Anna Kate's Dedication

The church we attend was having baby dedication this past week.  Jarred and I wanted our whole family up there with us (meaning, bringing our 2 year old, Caleb, up with us), so here we are.  It was very personal and we love our pastor.  Caleb kind of stole the show while we were on stage though......it was cute, unnerving, stressful, funny and any other combination of emotions.  He figured out that the stage was hollow underneath, so all of sudden, he started stomping his foot, then again, then again.  I would crouch down and he would sit on his knees, then all the way down, then up again, then stomp.  It was so stressful.  He stole everyone's hearts though.  As we were walking out at the end of church, everyone was saying hi to Caleb and waving at him and telling us he was adorable and they were expecting a bow from him after his performance!  Oh goodness!  Never a dull moment!

He started saying "nose" and wanted to touch my nose at one point.

The pastor slightly intimidated him :)

Anna Kate is such a doll!

I love this picture of Caleb peering up!

Best Buddies

We went to a parade, tree lighting, firework show thing at an outdoor shopping center this past weekend with our good friends, the Turners.  They were moving on Tuesday, so we tried to see them as much as possible to delay the tearful goodbye or in the military world, "see you later."  This was a hard one though, they have 3 kiddos, two boys and one of the boys is just 3 months older than Caleb.  Caleb LOVES these two boys and has been asking about ever since we said goodbye.  We went to church with them every Tuesday, Thursday and Sunday, so Caleb saw them quite a bit.  It was hard going to church yesterday and trying to explain to Caleb that the boys moved away.  Sad.  We will keep in touch and hopefully our boys can stay friends and reconnect in Colorado sometime.  Its nice that their family also lives in Colorado, so there is a great chance we will get to see them again.

It finally hit me, that we are a military family and our kids are going to have to leave their friends and make new ones everywhere we go.  It is not going to be an easy life, but it will build character for sure, said with a tear in my eye.  It builds character for all of us.

The three boys, Caleb, Bryson and Jace.

They could be cousins!!  Love them!

Quick Trip to Colorado

Anna Kate and I went to Colorado for a quick weekend for Katie's baby shower!  We arrived late Thursday night and left in the wee hours Sunday morning.  We had a good weekend and Anna Kate got spoiled rotten which was good and bad.  Good for her, bad for me when we got home :)

Uncle Stephen is a "fire artist" now, so he put on a performance for us which was a little unnerving at moments, but quite impressive!

Uncle Bryant got lots of Anna Kate time.

The guys went shooting before the baby shower, "practice in anticipation of having a girl" I guess.

Uncle Stephen's first picture with Anna Kate although he did meet her back in September.

The food for the baby shower.

We didn't want to do a traditional diaper cake (too many diapers to take home), so I made some diaper cupcakes!  I wrapped a diaper in a coffee filter and put a sock in the center as "frosting."

We put some boxes together with almonds inside to go along with our "bird/owl" theme, stamped a piece of paper with an owl for the top and tied some twine around the box to complete the look.

Our FAVORITE crafty thing we did were the cupcakes!  The owls weren't an original idea, but what we used for them were.  We used mini oreos for the eyes, with a mini m'n'm in the center, cut a skittle in half for the nose and used almond slices for the feathers.  The "nests" were just coconut with jelly beans in the center.

My sister LOVES owls, so I made some personalized thank yous for her.  I used my friend, Ashley's "thank you" stamp that I had seen her use before, so I borrowed her idea and used it with an owl instead of an elephant that she used.

We had a onesie decorating station which was SO fun.  I didn't get any pictures of the final product, but I am sure we will see some with Miss Kinsey wearing them!

Aunt Katie and her niece.

6 months old already!  At her appointment, Anna Kate weighed 17 lbs, 15 oz and measured a whopping 26.8"!  She is growing SO fast and so is her cute hair!

This was one of the most gorgeous wrapping I have seen done by Miss Jocelyn.  She stamped owls on the paper!

Family Pictures

It is SO hard to take your own family pictures, so we had some good friends take some for us.  I LOVE the pictures we got!  There are so many good ones, I may have to do a couple Christmas cards this year :)

Our Adorable Children

 Caleb made a mask at storytime that he likes to wear occasionally and sometimes to entertain Anna Kate, I have to put her in the middle of the kitchen while I try to put dinner together.

 I pulled out our boxes of gloves, hats and scarves for Caleb to play with one day.  He had tons of fun and Anna Kate truly had no clue what was going on.

 And......this is what our living room looks like everyday with Caleb playing with random toys and Anna Kate hanging out in the background.

Look how controlled she is getting with sitting up!  She is growing up so fast!

New venture

We finally did it...........we started a photography business.  I know, I know, like we don't have anything else going on in our lives with 2 kids, bible studies, thesis, school, and life in general, but.........photography is a passion of both Jarred and I and honestly, we see it as a great outlet and hobby for us.  We aren't looking to make a ton of a money, just enough to pay for our hobby.  After encouragement from friends and a pre-jidder photo shoot with some good friends, we jumped right in and made it official.  We are in the process of building our portfolio, figuring out pricing, picture packages, editing, etc, so we don't have a business license yet or a website, but we are getting there.  Right now, I am going out and taking the pictures while my fabulous husband watches the kids, then we both, mostly Jarred, edits the pictures.  Our name will be J&A Burley Photography.  We are super excited for this new venture and look forward to where it takes us and the new people we will meet in the process!  If you all would be praying for us as we begin this new chapter, we would greatly appreciate it.  I will send a link to our new photo business blog when I get it up and running!  Love you all!

Anna Kate 1st Solid Meal

Anna Kate had not been sleeping as well as she use to, and that had gone on for almost a week and it wasn't teeth, so it was time to start the rice cereal.  It is definitely not my favorite stage at all-I wouldn't mind fast forwarding this stage to where they eat big people food, but here we are.  Anna Kate did relatively well-we have to just keep at it so she gets use to it.  We are up 2 meals a day now, lunch and dinner and will begin veggies soon.  The baby food making begins as well!!