Too Fun!

We've been so busy this past week! We started the week on Tuesday going over to my friend Sterling's parents' house to celebrate Daren's 1st Birthday. Got that? :) Sterling is one of my closest friends, we've been friends since 5th grade! She lives with her husband Chris, two daughters Nixon and Daren, in Uvalde, TX. Which is 6 HOURS AWAY! Luckily her parents still live in P-town, so we get to see them when they come in town. Anywho, Daren had her 1st birthday this past week. It was a lot of fun. And also really nostalgic for me because the last time we got the girls together Daren was 6 months old and Audrey was just a few weeks old. It's amazing how time flies!

Nixon is the sweetest girl and she was just so precious with Audrey. Here she is trying to give her the balloon.
Audrey's all "I got it, now what's going on over here . . ." :)

Daren and Audrey playing . . .

And here's one of Audrey sleeping tonight. This is her new favorite position. Butt up, legs in, let's sleep!

Mommy feeding Audrey

Dad here... I hijacked the blog for a quick post! It just so happened that I had the video camera out and caught this clip at just the right time while Amy was feeding Audrey some cream o' banana's!

It makes me laugh everytime I watch it! Thanks Amy for having such a great attitude with Aud's even when she gets a little bit messy!

True Life . . . Living with a Doc Band

Well, Audrey has been wearing her Doc Band for about a full week now. It's already been such an interesting journey. It doesn't seem to bother her at all during the day, but at night it's a different story. James and I watch her each night on the monitor trying to get comfy. It's hard for her! She's been waking up a few times each night crying. Usually she can get herself back to sleep within a few minutes, but sometimes she just wants us to hold her and rock her back to sleep. What a transition for us! She spoiled us by sleeping through the night at six weeks. Last night we were up 3 times trying to calm her down. The poor baby also just got 2 new teeth, so her jaw hurts, her head isn't comfy, and she just wants to sleep. I think it is the teething though, and not the helmet. I wonder how long this stage lasts??

And, during the day, she's just a beautiful baby, with a helmet. I knew people would stare but I didn't know how KIND people really are. It's actually been a lot of fun to go out every day and meet new people. Everyone wants to talk to us now and know why she's wearing the helmet. It's so neat to talk to people every day and explain to them why Audrey's wearing her helmet.

The most common question is: "Oh, did she just have surgery?" The best one so far has been the older man we saw in Target yesterday. He was probably in his 80's, and he just came up to Audrey, looked at her, and then pointed to her helmet and said "That is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. What a precious baby." So sweet!

We also had the best playdate with my friend Hilary and her baby boy Cade at Northpark Mall this week. He is 3 months old and he just got his band too! It was our first outing with the helmet, and it was so nice to have another "helmet baby" with us. Hilary is my friend from when I worked at the super cool Islands' restaurant in high school. She is a great girl with a wonderful baby. Little Cade even brought Audrey some stickers to decorate her band with. What a gentleman! :)

New Jersey Trip

As I previously posted, my Grandma passed away a few months ago. She was my last living grandparent and I really wish she had the chance to meet Audrey. My Grandma lived in the most gorgeous house in Clifton, New Jersey. It was the house that my Grandfather built and my mom grew up in. You can literally walk down the street and see the NYC skyline. It's amazing.

Last weekend, James, my brother Eric, my mom, and my cousin went up to New Jersey to clean out my Grandma's house so they could put it on the market. It was a LOT of work but they had fun hanging out and eating New Jersey food!

The house:

James and Eric using yard tools from the 60's to clean up the yard. :)

Eric cleaning out the detached, 2 car garage. Pretty nice for a 1950's home!

And they worked just so hard that they had time to go into the city for the day. How nice for them! ;) Here they are posing in front of 30 Rock.

We're hoping the house sells quickly and I'm sure it will. It's a great house in a great location. If only James and I could buy it!!!

6 Months Old and Rockin the Helmet

I can't believe Audrey is half a year old! She is just getting so big!


She is getting teeth, rolling over, smiling like crazy, and now she can even sit on her own for almost a minute!!!!

The helmet is back on for good and she's doing fine with it! We're going to decorate this weekend and bling it out! ;)

We have a TOOTH!!!

I can't believe it! I looked in Audrey's mouth today and thought, gee, what is that white thing in there? It's a tooth!!! It's on the bottom in the middle. I just can't stop staring at it! (Which is annoying Audrey because she's busy trying to eat a toy or blanket!) I almost want to cry because she's getting so grown up. She's so close to sitting on her own and she is just rolling like crazy. I can't leave her alone in a room for 5 minutes or she will be up against a wall!

Other things going on over here are helmet/band issues. She did fine with it Weds. night and slept straight through. I took it off on Thurs. morning to check for red spots like they told me too. She had a few. The doctor told me not to put the band back on until the spots fade, which shouldn't take longer than an hour. Well one spot just wouldn't go away. So I called Cranial Tech and they had us come in on Friday. They readjusted the band but told me not to put it on until the red spot went away. Well it's Monday and it's still there! So we have to go back tomorrow to get Audrey examined. It's so frustrating because she was getting used to the helmet, and now I feel like we're back at square one. Hopefully she will get to wear it tomorrow.

Also, no pictures to post because we have to get a new camera. The reason the pictures were blurry in the last post was because I had the camera in my diaper bag, with a bottle full of water, and you can see where this is going. Yes, the bottle leaked all over the camera. :( So we are going out ASAP to buy a new one because we have to take pictures of Audrey on Wednesday when she will be SIX MONTHS OLD!!!

Also, two of my friends started blogs! I will try to link to the Acuffs and James' blog. Too cute!

Update!

We've had so much going on that I haven't had time to update the blog.

Most importantly, Audrey's friend Bridgette was born on July 2. She is absolutely perfect!!! Go to the Bloem's blog to see pics.

And finally, Audrey got her helmet. I have been so worried about this that I can't even tell you. I'm worried it will hurt her, cause her to wake up at night (she's been sleeping 13 hours!!), and just make her unhappy. But NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! Knock on wood! Since it was put on earlier today she hasn't even fussed. She fell asleep with no problem. Let's hope it continues this way!!

Audrey was baptised last weekend in James' hometown church in Kingwood. I posted a whole long post about it last night and it got lost!!! But here are some pics for now . . . the whole fam . .. minus Uncle Eric and Uncle Rick . . .

Audrey got to wear the Christening gown that I wore and my mom wore. She looked beautiufl.