Cloth Diaper Guest Post

On Wednesday I had the honor of being a guest blogger for my friend Kira at Rain or Shine who is expecting her first baby, a girl, in October! 

If you are a new mama and/or are interested learning more about cloth diapering you should check it out here!

Birthday weekend!

Saturday we had Blake's 1st Birthday Party! I still can't believe he is one. We had so much fun celebrating! I'll let the pictures do the talking :)

I always wish I would take more pictures. We had so many friends and family come to help us celebrate and it makes me sad that we don't have very many good pictures of them. I need to get better at that! We had so much fun and thank you to everyone who came! You made the day very special! We love you all! I still can't believe my little boy is one! 

ONE!

Blake turned ONE today! I can't believe a year has gone by. I can't believe this was a year ago. If I think about it too much I will start crying. The last year just went by so fast. I guess time sure flies when your having fun!

The happy birthday boy!

Some 1 year birthday stats:

He loves to feed himself finger foods. 

Still no teeth. 

He pulls him self up on anything and can cruise the furniture.

He sleeps great 7am-7pm most nights :)

He can wave bye-bye and blow kisses!

Happy Birthday Blake! We love you so much!! 

A quick up date...

Wow life has sure been busy lately! I just can't seem to find the time to sit down and blog. Thought I would give a quick update on life in the Bartlett Household (bullet point format)...

• Blake turns one in 4 days.... this makes me want to start crying. Seriously.
• I've been training for a new job! I'm able to do it all from home and to start it will only be about 2-5 hours a week which is perfect! And I'm still able to also watch Michael.
• It continues to rain in our neck of the woods.... boo rain.
• Blake loves to pull himself up on anything and everything and WALK around it!
• We finally picked out paint for the outside of the house! Painting will start this weekend, weather permitting.
• Planning a 1st birthday is a lot of work! But fun!
• Lots of yard work has been taking place. A couple weekends ago Don and Pam came up and helped us lay bark and some gravel... its amazing what a little bark can do!

Well that pretty much about sums it up. The days literally fly by. 

Came across this tonight, check it out if you haven't seen it already...

Such a neat idea huh? I LOVE it! And just create Blake an email account :) How cool will it be to be able to look back on those emails. Now lets just hope I can keep up with it! 

First Hair Cut

Blake had is first hair cut today! I had a hard time deciding if he really needed one but after a few comments from friends I decided it was time. I guess it just felt funny cutting his hair because I'm sure I didn't have my first hair cut till I was probably two (he's not even one yet). But he is a boy so maybe it's a little different. It worked out perfect too because my friend's sister who cuts hair just so happened to be coming through town and was able to cut!

 Before

 He sat still for the most part. 

After

It doesn't really look much different but now it doesn't split down the middle in the front or catch on his collar in the back. Thank you Katy!

My first Mother's Day

For Mother's Day we enjoyed a nice day just the 3 of us. I woke up to Russell making me this french toast for breakfast. Blake even slept till 8ish (but I think that was in part to his oddly being awake from 2-4am)(I guess he just felt the need to wish me an extra early happy mother's day, not my idea of a happy mother's day haha). The french toast was delicious! 

 Durring breakfast I opened my Mother's Day gift... 

 I love it!! Russell ordered it from here. I don't wear much any jewelry except my wedding ring. So when my good friend showed me this website I thought hey, I could wear that, it's nice and simple and would go with pretty much whatever I wear. That's my kind of jewelry. Simple. 

After we had breakfast, we franticly got ready and headed to church. 

After church we went to Starbucks and I enjoyed my favorite, a Carmel Machiato, yum! Then we went out to a little nursery off of Peoria Road and bought some flowers to plant in the pots on the deck. We headed home after that. When we got home we had lunch and then Blake took a 3 hour nap! While he was napping Russ and I did just the normal Sunday stuff around the house. It was a great day!

At church the Pastor spoke about three different mothers in the Bible (two were "good" one was "bad"). He talked about how the Bible didn't give much insight into what kind of mothers these women were, but how we did know what kind of women they were. And through knowing what kind of women they were we could gain what kind of mothers they were. They were women who saw God as holy and feared the Him. Another thing the Pastor said that really stood out to me was that it wasn't our idea to honor mom's, it was God's idea. 

Before this Mother's Day, my first Mother's Day, I kind of just saw it as a "hallmark holiday" just another one of those holiday's. But after becoming a mother there is much more to it then that. Being a mom is one of the most important jobs I will ever have. And I am so thankful, (even more thankful now) for my mom. I can't say thank you enough to you, mom, for you unconditional love, for everything you have done for me my whole life. Thank you, I love you! 

11 Months!

11 months! How did that happen?! I can't believe how fast the last 11 months have gone by.

He is CONSTANTLY moving so it is getting really hard to get a good picture of him!

Blake stats:

He loves to feed himself finger foods or to try grabbing the spoon as its going to his mouth which can make it kind of a challenge to not get food everywhere.

He had is first yogurt a few days ago and loved it! 

He has started waving!

He will clap when we sing "If your happy and you know it"

He is still is army-crawling but will occasionally crawl on his hands and knees. 

He is getting more adventurous on what he pulls him self up on. 

He has even taken a couple steps while holding on to something. 

He is still wearing mostly 9 month size clothing but can fit into 12 month (he's still a little guy!)