What I've been up to...

 FELT!  I have been busy busy cutting sewing and stuffing felt to make a felt card table playhouse for my favorite fifteen month old. Claribel played with it for a few minutes before nap time and I know she will have tons of fun in there...  So, here we go... picture time!

 Front Door(flap that lifts up) with an open close sign and mailbox that opens and has a pocket on the inside for mail to drop into

  Ice Cream Shop-  I still have novelties to finish that will stick to the velcro (banana split, ice cream sundae, ice cream cones, ice cream sandwiches, and popsicles)  There is also velcro on the table on either side of the flower for the ice cream to stick to.

 Mail Center- I am working on making letters (I have two each of the colors on the black pockets for sorting).  The brown package on the table is a peek-a-boo flap and under the table is a "doggie door" with a large mail pouch for unsorted mail.  I have a sorter that will be really excited once I am done with the mail.

The Garden- there are two corn in a husk that fit into pockets on the corn stalk (one is shown), 4 pockets in the "soil" for some beets, carrots, and maybe some onions that she can pick, strawberry bush with removable (velcro) flowers and strawberries, the other half of the tree that wraps around by the front door with two little red birdies that can come out of the nest.  I was going to add some fruit to the tree, but kind of forgot about that... I guess I could add it by hand later.

Inside of the house (view from the front door): fireplace, clear frame for a 5x7 photo, vase with flower, curtain over the window at the ice cream shop, table with tablecloth and goldfish bowl with removable stuffed goldfish.  The goldfish bowl ended up being one of my favorite things :)

Three pockets for whatever she wants to put in there and curtains for the window on the garden side

I definitely DID NOT come up with this idea on my own...  I really liked the house I found at http://homemadebyjill.blogspot.com/search/label/felt%20playhouse (for Christmas, Ray and I are going to make a DIY play kitchen- also a project on her blog)

I also got inspiration and ideas from MissPrettyPretty's shop on Etsy

New Mexico

After we left RMNP on Wednesday am, we dropped off the rental car at the airport and made the long trek in the RV down to the Lavin's Cabin in the mountains in NM.  I don't think there could have been a better last minute family vacation.  We were able to spend 3 nights hanging out and it was great!  Not to mention, of course, Ray, Claribel and I were able to finally kiss that little Lizette's head!  What a sweet, adorable little darling they have.  It is so hard to live so far away...  Hopefully one day we will live closer together again...

Ray, Tucker and Dad went fly-fishing one day and the rest we just hung out and enjoyed the wonderful mountain air on the awesome porch!

Rebecca said she was pretty sure Lizette had smiled at her,

all I have to say is that she smiled at her Aunt Melissa!

Claribel enjoyed wearing some warmer clothes and exploring a new place...

and of course meeting her new cousin! 

Although she wasn't quite sure about her mama holding another baby at first :)

Auntie Allison also squeezed in some snuggle time- good thing Lizette loves to be held...

Finally, the first of many Petty cousin photo shoots... very fun!

The visit went by really fast, and it was hard to kiss that sweet L's head and breathe in that new baby smell one last time before we see them at Thanksgiving.  WAY TOO LONG in baby time! 

Rocky Mountain National Park

All of the Pettys and Don and Monie were supposed to go to Destin, but with the unknown of the oil spill, that trip was delayed until next year.  Ray and I desperately needed a break from work and Texas heat so we headed to the Rockies!  We flew into Denver and rented a car to drive to Estes Park where we stayed in a pretty rustic cabin just outside of Rocky Mountain National Park.  My mom and dad bought an RV this summer and were staying at a campground in the park.  Sleeping was a bit of a challenge in our one room cabin, but we adjusted ok and Claribel was a champ as always! 

We had a great first vacation as a family of 3.

We went on a nice one walk one evening before we headed back to our cabin.  It was a rough ride for the Bob, but Claribel didn't seem to mind and took a nice little nap.

Ray was able to practice his fly-fishing skills with dad

our last afternoon we drove the long way out of the park to the north entry and took pictures at each pull off spot as Claribel napped in the back seat.  BEAUTIFUL... what a mighty Creator we have!

Double Happy!

Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday to you!
Happy Birthday dear Aunt Rachael and Popsi!
Happy Birthday to you!


We hope you both have FABULOUS days!
lovelove,
Ray, Melissa, and Claribel

Happy First Birthday Claribel!

Happy Birthday Monie!

Happy Birthday to one of my favorite people!

I am looking all over to find you and give you a hug and kiss!

Where are you?  I miss you!  Hope you have a bright sun-shiny day!

Happy BD and DD!

Happy Birthday to you!

Happy Birthday to you!

Happy Birthday dear Allison,

Happy Birthday to you!

We hope you have a great day and good trip!

ALSO...  
Happy due date to Rebecca!  We hope to meet that little Lizette VERY SOON!!!

We love you both very much!

Rebecca's Baby Shower

Well, it is about time for that little Lavin baby to arrive and I thought I would share some pics from Rebecca's baby shower (a few months late). Sorry about the mixup getting the pics to you Rebecca, I should have done this a long time ago!

Playing with Picasa...

Finally took a little bit of time to play with Picasa a bit- you are right, Kelli, pretty easy.  I still have lots to learn, but this collage tool is definitely the way to post more than one pic!

Pool Day

We tried to take our first trip to the pool this past Sunday... we got all swim diapered, coconut sunscreened, blue hatted, and swim-suited up. We made it almost to the pool and heard thunder and the lifeguard whistle... So we went again yesterday and and had a great time!

Hands Pattering

Claribel is crawling really well these days. You can hear her hands pattering down the hall. This is the warning I get when I'm in my office and Lil'Bel is coming to chew on my papers. Interestingly enough, one of the things she likes the most in here are the spec books for my projects (probably one of the only people in the world who wants to look at one).

Tearing up Laughs!

for some reason, cbel thought this paper tearing was the funniest thing! candice and melissa really had her going. our favorite is when she throws her head back.

That's My Girl!

cbel has already shown us that she has a sense of rhythm by tapping to music once or twice, but this is the best! i'm not very creative when i need her attention, so i do what any drum enthusiast would do and start tapping. can you guess what she did?

For the Aunties (part II)...

This isn't a deep laugh, but a small one. It's very hard to catch her laughing at all because she's always distracted by the camera.

She was acting really funny on the floor in my office until I turned the camera on (of course). I did catch a little glimpse of it...then she rolls over when she heard Melissa came home.

We hope you're feeling better Auntie Allison!

hb rebs

Happy Birthday to you

Happy Birthday to you
Happy Birthday dear Rebecca

Happy Birthday to you!

We hope you have a fabulous day!  Welcome to the 30 club!

Carseat Help!

Hollah Hollah!  I need some advice...  We really need to go ahead and get Claribel a convertible car seat and am wondering what you have and what you like about it!  So, give me a shout out and let me know.  We have a 4Runner so space isn't a huge issue, but it ain't yo mamma's cadillac either :)  I want one that she will be able to be in until she is ready for a booster.  Ok... let me know and talk amongst yourselves.  Thanks!

the assignment

I guess I should go ahead and do this while I seem to have a few minutes... 
Fave high school memories:
Road trips to the football games.  Sometimes we had a few stragglers, but for the most part it was Kelli, Meredith Hare, Alissa, and myself.  We felt so grown up getting to drive to faraway places, like Conroe (ha).  We had our cd's with specific songs that we always played and sang out hearts out to, such as Mariah Carey's "Always Be My Baby", and TLC's "Waterfalls".  
Pep-Rallies on Friday afternoons were also lots of fun, especially when we were seniors with our overalls and the little spirit dance... fun times!
Annual TP job at Coach Wade's.  In 8th grade, our history (i think) teacher was Coach Wade.  Christina, Laurel, and I started an annual (i think it was at the end of the year) tradition of wrapping his house.  We did this with the help of Dara (if i remember correctly) the following years until we went to college.  I remember getting caught at least once in high school and having to clean it up as well as returning a parking sign at a business once it was already light outside.  I am sure he was glad he taught us in 8th grade... obviously he made some kind of an impression...
Putting BHS up for sale.  In the spring of senior year, me, alissa, Kelli, Meredith, Doug (if i remember right- i am probably forgetting some or misnaming some) decided to do a little senior prank.  We went around town and collected for sale signs and even got a bit tarp style "clearance sale" sign from a mobile home sales place and put them all over the campus.  We also made up flyers from a copied for sale by owner sign that had a cost of $97 (class of 1997).  We put the clearance sale sign under the big marqui sign by the stadium.  Unfortunately, the next morning was an early mowing day for maintenance and it was all cleaned up by the time we got to school, but they missed the clearance sale sign.  The next day, I remember the vice principals were nosing around trying to figure out who did it.  I really wanted to hand the principal one of the flyers before we walked across the stage for graduation, but was a chicken...  I wish I would have.

Favorite teachers:
Ms. Mueller (Calculus AP) definitely stands out as one of my more respected and best teachers.  That class really helped me in college in Engineering Cal 2.
Ms. Pennebaker (senior English AP) was also one that stands out and I give her the credit for not having to take English at TAMU, which was huge for me!
Ms. Richards (Biology AP) was definately also a favorite as she was of everyone who had her I am sure.  She was also our senior class sponsor.

Well, my Bitty is up from her nap, so I better go take care of that-

This was fun taking a stroll down memory lane- can't wait to see what the others write!

word for 2010

I really loved this word of the year idea from Lacy and have been thinking about what I wanted my word to be.  This turned into resolutions of sorts and then I read a blog entry of a friend from college which sealed the deal.  My word of the year is care.  Caring for me... taking care of all the things that I have been ignoring and setting aside as I focus on the needs, schedules, etc. of others.  I need to make some big changes in my life as far as my health is concerned... things I have been saying I was going to and truly wanting to do, but not doing.  I am going to do it this year, even though now I have a baby that is just one more person that I can focus on instead of myself, I must do this now.   Learn to care for myself now.  Not in months or years, but now.

cloth diapering

This is mostly for my sister, who is interested in cloth diapering her little one coming in June... but I have wanted to blog about this and just show what I do and what I have so that non- cloth diaperers can see that these aren't our mama's cloth diapers.  It really is nice and easy!

Here are the diapers I have (bumGenius 3.0 One Size).  We have pretty much all white ones, which I love because you can't see them through clothes and they look nice under dresses:

*** added January 31***

I also have some Happy Heiney fitted diapers, but those never worked as good, we had lots of leaks (the lining likes to peek out from the cover) and didn't end up using them much at all.  I also bought two of the Fuzzi Bunz One Size Diapers which I like for the snaps instead of velcro, BUT they were not on sale when I needed to purchase more, cost more than the bumGenius, and they are harder to stuff with the inserts.  However, if these were the ones I had from the beginning I would love them as well- they are just different and take getting used to.  I also have some Hemp prefolds, snappis and some Happy Heiney covers that are definitely the economical way to go, BUT I never felt like the prefolds kept her as dry and had as much absorption.  So, they are mostly used as backups if we are behind on laundry.  Also, that option is not as "daddy friendly".

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I use this sprayer that hooks up to the toilet to spray off the dirty diapers into the toilet... works SOSOSO good!

I have a spray bottle of water at her changing table and these cloth wipes that I just spray down and then wipe her.  These go in the diaper pail as well as the diapers.  They are the bumGenius Bamboo wipes.  We also have some we use as wash rags for the bath and they are perfect for that as well.

I have this diaper pail and it has just enough capacity that you are pretty much needing to wash diapers when it is full (we got ours from Babies R Us)

I have two of these pail liners (Wahmies pail liners) that you pull out of the pail and dump it and the diapers into the washing machine.

I use this laundry detergent for all of our laundry now.

I line dry the diapers, not the inserts and cut out some liners out of anti pill fleece that I just lay inside the diaper that keeps diaper cream from getting on the diaper when we have to use some and sometimes makes cleanups a bit easier. 

*** Added on January 31***

If you live in BCS, Cloud 9 Baby is a lovely store that carries the majority of the diapers and other products that I use and others.  The owner is VERY helpful and will spend as much time as you need explaining the different diapering systems.  ALSO, if you find diapers on sale, say at Cotton Babies, she will have them on for the same sale price in her store!

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