giveaway!!

But it’s not MY giveaway…

check out The Glamorous Life of a Housewife

I know I’ve been gone forevs, but here’s a cute new pic of Lilli!

New post coming soon I swear! (if any of you are still out there!)

 

15 Months and practically a child!

I’m seeing less and less baby each day! I can completely understand why some mothers say things like, “you’ll always be my baby”, etc. etc. when their child is like 20 years old. Lilli will for sure always be my baby. Every second I have with her is such a gift. She is so pleasant to be around, unlike her newborn months!

She’s doing amazing things every day. I just can’t believe how fast she’s learning!

-About 23lbs. don’t know how tall
-goes to bed around 8ish and I wake her up at 6:45am because we’re out of the house by 7:00am
-she takes one nap, usually 2 hours long
-she’s eating most things these days, but can have her picky moments and as soon as she gets old enough to reason with I’m going to end this picky-ness!
-Knows many baby signs: more, daddy, please, ball, baby, bath, milk, eat, drink, stories, and all done
-She says new words everyday: today she said “diaper” for the first time.
-She has said these words more than once: momma, dada, hi, all done, Ben and Sam (cousins), apple, outside, inside, dog, cat, thank you, no, shoes, home
-If you ask her where something is she’ll go get it. For example, tonight I was looking for her sippy cup and I said, “where is your milk?” and she found it for me and this was after I already spent 5 minutes looking for it!
-She loves to answer questions by shaking her head “no”
-She just recently started answering questions by shaking her head “yes”
-She loves waving goodbye and hi, to everyone including strangers at w@lmart.
-She’s definitely her mother’s daughter….we can’t walk down a shoe isle without her whining and frantically pointing in every direction for the shoes
-She is slightly obsessed with Vega and Widget (our cats) She loves hugging them, patting them, squeezing them, kissing them.
-She also loves Chili-dog, whose tail whacks the crap out of her multiple times per day. She doesn’t even act like it phases her anymore, she just flinches and takes it.
-She could spend all day every day outside in the yard.  I kinda wish we had more fun things around here that were toddler friendly for her
-Yesterday when we got to the gym I let her walk all the way in to the gym from the parking lot (holding hands of course!). I know this doesn’t sound like a big deal, but I wanted to cry because she was such a big girl. She loved it! She’s such a little independent woman!

I know I’m forgetting things, so I’ll probably have to come back and update this again when I think of them!

Loving on Widget

Trying to cuddle with Vega

Sister pose with Chili-dog

HI. I am alive.

Here’s an update on us:

Lilli is as precious as ever. Doing amazing things (in my opinion of course) everyday. Going to force myself to write a 15 month post in the next week.

I started school again last Thursday, so I’m 4 days in.

I’m not teaching 3rd grade anymore. I’m teaching Reading and Communication Arts to one group of 1st grade, three 3rd grade, and two 4th grade groups. So far I think I’m going to love it. It’s a major stress relief! I come in ready to go in the morning and when I leave I’m really done with my work. There’s no come super early and stay super late. My work is just done! AND best of all slim to none behavior problems! I never have to use my nasty mean voice.

Buno started p90x-workout regime for freaks. He’s on day 20-something and going strong. He’s also eating 5 meals small meals a day and not drinking any caffeine. This is a big change for him considering he used to mainly only eat dinner (during the work week) and have several cokes or amp energy drinks throughout the day and little to no water.

I’M WORKING OUT! It’s a flippin’ miracle. I HATE every second of it. I was doing great for about 2 weeks then I went out of town and slacked off for an entire week, so I’m back at it as of now. I’m also trying to eat healthier. I did not say “healthY”, just healthiER. I’ve also been taking Zumba classes once a week for the entire summer, it’s so fun!

I’m finding that with school starting, loving Lilli (and the fam), working out, and house chores, my evenings are pretty much gone. There’s just never enough time. I hate that I don’t get more than 3ish hours per evening with Lilli Monday thru Friday. UGH! I thinking it’s just hitting me extra hard right now because we’re just getting back in to our old routine and I really liked the summer routine better.

And now PICS!

Lilli’s 2nd 4th of July

Lilli and I were on our own for the weekend part of the 4th of July. Buno went on a camping/floating bachelor party trip without us. Lilli and I headed down to my parent’s lakehouse. We had a wonderful time, as usual! Lilli rode the jet skis for the 2nd time and she swam in the lake for the first time. Those darn life jackets ruin all the fun. She hates that thing! It was only her second time wearing it, but I think eventually she’ll get used to it. They just look so darn uncomfortable. She can barely move her head around! This holiday weekend was pretty much like any other- jam packed with GOOD food. Oh my. I swear I gained about 35lbs. One night our italian friends made REAL italian food, then another night our mexican friends made REAL mexican food. AND there was also a good cake here and there, some rice krispy treats, and smores of course! Absolutely wonderful. Also, Lilli slept like a sweet angel, so I was able to get some good sun on both days. I think my parents have some sort of baby sleep miracle working around their houses. Every time we go to either on of them Lilli sleeps til at least 9 or 10 in the morning and also takes 2-3 hour naps! She NEVER does it anywhere else!

Swimming in her pink elephant, every kid needs a pink elephant to swim with!

Swimming in her life jacket!

Notice my new choice of bathing suit...NEVER going to sport a bikini AGAIN... Don't judge my belly or Lilli's thunder thighs! haha!

Riding jet skis with Grandpa

Lilli and Grandpa looking all festive in their 4th of July getup

We all got home on Sunday, and there was a carnival going on in our town. Their fireworks display didn’t start until 11PM, which is WAY past Lilli’s bedtime, but we were at least able to walk around and ride the carousel. Lilli wouldn’t even smile! She was just checking things out. She also ate a delicious carnival onion ring and earned some beads…but not the way YOU know how to earn beads. She earned them just from being her cute self.

Lills and her beads

mmmmmm onion rings

Summer Love

My Little Model

This has been the best summer OF MY LIFE. AND I am not exaggerating. I LOVE spending every second of my day with Lilli. Yes, at times, she can be difficult, but it’s all worth it. She is so much fun right now. She has such a funny personality and it comes out more and more everyday.  I really wish I could be a stay at home mom. I always thought that it would be hardest to leave her and go to work while she was an infant, but the truth is it’s still hard. It will always be hard. Whether she’s 3 months, 1 year, 2 years, etc. I have to leave her with someone that is not her mommy. There’s always going to be a phase that I will see less of when I’m at work. If I lived in my little fantasy world I would stay at home with her until she started Kindergarten. I try not to dwell on these thoughts, but I have to be honest they do cross my mind nearly everyday.  That is why I have to take advantage of this too-short month of July and savor every moment I have with her.

Try to ignore my pale legs in the background and look at this happy baby face

This is one of her new looks...mean brows...

"Who took my cracker?"

Mean brows again

The Park and The Remote

We like them both.

We have this wonderful park in town. There are actually about 6 different park areas located around a pond/lake. There is a special area for toddler size kids and Lilli loves it! She feels like such a big girl walking up and down the ramps all by herself. She’s not a fan of the tunnel though. I think it’s because she witnessed her little friend dive head first out of the tunnel, and she saw/heard his screams afterward. So needless to say, she’s a little weary of the end of the tunnel.

Lilli, like every baby I know, is obsessed with the remote control. She even has her own toy remote that she likes, but it’s just not quite the same as the real deal. Sometimes I forget that we have one in the hearth and I walk in to the room to find this…

How can I discipline this sweet face???? Seriously.

New Family Portrait

This representation of our family is pretty spot-on…

Cleanliness is next to Godliness

Word on the streets…

Post-Off!

Ok, so I kinda maybe slightly challenged my dear blogger friend Ruthie to a “summer post-off”, and apparently it’s the first day of summer… I don’t exactly know what this means…. but I guess I’ll need to post as much as her or I lose. Dang.

Technically I have 4 1/2 hours until it’s officially tomorrow, but I have some super exciting things going on this evening so I’ll make this short….
My exciting things for tonight consist of: putting Lilli to bed-ASAP, doing laundry,  eating a mint oreo blast from DQ, watching the Bachelorette, fast forwarding through all the nasty making-out/boring parts, more laundry, pick clothes out for tomorrow, AND sleeping.

So here are some precious pictures of Lilli eating her new favorite food:

The First Birthday Shindig

WAY late! I am practically a month late at this post, but I was really trying to get through teaching summer school. I will have so much more free time after next Wednesday! Yay! I can not wait!

Lilli’s first birthday party was amazing. It was way more hectic than I had anticipated, but I really had no idea what to expect because I’ve never had to give a birthday party before! I was just in awe of how many of our closest friends and family members were able to come. Some of them traveled 8+ hours just for my sweet love’s birthday and there were several that had 2 to 4 hour drives! It just really meant a lot to us. Everyday I just feel so grateful to have such great friends and family in our lives. We are truly blessed to have so many people that love our daughter just as much as we do.

We celebrated at my parent’s house, since that was the most central location I could come up with for our friends/family (it’s about a 3 1/2 hr drive for us). There ended up being probably close to 35ish people at Lilli’s party and at least 10 kids. It was really amazing. I haven’t ever had that many babies (that I know) in one place, it was so much fun. I also need to give a shout out to my mom and dad, because they helped out soooooo much! They ordered bbq from a local restaurant, so we didn’t have to worry about cooking or preparing anything. They also ordered Lilli’s adorable cake from the same lady that did our wedding cake, it was delish! AND, they watched Lilli ALL NIGHT the previous night so I could surprise Buno for his 30TH birthday! I set up a surprise dinner with three other couples for his birthday, then we went over to a friend’s house and slumber partied. NO, we are not too old for slumber parties! Jeez! So anyway, without my parents, the weekend definitely wouldn’t have turned out so perfectly. Thank you Mom and Dad!!!

Ok on to the pictures! My sis n law takes amazing photos (stole some that say “sweet” off her website), so she took a few before Lilli’s party.

I couldn’t get Lilli to quit squinting because it was so bright outside! But still cute I think.

Lilli’s actual birthday was two days after her party, but Buno’s 30th birthday was on this very day. They were getting ready to blow out candles, Buno had a delicious coconut cream pie and Lilli had her cake.  My brother got Buno this hideously hilarious shirt with matching hat. It was pretty ridiculous! He didn’t even hesitate, he put them on right away! You’ll notice that Lilli’s tutu didn’t last long, she freaking hates that thing. Maybe someday she’ll like playing dress up in it.

She wasn’t really a fan of getting messy. It was a huge letdown. I was hoping she’d go crazy!

I also need to include her monthly Chili dog picture since I forgot to in her 12 month post…

1 Month

2 months

4 months

5 months

6 months

9 months

1 YEAR!!! Notice her first goose egg! It was so sad! That's a whole other post...

Notice my foot trying to keep her on the couch for another pic, she wasn't liking it..

"Mommy PLEASE"