Mommy/Daughter Road Trip

Nothing like starting your kid early on road trips! haha. Before Christmas Madi and I went to Montgomery to visit with my parents for about a week. It was a nice visit and something I needed as I continue to adjust to being far away from home. Yes, the trip was probably more for me than her, but I must say that I have the BEST little traveler!! She did soooooo good on the trip there and back! On the way to Montgomery we stopped and stayed the night in Atlanta at my in-laws house. It was a short visit, but a good one none the less. That broke the trip up some, but on the way back we drove straight to Charleston with one stop for mommy and Madi to eat. She didn't fuss really at all! I was and still am so very proud of her.

During our visit to Montgomery, we took a couple trips to Birmingham to see family and friends, and Madi went with mommy and Granny shopping in Montgomery one afternoon. She's a trooper and a great little shopper :) hee hee.

Visit with her Great Aunt and Uncle and cousins in Birmingham.

Madi with her Aunt Holly and Maimi and her Aunt Jessica.

With mommy's friend Cie and her little girl Berkley who calls Madi "Baby Spongebob" hee hee.

While in Birmingham, I stopped by the ice rink to see some friends and Madi got to be on the ice for the first time. I didn't have my skates, but my coach there skated around with her for a few minutes. Here she is on the ice for the first time and with my friend Kris who coaches there.

It was really good to see friends and family who I miss VERY, VERY much!! I hate that I couldn't see more of you, but hopefully I will be able to make another trip sometime soon.

More to come soon :)

Santa Claus

Hello. Wow, I can't believe it's Christmas now! How time flies when you are busy and excited about your child's first Christmas! :) I took these pics a while back and then haven't gotten a post up, so I thought I'd do it today :) Sorry about the delay in posts. We have been crazy busy. I also went out-of-town for a week with Madi, so I didn't do anything then either. I'll put that up in a new post. Here are Madi's fist pics with Santa Claus. She did so good with him. She looked at him very intently, but never cried. These were right before she turned 4 month and she had got the grabbing and pulling things toward her mouth down, so since Santa's beard was close, she grabbed it and tried to eat it at one point! heehee

So, we are very, very excited about Madi's first Christmas! It's neat and funny how things change and you just want everything to be about your kids at Christmas once you have a little rug rat :) Both of our parents are coming to Charleston for Christmas and then spending a few days after, so we are excited. We get to have Madi's first Christmas with everyone around and spend it in our new house with both our families here. We are very blessed and thankful that they all could come. It's been so fun to dress Madi up in Christmas gear. I can't imagine how fun it's gonna be as she gets older :)

We hope everyone has a very MERRY CHRISTMAS!!! I'll post pics of all the things Madi racks up on from Santa Claus and grandparents after Christmas :)

Thanksgiving

We hope everyone had a wonderful Turkey Day!!! Ours was GREAT! Scott and Scott's mom cooked some yummy, yummy food and we had some wonderful family time together. It was definitely nice to be able to get away and be able to spend the holiday with family.

Madi enjoyed her first Thanksgiving :) She sat in her Bumbo seat and watched all the cooking and laughed, squealed, and talked all day :)

I am definitely blessed with a beautiful, healthy baby girl, a wonderful, loving husband, and a loving supportive family!! I am also very thankful for each and every one of you, my friends!!!

Today we came to Birmingham to visit some friends. We stopped by Children's Hospital and visited some friends and former co-workers. It was definitely nice to see some "old" familiar faces!!!! We enjoyed seeing all of you that we saw! It was great to catch up. Madi was in a GREAT mood all day. She was sooo cute while we were visiting. She just talked to everyone and let 'em know that she was there :) We have a great little traveler that we are thankful for cuz it makes it much easier to takes these trips to see family and friends!!!

Here are some pics from Thanksgiving.

4 Months Old!!

Can you believe it?!!? I can't!! Madi turned 4 months old yesterday! How time flies. She's getting sooo big and expressive. It's soooooo cute to watch. She just laughs and coos and squeals and talks all the time now. She does it more in the mornings when she wakes up and it's just makes my day :) She had her 4 month check up on Monday and everything is great. Her doctor was very impressed with her talking, standing, and alertness. She watches everything everyone does these days. She's learning how to pick toys up and play with them now and, of course, pull everything to her mouth :) She loves to chew...not suck....on her hands and thumb :) It's like those are the best things EVER!! haha. Oh, at her doctor's visit, she weighed 12lb 13oz and was 25 1/4 inches long. The doctor says that from where she falls in her percentiles, she's gonna be taller and slim. Scott and I are still not so sure about the tall part. She's pretty petite, but we all know that can change with a growth spurt :) hee hee.

Madi is doing really well at night and has fallen into a routine really well. The routine happened by accident, but it works well for her and me :) She's going down for the night between 8 and 9 regularly and sleeps a good 8 hours before she wakes up. I feed her then and then she'll sleep another 4 hours ususally. So, I'm still waking up once in the middle of the night, but that's fine by me if it keeps this routine that she has for now. It gives me quiet time for myself, or if Scott's home, it gives us some time together. Every now and then she will go the whole night without waking up and ends up sleeping a good 10-11 hours! I'm not gonna compliain :) hee hee. Madi is not a big napper, so I think that is helping with the sleep at night. She basically cat naps through the day and then's is zonked at night.

Well, I could go on and on about my sweet baby girl, but I'll leave some for another day :) We are in Atlanta now staying with Madi's Grandma and Grumpa (Scott's parents). We are here through Thanksgiving, then we are gonna go visit some friends in Birmingham. Scott got the whole week of Thanksgiving off, so we figured we'd make good use of his time off and see family and friends. My parents came and spent the day in Atlanta today. We all had a good time together.

We hope everyone has a wonderful Thanksgiving. We are looking forward to our first Thanksgiving and holiday season with Madilyn. We wish everyone safe travels that will be out on the roads going to visit family!! We love all of you very much!!

Sportin' Dad's Hat :)

Date Night

Hey everyone. Well, I just have to say that I have the most wonderful husband! Some of the girls he works with have been wanting to babysit Madi, so he took Jessica up on the offer and took me out for a date tonight :) It was good to get out...even though we both had Madi in the back of our minds the whole time. hee hee....Is she being good, is she having a come apart (as has been known to happen with new people), but we did good and we enjoyed our night and trusted that she would call us if anything was wrong.

All that you hear from parents is so true about the first time you go out by yourselves. You are excited to have a night to yourselves, but you continuously wonder about your precious little one! It's amazing and such a wonderful feeling to have such a strong love for a human life. We would wonder what she was doing and make stories up about what was going on and laugh :) We had a good time out. We only wanted to be gone for a few hours since it was our first time away, so we did dinner and a movie all in one. We went to this place in town called the Cinnebarre. It's a movie theater that serves food (pizza, appetizers, burgers) and drinks (milkshakes, beer, wine, cokes) while you sit and watch the movie! It's pretty neat. What a wonderful idea to come up with.

Well, Madi did very well with Jessica. She took a little cat nap when Jessica got here, then she had her "dinner" bottle and played for a little bit before going down for the night. We really appreciated the night out and are very thankful for Jessica offering to babysit for us. Madi met her once before and seemed to take to her pretty well, so it's good to know that there's someone we can trust to keep Madi when we want another night out sometime.

Ok, I'm going to bed now. I just wanted everyone to know how WONDERFUL my hubby is to plan this night for me and for us. I love him bunches! :)

Our "Hot Stuff" Chili Pepper

Hey there! Hope everyone had a fun Halloween. I got a little let down with mine, but seeing Madi all dressed up made it all better :) I went and got my hair cut today, and fittingly it was done on Halloween cuz it's a little scary! :) Really the girl did a good job, she just misunderstood me about wanting LONGER bangs cut around my face and now they are SHORT!! They are in my face all the time now! haha. Oh well, at least my hair grows fast :) Well, I was really excited about handing out candy to the kids this year with Madi, but that was shot down. We had all of 2 trick-or-treaters ALL night! Sad for me! I never handed out candy in B'ham, so I was excited about doing it here cuz there are tonz of kids in the neighborhood, but I guess since we are in the new part of the neighborhood that's just being built up, people really didn't make it down that far. Maybe next year will be better.

Madilyn made up for all that though being dressed in her costume :) She was too cute. Of course it was a little big, but we made it work :) She didn't too much like the hat, but she tolerated it long enough for me to get some cute pics :) It's sooo much fun having a little one to dress up :) hee hee.

Bath Time

Madi still loves her bath time. You can see it in her eyes and expressions that she just loves being in the warm water. She still likes having her back washed too. I love being able to give her a bath cuz I get to see so many cute expressions :) Can you tell I'm a little giddy about bath time! haha. The sad part is having to get her out of the tub :) She does NOT like that part and she definitely lets me know it. haha.

Her new thing now is standing. She LOVES to stand. It's funny cuz when I try to sit her up in the tub or to burp her, she straightens out her legs to stand. She won't bend them :) I've had to learn how to hold her and burp her while she stands! She does it with Scott too when he's feeding her. It makes it difficult for him to get her burped, but he's done great :) We both just laugh about it now.

Pumpkin Patch

Hey everyone. How exciting it didn't take me another month to make an update :) hee hee. Well, it has been busy these past 3 weeks around the Russell household. We have been in our houe for 2 1/2 weeks now and we have been busy unpacking and decorating. It's coming along slowly, but surely. It's a little more difficult to get things done when there's a baby in the picture. She only allows you to do a little work at a time before she wants the attention :) Madi really has done well with all the changes she has been through.

So, this past Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, my parents were in town. They came and brought stuff we had packed and stored at their house and they brought Madilyn's furniture. My parents gift to us was her furniture, so they had the chance to bring it to us this week. What a gracious and wonderful present. Madi now has her own bed for the very first time!! She doesn't have to sleep in the Pack-n-Play or on a palate on the floor any more! :) My dad put Madi's furniture together while he was here and he helped me and Scott hang a few things around the house. My mom babysat which was a BIG help! I got to do more cuz I knew Madi was being watched after. My mom also organized Madi's room and got her bedding on her crib while Scott and I were out running an errand one day. What a blessing and big help they have been to us! It was great to have them here for a few days.

I'm still adjusting to not being close to them, but it has been ok cuz we see them and Scott's parents once a month when we go to the Auburn game. We make a stop in Atlanta and spend the night to break up the trip for Madi. Madilyn is a GREAT little traveler!! She does so well in the car for so long. It has been nice for us to get to go to Auburn to a few games. I've even got to go into the games cuz my mom demands to babysit! :)

Well, why my parents were here, my mom and I took Madi over to the Pumpkin Patch to pick out a pumpkin for her first Halloween. She was a real trooper with all the picture taking and bright sun. We have her Halloween costume picked out. I'll keep that a secret until Halloween :)

Here are pics from the Pumpkin Patch. I'll put pictures up of Madi's room as soon as I get the last little bit organized.

ONE MONTH PICTURES