Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween from Kate and Bailey!






Unfortunately it's over 80 degrees in Texas today so I don't know if Kate will be able to wear her costume at church at Trunk or Treat tonight! She got very hot even just taking these pictures!

Applesauce

Kate had her first applesauce this morning. She's not giving the greatest reactions to food anymore, but I guess that's good that she likes it all!

We are going shopping with Nana today at the outlets in Allen. Should be lots of fun. Then our grocery store has some Halloween Madness sales that are this afternoon only if you bring a child in costume, so we might stop by there on our way home. :)

Picture of the Day

Kate looked cute in her little Pony Ranch outfit today, so I thought I'd take a few pictures and show how well she is sitting up! She is getting so good at it, I'm so proud!

Mama

I truly think Kate knows that when she says "mama" it's me. Most of the time when she says "mama," she says it in babbling fashion - mamamamamammama - as you could see on the video a week or two ago.

But today I laid her down on the changing table, she looked me in the eye and said, "Mama." Just once.

Fake Smiles & Bananas

For a while now Kate has been eating solids at dinnertime. She has mastered the cereals, and in the last 3 weeks she started with squash, then sweet potatoes, and now she is eating green beans. She loves all of it. A few days ago she started fussing after her morning bottle, so I figured it's time to add a solid breakfast to her regimen. We started yesterday with rice cereal and bananas. As long as the two were mixed she was ok, and would eat them, but then I offered her a spoonful of pure bananas. She completely gagged on them! It was the funniest thing I had seen in a long time. So today I was prepared, and brought the camera to the breakfast table. I knew I'd catch her making a face on camera. Nope, she ate them like no problem today! Figures. But she's cute anyway so I'll post the video. You can see a LITTLE bit of a look like "WHAT is this stuff???" on her face. The next time I introduce a new food I'll have to have the camera ready the first time!



I also snapped a picture of her because she just looked so darn cute sitting in the high chair! But I noticed her doing something new today - pulling out the fake smile for the camera! She's too young to be mastering that skill...

That's My Daughter

Make an on-line slide show at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Four Generations

We spent this weekend in Oklahoma. Jeff and I got to go to the OU game while Grandma babysat. After lunch today, we got a four generation picture of Great Grandpa Hawkins, Grandma Blair, Jeff, and Kate.




How special to have four generations there. My grandparents would have loved to meet Kate. I need to take another picture the next time we're there, at Thanksgiving. My camera was having trouble handling the light situation in there, making Jeff and Kate too bright and Paula and Danny not bright enough. We'll try again for a better picture!



Kate just loves Pa. (Great Grandpa) She loves to smile at him. She lights up every time he waves at her!

She is getting close to sitting up on her own. She can balance by herself for a few seconds, but then makes a faceplant into the floor. :)

Trick or Treat!

Kate is all ready for her first Halloween! I saw this shirt at Gymboree and just couldn't resist it. I love it!



Kate got her 4 month shots (finally!) yesterday. She took them so well! Her first round of shots was awful. Her cry was so pained. This time, it was no big deal! She only cried for about the first 5 seconds, then was fine after that! She was ba-ba-ba'ing less than a minute later! The shots must have wiped her out - she slept last night from 6:30 pm to 8:30 am!

Kate Says Mama

Is it even remotely possible at this age?

Maybe she doesn't know it means me, but she definitely seems to "get" that she can repeat it.

I've noticed for the last two weeks or so, when she cries, she cries "Mama, mama, mama" And just in the last couple days she has started jabbering mama for fun.



(Sorry for my constant mama-ing!)

First Homemade Baby Food Failure

I was so proud of myself today, I decided to make carrot baby food. I got them all steamed, and tossed them into my blender to start pureeing. Well, the blender was doing its stupid blender thing and pushing all the carrots up with the blade spinning below it, not doing any pureeing. So I carefully stuck a wooden spoon in to help push the carrots down. It worked great! I was getting close to being done when

WHACK

The spoon hit the blade, splintering into 50 pieces in my carrot puree.

There goes that batch.

Note to self: Next time, even though it's annoying, turn blender OFF, stir, and turn back on again.

Over the weekend, I bought Kate a Jumperoo on Craigslist. She LOVES it!

Let Kate's Fashion Woes Begin...

It happens to the best of us. You show up to prom and there's another girl wearing the same dress as you. You show up to work and you have a twin for the day. Well, it happened to Kate today at daycare.

I dropped her off this morning so I could take Blaze to the vet for shots, and wouldn't you know, the other baby girl at daycare that is about Kate's age was wearing the EXACT same outfit! Too funny!

A Tribute to Blaze

Some of you may or may not know, I'm trying to sell Blaze, my horse. I have owned her for 12 years, I can't believe it's been that long. Especially since Kate was born, I just don't have the time to devote to her that she deserves. She should be with someone who can get her back in the show ring winning more trophies and ribbons!

I have someone coming out tomorrow to pick her up. She doesn't want to buy Blaze herself, but she wants to put some work back into Blaze, and then try to sell her. I'm not sure how long she'll keep her, but if she can't end up selling her, then Blaze will come back to me. Which is fine with me. She told me that if I have a show record for Blaze that would help, well, I don't. The closest thing I could get was digging up all of her trophies and ribbons to take a picture of her winnings. The thing is... I KNOW I have one more box of ribbons - all of my best ribbons were/are in this box. And I could swear I have another box of trophies too. Oh well, I found all I could. This is what I could find:




There are lots of good memories represented in this image. Lots of fun over the years. I really do miss showing. I think if I still lived in Minnesota we'd probably still be showing, but here in Texas I just don't know any horse people and it's not fun to go do that stuff alone. Oh well. That phase of my life is over. At least for now... Don't tell Jeff but I think it would be fun to get Kate into showing someday. :)

Five Months

My baby girl is 5 months old today!! Where does the time go? She is so amazing, and brings a smile to my face every day. She is getting more and more vocal, and still loves her ba-ba's and ma-ma-ma's. She says mama a lot, but she doesn't know she's saying it, so I'm not counting it yet. Though it's fun to hear her say!

Photo Shoot

I had a little extra time this afternoon so I did a little photo shoot with Kate! She looks like SUCH a redhead in these pictures! Her hair is so weird, in some lights it definitely has red tinges, in others it's a complete mousy brown!

















And one last one - when did she grow up???

Minnesota Pictures

So I never got around to posting my pictures from Minnesota! Oops! We had so much fun! It was great to introduce her to friends and family.

Kate & Gabe



Emily & Gabe, Mandy, Kate & Me



Em, Me, Mandy, and Sarah



Jen, Kate & Me, Becky, Emily & Ana, and Krisanne



We both woke up the third morning not feeling so well. Kate wanted my orange juice!



I got to meet up with my Aunt Ginny, and cousins Carolyn and Sara, with Bella and baby Ilyas along too!

Kate's Bow

You had better get used to seeing Kate with these bows on! I didn't realize they had bows out there for baby girls other than the headband style. I saw these at Target today, and they are just TOO cute! I bought two packs of them. They make Kate look so adorable!