I'll Be Better

I promise I'll get better at blogging again.  I just feel like I have so much going on and I have a lot on my mind lately.  Tastefully Simple is GROWING big time, which of course, is AWESOME.  We're trying to figure out what we're doing about a house once our lease is up here and so much more.  My mind never rests!  But there are a lot of cute pics I want to share with everyone, so I'm just going to upload some here.  I do promise, though, I'll get better at blogging regularly.  It's on my 'priority' list.  :)

Wordless Wednesday

Dinner Conversation

Family dinners are important to me.  I love that we sit down together {almost} every night and talk about our day.  Gavin asks Daddy how his day at work was, we tell Daddy what we did...  It's a tradition I hope we keep as long as possible.  

That's why it was important for me to have Riley's high chair ready to go when she was born.  Most nights, she's at the table with us, either sitting in her high chair looking around, bouncing on my lap if she's fussy, or nursing while I try to carefully eat my dinner without spilling too much on her.  (Multitasking!) 

Some nights, Riley really doesn't find our dinner conversations very interesting...

Two Months!

Just as I expected it to, time is flying!  Our sweet Riley is 2 months old today.

We're really loving our new family.  Gavin is so enamored with his baby sister.  He loves her so much, and now that Riley's smiling, we can already tell she's going to love him as much.  It's so cute to watch her smile at him.  We were watching Friends the other night (imagine that!) and there was a scene with Monica and Ross picking on each other and Jarrod started laughing and said, 'I hope they're like that.'  :)

Riley's growing quickly.  We will get her official stats later this week at her 2 month check-up, but my guess is she's about 10.5lbs right now.  We're still nursing on demand and she sleeps when she wants to sleep.  I'm not worried about a 'schedule' so she's basically calling the shots right now.  She's up a lot more during the day, and is sleeping 5-7 hour stretches at night.  Typically, I only have to get up once a night to feed her, which is great!  She's still sleeping in the Rock and Play sleeper though next to the bed.  I never thought at almost 9 weeks she wouldn't be in her crib yet, but it's sooo easy to leave things as they are when she's sleeping SO well at night!  She's wearing 0-3 month clothes right now and size 1 Huggies Pure and Natural diapers.  I'm able to get her to take a bottle in the evenings, but she's still not taking it for Jarrod.  That's our biggest struggle right now.  

 

She smiles a lot now, especially at her Daddy.  We're starting to get a few random sounds out of her, too.  I'm noticing that she still favors her left side - she's always looking left, so we're constantly moving her head to the right when she sleeps to balance things out.  We're still loving our moby and the ergo carrier...I use one or both at least once a day!  Her baby acne has really cleared up well, but now she has some cradle cap that we're dealing with.  Her poor hair has definitely thinned out.  I just hope it starts growing again soon!  We're also wondering when (if) her eyes will change to brown.  Right now, they're still the same blue they were at birth. 

She's looking more like me everyday, I think.  She DEFINITELY got my ears and my nose.  I wish I had baby pictures of mine to upload for side-by-side comparisons, but I don't.  Maybe my fantabulous dad will scan some in to email me.  :)  

This is how our photo shoot ended.... 

And a quick comparison from last month to this month.

Quick info on Gavin - he's really enjoying preschool.  No tears since the incident on the first day!  I think it's been really good for him to have his time out of the house.  I love getting there to pick him up and peeking in the window to see what he's doing.  He's grown up a lot in the last few weeks!  I love hearing him tell me how much he misses me when he gets home.  I don't love the germs he's going to be bringing home now...we spent the weekend on Motrin dealing with a fever going up and down.  

Sweetness

 

I love this picture.  It shows just how sweet and loving Gavin is with his baby sister.  I heard him talking to her one day while she was napping and went in to check on them.  He told me he was giving Riley his Mater truck to sleep with...how precious is he?  

Wanna Join Me?

I'm going to talk about Tastefully Simple for just a minute because this deal is so phenomenal, so forgive me in advance for the plug!  :)  Signing up for a consultant account with Tastefully Simple is normally $170, and until Sept. 30 it's only $85!  It's the cheapest it's ever been offered and my team is growing like crazy.  Last summer, after moving to yet another new city and struggling to get things started without knowing anyone here, I thought about quitting.  But, my fabulous sponsor {Hi, Annisa!} encourage me to stick with it for just a little longer, and I'm so glad I did!  Last October, I signed my first team member, and now I have 10!  Three people have joined our team with this incentive and we have at least one more joining as soon as her party closes.  If you'd like to join us, let me know!  YOU decide how much you make. YOU decide how often to work. YOU decide when you get a promotion. YOU do NOT carry inventory. YOU do NOT pack/deliver orders. YOU do NOT carry more than 2 totes into a party. YOU DO get paid the night of your party. YOU DO make 30%. Parties are a blast.  I'm so excited to get my party schedule up and running again tomorrow night (even though it will be my first time away from Riley!)  I'd love for you to give this company a shot!  Contact me!
 

Wordless Wednesday

A Trip to the Gardens

For the year and half we've lived here, I've been telling Jarrod I wanted to take a trip down to the Botanical Gardens (about 25 mins away).  Finally, we made the trip earlier this month!  We woke up and had a family breakfast at Chickfila, only to come out to find it looking like rain.  But, we decided to head south anyway!  

The Gardens were really pretty, but not at all what I expected.  I was imagining the Botanical Gardens back home, where we had our maternity photos taken during Gavin's pregnancy.  This place was set up differently, and much smaller.  But, it was still beautiful.  I love some of the pics I got.  Of course, Gavin wasn't the most cooperative when it came to getting his pic taken.  He's like his father...

Gavin loves to walk on things like a balance beam now.  And I love to hear him say to himself, 'Airplane arms for balance!' like he learned when he took Fit Kids.  :)

Climbing up to the 'birds' nest.'

 There was a tunnel to crawl through in the Children's Garden.  But as Jarrod started to go through (thinking Gavin was following him), Gavin decided he didn't want to try, so Jarrod backed up.  

Love the color on this bridge! 

We'll have to go back because we didn't get a chance to finish walking through.  We got about half way around (it kind loops around) and the rain started.  We ran to the entrance where there was thankfully a tent that had been set up for a wedding that night.  Once it slowed down we ran to the car.  Fun memories!  

Bath Time!

In an attempt to get more cuteness on the blog, I'm sharing some bath time pics from the last couple of baths.  Isn't she just adorable?  After the first bath, she's pretty much loved bath time.  She's super calm the entire time and loves to kick her feet.