Friday, May 16, 2014

A little bit of lately...



My oh my how time flies. I was sure I blogged less than 6 months ago, but it turns out it had been almost a year! How do you catch up after that long?! This post is going to be mostly pictures, but here's a brief rundown of the last 6 months. . .

Dec '13 - I graduated from nursing school
Jan - We moved to Los Alamitos
Jan - I got knocked up
Feb - I passed the nursing boards
Mar - I woke up feeling nauseous almost everyday
Mar - Ryan started coming home at a decent hour (woo hoo!)
April - We found out we're having a baby BOY! And announced to our family by letting them spray blue silly string on Easter
May - Major heat wave meant lots of beach time!
May - Still not working as an RN (totally by choice). I want to stay home as much as possible!










Beach Babe
Always has her legs stuck in the couch























17 weeks


All About Finley

(Just a warning: this post is going to be very boring unless you're closely related to Finley because it's a novel about her life)

Oh my sweet Finley. You have no idea what you do to daddy and me. You are the sweetest, most gentle soul there is (most of the time). You say "hi" to everyone we pass by. You are so kind to animals, it makes me think you'll someday be a veterinarian or something. You're still learning how to be as kind to other children (mostly other babies), and to share. Anytime a kid takes something from you, or just does something you don't like, you tell them very sternly, "NO NO NO NO!" You make the cutest little mad face and roll your eyes at me like I already drive you crazy. You are so so animated. In the car you have long conversations with yourself, and use all sorts of hand motions. You can say way more words than I can count. I never realized how advanced in language you are until recently. You repeat just about anything I say and most of the time I can understand what you said. Everyday I tell you a million times that I love you, and a couple weeks ago you said "wuv oo" right back. A few days ago, you said "wuv oo" to me out of the blue. When you were 15 months old I'd ask "what's your name?" and even then, you could say " inley." You can't quite get the "F" sound yet but I was shocked to hear you say your name! You love giving hugs and kisses. You always want to cuddle when we're relaxing at home. When I rock you to sleep, you pull my shirt down so your cheek can rest right against my skin. You LOVE to read. You used to always want me to read to you, but now I often find you in a corner covered in books reading them out loud. Right now you especially love to read Goodnight Moon, Alice in Wonderland, A day at the seashore, Frozen, and this fun book of colors where you can name just about everything in it. And just like the books, you love watching Alice (Aaa-iss as you call it), and Frozen (you like to say Oh-off for Olaf), and Winnie the Pooh. You are very easy to put to bed, but you still don't consistently sleep through the night. At night, we read a couple books, sing a few songs, then I lay you down. You'll usually fall asleep within 10 minutes, but only if I'm standing right there next to your crib, and you love it even more when my hand is on your cheek. In the middle of the night when I walk in because you're crying, you lay right back down as soon as you see me. But again, I have to stand there until you fall asleep. Soon enough I'll be working on getting you to sleep through the night (before your baby brother comes), but for now I really don't mind waking once or twice a night. You are obsessed with bellies. Especially mommy's. You say "hi baby," and give him kisses all the time. I can only assume (and hope) you'll be just as sweet when he's here. We were swimming in our complex yesterday and a man with a larger belly came in the pool, and you kept pointing to him saying "belly!" Thankfully we were just about to leave and he thought you were saying "bye!" You love love love swimming, whether the water is warm or cold! You like to think you can jump in the water without anyone holding you. At the beach, you spend most of the time by the water, jumping over the waves. This week at the beach you laid your whole face in the sand, then rolled it around. It's still all in your hair. Almost every afternoon at home we go outside and look for bugs and you say "where oo bugs?" (where are you bugs?) You love playing with roly polies, ladybugs, worms, ants, etc. We had an ant problem in our apartment a couple weeks ago and I found you saying "hi" to all the ants and watching several of them crawl on your arms. When you see a cute bug or animal you say "Awww!" Since you started walking, you do this funny thing where you'll go to sit on someone's lap (especially Grandma Stokes) and you'll stop about 5 feet away from them, turn around, and back up the rest of the way. You still do this anytime you sit in your chair, or sit on your potty. It's the funniest thing. You are obsessed with balls! Any kind, any size, bouncy or not. Anything that's shaped like a ball you assume it is a ball and you want to touch it. You love playing with keys and helping mommy unlock the door. You absolutely love jewelry, makeup and nail polish! You'll gladly warm up to someone if they have pretty jewelry or nail polish on. When you hear mommy putting makeup on you run to my bathroom and beg for me to put you on the sink so you can help/put it on yourself. You always find my nail polish and say "peas!" when your nail polish has worn off (or sooner). When you do something you're proud of, you say "tah dah!" and throw your arms in the air. You're really good at singing E-I-E-I-O and patty cake. At grandma and grandpa lake's house you played patty cake with their puppy willow's feet. Now you want to do it to any babies feet. You love giving mommy butterfly kisses, and blowing raspberries on our neck or belly to make us laugh. You love to jump. You can actually get both feet off the ground on your own. You love climbing in your crib and holding mommy or daddy's hands and jumping as high as you can. You also love this game where you put a blanket over your head and walk like a ghost. Even though you've run into the wall several times, you still continue to want to play this and get mad when I tell you "all done." You hide anytime I blow dry my hair. You don't like loud noises, like the vacuum. We always keep our ottoman pushed up against our couch for more space to lay, and when we watch movies, you always get your legs stuck in between and leave them there. If I try and get you un-stuck you get very upset at me and get your legs stuck again. You love all your grandparents, but you especially love your grandpas. All of them. When we saw great grandma and grandpa Lake in Arizona, grandma would try to get your attention, but you'd walk right past her into grandpa's arms. And it's the same with great grandpa brown. But you are terrified of his cane! You won't take your eyes off it if he's near you with it.You're not a very picky eater, but you don't eat very much food at a time. Although you'll never turn down a snack. You weighed the same amount at 18 months as you did at 12 months.

It's so fun watching you grow and how fast you learn. We are the best of friends and I wish I could just pause time for a little while. Just know that mommy and daddy love you and hope you'll always love us in return.

Mommy


Friday, June 21, 2013

Just your average business owner and nursing student raising a restless 8 month old!

Let's just say a lot has happened since the last time I posted. First of all, Ryan has been busy as ever as a new business owner and learning all the ins and outs of running a company. He is now the boss, but till this week, he hadn't hired anyone to replace what he was previously doing so he's been doing like 3 jobs! Which means we haven't been able to see very much of him. Thankfully he finally hired someone so Finley and I are really hoping to see him around much more. But we are forever grateful for our hard working man and all he does for our growing family. Love you babe.

I also completed my 3rd semester of nursing school since I last blogged. I can't believe I'm a 4th semester RN student! This last rotation we were in L&D. Between just having a baby myself, and always wanting to work in L&D this rotation was pretty easy for me. I had to be gone from my baby girl for 12 hours every Monday, but it wasn't as bad because I got to see lots of brand new babies. I think 4th semester is going to be much more difficult because I'll be gone a lot more. In fact, I think I'll just stop talking about it since I don't have to worry about it for a couple months :)

Speaking of our sweet baby girl, she is 8 months old today! I mean seriously? It makes me happy and sad to think of how fast she's growing. She is such a sweet, happy little girl and she has no idea how in love we are with her. I seriously tell her how cute she is about 500 times a day. We have done a lot together the last few months. We've been to Disneyland and the beach many times, we went to the river and took her on her first boat ride, then to Arizona to see Grandma & Grandpa Lake, Great Gma and Gpa Lake, Aunt Mindy and cousins Raine and Emmett, then went on her first flight home. Finley LOVES playing with all her cousins. Anytime Brevon and Megan come over it's like "move over mommy" cause she will just watch her cousins all day. They are so cute with her and know how to make her giggle. She still loves jumping in her classic jumper, she loves sitting in the grass and being outside with the kitties, she also loves to read books, stand up (with mommy holding her hands of course), eat pancakes, swim, watch Alice in Wonderland, play with mommy's jewelry, roll all over the floor, say mama, bubba, bye bye, gaga, shake her head no while giving me a serious look, tilt her head side to side and laugh when you copy her, stare and wave at herself in the mirror, drink water from her sippy cut, and the list goes on and on. She also has 3 teeth, with the 4th not far behind. She also still LOVES nursing. I offer her all sorts of foods and she'll take a few bites here and there, but when it comes down to it she wants mommy's milk. I thought I'd be feeding her more foods by now but I'm kind of letting her set the pace because I believe breast milk is the best thing for her for now anyway, and I'm in no rush to wean her or pressure her into eating foods. She's obviously getting enough food, as you'll see from her pictures.

Oh and yes, I know...I take A LOT of pictures!