what parent's do for their kids!

Look at how much Hailey appreciates all the sacrifices we make for her!
oops...now she won't even look at the camera she's so mad at us!! ;) (what an attitude...lol!!)

This afternoon I went to the dentist to get some work done on a few of my teeth (I had my first cavity...) :( I had a little bit of pain this evening, not too much, but enough to want to just hang out on the couch for the evening. However, since we are having a little party for Hailey's dedication on Sunday, I didn't have that luxury. Tonight, Korey and I felt the need to clean the garage. And, as I was vaccuming the sawdust and spiderwebs off of the walls (Korey does a lot of woodworking in the garage and there is a lot of dust...) I was thinking about the love of a Mom and Dad and what it makes you do! It actually made me think a lot about my own parent's. There aren't many people that can say they had a picnic/wedding reception in their parent's backyard, but Korey and I did! I knew, at the time, that I was asking a lot out of my Mom and Dad, but I never realized how much work/stress it really was for them. Our little party will definitely be smaller than a wedding...but, there are a few similarities, mostly the fact that Hailey was sleeping while we were doing all the work and the night before and the morning of my wedding, I was sleeping over at a friend's house while my Mom and Dad were doing all the work! I guess I still feel kind of bad about the fact that I was off having fun while my Mom was sweating about the fact that it was raining and we didn't have enough seating under the tent, or that all the food wasn't there yet and she didn't have enough room in her refrigerator for all of it and who knows what else....I guess I've never even asked her what she all stressed out about!! But, I know that my parent's love me and that is why they were willing to go through all the work of having our wedding in their backyard and Korey and I love Hailey so much that we are willing to stand up in front of our church and dedicate our little daughter and have a little get together for her at our house! (actually, now that I think about it I think that having the little get together and cleaning our house is the easier of the two...) :) Needless to say I'm a little nervous about getting up in front of the church and dedicating Hailey. I'm a little afraid that Hailey will either cry or spit up on Pastor Engle!! She usually eats her "2nd breakfast" at about 10 or 10:30am, so if we can feed her before that at least we shouldn't have to worry about her crying...but, then we'll definitely have to worry about her spitting up all over Pastor. Hopefully she'll get it all out of her system before we get up there!!

I guess all in all being a parent means sacrificing and giving up things for your kids...it all begins with the pregnancy where you try your hardest to eat right, take prenatal vitamins, drive slowly so that you don't get in a car accident, and deal with huge amounts of nauseousness willingly, goes onto labor and delivery, where you, again, willingly, go through a tremendous amount of pain to bring your adorable baby into the world! But, it doesn't end there- as a parent you continually put yourself second and your baby first. I don't know if you ever get to the point where you stop putting your child first and live for yourself after you have a child, but I guess I hope that I don't!

I'm eating real food!!

ok. so, somehow these photos got uploaded backwards and I just don't have the heart to delete them all and do it again, so look at them backwards. ;)

We fed Hailey her first taste of cereal last night. It was really fun. I think Korey and I enjoyed it more than Hailey did, though. She didn't seem to mind it and she was super interested in chewing on the spoon, but I don't think that she got a lot of the cereal in her belly! (she got a lot on her face and hands, but not so much inside!) Even the food that she did end up getting in her mouth she had a hard time swallowing. Hopefully as she gets older she'll get better at swallowing...

Here she is in the bath that she needed after she ate! I think she enjoyed the bath more than the food! She loves being in the bath, splashing around and kicking. She's started doing this new thing where she kicks the front of the tub and scoots herself backwards!

Korey and Hailey- with her mouth full of cereal!
Mommy feeding Hailey while holding her hands to try and keep them out of the food.

The little chubby one eating! She kept moving her mouth trying to get the spoon, even before it made it to her mouth. She looked like a little bird. It was pretty cute, but I'm pretty sure that's why so much of it ended up on her instead of in her mouth!

Hailey trying to grab the bowl of food!

Playdate time!

We went down to Kody and Devra Ashbeck's house this weekend and Meredith, their daughter, is only 4 days younger than Hailey. It was so fun to see them together. I think that the two of them look a lot alike. It was kind of fun to compare them, also. Hailey definitely enjoyed playing with Meredith's toys! Meredith was a better "talker," though. She kept squealing about everything. :) I think that the two of them must be pretty close to the same size, too. Meredith has a bigger head, but she and Hailey seemed to be pretty close in every other sense.

Kody and Devra have inspired Korey and I to start trying to put Hailey to bed without rocking her to sleep. They just put Meredith to sleep every night and she falls asleep, after a little bit of squealing! (not even crying...just talking to herself!) It was so impressive. So, we have decided that we're gonna try that...maybe later, though. This morning we all fell asleep in the bed together, then she took her afternoon naps in the car seat and then tonight she fell asleep while she was eating and I really didn't want to wake her up and make her fall asleep again. So, I guess we'll just have to try it tomorrow!

Here are the two Mom's with their babies!
Meredith grabbing at Hailey- wanting to give her a hug! :) (or maybe just trying to play with her ear or something...)

The Dad's with their little girls! There is nothing better than watching the dad's play with their babies! It was so fun to see them play with them. Kody and Korey were friends in highschool and they were ushers in each others weddings and now they both have little babies the same age! isn't that fun?!

They were holding hands right before this, but we missed it! Go Figure. Hailey was sticking her finger in Meredith's ear and then she was grabbing at her and shirt and twisting it. I was so afraid that she was going pinch her on accident.

They were so cute just laying on the floor giggling and playing together!