Loving Life Lately...

Wow.. so much has been going on since the last time I posted!! I took the GRE a couple of weeks ago and did pretty stinkin good on it! Thank goodness for the math portion and being a nerd! ;) I called my advisor the next day to give her my score range and she said that I would be good to go!! SUCH great news!!! Now I just need to submit my FAFSA so I can get loans.. blah, I hate loans! However, it will be well worth it after graduating. Unfortunately, in the same week my sweet little boy got sick. He had that nasty virus that's going around horribly. It took him about 5 or 6 days to start feeling better. It completely broke my heart!!! I'm so glad that he's all better now and his happy little self again! Our church had "Western Round-Up" on high attendance Sunday and it was his first time to wear cowboy boots... It was the cutest little thing ever!

 

 Is he not the cutest?! He's starting to eat baby food a lot more now.. He loves vegetables! I can't believe how much he actually loves them but I'm not complaining! His new favorite thing at the moment to eat is cherry puffs. We have to cut him off or he would just keep stuffing his face with them! The boy LOVES water! He will drink water until you take the sippy cup away. He definitely knows what kisses are now and he loves to give them! He has this new thing, when you say "baby" he will give ya a kiss! It's so sweet!! For some reason, he hasn't been sleeping so great though. This past week has been pretty rough in the sleeping department. I think he might be going through a growth spurt because he tends to want a bottle at night now. I know everyone says, "Do not do a night feeding." Well, blah blah blah! If my angel is hungry - He's eating!  That's the way I feel about it and I'm the momma so end of story. ;) We still have no teeth.... I asked his pediatrician about it the other day when I took him in and he said some babies don't get a tooth until they are 18 months old! I just feel like he's been teething forever... but he said to count our blessings because the sooner they come in, the more they have a chance of decaying. We still do our daily brushing just to keep his little gums clean though! haha He also pulls up in his crib now. It's finally time to lower the mattress in the crib so he doesn't fall out! I can't believe all the new things that he does... new facial expressions, new noises, and he's interested in all new things. He has the sweetest personality and he's just the love of our life!! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Last but not least... We took Christian to the fair for his first time this week! We were so excited to take him and he just loved it! We went to Old McDonald's Farm and looked at all the animals. We walked around so he could stare at all the lights and then I took him on the train ride. Call me over-protective, but I just could not get on any other rides with him yet.. not this year anyway. The train was our safest bet and he didn't have a chance to reach at anything! haha I think he had a lot of fun.. We sure did! It is so much more fun going to the fair when you have a sweet baby to take.. Well, anything is more fun after you have a baby!! :) Life is just amazing with him in it!! Hope everyone is having a wonderful week... Cold front coming in.. Whoo Hoo!! Goodnight ya'll!

Kristen

My Big Boy...

I was in the living room floor last night grading papers while Corey and Christian were playing. Corey was laying on the floor and Christian was crawling around... All of a sudden, he starts crawling up on Corey, puts his hands on his chest, and STANDS UP!!! I could not believe it.. we were in shock!! He is only 7 months old and he's my little baby still... Is it really already time for this?! Crawling, I could handle... standing up, not prepared for! I have to say though, it was the cutest thing!! He kept doing it over and over and now he tries to reach everything to pull up, but he can't reach much of anything yet when he's sitting down! It just seems so crazy to see a little 18 lb baby standing up.. haha! He was in such a playful mood last night... we all played and played forever. I was so happy that I got him pulling up on video. I didn't get to video him when he started crawling because I was getting my phone fixed and I was so bummed. So, I'm really happy I got this one on video! :) 

Corey decided to join me on my run last night. He wanted to run outside since it was so nice out instead of going to the gym. I thought it was a great idea... until about half way through! Whew.. running up and down hills is killer!!! 30 minutes seriously felt like atleast an hour. I was so proud of myself when it was over though! ha! I'm having a hard time walking today due to shin splints.. blah! I always get them.. it doesn't matter how much I stretch. I used to get them all the time running track. I look ridiculous walking around and if you've ever been around an 8th grader.. they do not mind to tell you that themselves! haha I'm taking a break from running tonight... it's arm workout night with the hubby (which is the worst). If you've ever seen my husband, he's not puny by any means and his work outs are hard core. I told him to not take it easy on these flabby arms though.. I'm ready to get rid of that disguistingness (new word). Well, hope everyone has a fabulous Wednesday!! :)

Kristen

Kiss My Hiney Jillian...

You will be happy to know that since my last post, which was 10 days ago, I have lost 11 lbs!! I know that's a lot in under two weeks but I've made A LOT of changes!! I have finally changed my lazy ways and started working out more, completely changed my eating habits, said goodbye to cokes (by far the hardest), and with Christian crawling now I feel like I'm always on the move anyway! Now that I am so aware of what I eat and portions, I can not believe how horrible I used to eat!! I seriously ate anything I wanted at whatever time I wanted and however much of it that I wanted.... And I couldn't figure out why the baby weight wasn't just falling off?! Ummmm... Probably because I'm not 20 anymore!!! I'm glad I've finally faced reality and changed my ways. It feels really good, too! The hardest part, hands down, was giving up cokes! I love me some coke and dr. pepper and not having it 7 times a day (not an exaggeration) was pretty tough on me! I took a sip of one the other day just to swallow a pill and it was so syrupy tasting that I didn't even like it anymore. I do have to have my occasional glass of sweet tea though.. that will never change! I am a true southern girl! ;) I've also started the C25K challenge, which is just an app on my iPhone. I completed day 1 today and it felt so good to run again! However, my body is already aching and it's not even the next day yet (gosh, the next day always hurts!). Corey and I are planning on running our first 5K on October 22nd so I need to stick with this and get in a lot better shape before then! I have always wanted to run a 5K but have just been terrified of it! I will be so proud of myself if I make it through it! :) I'll keep my progress updated on here because it's the best way for me to keep track of it.

Over the 3 day weekend, I got a little crafty and decided to make some wreaths. They turned out so cute! I made a Razorback wreath for the front door and a yarn wreath (which took forever). I pulled off a dead branch on a tree and wrapped it up in yarn too and stuck a birds nest on it and put it on the wreath.. I just love it! I also made a collage of a book Corey and I read before we got married called, "Plan Your Marriage, Before Your Wedding." I would highly recommend it to any engaged couple! Anyway, I took important pages out of the book along with the church bulletin on the day that Corey was baptized, added a few things and framed it in our office!

This past Saturday was Brittney and Kyle's first wedding shower! We had a great time! I'm so excited for the upcoming wedding festivities... I just love that girl to death! Kyle is a lucky man but she didn't do so bad herself. ;) Their next shower is at our house and I am beyond excited about it.... except for the fact that my OCD has already kicked in and I'm going a little crazy over it, but that's okay! Only the best for my bestie!

Britt's shower

 

Now, for the most important topic... Christian! :) Little angel, I swear! He gets cuter and cuter every single day!! He is full fledged crawling now... It is so cute! It's kind of like an army crawl almost... but the little guy is so fast!! His sweet little legs go ninety to nothin'! Yesterday, mom and I took him to Toys R Us and he got a lot of new goodies! He got a hippo that pops balls up and shoots them out, stackable stars that light up, a ball that shakes and rolls around, and a ball pit (aka - a kiddie pool filled with balls!) He played in the Teff's ball pit at Townsend's birthday party, but he wasn't old enough to enjoy it then.. but I could tell he liked it! He's so funny when he gets in there. He just sits there and looks around for a while before he'll play! He also got a new rubber ducky bathtub... He LOVES it!! I put bubble bath in there for him and he kicks and screams the entire time! He looks absolutely adorable in there! Well, I think it's time to take a long, hot bath and go to bed... Hope everyone has a wonderful night!

My sweet family before church..

His shirt says it all!!

 I thought these Hogs cookies were adorable.. Had then made at Paul's!

 Christian's 1st Hogs game!! WPS!!

 Love these sweet ladies!

His 7 month picture!

TGIF...

I can't even begin to explain how happy I am that it's Friday.. and to make it even better, a 3 DAY WEEKEND!! :) This makes me one happy momma since I will get lots of extra baby time! My classes are so great and we have had a lot of fun in class doing a lot of cool activities and experiments. I have a mailbox at the front of my room for "comments and questions" and I have been getting the sweetest comments at the end of each day about how much they are loving this class. I work really hard trying to make things interesting for them... last night I searched online for hours to try to make converting temperatures from Celsius to Fahrenheit exciting... haha! Sometimes it's a little more challenging than others! I'm glad they are enjoying it though - that means they are learning!! :) I'm signing up to take the GRE in a couple of weeks.. I'm pretty much dreading it and if I don't get a minimum score of 1000, I don't get accepted, boo! I haven't heard of any other schools requiring it but my heart is absolutely set on JBU. I will be doing a lot of studying and praying over the next couple of weeks! Tonight is the first Airedale game of the season... Good luck guys! Beat VB! Tomorrow is also the first Razorback game.. WPS!! I'm very jealous that the hubs is going to the game without me. He is going with his friend, Daniel.. they will have a lot of fun and that means I get time with his lovely wife which just happens to be one of my favorite people! :) Christian and I plan on tagging along with her to a birthday party. I'm excited about church Sunday - it such a great rejuvenation for the week! We are still talking about finances in our SS class. It has really made me realize what is important, and nothing that money can buy is! I honestly don't even care about shopping that much anymore which is a HUGE change for me! I also dyed my hair back to its original color last night. I was tired of all the maintenance it was taking to be so blonde. I haven't had my hair its original color in my entire adult life! ha! I actually really like it... I think even more than the blonde! I'm almost positive my natural hair color got much darker after I had Christian.. my roots had never been so dark before! It feels really good just to have my natural color though! 

In honor of the first game! GO RAZORBACKS!!

So, yesterday... I went home for lunch and Christian had spit up and I can not stand for him to smell like anything besides a bottle of baby lotion so I immediately put him in the bathtub. I got him out and lotioned him up and Corey said he would get him ready. He had plans to take Christian with him to Academy to get some arrows. When I came back in Christian's room, Corey had him dressed in camo... hahaha! He had to have camo on to shop for hunting stuff I guess! Cracked me up!! It was just the cutest thing... he sent me a picture text while they were shopping. Christian loves his daddy so much, he has been such an amazing dad to our little boy! I'm sure next year, Christian will be out in the woods with him!  

The current status of my post baby body: Let's just say... it's not a good situation. I had to run from my classroom to the library today (one hallway over) and by the time I got there, I was out of breath! I decided it was time to break out the ol' 30 day shred video. So, that's what I did... I was super pumped about working out! I put the video in AND.... only made it 15 minutes. haha!! I was about to die. Loser with a capital L for sure. The worst part of this is.. I am sore today - after 15 minutes!!! haha! Oh well... I made a vow that I would give myself 10 months to lose the weight since it took 10 months to gain it.. it just makes sense to me! ;) So that means I now have 3 more months and I think that is an attainable goal. P.S. - Jillian, I hate you!! :)

Meet Jillian... This is how I imagine her in real life. lol

Hope everyone has a Fantastic Friday!! 
Kristen