8 months

Yesterday, Lyla turned 8 months old! Amber and I are realizing that she is starting to loose her baby look as she gets closer to the one year mark. I think it will really hit once she gets more teeth and longer hair. Each day seems to be going by faster and faster and Lyla seems to be doing something new all the time. She started babbling a few weeks ago and is quite the talker now...when she wants to be. She still spends a lot of time quietly observing her world and taking in every moment. She also gets very quite when we try to show off her talking skills to other people.
She is crawling all over the place and standing up on everything. She isn't exactly "cruising" yet, but she is trying to. We don't think it will be too long before she gets the hang of it.
Her first tooth popped out a few weeks ago and with the never ending drool, constant waking throughout the night, rejection and obsession of her paci, we think she is working on another one. She has, within the past few days, discovered that she can bite things with her new tooth and tried it on me a few days ago...which was quite unpleasant.

Here are a few new pics of our pretty little 8 month old!

2009 Reading Challenge

Inspired by my cousin-in-law, Julie, I have decided to join in on a reading challenge for 2009! I have a serious case of "mommy brain" that started as "pregnancy brain" and has only gotten worse. If I'm going to go back to work in 2009 then I need to start exercising now! The challenge is to read 100+ books in 2009. I am being realistic however and realize that most of these books will be children's books that I read to Lyla...but books are books! You can watch my progress here:
Mommy's Reading!

Christmas

We had so much fun watching Lyla enjoy the magic of her first holiday season. It turned out to be a wonderful Christmas and we were able to spend time with all of our family and friends. We took about a million photos, but here are just a few from the past week.

Lyla in her new wagon that Santa brought her! She LOVES it! Check out the wheels! We can take this All Terrain Wagon just about anywhere.

Playing in the leaves in her Christmas dress.

Lyla and Cousin Bliss in their Christmas jammies.

Lyla and Cousing Renzo in their matching Christmas jammies.

Hugging her big bear from Santa.

Dancing Baby

So Lyla's latest obsession is dancing! She used to bounce up and down to music, but a few days ago she learned to do the twist! Now she does it all the time...when music is playing, when you sing to her, or even when she makes her own music. Check out her cool new dance moves!

Train ride

This past weekend we went on a train ride with my family. My Mom and Dad have had this holiday "trip" planned since this summer, so we have been looking forward to it for a long time. It turned out to be what seemed like one of the coldest days this year, but despite the cold we had a lot of fun. Santa and Mrs. Claus visited us on the train and passed out cookies and a wooden train whistle to all the kiddos.
What a great way to remember Lyla's first Christmas!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Storytime

Lyla and I went to our first story time together at the library. We had heard about it, but weren't completely sure where this specific library was. As it turns out, it is about a mile or two from our house! I can't believe we have never been before! It was so much fun...and free!!



The teacher was fabulous! We sang songs, learned sign language, read books, and at the end of the story time the teacher dumped a big box of toys out on the floor for all the babies to play with.
Lyla was a little shy at first. She found a ball that she wanted to play with by herself...




The next thing I knew, she was pushing babies aside to get where all the action was!




I think we are going to have to make this a weekly event!

7 months

I forgot to post about Lyla turning 7 months!! It fell just a few days after Thanksgiving so I guess we all got busy and distracted. It is amazing how much she has changed in just a month! Her crawling has really improved and her favorite thing to do right now is to pull up on things and stand up. This has made putting her down to sleep in her crib really fun!!
She is really good with her hands now and one of the cutest things she does is grabs her paci and puts it in her mouth. She is also starting to clap, wave at people, and point which is pretty darn cute too!

Santa

We went to the Sights and Sounds Festival and Lyla met Santa for the first time! She did so good! We thought for sure she would freak out and loose it, but she totally proved us wrong! It was late and she was super tired, so we didn't get a smile out of her...but the pictures turned out really cute!

Santa was kind enough to bring me my Christmas wish early this year! Last night Lyla slept the whole night through without waking up! She went to bed around 8:30 and woke up accidentally at 4:00 (an alarm went off in her room waking her up), to eat at 5:00 and then went back to sleep until 8:30 am! Yea!! Lets hope she repeats it tonight!

Advent calendar

When my sister and I were growing up we both had a big angel advent calendar that hung on our bedroom doors. It was so much fun finding a little treat like Hershey's kisses, candy canes, or quarters every day as we counted down to Christmas. I have been looking high and low for an advent calendar for Lyla and never found anything that was what I was looking for or what I wanted to pay. So I decided to make one myself!

I am really impressed that I finshed it before Christmas day! I am famous for starting projects...setting them down...and then finding them months later. It actually turned out pretty nice! It's cute because in each pocket there is a tiny ornament that you "hang" on the tree...but there is still room in the pocket for a little treat for when Lyla is older.... Hopefully it is still in one piece by then!

Thanksgiving

Lyla's very first Thanksgiving has come and gone. We celebrated the holiday by visiting family and stuffing ourselves silly with lots of yummy food of course. The weather was warm and sunny and then cold and windy all within a matter of three days.

Lyla and Renzo had a lot of fun together. Aren't they cute!

We had fun taking June bug on her first wagon ride around the house.

The hill up to the house doesn't seem all that steep until your half way up pulling over 35 pounds behind you.

Lyla's cold is gone (yea!) and yesterday we discovered that her first tooth finally made its appearance. Looking back now, I realize that this silly monkey face she has been making lately is her itching her gums with her tongue and checking out her new tooth!

When we went to Granny and Grandpa's house in the country, Lyla got an up close and personal introduction to the horses! One of the horses, Brio, was so excited and wouldn't leave our side.