Long Overdue

Life has been so crazy these past several months. After I passed my licensing exam in July, I was at a loss as to what to do with all my "spare time". Being home with Lily was so great but it took a lot of adjustment. I've always been a go go go kind of person so staying home was challenging at times. But we found little adventures to go on together and I gradually adjusted to being full time mom. Just as I was fully enjoying and fully accepting being home, I finally got a job. It took nearly 6 months....so much for the nursing shortage. But Dustin and I had spent a lot of time praying about the right job and the right timing. As a result, I absolutely love my job and the people I work with! I'm working on the Cardiac Surgery Unit at one of the local hospitals, in other words I take care of patients after open heart surgery, lung surgery, vascular surgeries among other things. Everyone has been very supportive and welcoming. I've already been yelled at by a few doctors and been so overwhelmed I was nearly in tears....welcome to nursing I guess, but I still love my job. I miss my little girl so much but I know she's in good hands with family.

We had a great time getting our Christmas tree this year. We went to a local tree farms and cut down our tree. Lily and I were playing hide and seek in the trees and jumping out to roar Daddy and grandma and grandpa. And Lily wanted to help daddy cut down the tree



I promised myself that I would not procrastinate on buying gifts or sending out my Christmas cards this year...and somehow it still happened. I never did get my Christmas cards out but I did get all my shopping done. I was a little worried Lily would be scaling the Christmas tree this year so I bought all new ornaments that were plastic or styrofoam. I did catch her stirring a few ornaments in her pots and pans on the stove top of her play kitchen which was quite cute. But overall she was content to move the ornaments around that she could reach and stare at the lights or the "wows" as she called them.

It was our year to spend Christmas Eve with the in-laws and Christmas Day with my family. Unfortunately I had to work both days but at least I got to enjoy Christmas morning with Dustin and Lily as well as spend a little time at my parent's. Lily mastered ripping open her gifts rather quickly but it was also a slow process because each gift had to be played with before the next could be opened. She looked absolutely adorable in her Christmas dress too.
We managed to get a decent family picture in front of our tree too which I was very excited about, although the tree is kind of cut out of the picture :)
We are so blessed!

Loving my Summer!

Its been so nice to be home with my girl this summer. We've had a lot of good times and she's growing up so fast I can't believe it. She is running all over the place....walking is a thing of the past. She's my big helper too; she helped me wash my car this morning:

She washed the same spot over and over and over, it was so cute.

She loves playing peek-a-boo

And riding in her wagon

And picking flowers

Too Busy!

The weeks are flying by and life is far too busy. Thankfully the end of school is near, one week left of this term and then one final term to go. Lily is growing up so fast and getting more and more of a personality every day. Its been so fun to watch. I treasure our time together. She finally cut a tooth this last month, man that was a miserable experience for the whole house, we didn't sleep for days. It was like having a new born again. Alas she STILL isn't sleeping through the night....someday maybe.....I think I've forgotten what it is like to sleep all the way through the night myself. Lily has also decided that mommy and daddy's food is far better than baby food....that one is my fault....feeding her from my plate too much.....so we have to feed her first and then she sits in her high chair and nibbles on whatever she can from my plate while we eat.

We had a couple nice days this past week so Lily and I made a trip to the park. The swing swallows her up but she loved it despite the fact that it nearly put her to sleep.

She also out grew her infant seat already since she's so tall so we gladly accepted our cousin Jace's car seat since he moved onto a booster seat. She loves this new seat since she sits up more and can see out the back window of the car. It makes traveling in the car far less painful for all of us.

Update

Life has been pretty hectic these days....but that's nothing new. I thought for sure during Christmas Break I'd find time to post some long overdo pictures of my adorable little girl....but somehow time slipped away and here I am back to the grind of school again. 23 weeks to go and I'm done!! Yahoo! So tired of school!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So yeah back to my cute little girl. Here is a video of her from tonight, she just started doing this in the last few days....so cute!

Christmas was great! We celebrated Christmas Eve with my family which was chaos, with kids running everywhere and 25+ people in the house, but that's Christmas with my family and I wouldn't have it any other way. Dustin BBQed the prime rib as is customary since he's been in the family and is the king of the BBQ. Then Christmas day we had at our house. It was nice and low key. People came to us this year, we had Dustin's parent and mine over as well. I had fun decorating the house, although I kept it simple since we have limited space. I also enjoyed finally getting out some more of my china.

I made omelets for breakfast, I just discovered that I could make them this year, Dustin insists I've been holding out on him our whole marriage...but apparently all those years of working in a restaurant and watching gave me the skill. Dustin grilled tri-tip steaks in this amazing marinade for lunch/dinner. Yummy! I love that he can cook and enjoys doing it.

Lily was an absolute ham. She loved ripping the paper off of her gifts, although she just wanted to eat it. We got some great video of it. Thankfully Aunt Misty wrapped Lily's gifts in a foil wrapping paper which Lily thoroughly enjoyed the crinkling sound it made and that she was allowed to chew on it since it didn't get soggy.She was even willing to put up with wearing a santa hat
I have a cute Christmas dress for her but I haven't actually put it on her yet....yeah yeah I know it was supposed to be for Christmas but I actually bought it for pictures....which I still haven't gotten around to doing quite yet....who can fit all this stuff in? Soon though...I promise. I actually had to buy her two dresses because the first one turned into a long shirt because she had a huge growth spurt.....plus I bought it in November thinking I was planning ahead....nice.

More Pictures to come.....