Precious’ 1st Birthday

07/31/2012

Our big family vacation was planned on the same week as Precious’ first birthday before we knew she existed, but it worked out great to have her aunts, uncles and cousins from my side (who all live in Eastern PA) to be there to celebrate with her. I had no intentions of having a BIG first birthday celebration for her, because I like the idea of keeping birthdays for little ones as small family get togethers. We kept it super simple with homemade cupcakes (decorated by Jason and me), party hats, blowers and balloons, and a special handmade banner that I sewed a few days before our trip. It says “HOORAY” so we can use it for many occasions in the future.

Precious, who loves music, looked at us very strangely as we sang Happy Birthday. The majority of us can’t carry a tune, so… Sorry, Baby.

She knew exactly what to do with that cupcake though…

She also got all sorts of neat gifts. This photo-dump is to document and give thanks where it’s due!

Thank you, Grandma and Grandpa, for the puzzle and neighborhood wagon!

Thank you, Uncle Jeff, Aunt Jess and Iris, for the Eric Carle books, wooden Costa Rica puzzle and the play breakfast set!

Thank you, Uncle Aaron, Aunt Laura and Eli, for the new clothes and pull frog toy!

The party girl.

Party cousins: Eli and Iris.

My brother Aaron and his boy Eli.

My sister Jess and her girl Iris.

My sibs and their families had to leave the day of her birthday so we had a little bit of celebration the next day, too, on Precious’ actual birthday. We gave her a set of musical toys.

Thank you, Uncle Steve, Aunt Char and Aiden for the gifts you sent. She LOVES My Pal Violet and she’s getting the hang of the sippy cups.

Jason programmed Violet to say and spell her name and mention her favorite food, color and animal. (We took our best guesses: peaches, green and alligator!)

When Precious joined our family at 2 months old her toenails were painted green. After I took that off, I decided then that I’d wait until her first birthday to paint her toenails again. Light pink!

And one last photo…Jason and Precious waiting for her birthday dinner on our last night of vacation.

Happy Birthday, Ali-gator! I hope you enjoyed your celebration. We love you so much!

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Phone Photo Friday

07/27/2012

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Happy 1st Birthday, Beautiful Girl!

07/20/2012

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Our joyful, sweet, precious daughter turns 1 year old today. I am so excited to celebrate her today! The joy she brings into my life everyday is way beyond what I had ever imagined. She makes being a mom such a delight.

Dear daughter, you are one year old today. We missed out on the first 9 weeks of your life so I’m sorry that I can’t tell you stories about the day you were born. I know that you weighed 7 lbs. 7 oz. because I saw it on a slip of paper once and it caught my eye because I was also born at 7 lbs. 7 oz. I know you were born on July 20, 2011 by C-section and I know your first mom loved you very much. Though I can’t tell you much about your first two months, so much has happened between 2 months old and 12 months old. Someday we’ll tell you all about it, and the beautiful, bumpy road that led us into becoming a family of three. Our lives will never be the same because of you, and we would never want to go back to the way it was before. People often talk about parenting being about giving, and while it’s true that we give everything we’ve got towards being your parents, you have given us back so much. You bring sunshine and laughter and smiles into our home everyday. You are constantly learning new things and encouraging us to get down on the floor and experience the world from your perspective. I have no doubt that God has tremendous plans for your life, sweet daughter, and I’m looking forward to journeying along side you for as long as you need me. Guess how much I love you. “I love you right up to the moon—and back.” Love, Mama

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Precious’ First Guitar Lesson

07/10/2012

Jason is very protective of his guitars. Normally he wouldn’t allow a child to touch them but he made an except for a particular chubby handed baby girl when we did the photography for his Acoustic Lullabies album cover.

Now, she’s eager to get her hands on it again. This time she’s studying how Jason plays. Precious loves music. If she hears Jason playing she’ll crawl across the room as fast as she can, climb up his legs (sometimes pulling leg hair—ouch!) and try to get to the guitar.

Her daddy sweetly lets her touch and pluck the strings, trying to figure out how they make the lovely sounds they make while he plays.

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Freight Train

07/04/2012

Happy Independence Day! I LOVELOVELOVE fireworks so this is one of my favorite holidays. I’m optimistic that we can keep Precious up late enough and that she’ll be entertained and not terrified by all the colorful explosions.

Here’s a little musical morsel to celebrate the 4th of July. My handsome husband Jason Ahlbrandt playing “Freight Train” (Tommy Emmanuel’s arrangement):

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Father’s Day

06/18/2012

A very brief recap of yesterday. I posted this on Instagram from church:

Father & Daughter. These two have such a special bond. Someday she’ll understand how hard he fought for her and how close she came to not having a daddy. Happy Father’s Day, Jason. We love you to the moon and back!

And then Precious look a nap on her daddy’s lap during the sermon and we got to sit through the whole service for the first time in as long as I can remember. It was awesome!

On our way home we stopped at Wendy’s to get frosties because I saw this post Friday at Adding Members. We love the work that the Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption does. On Father’s Day weekend they donate $0.50 from each frosty sale to the foundation and Wendy’s Wonderful Kids. Frosties and french fries…no need to twist my arm!

We got our Wendy’s frosties! Support kids in foster care today in honor of Dave Thomas and his adoption advocacy!

After that, we went down to our property to dream about landscaping while Precious was napping. (Progress reports coming soon!) We ended up standing out in the tall weeds for a couple hours talking to our new neighbor…getting devoured by chiggers. UGH! I hate chiggers. We capped the evening off with a poolside dinner with family and friends and swimming. It was a lovely day.

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Posted by mahlbrandt

New Home Update

06/14/2012

On Monday, we closed on construction loan. YAAAAAAAYYYY! I’ve never been more excited for a loan closing, probably because we’ve been waiting months and months for this. Kudos to local Wilson Bank for working things out for us and being super awesome so far. Now we can break ground. Woohoo!

Jason and I stopped by the property the other day. It’s hard to not walk around and dream about our new home. I can’t wait to start seeing progress! (SIDENOTE: Today is our NINTH wedding anniversary! Happy Anniversary, Jason. I love you!)

While we were piddling around at Home Depot the other day, we spotted programmable light switches. This one made by GE is only $19.97; a better deal than I found last week. We got one for the front lights at my parents house so we’ll get to test it out and see if we’d like to have one or two at our new home.

While we were there, we also looked at some paint swatches. These are all just ideas. Most are Martha Stewart Living and a few are Behr. Sherwin Williams colors are my favorite so we’ll probably get colors from there (plus there is a store right down the street from us) but anyway… top left: kids room; top center: Jason’s studio (which is going to look like a cave…); top and bottom right: my office/laundry room; bottom left: baby’s room. Precious wouldn’t stop eating the paint chip for Behr Raspberry Lemonade (fourth from the left on the bottom) so I’m pretty sure that’s her vote.

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Hello there, Stander

05/31/2012

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The post I was going to write for today is not ready because we had a monster virus attack at our house. Miraculously, Precious is the only one who escaped it. (It = norovirus, we think.) I’ll spare you the details but it was violent! When Jason got hit Saturday night, we were all convinced it was food poisoning. After dinner Monday night I started feeling “carsick” and then “bloated” from the Mexican food I had…anything but that awful sickness Jason had for 24 hours. But then I could no longer deny it. The next morning my mom got it and the following night, my dad. I pray that we didn’t spread it to anyone else. So…I’m a bit behind on everything this week. Thankfully, I had a few posts prepared in advance.

Precious is just as cheerful as any teething baby this week, making us all smile with her babbling and silly faces and her peek-a-boo games. She’s getting really good at standing and getting around the room in a combo of rolling, dragging and backwards crawling. Her fourth tooth is all the way through, the 5th is visible and the 6th is coming soon. No wonder she’s more interested in chewing on the spoon than eating purées this week.

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Peas

05/15/2012

“We’re like peas and carrots, you and me,” Jason said. A sixteen year old romantic.

“I don’t like peas,” I typed back on AOL chat.

“You don’t like peas?! Peanut butter and jelly, then.”

“Ok then.”

It was 1999 and we were young and freshly in love.

13 years later, we have an almost 10-month-old daughter that loves peas as much as her daddy.

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Posted by mahlbrandt

Our Love Story – 1:6

05/14/2012

I thought it would be fun to record Jason’s and my love story—at least the beginning of it—starting with when we met and fell in love back in 1999. This is part 6 of 6.

Jason and I started talking everyday after school on the phone and on AIM chat (the text messaging of our day…) late at night. We shared everything with each other about our struggles at school, drama with friends, tension with our parents, dreams for college and beyond. It was clear that God had answered my prayer.  I got my best friend.

From the beginning, Jason shared with me that he wanted to take it slow and not rush into anything. It hurt. I assumed that meant he liked me, but he didn’t like me like me. But he kept calling. And we kept getting closer.

Jason had a job at a McDonalds inside of a Wal-Mart (talk about double-yuck!) and as my mom and I were on one of our frequent mother-daughter shopping dates, I suggested we stop by and say hi to him. She kindly obliged. We probably ordered fries or a milkshake. That I don’t remember, but I do remember seeing Jason in his purple hat and polo shirt and thinking he looked so cute!

The Saturday after our first double date, Jason and I went out again, just the two of us this time. We went down to the peninsula to watch the sunset over Lake Erie—my favorite place in Erie, PA. I remember sitting on a lifeguard chair together and talking about the awesomeness of the sunset and how the sky changes colors. We pondered the marvels of God and the complexity and beauty of Creation. This guy was a deep thinker and I loved that we could share this awe of our Creator together.

Back at my parent’s house we watched TV with my dad. When he left the room, I let Jason pick what he wanted to watch. He landed on Emeril on the Food Network and I learned that he loved cooking and was considering becoming a chef. Seriously? This guy is an amazing musician, writes poetry, can spend an hour marveling at the sunset AND he loves to cook? I was in heaven. Emeril’s show was just starting to get popular back in 1999 and he would say he needed to “kick it up a notch” every time he was adding more spice, and “bam” as he tossed it into the dish.

As we sat there on the love seat together, across from Emeril Lagasse on the TV, Jason asked if I thought we should “kick it up a notch. You know, make it official.” He was asking me to be his girlfriend! I don’t think Jason was certain of it quite yet, but God had answered his prayer, too. He didn’t want to date another girl unless she was his future wife.

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Posted by mahlbrandt

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