Livin' the Life

For that past two months it feels like Liliana and I have been on vacation. Despite trying to find a sweet baby to watch, I am not caring for any other little ones at the moment and I have been really enjoying focusing all of my attention on Liliana. Having one baby and no job is SO much FUN! ;) For the first six months of her life it was just her and I also, and that was a lot of fun in its own way, but now that she is older our days are filled with exciting adventures and I often wonder who is having more fun--Liliana or Mommy?

Adam always laughs when I tell him what our day entailed and says that Liliana is "livin' the life." He is careful not to poke too much fun though because I think he is also enjoying the fact that I am not working right now. He loves coming home to a clean house filled with a relaxed wife, happy baby and the smell of dinner coming from the oven. While I am excited to find another little one to watch and to make some of my own money again, I am cherishing these days that have been filled with daily visits to different neighborhood parks, Disneyland at least once a month, Wild Animal Park with her friends Stella and Jack, play dates with different friends every week, The Carlsbad Flower fields, the beach whenever the sun is shining, story time at San Clemente library, swim lessons on Wednesdays, and bike rides around the neighborhood. Life is good!

The Beach: Liliana loves to run into the "ochen" and likes to play in the sand, but she doesn't love the "dity" hands that comes along with it.

Wild Animal Park: with Annie and her son Jack, and Sarah and her daughter Stella


Disneyland: pics from one of our trips with our fave D-land buddies...the Reynolds.





Carlsbad Flower Fields: Liliana is really appreciating the beauty of flowers and calls them "Wobies", like, "wowie" but with a 'b'. We think this is because I would say, "wowie, look at those beautiful flowers."



Swim Lessons: These are pics from her first day. She was so excited to wear her new suit and matching skirt that Grammy gave her for Easter. She loves the class and tries to peel my hands off of her to get to the teacher. She is especially excited because her friends Jack and Stella are in the class. She has a major crush on Jack and ALWAYS talks about him. We are going to Waterbabies swim school in San Clemente. In class she is practicing blowing bubbles, hanging on to the edge, submersions and back floating.

Havasu Trip and Anthonys Babysit

Adam and I went away for a long weekend to Havasu with Nicole and JR and a bunch of their friends. Everyone left their kids at home for some adult fun in the sun. We had a great time and Liliana had an even better time at home being spoiled by Grandma, Grandpa, Uncle, and B.

Havasu:

Home:

No idea why I can't get this photo to rotate, but here is a shot of Liliana with the curlers in her hair that came in the kit of hair styling tools that Grandma got for her:

The fancy "'kirt" that Grandma and Grandpa got for her. She even wants to wear it over her Pj's. She swishes it around and you can tell she feels very fancy in it.
With Grandpa at Fisherman's:
She LOVES her Aunty B:

The Walters visit

Peggy and Paxton came to stay with us for five days and David stayed with us for a night also. We had SO much fun!! We visited with Ashlyn and Taryn, went to Legoland with Katie and Layla (Liliana was thrilled to see Layla and Katie), went to the park, and had a lot of fun catching up. Paxton and Liliana played very nicely together. They gave each other a lot of kisses and shared very well. Liliana was a little bossy, but Paxton is such a gentle little lover and was very patient with her.

I miss Paxton and my "sister wife" already and can't wait for their next visit in a month. :)

The Kiddos:





Legoland:

Easter

We had a busy and fun Easter weekend. Krissy was visiting for a few days and she came with Liliana and I to enjoy some Easter festivities at Pines Park. They had a petting zoo, Easter bunny, and an Easter egg hunt. Liliana and I had been practicing collecting "egsh" in her "baket"in our backyard the week prior so that she would know enough to participate in the hunt. She did great for the first few moments until she found some "yeah-yeahs" (aka snacks--animal crackers to be exact). Once she got her little hands on those she was satisfied and done with the hunt. She had a lot of fun with her Grammy on the Saturday before Easter.

On the actual Easter Sunday, our little family of three went out for a lovely champagne Easter brunch at Cannon's. We had so much fun eating and drinking while overlooking the Dana Point Harbor. Liliana stuffed her little face and was a total ham with all of the waiters and other customers. By the time we left her Easter outfit was covered with food.

That afternoon we headed over to Aunty Barbara and Uncle Steve's for an Easter egg hunt and dinner. Liliana got spoiled with Easter surprises from Aunty Barb, Aunty Cat, and Aunty Cole. She had so much fun with all of her cousins, especially "Hutsy" and "G" who gave her a lot of attention and even cuddled with her while watching a movie.

Pines Park:






Brunch:


Cuddling with Big Cousins:

15 month update

Liliana is 15 months old. We saw the pediatrician a couple of weeks early for her 15 month appointment and he was very impressed with our little social butterfly. He said that she was one of the most social, interactive babies he had ever met for her age. I must say, she is always very friendly and talkative and people always comment on this, but she really laid it on thick for him. She walked right up to Dr. Bob and said "hi" and smiled at him and asked him to pick her up. Once she was sitting on his knee she touched her nose and said, "beep, beep," and then touched his and said, "honk, honk." They both started laughing, which is when Liliana noticed Dr. Bob's teeth. She pointed to them and named them and went on to point to and name his eyes, nose, and ears. For the duration of the appointment she talked and played with him and practiced counting to three (which sounds like, "why, ree, ree"), gave him high-fives (aka "hi-byes"), and pretended to read a book in her nonsense language. Such a little show off.

But, you can't be good at everything...one of the benchmarks on Dr. Bob's list that the nurse gave me when I arrived was if Liliana was starting to run. I had to explain that she just started walking this month. ;)

Despite the fact that Liliana literally eats as much food as I do, she hasn't gained any weight since September! She still weighs 21 lbs, putting her in the 45th percentile. Someone the other day actually said that she was a long, lean baby!! It made me a little sad to hear that because it means she is growing up and losing her adorable baby fat. She has never been anything close to lean...she was always the chubbiest baby around. She is definitely thinning out, but she still has a little chunk hanging on around her knees and you can see the faint rings on her arms where there used to be rubber band rolls, and her belly ("bewy") and buns are still big.

She is 32 1/2" tall, putting her in the 95th percentile for height.

And, for those of you who are wondering, her head size is 19 1/2"...still off the charts. :)

She is starting to enter the "terrible two" stage. It's not so terrible really, but she does have a few melt downs during the day either because I can't understand what she is trying to communicate or because she can't do something all by herself. She gets so frustrated that she scratches at herself and bites her fist. She has such a fiery temper for a generally happy-go-lucky little girl. One of her favorite new phrases is, "NO, NO, NO!" and she tells me that A LOT these days.

She continues to love to sing and still makes up her own songs, but is now trying to sing real songs that we sing to her. She "sings" ABC ("b,b,b") and Row, Row, Row Your Boat (for which she just sings "row, row, row, row...") The funniest part about it is how serious she can get about it by bopping her head back and forth and getting into it with her facial expressions.