Newborn Pics

Thank you Clare!

Birdie

Our little birdie is one month old and my oh my, this girl has a set of lungs on her. Her tiny squawks aren't so tiny. In the evening Iv'e been closing up the house and turning on the AC just because I feel for the surrounding neighborhood. We live on a canyon and let me say that sound definitely carries around here. It's not every night though, only a few so far. When it comes to answering those questions that even total strangers feel comfortable to ask..."Is she an easy baby? How doses she sleep?" I'm giving it time, I'm not throwing in my towel yet. She's just a little thing and I have high hopes. 

The girl has beautiful deep blue eyes. Where do I reproduce these beauties from? And their eyes? If you haven't seen me in a while, then maybe you have forgotten, that I have nothing magical going on in my average brown eyes like these daughters of mine. It's unreal. 

She has long legs and long feet. I'm hoping for some height from this one. I remember Riley being in newborn clothing past the first month. In fact Riley easily fits into a lot of her 12 months clothes and she's 24 months in a week. So far, with Av, we've got a grower. Appropriately so, she is in 0-3 month clothes already. 

She's just starting to make those adorable baby coo-ing sounds. She smiles a little while she falls asleep sometimes. 

She looks a lot like Robby's baby pictures. It's funny how when people tell me how much she looks like Robby, they have an eyebrows tilted, half frown face. In other words, sorry she doesn't look like you Chels...but don't you worry people...I married my husband for quite a few reasons, and one of them was his looks. So If my little lady looks like my good-lookin man, then I'll take it. 

Ava, you seem like you may be on your way to being just as determined of a little girl as your sister, but please have some grace on us honey. 

August

Here's a breakdown of the last 3 weeks. It's pretty self-explanatory.

I guess unless most toddlers serve a good IPA in their playhouse, this one isn't quite self-explanatory. So to explain - as with Riley we tried to make the most of happy hour while on leave from work with good friends around to help chase Riley and share their adult company with us.

Laying sod

Cousins

A couple non-self-explanatories:

Ri...
...has new words each day. Half of them are some other language that take Robby and I a couple of minutes to sometimes 24 hours to realize what she was saying. An example is when she says 'meelps' for 'milk.' Sounds ridiculous but it is so dang cute. Another one is "hoont," in which she crouches and shakes her fist in the air. This is her imitating us "hunt"ing flies with a kitchen towel around the house. She also loves ironman clips, nursery rhymes, and dogs all on You Tube. Grandma Fleisher has taught her to become pretty efficient with iPad apps. She goes to gymnastics with her friend Aniston. She also turned two (at least mentally and emotionally). The other day Robby asked me "so, how long will Riley be two for?" In other words, she tests us like crazy, avoids eye contact anytime we are trying to be serious with her, runs away when we say not to, and I could go on and on.

Av...
....has long legs, arms, fingers and toes. Please God, let her be tall. I need someone to reach things when Robby's at work. Her eyes are deep dark blue. She is fussy a lot of evenings, just about at Riley's bedtime on the minute. She has a dimple on her right cheek. She sleeps a lot.

Summertime & waiting for Ava continued

I am almost caught up with life up until Ava came along, then I can hopefully be truer to this blog. Here are some more fun things we did to entertain ourselves as we waited for Ava. 

As I write this I am thinking about how I was talking with another mom in Riley's gymnastics class who is currently very pregnant. We had a conversation in which I tried to encourage her that in my opinion transitioning from one to two kids is easier than zero to one. She asked if despite having two to look after, do I have more energy because I am no longer pregnant. The honest answer I realize from looking back at pictures of those last few weeks is yes. Despite the sleep deprivation of night feedings and the crazy days now, especially when Robby is at work, I do have more energy. Thank God for that. 

Ri is such a girly girl....loving nail polish, heels & jewelry. Where did she come from?

The Fair

It was absolutely wonderful to get a visit from Wafa. Welcome back to the States Waf!

Neighborhood bike rides, a shower from my Pasadena Greek family, slow mornings at home, seal beach in La Jolla...

And of course Luna Celeste made our world even better by joining us. Born to Tia Holly & Tio Jose on May 18th. 

Goodbye to the Gordons

Tomorrow our neighbors are leaving us for greener grass in North Carolina. What a bummer to see them go. They have been wonderful to live next doors to for the last 5 years. We have seen the birth of our combined 4 children. Of course, just in this last couple of months Riley and their son Kieran have become closer. The pictures that follow are of dinner out in Kensington last week. It was a classic kids out of control dinner, but it was great fun.