Big Girl Room

As promised, here are some pictures of Ainsley's new big girl bed and decorations! I did a lot of sewing to save money, and I bought her quilt and sheet set (separately) both on clearance back in the Fall. Here's a picture of the bed. I got the canopy from Dollar General for $8 and the beads on it came off of a chandelier that my neighbor gave me out of her garage sale for free! Ainsley loves it and calls it her "castle bed!" Most of the decorative items are things I had laying around the house. I made the valance and all of the throw pillows...it's not easy to sew with feathers either! :)

More views of the furniture...and some good finds I stole out of a friend's garage sale pile this summer!

Here's the cheap, little bookcase I looked everywhere for! I haven't hung the mirror yet because she can only barely see in it even just sitting on the bookcase (as it is here). Also, a little hard to see, but I made the chair cushion, lamp shade, and painted the lamp base.

And here are the letters that I waited 6 months for! Well, actually, I just waited 6 months to get a "Y". :) Good thing, too, because I ended up getting them half price! I wasn't planning to put them on this wall, but Ainsley insisted that's where they should go. It's her room, after all! I had planned to do some designs on them too (stripes, polka dots, etc.) but I decided there were too many patterns in here already!

"Baby Bwoder's Woom"

I finally finished the painting in the nursery! There are still a few touch-ups I could do, but I made myself stop! (I'm such a perfectionist...this was harder than you'd think!) I was actually planning to paint some kind of a decorative border around the room also, but after 2 weeks just to do the stripes, I think I've given up on that. I'll probably just do some canvases...maybe ABC's or the patterns on the bedding.

The bedding just arrived yesterday so I haven't washed it or ironed it, but I wanted to see what it looked like together. I plan to make some window treatments and a slipcover for the pink rocker (a huge undertaking, I'm afraid) as well. I think all I have left to buy for the decorating is the pillow and changing pad cover that match the Babylicious Islands collection and some type of lamp. I feel SO much more prepared now! There are still a few necessities (like a name!), but at least he has a room! I have 11 more weekends to get everything in order!

(I uploaded the full size, so if you click on the picture you can get a better view of the bedding.)

Also, I know several of you are waiting for pictures of Ainsley's room! I finished painting her letters so I just have to get those hung and I'll post some pictures of her room too....

Video! Ainsley's First Dance Performance!

Ainsley had her first dance performance tonight. Her class performed during the health fair at the elementary school. I totally thought she'd just stand there and pick her nose, but she actually danced! She was the youngest one there, but I think she did just as good as some of the bigger girls! At one point, she even pats the back of her friend Jacee! All the girls were very excited to be wearing their sparkly skirts too. I think that helped. Hopefully, they'll do even better at the recital in their little tutus.

I can't get the video to upload, so just click here to view it. And turn your volume up!

Pictures - Chuck E. Cheese

I forgot to mention that the Chuck E. Cheese pictures have been added to the January set on flickr.

Sick Baby

Thank goodness my husband loves me and enjoys spending quality time with Ainsley or I would be pulling my hair out by now from lack of social contact! I took Ainsley to the doctor on Friday (which means we missed MDO) after her fever reached 104 Thursday night. The doctor suspects that she probably got a virus going around (symptoms are fever and runny nose) and then developed an ear infection from all of the drainage. I figured that was probably it after her fever spiked up Thursday night. Anytime she gets a fever over 104 it's always been either an ear infection or a urinary tract infection, and she seemed to be pottying just fine. Mother's really should be able to diagnose our own kids, ya know? :)

Anyway, she's been on antibiotics and doing much better now, but her fever didn't break until Saturday. Then she still had a mild fever when she woke up on Sunday so I stayed home while Clint went to church and he let me go to church that evening while he stayed home. Since then she has been SO cranky and clingy....like way more than normal. I'm not sure if she still doesn't feel good or if she just got so much attention by whining while she was sick that now she's discovered a hidden secret! (Pout and Momma will hold you) She keeps going around saying, "I need big hug!" and just wants to lay with us. Who knows, but it sure is getting annoying!

I was a little disappointed that Ainsley hadn't been playing with her kitchen as much as I had hoped, so I decided to move her little table into the toy room while she was sick to see if that made a difference. She hasn't stopped playing with it since then! She gets ALL of her babies set up around the table (and they each have to have their own chair) and cooks them each exactly what they ask for. It's so funny! She even feeds the baby (which is whoever happens to be sitting in the highchair at the time) baby food. I even noticed that she uses the spoon to clean the extra food mess off of the babies mouth....just like Mommies do when we're feeding baby food! I'm not sure where she's seen this done, but I'm guessing it's from watching her cousin eat a couple of months ago.

Friday night was girl's night out and since I had been couped up in the house since Tuesday, AND missed my MDO day, Clint was more than willing to let me leave a couple of hours early to shop with friends before we went to eat. I even replaced my black pants with some cuff-less, shorter ones that hopefully won't be so hazardous! Here's a current belly shot at 27 weeks...a little hard to tell with the crazy shirt...
On a totally different subject, Ainsley has been saying a few things lately that just crack us up! For example, she knows that we both sing in the choir so when Clint left for choir rehearsal Wednesday night she asked where he was going. He said, "I'm going to church to practice singing." And she said, "Ok, have fun singing for Jesus!" So now every time we say we're going to church she says, "You sing for Jesus? Ainsley play playground!" Ha! She also told me yesterday that my name was Mandy and Daddy's name was Sweetie! She's very set on this too!

She has also been making up her own prayers at dinner time instead of our standard, "Thank you Jesus for our food. Amen." She'll thank Jesus for anything and everything but food! And the funniest part is that she always ends by thanking Him for "Uncle Gawy (Gary)!" Last night she was saying her prayers before bedtime where she usually thanks Jesus for all of her friends, but instead said, "Thank you Jesus for God in heaven! Amen!" You think she'd understand the Trinity yet? Ha!

Well, I have a million projects to finish and get cleaned up this week before our company comes. Clint's parents and his sister are all coming this weekend. It's been a long time since we've had company for the entire weekend. Usually my parents spend half of the time at my sister's house. Even if they sleep here both nights, their time is still split somewhat. So, I have to figure out how I'm going to feed 6 people from Friday evening through Sunday afternoon! I get stressed out just thinking about it!

Lastly, Ainsley has her first dance performance tonight! Her class is doing their "teddy bear" dance at the health fair at the elementary school here. I totally expect her to either cry and run off the stage or just stand and stare at everyone. I'll keep you all updated on that one! :) Gotta go paint!

Daddy's Home!

That's right!  Clint got on an earlier flight Wednesday night so I was awake when he got home!  Ainsley was asleep, but she was beside herself with excitement when she saw him the next morning.  He even got to go with us to sit in the observation booth during swimming lessons.  In over 2 years of lessons, it was the first time he had been able to see her swim so that was a lot of fun for both of them.  Then, to celebrate Clint being home, we all went to Chuck E. Cheese to use our coupon I've been saving.  Ainsley absolutely LOVED it, but cried all the way home because she didn't get to talk to Chuck E. himself.  (He was very busy with birthday parties)  She's usually scared of characters like this, but was REALLY excited about seeing him.  So I guess we'll have to go back again and make seeing him our goal!

Ainsley was at school on Friday so Clint and I spent most of the morning together just running some errands, shopping for the baby, etc. and then spent our Olive Garden gift cards from Christmas 2006 for lunch.  It was a lot of fun!  Then Clint had a previous engagement he had to go to so I went home and laid in the recliner for the next 2 hours!  Wow!  Clint even picked Ainsley up from school for me so I wouldn't have to leave the house again.  (I've been having really bad back pain)  It was so nice!  Man how I wish he could be at home a couple of days a week, but still get paid.  Of course, if he was I'd probably just complain about how he interferes with our routine.  :)

Saturday we started painting on the baby's room.  We're doing stripes on one wall in all 4 of the colors of the bedding.  I had no idea that it would take so long to do stripes!  Since we have so many colors, you really have to do 1 color a day, let it dry, re-tape, and do another color the next day.  I have only focused on 3/4 of the wall right now and I'm still not finished.  As soon as I can finish the entire wall, I'll post some pictures.  

Sunday brought back some painful childhood memories!  Just not the kind you're thinking of.  We were all walking out from church (in the parking lot) and each of us holding Ainsley's hands when my favorite heel got caught in my favorite black cuffed pants and threw me down hard!  I had a choice...land on Ainsley, land on the baby, or ruin my clothes.  My very favorite pointy-toed black slingbacks met with the evil pavement that scraped half of the leather on the front.  And my pants are SO far beyond repair!  A huge hole ripped in the right knee and it bled all over them.  I still can't bend my knee far, but at least I finally got most of the black fibers out of my wound.  I think the last time I had a knee wound like this was a bicycle wreck in the driveway when I was in the 6th grade!  :)  Anyway, it was funny how Ainsley reacted to the whole thing.  She was SO upset and just kept saying, "I so sorry, Momma!"  I don't know why she thought she needed to apologize, but she did almost all the way home.  Then she started crying and just wanted to hug me and kiss me.  If she reacts like this to a little blood on my knee, I can't imagine how she's going to react to an incision in my stomach in a few weeks!

I kicked butt on my painting project Monday!  I have everything taped off and ready for the last stripe color on my 3/4 of the wall.  So hopefully I'll be able to finish the whole wall this weekend.  I still have more to do, but that's by far the biggest piece of it.  I even gave Ainsley a little, bitty brush and told her to stay between the lines.  She did pretty good!  Of course, it was in polka dots rather than strokes, but easily fixable!

And lastly, Ainsley woke up with a snotty nose this morning.  I wasn't the least bit surprised because we had our first week of bible study at church yesterday.  Every time I'm involved in a women's bible study Ainsley gets sick a lot.  I don't know why people think it's ok to bring their sick children to church, but they do!  And she seriously gets sick from her interaction with kids on Tuesday mornings than any other time.  Actually, that's why we moved from Wednesday's at Mother's Day Out because she'd always wake up sick.  She's just one of those kids that catches everything!  We were at a friend's house this morning (I was low-lighting her hair) so I really hope her son doesn't get anything because Ainsley woke up from her nap with a fever!  Just 101 so it's pretty low, but it kept us home from church tonight.  She went to bed really early tonight, so hopefully she can sleep it off.  Regardless, it's probably not a good idea to take her to swimming lessons in the 20 degree weather, huh?  Ha!

So there's my catch-up.  I have several pictures to upload, especially Chuck E. Cheese so I'll work on those soon.  In the meantime, if you want to take a look at my other baby name poll I have going, you can check it out here.  (And no, we're no closer to choosing a name than we were 3 months ago!)

100 Days!

As of today, I have 100 days until "baby brother" is born! 100 days seems like a lot of time to me, but when I think that I only have 14 weeks left, that seems pretty short. That's only 14 Saturday's to get everything ready - painting, decorating, organizing, etc. It doesn't seem like enough time! I did get my "golden ticket" from the doctor last week, though, with my surgery date/times. My pre-op is on April 23rd and the C-section is scheduled for April 24th at 7:30am!

Wow, we need to get a name for this baby! If you have a moment, please help us narrow it down by voting on our name list! Thanks!

Don't drink the Bunco water!

Casey took this picture of all the pregnant girls at Bunco last week. (We're missing Leah) Yes, over half of the Bunco girls are pregnant! It's pretty funny, really. The food is changing because none of us are drinking a lot of caffeine and we're all eating a lot of dessert! :)
From left to right: Andrea Shoppach, Shannon Allen, me, Tiffany Lee, Leigh Fox, and Natalie Knoble. Andrea is delivering tomorrow so she was pretty miserable here. And Tiffany delivers in less than a month. I'm next....

She's growing up!

The big girl bed is here! My parents got in late Friday night, so when Ainsley woke up Saturday morning Mimi and Bapa were here. She was SO excited! I cooked breakfast (blueberry waffles, bacon, sausage, and eggs) since it's been over 2 weeks since I've actually cooked a meal. Cooking is a stress reliever for me so it was nice to have someone to cook for.

After breakfast we got started on the rooms. Since Ainsley was staying in the same room, we had to move all of her furniture into the baby's room before we could get the new furniture in. My first task was to strip down the toddler bed (crib) so I asked Ainsley if she wanted to help me. I wanted her to be very involved in the process so she wouldn't lose the excitement of a new bed. Well, instead of helping me, she stripped her mini-crib (dolls and all) and said, "I did it! I win!" Ha! I guess we were racing. I'm so glad that I had the majority of the work completed already. Like painting the walls, ironing the bedskirt, etc. Here is a picture of Ainsley and my mom cleaning the bed...

She was letting Ainsley help pour the cleaner onto the rag since the bottle was almost empty. This eventually led to a mini disaster...

The half-completed bed...Ainsley's first "turn". Doesn't she look SO tiny in it?

What a sweetheart! She's helping me put the sheets on...

A little bit of jumping action to make sure it's fit for sleeping!

Yeah! She likes it!

It looks really cute in her room and is perfect for her. She thinks it's a princess bed like Gigi's. (God's Little Princess book by Sheila Walsh) She keeps saying, "Just like Gigi's bed!" I haven't done any decorating at all yet. I just have the bedding on and the curtain up, but so far that's it. I was planning to get a small, black bookshelf and hang the mirror above it so it would double as a bookshelf and an Ainsley-sized dresser. I went to 2 different Wal-Marts before I discovered that the 2-shelf one was only sold online. They had a 3-shelf one at both stores, but I really wanted it to be smaller so Ainsley could see over it and have a little dressing table. But after I got home and realized that the smaller shelf was twice the price as the taller one, I decided to get the 3-shelf. So, Ainsley and I headed to Wal-Mart tonight specifically to buy a bookshelf (which she was excited about) and they were out of stock! Argh! Anyway, I have a tub full of books and some of the accessories just sitting in the floor until I get a bookshelf. I also am not positive that the furniture will stay in the current placement until I get this. So, after I make up my mind and purchase a bookshelf, I'll post some more pictures.

Oh, I didn't even talk about how well she's been sleeping in her gargantuous bed! We got it set up just about 30 minutes before nap time. I wasn't sure if this was a good idea or not, but it turned out great. I think it was good to introduce it to her before I left her in it for the night. Her nap wasn't great, but about an hour and 15 minutes or so. Enough. Then she slept about 11.5 hours last night before my parents woke her up for church! Fantastic! I think it's a success! Wow, big girl bed and potty-trained all before the baby comes? Can somebody pinch me, please?

Practicing for Baby Brother!

This was hilarious! Ainsley was sitting on my bed watching the Veggie Tales Jonah movie, eating oranges, and had such a cute little smirk on her face. So just as I went to snap a picture, Jonah got swallowed and she gets SO mad at the whale! So this is her telling the whale what a "bad girl" he is! :)

So, I'm heating up my pizza (that we've been eating on for a week now) and Ainsley says, "Hey, look at my frog!" The red-eyed tree frogs on Diego have suction cups on their hands that help them climb trees. So much of her imagination comes from Diego so I'm sure this is where she got this. Anyway, I barely got the camera in time before she started eating them!

This is Ainsley's mattress set that's laying in the baby's room. My parents are bringing the furniture (and should be here tonight) so I was organizing and getting things together tonight. A friend had given me a sack of shoes she had borrowed of Will's and asked me to get them back to Leah. I also had a blanket of his that we borrowed the night of the tornado. Well I guess Ainsley found my stack of "Will things"...you know her imagination! Here she is telling Benji that it's time to eat...
All dressed up for dinner! He's the best dog ever...he even left the shoes on while she made little smacking sounds!

Ok, Benji, time to go night-night. (She got him a pillow)

Here she was singing him a lullaby! I think it was made-up because I couldn't make out the words. :)

Oh, and I have some fantastic news! Ainsley came home in the same pull-up that she wore to school this morning! Miss Stacey said she potty'd like 5 times today! I'm so proud of her!

Pump It Up!

We had Toddler Toes yesterday morning at Pump It Up.  It's an inflatable playground for kids and was SO much fun!  Ainsley hated these things at the fair so I didn't think she'd go in, but Mommies were free so I went in with her for the first few.  After a few minutes, she was an old pro!  Here is Ainsley and Will on the "UFO"...

She kept jumping right toward me so I could get a picture of her jumping!

This slide was HUGE!  There were no stairs either...just this chicken run sort of thing with ropes on each side for you to climb up.  Well after Ainsley saw other Moms going with their kids she wanted me to go.  Easier said than done when you're 6 months pregnant, but we made it!  Here we are at the top with another random little girl that followed us around a lot.

It only took 2 times for Ainsley to realize she could do it by herself.  (And watching Will...notice her following him)  I was nervous watching her climb up the ladder thing!

Let me tell you, that thing was big!  I thought I went down fast and Ainsley went down even faster!

Ainsley and Will going up together...

Doubles!  Tomorrow we'll start training for the 2024 Olympics!

We all had a great time and I never saw a kid without a smile the entire time!  But I think every single kid through a fit when they had to leave.  I had to carry Ainsley out!  When I told her it was time to put her shoes on and she started saying no, I did the whole reverse psychology thing.  "Ok, but Mommy's leaving.  Bye bye!"  This has never, ever failed!  But she came up to me, gave me a hug, and said, "Bye, Momma!  Fee ya waiter!"  :)  At least I know she enjoyed herself!

And lastly, just a cute picture after dance.  For some reason, she really wanted a picture with Benji!  He wasn't quite as excited as she was...

Tornados!

We had a very exciting night last night! Ha! Luckily I was on the phone with my sister yesterday evening when she asked if I was ready for all of the tornados. Tornados? Huh? They don't have much of a storm tracker on Nickelodeon these days! It was just raining a little outside so I didn't think too much about it. (I did grow up in the middle of tornado alley after all) So we went ahead and ate and went to the toy room to play a while before bedtime when I decided to turn the TV on. Whoa! I had exactly 25 minutes before they estimated the first rotation to come right over our house. So now I had a decision to make....keep Ainsley up and wait it out or put her to bed? Funny that I didn't think about shelter first! :)

So after a couple of friends called to check on me I decided to go ahead and get Ainsley ready for bed...just in case the storm didn't even come our way. Well, now I only had 20 minutes left so I was in a little bit of a panic mode. I got Ainsley in the bath and started pulling stuff out of the bathroom closet and lining the floor with blankets, pillows, books, snacks, flashlights, etc. to keep her happy. Then everything was out of place...couldn't find my cell....pajamas were all in the dryer....flashlight??? flashlight???...where's the stupid weather radio!!??? Yeah, I was a little flustered trying to get everything finished in enough time to get Ainsley out and dressed without rushing her. After all, I didn't want to scare her. Well, too late. I guess just all of the commotion was enough because she was crouching down in the bathroom and starting to cry a little. When I asked her what was wrong she said, "I cared!" (I'm scared) So I ask why she's scared and she says, "Torm's comin!" (Storm's coming) Wow! I had tried so hard to be calm in front of her (and didn't even know she knew what a storm was) but kids are SO perceptive!

My friend, Leah, called back to warn me that it was headed straight to us and see if I wanted to come on over. I had pumped myself all up into thinking I'd be fine by myself, but knowing that I was starting to scare Ainsley made me decide it might be better to go over there and get her mind off of things. So, by now I only have about 5 minutes before the storm hits. I decided to drive the Bronco (hoping I'd get Clint a new truck out of the deal) but I had to put the carseat in first. Then I had to chase Benji because he was so scared and running from me. By now it was REALLY pouring down outside and a little hard to see, but I could see the wall cloud and we still had plenty of time to drive just a few blocks to their house. Leah had made popcorn for the kids and, being in their p.j.'s, they thought we were having a party! They immediately starting running around and squeeling! We mostly let the kids play while we watched TV and Caleb (Leah's husband) watched outside. At one point it got scary enough that we went to the closet where Caleb had hooked the portable DVD player up and made a little pallet for the kids. They stayed in there for a long time!

Well, the rotations were coming about every 10-15 minutes so I knew it would be several hours before it all passed by. So, I decided to put Ainsley to sleep at their house. She did fine and we continued to watch the storms pass right over us until about 11:30pm when Ainsley woke up crying. I think she just didn't know where she was and it scared her...plus she was overtired since it was after 9:00pm before she went to bed. So I decided to just go ahead and take her home. There were only about 3 more rotations to pass and it looked like they would miss us by 4 or 5 miles so we loaded up during the heavy rain again (since I knew a tornado wouldn't hit during rain) and went home. It was a scary drive again, but once home Ainsley went straight to sleep. The poor thing just climbed into bed and closed her eyes! I stayed up until the last rotation passed about 1:30am. But then woke back up at 2:15am to a loud noise and the weather radio going off again. I turned the TV back on and waited it out again...back to sleep at 2:45am.

6:45am - my alarm clock went off so I could get the trash out before the truck came. This is something I really hate doing while Clint's gone because the truck usually comes so early! Then I just went ahead and took a shower and got ready because we had Toddler Toes at 10:00am anyway. Well, it turns out the truck didn't come until 2:00pm and Ainsley slept until 9:00am! I could have had 2 more hours of sleep!!! Agh!

Oh, the loud noise? I guess a branch broke off of the neighbors huge dead Oak tree (behind us and over one). Their guttering is flattened and there's plastic nailed to the corner of their roof. At least the tree didn't fall because it probably would have hit our house!

Just us girls!

Well, Clint left on Friday before Ainsley got home from "school" and so far the time is passing pretty quickly! Saturday morning we went over to my sister's house to hang out for a while and let the girls play. Ainsley adores her little cousin and had SO much fun! I bet she hugged Hailey 2o times while we were there!


After a really good nap, we met Ainsley's friend Michael and his mom at the park. It was 69 degrees in Centerton! We didn't stay too long, though, because it was really windy. I didn't get any great photos because I couldn't keep my hair out of the shot, but here's a few nonetheless...

Ainsley told me she was "shopping for apples" here! :)

After the park we went to Wal-Mart to get some good girly food while Daddy's gone. I needed things that I can heat up and not have to cook huge meals just for the 2 of us. I also got some shelving for "baby brother's" closet so I can start sorting and organizing! I had 2 awful experiences at Wal-Mart with rude people that don't respect pregnant women. The first time I was trying to load one of the boxes of shelves (which wasn't light) into my cart and keep Ainsley sitting down without her falling all at the same time when this guy came up behind me and said, "Excuse me?" First thought - how nice! Someone is coming to help me load these into my cart! Nope, he wanted me to sit the heavy box down while balancing it with one hand and move the cart full of the 30 pound toddler (29 lbs 14 oz with shoes on....we're almost there!) with the other hand! You tell me why he didn't go out the other end of the EMPTY aisle? Ugh! (BTW - he was about my age with a 3 or 4 year old daughter...should know better!)

Then this young punky cashier just sat there and watched me fight the toddler and try to load all of my bags in the cart all while he stood holding my receipt and waiting for me to finish. That was it! I haven't been feeling well the last week (normal pregnancy stuff, braxton hicks, sore all over, etc.) and have NO energy at all so I just snapped! I looked right at him as I was making Ainsley sit for the 4th time, out of breath, and said, "I'd really appreciate it if you could help me load the rest of these bags!" Response - "Oh, ok." It's not like I'm not visibly pregnant or anything! Do these people have ANY idea what it feels like to be pregnant at the end of a busy day with a stubborn toddler?!!!!

Anyway, I was glad to get home and receive a call from Clint saying he was in his hotel room in Shenzen! It definitely made my day! Ainsley actually was really good for me most of the time. Plus, she was in big girl panties ALL DAY LONG! This is a huge milestone considering how busy and active we were all day. It's the first time I've ever put her in panties on a busy day like that, but she did excellent!

Speaking of, she insisted on wearing her Tinkerbell panties to church today also. I was really nervous as we often have accidents at church (long story there...) but she also did fabulous at church! I'm so proud of how good she has been! Anyway, she looked so cute so I tried to snap a good picture of her in her cute little dress. Ha! She was way too excited to be outside. This is the best I did....



Ainsley has been the BEST sleeper so far. I've been praying really hard about this because she didn't sleep well at all the last China trip and God has definitely blessed us! She's been sleeping about 12 hours at night and going straight to sleep without singing or talking! Then she's been napping about 3 hours each day! Also easily laying down like a big girl! Today I put her down at 1:00pm and heard her snoring about 1:15pm. My friend Casey came over to sew some pillows and keep me company during naptime. (Thanks Casey!) It felt like a lot of time had gone by so I looked at the clock and it was already 4:15pm and I could still hear snoring! When we went to wake her up she was still in a DEEP sleep! So I had no idea how bedtime would go, but she was asleep by 8:45pm tonight! I just can't stop using exclamation points!!!!

Clint called again this afternoon, it was his Monday morning and he was getting ready to go to work. Ainsley was so cute on the phone! "You in China, Daddy? You work? Have fun in China? I love you, Daddy!" She loves to go outside and watch the airplanes because she thinks Daddy is in them. Too cute! She also runs to the garage every time she hears a loud truck go by the house...she's convinced it's the Bronco. Hopefully I'll keep her busy enough next week that she won't miss him too much...

Where's China?

I've been working really hard on all of the decor for Ainsley's big girl room. I've made curtains, tons of throw pillows, lampshades, etc. Ainsley decided it was time she learned how to sew too, so I got the little toy Singer out for her. I've never used it (I got it at a garage sale a few months ago for .75) but it was great for Ainsley! She didn't like to use her foot for the pedal, though, she liked to just squeeze it. She sewed for about an hour, though! Cut her fabric, pinned it back, and everything!

Making sure her measurements are correct!

Clint leaves tomorrow for China so he took Ainsley in to show her where China was on the map. She knows that he is going to fly over a lot of water (which she thinks is way cool!) and she knows how many days he is going to be gone. It was really cute watching her learn with Daddy.

She's wearing a bib like a cape on her back, only she says it's "wings like Tinka Bewl!"

On another note, Ainsley went #1 in the potty for the first time when Clint was in China a couple of months ago. So tonight it was only fitting that she poopied in the potty for Daddy for the first time the night before he leaves. (Not poopied the first time, just the first time for Daddy....she will usually only go for me) She's in big girl panties most of the time now unless she's at church or school (and never has an accident in panties), so I think we're doing pretty good to be so close to potty-trained in only 2 1/2 months! With a little less than 4 months to go before the baby comes, I think we can be completely potty-trained! Woohoo! I'm so proud of her!

New Year's Eve/Day

Clint had to work on New Year's Eve, so Ainsley and I ran all sorts of errands that morning. Pharmacy refills, dry cleaning, groceries, and Hobby Lobby sales! :) She took a good, long nap that afternoon and when she woke up I heard her on the monitor say, "Time for Gracie's house!" I had told her that if she closed her eyes and took a nap like a good girl then we'd go to Gracie's house for a party...she was SOOOO excited! Unfortunately, she had to wait 2 hours until the party started, but reminded us every 10 minutes that she was going to Gracie's house.

The party was at a friends house from church and they have 2 kids, Gracie is 6 and Gavin is 4. Ainsley is convinced that Gracie is her best friend in the whole world! She has always loved that little girl! They just built a house on some land outside of Centerton so this was our first time to be over there. There were about 8 couples there and they each had a couple of kids so it was definitely packed, but we all had a great time. Ainsley stayed with the big girls (other than 1 baby she was the youngest there) the entire time and we never even saw her unless we went back to check on her. They had a big dog too, which I thought would be a problem, but Ainsley didn't seem to mind him too much. He even licked her forehead once and she just pointed her finger at him and told him, "No, don't do that!" We had great food! The kids ate at little picnic tables and the adults played a couple of games and got to know each other. It really was a good time. We only stayed until about 8:30pm (which is late for Ainsley to be out anyway) so we were the first to leave. Most of the couples were planning on letting the kids just crash somewhere and watch the ball drop, but my child would have never recovered from a night like that! So, we planned to come home, drink our sparkling grape juice, and watch a movie, but Clint had been up since 4:00am and I am pregnant and always exhausted, so we fell asleep in the middle of the movie about 11:00pm! Oh well.....maybe next year!

We all slept in until almost 8:00am on New Year's Day. I can't even remember the last time Clint slept that long! We all three stayed in our pj's all morning, Clint cooked us waffles mid-morning, and we played a couple of games. Here is a picture of Ainsley enjoying her New Year's Day while watching her movie!

When Ainsley woke up from her nap, we headed to the mall for our traditional "fun day with Daddy." Clint leaves for China again on Friday and we always try to do something fun with Ainsley before he leaves. I had a $10 gift certificate for Build-A-Bear so we started there. We were looking at all of the different kinds of animals to choose from and Ainsley kept saying, "I want a bunny!" I wasn't even sure they had bunnies, but luckily we found a cheap one! :) Here she is stuffing her bunny....with her "cheese" grin.

Picking out a heart for her bunny....this took a while to choose which one was the best!

She gave the heart a kiss and stuffed it in the bunny. They didn't do all the things they did the last time with the heart, but they were really busy too so maybe there just wasn't time.

Bunny's first bath!

She named her bunny what we thought was "Buster Bunny" so that's what we put on the birth certificate. But she's been calling him "Brother Bunny" at home....who knows?

What a fun day with Daddy! (They had just gone to play with an iPhone at the AT&T store)

I also had coupons for Cold Stone Creamery, so we stopped there before heading home. This was a big step for me because we hadn't even had dinner yet! Ainsley picked out the "blue" ice cream with sprinkles on top! (She did not want them mixed in) She ate the entire thing, but I tasted it and it was really gross!

We came home and I cooked our traditional New Year's pork dinner. It was a great, relaxing day!