Carving Pumpkins

I realized in my last post about Saije that I forgot to mention that my friends Mike and Char live up here in Dickinson, North Dakota because Mike also works in the oil field. He drives water truck and Brogan fracs for a different company. Brogan lives out of a company paid for hotel, but Mike and Char actually reside here because Mike works 6 days a week all the time. Brogan has two weeks on and one week off. Anyway...that is how I was able to compare Ryan and Saije's size. It's nice having her here, along with a bunch of other girly friends because of their husband's jobs in the oil field. Because Brogan works 3 AM to 9 PM and we're staying at the hotel, I get pretty bored. I watch ALOT of TV! ha ha! With Char right up the road I've been going over there every day to chill. The other night we made sugar cookies and frosted them like pumpkins. The night before that we went to the tiny mall here and went shopping and got some great deals on baby clothes! And then last night we carved pumpkins!

So I had a super cute face drawn on the pumpkin before I cut it out, and well my knife didn't agree with me when I went to cut out the nose! Needless to say, it looks TERRIBLE! Ha Ha! It was fun tho! Me and Char got a good laugh out of it :-)

Ok...so I totally suck at carving pumpkins! But it was sure fun!

Fun in North Dakota!

10 weeks old today!

I love taking pictures of her cuz she is so damn cute! Her little personality comes out more and more each and every day and she is so fun! Such a pleasant baby. I got REALLY lucky to have such a sweet spirited baby girl to love on all day and be best friends with!

9 weeks and 5 days old

Trying to stay warm! It's been in the low 30's the entire time we've been here and it's supposed to get colder this week! Like 11 and 13 degrees!!!

9 weeks and 4 days old

This picture totally looks like Saije took it herself because of the way her arm is up! Ha Ha!

Always smilin' from ear to ear!

I'm pretty sure her hair gets more and more curly every day. It's so easy to do and only takes like 30 seconds! :-)

My good friends Mike and Char had their little boy the day Brogan and I got engaged, September 29th. He's barely a month old and Saije is just over 2 months old, but look at the difference in size! Saije is a monster compared to little Ryan! One of the big things is that Saije was 6 1/2 lbs when she was born and Ryan was barely 5 lbs. He was a little tyke from the get-go and has had trouble gaining weight so I think Saije will always be bigger than him unless he hits a massive growth spurt! He just might!

Just as a side note: All the outfits Saije is wearing now are all 3 month outfits. They are just a TINY bit too big but all her newborn stuff and 0-3 month stuff is way too small. She has a long body like her Mama so all the onsies were way too tight. She barely hit 2 months last week but she's already wearing 3 month clothes! She's growing up! The day before we came to North Dakota I got a box and boxed up all her newborn clothes to put in storage. It was really sad! They were all so cute and I remember her wearing each and every one of them for the first time and thinking she looked absolutely adorable in them! Her clothes keep getting cuter and cuter tho! Probably cuz Brogan has a shopping addiction ;-) Ok...maybe me too! Lol!

My Beautiful Baby Girl!

North Dakota

Mommy and Saije getting ready for bed in North Dakota!

After 12 hours we made it to North Dakota! We drove for 11 hours and then between stopping a few times for gas and what not, it was 12 hours exactly. We left Saturday night at 7:30 and just drove straight thru the night. Brogan was a trooper and drove the entire way. Saije slept the entire way except for the times I changed her diaper and fed her a bottle. She did soooo good! The hotel Brogan stays at is beautiful! His company was the first booking for this place so no one had ever stayed here before. I'm pretty sure it's rated four stars. They pay out $75,000/week for 79 rooms 7 days a week. That's a TON of money considering they are only in their rooms for like 4 hours a day!

Saije just chillin' on the bed in the hotel!

We got really lucky. Brogan would have normally started work at 3 AM Monday morning but they had been having problems with the rig they are working on so he got the day off! We went to lunch at a delicious steakhouse called JD's, took a nap (we were still tired from the trip), went to Walmart for groceries so we don't have to eat out every meal for two weeks, and then watched the Ravens vs Jaguars Monday night football game in our room with his coworker Roberto. Roberto is a really good guy. He lives in El Paso, Texas. On Sunday I met a few other coworkers of Brogan's and man alive some of these oil field workers are CRAZY! They come from all walks of life that is for sure! A bunch of ex-druggies all the way down to good family men (like Roberto). Brogan spends 20 hours a day with these guys! Lol!

2 months old!

My baby girl is 2 months old already! Where has the time gone?! We took her in for her 2 month checkup with Dr. Graham last week and here are her stats: she was 11 lbs 1 oz and 23 inches long! At birth she was 6 lbs 10 oz and 18 1/2 inches long! She's a growin girl and FAST! She is 100% healthy, she just has a few issues that can be easily resolved. See in the picture how her head leans to her right? She has a condition called torticollis where the muscles on one side of her neck are tighter than the ones on the other side of her neck. This causes her head to lean to the tight side. Dr. Graham sent us to physical therapy where they showed me excercises to do at home with her to help loosen up those muscles on the tight side. No biggie. He says it's very common and it's caused by the way she was positioned in my belly.

She also has a cross-eye issue. All babies go cross-eyed when they are first born because their eye muscles aren't strong enough yet. As she started getting older she was still going cross-eyed from time to time. She hasn't in a couple weeks now, but Dr. Graham says one of her eyes is still weaker and slower than the other. He says he will check it out when I take her back in for her 4 month checkup and if it's still a problem, he will send her to an eye specialist. Sometimes some babies just take longer to build up those eye muscles. Saije's father Joe has a lazy eye so maybe it's the genetic side of things. Who knows. You can do it Saije! At this appointment she got her first round of shots and boy did she scream bloody murder! I knew she would, but still. It's hard for a Mother to see her sweet baby be in pain and cry so hard and not be able to do anything about it! I didn't outright cry, but as I was kissing her little cheeks trying to calm her down while the shots were being given to her, I got really teary eyed :-( I know they are for her benefit and that's the only reason I did it.

Look at her curly hair! When she was first born her hair was straight straight straight and dark dark dark! As she's gotten older, it's lightened up ALOT and goes really curly! I've started putting hair gel/wax in it so it stays that way during the day and I get TONS of compliments on how cute her and her hair is! What can I say...I have a BEAUTIFUL little girl!

Mommy hadn't done her hair yet this day, but her outfit was adorable. Brogan bought it for her...of course! I swear everything this girl owns says something about Daddy on it! Ha Ha!

I've been crafty!

I bought this little craft kit from my "Mama Cris". She's the sweet lady I lived with in Utah. She owns a craft boutique store in Ogden, UT where she sells finished and unfinished crafts that she comes up with on her own. She is THE MOST creative person I've ever met in my life! This little kit came with the wood block and the metal "I <3 Fall" piece. All I had to do was paint the wood block brown, glue on scrapbook paper on the sides, top, and front, and find a cute embelishment for the side. I found these cute fall leaves at a local scrapbook store and then got some orange and brown ribbon for the little bow. It didn't take long to make, but it is sure cute! It's the only Fall decoration I have in my apartment! Ha Ha!

I made these cute picture frames for Saije's room. I got these frames at Walmart for .97, painted them brown, and then hot glued the pink/yellow flowers and ribbon on the front! Easy as that! The whole project only cost me about $9!

Now I REALLY have to marry him! Ha Ha! I bought these 4" wood letters from Mama Cris as well. I just painted them brown, glued cute scrapbook paper on the front, hot glued buttons and wood hearts on, tied some ribbon on a few of the letters, and then antiqued them by sponging on some black ink around the edges. They turned out sooooo great! Way better than I even imagined in my head! YAY! I picked scarpbook paper that matches our home decor: red, black, and brown. I thru in a little mustard yellow just for fun. :-)

Here are the letters up close so you can see details.

Between the wood letters, scrapbook paper, buttons, wood hearts, ribbon, and paint I think this project cost me about $25. Not bad!!!

Brogan's Birthday! The big 2-5!!

We celebrated Brogan's 25th birthday on Thursday the 20th! He is NOT a fan of his birthday at all. He hates gifts and he hates the attention. Ha Ha! Well that doesn't get too far with me! I got him two 1-hour spa massages because he's been complaining of back pain from work. Plus he just deserves it. He works really really hard putting in 250 hours every two weeks. He had never had a professional massage in his life so I thought it would be fun for him to experience it. I scheduled his appt for the first massage the day of his birthday. He says he liked it, but he's not a big fan of them rubbing him with their elbows and stuff trying to get certain pressure points and whatever. He prefers just a good 'ol back RUB! He also isn't a fan of lotions and oils being rubbed on him. He's a freak about his skin and keeping it clean so that kind of bothered him. All in all, he said he did feel better afterwards than he did going in, and he did appreciate it, however he would let me use the other 1-hour massage. Ha Ha! I can't win with this guy when it comes to gifts! Lol! We went to lunch at a Mexican restaurant with his cousin and her husband. Of course we sang to him and they made him wear a sombrero. Oh...and the shot of tequilla! It was really funny cuz Brogan doesn't like the attention.

Channing had to get his turn in with the sombrero too! What a stud. Once it was on his head he didn't quite know what to think! That night we had Brogan's Grandma, Aunt, and cousins all come over to the apartment for cake and games. I cheated and just got a Dairy Queen ice cream birthday cake! Ha Ha! Brogan's Uncle and Grandpa couldn't make it because beat harvest is going on right now and Grandpa works for Uncle Rick driving beat truck. This is their busy season. We sure missed them tho! We also missed Brogan's Dad too but we know he was there in spirit. He passed away 2 1/2 years ago of MS. We know, Brogan especially, that Ronnie is with us everyday and watches over us and our kiddos. It was a good day all in all! Happy Birthday baby!