Blake + Mommy's Camera = A Morning Well Spent!

If you haven't already guessed... I love photographs. I love taking them, and I love looking at them. I have a lot of theories about what photographs say about different people. Pictures can be so complicated and say so much. I love photographing babies the most because they say everything about life, and they are perfect. Of course, I may be a little biased about this little guy, but... yeah he's the most perfect thing I've ever photographed.

 

 

-SL



March Madness

 

You know this little guy is going to grow up as a sports fan having the dad he does. We are starting him off with a little March Madness! He mostly has his new exersaucer down... mostly. Maybe one day he will reach the books. For now he seems to be enjoying just hanging out.

 



 

The mirror seems to be his new favorite toy! Such a cutie.

-SL

3 Month Alligator Update

 

-SL

Being Crafty

 

We didn't know if Blake would actually get to see a lot of snow since...we live in Arkansas....BUT We did in fact get a snowstorm this winter! And what are snow days best for? Being crafty! New Beginnings is this month, and I had a ton of stuff to do to get ready. Our theme was "I'm a Mormon...I know it, I live it, I love it."

 

 

Blake was a total angel the whole time I was working on my projects. Of course...snow in Arkansas usually means that everything and everyone shuts down for the foreseeable future, so of course New Beginnings was cancelled after all that work! Oh well...that just meant I had more time to spend with my two favorite boys...

 

 

He is trying so hard to roll over!



 

I just can't resist taking pictures of this cutie... Precious!

 

I decided to make a "greenie" box for Sam. I thought it turned out pretty cute.

 

More crafties...We have a couple new girls coming into Young Women's this month as well, so I  made a couple little gifts for them.

 

What else are snow days good for? BAKING! I have had this weird obsession with wanting to eat cookie dough lately, so I decided I should try a "no-bake" cookie dough recipe. No eggs... so theoretically they are safe to eat. They were ok. Not nearly as good as my normal cookie dough!

 

We do snow days the right way here.

-SL

The Finished Nursery

 

It took me a couple months, but I finally finished Blake's nursery! I LOVE IT! SO MUCH! I fell in love with this bedding as soon as I saw it. It was ridiculously expensive, but I knew I wouldn't find anything I liked better than this.

 

I bought extra fabric from the company that makes the bedding. With the extra fabric I made the pillows and the curtain. The three black picture frames above his dresser have the blue fabric in them with animals cut out of the same fabric as his bedding. I used my cricut to trace the animals.  I also made the slipcover for his rocking chair.

 

He also has a gorgeous bumper that matches his bed, but since he is so little still he doesn't sleep with it yet.

 

LOVE how it all turned out!

 

 

-SL

Valentine's Day

We decided to keep it pretty simple for Valentine's Day this year since we had Blake with us.

 

Aaron bought me an awesome new Cricut cartridge (Pixar characters!), flowers, and a couple beautiful new charms for my Pandora bracelet. I gave him a basket full of all of his favorite goodies to snack on. Do we know each other or what?!

 

 

 

Aaron had one other sweet surprise...

 

We had originally tried to get a tree house in Eureka Springs for Valentine's Day, but they were totally booked up! Instead, Aaron created our own little "tree house" in our guest room for the night. Pretty cute, eh? Here is a picture of Aaron setting up the computer so we could watch a movie. He told me to pick whatever girly chick flick I wanted. I had a specific, cute, Valentine's Day movie in mind, but couldn't remember the name of it. We searched around Netflix for awhile, and we found "I Hate Valentine's Day," and I thought that was the one I was looking for. Nope. Turns out that was one of the worst movies ever! So lame! Later I found the movie I was looking for, which is in fact called "Valentine's Day." Oh well... It was still a blast. Love that I have such a creative husband!

 

 

This guy is my best friend, and I love him more than anything!

-SL

 

Elder Whitlock...the adventure begins!!

 

Blake's first big road trip in a car was to Sioux Falls, SD! It was kind of a long car ride (9 hours without stopping) because we had to stop to feed Blake every two hours, but it was worth it. I was so glad to have Sam with me to keep me company on the way up. My parents asked me to watch my two younger brothers while they drove Sam to the MTC in Utah. Aaron and I have never been apart for longer than a week (when he travels for work), so I knew two weeks was going to be crazy hard... and it was! Thankfully I had my awesome family to distract me.

 

Sorry for the poor quality in pictures...I forgot my camera cord at home so these are all camera phone pictures. Sad day!!

 

Grandma sure enjoyed the cuddle time!

 

 

Great-Grandma did too!

This is a picture of my grandma with Blake and my Uncle Barry's daughter, Stella. They are only 6 months apart!

 

 

The newly set apart missionary! Sam will be serving in the Washington, D.C. North Mission...FRENCH speaking! How cool is that? I was able to go with him when he was set apart. Such a strong spirit filled the room. He will be such an awesome missionary.

 



 

Uncle Nate

 

Uncle Nate, Uncle Ben, and Blake playing games

 

 

Master Yoda Blake went through a huge growth spurt while we were gone. He does this thing where he gets SUPER chubby and then grows tall and leaner...and then he gets SUPER chubby again. I love it!!!

 

 We had such a fun time, but let me tell you what...I'm not ready to have three kids! Running my brothers around to school and their different activities with a three month old was a ton of work. Also, my brother Ben is Autistic and is on a gluten-free and dairy-free diet. Talk about challenging! I really appreciated all my parents do for my brother after those two weeks. It is not an easy life. I enjoyed every minute of our trip, but I was glad it was only for two weeks. I couldn't wait to get back to my hubby!

 

 

Even though Blake is only three months old, I could tell that he missed his daddy!! I was thrilled to be home. I felt so bad that we missed Aaron's birthday while we were gone too! Hopefully I made it up to him with some awesome gifts and...HOMEMADE NOODLES! Just like his grandma used to make...well...kind of. I can't claim they were that good, but I tried.

 

 

-SL