive smocked outfit you may or may not have spent a tiny fortune on.  You should have known better.