The Ballard Bunch

I had been told that it would take at least two weeks for my dining room table to arrive, but received a great surprise on Tuesday. It had only taken 5 days - so it's here and ready for the holidays! I even hate my "pink" walls less now that it's in the room. :) We'll still paint, don't you worry! I'm just not sure when we're actually going to get to it now that Thanksgiving is almost here.

Here is the table and chairs (the barstools are on back order and we should have them in a week or two)

I have to brag, too, about the crafts that we've made as of late. Below are pictures of three that are out now. Thanks to Karen and Shanna for the inspiration/company when making them!

Here's our welcome signs for our front doors. The pumpkins and turkey are replaced with a different themed craft each month. For instance, December will have five stockings with the letters S-A-N-T-A on them. We'll be making those soon enough - I'll post pictures for all to see.

This is the pumpkin that I made on my own. It was so inexpensive and I'm in short supply of fall decorations, so I thought I'd give it a try on my own. The stem is a sanded down branch from outside our old house!

Gobble gobble! Shanna's favorite item, the turkey. She's got one in slightly different colors.

Another random Evonne project that turned out surprisingly cute. This sits on my kitchen counter for now - I need to find it a better home somewhere in the house.

With so much focus on our new babe, Hayden in the last few months, I wanted to pay tribute to the cutest 20-month-old girlfriend in the world. Tatum has grown so much over the last year and a half and I'm so proud of the beautiful and kind little girl she's become. Enjoy!

Thanks so much, Jocelyn, for your help making this blog so cute! I really appreciate it and I'm glad we touched base - now I can look at your blog in the open - no more "secret" viewing - haha!

Here are some recent pictures of our littlest babe. I took her to JcPenney's for the super $7.99 deal and this is what we got. Pretty good, considering the girl that took our pictures was absolutely horrible and terribly rude. I guess it helps to have the cutest baby in the world as your subject. :)

Check out the cheeks!

Here I am, posting for you from our NEW house! I love being here and am so anxious to finish unpacking and making this place a home. We love being here already!

Last week was a hectic one of packing, cleaning and running around. I'd like to send a quick "thank you" to all of our friends and family that helped us with everything - we couldn't have done it alone and we're so appreciative.

Here are some pictures from our last week in the Haunted House:

I had all of the kids (mine and Shanna's) over Friday morning while Shanna went to her dentist appointment. Here they are eating cereal on our living room floor. Now that we're in the new house, we'll have room for all of the kids to eat at the table - yay!!! As you can tell by these pictures, Shantell is in her "loser" phase. Gotta love it.

Here are Tatum and Hayden hanging out in the living room the day before we moved. Tatum even let me take pictures of her being a mommy - she LOVES her baby. She's taken to copying everything I do with Hayden with her own baby.

Here's our sweet little Hayden in her Halloween gear. She was such a trooper and went out trick-or-treating with Beau, Tatum and I - she even let me put a little "costume" on her face! It seemed fitting to make her an indian, having all that dark hair and all. Her face paint is a little rubbed off in these pictures - it was a long night!

I had to share these pictures of my cute Miss Tate in her Halloween-themed outfit. She totally dug the cutsie scull and crossbones! This was for the non-costume part of the day.

I know it's still before Halloween, but the celebration has already begun in the Ballard house. Tatum, Hayden and I went with some friends to "Trick or Treat Street" at the South Towne Expo Center this morning and had so much fun! As you can probably tell in the pictures, Tate wasn't too into it all at the beginning. Once inside (they have it set up with lots of little doors you knock on and different characters give out candy), it took her awhile to venture away from holding my hand and making me ask for candy. But once she felt comfortable, she was a wild woman! They had great Halloween-type songs playing and she and Jadi (the ladybug) and Kayden (the dinosaur) danced and ran around. She ended up leaving with quite the loot, too - so the $5 price tag on the day wasn't a loss.

Afterwards, we met up with the dads and went to the Training Table for lunch. Tatum quickly earned the nickname "Stair Fairy" because she only wanted to play on the stairs by our table in her fairy costume. I have to say, she looked pretty dang cute all dressed up and glittered out - she's SUCH a girl when it comes to stuff like that.

Tuesday will be the big celebration (as will be for most of you, I'd guess) so I'm sure we'll have more to share then. Stay tuned for our little Indian Baby in a future post...she hasn't made her costume debut just yet. But it's worth the wait, I promise.

Loves,
Evonne

p.s. I have to share a close-up pic of Tate's saucy fairy shoes I found on eBay. Love me some eBay lately!

Lately I've found it difficult to get Tatum to go down for a nap. Heaven knows she's tired when the whining and the tantrums rear their ugly heads, but she fights laying down like no other lately. I've been forced to tuck her in and shut the door to let her scream it out most days in the past week or two. Typically, she's asleep before 2 minutes are up, but some days she's more reluctant.

Sunday was a particularly hairy day for nap time. After about 15 mintues of solid screaming...silence. I cracked open the door so that when she woke up she could come out on her own, but didn't really get a good look in the room. After about an hour, we were getting ready to go to Beau's grandma's house so I went in to wake Tate up. For a split second I began to panic - she wasn't in her bed! There was, however, a big clump of soft blankie peaking out from under Hayden's crib. I carefully pulled the blanket away to find my little munchkin sound asleep underneath.

Waking her up was even more difficult because in her sleepy daze, she had a hard time figuring out where she was and how to get out. I guess "bed" really is where you lay your head!

Enjoy the pics!

The other day I was going through a drawer in our bedroom and came across some glasses from years ago that I never wear anymore. Tatum saw them and wanted to try them on, so for fun I let her. She LOVES them! Obviously, I can't let her wear them too much since they are Rx, but it's too cute to see her run around in them like a mad woman. Here are a few pictures I was able to snap.



p.s. As you can see in the background, we're well into packing up this old house! The Dora training toilet seat is her new favorite accessory - it's never been used for it's original intent, but she sure does love to walk around the house with it on like it's a hat. Guess we're not quite ready to potty train, after all. :)

Miss Tate is at the age of tripping, falling, bruising and tears and Miss Mama is have major anxiety over it! Yesterday was a prime example...

Earlier in the day Shanna and I took the kids to lunch - their usual haunt, Mickey Donald's. They were having a great time playing and were getting along famously with each other (Shantell and Braeden are great about watching out for little Tatum). Remember me previously mentioning how I can't stand the moms that don't watch their own kids? Again. This one little boy was a terror! First, he's in the basketball area pinching and pushing my daughter. I watched from a distance to see what she'd do - she just stood there looking at him like, "No you didn't." He kept at it and his mom didn't say anything. Tatum finally started to scream at him (she's not a hitter, though, so screams are pretty nasty). He still kept going so I went in and said, "Tatum - next time he pinches or pushes, you do it back." That got his mom up, well at least looking in our direction. She still ignored the issue. He went and did it while I was standing right there so I looked at him and I said, "If you don't stop being mean, McDonald's will make you leave." Putting the fear of the manager into a kid did the trick. At least for awhile.

A few minutes later there is this cute little girl - maybe 3 or 4 carrying her croc shoes around. He comes up, yanks them out of her hand and starts putting them in the cubbies. She's crying - again no mom around - and looks at me with sad little puppy dog eyes. So I walk her over and show her where they are in the cubbies. He sees this and gets pissed. He runs up to us, grabs a shoe and runs into the playground and hides it - coming out laughing. Damien, I swear, people. The kicker is, when he left, the little girl was with his group and she got in trouble for not having her shoes. Yelling-how-stupid-could-you-be, trouble. I wanted to cry for her.

Maybe I'm out of line for intervening and telling this kid to stop pushing and pinching and for helping her find her shoes, but I feel like sometimes kids need people to advocate for them and I felt so sad for this little girl. I'm sure this happens to her at home all the time - he terrorizes and she somehow gets in trouble for it because she's little and timid and doesn't speak up. I know, I'm the mom that other moms hate at the playground, but I'm not the type to sit by and let things happen. Kids do need to learn to solve their own issues and I'm all for that, but sometimes it's too much and they need a little mom step-in. And I'm happy to do it - especially if my kid is the one being terrorized. On the flip side - in an instant I would discipline Tatum if she was bullying - I don't deal well with that either. Kids need parenting, plain and simple.

And now I'm off my soapbox.

After that we met up with Amanda and took the kids to Gardner Village to see the Halloween Witches. It was cold and windy, so we didn't stay long, but the kids got a kick out of them. Just as we're at the end of the displays, Tatum swats something and starts screaming bloody-murder. She got stung by a bee! Her poor little hand was swollen in seconds and she was so sad! She survived and the swelling went down pretty quickly in the car, but I felt so bad for her. She had absolutely no idea what was going on - she was fine and then all of a sudden *bam* pain and swelling. Poor little thing.

Our last stop was Children's Place to look for a costume for Baby Kehl. Shanna had seen an ad for a lion costume that she wanted to get for him. We had the babies out feeding them bottles while we looked (they'd had a long day, too) and Shantell, Braeden and Tatum were walking around. Minding themselves pretty well playing near the display a few feet away from us. I guess I was pretty distracted because a few minutes later I can hear Tatum crying, but it's muffled. I look out and she's standing outside the doors with her little hand smashed in them. The saddest part was her face pressed against the window and the weight of her own pushing on the door making her hand hurt worse. She didn't understand that if she stopped pushing, she could pull the door open and free her hand. Mother of the Year. She must have walked out with other people leaving or something because I have no idea how she got out otherwise. I'm usually overly strict with her being right by me and this is why. Everyone was fine in the end, but I was pretty freaked out that she'd gotten outside. Lucky, as mean as it sounds, that her hand got caught or she may have totally wandered off.

Anyway, she fell asleep pretty early yesterday - no blaming her after the day she had. Being pinched, pushed, stung and stuck, my little Tate is beginning to be quite the handful. But at least she has a mom that is aware. :)

Our little Hayden is truly the sweetest little thing! She's got such a pleasant, calm demeanor and hardly ever fusses (her dad would disagree, but he only sees her in the evenings during the week - meltdown time for all kids).

Here she is in her cute little hand me down outfit from Tatum that I absolutely love. She looks great in red - please keep your dark hair, Hades!


And here she is asleep with her daddy in our bed. I was up late working and came in to bed to find them this way.

To follow suit with all the cute moms I know that share the funny things their babes say, here's a list of the current funny words that Tatum says. I love reading about all the other kiddies and thought all you Tatum-lovers out there might enjoy some from her.

I'm sure there are more, but this is what pops in my head right now.

Any Drink - Meal-k (Milk - with a really long e sound)
Backyardigans - Pablo (everyone is Pablo)
Banana - Bana
Blanket/Burp Rag/Anything Cloth, really - Bankie? (said just like a question)
Cat - Ki-Yee (she's obsessed) followed by "Meowwwwwww" and a really sad looking face.
Cookie - Tuh-Teee
Duck - Kuck (I swear a lady in the store the other day thought I was teaching my child swear words - she gave me the nastiest look!)
Elmo - Melmo
Fruit Snacks - Snaaaaz
Grandma - Ma Maw
Grandpa - Paw Paw
Hayden - Hay-yen
Swing - Weeeee! (Just like Colin, Sharn!)
When Looking for Something - "Wherisshe?" (all one word)

It's crazy how quickly they pick up on new words once they get the hang of a couple. Every day she's got something new to say. My favorite is when she sings the hymns in church - but it's a quietish-yell with her head back and eyes closed. I figure everyone else is being loud then, she can , too right? It's pretty cute.

We found a house! On Saturday, Beau and I spent the day looking and stumbled upon this one with our realtor, Megan. We had scheduled time to go and look at it, but found out there were offers already being made (it was on the market since Friday afternoon). Even though we knew it was a long shot, we decided to go and take a look (everything else was coming up short of our expectations).

Tatum had a great time playing with the owner’s daughter that was just a few months older than her. We talked a little and got the grand tour of the house and said our thanks and goodbyes. Because final offers were being made that afternoon, we had to make a quick decision. We gave it a shot and put in our offer, not knowing what the other bids would be. Apparently we weren’t the highest offer, but the owner chose ours because of the good report our family had with theirs. It was nice to hear – we loved the house!

Anyway, it’s older but so perfect for our little family! We were so happy to find something this spacious and clean in our price range. Now we’re in the process of the funding and all the fun stuff (ugh!), but if all goes as planned we’ll be in November 1st! Wish us luck – it’s going to be a busy couple of weeks. I’ll be sure to update. Here are a few pictures from the online listing (keep in mind, we’ll be doing some painting, etc.)…

This is the front view of the house. Not much to describe – it pretty much says it all.


This is the living room (both pictures). It’s a great big room that also connects to the dining room, giving us lots of open space. Something we REALLY lack right now.


This is the dining room and kitchen. The biggest downfall for me with this house is the size and color of the kitchen. It’s actually bigger than it looks in this picture because off to the right is the fridge and pantry (cut off). Before we move in, we’ll be painting these rooms. Who thought this color was pretty? Scary.


Here is the master bedroom. Again, it’s nice and big, but needs a tiny bit of work (mainly, new window treatments!). Our new big bed and dresser will fit in this room so much better than they do in ours now.


This will be Tatum’s room.


And this will be Hayden’s room. We’ll need to paint her room as well (it’s blue right now), but no huge rush on that – we’ll do that after we move in.


There is a huge finished basement with a full bathroom, two more bedrooms, a large living room and an office area. Lots of room for the Ballards to grow into!

It's always hard to get a real feel for a house when other people's stuff is still in there. I'll post more pictures when we have ours moved in!

What a nice day! Beau blessed Hayden this morning in church and did a wonderful job. She looked so cute in the dress my mom made her (thank you so much!) and was so good during the blessing – no crying at all! Beau did a wonderful job and gave me lots of things to put in her scrapbook (if I’d ever start on it!!!). I was one proud wife/mama.

Afterwards we had a get-together at Beau’s grandparent’s house with friends and family. Because it was so early in the morning (10am) we decided to do breakfast foods and everything was so yummy! We had a few people bring breakfast casserole (hashbrowns, eggs, sausage & cheese), I bought a bunch of muffins and bagels, we had juice, chocolate milk, goodies – all the works! And, surprisingly enough, didn’t come home with too many leftovers.

It was great to see family and friends – we wish we could arrange get-togethers like that more often!

Here is a picture of our little family right before church today. I figured I had better get a good picture BEFORE so that I still had make up in place and Tatum was relatively put together.


This is the dress that my mom made for Hayden. The bottom is made out of the same material as my wedding dress and we found some embelished material to match for the top. It looked so cute on her and was still a little big, even though she is almost two months old! I should have taken a picture of her in her tights – they are so big on her and looked so funny, but she had to wear some because it was cold out. I need to find a place that makes good newborn tights – this 0-6 months business is a joke. Newborns and 6 month-olds are totally different sizes, sorry!


With the leftover material from Hayden’s dress, “mamaw” also made a dress for Tatum to wear to the blessing. It’s a perfect church dress and luckily I found a pink sweater to go with – it’s getting cold out now!


Karen, Connie and I haven’t had a chance to get all three of our girls together until today! Breanna, Lydia and Tatum were all born within four months of each other respectively (Tatum being the youngest). They all had fun playing on the trampoline outside at Beau’s grandparent’s house today. It’s fun to think that these three girls will grow up together like the three of us did – I hope they are as close and stay good friends! We tried, but had little luck getting pictures of all three looking at the camera at the same time. Picture these in action - they were crazy girls!







Lydia (Connie's)

Breanna (Karen's)

I know, I know. I suck at keeping this blog updated. But you try being the mom of two babies (really, who are we kidding - Tatum is 18 months old!) and now working basically full time from home! It's not you, baby, it's me. :)

Nothing much is new on our end. Beau and I are looking into finding a house and hopefully getting into one by Thanksgiving (that’s our personal goal, at least). We haven’t found what we’re looking for just yet, but I have a feeling it’ll be soon. I’m excited – we’ve totally outgrown this cute little house. I’m not a cluttery person, but you can’t help it in these close quarters. I’ll be happy to find a house that is bigger than 750 square feet (no joke!). We’ll be sure to keep all updated on the progress of our new family project.

Besides the house hunt, we’re all busy with work (Beau and myself) and playing lots (Tatum). The weather is starting to cool down again and we’re excited for fall. I’m thinking of taking the girls to Thanksgiving Point to visit the petting zoo before it gets too cold and we need to plan our annual visits to the pumpkin patch and Gardner Village to see the witches.

Last week Shanna and I decided to take Braeden, Tatum, Hayden and Baby Kehl to “Mickey Donalds” for some much needed play time. The kids were overflowing with energy and the weather had been so wishy-washy that the play place was the safest bet weather-wise. Plus, we could sit and talk without having to watch an entire park. Because the weather had been so cold for so long, McDonalds still had their heat running even though this particular day was about 80 degrees outside. As most of you moms know – the play place can get extra hot being all windows and whatnot. We were all miserable and one mom complained to the manager. He told her that he couldn’t touch the thermostat, but that he would try and see what he could do to alleviate the situation. A few minutes passed and then we see him come out and prop the emergency exit door open with a “caution: wet floors” cone tipped on it’s side. Luckily, I happened to be standing closest to the door while watching Tatum play on the toddler slide and could make sure no one went out the door. I figured, being a sane person, that he was coming right back – this surely couldn’t be his solution to the heat problem! After a few minutes and him not coming back, I took it upon myself to remove the cone and shut the door. All of the moms around us were thankful – we were all so freaked out that he’d just leave an open door at the play place area. Forget being hot, I’d rather bake than have any kid (especially my own, no offense) get hit by a car on 106th South and Redwood Road (two very busy streets). The mom that had complained wasn’t too happy with my decision asking if the manager had told me to remove that cone. I proceeded to inform her that he did not and that I didn’t care how hot she was, I wasn’t about to leave an open door for one or more of the 20 kids playing to discover. She wasn’t so keen on my thinking, but she’d have to get over it. Honestly, people surprise me! I hate the play place for two huge reasons – kids that are brats to other kids (especially bigger kids that shouldn’t be playing anyways) and parents that don’t give a damn. Sorry that you just drop your kid at McDonalds for fee day care, but I don’t see it as that. Especially now that I know doors are propped open – yikes!

That same trip to McDonalds was a milestone for Tatum. She had watched as Braeden went into the boys bathroom and come back to play. A few minutes later I hear “Mom, Mom” and feel a tug on my shirt. She’s dragging me towards the bathrooms! I left Hayden with Shanna and followed her into a stall where she pulled her pants down and indicated that she wanted her diaper off, too. She sat on the toilet for a few minutes and then said, “done”. She didn’t actually go in the toilet, but it was great that she tried on her own. 18 months is early, but I’m willing to follow her lead! Now, at home, she’s taken to removing her diaper when it’s wet (and poopy for Beau the other day – haha) which tells me she knows when she needs to be changed. I’m considering starting the potty training bit, but not sure where to start. Moms of the blog – help! Where does one start?

On Saturday, for Beau’s birthday, we had a family BBQ at my in-law’s house. Beau’s dad had forgotten a part of his gift and asked if Shanna and I would run to Wal-Mart and pick it up for him. Seeing this as a quick break from the kids we agreed and left the kiddies with the dads. After shopping, we were in my car ready to back out of our parking space when a red truck pulls through to the spot next to us, narrowly missing the front end of my car. Shanna rolls down the window and shouts “Hey! How old are you?” because the driver could not have been – and I am not exaggerating – more than 12 years old! He hears Shan and bolts it into the store. It was crazy! So, being the narcs that we are, we called the police and reported the bugger. He could have hurt himself or someone else driving that truck – he could barely see over the steering wheel! 12 years old! I mean, come on, Karen and I were at least 15 when we “stole” my mom’s car to drive down and buy candy bars! :)

This Sunday we’ll be blessing Hayden at church. I’ve got some Cost-Co shopping to do this week to get food ready for afterwards. It should be a fun day – but the weekend will be a busy one! The Saturday before cousin Makayla is getting baptized, the 11th is Bunco (I’m in charge of dinner this month) and on the 12th are 2 month and 18 month appointments for Hayden and Tatum respectively.

Anyway, I hope all is well with you and yours! Please keep us updated on your goings on and we’ll try to be better at the same. Here are a couple of funny pictures of the girls to brighten your day. Loves!


Gassy Girl

I was so happy I caught this picture! Tatum was wanting to hold the baby so badly that I decided to prop her up on the couch with the Boppy pillow for support. I was in the kitchen for a second and heard Tatum giggling uncontrollably. I guess Hayden had a fit of gas and kept tooting on Tatum’s lap. It was so cute how funny she thought it was and equally as cute how unaware Hayden was.

Goofy Grin

Here is Hayden and her HUGE grin. We don't get to see it that much, being that she's only 7 weeks old and doesn't respond with smiles as much as she will in a couple of month's time. But there are days that she just grins - and her face looks so chubby and dimply when she does - you seriously can't help but laugh when you see it. She looks so much bigger in this picture than she really is! The kid is all cheeks (surprise, suprise) and hair and has tiny bird legs and arms.