six month Annabelle

At the exact moment I turned 6 months old we were leaving the Cracker Barrel parking lot.

Daddy always makes me smile!

Vital statistics: I weigh 12 lbs. 9 oz. Mom said she thought I was around 13 or 14lbs. Do I look like a chubby baby?

I dislike: bananas and sleeping for more than 6 hours in a row

My favorite toys are: paper, plastic medicine droppers, hair, eating mail, my rubber ducky

Milestones of my young life this month:
* I roll all over the place. Once Mom wasn't paying attention to me and when Dad asked where I was, she said I was playing on the rug. Except I wasn't. I rolled myself into the corner and nobody knew.
* I just learned how to sit up!

* I tried a lot of food this month. I like carrots, kale, limes, cantaloupe, peppers and apples.

* I hung out with Mom all week while Dad was in the field. I was so glad when he came back.
* I like to wave at everyone and everything with both arms.

* I went to the pet store. Mom was more excited than I was.  

Editorial comments- Five months was not my favorite age so far. She's so fun to play with, but she spent most of the month whining, pulling at her ears, boycotting naps and not sleeping through the night. The fact that she went a week without a dirty diaper didn't help. If she ends up in therapy later in life it will be from the day the doctor told us to use a suppository. I might end up in therapy for that too. 

As fun as it will be to have her first birthday party, I am in NO RUSH. I can't handle how fast she's growing. 

I'm sorry your baby isn't as cute as mine.

my green thumb turned black very quickly

This was my garden a few weeks ago. The tomatoes were out of control and smothering the peppers and basil. The marigolds never even had a chance. Even though it looks like a disaster zone, it was the most abundant garden I ever had. You don't know how many times I patted myself on the back this summer after making tomato sauce from tomatoes I grew. My gardening skilz were second to none. 

I bought this plant at Christmas time and have done absolutely nothing with it except occasionally water it and move it from the front porch to the back deck. I showed it to Annabelle the other day and told her that although the plant seemed dead, but it must still be alive because the berries were as vibrant as ever. (Science lesson of the day!) Plants flourish in my presence. 

 Then I picked up a branch to show her and low and behold, THE BERRIES ARE FAKE AND ATTACHED WITH WIRE.

That was the day I lost my Garden Club of America card.

I tried thinking of a creative title but for once I'm out of words

Last weekend I went to the dotMom conference in Nashville. I'd like to say I went purely because I wanted to be encouraged as I train my young child to walk the pathway of the Lord, but that's only 10% accurate. The other ninety percent is three of my favorite bloggers were going and I wanted to meet them. In case it hasn't been made glaringly obvious over the years, I would rather be bitten by a thousand mosquitos than talk to strangers, yet I paid $68 to attend an event in the hopes of meeting three. Sometimes I do not understand myself. 

Number one on my agenda (hello, my name is Sarah and I'm a stalker) was Kelly. Christopher and I met through her blog and I feel deeply indebted to her for being partially responsible for the number of times we've moved both my husband and my baby. I was walking down the hallway when she walked by going the opposite direction. I was 99.99% sure it was her, but I was still recovering from the embarrassing incident five minutes earlier when I walked up to a girl I was convinced I knew from my birth class only to discover that it wasn't. I didn't want a repeat awkward moment so I almost didn't follow Kelly, but I decided to be all carpe diem so I swung around and chased her into a classroom. I hope Annabelle follows the example of ladylike behavior I showed that day.   

Annabelle was trying to give Kelly a fist bump.

Kelly was so sweet. I'm sure I blew her away with my wit and smoothness. NOT. I was so nervous that I blurted out, "My friend Laura said to tell you she said hi." LAURA SAID NO SUCH THING. I don't know where that came from. Once it was out of my mouth I couldn't get it back. I'm sure Laura would have asked me to pass along the message but she didn't. Kelly, if you ever read this I want you to know I didn't mean to lie. 

The next day I was still on my Kelly high and had my goals set on meeting Sophie and Melanie. Elizabeth cheered me on from Massachusetts.

 

We have a caps button and know how to use it.

I want to say for the record that all the mens rooms were converted to ladies room for the event.

The line was shorter than the line for the ladies room (OF COURSE) and I'm all about expediting the bathroom process. I wasn't hanging out in the mens room for the fun of it and I CERTAINLY did not use the urinal.

I didn't find them in the mens room but tracked them down like a hound dog bumped into them in the hallway. Ok, maybe it was an intentionally bumping into but let's not get caught up on technicalities. All that matters is I found them.

I learned something last weekend that I'm fairly certain the coordinators of dotMom didn't plan on- I am really good at chasing people down. All I'm saying is Brad Paisley better watch out. 

we're back to regularly scheduled programing

The last time I had a lengthy unplanned blogging break I was sicker than a dog newly pregnant. While I make it my mission in life to keep up with the royals, I assure you this break had everything to do with a broken computer and was NOT because I jumped on the second baby train along with William and Kate.  It's a good thing Annabelle's new tiara came just in time to celebrate the coming of her new brother or sister in law. 

A real princess wears her tiara while in her pajamas.
We're working on her royal wave.

In other news, it's been business as usual over here. By that I mean embarrassing and awkward things continue to happen. The maintenance man came over unexpectedly this morning and I only had on half a face of makeup. Literally down the middle half. One eye had eyeshadow and one didn't. I wish I was kidding.

For reasons I do not understand, Christopher insists on keeping the beer caps and wine bottle corks every time he has a drink. I'm always finding them in the laundry or random corners around the house. A few days ago I found one under the couch and threw it at him while sarcastically asking, "What are you going to do with all these corks? Make a pinterest craft with them?" Imagine my surprise when he said, "Actually, I was thinking about it." COLOR ME SHOCKED. Who is the pinterest perusing man and what have you done with the person I married? 

A little inspiration. Might as well DIY that new chair for the living room.

My father in law came up over the weekend to meet Annabelle and visit with me, his only favorite daughter in law. I suppose he wanted to see Christopher too. It was a big weekend for AB. She met her grandfather, took her first selfie on his phone, and stayed in the church nursery. 

I did not plan for the nursery part to happen. She was crying during Sunday school so Christopher took her out and I assumed, based on our actions the last 23 weeks, that he was going to walk around with her. HE CAME BACK WITHOUT THE BABY. All he had was a magnetic whale with her name on it that we had to bring back to the nursery when we picked her up. (I'd like to interject that I don't get the point of the whale. If I lose it in the hallway do I not get my baby back?) I haven't put her in the nursery longer then five minutes so it was very much of a pull the bandaid off quick situation. I rushed to the nursery the second the class was over and for the second time in 45 minutes, MY CHILD WAS NOT WHERE I THOUGHT SHE WAS. The nursery worker very casually informed me that AB was in the next room over because she "graduated".  Is it just me or is that a little ridiculous? Annabelle can't even sit up yet but somehow she's the only baby who graduated to the room with the big kids who walk, talk, eat Cheerios and are basically going to trample all over her. Now I'm that mother who's causing a ruckus because her child isn't with the kids her own age who think their toes are food. This is pretty much how Annabelle looked when I finally rescued her from the hooligans that are toddlers.

At least she wasn't looking at me like that because I only had on half my makeup. 

Contrary to how it appears, this is not a pregnancy announcement. I repeat. This is NOT an announcement.

 One year ago today we saw Sesame for the first time.

If I'm being completely honest, the best parts about today were not the moments when she finally stopped crying from teething pain when I took a super cute baby wearing a giant flower bow to story time, when we went for a swim in her pool, or even when she laughed when I kissed her neck. The very best part was that unlike this day last year, I didn't throw up once.  

She's a sweet baby now, but there were many a dark day getting her here.

it's a very hairy situation

I got a haircut last week. Normally I wouldn't mention it except, naturally, it didn't go according to plan. 

It all goes back to the fact that my normal hairdresser moved. It really was rude of the Army to relocate the husband of the only hairdresser I've ever loved. This tragic move meant Mary cut my hair. She did a great job washing my hair with caviar shampoo but things started to get a little stressful when she brought out the scissors. Every time I've prepared for a haircut over the last twelve years I've debated doing something drastic. In the end I always fall back on my trim the ends/lots of layers/out the door I go approach. I originally told Mary I only wanted a trim but I started second guessing myself after noticing how good her short hair looked. Error number one. My hair would never look as good as hers.

I mentioned that to her which, I NOW KNOW, was my second error. She said she could trim a little more then see how we liked it. After all, it's only hair. Hair grows back. I should have known better than to go down that slippery slope. Then she said that since this was no longer a "trim", I had enough hair I could donate. I said that was fine, as long as my length stayed around the middle of my back (at this point it was near my waist). Three minutes later she held a ponytail of my hair that was no longer attached to my head in front of my face and snip, snip, snip my hair was AT MY SHOULDERS. I now present a question to you, good people of the internet. HOW COULD THERE HAVE BEEN ANY CONFUSION AS TO WHERE THE MIDDLE OF MY BACK WAS? 

I almost cried. 

Mary kept cutting away, telling me how good it looked and how she was so glad I decided to try it. Have I mentioned how emotional I was? I didn't want to tell her I wasn't a fan because what could she have done about it? Pick my hair up off the floor and glue it back on? Make a wig for me out of the hair I just donated to cancer patients? I barely made it to the car before sending Christopher this desperate message:

The first time I put my hair in a ponytail all I could think was I haven't had a ponytail that short since I was 5. To sum it up in three words- I FEEL BALD. I don't know how to work with the small amount of hair I have. Mary said my curls would be better than ever but I have yet to see that promised land. Not to mention that it looks like I got a Mom Cut and I absolutely didn't want that. People keep telling me it looks good (or that I need to relax because it's just hair but I was VERY ATTACHED to my hair) but I don't know. That's why I'm currently in search of a hair loss support group. 

Please know that it makes me feel incredibly awkward to post this picture of myself. I'm so bad at talking selfies (or as they were called back in the day, self portraits) that it took me 8 tries to get this. Also. I may be smiling on the outside but I was crying on the inside.