15 Months

Lyla turned 15 months a few weeks ago. It just blows me away how big she is getting. She is a pistol full of energy and is on the go all the time. She is jabbering so much now. She talks to herself and to anyone who will listen although most of it is still in her own language.

Some of the things she is saying:
Shoe (shz), milk, water (wawa), Big Guy (guy guy), bird, dog, kitty (kith), nana (which is for all fruit), yes, no, hi, bye-bye, mama, dada, hot (which can be for hot dog and I'm also trying to teach her what things are hot), cheese, please (she will sign it and/or say it)...it took me a while to teach Lyla please in sign language. It's the only sign word she knows. She definitely has her mommy's strong will. She would mimic every word we say, but would refuse to say or sign please. I think she knew we were trying to teach her manners and decided she was going to refuse. Andy and I had a 30 minute cry fest on our hands one night when we refused to give her milk until she said please. (And Andy would have you know that I finally gave in and gave her the milk without her officially saying please. She was tired and hungry and did much better later in the day with please after both her needs were met). She now says please the majority of the time when prompted.

At her doctor's appointment she weighed in at 19lbs 14oz and 31 inches. She is a little over the 50% for her height and I think in like the 10% for her weight, but Dr. Wood was just glad she is gaining. (If you remember at her one year appoint. she only gained like 13oz in 3 months). Dr. Wood was very impressed with all that Lyla is doing now.

Lyla loves to turn on and off light switches. It's a huge fascination. If she sees one you better believe she's going to want you to carry her over to play with it. She has finally learned to get down stairs. It's funny because when she was crawling she could climb up and down my parent's staircase, but as soon as she started walking it's like she forgot how to get down. She now can go forwards on her bottom, or backwards on her belly. Lyla loves being read to. She has about 5 favorite books and she can find them anywhere on her book shelf. She will bring one to me, put it in my hand and climb in my lab. I love that she will actually sit through a book...at least 90% of the time. She's also gotten better about putting things back and giving things to people when prompted.

At this point Lyla is still taking 2 naps. Her summer routine with me is to wake up between 8:00-8:30 and then go back down around 10:00 for an hour or so. Then she'll take about a 2 hour nap around 3:00. We still put her to bed around 8:30, but it's not uncommon for her to talk to herself until about 9:30.

Lyla has so much imagination. She holds conversations on my cell phone while walking around the house. (I guess she's seen mommy do this a time or to). Often I find her in her room sitting on the floor "reading" to herself, playing with her shoes (while sitting in her shoe basket), or trying to put on Daddy's crocs and where them around the house. She still loves her baby doll and her radio. Lyla still loves to dance. I think this is one of my favorite things. She will hear music and just stop whatever she is doing to groove. She loves to be outside or at least crawl up on the couch to look out the window. She absolutely loves airplanes. If she hears one we try to run outside and see if we can see it. But even if we stay inside she'll wave and say bye-bye.

She is becoming more and more independent. She can play be herself and get things she wants herself. Andy and I find our selves saying, "she is getting so big" on a regular basis. It just amazing to me how much she has grown and changed just since her 1st birthday 3 months ago.

For Sale!

Last week we put our house on the market. Wednesday to be exact. It all kind of came up suddenly. A few weekends ago my mom and I were bored while the guys (Andy and my dad) were doing some hunny-do's around the house. We decided to get online and look at houses. Andy and I had a plan of putting our house on the market next spring. We will need a bigger house before we have another baby. But we hadn't really looked to see if there was anything out there that was in our price range. So that's what mom and I did. And wouldn't you know, there were several. So we wrote down about 5 and took a drive to see them all. There are two in our neighborhood, which make Andy and I so happy because we absolutely love where we live.

Needless to say this spurred the whole house on the market thing. Next thing you know Andy and I are discussing..."why don't we just call our realtor and see what we could put our house on the market for." To keep a long story short, two weeks later, there is a for sale sign in my front yard.

Because this all came on so quickly, it meant that I had a lot of work to do. I spent a day and a half cleaning our and re-organizing closets. I spent another day decluttering (i.e taking down all of my personal pictures to "stage" the house.) Let me just say this was a lot harder than I thought it would be. I miss all my family pictures. I then spent another morning in the yard cleaning up under the deck, pulling weeds, cleaning off the front door and all the siding around the front porch. Yes, it was exhausting, but so worth it. We had a call for the first showing on Saturday. 3 days after the house when online. Crazy!

Right now we are hoping that all goes smoothly and that God's timing will be in the for front. I am really trying to put all of this in God's hands so that he can be in control and hopefully then I won't go crazy in the process.

Here's a few pictures from my hard work...
Sorry this one came out side ways.

Andy's closet. I don't think I had swept it in over 2 years.

My closet. Snoppy does not normally reside in there.

This is only half of the stuff that I ended up getting rid of.

Coast Trip 2010

Our coast trip this year started with a trip to the Zoo with my parents and sister. My sister hasn't been to the Zoo in forever and since we couldn't check in until 4:00 we decided to make a stop and visit some animals. Not to mention we were hoping it would wear Lyla out and thus she would sleep well on the drive.

We saw some monkeys (Lyla's favorite).

Climbed on lily pads.

Did some fishing.

Posed for pictures.

And walked with our Big Guy. (Is that not the sweetest picture?)


The car trip went really well....everyone slept...I drove.

We hung out in the condo Thursday night and enjoyed laughter and relaxation. Friday was our first day at the beach. Now, let me just say that for weeks I've been looking forward to playing in the water and building sand castles with Lyla. Unfortunately that did not happen. She hates the sand. I mean HATES it. It probably didn't help that in the first 5 minutes so fell out of her chair and face-planted into the sand. She was good as long as she was sitting in her chair eating something. She also did really well in the water...as long as someone was holding her or there was a lap to sit in. Even with shoes on she wouldn't stand up. Silly girl. But we still had fun. Eventually we took her to the pool where everything was clean and she was happy. Saturday the boys spent the day fishing while the girls continued beach and pool time. Still no sand playing progress but Lyla still had fun in the waves.







Sunday we packed up and headed to the Texas State Aquarium. We did this last year and had such a good time that we decided to make it a tradition. (Not to mention my zoo pass got us $10 tickets. That was $6 off each ticket...huge). Lyla had so much fun. She looked at the fish and walked around. She played on the steps in the dolphin area and played in the kids area with Aunt Autumn and Big Guy. I think her absolute favorite was splashing in the sting ray petting area. She didn't really get the concept of petting the sting rays, but she had a blast with the water. Oddly enough the sting rays kept swimming up to her.






All in all it was a great trip. I can't wait for next year. I'm hoping Lyla will be over her fear of the sand and will help me build sand castles.

Front Porch Rocking

Tonight Lyla had a hard time falling asleep. I think 4 days of zoo, beach and aquarium left her completely and utterly exhausted. She was so tired and so fussy this evening that I actually put Lyla to bed early thinking that she would just crash. Boy was I wrong!

For an hour she fussed, then cried, then screamed. This is not like my daughter. Usually she talks to herself as she unwinds before she falls asleep. She doesn't ever need me, or anyone, to rocker her or soothe her. I've always been so proud of Miss Independent. But as I listened to my sweet girl wail in her crib, I was torn. Do I rush in to comfort her, or do I keep with the Super Nanny and all others that say let them cry it out or they will always expect you to come rushing in? So what did I do? I went in. My heart just couldn't take her crying and it was getting worse instead of better.

So I picked her up and took her out on the front porch to rock. Within seconds the crying stopped. She laid there in my arms completely content. The soothing sounds of the cicadas and the rhythm of the rocking chair was the perfect combo. After some time the heaviness of sleep took over. And lets just say this front porch rocking did both of us some good.

Tonight Lyla need the comfort of her Mommy's arms to put her to sleep. But maybe more importantly Mommy needed the feel of her not so baby, baby falling asleep in the safety of her arms. For a brief 20 minutes time stood still. I didn't think about the suitcase that needs unpacking, the laundry that needs washing, the closets that need organizing or the house that needs cleaning. I simply sat, and rocked, and held on to the moment. Because all to soon that sleeping baby will be off to school and too big to need her mommy to rock her. So for tonight, front porch rocking was just right.

Today

Today was a day of firsts.

Today Lyla fell on the drive way and cut her lip. It was the first time a booboo drew blood. She cried, I mean screamed! We cleaned her up and let her eat a skinny cow fudgesicle. I figured the cold would help the swelling and the taste would get her mind of her booboo. It worked!

Today we played in the rain after nap time. Lyla had fun reaching for the rain drops and splashing in puddles.

Today we bought Lyla her forward facing car seat. While I had plans of keeping her in her rear facing infant carrier for much longer, her long ole legs had different plans. The poor girl keeps her legs all bunched up in her seat because she can't straighten them. And while we could have purchased a car seat that can face forwards and backwards, we really liked the Graco Nautilus. It converts 3 times and will grow with her up to 100lbs.

Today was a day of first.

4th of July

I love the 4th of July. The red, white and blue, the fireworks, the festivities. It doesn't get any better. (Not to mention my birthday is two days following the 4th).


This year we decided to take the boat out and watch the fireworks from Medina Lake. It was such a great idea! We had dinner at my parents house and then all loaded the truck for an evening stroll on the lake. We relaxed on the boat until the sun went down.



And then we enjoyed an entire 360 degree view of fireworks. But the best part, I got to hold my sleeping baby in my arms. Lyla never falls asleep in my arms any more. But with only 1 nap and the rocking of the boat, she passed out not long after the fireworks started (just like last year).

Lyla last year...


And this year...


What a difference a year makes!