#richlyblesseddaily2014 {Week 25}

Here is week 25 of #richlyblesseddaily2014! 

You can follow along every day on Instagram @richlyblessedblog. :)

Click here to see previous weeks.

 Day 172: New entertainment: The Itsy Bitsy Spider.

 Day 173: Church with our sweet girl today. Love my little family.

 Day 174: Snuggling with a lovey and a paci in the eye.

Day 175: We love it when Daddy gets home! I love watching him with her!

 Day 176: Our little snuggle bunny. I really can't hardly stand the cuteness!

 Day 177: Watching the world cup with Mommy!

Day 178: We spent some sweet time with Vanna and Aunt Aliesha today! Vanna loves Emery so much and Emery loves her back!

  

Five on Friday {June 27, 2014}

Happy Friday! You know that saying, "The days are long but the years are short"? I am totally finding that to not be true. Our days absolutely fly by and I can't believe Friday is here again! I realize that I'm sort of in the honeymoon stage of having a baby that isn't mobile, and I may have some completely different things to say about the days not being long when Emery is walking and I'm chasing her around all day! But for now, time is flying by and I wish it would slow down just a little!

Anyway, here's my Five on Friday this week! :)

One.
I just finished reading the best book I've read in a long time. Like seriously. I had heard about Sparkly Green Earrings on a few blogs, but I didn't end up reading it until it showed up on our church's list of suggested books for summer reading. It's all about motherhood and I was laughing out loud on the very first page. I laughed pretty much the whole way through. There were definitely a few tearful moments, too. Not like oh this is so, so sad tears the whole time, but more like this is so touching and I totally feel the same way tears. The author also blogs at The Big Mama Blog and she tells the story in the book of how she came up with the name of her blog. Hilarious. She's also written a book about marriage called The Antelope in the Living Room: The Real Story of Two People Sharing One Life. It's definitely on my list!

{via}

Two.
We are starting to think about getting Emery a high chair. She'll be four months old in a couple of weeks, so we'll be starting some new foods. She probably won't be ready for a high chair that soon, but we're starting to check some out. We're considering this Ikea high chair because it's $19.99. Yes, you read that right. I mean, even if we hate it, we're only out $20. I don't like how it looks *at all*, but it's price makes it a lot cuter. Anybody out there have this high chair and love it? Or hate it? Let me know! I do know we don't want something with a lot of nooks and crannies because that would just be nightmare to clean.

{via}

Three.
There is this fabulous popsicle place in our town called Steel City Pops and they just opened a new one just a few minutes away from our house. We went last weekend and we decided right there that we were going to go every weekend this summer. It's such a summery thing to do and it's a fun, cheap night out.

Four.
Emery and I have settled into a pretty good daily routine. One of my favorite parts of our day is when I lay her down for a nap. We'll sit in the glider, I'll read her a story from her Storybook Bible, and then we'll listen to the Praise Baby station on Pandora while she goes to sleep. I usually sit there and pray for her, or cry, because she's just so cute and sweet and my heart can barely take it. It's all very sweet until the Walgreens commercial comes on.

Five.
Daniel took this picture of us on Sunday morning before church and I think it's my favorite picture of us so far. Probably because all of the pictures from the first two months of her life I was so tired that I looked like I'd been drugged.

I hope y'all have a great weekend!!

  

Anniversary, Father's Day, and Baby Dedication

The week before last, we had one of the craziest weeks since Emery was born. It was our fourth wedding anniversary, Father's Day {Daniel's first one!}, and we dedicated Emery in the church service on Sunday. It was so super busy, but it was such a fun weekend!

Our anniversary was on a Thursday, so Daniel and I met for lunch at Olexa's in Mountain Brook {just like last year!}. If you're in Birmingham and you haven't had Olexa's, you must go. The chicken salad is amazing!! And the cake. Oh, the cake.

We exercised some ridiculously good self-control and didn't get cake at Olexa's because we had plans to recreate our wedding cake on Friday night. The lady who made our wedding cake made us a cake for our first anniversary, but she doesn't make cakes anymore! :( I decided on our second anniversary that I'd try to recreate it and I found a recipe that is actually pretty close. We've made it every year since...and I look forward to it allllll year!

White Almond Sour Cream Cake | Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

We started our Father's Day Celebration on Saturday morning. I printed out this "Choose Your Own Father's Day Adventure" book from the Dating Divas and it was really fun. By the way, if you haven't checked out the Dating Divas, you definitely should! So many fun ideas!

To start the adventure, Daniel had to choose what he wanted to do for breakfast. One of the choices was to eat at Big Bad Breakfast which is a new restaurant in our area. I was pretty sure this was what he would pick and I was right.

Daniel could *not* get the name right, though. He called it everything from Bad Boy Breakfast to Big Boy Breakfast. It was hilarious! We had to wait for about 30 minutes, but it was a pretty morning and Emery just snoozed away.

It was worth the wait, though! We're already planning to go back sometime in July. There's something so fun about going out for breakfast.

We continued our anniversary celebration on Saturday afternoon with a watermelon carving contest. 

Yes, you read that right. We've always done the traditional anniversary gifts and this year was fruit. What a weird gift! So...we decided to get creative and carve each other a watermelon.

It ended up being really fun! I carved a turtle and Daniel carved {he would correct me and say that he "sculpted"} a heart.

We asked our Facebook friends to vote on their favorite and I won by a landslide. Sorry, honey. ;) He did kind of deserve it, though, because he was telling me all week that he was going to win without a doubt. :)

Saturday night, we went out to Ruth's Chris for our official anniversary date. Honestly, we've had these plans since last fall. I couldn't eat steak since I was pregnant and I craved it so much! It was worth the wait!

And then came Sunday, probably our busiest day yet. We were part of the Baby Dedication service at church and then we were hosting my family for Father's Day lunch. Our church did a brunch that morning for all the families who were dedicating babies and we got to invite our families.

I was worried all week that Emery would scream during the dedication, but she fell asleep a few minutes before the service started.

I love this face. And look at those sweet little hands.

Aaaannd, she woke up just in time for the service to start. She did okay for the first couple of minutes, and then around the time our pastor started praying, she decided she had had enough. Yep. Her beloved Wubbanub pacifier didn't even help. :-/

This was about how the rest of the morning at church went...

After church, we had my family come over for Father's Day lunch. 

Emery was much happier once we were home. She loves her sweet cousin Vanna!

We snapped a few family pictures before Emery took her afternoon nap. I'm so thankful for my sweet dad and everything he's done for me, and now I'm so thankful for the wonderful grandpa he is to Emery!

My mom and the girls. Emery was about done here!

Emery went down for her afternoon nap and we all had the perfect summer lunch. Potato salad, fresh green beans, rolls, and Daniel grilled baby back ribs and corn on the cob. My sister and I made two of our dad's favorite desserts, yellow cake with chocolate frosting and oatmeal scotchies.

Emery took a good nap and was much happier once she got up. I love this picture!

I'm so thankful for my family.

And I'm so thankful for this new father that we got to celebrate this Father's Day. I love watching him be a daddy!

  

#richlyblesseddaily2014 {Week 24}

Here is week 24 of #richlyblesseddaily2014! 

You can follow along every day on Instagram @richlyblessedblog. :)

Click here to see previous weeks.

 Day 165: Breakfast at Big Bad Breakfast today for an early Father's Day celebration. Or as Daniel kept calling it...Bad Boy Breakfast. ;)

 Day 166: Happy first Father's Day to the sweetest daddy this baby could ever want. He loves her so much! She is one blessed baby!!

 Day 167: Shots are the worst...and they make our little sweetheart go to sleep almost instantly. Bless her little heart. The only good thing? Lots of extra snuggles today.

 Day 168: I'm pretty sure she found her hands!

 Day 169: We'll have watermelon for days (weeks?) after our anniversary watermelon carving contest.

 Day 170: Happy girl!

Day 171: Emery spent part of the day with Aunt Aliesha and Vanna. She had so much fun that she fell asleep as soon as we started driving, didn't wake up when I unbuckled her from her car seat, and then slept for 2 more hours!!