Messy Dinner

We met Nathan and Rachel for dinner last weekend and had a great time!  This was their first time meeting Layla, and she loved them both.  She smiled and laughed the whole time.  Here she is hanging out with Nathan (sorry for the even worse quality than usual, I took the picture on my phone).

For some reason, I was a mess during dinner.  It started off when I accidentally flung sweet potatoes into the queso when I was trying to open Layla's food (I hate that packaging).  But that was no big deal, just a quick scoop and all was good.  Then, I made the mistake of ordering a shrimp cocktail for dinner.  It was served in a tall glass, as usual, and when the waiter brought it out he tipped the plate and I caught the glass and ended up with a handful of shrimp sauce.  OK, no big deal, still an easy clean up.

Until dinner was over.  I didn't eat much, so the cup was still fairly full when we were visiting, waiting for the waiter to clear the table.  I had Layla in my lap, facing forward.  And you can guess what happened next.  Yes, my beautiful, sweet little baby proceeded to reach out, grab the glass, and dump the ENTIRE shrimp cocktail into my lap.  It was all over me!  I was mortified.  And just so you know, cocktail sauce itches.  I'm still getting used to having to keep everything out of her reach, she's so quick and grabs things before I know it - kind of scary, actually.  At least I learned my lesson and will definitely be more careful from now on.  And somehow, Layla managed to not get a drop on herself...makes you wonder how innocent they really are...  :)

Happy Valentine's Day!

Nursery - Before and After

This is really late, but I wanted to get some pictures out here of Layla's nursery.  I want to be able to flip through this blog as Layla gets older and show her how things were when she was a baby, so I have to make sure I capture all the big stuff!

Nick and I (mostly Nick) are updating our house room by room.  We bought it knowing that it needed some work, and it's been a definite learning experience for me.  We were all set to start on the master bedroom, but then we found out that I was pregnant, so we had to switch gears and concentrate on the nursery.

Here are the before pictures.  Nick started working before I could snap a picture with the carpet in, but you get the idea:

Now, here is the same room today:

Nick put down new flooring and replaced the ceiling fan, doorknobs, outlet and light covers, baseboards, and blinds.  He also painted the whole room on his own (walls and doors), since I wasn't supposed to be around the fumes.  What a difference!  Layla loves her room and is always looking around at all of the bright colors.  I also think it will transition well into a toddler room, so she will be able to enjoy her Daddy's hard work for a long time to come!

More January birthdays!

Layla attended her first birthday parties in January (unfortunately both on the same day at the same time), and they were amazing!  We started off the day by attending Liam's 1st birthday party, and let me tell you, everything was perfect.  The theme was The Very Hungry Caterpillar, and Kate outdid herself.  The decorations, food, and goody bags were awesome.  She put so much thought into making sure that Liam had a great birthday, and we had a wonderful time celebrating with them.  Liam is such a sweetie and I can't believe it's been a year since we went to visit that little newborn in the hospital...

After Liam's party, we headed over to catch some of Olivia's celebration.  She had a Princess party, complete with a bounce house, face painting, balloon animals, and of course, princess costumes.  It was too cute. Layla received a "Polite as a Princess" bath book in her goody bag that she LOVES and we read every night while in the tub.  I remember Kyle bringing Olivia up to the office as a little baby for a visit, and now she's all grown up (and beautiful)!

We had such a great January celebrating birthdays with our friends!

Six Months

Layla turned six months old in January.  I can't believe we are halfway to a year already!

This age is such a blast, we are having such a wonderful time with our little girl.  Layla, your personality is really starting to come through!  You laugh and smile all the time, still love to be sung to, and love getting kisses! When you get excited, you bury your little head into our shoulders and laugh and bounce around.  My favorite times are just me, you, Daddy, and the dogs on the floor, no toys, just us playing and laughing.  You babble all the time - your favorites are "mamamama" and "blahblahblah".  Personally, I think you know I'm "Mama" - you only seem to say it when I'm around :)  You're sitting up on your own now, so we have a lot of fun playing with your bath toys during bathtime!  You scoot on the floor a little bit, but your main mode of transportation is rolling to get where you want.  We'll put you down, look away for a sec, and when we turn back around, you're two feet over facing the opposite direction!  Time to start the childproofing...

You eat every three hours, starting at around 4:30 AM.  You have oatmeal and fruit in the morning, veggies at night, and four 6 to 8 ounce bottles a day.  We started introducing water in a sippy cup, and can usually get a couple of ounces in you, but it's definitely not your favorite and we usually end up with a soaked bib.

Sleeping...not going the greatest.  You go to bed around 8, but will wake up anywhere from 11pm-1am, then again at around 3, then up for a bottle at 4:30, then back to sleep until around 6:30.  I hear other moms say that their babies sleep 12 hours straight.  We definitely aren't there yet, but that's OK - more time for me to snuggle my little girl!  This time is flying by and I know soon you won't want to be held and rocked, so I cherish any time we have now, even if I am half-asleep!  Here are a couple of cute sleeping pics (notice neither one is actually in your crib).



Nice and comfy in our bed



You still love your swing the best!


 At your six month appointment, you weighed 15 lbs, 15 oz, are a little under 26 inches long, and are in the 50th to 60th percentile for length, weight, and head size.  You are still in six month clothes but I think we're going to have to move up a size pretty soon.  And I have to say, I'm really liking the cold weather because I think you look SO CUTE in your winter clothes.  You are just this little bundle of fleece with a head peeking out and I love it!

You have two new tricks - fake coughing and sticking out your tongue.  I feel bad when we're out in public because one of two things usually happens.  We either walk around with you "coughing" and me ignoring it, making me look like a bad mom that doesn't care that her kid is sick, or someone comes up to us to comment on you or give you a little tickle and you stick your tongue out at them...Oh well!

And even though you are a full year too young, Daddy bought you your first 4-Wheeler - Disney Princess Edition.  You riding around on it (with Daddy's help, of course) is one of the most precious things I've seen you do so far.  You have a very solemn look on your face when you're riding around the living room - you take it very seriously.  You're surprisingly good at staying on it too!

Combo of the 4-wheeler and your new trick!

We love you so much, little girl!

More Birthdays!

I'm unfortunately still trying to play catch-up on the last few weeks with my posts - I'll get there eventually! 

We had another fun birthday dinner at the beginning of the month for Ashley and Mobs.  We went to La Vista, which is the perfect place to sit back and linger over dinner.  We shared some pretty hilarious holiday stories, including our best and worst gifts (by the way, best for me would be my New Kids on the Block/Backstreet Boys concert tickets - yes, I'm going and super excited about it.)  As always, I had a wonderful night with my great friends and really treasure the times we get together!

There's another special birthday to celebrate so far this month.  Congratulations to Patrick and Emily on the birth of their beautiful baby girl!  She's adorable, and Layla can't wait to meet her future BFF!

Holiday Fun!

Well, the holidays flew by and unfortunately I didn't stay current on my blogging, so I'm going to have to do a very condensed version of the last month...

Nick's office party was at the House of Blues this year, and was really fun!  The band was great, and it was really nice to have night out.  Aunt Jamie babysat for us, and all the baby did was sleep while she was there.

Of course, once we got home, Layla decided to let me sleep for a whole half hour before she woke up, lucky me :)  The line for pictures was too long so I don't have any from that night - next year I'll make sure to wear more comfortable shoes so that I don't mind standing!

Kate also held her Annual Girl's Gift Exchange, which was so great as always.  Kate is the perfect hostess - everything from the food and drinks to the decorations are always gorgeous.  It's so nice to relax, visit with friends, and see all of the cute gifts that everyone brings!

We celebrated Christmas in Corpus Christi and Houston this year.  We kicked off the week by taking our first longish road trip down to Corpus to stay with my parents.  Layla did great in the car!  I will admit, we left very early in the morning so that she would sleep most of the way, but even awake, she just babbled away until we got there.

We set Layla in her Bumbo and just had the gifts around her while we all got ready to start opening.  No one was really paying attention, and before we knew it, we heard a loud "Rrriiippp"  Layla just took it upon herself to go ahead and start on her gifts!  She knew exactly what to do with no coaching, it was too funny.  

Everyone told us she would be more interested in the wrapping paper than the toys this year.  At first, that was definitely the case, although she wore out her new toys that day too!

And of course, since she's at that stage when everything goes in her mouth, the wrapping was no exception.

We continued the celebration with Nick's parents starting on Christmas Eve. Yet again, Layla knew just what to do.

More yummy wrapping paper.  We couldn't get it away from her fast enough!

Layla received such fun toys.  She loved the Grinch!

Unfortunately, someone else loved it as well...They will have to learn to share!

We were so happy to be able to see everyone for Layla's first Christmas.  She is such a loved baby and we are so blessed to have such wonderful family to celebrate with.

These are just a few more cute Christmas pictures.  Kate took the first three - she is such a great photographer and was nice enough to take some pics of Lays so we would finally have some good ones!



Look at those cheeks!



She wasn't too pleased with Santa, in case you can't tell!  At least she wasn't crying...

Nick and I were both feeling pretty under the weather on New Year's Eve, so we just stayed in.  We did have some sparklers, so we lit them in the backyard to see Layla's reaction.  She didn't really know what to think.  She seemed surprised/scared at first, and then just lost interest and started watching the dogs run around the backyard. 

We can't wait to see what next year brings!