Silent Night

One night during the holidays during Julia's bedtime routine was just so sweet. #1, Julia never sleeps at school. #2, Julia USUALLY takes a nap after we get home from school. Well, #1 happened as usual, but not #2!

Needless to say, baby girl Bankhead was T.I.R.E.D. She didn't act up or anything like that, but the usual bedtime routine changed from: Bath, Read, Sing Songs, Pray, Kiss, Sleep tooooooo Bath, Read, Sing Songs, Sleep. She skipped the praying altogether (sorry "Shay and Steven").

It was now one of my most memorable times with my baby girl. I started singing Silent Night as our last song (you know the holidays and all) and her eyes started to droop. Surely this couldn't be. She's a partier, she stays up with the best of us. I thought, "Let me sing it again in case I was just thinking I saw her eyes starting to close".

So I sang it again....more droopy eye action. And I sing it again and again and again, droopy eyes turns into the sleep twitches turns into eyes closed for longer periods of time now....singing, sleeping, singing, sleeping, momma crying while singing because it's oh so sweet, more sleeping, more sing-crying and now she.is.silently.sleeping.

I settled for this picture since I don't normally take a camera in to her room at bedtime. But next time.....I WILL because I so wished I would have captured her little sweetness spilling out all over her chocolate brown polka dot pillow, hands under her cheek. Oh.so.sweet!

I love that girl and it's times like these the Lord gently reminds me of my little blessings. Thank you, Lord and thank you, Julia for letting me experience that with you.

Now, THIS is funny....can anyone relate to THIS bedtime routine? Enjoy!

Decor Galore

Some of you were asking about our la casa and how it was decorated for the holidaze.



























I made these trees - just wrapped them with cool fun yarn (that you make scarves with) around one of those triangle styro-foam thingies...and voila! instant decorations.




































Also, here are some pictures of my very first sewing project. My friend, Emily, came over last week to help teach me to sew. She called me a little ambitious when I mentioned that I wanted to make Julia a new nap mat. that. night. !!

But before I show you pics of the new one....you be the judge and let me know if she was due for a new nap mat. This one was a child's garment bag that yours truly HOT GLUED (still my favorite) the ribbon around the edges. I secretly prayed Julia would lay on it at school with her legs bent so she didn't look too deprived of a nap mat that actually fit her!














And here is the new one!

I bought a body pillow pillowcase (one that was on sale in the teen section) which fits perfectly over the nap mats they give them at school.

Now, don't click on the picture because you will see a lot of, what I call, "drunk driving" with the thread and using that pedal thing on the machine....seems I'd catch myself driving a little too fast at times.

Comparison Picture

I don't know if you remember this:



















But here is my actual picture from 1990 (senior high school picture) my mom just gave me this week. I told you I had a real picture of myself from the 90's with the big hair!!!!

8, 9, 10 Month Comparisons

Remember I told you as soon as I find pictures of Julia's 8, 9 (and now 10) month pictures, that I would post their comparison pictures?

Well, we had let Uncle Brad borrow our mini hard drive and all the pictures were on there. We just got it back from him, so I'm glad to find them...yeah! Enjoy and let me know what YOU think....do they look alike?


Here is Julia at 8 months in 2006 and Johnathan at 8 months just 2 months ago















Here is Julia at 9 months in 2006 and Johnathan at 9 months a month ago















































Here is Julia at 10 months old in 2006 and Johnathan at 10 months old now (um, she has a wee bit more hair than the Mister....or maybe it's just darker - nope, definitely more hair!)

10 Months Old!

Baby Boy is a whole 10 months old! I can't believe he is already just 2 months away from being a year old...where does the time go?

When I think about it, I get all teary eyed!

Here are some pictures from Bankhead Movie Night the other night so you can see how big he's gotten.....we went to Walmart, got one of those $1 movies from the movie machine (Kung Foo Panda), then went and picked up our pizza and sprite from Pizza Hut. We all went up to our new family room area we created upstairs.




































































If you see the picture below, there is a bare wall...no shelves.

Now we have shelves I bought for $35 each that go in the space perfect. We already had a TV, we brought up the trunk from downstairs, turned it on its side and viola! instant TV stand. Now while we're upstairs, we can play, watch TV (mom can get laundry done too) and we're all happy campers. The picture with Julia sitting on the toy chest....we're going to make that a wall of art where she (and Johnathan one day) can display their art projects, etc. And eventually we are going to build a desk between the shelves so they can do projects or homework, etc....but that will be a while from now. More pics to come in my blog later this week. Happy 10 months, Johnathan! Love you.