Valentine's Day 2012

Beej came home early with a bouquet of tulips for me, and he sweetly surprised Grace with the world’s biggest heart balloon and a heart shaped sucker bouquet. She was very happy!

He’s always a thoughtful gift giver, and this year he told me he wanted to take me “out shopping”. I was surprised, to say the least. 


“Man, my feet are killing me!”

For years, that is what I heard every time we hit the mall or went out shopping together. Literally, about two minutes into looking around. Beej isn’t a huge shopper, and in all honesty, neither am I anymore. Except, of course when we are down south where there’s a lot more to offer in the way of clothes or shoe shopping. Then, we both just want to make the most of having more variety.

We left Adon and Grace with my mom and headed out. I did find a beautiful scarf at a local boutique that Beej happily bought for me. Then we hit Eureka, where he said, “Well, I guess there’s only Target or Khol’s. Which one first?” We just had to laugh and then bopped around the sad and lonely, half vacant local mall. 

Then on to Target, which is being remodeled, so everything is a crazy mess. It’ll all be cleaned up and done by the end of March though, so who knows, maybe it’ll get some cool, new stuff by then. I did find a cute black dress that’ll I’ll be able to wear when I’m done nursing. Until then….

We hit Rita’s for dinner, which was delicious as always. Shopping, or lack of it, aside, it was just really fun to spend some time out and about together.

How was your Valentine’s Day this year? Any favorite memories from this day?

Latest & Greatest

My two favorite kiddos in all the world.

Adon just had his four month checkup and weighs in at 15 lbs. 13 oz. and 25.5 inches long. He's the exact same size that Grace was at five months. And of course, his head is HUGE. I don't even remember how many centimeters, but around the 90th percentile for his age group. The doctor showed us the stats, looked at me, then turned to Beej and asked him if he ever has trouble finding hats that fit. Ha! Poor Beej. Remember when a similar thing happened with Grace? He's been battling a cold, again. Little guy has already had three in his short life.

For the most part, people know how to say his name now. It's pretty funny to hear all the variations people have tried though. My favorite story was one my mom passed onto us. She mentioned "Little Adon" to a coworker. "Huh? They named him Aladin?!"

He loves to suck on his hands, be outdoors, watch Grace zip about playing, be held facing outward--he likes to see what's going on, and he just discovered his feet this last week.


Grace is bursting out of her 2T clothing and wears a size 6 shoe, but only certain shoes because her cute feet are too chubby on top to fit into all the new size 5 shoes we bought for her. Oh well.

She absolutely loves to play outside and visiting the fish hatchery is still one of her favorite places to walk to. She is talking like crazy now, and really is very helpful around the house. She asks all the time, "Mom, help?"

A really sweet moment happened a few days ago when after I swept the bathroom, she came up and patted my back "Good job Mom!".

She has done pretty well with Adon so far. She likes to lay down by him or sit by him on the couch. She's great about showing him how to do things. She's also great at telling him, "NO Adon!". I think she's got the bossy big sister role down! And I find myself saying often, "No Grace, you can't put that box of wipes/drive that toy car/balance that book/you name it on Adon's head".

What's Missing Here?

Beej volunteered to do all the grocery shopping and run quite a few of our usual errands once Adon arrived. "At least through Christmas" is what he told me. What a great guy huh! I knew I had a few months where I didn't have to juggle two kids and bags of groceries!

I have been very thankful for this act of love from him! When it was just Grace and I, we'd make a morning out of it, running tons of errands on the same day. She loved her car seat and was pretty entertained as long as we were out and about. I wore her in the ergo while grocery shopping until she got big enough to sit in a cart.Yes, I was that mom, sweating as I bagged groceries while wearing Grace, but it worked for that season! I would just nurse her in the car and she'd konk out on the ride home, and usually stayed asleep once I whisked her inside the house. Even now, if she's in the car for a long time, she'll just fall asleep. 

Adon, so far, does not share his sister's love for car seats. This is unfortunate and something that I hope gets better as he gets older. I've heard friends tell stories of how their kids screamed the entire time, every time, they were in the car. We're nothing near that, thankfully! But it's just obvious he prefers to be out of it, held up, looking around more. So far, I've ran quite a few errands with just the two of them, but nothing like the marathon mornings I used to plan.

Anyway, this was one of the times Beej took Grace out with him to run errands. He made it all the way to Target before he realized he'd packed her in the car without any shoes! I don't think either of them cared. Usually she loves getting out with her Dad because of all the extra attention and treats she gets!

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Grace's 2nd Birthday Party Pages

Here are two pages I created to capture Grace's 2nd Birthday. A couple of the new products I purchased and used were the pennant banner stamp, which I love, and Amy Tangerine "A slice of the good life" cardstock shape. The little "Happy Birthday" Elephant card I have been saving since shortly after she was born. I picked it up at a local second hand store's card boutique area and knew I wanted to include it somehow.  See, I've been thinking about this album for a long time! I have five, count 'em, FIVE pages done already and it feels great to finally be putting it all together. 

I still want to hear your own ideas about how you capture family memories!

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I Was THAT Kid...

When I was a kid, I would save my money all summer long to buy...school supplies! Yep. That's right. School supplies. I was that kid perusing Sprouse Ritz for several hours drooling over all the pencil boxes, hot pink sharpeners, and Lisa Frank tape. Seriously folks, I don't even know what to say. I asked my mom why she let me waste all my hard earned allowance on that stuff, but I guess there was no stopping me. If I remember right, I even roped my dear childhood friend, Audrey, into going with me and using all her money to buy school supplies as well. A natural leader I tell ya! 

Fast forward many years and I was still addicted. Only as an adult, you know...it's called scrapbooking supplies, and it's an acceptable hobby. I was in paper heaven! I loved pretty paper, stamps, embelishments, you name it. Only I mostly bought and hoarded stuff. I would make cards occasionally for friends, and I even started a wedding album. Good intentions at best.

But this year, I am determined to put Grace's album together and start one for Adon. I have several little books that I've filled with memories of Grace over the last two years and Adon's first journal is already starting to fill up. You know, all those little details and sayings you just don't want to forget. I want to include as much as I can to along with the photos in their books. 

Thank goodness God blessed me with a man who also loves office supplies. We can never have enough pens here in the Stockman household. He understands my love to create and wholeheartedly encourages me to use my birthday/Christmas/extra money to be artistic. So I splurged right after Christmas and ordered some things from Two Peas in a Bucket. I couldn't wait for the box to get here. I've already used several things just working on Grace's and Adon's albums. I've got a good start, and this is one of the projects that brings me joy, so I want to keep it up. I love the process. There's something fun for me in taking photos, editing, and then putting it all together in a creative way. It's one of those things that I enjoy simply because.


Anybody else out there love paper? How do you store your photos? Did you create any kind of albums for yourself or your children? 

One Little Word

Last year, one of my friends chose three words to focus on in 2011. Those three words summed up what all her resolutions were about. I have always been a big goal setter, and I loved the idea of narrowing all the resolutions and goals for a new year down to the very root at what you're getting at. Then, this year, I was inspired by Allie Edward's challenge to simplify even more and choose just one word. 


So, I've been thinking and praying about this for a while. What is one word that I want to describe this new year? When it's over, what do I want to look back and see the most of? What's one word that can sum up what most my resolutions and goals are hoping to bring about? 


I kicked around a few other words the last few weeks, but finally settled on JOY. I want to have more joy this year. In fact, I've been praying that 2012 will be the most joyful year I've had yet. 


The last few years have been filled with a lot of heartache over losing loved ones, a lot of blessing in the birth of our two children, a lot of sleepless nights, a lot of tears, a lot of date nights and long conversations, a lot of sweet memories made with family and yes, there's been joy. BUT, I just feel there could be so much more! 


Have you thought about what you want out of this year? What is your one word for 2012?

36" Helium Balloons

It's so much fun taking pictures with ginormous props! When Grace turned one, I ordered one GIANT balloon and we had fun taking pictures of her with it. This year, of course, we ordered two GIANT balloons and headed to the park to carry on the tradition. We have the usual cake and presents, but I love that we've incorporated something else that's special about her birthday. We did this the day after her party. It's amazing to me how much she's changed since then--just two months ago! I want to do this with each of my children until they hit five years old, at which point, five balloons may lift them off the ground. These things really are that big! 


Do you have any fun birthday traditions you practice with your children?