hi ho, hi ho, it's off to camp we go

This summer is the first summer since I was in 3rd grade that I did not attend or volunteer at camp. Go ahead and call me crazy, but I love me some camp. Even last year, when I was fairly rotund, I still managed to haul my baby carrying self to our church's Jr. High week of camp. I love camp. I love the bunks, I love the lack of technology, I love the time with God through nature, I love the food, I love not wearing make up, I love the zipline, I love being a team leader, I love teaching, I love seeing the same kids coming back year after year and watching them grow. I love me some camp.

This year, though, Jude and I stayed home during camp week and Shawn enjoyed a camp vacation filled with bug bites, sleepless nights, communal showering, and Jr. High kids who haven't quite figured out the wonders of deodorant yet. Jude and I have missed the mess out of Shawn (really, really, really missed him!), but we were able to visit Shawn at camp for the day - thanks to our friend Katie, who let us go with her. Even though it was Jude's first (I guess technically second) time at camp, he knew just what to do.

First things first. Staying hydrated at camp is very important. What Jude doesn't know is that bottle is actually chock full of caffeine. Lesson Number Two? Staying highly caffeinated at camp is also very, very important.

Once you're thoroughly hydrated, it's important that you socialize with other campers. A great way to do so is to play the ever popular game - carpetball.

To really get into the camp spirit, you can even sign your name on the carpetball table or the walls!

You can't forget the awesome teaching and worship times at camp. It's important to pay attention...and to not play with your shoe.

We also got to eat lunch with Daddy and the kids, where Jude was introduced to the fun table games we play at camp during mealtimes. We had a lot of fun, and it was really nice to see Shawn for a little bit. This one wasn't taken at camp, but I just couldn't resist including his cute kissable cheeks -

If you have a free minute, head over the Serwa Chic blog and help me pick a tagline for the business. I'm terribly stuck and indecisive about this - I've been waffling back and forth for days. I'd love to know your opinion : help me pick a serwa chic tagline.

i love saving

You may remember that from 29 weeks on, I was put on modified bed rest when I was pregnant with Jude (a little firecracker even in the womb). After watching a ridiculous amount of Gilmore Girls and catching up on every email I'd ever been sent, I set to work putting our family on a strict budget. We had tried to budget before, but had never been able to really flesh it out and stick to it. Dave Ramsey says that most couples have a "nerd" who loves spreadsheets and numbers and a "free spirit" who hates being told what to do. You should see my Excel files for our personal home budget and for my Serwa Chic expenditures and profits. It's a thing of organized beauty. I won't go into the details of describing the piles of random receipts on Shawn's dresser (that I think makes sense to him), but suffice it to say that I am 100% the nerd, and Shawn definitely qualifies as the free spirit. The difference between this time we tried a budget and the last few times were many: 1)I did it all. We had always tried to do it together before, and we always put it off or did it halfway because we were avoiding the inevitable heated discussion. We were trying to do what every marriage counselor says to do and split the financial record keeping, but it turns out that just doesn't work for us. I keep up with the budget, and every couple of days or so when I'm entering in the numbers and seeing where we are with line items, I email or text Shawn to let him know how much money we have in each category 2)The fears of all of the forthcoming pre-term labor bills scared the pants off of both of us - so we had a very tangible reason to save our butts off 3)I suddenly had a ton of time to track every penny we spent, to put all of our bills on automatic withdrawal, to make a spreadsheet for every month of the next year and half, and to not only put us on a budget, but to look at our account every day, track our spending, and keep us on that budget. I obviously have much less time now, but I've found that I did all the hard work in the beginning - now it's just a matter of keeping us on track and running the numbers a couple of times a week.

Our goal since beginning this budget was to get ourselves so that we can live solely off of Shawn's income. This proved to be harder than we thought, so we're still working on that, but we're getting closer. In the meantime, we're using my income to pay down student loan debt, and save. One of our main goals for savings are our many home improvement projects. You see, we bought our house before the market really crashed when young naive couples everywhere were buying well above their actual price range. By the grace of God, we had the wherewithall to buy a house much below the loan amount for which we were approved, and much below what we could afford with our two incomes. We knew I'd eventually want to stay home with whatever kiddos we'd eventually have, and while we didn't know what exactly that would mean for us financially, we knew it would require a modest monthly mortgage payment and a small, fixer-upper home.

Why am I telling you all of this? Because I'm excited. After months of doing our best to stick to a budget, we were finally able to build our savings to a place to actually fix up our fixer upper. Don't get me wrong - there's still plenty of work to be done (the bathrooms and landscaping are the next step, I think), but it's been such a great feeling to see such improvement. Even better is knowing that we're able to pay cash for these improvement - knowing that we worked hard to be disciplined and are now able to see the dividends of that.

I'm not bragging - trust me, we have a loooong way to go before we're financially savvy AND before our home is anywhere near where we'd like it to be - I'm just really, genuinely excited and want to share.

I mentioned in a previous post that we were able to replace our old, very unsafe windows this spring, and our next project was to get a patio built off of the back of our home. Here is the only picture I could find of the back of our house pre-patio. Snow is a big deal in North Carolina, so yes - it warranted a photo:


And here's our new patio! This is the view of our backyard from the door (someday that corner in the top left will be a stellar vegetable garden):
Looking left from the back door:

Looking right from the back door:

And our brand new patio in all its glory (without landscaping - which is our goal for the late fall):

We were so excited, we grilled out the first night it was finished:

In case you're bored with this post (I wouldn't blame you), here's our sweet Judeabug at bath time. We use the nasal aspirator as a toy - it's perfect for shooting water under his neck crevices (which hides all manner of pea flavored spit up, lint, milk, and who knows what other grossness), and he loves holding it. It's a tough life having to choose between the ducky and the "squeezy ball" as we call it:

Daddy's getting ready to suction the nose!

Go ahead - try to resist the baby talk. I dare ya.

Okay, so after the patio was finished, we had a little left over in savings to get me this really cool thing from World Market (that was on sale AND for which we were able to use a 10% off coupon). I have to admit that I don't actually know what it's called. Shawn's called it a buffet, a console, and a few other terms that I don't remember. I just know that I do most of my sewing on our kitchen table. Whereas before I had to pile all my junk into the corner when I was finished, I now have the perfect sewing stuff holder that not only looks lovely, but organizes everything perfectly (nerd alert! nerd alert!).

Those baskets are actually from Matt and Patrice's yard sale and are the PERFECT length to hold the fabric that was randomly piled up in our guest bedroom before:

I'm working on a project right now, so the sewing machine is on the dining room table, but trust me - it fits perfectly right here. And it looks like if we ever wanted to use it as an entertainment stand, we could (that thing at the bottom will eventually be a shelf. The shelf pins were missing in the package, so we're calling to get those sent to us):

And there are three drawers. Perfectly sized to hold: 1)Elastic, Velcro, etc. 2)Microfiber and PUL fabric, and 3)Patterns and thread.

So while the discipline of saying "no" to things is not ever always fun, it's an awesome feeling to be able to finally do some of the bigger projects we've been wanting to do! So please excuse my long winded, picture laden post - I'm just really excited. :)

jude jumps

Just in case you need some more Jude-goodness in your life (and really, don't we all?), feast your eyes on Jude's cuteness jumping in his Johnny jump up. Incidentally, this is about the only time he's been happy jumping in that thing:

Watching this video will be significantly funnier if you sing "Low Rider" to yourself as you're watching:

jude crawls

for evidence that Jude is, in fact, crawling (and that Shawn is the best dad in the world) check it out:

to jude's favorite daddy

I don't know what happened. I turned my back for two minutes, and Jude was typing a blog post on the computer. Crazy kid.

Let me tell you about my Daddy. See, I have the best Daddy in the world. He loves me a whole lot even when I'm being a cranky pants and doesn't ever get mad at me.

This Daddy of mine, we do all sorts of stuff together. He's not a Daddy who is always gone all the time, and I'm really glad for that. He's a Daddy who really likes to take care of me and spend time with me. And you know what? I really like to spend time with him, too. We do lots of stuff together. Daddy likes to read to me:

Sometimes he likes to give me rides on his shoulders, too! Daddy likes to throw me around a lot more than Mommy does, and I love it!




Every once in awhile Daddy will let me watch a game, The Muppet Show, or Yo Gabba Gabba with him! Daddy makes me smile when he gets really excited!

I especially love mornings with my Daddy. I laugh a lot when he peeks out of the covers at me, and we just like to chill together. Mommy is kind of crazy in the mornings, always zipping around and doing stuff. But my Daddy - he gets that sometimes you just gotta chill.

My favorite thing to do is to be held by my Daddy. I love to cuddle with him, and you know what? He makes me feel safe.
My Daddy also really likes to tell me about Jesus. I'm so lucky to have a Daddy who loves God so much.

But I'm getting ahead of myself. Let's start at the beginning, okay? See, before I came along, it was just Mommy and Daddy. They tell me they got a lot of sleep back in those days, but I don't know why they were sleeping when there's so much cool stuff to do in this world! MommyDaddy decided to have me, and they say that they were really excited and a little bit nervous. Mommy tells me she was kind of a basket case (no surprise there), and that Daddy really helped her a lot. That sure does sound like the Daddy I know - strong, steady, and calm. He sure does take great care of Mommy and me.

I remember the first time I saw my Daddy. I knew right then and there that I would be well cared for. I could tell just by looking at him that he loved me a whole lot and would be the best Daddy that he knew how to be.

Yeah, me and Daddy have had a bond since the beginning. Sometimes I get tired of everyone else holding me, and I just want my Daddy. I sure hope I grow up to be like him.

Daddy, you're the best. I know you work hard, and I know you have a lot of expectations on you from other people. I know you are sometimes exhausted, and I'm amazed by how you do everything you do. It means a lot to me that you stay home with me on Mondays and take me into work with you on Fridays. I love spending time with you, Daddy, and I love watching you and learning from you. I love it when you spin me around, when you sing me silly songs, when you teach me stuff, when we have Dancey Dance time, when you make my legs kick back and forth, when you read books to me, and when you give me kisses. You're just about the best Daddy a Judeabug could ever wish for. Thank you, Daddy, for taking care of me and protecting me. I love you so much.

photgraphic memories

So here are a few shots that Jenn from Photographic Memories got a couple of weeks ago. I'm sorry that they're so small - I can't seem to figure out how to resize them. Still, he's a pretty stinkin' cute kid, even in miniature version:

The onesie he's wearing is one of our favorites - it says ADO(RED)

That would be an original single of "Hey Jude" on which he's drooling

...the "this is kind of stupid" face

...the "but i suppose i can grace them with a smile or two" face

...and the "i am so over this" face

the j team

Jonah and Jude, or the "J Team" as Matt called them finally met this past Saturday! They've been each other's presence before, but a certain baby (whose name may or may not rhyme with Schmonah) was asleep. This time, we outwitted Jonah and hung out long enough for him to get in a good nap AND meet his bff (or whatever boys call a bff), Jude.

Jude has a tendency to hit things he likes, so Patrice had to hold him back from giving a Jonah a big fat smack. In baby world, that means, "Hey! You look pretty cool! Wanna stare at each other and kick our legs?"

Both boys behaved much better than either Mamma expected, and we had a total blast hanging out.

With Jude's new found crawling freedom, he's eager to see how he can get into more mischief. In the time it's taken me to write this blog, I've had to pull my pen out of his mouth, stop him from tugging on Cole's tail, stop him from grabbing at Cole's feet, and pull him out from underneath the couch. And I'm fairly certain this is only the beginning!

I've realized recently that I'm actually producing even less milk than I was a couple of weeks ago - it looks like it's maybe 10 ounces a day that Jude is getting via breastfeeding. I think we're going to have to drop our daytime feedings entirely and supplement instead. I'll still nurse for his morning and night feedings. I'm disappointed - severely disappointed - but am ready to end the drama of "is he getting enough?". He's been gaining weight so well and has been so much more happy since we started supplementing, so I think it's time. He'll be okay, right? I'm not the worst Mom in the world?

I know I mentioned a few posts ago that Jenn from Photographic Memories took some pictures, and don't worry - I didn't forget! I'll make sure to get them up in the next day or two!

picture time!

Before we get into looking at the most adorable seven month old ever to be born, I wanted to let ya'll know that I'm giving away two Medium All In One Cloth Diapers. Just leave a comment on the Serwa Chic Blog to win! Don't know what the heck an All In One diaper is? Check it out.

Okay, enough of that - now on to pictures!

Sitting up like a big boy on his changing table. He handled his six month shots like a champ and got some cute football band aids in return!

"Hello. My name is Jude. And I look exactly like my Daddy."

Oh, that smile. Life is good when I see that face.

This would be the face he makes right before he tries to eat the camera. We're still working on learning what is food and what is not food.

A quick update on how my sweet Judeabug is doing :: We now have two...count 'em...two teeth! And boy are they ever sharp! The second tooth seems to be causing slightly more pain than the first, but I'm still super proud of how well he's handled the teething process. Jude has very quickly mastered crawling and getting around - except that it's more like he's doing the worm - but it's fast! He can get from one end of the room to the other in no time flat. Speaking of which... I actually need to go get the child whose head is dangerously close to our brick fireplace. Seesh.