8 Months

Sam just turned 8 months old. I can't believe how quickly the time flies! I think this stage is my favorite one yet. He's showing more affection these days, giving me lots of sloppy kisses and tight neck hugs, and showing off more of those sweet smiles and laughs. It's just the best.

He's also started "army crawling". It's so funny, and it wears me out just watching him. That does not look easy! His favorite thing right now is bath time. Since he's graduated to just the big tub, he has much more freedom to splash around. It's such a blast!

Last night we had a photo session at the park with our awesome photographer friend Mary Morrow, who also did his newborn session (see my blog header). If you're in the OKC area, you should definitely check her out. You can follow this link to her photography blog, where she's posted a couple of pics from our session last night. Is he the cutest?! And he has an ear infection right now, poor thing, so I was especially impressed with how well he did.

Also, Sam's new house is coming along! Here's a pic from yesterday. I doubt much will get done today, what with the monsoon rain, but we've been excited with the progress.

See Sam Swing

I took Sam to the park this week to try out the baby swings. I think he really liked it, although he doesn't look super enthused in the pictures. Either way, he was definitely the cutest baby at the park ;)

This was at a great park that's just a stone's throw from where our new neighborhood will be. I have a feeling we'll be frequenting this place quite a bit! Speaking of the new house - a quick update - our slab is done, and they're supposed to be framing today. I could post a picture, but it just looks like a big pad of concrete and tubes and sand right now... which it is, but it's going pretty quickly right now so we're excited!

A Few Things I've Learned Since Becoming a Mom

I've only been a Mom for 7 1/2 months or so now, but in that short time, I've learned many things. Here are just a few....

* Pureed green beans, when left to dry, could be used as a great substitute for cement.

* Bibs should be securely fashioned to a child's neck before sitting them up after dressing them - if you fail to do this, the child will, without exception, spit up down the full length of their fresh, clean outfit.

* It is futile to try to keep your shirt free from spit up and other unmentionables. Just embrace the splotched look for this season.

* Children, especially little boys, will have a runny nose until they are at least 8 years old.

* Much destruction can be accomplished in that 2 minute time frame that you run to turn on the dishwasher, even by a not-yet "mobile" child. Much.

* Cheerios are the greatest thing on the face of the planet.

* Baby feet naturally repel socks. There's no keeping those suckers on.

* Boys are boys from the very beginning. Remotes, cell phones, and other gadgets top the favorites list.

* There is no equal to having your child smile at you. It will melt even the most stone cold heart.

* Once your baby has laughed, you will spend the majority of your day trying to coax it out again.

* That little body cuddling up against you is the best feeling in the world.

* Watching your baby splash and play in the bathtub becomes your favorite entertainment.

* Motherhood is probably the hardest, most wonderful and tenderly miraculous gift God gives us.

And here are some recent pics of my little miracle!

Playing with Grandpa Pruitt and the beloved remote

With Mom

With Great-Granddad Thurlkill

In the sun hat :)

Hanging with Dad

A Nephew on the Way!

My sweet sister is expecting, due in September, and she just found out a few days ago that she’s expecting a BOY! I’m so excited! Of course, I would have been ecstatic about a girl too – we already had the girlie nursery stuff figured out, but hey, boy nurseries are fun too! I’m thrilled that Sam will have a cousin and playmate so close in age. I see a friendship in the works!

Congrats, Christina (and oh yeah, Brandon too :)). I love you so much!

Uncle Jeff

On my way home from the Ladies’ Retreat last Saturday, I learned that my Uncle Jeff had passed away earlier that afternoon. He had been sick for about a year now with cancer, but I don’t think you’re ever really prepared to get news like that. Uncle Jeff was my Mom’s younger brother. He was only 49 years old.

Jeff was one of those people that was the life of the party and just lit up the room. He was always cracking jokes or tickling one of the kids to death, or just cutting up. His laugh was contagious. He absolutely loved babies and children and could get them to smile and laugh like no one else I’ve ever known. I’m so thankful that he got to meet Sam over Thanksgiving. Beneath it all, he was so sweet and tender hearted… truly a good man.

Mike and I left early on Monday to go to Arkansas for his funeral. I’m so grateful that we got to be there to see family, and to say goodbye. It was obvious that he was very well loved by the amount of people that came by for visitation on Monday evening, and then the crowd that showed up for the funeral. He certainly made an impact on everyone he met.

Uncle Jeff, I love you so much and you are missed so dearly. Thank you for being such a bright spot in my life and the lives of so many. I look forward to seeing you again one day, and until then, keep laughing and making everyone else up there do the same.

Oklahoma Ladies' Retreat (plus 2 Pruitt men)

I had the pleasure to hostess Liz Curtis Higgs this past weekend at the Oklahoma Ladies’ Retreat. She was the keynote speaker this year. If you haven’t heard her speak or read any of her books before, I highly recommend that you check her out. She’s amazing – one of my absolute favorites.

They were generous enough to also allow Mike to come along and bring Sam, too, even though babies are usually not allowed at the retreat… special perks when you’re a former employee, I guess! It was a really good time. I got to actually talk one on one with Liz quite a bit, and that was amazing. I also just helped out in general where I was needed. It was a lot of work, but not near the amount it was for me in years past!

Blogging is going to help push me remember to take pictures. I looked through my camera after I got home to see which pictures from the weekend I should post and literally, these are the only three pictures we snapped while we were there:

The first is proof that I took my responsibilities very seriously while I was there. The second just happens to be a good picture of the only 2 guys there that weekend, and the third…. I have no words. I’ve always thought the lamps in the Falls Creek hotel rooms are hideous and kind of humorous, so for some reason I decided to snap a picture. That’s right, I got a picture of the hideously funny lamp, but not a single shot of me with Liz Curtis Higgs, or anything to do with the actual conference. I’m retarded.

Being there brought back a lot of memories from the retreat last year. Many of you may not know, but during last year’s retreat I was still working in the women’s office and I was 5 months pregnant with Sam. Just a few hours before the women started to arrive on the grounds, I was still working on set-up when I started bleeding. They took me to a hospital in a nearby town. I called Mike in tears and he immediately left work to come and be with me. We were so scared. I couldn’t help but wonder if we were going to lose Sam. It made me all the more grateful to be back there again this year with my healthy baby boy in tow. Boy, is God good!

T.V. Thursday Disappointment

I just have to say how disappointed I am that there wasn't a new 'Office' on tonight. I look forward to 8:00 Thursday nights ALL week. Does anyone else out there watch The Office? If not, you're sincerely missing out. If you do - what the SAM HILL is going to happen? What's going to become of Michael, and what in the world is Pam thinking?

Mike just informed me that there will be 2 new episodes on next week. You're redeemed, NBC!

Now I'm off to pack for the Oklahoma Ladies' Retreat... I'm leaving at the crack of dawn to get down there and hostess Liz Curtis Higgs for the weekend, and help out where I can. It's going to be great!

Sweet Moments with My Sweet Sam

Today I had one of those moments where I just wept. I’ve discovered that this isn’t unusual in motherhood – sometimes for sweet reasons, sometimes from overwhelmed feelings, sometimes from just sheer exhaustion. Today it was oh so sweet.

It was naptime for Sam, and I’ve been trying to teach him to fall asleep on his own. He’s been doing pretty well at it for night-time, but he’s still pretty dependant on me rocking him to sleep for naps. I did the usual routine in getting things ready for naptime, then wrapped him in his soft blanket, gave him his pacifier, and sat down in the rocking chair with him cuddled in my arms. He’s gotten to the point where he likes to squirm and crane his neck to look all around the room while I try to stay patient and get him to the sleepy stage. But. This time he was tired enough that he just snuggled up close to me and just stared up at me with his clear blue eyes.

We had the sweetest moments together, just staring at each other, snuggling, and silently communicating ‘I love you’. It was so sweet that I just cried and thanked God for him. And I didn’t want to put him down. So just for today, I think I’ll rock him and hold him while he sleeps. Thank you, Lord.

Going Green Part II

A couple of quick things before I start: First off, none of this is rocket science, and a lot of you probably already do this stuff (in fact, you may have given me the idea). These aren’t really new ideas, I just thought it would be fun to share what we’re doing. Also, I wanted to clear up a mistake I posted in the last Going Green entry. If you’d like to make the orange vinegar, it’s actually 3 cups of vinegar to 1 orange peel… sorry about that. Of course, you could use any amount you want for a stronger or lighter scent. Another note about the vinegar cleaner is that it also can be used on wooden furniture, so I use it for dusting too. It really is all-purpose! I’d recommend testing it on your furniture first in an inconspicuous area to make sure your finish won’t be harmed. I don’t want to start getting hate comments or something…

One easy change I’ve made is that I try to save the glass jars from food that we buy, and sometimes the plastic containers that I think I might re-use. I try not to go overboard and become a total pack-rat, but there are a million things you can use old containers like these for. Just a couple of ways we use them are for storing leftovers or home-made food, or the jars can even be used for packaging a homemade gift of hot cocoa mix or soup mix, wrapped up with a pretty ribbon and a cute card attached. You can even use some craft paint to paint something cute on the lid, and cover up the not-so-cute ‘Preggo’ label. Anyway – I’m venturing into crafts already so I’d better move on.

I’ve also been trying to cut down on the amount of disposable paper products that we use, especially paper towels. I still buy them, because there are some things you just need a paper towel for, like draining bacon or fried chicken (anyone have some suggestions for healthy eating?), but I have found that I actually prefer using old washcloths for most of the little clean-ups and spills I used to use paper towels for. We’ve also been trying to really recycle everything we get that can be recycled. There’s a whole lot more than you might think!

To be honest, these next two things were started not so much out of the valiant effort to be green, but just to save some cash. First off, if you’ve got kids, you’ve got to check out the jbf sales in your area! You can find their website here. It’s basically a city-wide consignment sale for ALL baby and kid stuff you could possibly imagine. You can find some incredible deals at these places and hey, reduce-reuse-recycle, right?

Finally, I make Sam’s baby food. It’s so easy, so economical, and good for him too. I just buy some veggies or fruit, organic when I can find them, then steam and puree them. When it’s the right consistency (you can add some water if needed), I just pour it into ice cube trays and freeze it, then pop it out and keep it in freezer bags. Each cube is about a 1 oz serving and it’s really convenient. At mealtime I just microwave however much he needs. Usually I mix it with a little bit of cereal, or it’s perfectly good by itself too.

Ok, that’s all for now! Best of luck on your green quest!