Marshall at 1 Month

Most of these pics were taken around 5-6 weeks and he's actually almost 2 months now but just wanted to do a little update on his life thus far! At his 1 month checkup (which was just before 6 wks old) he was 21 inches long and already 10 lb 3 oz! So he certainly is growing! In fact, he really is an awesome nurser. I couldn't ask for better. Ivy was fairly difficult in this area so I wasn't sure how things would be this time around but he seems to love it. Takes a lot of stress out of having a newborn, I think. To know that they are eating and growing well..

Our little guy has the sweetest, most easy going personality. Very easy to please. He does have his moments of fussiness or crying, like any baby, but it's hardly ever full blown fits. That's not to say he doesn't make noise though. He makes a ton of noise! Grunts, snorts, LOTS of coos and squawks.. It cracks me up! Ivy was a pretty silent baby until about 4-5 months (besides crying) so it's been something to get used to, especially at night, lol.. Boys are just noisy, I guess! It's oh so cute, though.

So far, Ivy is a great big sister and loves baby Marshall so much.. She loves to show everyone that comes over or gets in the car where her Baby Brother is. She loves to help mommy take his diapers to the trash and tries to give him his binky (or a toy) when he's upset.. She's such a sweet sister.

Love this, lol:

Marshall loves his binky and loves to be swaddled. And he is quite the snuggler. He just loves to be held and cuddled. I barely have to rock him to get him to sleep most of the time. For the times that he is a little fussier or has a hard time falling asleep, I started using a Maya wrap that I found at a second hand shop (pure luck because those things are kind of pricy). I learned about it from a good friend and so far I looove it, especially in the evenings when caring for Ivy and he is acting a little clingy. It's also been super handy while teaching voice lessons (only teaching a couple students right now who have competitions coming up).

And now, the closest I've gotten to some smiles on camera:

I love this cute little munchkin and think he is just perfect in every way! Can't wait to see him grow! At the same time, I am very much enjoying this snuggly newborn stage very much. :)

Just a few extra pics that I caught with my phone over the past month.. The bottom two are little man all cozy in the wrap:

Crafts and Sewing Projects

Here's a few pictures of projects I did last fall.. The wreath is burlap with light burlap flowers, idea from my lovely sisters. Wasn't too difficult, just a little time consuming. The next two were a couple crafts that I did at our Super Saturday activity in October. The O Holy Night was supposed to be navy blue but it ended up looking pretty darn close to black. Oh well! I still love it. I did see some people do a white wood with gold vinyl which I thought looked gorgeous.... 

In september, my mother in law gifted me these few essential items for sewing and I am forever grateful! They have changed my life in sewing and I have been taking full advantage of them:

I made a few different sets of baby burp cloths, based on this tutorial, for a close friend and my sister. I love how the navy and pink turned out for a girl. For some reason, the fabric in the store just spoke to me:

 

The fabric is navy blue with cute tiny hearts. Had to show a close up, otherwise it just looks like polka-dots:

And finally, my big project that took me a few months to complete... I set out to make my first quilt for baby boy, based on this tutorial. I figured it was an easy enough beginner quilt and I absolutely looved the randomness of the pattern that the girl created. So I picked out my fabrics, cut all the pieces with my new tools, and pieced the front (In some photos the bright one looks yellow, but it's actually a bright neon green):

Then I just quilted along the straight lines of the rows. The next part was a little complicated because it turns out the flannel fabric I chose for the back ended up shrinking when I washed it. Plus I'm not sure the fabric store gave me the right length to begin with but they were in Knoxville and I wasn't about to drive all the way down to get more. Anyways, I really did like the print and didn't want to switch to anything different so I just got some white cotton and made a white border. Finished off with a black binding. Thank you to Mom Robinson for helping me in my crisis days and to Richelle and Christine for helping me with the binding! First quilt=DONE! Not sure I'll ever make another one. It was a ton of work, haha. Good experience and learning though! And I do love the colors.

Sunset photos of my loves

Sam and Jeff wanted to head out one evening to practice taking some landscape shots (Jeff is an amazing photographer and Sam loves learning new tips from him when he can). Anywho, I asked Sam just before he left if he could take Ivy along considering she had been cooped up in the house all day. I didn't expect to get such cute photos of my little girl! I maybe would've done her hair or put a cute outfit on her or at least sent some kleenexes with them for her runny nose, haha! But here she is, in all her toddler snot-nosed glory, lol. Still, I think she is just beautiful. And maybe the toddler messiness of the photos is what makes them so cute....

(Some of the photos are by Sam, some are by Jeff)

 

  

Texas Continued...

The week after Christmas was pretty laid back. I did take the kids up to visit my sister a couple times.. Alexa was scheduled to have her tonsils removed so we had one last hoorah before her surgery at a place called It'z (like a better Chuck-E-Cheese).. But for the most part, we just hung out at Sam's mom's house and chilled. 

To fill his free time, Sam actually decided to dig through all of his mom's old photos and started scanning some into the computer.. He came across many gems like these... (and no, that is not Sam in the right picture, it's his older brother Joe, haha):

Meanwhile, I spent my free time painting my nails and catching up on a couple new books that I had been wanting to read. Oh AND finishing my quilt but that will be in another post:

New Years Eve looked a little like this... Oh and didn't get any pics but Jeff, Michelle, and the girls were finally feeling better so they came down and played a few games with us:

 

Somewhere in those two weeks, Sam managed to play more rounds of frisbee golf than he had in the entire year of 2013 collectively, LOL. Dan and Richelle came down from Dallas and Christine and Lehi joined the party for a couple days. Ivy was in cousin heaven, hehe:

  

New Years day on the hammock with my girl:

Christmas in Texas (lots of pictures!)

A few days after Sam finished his last final, we decided to drive down to Texas so we could be with family for the holidays. We hadn't originally planned to go down, mainly because we weren't sure how everything would go with the new baby and how I would be feeling. I still wasn't quite at 100% but I felt strong enough and things with baby had been going well enough that I felt like I could make the drive. We stopped about every 3 hrs or so to feed him and tried to keep our stops as short as possible. Finally, on the Friday before Christmas, we made it to Jeff and Michelle's house in Pearland and the fun began! And I will admit, it was very nice to have family helping out with Ivy and providing fun distractions while being at home and nursing all the time, haha.. 

We stayed there until Christmas, when some of Jeff's family came down with the flu! Sam and I were very grateful that we had gotten flu shots just a couple weeks before and didn't end up catching anything. But with a newborn baby, we didn't want to take any chances so we moved our stuff down to Mom Robinson's house (just down the street) and spent the rest of our trip at her house.  Ivy and Marshall actually ended up getting some sort of little virus/cold anyways but it wasn't the flu and both were feeling better just after a few days, thank goodness...

Just relaxing around the house:

Dad and Trish stopped by for a visit one night before heading out to Durango:

 

Christmas Eve.. This was the best we could get of both of them by the tree with a wiggly toddler and a tired newborn, haha:

Christmas morning!

 

 

 

Later that day we drove up to Kelli's house for dinner with my family. I didn't get any pics with my camera but got a few good ones from my sis Kristin: