One Step

It was just one, and it was small, but it was significant because it was her first. Yes, Madelyn took her first step today.

I understand if you are not all that excited, but you know how a first time mom can be. Humor me. It was pretty fun to see her standing there tottering back and forth and instead of falling over she took a step and then lowered herself to the floor. So fun to see her learn.

Mommy's Little Helper...

Daddy's Little Pal.

Give-Oh-Give-Away

Give aways are a fun part of blogging, and it seems that I have entered my fair share and have come away with nothing to show for it...until now.

Thanks to Chocolates For Breakfast I was able win these darling Easter stackers. I also received a discount coupon to be used on my next vinyl purchase along with some delicious Easter chocolate from See's Candy. I only had to enter my name like 10 times.

I'm happy to now have at least one Easter decoration to put up in my house. Thanks Kathy Jo.

Oh, and Madelyn wanted to wish everyone a happy spring.

Sunday Afternoon Treats

In my family Sunday afternoon was a time for cookie making. We made chocolate chip cookies or snicker doodles most often, and if they turned out really good my mom would hale the cookie maker as "the new best cookie maker of the family." Visitors would always get to try one and after they commented on how good they were the credit would go to the cookie maker.


Yesterday Spence made us some delicious Macaroons that we took to dinner at my parents house. Oh yes, he is "the new best cookie maker of the family." My mom wanted the recipe so I thought I would just post it for all to have.

4 large egg whites

3 C. Sweetened coconut

1/4 C. sugar

2 tsp. vanilla

1/4 flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.


mix all ingredients on the stove at a low heat for 6-8 min, stirring constantly to make sure it does not stick. When the mixture becomes the consistency of thick oatmeal remove from the heat.


Place spoonfuls of the mixture in rocky piles on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake for 12-13 minutes until golden brown. Remove from oven and leave to cool completely on the baking sheet.


Tho outside of the cookie is caramely and chewy while the inside of the cookie is nice and soft. They are really good. Enjoy!

I Love Coming Home and Seeing...

...Spencer using his best babysitting tactic (see picture below).

It's a scene that is most likely to happen on a Saturday afternoon while I am out running errands. I won't be surprised if Madelyn is a daddy's girl.

Spreading The Love

This Valentines we spread the love by doing a few crafts. Christina and I made a few Valentine cards that I thought turned out cute.

Madelyn helped out with a card for her daddy by offering her hand print. If you want to see your husband get a tear in his eye, just give him a card with a hand print from the baby (It worked for Spence).


I purchased the below heart containers from Roberts as plain, brown cardboard boxes. I painted them red and then Mod Podged a scrap paper that I liked to the front. I really like the way they turned out. They are a fun decoration, cheap and easy. All things I like.

And last, but definately not least we made sour cream, sugar cookies with a recipe that I got from Linds. They always turn out really good.

Hope you all had a good Valentines day.

Loving Motherhood...

...and it just got better.

This past week of taking care of Madelyn has been better than ever. I am in love with the little angel.

For those of you who are just having your first baby, you may think that it is fun at the beginning, but just wait. Friends told me that motherhood would get easier and more fun as Madelyn got older; turns out they were right.

The most recent development is that Madelyn is now sleeping for 12 hours at night. At least she has for the last 5 nights. Hopefully we can keep this up.

As Madelyn moved into her 4th month she started sleeping 7 hour stretches by herself. That didn't last long because soon after that, she developed a cold, then another, then the holidays came, and then another cold. Obviously she wasn't sleeping through the night and when the colds were gone she would still wake up every two or three hours wanting be nursed back to sleep. I avoided letting her "cry it out" because I kept thinking that she would start to sleep on her own. The whole sleeping thing became an incredible stress in my life. As you can understand, I was tired.

After much encouragement from multiple people (thank you to everyone who listened to my sleep stories over and over), we finally let her "cry it out". I was determined to at least see if letting Madelyn cry would work. About a week ago we put Madelyn to bed, she fell right asleep and woke up crying two hours later. We didn't go get her. Listening to her cry was hard. She cried for an hour and fifteen minutes before she fell asleep. I was sure she would wake up in two hours and give us another hour long cry. I was dreading listening to her crying for the rest of the night, but I was shocked when I woke up the next morning and found she had slept until morning. A similar scenario happened for the next two nights with a little less crying each night. On the fourth night, she went to bed and didn't make a peep for 12 hours. Wahoo!! As I said, she has slept for 12 hours through the night for the past 5 nights and her mommy and daddy are elated.

This past week has been fabulous. Madelyn has been happier while she is awake. Her personality has become more cheerful and dynamic, and when it is time for her nap she goes down without crying (for the most part). She sat on my lap through most of sacrament this past week. Normally we had to walk around with her because she was squirmy 15 minutes into sacrament. It has just been a ton of fun to take care of her this week!

Here is a picture of the little angel sleeping.