These 4 Walls

At 4 pm Sunday afternoon, I looked at Brent and told him that if I ever spend another weekend locked up in this house, someone was probably going to lose their life. And that someone would probably be him.

Over the course of my 48 hour weekend, I spent 2 hours out of the house.


It was brutal.


But that's what happens when your baby has a runny nose and a smoker's cough. I blame Brent. He brought the funk in the house the week before last, gave it to me, then we gave it to Cecilia.


It wasn't pleasant at our house. Everything that wasn't done Cecilia's way caused drama. EVERYTHING. I think we all know how well that went over with me.


Cold + teething= one cranky baby and a mama on the edge.


It wasn't all drama, snot, and tears. There were moments we would roll around on the floor and laugh and make noises to get the other one to smile.


There was a few fixer-upper projects we had to do and Cecilia was glad to help.





Never seen the girl move as fast as she did once she saw a hammer in her daddy's hand.


I attempted to clean and straighten the house but about the time I got everything shoved in a closet (out of sight, out of mind) I heard the sound of a 1000 piece puzzle hit my kitchen table.

Don't try to call us, we will be busy for the next 2 weeks.

And while we sorted through 1000 pieces that seemed to all look alike, Cecilia sat down for a movie and snack.

About 10 pieces in, I bailed on the puzzle and joined her. Toy Story 3 was WAY more interesting than the 1000 tiny pieces laying on my kitchen table.

The snotty nose is still with us but the smoker's cough is gone.

One day the sun will decide to come out and stay for good and all the snotty nose everywhere will disappear.

Another Year Older

Here's to you, Uncle Mayo...

Happy birthday!

We hope your birthday is as fabulous as you are!

Down the Hatch!

We aren't sure when this happened...

One day she grabbed the bottle as if she had been feeding herself for months.

The one-hander has even been mastered...

She acts like nothing is new.


Seriously Dad, nothing to see here.

There's no telling what other tricks she has up her sleeve.

10 Months

My, my what a completely different baby you are! I shouldn't use the word "baby" because I feel like I have a toddler.

I'm guessing here but based on your last doctors visit at the beginning of last week, you are weighing about 22.5-23 lbs and are about 27 1/4" long (9 month stat so you could be a tad longer). You wear 12 months clothes, size 3 diaper and a size 2 shoe.

Your personality has really come out this month. Words I would use to describe you: dramatic, hard headed (sorry it comes from both sides and you had no choice!), sweet, funny, and loving.

Your daddy and I laugh everyday over something you've done or a new facial expression. Here lately you will shrug your shoulders, wrinkle your nose and flash a big smile. We have no idea where you got this but it is the funniest thing! I keep trying to get it on camera but most of the pictures look like you are trying to handle your business.

You LOVE food and are a healthy eater. You have a big bowl of oatmeal in the mornings, a fruit or veggie for lunch, puff as a snack and a veggie/meat and a fruit for dinner. You are still taking 4-8 oz bottles but we are switching to whole milk this month! My pocketbook thanks you!

We have started letting you feed yourself. I asked the daycare to help us out and apparently you picked it up in a day!

I'm assuming it didn't take you long to figure out that if you do it yourself the food will go in a lot faster!

You are now a crawler. You don't find it necessary to crawl from room to room but you will crawl to get into something you aren't supposed to or to grab a toy your eyeballing.

You love to stand and are really good at it. You will hold on to my legs or the ottoman for support and just hang out awhile.

You have gotten brave and let go a few times and can stand for about 2 seconds then fall. But no worries you just pull right back up.

We've gotten you to take a few steps while holding on to us and you are getting stronger with it. We are hoping we have a walking flower girl come April.

You are still a really good sleeper at night. You usually take about 1 good nap a day so by 7:30 you are pooped and ready for bed. You then sleep until about 5:30. We try and leave you up a little longer on the weekends so we can sleep in a bit.

I'm not really sure how you sleep so well because you are a WILD woman in the bed!

No wonder I never get much sleep when we share a bed. You flop around like fish out of water!

This month has been so much fun! You are interacting more and more and becoming a little girl. Its true I want to slow things down but on the other hand I love celebrating your milestones and watching you grow!

Daddy and I love you very much, even if you are the most dramatic thing I have ever seen!

Contentment

I never thought this day would come. I have prayed hard and my heart has begged for this day.


It's a day where I can finally say, "I'm ok with Cecilia going to daycare."


After a rocky start and a VERY rough fall, I am finally at a place of contentment with daycare. Cecilia spends her day with 3 wonderful women who seem to love her as their own. There aren't too many days that I walk in that I don't find one of them holding her. One has even taken her on her lunch break because "Cecilia just didn't want to be away from me."

They openly admit to spoiling her and you can tell by her actions! She is used to nonstop attention and we usually have to detox on the weekends!

They are always happy to see her and sad when she isn't there. I know she isn't the only one they show this kind of attention to. It's another reason why I have found contentment. I know there are no favorites and that all the kids are loved on equally.

I am very thankful for those women. More than they will ever know or I can express. Not everyone can do what they do and they are the reason it's a little easier sending my baby to daycare.

I won't say there still aren't days that I can't even make it out of the parking lot before I breakdown. But those days are far and few between. And I'm not saying given the chance I wouldn't stay home with her everyday. But finding this place where I'm at with the situation has lifted a huge weight off my shoulder.

Maybe this will make me stronger when she goes off to college or moves farther than an arms length away. I doubt it but it is a good thought.

A Good Balance

This weekend was a good balance of busyness mixed with lots of family time.

Our weekend started off with a last minute sleepover at my parent's. I had a baby shower early Saturday morning, so I decided to load Cecilia and I up and stay at my parent's. It worked out beautifully! Cecilia ended up sleeping till 7:30 am and I was one happy mama because I was able to sleep that late too!

Saturday morning, I helped host a baby shower for Natalie. She is expecting Jackson in a few weeks so we showered her with lots of gifts!

Jaclyn did an amazing job decorating and pulling it all together.

As you can see the sun was super bright but Jac has better pictures that really show off the decor.


After the shower, my mom and I took Cecilia to her very first kid birthday party. One of Mom's co-worker's has a son who just turned 1 and they had a Mickey themed party.

All the little ones got their very own Mickey ears and there was Mickey everywhere! They were even VERY smart and had a TV set up playing Mickey dvds for the kids to watch.

Cecilia, however, didn't need the entertainment. She had Kila!

Kila kept Cecilia entertained for most of the party and Cecilia had a good time. Our first birthday party was a success!

The rest of our weekend was full of family time. We get so few weekends with Brent here with us so we like to make the most of it. We even managed to get a few things done around the house while Cecilia took a nice LONG nap yesterday.

Today, it was back to work and I'm wishin' for another weekend.

The Baby Shuffle

I used to love snow days when I was in school.

On the morning I woke up to snow, I would pray it was enough to keep us home. When I finally heard my school's name on the closed list, I would shout and jump up and down and go back to sleep.

Those days were wonderful!

Now, snow days turn my world upside down.

It hasn't happened often; only twice so far. But as soon as we see Cecilia's school's name across the screen, I'm on the phone dialing my parents to see if we can do the baby shuffle. My next call is to my Nanny to see if she cares to have a visitor.

Que baby shuffle. I take Cecilia to my parent's house. My mom takes Cecilia to my Nanny's house on her way to work.

Thankfully, she is willing to help us out when a snow day occurs or when Cecilia can't go to school. They love playing together and Cecilia is always on her best behavior. I'm not sure which one of them laughs more during the day!

I don't know how some people manage without family/friends around to help out. It takes a village these days!