A Little Mommy

Lily loves to play with her babies and all of their accessories, such as passies, bottles, etc. She got some baby stuff for her birthday, which we recently unwrapped and put together--we were just waiting until we moved so as not to create extra stuff to move--and she loves it all!!! Here she is in her PJs after bathtime playing with a baby she opened today. I think she's going to be a good mommy, even though she seems to take a lot of delight in the baby crying! Hmmm. Oh well...she is already potty-training her Cabbage Patch Kid preemie, so I thought that was pretty good.

Pretty Blue Eyes

I love it when Lily wears dark blue because it shows how blue her eyes are. Usually Lily and I both tend to get terrible red eye in pictures and even when corrected, our eyes just tend to look dark but not necessarily blue. Here are some pictures I took today when we were outside planting flowers in our pots. The newest thing that Lily does that I think is terribly cute is that she says "Aww man" when she drops something. It is too funny! She's such a little teenager.

March of Dimes 10K

Today, Johanna and I did the March of Dimes 10K. Many of the ladies in NICU do it every year and this year was the first year I was able to go. It was challenging because of all the hills, but we made it!! It is definitely going to be a yearly occurence. I didn't bring Lily because I thought she'd get bored in the stroller, but Johanna brought Anna, who was perfect!! She was our cheerleader. Even though I work in the NICU and work with amazing families frequently, it was still such a touching experience to see families who have suffered terrible losses and are now trying to make a difference so other families and babies don't have to go through the same things. I was glad we did it!! And I have to give a big thank you to Aunt Marian for your generous donation!!

Pre-walk--feeling pretty good!

My coworker, Becky--she has done it in previous years as well.

Post-walk---how does she manage to still look cute?!? I looked disgusting!

The real trooper of the day!! She was such a good girl!! I was very impressed.

The Incredible Shrinking Bunny!!

These are Easter pictures from the past 3 years! I can't believe how big my baby has gotten.

2007--She was about 4 weeks old here.

2008--a Mississippi girl!

2009--Back in Atlanta.

Happy Birthday Allison!

Recently, we went down to Newnan to celebrate Lily's cousin, Allison's, first birthday! It was such a great party and so well organized with an Easter egg hung and a wagon for the kids to play in. We apologize again to Mary and Adam for being late--because we had just moved, we were still in chaos and couldn't find anything, etc which resulted in not only us being late, but Lily having to wear 2 different shoes. Luckily the shoes were alike enough that no one noticed. We ate hotdogs and hamburgers, hunted for Easter eggs and had some super yummy cake! Lily thoroughly enjoyed herself. As most of you know, Lily loves to sing, and she includes Happy Birthday in the list of songs she enjoys, only she sings "Happy to you, happy to you" which I think is just adorable! She understands we put people's names in the song and every since Allison's party, she frequently asks me to sing Happy Birthday to "Alice" as Lily calls her!


The hunt is on!!! Lily had a big advantage over all of the other kids except cousin Collin, since they were the only 2 good walking kids! I tried to keep her away from most of the other kids so she wouldn't get all of the eggs, but I think she still got quite a bit more! Oh well...she enjoyed herself so much!!

Lily looking pretty with Bryan's mom, "Grandma Laura" and cousin Baby Anna.

Lily and cousin Collin!! She loves Collin so much and wants to do and say everything he does. Luckily, he's a very nice boy to her! I love this picture because Lily looks so happy in it!!

Aunt Hanna helping Anna get some eggs.

Collin, Anna and Lily going on a wagon ride. Lily's Daddy and Uncle Chris took turns pulling them.

Then Collin took a turn in pulling Lily around. He actually did this for a good half an hour! I thanked him when he left, but Mimi said that as they drove away, he asked why Lily never pulled him in the wagon!

The birthday girl!! Allison loved the cake!

So so long!!

Wow!! It has been a crazy few weeks and it shows in how long it has been since I have updated the ole' blog. We were supposed to close on our house on March 26th. However, on March 24th, we were told that they had just learned of a lien that had been put on the house by the HOA and they were trying to work that out before closing. I went to work on Thursday (March 26th) and told my very understanding boss that I may have to leave early for the closing. Unfortunately, we weren't able to close that day---apparently the attorney that the HOA used to put the lien on the house was charging $1800 for doing so and he wasn't willing to reduce his fee so that we could go ahead and close. After much back and forth, we were finally able to close on March 31st. I don't even really know how--the listing agent just said he worked it out with the HOA...and here we are!! We started painting and cleaning right away! I hired someone to have the carpets professionally cleaned (after 4 college guys living here, I don't even want to think about what was on these carpets), but Bryan and I were planning to do all of the rest of cleaning ourselves. Miracle of all miracles, my sister-in-law, Johanna's, mom won a spring cleaning at an auction and gave it to us as a house-warming present!! It was one of the best gifts ever! We then moved in on Saturday, April 4th. Currently, we still have lots of boxes everywhere, lots of painting still do to. We've only discovered 2 issues we didn't already know about--a rotten outside window sill and that we get TERRIBLE cell phone reception here. My parents came in town last weekend and were our life-savers. They helped us organize and unpack--I can actually park in the garage--a feat it took me a good 6 months to accomplish in Mississippi! My mom and I put the kitchen stuff away, which always overwhelms me the most. Hopefully, we'll continue making good progress and be "done" before long--I say that knowing we will never be done. Even in our turn-key house in Mississippi, I had a to-do list 3 pages long.

Lily is getting so much bigger and cuter every day! She says "love you" now without prompting and is VERY into her babies. She kisses them and pushes them in the doll swing. She pretends to feed them and changes their diapers. She is a very good mommy. I can't even begin to list everything that she is saying now. Her latest is that she says "yes" correctly, which we think is super cute. She frequently yells at Sammy now--"Sammy, come here!!!", which Sammy politely ignores. She also likes to say who is being funny--"Daddy funny!". She remembers notable things to report back--for example, today we were leaving Walmart and right across from it is a new restaurant which frequently has blow-up things on the roof to call attention to it. Right now, they have what we call a "wobbly-man"--one of those long tube men that fold and straighten all crazy-like because of air being blown into them--she LOVES him. When we got home, I told Lily to tell Daddy what we saw in the car and she said "wobbly-man". I was very proud. She is sleeping well at night now and these 2 year molars don't seem to be bothering her compared to those pesky eye teeth. Of course, as I type that, she is crying on the monitor, so I may have just cursed myself!! She seems to be adjusting well to the move, despite my anxiety about it all. She is such a trooper! She is, however, very much a 2 year old right now and we have whole days of boundary-testing, which is super tiring for mommy. Sometimes we are in time-out 5 times just in the course of getting dressed. It's also a tough time right now as Bryan and I are facing decisions as parents--Do we care about this? Does this warrant a time-out? Do we let her do this? It definitely gets harder as they get older! My mom also tells me "Just wait until she is driving!" I can't think about that yet! She is still very much into dancing and singing. She will dance just about anywhere and doesn't really care if there is music or not. She sings a lot as well--she frequently combines the alphabet song and Twinkle, Twinkle or sings the Barney song. She loves to sing 5 Little Monkeys as well!