Our little cupcake

I just can't get enough of this little girl. It seems that everything she does just keeps getting cuter and cuter. She has wiggled her cute little self into a very special place in my heart.

Good times!

In the beginning of March my brother Bradley and his wife Victoria came down from Anchorage for a visit and to meet Lyla for the first time. It had been ages since we had all hung out together. Bradley and Victoria are one of our favorite couples to hang out with. I was so very excited for them to meet Lyla.


The weather was super nice while they were here so we were able to get out to Sellwood and walk around one afternoon and have lunch.


A fine family photo.

We also went to the Portland Saturday Market and the Japanese Garden here in Portland. Matt and I did learn a few more things about taking Lyla out and about. She will fall asleep but she needs a good sleep (like the one she gets at home in her crib) in order for her to be the happy baby we all know and love. There were a few tricky moments for us when Lyla just instantly became done with the activity at hand. We did manage though and I came to realize that we just aren't ready for the zoo yet, despite my overwhelming desire to take her there.


Brad and Victoria also went out the coast for a night, though we stayed here since I had to work and we couldn't take the dogs. It was so nice to see them and I am so very happy they were able to come down and meet Lyla for the first time.

A growing girl...

Lyla rolled over last week. She hates tummy time but we keep at it. She flipped from her tummy to her back. We thought is was a fluke at first but then she did it two more times. It doesn't happen very often right now but when it does there is quite the celebration from Matt and I. We cheer wildly. She is also grabbing onto more things these days. She has a little giraffe names Sophie that she loves and Sophie ends up in her mouth most of the time by her own doing. It is so fun to just watch her little fingers try to grab things- it's so much work for her but such a cool thing to watch. She has also become a glorious producer of spit bubbles. She makes a million of them a day- it's super cute. Her mouth never stops moving. She is very alert to her surroundings, looks when we talk and loves songs. I don't know many songs so I usually make them all up- we sing everything in our house these days. It's pretty amusing.

Busy Busy!

The pace of life sure has changed around here. I can tell you first hand that going to work full time and having a baby is a lot of work. I feel blessed that Matt is able to stay home- I honestly can't imagine if we both worked how we would ever arrive at work on time each day ALL week. It has been a little bit of a tough transition for me. Lyla hasn't been waking up before I leave for work so I just have to give her little kisses while she is sleeping and be on my way. My office is covered in pictures of the little darling. Pumping at work is the most strange feeling to me ever. It doesn't seem like an activity I should be doing at work- the room that they have provided for me is the smallest room with no windows- it is an old storage closet. Yes, a closet. I am slowly dressing the place up- it is gonna be the prettiest closet this side of the Mississippi when I am done. It's my own secret little project at work that no one knows about- I am the only one that uses the room. New mamas in the future will have a pretty little place to sit.

I miss being home most of the day. I miss seeing Lyla. I wonder what she is doing most of the day. The evenings are as busy as ever. I usually get home by six and we find time to have dinner and then I hang out with Lyla as much as possible before bedtime for her. She is usually pretty tired by this time of day and little crabby so it's hard that it's the only time I have to spend with her. Once she is off to bed, time is spent making a lunch for the next day and then I crash. I do have to say that Matt is doing an amazing job. It is kind of weird for me to have to check with him on Lyla's schedule. I have always been the one to pay attention to stuff like that in our house. He has her on quite the little schedule though and I come home to a clean house, a clean baby and dinner is usually prepped when I walk in the door. Sometimes I feel guilty, like I should be the one doing all those things but he very much looks at what he is doing as a job and takes it seriously. Honestly, that means the world to me. I can't lie though, it is still a constant work in progress to wrap my brain around all the change. It's good though- I feel like we are where we are meant to be in life right now.

It's off to work I go...

I am headed back to work tomorrow after 12 glorious weeks at home. A lot has happened in this short amount of time. We bought a house, moved and had a baby. I am headed back to work from a new address. It almost feels like I am starting a new job. It is gonna tear at my heart as I drive away tomorrow but there is some part of me that is craving a routine again and I am kind of looking forward to my first meeting tomorrow morning. I sure am going to miss our morning game of "Farm Time Fun Town" tomorrow morning though. Life lately has been pretty simple and nice. Being able to watch Lyla change, learn and explore these last nine weeks has been amazing. I have spent many an afternoon glued to watching her discover she has hands. That's pretty fun to watch. I will miss those moments for sure. She is becoming her own little person. It's just cute and sweet. Man, I hope I keep it together at the office tomorrow.

Birds

I did not intend for the theme of Lyla's room to be birds, however it slowly evolved that way. It started with a box of large counting cards that had birds on them. I decided to hang them on the wall and then a we put a giant tree decal on the wall and slowly it started to take shape. I have been looking high and low for a mobile for Lyla that was colorful and simple. It drives me crazy that everything for kids these days had blinking lights and a million sounds. I couldn't really find what I was looking for so I decided to make one. She really seems to enjoy it so far...

Here is a picture of her room before she came home. We had the Amby swing but then it was recalled, turned out to be a little dangerous for the young ones. Awesome! Glad she spent a couple of nights in it.... sheeesh... scary how much you have to watch for all that stuff now- it seems everything is a hazard anymore.

First monthly meal.

As I said earlier, Matt and I are going to make a brand new meal to us on the 30th of each month. Our first meal was January 30th and we went with Mexican food as it's our favorite. We decided to make Shredded Pork Tostadas and they were the most divine things ever. The pork was delightfully easy to make, just a 1lb pork shoulder cooked on the stove in some water for 40 minutes and then shredded. The recipe also called for Cinnamon and cloves to be added to the meat once the water was drained and it was shredded. Talk about a unique flavor in Mexican food. It was good. We also made a corn and black bean salsa to but onto along with some jalapeno refried beans and a pasilla chili. This meal will definitely be added to our foods that we make, so much so that we are making it again tonight. It was also really fun to add a new recipe to our cooking- we were excited all day about it. This picture is a little fuzzy but mmmmm.... I get hungry just looking at it.