Celebrations

This weekend we flew to Midland for two important celebrations: Luke's 3rd birthday and Steven and Megan's engagemenet party! It had also been a while since we'd seen our families, so it was great to spend the weekend with them!

Saturday morning we got some good pool time with Mimi. Gracie loved floating and playing in the water with Daddy! The water was a tad on the cold side, so I stayed on the sidelines and watched them play. Once she got tired of being on the float, Mimi pulled out some new water toys, and Gracie sat and played happily on the pool shelf.


After an hour or so of playing, it was time to eat lunch and go to Luke's birthday party. Kim had rented a huge blow-up pool and slide set for the kiddos. Gracie was a little too small for the slide, and it was pretty hot in the sun, so Trinity's uncle pulled out the baby pool for Gracie. It was perfect for her, especially with the HOT weather. She splashed around and laughed at the kids running around and splashing each other in the big kid pool. Cousin Luke got lots of great presents from the family, and he was pretty excited about the bike that Gracie gave him!

Saturday night we celebrated my brother's engagement to the sweetest girl in the world, Megan! We are all so lucky to welcome her into our family, and we couldn't be happier for the two of them. The party was a huge success and had a great turnout! We had delicious brisket, ham, and a ton of sides, complete with plenty of wine and beer. Mimi and Pop sure know how to throw a party!

The Family

The rest of the weekend we spent visiting with Mimi and Pop or Nana and PopPop. Thanks to our family for another great visit! We love you all so much and wish we could spend more time with you all.

10 Months

With only two months until our baby girl is no longer a baby, I wanted to share our daughter's life as a 10 month old.

Gracie is crawling all over the house like a champ. She loves to speed crawl between our living room and kitchen while panting! She'll even chase the dogs around, which she thinks is great fun. I can't tell if they are playing with her or running away from her, but she obviously thinks it is a fun game! She will occasionally still crawl in her own special way, but I don't see her do it as often as she used to do it.

Grace is also walking along the furniture and walls with no fear! I keep thinking she'll let go and take her first steps any day now. We keep trying to get her to let go and walk on her own, but for now she still holds on to our hands with an iron grip! If she happens to let go, she quickly plops on her bottom and begins to crawl where she wants to go.

The other day Grace stood unsupported for the first time! She was standing at our coffee table and trying to drink her bottle with one hand. At some point, her other hand let go of the table, and she was standing with both hands on her bottle for at least 30 seconds. Thankfully Trinity caught my attention and I quickly snapped a photo with my iPhone.

Bedtime is finally becoming less of a struggle! After talking it over with a friend of mine, I decided a more rigid nighttime routine was necessary, and it worked like a charm! Sometime I'm going to blog about an average day in the life Grace Vaughn (also an idea stolen from my wise friend above), so you'll get to hear about our new bedtime routine when I get around to writing that blog.

Thankfully, feeding Gracie is still an easy task, and she'll eat just about anything you stick on her tray. Every once in a while she'll decide she doesn't want "insert dinner item here" for dinner and will stick it in her mouth and immediately spit it out, but then the next day she's eat it ravenously. I guess that is no different than my tastes on any give day. Just ask Trinity. He gets SO annoyed at my random pickiness when we're trying to decide what to eat!

Gracie has started to get a little bit more attached to her first doll, which she sleeps with at night. Although she doesn't carry it around with her or cry for it like some kids do for their "lovie", she does cuddle with it when we put her in bed each night. I hope that Grace continues to love on this baby doll, as it brings back great memories of my favorite doll, Polyanna. I actually still have Poly-oly, as I called her before I could say Polyanna, but she is VERY dirty and falling apart! I just can't bring myself to get rid of her. She used to comfort me when I was sad, even after I was too old to have a doll.

Right now, Gracie's favorite activities include stacking blocks, pulling toys in and out of a box, and reading books. Trinity and I are both glad that she loves books, even if it means she pulls ALL the books off the shelf on a daily basis. We have two canvas boxes of her toys in the living room, and almost every day Grace will pull toys in and out of them. Her teachers says she does the same thing at daycare!

Speaking of daycare, she is doing great there! She has made lots of friends, and it is so fun to drop her off in the morning and watch the little babies get excited at seeing each other and start playing before I've even left the room. I absolutely love her morning teacher, and I will be extremely upset on the day Gracie has to move on to the toddler room. I am sure the toddler teachers are great as well, but Miss Sylvia has been an amazing teacher. I know she is the reason I'm so comfortable with Grace at daycare.

I'll leave you with a recent picture of our growing girl, who's hair is finally long enough for a small clip!

July is Over?!?

Wow, this summer sure has flown by, and it sure has been a hot one! We are on day 30 or 31 of 100+ temperatures, so it's been too hot to spend much time outdoors with Grace. We have, however, spent a morning in a baby pool our friends were kind enough to let us borrow. We just hook it up to the water hose, and it's like a mini-waterpark for babies! Hopefully we'll get some more use out of it throughout the rest of the summer because Gracie loved it!

Unfortunately, the hot weather made our trip to Rahr & Sons almost unbearable! We scheduled a trip to the unairconditioned Fort Worth brewery with Erin and Craig a month in advance (I know, crazy that our schedules did not accomodate a trip for an entire month), so we had no idea the weather was going to be quite so hot. But it was good to catch up with them while drinking three good beers in a keepsake glass for a cheap $7 entry fee!

We knew we were in FW when we saw this man...

The last week of July was my 29th birthday, and Trinity made it a special one! He took me to eat at Fearing's for a wonderful meal complete with a bottle of wine and scrumptious desserts! I've been wanting to go for quite a while, so it was good to celebrate a special occassion there! Trinity had to leave town on my birthday, so he ordered flowers and had them delivered to Grace's daycare. So when I went to pick her up that evening, I had beautiful flowers to take home along with my beautiful daughter! Her teachers also put together a birthday card from Grace, which was so sweet of them! We met Steven and Megan for dinner that night. It was one of the best birthdays I've had in a while!

Grace and I ended the month of July with a trip to Houston to visit Trinity. He's been working there a lot lately, so we decided to take advantage of the free hotel room for a weekend getaway. Grace did great in the car both to and from Houston! I was a little worried, as we haven't been on a roadtrip with her since Christmas when she was only 3 months old, and I would be solo on this trip. But I shouldn't have worried. She slept the entire trip, except for the stop at Buckee's to buy Daddy some beef jerky!

We split Saturday with Anna and her family and then my aunt, uncle, and cousins. It was so fun to see how much Ellie and Lexa have grown, and Gracie was very interested in watching them play! She loves, loves, loves to watch other children. I don't blame her; they are very entertaining! It was also great to catch up with my family. We were supposed to watch Hayden play baseball, but his tournament was canceled due to a flooded field, so we just hung out their house and then went to dinner instead. They are always so much fun to hang out with, so I was glad we were able to spend some quality time with them too!

Sunday Trinity, Gracie, and I met two of his coworkers from brunch and then headed to the Waterwall, which is a 64 foot waterfall right next to the Galleria. I had seen pictures of the wall from Jessica's trip to Houston but had forgotten about it until Anna mentioned it to me on Saturday. Our hotel was just down the road, so it was a convenient place to go! I'm not sure Grace knew what was going on, but it was fun to get some pictures; one of which is my new favorite picture of the three of us!

My Newest Creations

This week I've spent my evenings sewing after Gracie is in bed. I am really enjoying this new hobby, and it's the perfect evening activity while Trinity is out of town.

Here are my second and third sewing project finished! I made some bloomers in the green and pink striped material to match both shirts.


I'm trying to decide what I want to start on next. The sizing is sometimes a challenge. Gracie is wearing 12-18 month clothing now, but I'm curious if her growth will slow down any now that she's mobile. I have a pattern and material for her birthday dress, but I'm holding off until it gets a little closer... just to be sure it fits!

Beach Babe

We have another beach babe in the family! I took Gracie to Clearwater Beach, Florida with my mom and five other lovely ladies last weekend. We arrived Thursday around 11am and headed straight for the beach after picking up our rental minivan.

Unfortunately, a storm blew in as soon as we arrived at the beach, so we went straight to The Palm Pavilion bar and grill (our favorite spot right on the beach and next to our hotel, the Palm Pavilion Inn) for lunch and our first drink of the weekend. The food and drinks at The Palm are great and cheap. And they have live music all weekend, so it's a great atmosphere. Last year it's the only place my mom and I ate the entire weekend.

After dinner on Thursday we all walked down to the beach and let Gracie walk at the water's edge. We were disappointed that we didn't have any time at the beach but were hopeful it would clear up in the morning.

First time in the water

The weather did not cooperate. It was extremely frustrating to watch the days waste away under storm after storm. Friday we headed to John's Pass for breakfast and some shopping, hoping that after a few hours the sun would shine. But it wasn't meant to be, so we took our time shopping and even stopped for coffee and hot tea... something I never thought we'd want to drink at the beach! Friday night it was back to The Palm for dinner, drinks and music. Megan, Gracie and I again walked down to the water to get our feet wet. Grace loved sitting in the water as the waves splashed around her. Grace and I called it a night early, but the rest of the ladies danced and sang the night away!

Saturday morning we woke to a rain-free morning. There were still plenty of clouds in the sky, but we were determined to have a beach day, rain or shine. A few sprinkles came and went throughout the morning, but we didn't have to head for cover so it was a successful day!

This was Grace's only full day on the beach, and she did great! She was not so sure about sand on her feet and hands, but thankfully I had bought her a sunshade that kept her off the sand and out of the sun.

The Palm Pavilion Bar and Grill and Inn are behind Gracie

Although she wasn't a big fan of the sand, she LOVED the water! She relaxed on her turtle float (nicknamed Tommy the Turtle by Mimi), and giggled and splashed as the waves came and went.

Saturday night we had dinner at another great restaurant on the beach and saw our first sunset over the water before bedtime.


We had to head home Sunday afternoon, but the weather was beautiful that morning, so we spent a few hours on the beach before cleaning up and heading to the airport. Grace again floated in Tommy the Turtle and even fell asleep! Mimi and I were excited to see that we'd have a fellow sea-floater for our beach trips! I was again thankful to have the sunshade because it was sunny and hot!
It was hard to say goodbye to the beach so quickly, but we had great company that made the trip a success, even though we had less time on the water than we had expected to enjoy. I guess there's always next year!

9 Months

Gracie hit some pretty exciting milestones this month!

She has been crawling the official way for about two weeks now. She will still occasionally crawl with one knee in the air, but she's figured out that she is a lot swifter on both knees. Grace is also very interest in walking these days. She loves to hold onto furniture or someone's hands and walk all over the place. Her balance is much improved, so I won't be surprised if she takes her first solo steps before her first birthday! We have yet to completely baby-proof the house, so we folllow her all around as she explores new rooms, stairs, and cabinets!

She remains in the 95+ percentile for height and weight at 23 pounds, 9 ounces and 29 inches long, but she seems to be slimming down some at the same time. Her face doesn't look quite so chubby, but those thunder thighs sure are sticking around!

These days Grace prefers "real" food, as opposed to baby food. If we don't have enough veggies or fruit with our meal, I'll feed her baby food before any other food is brought to the table. She has no interest in the baby food once she sees our food! I honestly can't blame her... our food has seasoning. Daycare also feeds her portions of baby food and finger foods. To date Gracie has already had more food than I can keep track of, but some of her most common foods include: pineapple, apples, mandarin oranges, mac & cheese, chicken breast, deli meats, hamburger, black beans, green beans, peas, guacamole, yogurt, cheese, rice, and bread. I have yet to see her reject any food we offer her! She'll even eat a pickle or lemon!

As I posted earlier this month, Grace has had a little separation anxiety from her momma. Thankfully it is usually only when she is really hungry or tired. Bedtime is definitely a struggle when I have to put her down, which has been more often because of Trinity's travel for work. She's also cried when I dropped her off at daycare a total of three times (yes, I'm counting), so I usually try to wait until she's distracted by one of her teachers or another kid before I head out the door.

Overall, she is very happy at daycare though, and Trinity and I are very happy with her teachers. I know she has a special bond with the main teacher, Miss Silvia. Silvia has been out for the last two weeks, so Gracie was very happy to see her this morning when I dropped her off at daycare. She smiled big time and reach out her hands to go to her as soon as we walked into the room. It was too cute!

Gracie is still a very happy girl, and we have been so blessed these last 9 months. I can't wait to see what the next few months have in store for us, as she continues to grow and learn!

Sew What?!?

If you had asked me a year ago if I wanted to learn to sew, I would have laughed in your face! But there is something about looking at adorable $50 little girls clothing and knowing that it can't possible cost that much to make them that made me want to learn. I might not ever be good enough to sell the clothes I sew, but they will definitely be good enough for Gracie to wear for the few months she'll fit in them!

A few weeks ago my mom, Megan, and I were sitting around drinking wine on a Saturday night, and my mom asked what I wanted for my birthday. I mentioned that I had thought about asking for a sewing machine so that I could learn to sew for Gracie. Thirty minutes later, after finishing our bottle of wine, we were on the internet looking at sewing maching prices! We headed out to Target and Walmart around 10pm and came home with a $100 machine!

The next morning my mom and I went to Joann's and bought a pattern, material, and the necessary supplies to teach me to sew! We thought making Grace a 4th of July outfit would be a good first project. As an aside, my mom made my whole family matching 4th outfits one year, and we were one good-looking family! Unfortunately, our shorts fit us for about 5 years... much longer than any of us wanted to match!

That afternoon Mom and I sewed for quite some time. I was pretty slow at the beginning, but I started to get braver as the afternoon went on. By the end of the day, I had made pretty good progress on the bloomers. Ironically, they looked quite large, as Trinity is demonstrating!

Over the next week I worked on the outfit after putting Gracie to bed each night. It took just over a week to complete the top and bottom, and I was so proud of my accomplishment that I decided to make the matching hat!

Although my seams aren't always straight, I was generally pretty surprised at how well the outfit turned out. It was a lot easier than I expected it to be, and I definitely think that I have already improved from the beginning to the end of my adventure.

Gracie wore her darling outfit to Erin and Craig's cookout on the 4th. I was so glad it fit! I wasn't able to get a great picture of her with the hat on because she just doesn't like things on her head.

This project was so much fun, and I cannot wait until I can start on the next outfit for Gracie! I already have some material waiting for me to start, and I have plans to make Grace's dress for her first birthday party!