Oh right, this happened

"This" being pretty much the cutest set of newborn baby girl photos in the history of history. 

 http://www.libbyannphotography.com/blog/2013/02/austin-newborn-photographer-piper-7-weeks/

We waited until after her due date for her newborn photos, so I think she was about 6ish lbs in these. A few of my favorites:

Here is our slideshow with all the rest:

http://www.libbyannphotography.com/slideshows/piper/

And since you now want to hire Libby of Libby Ann Photography:

http://www.libbyannphotography.com/

Piper's Yellow and Turquoise Nursery

In all the craziness with Piper arriving early, I never posted any pictures of her finished nursery.  I got so much inspiration from others on Pinterest that I wanted to be able to contribute there for others.  Here are a couple pics taken when my mom was in town last month.  I will come back and add more when I have some time (so a year or so from now).

Crib: Munire Urban Collection

Fabric for window seat cover (made by a friend) and valance/pillow (made by mom): Premier Prints Twill Suzani Corn Yellow

Picture wall collage: center print from Etsy seller happydeliveries, upper right print from here (free printable), lower left print from here (free printable), upper left and lower right are just a framed piece of fabric with scrapbooking stickers on the glass (insipred by this).

Quilt: Grandma Dee

Wall color: No clue. Jon brought a Tiffany box to Home Depot and asked them to match it.

Hutch/changing dresser: Munire Urban Collection

Yellow baskets: Michael's

Yellow metal bin: Hobby Lobby (party supply section)

Changing pad cover: Babies R Us (bought in desperation when we realized she was about to be released from the NICU). I also have this one from Etsy seller LittleOwlsNest and I love it. Both are super soft and well made.

Bird house: $6 find in the garden section at Tuesday Morning

The glass bowl is filled with pacifiers. I got that idea here.

The wall hanging on the left is from Etsy seller MaisieMooNZ. I ordered the night before I was induced.  Call it retail therapy when I realized I was about to have a teeny tiny 33.5-week-old baby girl the next day. Here's a better picture of it:

I first fell in love with this lamp, but $395 for a lamp was out of the question (and silly if you ask me).  A little Googling lead me to this one from Bedroom Expressions.  I called the local store and had it shipped there.  The first two arrived in pieces, but the third time's a charm. In other words, if you order a lamp from them, make sure they open the box and check it before you drive yourself down there and waste your time.  I girly'd it up with some yellow ribbon and hot glue.

There are a few other touches I'd like to document in there, but I'll have to come back and post those.

**Update**

Relatively recent additions to the collage wall:

Happy February!

Ms. Piper Dee is ready for her first Valentine's Day.

And since today is Superbowl Sunday, here's a side-by-side of Amery and Piper in their Bambino Balls onesies.  Think they're related?

Growing!

Here's a little comparison of how much Piper has grown in the past 3 months.  The top photo is her with a pacifier when she was about 10 days old in the NICU.  The bottom photo is the same pacifier about 3 months later.

20 Days in Instagram

 

 

 

 

 

 

Home.

And then we had a baby.

So yeah, little bit of a break in the old blog the past two months.  About three days after our last post I was admitted to the hospital with pregnancy-induced hypertension.  Three days after that on September 23, 2012, little miss Piper Dee made her way into the world at 33.5 weeks (7 weeks early).  She was 3 lbs 9 oz and 16.5 inches long.  She spent 20 days in the NICU and came home with us on October 12, 2012.  I'll keep it short since I'm dealing with precious nap time here, but here are some photos showing her journey from birth date to now:

Just born.

First bottle.

Finally meeting my girl in the NICU.

Laying on her bili blanket (treatment for jaundice).

Piper in her isolette before she was moved to an open crib.

Receiving a blessing from our minister Chad.

Her fingers in mine.

Meeting big brother Amery.

Home!

Pipers baptism. This is the same baptismal gown worn by me and my sister. It's 45 years old.

My pretty girl captured by Libby Ann Photography. You can bet we'll be posting more of these when we get them.

Some people have asked about her middle name.  Jon's mom's name was Merri Dee and my grandma's name is Dee, so it's a way to honor them both.

Guilty

The easiest way to get to my friend Mandie's blog is to go through the link on our blog.  Every time I passed by ours I felt a little bit worse about slacking on posts this summer.  The guilt of not posting anything since July finally got to me.  We really did do stuff the rest of the summer.  Lots of stuff.  And then it got really, really hot and we holed up in the house most weekends or spent time in the pool.  To ease my guilt, you get pictures.  Not a lot of explanation, but this is the best I've got right now.  Getting ready for Amery's birthday, family visits, and a certain baby girl are taking up a lot of time right now!

We spent time on Grammy and Grampy's boat:

 Rocked some swimming lessons:

Dressed up for hippie day at school:

Moved into a big boy room:

Visited a cave:

And checked out a Lego festival:

Fourth of July Fun

We had a lot of fun celebrating Independence Day yesterday.  We started with Plan A - pool party at home with friends.  One of their little ones got sick so we moved on to Plan B - spend the day with grammy and grampy and swim in their awesome neighborhood pool.  Turns out BOTH of the neighborhood pools were closed for the 4th (why? dumb).  We moved on to Plan C - drive 10 miles back toward Austin to go to the big pool in town.  It was crazy crowded but we still had a great time.  We headed back out to grammy and grampy's for dinner and fireworks.  Some pictures from our day:

My masterpiece. A patriotic triffle of pound cake stars, strawberries, blueberries, and whipped cream. It was simple and delicious. I can once again thank Pinterest for this one.

Amery's first sparkler. The cup as a hand shield for little ones - brilliant. You may be shocked to hear that this idea came from, wait for it, Pinterest.



Finally it was time to head down the marina for fireworks. Waiting for it to get dark enough is tough for the 3-yr-old crowd.



A million years later, still waiting...

Taking pictures of ourselves, thinking it will NEVER get dark.

Finally! He was definitely impressed.

And then there's this awesome little video of our smart boy. Throughout the fireworks show, he was calling out their colors in Spanish. What a little sponge he is right now. I suspect his teachers, many of whom speak fluent Spanish, are to thank for this.  Oh, and Dora and Diego.  Lord knows he watches his fair share of those two.