Introducing Miles!

Miles Alden Halsey was born Thursday night, January 21st, at 8:06 p.m.

He weighed 9 lbs. 4 1/2 oz.--a big boy!

More details to come...

Four more!

Lila has four more teeth through the surface! They're the four middle teeth on top. She may have been waaaaay late but she sure is catching up quickly... 6 teeth in less than three weeks!

Lila at 16 months!

This is going out of order of my intended catch up blogging, but I just wanted to take a minute to record some of the things Lila has been up to lately before I forget. I know if I don't record it the months will just blur together and I won't remember all the cute things she was doing and when she was doing them. It seems like lately she's been learning at super-speed pace. I'm sure every kid goes through spurts where it seems like they're growing up really fast all of a sudden.

Here's a little bit about Lila as of late:

VOCABULARY:

Mama, dada, grandpa/grandma (sound the same), baby, dog, duck, ball, balloon, bird, bye-bye, hello, stuck, all gone, all done, amen, Elmo, Big Bird, cracker, popcorn (well just "pop" really), egg, shoe, bow, eye, cheese, hot, cold, uh-oh, night-night, bumbo. There are a lot more things she imitates after I say them, but I think these are most of the ones she comes up with on her own on a regular basis.

***Of note is one key word that is still missing: NO. Yay! If only that could last forever. She still shakes her head a lot meaning "no" but it's a lot better than hearing her say it every second like some kids do. I guess that's probably just a developmental stage we'll reach a little later! I'm also dreading the "my" phase that I know is soon in coming.

LILA-ISMS:

• If we haven't left the house by around 9 am, she heads to the door and starts pounding her hands on it saying "bye-bye" over and over again. She doesn't like being cooped up in the house for long and she knows how to let us know she's ready for an outing.
• She is OBSESSED with Elmo. We watch Sesame Street together every morning but the only part she really cares about is Elmo's World. If she hears the song playing from the other room she comes running in like her life depended on reaching the TV asap. I showed her some Elmo video clips on sesamestreet.org once and now anytime she sees one of us on the computer she comes rushing over saying "Emo, Emo" in a super distraught/desperate voice that basically forces you to let her watch Elmo on the computer for a few minutes.
• She's still using the binky, but mostly just when she goes to sleep and in the car. I pretty much had her weaned from it (except for sleeping) until she started teething. The binky comforts her more than anything and I knew chomping on it really helped soothe her teeth so I started letting her have it more often. She ended up getting way reattached to it for a few weeks until her teeth came in and now she's doing better without it again. I don't know when I'm going to wean her from it completely. I'm afraid to try before our flight out to Maryland because I know it will save us a lot of grief on the plane, then when we get back we'll have a new baby around and I know that's not the best time for a traumatic change in her life. Maybe when she's 13?
• She loves putting anything that resembles a phone to her ear (calculators included) and saying "hewo."
• If she doesn't want me around or wants to do something I don't want her to do, she starts waving at me and says "buh-bye." Translation: Mom get out of here.
• If she needs help with something, can't get something open, can't figure out a toy, etc. she starts repeating "guck" (stuck) over and over again. I honestly have no clue how she even learned that word.
• She's basically over it now, but for at least a month or more she was infatuated with stairs. The funny part is that she doesn't crawl up them like most babies do, she just wants to hold on to your fingers and walk up like a regular person (she even did this when she could barely lift her leg high enough to reach the next step). If she saw stairs anywhere, you could guarantee she'd make a run for them. We probably walked up the three flights stairs outside our complex 3-4 times a day for several weeks.
• She loves blowing her nose. We never taught her to do it, she just started doing it. I always just wiped her nose because I figured you couldn't teach a baby to blow. Then one day she just started randomly picking up tissues, putting them to her nose, and blowing. She's pretty talented at it and she does it all the time.
• There are times when she insists on being set on the toilet seat (with it closed). She loves to pull the toilet paper off the roll and pretend to wipe and then throw the toilet paper in the bowl. It's amazing how much babies really do watch and learn because we never showed her anything about that (despite my one random attempt to put her on her little potty a few months ago), she just imitates what she's seen me do.
• She rediscovered her bumbo and loves sitting in it. It's been stored under her crib all this time and she saw it one day and spent quite a while trying to figure out how to sit in it. The problem is her bum is a bit too big for it now so although she can fit in it, she gets stuck every time she does. She sits in it, gets stuck, asks for help to get out, sits in it again, etc... the cycle goes on and on until I force her to put the bumbo away.
• She insists on feeding herself with an adult-sized fork and spoon. Even when she doesn't get any food to her mouth (which happens most of the time), she isn't concerned and still proceeds to chew the air.
• We went to a Christmas concert on Sunday that was held in a church building. Apparently she's been paying attention in church because she said "amen" after every song. Maybe she just wanted it to be over?
• At her 15 month check-up she was 50th% for height (22 lbs. 12 oz.) and weight (30 1/2 in.) and 90th% for head (18 3/4 in.). She's just got a big brain, that's all.
• She knows two animal sounds on cue: lion and duck.
• She can point to a lot of her body parts (she learned from the "Your Baby Can Read" videos my mom bought her) including: head, nose, eyes, ears, mouth, tongue, hands, fingers, belly button, foot, and toes.
• She loves finding other people's belly buttons and sometimes demands that I lift up my shirt so she can touch mine. That doesn't go over so well when we're in public places like storytime at the library. She's VERY persistent.
• She can kick, "jump" (not much air if any), and dance on cue. She LOVES dancing. I need to post a video of her dancing soon.

FAVORITE FOODS:

Peanut butter and jelly, macaroni and cheese, plain noodles, toast, bagels (especially with cream cheese), waffles, pancakes, apple sauce, grapes, bananas, raisins, cheese, goldfish, pirate booty, chicken nuggets, yogurt, boiled eggs (disgusting!!!).

I think we need to work on more variety in her diet. Notice any food group missing? Does everyone have as hard of a time feeding their toddler veggies as I do? I even bought special baby yogurt that has veggies mixed in to try to get her to be a little healthier. She did eat peas one time. That was a miracle.

Our baby is 1 year old!!!

Lila had a very fun birthday party the day before her birthday. We had a bunch of friends and a few family members over to our clubhouse for lunch and a pool party. I made the decorations out of scrapbook paper and believe it or not I cut out all those letters by hand. It took FOREVER! I want one of those cutting machine things they sell at craft stores. I could have saved HOURS!
The cupcakes turned out super cute. I made some, my mom made some, we topped them with the cupcake toppers I had made, and my aunt let us borrow her cupcake stand.

Lila really seemed to enjoy herself at her party.
This cute cake was made by a girl from our church who is trying to start a cake decorating business.
We tried to get a picture of all the kids together but it wasn't easy! Lila actually stuck her hand into the cake before we could even snap a shot.
Then she REALLY got to dig in to her cake. She was not cautious or careful about it all. She pulled the number 1 right out and started putting her arm in practically up to the elbow and grabbing fistfulls out of the center of the cake. I loved it! Every mother's dream for that perfect "messy cake" 1st birthday picture : )
Yep, she was COVERED!

Lila got some awesome gifts. The little train/car thing my mom got her was a major hit... all the kids wanted to play with it and it really helped Lila learn to walk. The shopping cart we got her was also a favorite, but we had to hide it after a while to make sure the kids didn't fight over it! haha...
We had a fabulous time and it was so much fun to have our friends from church, my parents and Kelsey, and my Aunt Shelly and Uncle Ron at the party.

HAPPY (late) BIRTHDAY LILA!

Finally!

Last Monday, 9 days before she turns 16 months, Lila got her first two teeth! We could see them poking through the surface and got super excited that our baby finally reached a milestone most arrive at between 6 and 8 months!

I know most of you who I don't talk to on a regular basis probably assumed she had a dozen teeth by now, but seriously, these were her FIRST TWO TEETH. Can you believe it? Our pediatrician kept assuring us that one of his daughters didn't get any teeth until 16 months (something most people I talk to have never heard of) and I guess Lila decided to follow in her footsteps.

It's so funny when I feel/hear the spoon clinking against her little bottom teeth stubs when she eats. I think she's going to get a whole mouth-full of teeth super-speed style because we can already feel several more pushing their way through.

It's about time!

Ouch!

Lila had her second major boo boo incident two days before her birthday. She was standing up at the table cruising around as usual and I was sitting on the couch right next to her when she suddenly lost her footing and fell and knocked her forehead right on the handle of a drawer on our coffee table. I immediately scooped her up in my arms and blood was already streaming (ok streaming might be an exaggeration but there was enough blood to scare me) out of her forehead and turning her hair red. I DO NOT do well in these type of situations so I immediately started freaking out and called Byron and my mom to ask them what I should do. I put pressure to her head of course, but it was really hard because naturally she didn't want me pushing on her owie. Byron rushed home from work to see how bad it was, but I guess heads just bleed a lot because in the end, it only left a little mark on her forehead. She did have little cut on her head for all her birthday pictures though. Good thing I didn't call an ambulance like I wanted to : )

Hopefully some day I'll learn to stay more calm when my kids get hurt!

First Ponytail

My parents got us an awesome new computer for Christmas and gave it to us early. I can finally put all the pictures burning a hole in my camera's SD card onto the computer! Yay! Thanks mom and dad!

Now that I've got my pictures from the last 4 1/2 months on here, I'm going to catch up on blogging and I'm going to do it the hard way: separate individual posts. I'm doing it because I really, really want to make one of those cute blog books and so I need everything to be somewhat organized. Here goes!

First ponytail back in August. Lila was still deciding if she liked it. Ok, she wasn't deciding, she didn't like it. She HATED having me do her hair for several months, but now she's getting somewhat used to it and will usually let me do my thing if she's either distracted by a snack or the TV. Her little ponytail is so much longer and thicker already! Byron's family always comments on how much hair she has because their kids don't get any until their about 3 years old. Too bad I didn't get a picture of her first pigtails...they're so darn cute!

Yucky!

I know I haven't blogged in FOREVER, but this story cannot go unrecorded. Yesterday we decided to go out and buy Lila a little potty. I know she's not ready for potty training yet and she won't be for a while, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to have one around for the while before we start trying just so she can get used to it, etc. Lila loves her little potty and keeps opening and closing it, but she clearly has no idea what it's for. It has a removable cushiony seat and she loves taking it out and carrying it around the house and trying to wear it as a hat. I'll have to get a picture of that.

Apparently I got a little overexcited about the new potty because this morning when I noticed Lila making her pooping face (if you're a mother, you know what I'm talking about), I decided to take her diaper off and to set her on the potty to finish. Why not, right? Then maybe she'll know what it's for (that's what I was thinking at the time). Well, she was NOT happy about me trying to sit her down while she was doing her business. Needless to say, having a baby flail around without a diaper while they're in the middle of pooping is NOT a good situation and the mess that was left was not very much fun either: Some poop in her diaper, some on the floor, some on the rug, some on the real toilet seat, and yes, some on the bottom of my foot and my jeans. As I said to Lila: Yucky! Oh the things we moms suffer through. That's what I get for trying to get a 14 month old to poop on the potty! Don't ask me what I was thinking.

When I called Byron to tell him about our first potty adventure (or should I say nightmare?), he asked if I took pictures. Are you kidding me? Yes, I left poop all over the baby, me, and the bathroom, grabbed the camera, got Lila to pose and started snapping away precious memories. Ha!

P.S.--I haven't been blogging because (a) I'm lazy, (b) Lila needs entertaining every waking hour, and (c) we can't fit any more pictures on our computer (we need to buy an external hard drive and haven't gotten around to it yet) and posts without pics just don't seem quite the same, and (d) it's overwhelming to start again when you get so far behind!