Testing Taste Buds

Tonight KB tried baby cereal. I used 4 tbs breast milk and 1 tbs cereal. She seemed to like it once she got over the fast that there isn't a constant flow. She was already upset, very tired, and just wanted to nurse. But once I got her to see that it tasted ok she ate like a big girl. I had to put toys in both hands to keep her from spilling it all over both her and I. We are learning together.

I love this little lady!

Imbecile

Yeah, I cook while holding my daughter... "be careful so that hot stuff doesn't splash on her". Well no shit! Do you think I am some kind of idiot? Next time I am making dinner with her I will just fry some bacon and go ahead and let it burn the crap out of her. Sounds like a great plan. I might be young, but I am most certainly not a freaking moron. Thanks.

Dig Deep

In the bad, no matter how horrible the bad may be, there is always good. You might have to dig a little, you might have to dig a lot. It may not always be visible right away, but I promise you, something good will come of everything. Within the last couple of years I have learned something. That something is that God is always with me, and always will be. No matter how big the mistakes I make are, no matter how much it hurts, He is always there to lift me up. Tragedy brings us closer together. It makes us realize how we feel about each other and how much we appreciate one another. It makes us think about what it might be like if the ones we love were not here.

When I'm having a bad day, there is always someone that turns it around. The people who truly care are the ones who can make you smile when you are sad. They are the ones who tell you that you are beautiful when you are at your worst, and most of all, they are the people who accept you for who you are with out judgement. When you make a mistake, they point it out to you so that you can fix it. These are the people I like to surround myself with.

Today everything was deleted off of my computer. I should have known this was going to happen, but I didn't. What am I going to do about it? Well, I will probably call customer relations tomorrow... that is a whole other story. I ask myself, where is the good in this situation?
         My computer runs faster.
         I can download again.
         My pictures are gone- there is no looking back, only moving forward. It can only get better from here.
         I learned to backup all my files.
         If I can't remember what documents I had saved, I probably don't need them. I'm sure I emailed the important ones to myself any way.

Lesson learned. I'm not going to dwell on this, even though I shed a few tears when the computer finally came to and every thing was gone. I'm going to move on. I am going to make my photography business bigger and better.

I can be the bigger person, I can be optimistic, and I WILL!

Picture of the day! My little lady can make a kissy face now! What a champ. I feel like I have achieved success in all things. What shall I teach her next?!!

What doesn't kill you makes you stronger

God Blessed the broken road that led me straight to you. Looking back at my past sometimes I still feel broken and battered. Not physically battered, but emotionally. I have been through a lot, but who hasn't these days.

A couple of years ago we lost a good friend. Chance Threet was killed in a car accident at age 20. It is still so unreal to me. There are times when I question why, why him? But I know that this isn't a question that will ever be answered. His work here on earth was done and the Lord needed him there.

Songs bring back memories, pictures, vehicles that I see pass by me. Sometimes I wish that we could go back to high school. That we could go to that State Championship football game all over again and watch them win, just to see the smiles on those boys' faces. To hear the laughter and happiness that it brought to them. I wish we could go back in time just to hear Chance mumble along with the music in the row behind me. To see all of us teenagers serving the adults at the Valentine's Day dinner. Our air soft gun fight that ended up with a welt on Chance's forehead, and me hiding on top of the sink in the bathroom so he couldn't shoot me under the door, begging and pleading for forgiveness. His huge, contagious smile. Watching Friday Night Lights every time we were all together. I still can't get through that whole movie, it's just not the same. County fair. Ohhh the memories of country fair. The guys roping in the church parking lot, the school parking lot, actually every where. Rodeos, stories, campfires, Sonic after football games (when Calvin would let me go of course. Darn overprotective big brother :] ) Chance pulling the E-Brake in Calvin's little red car every opportunity he gets. Calvin wrecking his Jimmy at the high school, when "the accelerator stuck", I still don't believe that.

I hold these memories and more so close to my heart. I'm so lucky to have been able to have Chance as a friend. He was so much like a brother to me. I wish that I would have told him how much I appreciated him looking out for me and watching my back. He was a great friend to both my brother and myself. I wish he could have been here to meet Kaylyn.

Chance's family is so strong. I look up to Rod, Char, and PJ. They are family to me. They have always been here for me and I hope that I can return the favor. Peyton is an adopted uncle to my little girl. I loved watching him make her smile while we were in Colorado.

It is the little things in life. I have learned to pray, to tell people how much they mean to me. I know that I don't do it enough and that is something I will work on. You never know how long you have, or how long someone else has. Be the best that you can be every day of your life, and at the end of the day, thank the Lord for what He has given you. Pray, and pray more. Be faithful and the Lord will provide.

The good seems to shadow over the bad. I hold those precious memories to my heart, always will.

That broken road that I once walked down has made me into a better person. It has led me back to my high school sweetheart and now I have a beautiful family. I can't imagine my life any other way and will strive to be the best mother that I can be to my daughter. Today, and always.

Growing Up

I believe that there is a very strict difference between growing up and getting older. Growing up requires maturity, responsibility, honesty, and pride, as well as many other traits. Every one who gets old has not grown up. I would like to think of my self as growing up, instead of getting older. Every day I learn something new about not only myself, but others. Today I learned that in many situations, I am the bigger person. Even though I am only 22 years old I can clearly see that I am more mature than some. I am responsible for my own actions, and have a work ethic that not everyone shares. I want to do my job while I am on the clock and I want to do things correctly the first time. The other day I challenged myself to make fewer mistakes on my folders at work and I know that my hard work will pay off in the end.

Whether it be in my personal life, or my time at work, I strive to be the best I can be and I will strive to be the better person in all circumstances. I will not let petty stuff get me down but I will stand up for myself.

This road leads somewhere and I am putting my faith in God to show me which direction I am to go.

Crickets and Crying

I reached down to limit the amount of crying I could hear coming over the baby monitor. These early morning wake ups are killing me, I thought to myself. Rubbing my eyes I rolled over and glanced up at the clock. I was about to let Kaylyn cry this one out, I'll feed her next go around. Much to my surprise it was almost 4am. She made it past her usual 1 am rise and shine call. Pushing the blankets off me I bed my bed farewell and entered her room. The crying seized and her whimpers turned into a huge grin and a sweet belly laugh. Success plastered across her face, and hunger piercing her glamorous blue eyes.

On the surface, I beg for Kaylyn's early morning feedings to saunter off into some distant place, but then again, deep down, I'm in love with them. I know one day I am going to miss spending an extra thirty minutes with her. One day she will be sneaking in at this time of the night/morning (oh God, no!). Praise the Lord for her beautiful smile. I would not want to have it any other way. What a perfect way to be woken up. This innocent darling brightens my days!

 

Remember when?! 

The first week of her life she had to sun bathe on the car dash to lower her billy rueben levels.

 

Good morning and if I am lucky, I will fall back to sleep until the alarm clock goes off.

Leaving on a Jet Plane!

Colorado Rockies
Denver Broncos
Country Concerts
Calvin's Wedding
Camping
Hiking
Shooting
Birth of Laura's child
Adventures with the old gang (Kris is home from Afghan!!! yay!!!)
Payton's Football games
Church!!!
See Dad
See Grandpa and Grandma
See the Wisconsin clan that are here for Calvin and Sara's wedding
Jenna's engagement pictures

Party like a Rock Star at Calvin's wedding!!! Yippeee


This doesn't even begin to list all the things I hope to go do and see while I am home!


Can't wait for October. Colorado here we come!!!

I'm anxious to see how traveling alone with a 5 month old on an airplane will be. Weston is meeting us there. So thankful that he will be able to come at all and that he is going to be flying home with us!

Dot Your "i" and Cross Your "t"

My new job is at Parent Central Services enrolling children for CYS. I am an administrative assistant still, but more along the lines of a registration clerk at the moment. I greet patrons, and process their paper work. This is a very attention to detail job. It is very easy to miss things and make mistakes on the paper work. I am making it my goal to make the least amount of mistakes as possible in order to prove what kind of employee I really am. That means double checking myself and making sure that I dot my "i's" and cross my "t's".

It means not being in a hurry because there are a ton of people in the waiting room. I must learn that quality is better than quantity.

Simply said, I am challenging myself to ask for help when I need it. I know that I have not mastered this process yet, and in order to move up in this organization that is something that must happen. Starting tomorrow, attention to detail will be my middle name. It's time to let that OCD in me come out and show itself.

Word Games

For once, I am at a loss for words. Let me read some more Fifty Shades of Grey and then maybe I will have something to say. At this time, feel free to enjoy the brief silence. 

Cheers!

Potty Like a Rock Star!

This weekend we got the opportunity to attend to head line concerts for free. This is one of the benefits to living to close to Nashville. Down by the River we got to see Kip Moore. I have to say that I am a tad bit disappointed in his live performance. Either the sound guy got left at their last pit stop, or Kip should just stick to the recording studio. All I wanted to hear was "Something about a Truck", but we decided to leave. As we were walking away, (of course) the song came on. However, rumor has it that it wasn't very good any way.

Momma and her lil Cowgirl!

On Sunday, we caught the Kelly Clarkson concert hosted by Ft. Campbell. It was the rain date concert for Week of the Eagles. She put on a decent show. I knew a few of her songs, but mostly I enjoyed listening to Weston and Rob make up their own words when they didn't know the actual lyrics... Which was pretty much every word of every song... Except Rob knew that she had a song with the word "sidewalk" in it somewhere.

 

Kaylyn sported her knew onesie from her Great Aunt Kathy. 

Sunday, we went to Lake Kyle and let the dogs swim for a while. We enjoyed a nice picnic and took this lovely family picture too.

I Believe I Can Fly

After a 12 mile ruck march this morning, Weston's blue truck pulled up to the house. Not in the driveway, but through the grass and by the front door. I could see the soreness in his body as he slowly exited his truck and slid feet first to the ground. He grabbed his gear, and made his way to the house. I opened the bedroom window and greeted him as the smell of the fresh morning dew attacked my senses in more ways than one. "Good morning! What time is graduation?" He responded filling me in on the time for the day's activities.

As he dropped his assault pack onto the kitchen floor I saw a deep look of concern in his eyes, and he told me that he didn't make it. "You didn't make the ruck march in 3 hours?" I asked. He nodded. "Does that mean that you don't graduate?" and he nodded again. "Oh." I didn't really know what else to say to him... He started laughing and told me he was kidding and that graduation would be at 9:30am.

My soldier received his wings today at the Air Assault School Graduation. I am so proud of him. This is something he has been looking forward to since the day we got here.

Weston is the 2nd one from the right hand side. These are all of the MP's that graduated the school today. Some guy was talking non-sense that only the soldiers really care about. I tuned out and attended to our baby girl.

 

Speaking of our baby girl. She looked so adorable today wearing her cutest outfit that mommy could find. This is actually a 9 month shirt that has matching shorts that Brynn gave us, but I like it as a dress too. I put some pink shorts on under it and she looked stunning! Those big blue eyes are going to have daddy cleaning his shot gun in just a few short years. 

 

After the graduation and the MP's talking, Weston had to do 10 to the wind and then dig his coin out of the ground with his mouth. Lucky for him his SGT put him on a slope. 40 push ups later and his mouth contained grass, a little dirt, and a shiny new coin to add to his Army collection. Lucky for Weston, my camera ran out of memory while he was digging in the ground. I guess it is time to delete some pictures and videos off of the memory card!

Congratulations again to my soldier. WLC is next.

Ribit, Ribit

In the past few days we have found 3 of these little guys hopping around our living room. The last one jumped right over Kaylyn who was sleeping on the couch and landed next to me. Scared the crud out of me! Weston keeps putting them outside. We don't know where they are coming from. We are convinced that this is the same, very persistent little frog... Or we have a nest somewhere in or around our house. I'd rather not think about option 2. I really hope they are not poisonous but Weston keeps washing his hands after he rescues them from his terror dog and puts them out. I asked him if we could collect them but that would probably have the same ending as the turtle... 

Story time... 

We rescued a turtle.. Ok, captured a turtle and let him live outside in our swimming pool with the fish. He seemed to enjoy himself. In the winter I put a bunch of dirt and rocks and some water in a red tote and moved him into there so he could burrow and keep warm. About half way through the winter we moved him into the fish tank in the house and boom, like magic he died. Sad day. Lesson learned...

Catching Up!

Seeing a friend of mine's post on her blog reminded me that I should probably get with the program and catch you all up on the happenings of our world. My last post was in December and I was 20 weeks pregnant. I will post some pictures to show you what has happened since then. This is going to be long... So see if you can keep up :) 

Angie Thomas, a dear friend of mine and past co-worker hosted a baby shower for me at our house. We had a great time. Unfortunately this is one of the only pictures I have of me and Weston while I was big and pregnant... He says, "I don't need maternity pictures with you pregnant to know that you had my baby.." Silly boys. He just doesn't understand!

Our sweet girl... I could get up and find the ultrasound pictures to see how far along I was in this picture, but that just isn't happening. If you really want to know, go to my facebook, it is on there too.

Weston got us free tickets to the Ron White Salute to the Troops Tour comedy show and it was fantastic! We had a great night out in Nashville and got to spend some quality time together.

 

Work had a baby shower for me too. We were so blessed for all the gifts that we received. I will forever be grateful for those who helped celebrate my pregnancy and our daughter!

Now I am just going to jump to when Kaylyn was born. There is more in between obviously, but I have a horrible memory and if I went through everything we would be here forever! 

On April 13, 2012 I had a non-stress test (NST) and the doctor ordered that I have an ultrasound.  I had the ultrasound on the 17th. I called my OB that day concerned at why he ordered the test and she said that she would look into the next day after her training. I went to work that day... On the 18th, the OB called me back and told me that they needed to induce me the next morning and to call at 5am to see what time I needed to go in. We called all our family and let them know, and my mom and step dad began driving that night. It is an 18 hour drive from Colorado and they were estimating that they would be there around 12 noon the next day. 

I went into the hospital at 7am the next day and was called back to the room at approximately 7:30am. The labor adventure began then. A few things that happened during the day. 

10:00am given pitocin to increase contaction

12:00 noonish Mom and Tony got there

They broke my water at some point in time.

3:00 got the epidural

The Dr's kept threatening C-Sections because both the baby and my heart rates kept dropping.

Blah, Blah, Blah... Watching Season 3 of Sons of Anarchy (good show)

10:30 pm... Dr came in and said if I was not dilated then he was doing a C-Section. Thank God I was dilated at a 10 and he said I would have the baby in the next 30 minutes. He went to do something and the nurses prepared our room. Weston was sad to pause Sons of Anarchy but excited for the baby to finally be here. 

6 pushes later and at

11:02 pm, Kaylyn Breigh Wells was born.

Weighing in at 4lbs 14 oz. 18 1/2 inches long. The pediatrician grilled me about why she was so small and what I possibly might have done during the pregnancy... No, I did not do drugs. No, I did not smoke. No, I said I did not do drugs. No, I did not drink alcohol. No, I said I did not do drugs... It went kind of like that...

Weston didn't get to cut her umbilical cord because the Dr was worried about how small she was so they hurried up and got her under the light. She had trouble keeping her temperature so they took her to the special care unit and got her warm there. Weston helped in giving her her first bath. She was in the SPU for 3 hours while I slept. I still couldn't move my legs after 3 hours (what a great epidural!). They put me in a wheel chair and took me to the Mother Baby Unit where I got to be reunited with Kaylyn again. 

 

We kept her dressed in two outfits and wrapped in a blanket or two for quite a while because she was too small to keep her temperature. We were released from the hospital after 3 days (one day longer than they usually keep people here). 

 Our first family picture!

Gramma Helen and Grandpa Tony stayed for almost 2 weeks and then headed back to Colorado. 

Grandpa Chad and Grandma Debbie came to visit.

Great Momo and Great Popo Wells came to visit.

Gramma Helen and Grandpa Tony stayed for almost 2 weeks and then headed back to Colorado. 

Grandpa Chad and Grandma Debbie came to visit.

Great Momo and Great Popo Wells came to visit.

 

I changed the name of my business to KB Photography. 1 Month.

Grandpa and Grandma Wells came to visit and brought Aunt Samantha and Tim with them.



I went back to work after 8 or 9 weeks to CDC #1 at Fort Campbell.

2 months.

Work lent me out to work at Taylor Youth Center for a week. Then I went back to CDC #1 for approximately a week. I wanted something more, a raise, a higher position in the company. I emailed someone at Parent Central Services and was called for an interview the next day.

I got a job at PCS.

Great Grandma Schneider-Campbell had to go to the hospital. They said she wasn't going to make it through the night. I wanted so badly to get in my car right that instant and start driving to Colorado so that maybe we could make it to see her. I wanted her to meet Kaylyn and share in the joy that our princess was bringing to us. I called my Uncle Bill and asked him to put me on speaker phone so that I could talk to Grandma. She told me that she loved me. I told her that I loved her and missed her and that we were going to see her. She told me that she was proud of me and that she wouldn't be there when we got there. My mom called the Red Cross and got a message so that we could go home to Colorado. Grandma passed away that evening. We began our long drive to Colorado the next day.

 

Grandma and Ross. She was 87 years young.

 

This is where my Grandpa, Clarence Schneider.

Grandma Schneider-Campbell.

Uncle Paul Schneider.

Uncle Daniel Schneider.

and Uncle Buddy Schmid rest in peace.

We love you all and miss you dearly!

3 Months. Picture taken in Buena Vista, CO at Grandpa Chad and Debbie's house. 

Kaylyn rode a 4 wheeler for the first time. We can't wait to go back to Colorado. She got to meet so many friends and family and we miss them all dearly. Colorado will forever be our home no matter where we are living. Kentucky is nice, but it just isn't the same. 

 

3.5 months

Back home and back to work after a very much needed vacation. I wish it would have been on better terms, but there is a blessing in every rainstorm!

 

4 Months. 

I entered this photo into a contest in Colorado and they told me that they do not accept "Professional Photographs". Score one for me! I just need a new editing program and my business could really take off. Maybe I will work on getting one soon. 

We are pretty much caught up now. I will try to post more regularly. Look forward to my next post about 50 Shades of Grey! Thanks for taking the time to read.