Homemade Toys

Connor loves to play! He plays with the toys we've bought him, he loves his touch & feel books and he can't get enough balls to roll around and throw (in fact he's just learned to roll the ball with someone - thanks for the lesson Grammy!!). But, what has amazed me is how he will turn anything into a toy. The door stopper - he loves! The baby gate - an absolute hit! The dog bowls, cabinet doors, stairs, mirrors....he just loves to play, climb, cruise and push. I'm amazed at his creativity!

We've created a few homemade toys around the house, and he loves them. Feel free to steal these ideas for your little one, too!

Suck the air out of a water bottle. Connor loves the sound the bottle makes when he squeezes it!

Insert a pacifier into a small Rubbermaid container. Homemade shaker. This idea is from my brilliant MIL.

Mardi Gras beads into an empty egg carton. Another great shaker, and another great idea from my MIL. 

This isn't homemade (obviously) but I had to share. This is the ball that finally convinced Connor to start crawling at 7-8 months. He would chase it all around the room. I purchased it on a sort of whim from Target.

Just wanted to share a little fun from our corner of the world. We are having a blast with our 11 month old!

B

Connor's First Tailgate Party

Disclaimer: I did not attend LSU - I am a graduate of HBU. But, I did marry LSU. For more details, please visit www.fordfamilytailgating.com. Enough said.

Many weekends in the fall, J and I can be found in the armpit of Louisiana - Baton Rouge. We are third generation season ticket holders to LSU football games. We are huge Tiger fans in our family, and couldn't wait to introduce Connor to the fun traditions of Ford Family Tailgating.

FFT began in the 90's as a true tailgate. One cooler, some food, and around 12 people tailgating out of a van while the kids tossed a football in the parking lot. That simple idea has since morphed into a 60+ person party complete with games, TV, a sound system, trailer, signage, a full four-course menu, t-shirts, a cookbook, a twitter account (follow us @fordfamtailgate), a strong presence on Facebook, and a website. It's quite the production, put on by J's parents, family and friends. But, I can't stand to imagine Connor growing up without tailgating. I guess it's because that's how I "grew up" into the Ford family.


This past weekend we took Connor to his first tailgate party before the Auburn game. J was so excited to get our little munchkin out there he could hardly stand it. It was really sweet, actually. I love watching how proud J is to show off Connor.

Connor's laugh is my most favorite sound! J was dipping him down in front of the fan and back up again - Connor thought that was the greatest!

And this is what he spent most of the day doing...crawling all over the porch, and attempting to crawl down the steps! His knees were some kind of dirty!

This is Connor's gameday face....he will do it on command. It's absolutely hysterical!

He loved pulling up on Pops' toolbox and pulling the handle up and down. 

This is Andrew. He's the son of Jeremy's lifelong friend (literally, they've been friends since birth). Andrew is seven and he LOVES Connor and hardly let him out of his sight at the tailgate party! They're making the gameface...but really Connor is making the "I didn't take a long enough nap and I'm cranky face."

Our friends brought their puppy dog to the party, and it loved giving Connor kisses. Connor tried following the puppy all over the place! Excuse me, I just need a moment to bask in all of Connor's adorable-ness in this picture. GAH! I canNOT get enough of him!

Sweet boys! How cute is Connor's lil tailgate chair?

Well this is embarrassing...how did my adorable front porch decoration end up in here?

Geaux Tigers!
B

P is for PARTY!

I love my job. I've been working at a private school in Houston for seven years and I've done everything from fundraising to public relations to coaching to event planning and more. We all wear a lot of hats working at a school, and it makes the job all the more fun. You just never know what to expect day to day, and for that I am thankful. I don't do well with monotony boredom.

The past few years, I've worn the hat of event planner at the school. Or as my colleague likes to call me, the party planner.

At the end of the school year, we typically have a last day cookout for teachers and let me tell you it's blazin' hot! Not hair blowing in the breeze, cheeks glowing hot....but armpit sweat, frizzy hair hot - you get the picture. It's an outdoor cookout on a rocky playground where we eat burgers that sweaty men are grilling. Umm...I'll pass.

So, this year I approached my amazing boss (but, seriously, he is amazing; and he doesn't even read this) with a new idea. Let's have an indoor, end of school catered party! We'll have fun music, delicious food and give away gift cards. I was so honored that he trusted little old me to run with my crazy idea!

The theme was "School's Out for Summer" and my sweet friend Lauren helped me pull this off!

As the faculty and staff entered, fun songs were playing like "Beat this Summer" (Brad Paisley), "Summertime" (Kenny Chesney...of course), "Long Hot Summer" (Keith Urban) and "Surfin' USA" (one of several Beach Boys songs on the play list) and more. I believe that music can really add to an event! They went through the buffet line and filled their plates with food from Zoe's Kitchen. Happy food = happy people!

Here's an overview of the party! We did bright blues and yellows to brighten up the otherwise drab party space. 

Each place setting had an iced sugar cookie that looked like a beach ball. 

We had 150 personalized beach balls scattered all over the floor! Fun takeaway!

The stage was especially fun to decorate. Yellow striped umbrellas, beach pails with gift cards, blue Adirondack chairs and monogrammed beach towels.

The party turned out to be a success, and a really fun way to send our teachers off for the summer! 

For back to school, we did a bingo party, which was super fun. Maybe I'll post on that one, too. 

The next party I'm planning is the biggest one....Connor's first birthday. Lord, help me! I need to get off Pinterest and get it together!

Until next time...

B

 

All Wrapped Up

I've got several pregnant friends right now. And all of them - no joke - ALL of them are having girls! 2013 must be the year of the girl! Many of these pregnant friends happen to be in my Sunday school class, and so we threw them a combined shower for these sweet second time moms. 

My job at the shower was to get the group gift (besides the diaper gift card). I take gift presentation pretty seriously, so I spent some time trying to come up with a clever way to wrap the gifts. Enter my mom...my go to gift wrap helper. 

I got the girls monogrammed pottery barn kid bath towels. The best baby bath towels out there if you ask me. To wrap the gifts, I bought Kraft paper from Container Store. Then I bought every roll of pink ribbon from Michael's (you just never know what will look right), and large pink diaper pins from amazon. For a final touch, I added the first initial of the baby's name to the bottom corner. 

I was happy with how they turned out....but more importantly, the mom's loved them and the gift inside. I love doing fun things for my sweet friends!

#ThrowbackThursday

I'm not throwing it back that far...really just an excuse to post some favorite memories of Connor!

Connor's first (and perhaps only) Easter photo shoot!

His 6 month photos back in May...the pout, I die!

One of his very first baths. I had forgotten about the days of the sponge baths, when he still had the umbilical cord (which took almost three weeks to fall out!)

The first time we captured his smile on camera iPhone. This momma was ready for a smile!

All dressed up for his first LSU bowl game, complete with football socks. #whynot

I love his expression here! He's on the buggy at school on Valentine's Day!

Practicing a little tummy time on our bed, and he was all gummy smiles!

Throwing it back to a few hours ago! Look at him pulling up to standing...it's his latest trick! So proud of himself!

He was NOT having the family photo!

Naked baby newborn photo...beyond precious!

We take monthly pics of Connor, and this 5 month expression melts my heart. 

Our little family at Connor's baptism. It took several takes to get this cute expression!

Maybe I'm obsessed with the baby? I'm okay with that! The days are long, but the years are short. I'm soaking in the blessing of being his mommy!

Children's Museum

We went to the Tot Spot at the Houston Children's Museum for the first time last week and Connor had a blast! He loved crawling around - and he did so great crawling up and down the steps, tunnels and ramps! He pulled up to his knees to give himself kisses in the mirrors. He loved the spinning wheels of baby pictures, and of course the ball pit! He lasted almost two hours before realizing it was nap time!

Everything goes in this boy's mouth...luckily, the balls in here had just been cleaned! 

I love July and all of my time off with my sweet boy!

Pigeon Ford: Family Vacation

Hey, it's me again! Doing my bi-annual blog post. I was creeping around on some friend's blogs tonight (Sam, Tiffanie, Katie, Sara...I'm looking at you) and then decided I might as well post, too.

This month we celebrated Jeremy's folks 40th wedding anniversary with a family trip to Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Never heard of it? I hadn't either until we started planning. It's in the heart of the Smoky Mountains. We stayed in a beautiful four-story cabin with a breathtaking view. We had a great time.

Before we joined the family for the week, our little family of three spent a few days (including Jeremy's birthday and the 4th) in Nashville. As a lifelong country music fan, I soaked the country music capital in. Literally...since it rained everyday we were there. My favorite thing we did was tour the Country Music Hall of Fame. We had Carrie Underwood/The Band Perry tickets to the Opry, but we didn't last long there because the munchkin was ready for bed.

After Nashville fun, we headed to the smoky mountains and we stayed in Pigeon Forge Ford for the week. We had a really great time with all of the Ford's. We went to Dixie Stampede, drove through the park, had a picnic, and lots of other outdoor things. Connor mostly enjoyed crawling, as he was still pretty new to being so mobile. He also had fun "playing" with his one year old cousin, Dominic, as much as babies actually "play".

Here are a few pics!

Go ahead and swoon over his adorable 4th of July smocked outfit! I had the camera out while we were waiting in line at the Hall of Fame!

We went all the way to Nashville to ride the carousel at the mall. But look at the smile on his face! We were killing some time before the Opry!

With his 91-year old great grandmother, Mimi in Rocky Mountain National Park! What a view!

He loved sticking his hand in the water trough at the picnic and splashing!

Playing in his outdoor playpen his Nana and Pops brought for him. See the orange ball...that's what made him finally start crawling, instead of just rocking back and forth, reaching his arms and belly flopping!

The Ford's. And yes, we are wearing matching t-shirts. Why not? And of course they are purple & gold!

Adore this picture of my boys!