Bring on the new year!

As I sit here on this last day of the year, I reflect on what I accomplished this year, what I am happy with in my life and what I need to work on this next year.   This year has been a wonderful year as it was my first year as a MOM!  I have loved every minute of being Harper's mom and all of the experiences it has brought to our lives! She is such a sweet spirit and very curious!  I hvae loved watching her grow into such a "big girl."  I am excited to continue to watch her grow and learn.  I'm really anxious for her to start talking!  Most parents that have talking children tell me no you can definitely wait for them to start talking, but I'm excited to hear all of the things that is going on in that little mind.  I know I have a while before I hear full sentences, right now we communicate a lot by pointing and the sound of her going "uh uh uh uh"  and I just keep grabbing things until I figure out what it is, lol!

Adam and I have grown a lot in our relationship.  He has been gone a lot this year for work and so I have learned to get used to being a parent by myself a lot of the time.  Its has been challenging on our relationship and we have had to get used to this new "normal" for our lives.  I am so thankful for his job  and being able to be work part time.  I really love working part time, it is nice to be able to get out of the house a couple of days a week and see all my friends at work and apply myself at things other than changing diapers, laundry and fixing meals.  By the time those days are over I am so ready to go pick up Harpy and spend time with her. I miss her so much when I am away from her.  I am so blessed to have the man I have in my life, he is a wonderful provider, a wonderful father and a best friend.

As far as my career, I am really happy to still be working but I am ready for a change.  My job is great and I really do love what I do but I feel like I am at a point in my life where I need more.  I feel like I need more of a challenge and more of a satisfaction for what I do.  I have found myself not being %100   in what I do.  When you work with people that are sick, hurting, dying and healing I think it is important to be %100.  They don't deserve anything less then the best and so this shows me that I need a change.  I think any type of customer service job is hard because you have to stretch yourself.  Even if you don't feel good or you are in a fight with your spouse, or you are worried about your sick kid at home you have to put a smile on your face and act like you care.  Some days that is easier than others. I haven't decided what a change means for me but I do know that this year I have plans for something different.

Spiritually I am not where I need to be in my life.  Adam and I do go to church and we try to attend regularly but it has been hard with his job and him being gone so much. We also got involved in a weekly bible study which we really enjoyed, but again with his schedule we were not able to keep up with it.  My goal for 2013 is to pray daily and be in the word daily, I need to make this a priority.  Adam's schedule is looking more of the same from this last year, so my plan is to get involved in a women's bible study.  I know this will help me be more accountable.

I would love to travel some this next year, work out more, get more painting, decorating and house decor for my house.  We have lived here two years this spring and we are still trying to get it all decorated:)  I have just learned to be happy right where we are because it is a PROCESS!!   Hopefully Adam and I can take more time with and for each other.  I think this last year we didn't ever want to leave Harper.  We didn't take a lot of time away from her for ourselves. It must be a new parent thing!!  Maybe if we took some time away we could work on a brother or sister for her;) I hope that is part of the plan for this year!!

I am so thankful for everyone who helped us get through our first year as being parents, it truly does take a village to raise a child!  I want to thank our parents, grandparents,  and friends for all of your advice and help with this new year of discovery!!

Some of my favorites from this year!!

We had so much fun at H's first pumpkin patch 

UH OH someone is in TROUBLE:)

I just love this pic of H she looks so happy!

great day with one of my favorite people!

Halloween!!

We had such a fun day at OSU and also so proud of my husband this day 

she is so sweet!

being silly

Such a precious pic

This pic is from my first mothers day, we had such a fun day this day. It was a family BBQ 

One of my many "photo shoots" with Harper this year:)

I just love her little smile

I just think she is gorgeous

H and I on Christmas, we missed Daddy but we got to see face time with him.

This is a video that was made of Harper over this last year.  I posted to my Facebook but if you haven't seen it here it is again!! We are so blessed.
Harpers 1st Year


May 2013 be a great year for all of you!!!  Happy New Year:)

Merry Christmas!!!

Merry Christmas!! I hope you all had a blessed holiday with all of your families!! We had a great Christmas with our families. It was fun with Harper this year!! She has a lot of new things to play with now and I have to figure out where to put all this new fun stuff. I think a room in our house is going to have to be converted into a play room sooner than later! We have a lot of kids in our family so we get to use their old toys that they are too big to play with. It's a win win right?!? We get free stuff and the parents get rid of extra toys!! It is really great for us but we just got to figure out where to put it all!!!

I was really hoping we would see a white Christmas with all of the weather reports but we were unlucky!! I'm waiting for that big snowstorm this year! I looooove snow!

We did get to make a Christmas trip!! We went back to KS to my parents.  Harper started running a 102 fever the second day we were there so to the ER we went!! Harper had to get a breathing treatment and some antibiotics, they thought she may have pneumonia. It was NO fun, but Glad to report she has now made a full recovery!! These last few months have been so crazy with sickness, I'm hoping 2013 is a healthier year for all of us!!!

My baby all dressed up for Christmas at Great Gparents

Harper loves playing with all of her cousins!!

With Grandma and Gpa Ellis and Aunt Macy

Her new Pink Car!!!

Tired baby on our way home!

She even got her own little recliner

A trip around the sun

Wow! My baby girl is one year old today!!!  I can't believe a year ago today I became a mom!  My life has been so blessed with Harper and life has been so much fun since having her.  This time a year ago I was in a hospital room getting to know this new little person that we welcomed into the world.  I respect moms all over and especially my own my mom so much more, it is not an easy job.  She changes so much from day to day and I always love to see what new "thing" she will do. I love to see her little mind working!  I know that time will pass no matter how many moments I wish I could just freeze in time so I just try to soak it all in and take lots of pictures!!

This last weekend we had Harpers 1st birthday and we had so much fun!!  I had a blast planning it and decorating for it (I may have went a little overboard).  Harper was feeling a little sickly, she has had a cold but we partied on.  We had a really good turn out and Harper got a lot of fun toys! We are definitely blessed with great family and friends.  She wasn't super interested in eating her cake but more in just playing in it.

We have been so busy these last few months, but in the last few weeks Harper has started walking!! She isn't super fast yet but she is very steady.  She is now saying "hello" "dog"  "ball"  "uh oh" and "Abby" (our dog's name)

We are traveling back to KS this weekend for Christmas to stay with my parents since Adam will be busy working.  My family of course is excited since I haven't been back there for a Christmas eve in four years.  My sister is in the nutcracker so she is excited for me to get to see her in it this weekend!!

We went to the Dr today for Harper's 12 month appointment, I know a great way to celebrate her birthday, right?!?!  She weighed 18.8 lbs which puts her in the 20% and 30 inches long which is 75%.

Happy Holidays!!

Amazing day!!

Get ready this is a long one!! Where to begin.....So last weekend was Tulsa Junior Leagues Holiday Market and it turned out to be a huge success!!  Santa also came to visit so I took Harper and surprisingly she did well!! I was prepared for her to kick, scream and cry.  She kind of just stared at him like "who are you?" Here is the pic we got!!

Crazy to think that my little Harps first bday is just next month.  Ive started planning details of it and making her outfit.  I'm really excited to celebrate her birthday.  1st Birthday's are always for the parents, it's like OMG we did it!!!  Especially with your first child, I'm Sure.  It's like your life completely changes once that little baby comes along and you can't ever imagine what life was like without them.  The first year brought so much joy, pride, worry ( I never knew how much I would worry about EVERYTHING), excitement, fear and just so many other emotions, Parenthood is truly AMAZING.  But anyway what I'm getting at is, I thing the first birthday is a great celebration time for the parents and the family and I'm EXCITED!! So I ordered some of her outfit and then I'm making other parts of it.  So here is the hat that I made, I think its pretty cute.  Now the question is, Will she keep it on??  

    This weekend we traveled to Stillwater, OK to an OSU game for Adam.  His squadron was doing the flyover for the game!! Its especially exciting that Adam was able to be part of it considering he is OSU Alum!!  It was truly an amazing day!  We were treated so well and had the best time! I rode to Stillwater with two of the other spouses of the pilots. We arrived and we were escorted to the varsity club level where we had all kinds of free food and drinks. They also took us down to the field and let us hang out there for a while, which was pretty neat! We waited for the flyover and the game to start. Once the guys got back we were taken up to the Suites.  We first met Boone Pickens himself in his suite!!  After meeting him we went to several of the other suites and then we all had dinner up there.  At the end of the game we went back down to the field!  OSU won the game so it just made the day that much better!!  I know this was a special day for Adam, I'm so proud of him!!

Adam presenting flag to Boone

Adam presenting a flag to an OSU student.  There is cool story behind this.  This man lost his father to a service related death 2 years ago.  A flag was presented to him at the game in honor of his father and in celebration of Veterans day.  Adam also lost his father in a service related death so these two men were able to connect on that level.  I know this had to be such a special moment for both of these guys!

This is all the guys with Mr. Pickens which owns the OSU Stadium.   I mean it is the "Boone Pickens Stadium!" They flew this flag over and they all signed it for him. Very cool moment!

This is a pic of all the guys!!  This was right before they were announced on the field in the  third quarter of  the game.  They received a standing ovation from the crowd.  It gave me goosebumps!!



Here are just some pics I got from the day!! Enjoy:)

This is a pic of the whole crew!!  They even gave them the "Game Winning Ball!"

Happy Veterans Day to all who Have served and are currently serving!!!!!!!!

Happy Halloween!

Happy November!! It seems that October just flew by!  We had a good halloween, although Harper was down for most of the week. This is the first time she has been sick besides like a cold or ear infection. It was awful seeing her feel so bad, by far the worst thing about being a mom is seeing your baby in pain and not being able to fix it. She had green drainage from her eyes, fever and vomiting.  Good news is she is doing much better and thankfully they gave her some antibiotics and they are doing the trick!! Having health is such a blessing!

This was a pic of Harper when she was not feeling so great. 

We carved a pumpkin with her and thought she would like playing in all the gooey insides. Well, I was wrong, she did not like it at all.  She did not find it amusing when I put some if it on her hands, ha ha!! I guess she is going to be more of a girly girl.

you can see here she got a little on her foot and she was not happy

After we carved the pumpkin I decided to roast the seeds. They turned out really yummy!!  I just covered them in a little Olive oil and then put seasoning on them and cooked them in the oven for about 40 min. They were really good!

This is the final product of our pumpkin. "H" for Harper!

For Halloween we had plans to take her trick or treating around to all of our family in her costume. We decided since she had been sick that we were going to stay home.  I dressed her up in her costume and we handed out candy at our house.  She loved seeing all of the kids dressed up and she even put some candy in their buckets!! 

Harper and daddy outside ready to hand out candy. It was actually a really nice night. 

getting her bucket ready

This big puffy costume will not stop me from crawling around!

ROARR!!!

After she got in her costume she started practicing her ROARR!! I think she did pretty good for a baby dino!!  

Wow I cannot believe October is almost over....

Wow I cannot believe October is almost over.....this month has flown by. It seems like once Halloween hits the rest of the year goes so fast!! Adam is gone for another week of Alert in Houston.  He will probably not be happy that I said that, he doesn't like me to broadcast that Im home alone... but I'm like hopefully if you are taking the time to read my blog then you are a friend and I don't have to worry about you scheming to do something to me while my husband is out of town!!  Its very busy for me when Adam is gone, because he is such a help around the house and with Harper, so I definitely notice when he leaves.  Usually when he is gone I get to work on my house projects!! So my goal is to get the rest of my powder bath painted and get my bedroom completed.  These are both projects that have been ongoing for sometime. Fingers crossed I make progress this week:)
Today Megan and I went to a winery about an hour outside of Tulsa for the day and the weather was Amazing!!!!   We had so much fun.  Just laughed and talked, we always have a blast together.  I love the kind of friends that literally you can be doing "nothing" with and you always have the best time.  Those are the best kind of friends!!  It was a cute little winery and we stopped and had lunch at a quaint little antique store that had a diner inside.  I just love small town charm.

Look what I found???  Somebody was having fun with the toilet paper!!

I have a 10 month old now!!  this was taken yesterday on her 10 month bday!!! I can't believe it:)