My Nine Month Old Sawyer Grace

Sawyer is 9 months old!!!! This was a pretty big milestone for her because as of yesterday (a day before her 9 month birthday) she started crawling! She really kind of started on December 30th, but it was so sparse and off and on I am counting it official as of January 13, 2012. :) I have two vidoes from today that I will post so you can watch. She looks pretty uncoordinated, but she is definitely moving across the room for stuff!

AT NINE MONTHS… 

• Sawyer sleeps like a rock star. She continues to amaze me with her sleeping habits. This past week she was sick and has 2 teeth coming in and she woke up a little earlier each morning than usual, but still slept at least 7 hours before waking up and even then she just needed to be fed a little or comforted and then right back to sleep! 
• She is crawling!!! She loves to go after certain things (the computer, my phone, the remote, etc.) so we put those things in front of her to get her motivated ;)
• Sawyer is grabbing anything and everything! I am having to really keep my eye on her especially now that she rolls and crawls to get wherever she wants! She will dive off of the couch for something if I let her. She knows no fear.
• She "rocks" in her little Sawyer-sized rocking chair and then jumps out for me when I hold out my hands and say jump! It is so cute! I must video this soon. 
• Sawyer eats all baby food (including the meats now), puffs, yogurt melts, baby cookies, and now I am starting to feed her real table food (ie. a mushy banana)
• Sawyer likes to feed herself finger foods and is really quick to put the food in her mouth as soon as I put it on her tray!
• She still takes around 4 or 5 8oz bottles a day.
• Sawyer has SIX teeth!! Holy Moly!!! She has the top 4 middle teeth and bottom 2 middle teeth. Goodness gracious the girl can bite.
• She is really wearing age appropriate clothes now! I just retired her 3 month onesies yesterday and 6 month onesies fit her well and 6-9 months in pretty much anything else. She still wears size 1 shoes (sometimes size 2 will stay on without falling off)
• She just started on size 2 diapers this week, but only because we ran out of size 1! We soon realized that size 2 were allowing too many leaks so we went and bought one more package of size 1. I think the 2's will work when we run out of the 1's we have.
• Sawyer still loves bathtime. She is obsessed with her bath squirt toys. Sometimes I think she makes a mess just so she can have a bath! :)
• Sawyer is starting to babble new sounds and words, but "bye-bye" is still her favorite!
• Sawyer got a jumperoo for Christmas and loves it to death! She jumps non-stop and squeals while she is in it. She's hilarious to watch!
• Sawyer is still as sweet as ever. Always giving people a smile and just generally happy. I love it!

Sawyer's Weight Progression:

8 months - 15 lbs 4 oz

9 months - 16 lbs 2 oz

Loving her in the overalls :)

And here are a couple of videos of her crawling!

Love you more and more sweet girl.

Our Blessings in 2011

Every year now Casey and I talk about and write down our blessings from that previous year. You can read 2009's HERE here and 2010's HERE & HERE. In years past we did this on our anniversary getaway, but since this year's anniversary was much shorter in length (just one night away instead of 3) we did it at dinner at our kitchen table on December 31st. We came up with so many blessings, easily!

Sawyer Grace Coats was born! :)

Nice people of Baylor hospital and their help in the NICU

Generous gifts given to us at 4 different baby showers for Sawyer

Laura Bond & Ginni Rickerson using their nice cameras and expertise to take free newborn pictures of Sawyer for us

Carroll Twins were born

Continued improvement of Beverly’s health

Getting to stay at home with Sawyer

Lauren had a great experience at Smith for my first 3 years of teaching and was congratulated upon staying at home and has kept up with my friendships made there (Tracey, Christie, & Jim)

Part time job at Mimosa Lane Playschool IN the baby room with Sawyer!

Being able to sub on Fridays (ie. Casey’s day off)

Sawyer’s helmet improving her head shape

Financial blessings

We sold my Mustang for almost as much as our new Escape

No car trouble this year!

Good health for both Casey & Lauren (minus Casey’s Poison Ivey experience:)

Good fellowship & learning with our community group

Answered prayer of Lauren & Ben’s remarriage in Colorado (November)

c|Life’s d|now had over 300 kids with many salvations!

c|Life’s youth camp had 256 kids with many salvations!

c|Life's high school mission trip with children in Robstown accepting Christ!

Casey has enjoyed playing basketball frequently with friends

Casey has enjoyed his new men’s group/book club with some men from church called “5 Guys No Lies”

Money was raised for the youth group through the Annual Micah Johnson Memorial Golf Tournament that Casey hosts each year

Lauren is still enjoying friendships made through pokeno each month

Christie Harty Photography doing Father’s Day pictures of Sawyer and of our family for no charge!

My mom bought us a king size bed in exchange for our queen! Great nights of sleep in 2011!

Taking sewing lessons from Natalie Swartz and my dad buying me a sewing/embroidery machine for Christmas

Answered prayer of Ben & Abby Lowery getting to bring Abe home from Ethiopia

Wow! Every time I read through that list I just feel so blessed! It is exciting to see answered prayer and other blessings that God gives us. Every year we are able to come up with 25+ reasons to be thankful and there are always things I leave off of the blog because it may be private to someone. God is good to us--What a great reminder for the new year.

Christmas 2011 Recap

Our first Christmas with Sawyer was great. We had a lot of fun with her and she had a great couple of days! No whining and just overall a happy baby! :)

Here is our Christmas in pictures (and a few words)… 

I wrapped our presents a little differently this year--turned out to save a lot of money because that paper is cheap and it comes on a big roll! I also displayed our Christmas cards differently this year and I loved it. Brightened up our kitchen cabinets quite a bit!

Sawyer made a couple of ornaments at playschool this year and we were also given some great ones as well! I think all in all she got 6 new ornaments! haha!

Sawyer got to see pretty much all of her family members this Christmas season! From Great, great, grandparents to Aunts and Uncles and Cousins galore! I wish I had gotten group shots of everyone. Next year that will be my goal ;)

We went to the Christmas Eve service at c|Life and had a good time eating dinner with Casey's parents afterwards. Then we came home and took some pictures before bedtime:) Meanwhile, Casey had on the Santa tracker - haha!

Christmas morning was a lot of fun! We first got up and read the Christmas story together as a family. Then, we looked in our stockings and opened presents! 

Later we went to Mimi & Poppy's house (Casey's parents) and met up with Chris & Stephanie and their clan. We all opened presents there before going over to Great-Grandmother's house for lunch where we gathered with even more family--Casey's Aunt, Uncle, and cousins!

Around 2 we left and went to my Papa Tapp's house--Sawyer's Great, Great-Grandpa!! He is 92 and still going strong! After talking with family there, my immediate family (my mom, grandparents, and uncle, Casey, Sawyer, & myself) left and went to my Momma Sheila's (my grandma) new house! We opened presents there and stayed til about 8pm. After all that we got home, unloaded the car, and went to bed! We usually go see a movie on Christmas night, but not this year--we were too exhausted!

Sawyer's first Christmas was a success and I just know they are going to get better and better as she gets older. She is so much fun! I can't wait to teach her all about the reason for Christmas and the birth of Jesus. Next year I want to get her one of the Fisher Price nativity sets so we can talk about it as she plays with it.

One last picture of me and my favorite man--He'll even put on a silly Santa hat to make me happy:)

3rd Annual Christmas with the Rickersons!

For the last several years now we have a little Coats/Rickerson tradition of dinner and looking at Christmas lights! This year we went over to Charlie & Ginni's to see their new house and Ginni made us some delicious chicken tacos! We also had wassel (hot apple cider) for the car ride! Yummy!

Charlie & Ginni gave us an awesome Christmas gift! Personalized corn hole!!! We love it, as you can plainly see. ;)

 We took some pictures in front of their nicely decorated fireplace!

Charlie & Ginni looking good:)

 Every year Ginni and I do this little pose and we gotta keep the tradition going! :)

Casey & I :)

Ginni was trying to capture the perfect picture of Casey and I, but he had other plans… 

 Finally a couple of good ones:)  

 

As usual we had a lot of fun! 

Thanks again for the awesome corn hole guys!!! We love y'all!

The Good News

"Fear not, for behold, I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord." 

Luke 2:10b-11

Check out this great video by The Village Church that c|Life showed tonight. I loved it. 

The Village Blog - Advent: God With Us

We wish you a wonderful Christmas and hope that you are remembering God's precious gift to us on this special day.

Casey, Lauren, & Sawyer

Sawyer Meets Santa

Sawyer met Santa Claus!

She decided she liked him pretty well. She even pulled his beard. I hope that doesn't put her on the naughty list! ;) 

We got a picture of Aubrey and Sawyer together with Santa, too! They are super cute! :) 

I am so excited about Sawyer's 1st Christmas!

Every year will just get better and better, I am sure.

Merry Christmas Everyone!!!

Video Diaries: Sawyer Grace 3 months-8 months

I haven't been very good at staying up to date with posting videos of Sawyer. I have posted a few here and there and then posted several of her first 3 months here. If you ever want to take a look at my videos you can do so at youtube--my username is AggieMrs. Most of the ones on youtube are just from my phone though as we haven't yet figured out a fast way to upload short clips from the video camera. I need to do that soon though because I am so afraid they are going to get erased somehow!! 

Anyway, the videos start with Sawyer at 3 months old and continue to the present (8 months old). I cannot believe the difference! So much growth in 5 months! What a crazy little miracle babies are. Actually blows my mind. 

I don't expect you all to watch all of these videos - I like to have them on my blog for me, but you are sure welcome to them as well! :) The last 3 are the best for sure (since she is big enough to actually do something at 8 months old)! If you only watch 1, watch the second to last one of her in the bathtub! She LOVES splashing and playing with her toys! So fun! (And yes, I know you people think I am crazy for still bathing her in the baby bathtub, but I think it is so much easier than warming up the big bathtub, plus my back doesn't hurt from leaning over for so long!! I like to let her play a while and I don't want to kneel on the hard tile and lean over, hurting both my knees and my back, so for now, the pink baby bathtub it is! Don't judge me :)

Isn't she a cutie? I love her to death!