Happy New Year!

Lily's first New Year and outfit!  Check out the shoes!

Happy 2011 everyone!

Presents

Lily had a great Christmas with lots of fun and thoughtful gifts.Some Christmas photos:

From Justin and Kendal.

Obviously, Jason's favorite. Lily got a little tired so we just opened up her gifts and she napped. Here are some pics with her and her new things!

Her little push wagon.  She can use this as a walker in the next few months.

Lily and Violet, or what I can Teddy Ruxbin 3000.  This is from Leapfrog and is programmable.  It says her name, knows her favorite colors, animals, etc. and sings her songs and talks to her.  Pretty amazing stuff!  She thinks it tastes good now and that's about it.  But I know she'll learn a lot from it as she figures things out.

 More stuffed animals.  Her first teddy bear!!

Next, what we woke up to Sunday morning.

 

And finally, Nana got run over by a reindeer!!

 Happy Holidays!

Moving around...

Lately, one of our favorite pastimes is to see how much Lily moves around at night.  She is going down to sleep really well.  She may not fall asleep right away, but she will talk and giggle to herself and finally fall fast asleep.  Usually we put her down in her crib so her head is towards the window and her feet are towards the closet. 

She is moving a lot now.  This is how I found her.

Her head is next to the closet.  The girl is doing a 180, and then backing her head into the corner.

Apparently the paci is making the trip as well.  But she sure is cute when she wakes up!

Christmas pics coming soon!

Christmas Dress

We got some ADORABLE clothes for Lily from cousin Sheena and Auntie Sandy.  Lily wore this dress to church, complete with shoes.  Usually kids don't need shoes, but in this case, about 4 extra inches of tights were stuffed into the bottom of the shoes.  Hey, we make it work.

Jason is growing in his winter facial hair.  I have mixed feelings.

And our Christmas card pictures.  Jason did a fantastic job on these.  We did it in about 30 minutes because we procrastinate, the coupon expired that day, and Lily was getting into her grumpy mood.  But Jason got some great shots.

She sure moves a lot, as you can tell by her ghost foot and blurry face.  My favorite one is this one, and Jason's edit after.

That cute little tongue! It looks like she is trying hard.  I don't think she pooped though, so she must just be thinking.  I love Christmas!!

She has changed

Lily is going to be 20 weeks tomorrow.  I can't believe how fast the time has flown by.  These are the days of our lives.  Its amazing how much she has changed.  Here she is when we were leaving the hospital. 

She was SO tiny! I remember the drive home and Jason and I wondering what we got ourselves into.  We still don't know. 

Here she is in her car seat today:

 She looks huge!

She rolled over yesterday from her stomach to her back.  I don't think it was on purpose, but she did it.  I had her doing her tummy time in the crib while I picked out her clothes.  When I turned back to get her, she was halfway over.  Then she landed on her back and started playing with her hands like an old pro.  This is happening way too fast!  As soon as she's mobile we aren't going to be able to just leave her places.  She may not be there when we get back!  I'm going to have to look into low-jacking my baby.

Cooking day

This quick post isn't about Lily but it is about some freakish food in my kitchen.  I am trying to watch my carbs so I made some hard boiled eggs.  I put some vinegar in the water.  Supposedly it helps keep the egg white together if an egg cracks.  This is the egg I got.

And to add it that, this is the largest butternut squash I've ever seen.  I almost weighs more than Lily!

That is a 4 cup measuring cup next to it and it is that close to the bottom of my cupboards.  That sucker weighed over 9 lbs!  Crazy.  I'll be freezing some squash for sure.

Lily's New Toy

We've graduated Lily to a play mat on the floor with one of those toys that has stuff that hangs in her face and she can grab it.  This one makes noise and she has the best time with it.  When we went to the doctor for our four month check up, I felt bad for saying she put her hands together, because she really didn't do it on purpose.  My doc seemed like he didn't believe me when I said she didn't, so I said she did and pretended like I didn't know what he meant.  So I'm agreeing that she has played with her fingers and meanwhile I'm thinking "How is she going to function in daily life when she doesn't even know her hands are hers to operate???"

Fast forward 5 days and she is all about her hands.  But as you can see from the video here, her right hand is still controlling her.  It all started when she was about 2 months old.  She'd have her paci in her mouth, and that right hand would come closer and closer to her paci.  She'd see it coming because her eyes would get all wide, but then that hand would yank it out of her mouth.  Then she'd scream.  We're still not sure if she was upset about losing her paci or if it was the rogue hand that was bothering her.  But I'm thinking its that hand.  It seems to have a mind of its own.  She looks surprised by its behavior in any case.

Either that or she is one slow motion ninja.  Hiiii yah!

Thanksgiving

We had such a great Thanksgiving holiday.  Michelle, Rod, and Nina came in from Colorado and Mom and Dad came from Texas.  Lily got to meet her cousin and aunt and uncle for the first time.  It was wonderful to have family around. 

 Here are the Carters, with Michelle holding Lily.  Nina loved that key from our media cabinet.  She was very careful not to lose it.  We had so much fun with Nina.  She really likes taking "pictures" with her princess cell phone. She also loves playing games, especially Sorry.  She was trying to convince me and Grandma to play and she said she knows how to play and win.  So I said, "Are you sure you don't cheat?" and Nina looked me dead in the eye and said "I don't cheat.  I win."  She intimidated me so I didn't play.  Later when I went up to feed Lily on our bedroom, I shut our door and noticed our closet light was on and the door was slightly open.  So I opened the door and here was Nina, sitting in the corner with a huge smile on her face.  She said, "Is Grandma here?" and I told her no.  Then she said, "Good.  Don't tell her where I am.  I'm hiding from her."  Then I noticed she had her Sorry game pieces in her hand.  Later, Mom told me they were playing and she was going to send her pieces back home so Nina grabbed them and ran.  I guess that's a win.

Mom and Dad had a great time, and lost some money playing cards.  Here they are with our "Little Turkey."  We had great weather when everyone was here so that was awesome.  It was cool, but not cold.  Quite pleasant really.

Nina was very careful around Lily.  Here she is holding her.  The two granddaughters.

 Nina takes a great picture.  Lily is a little distracted.  Lily just realized her hands are there for the tasting and was sucking on them all Thanksgiving.  She also has learned to giggle.  She has been constantly giggling since then.  We call it her pterodactyl cry, but it's a happy sounds for sure.

And finally, a picture of Auntie Michelle and Lily.  Michelle was about to go to sleep and Lily was up for her dreamfeed but it still looks cute. 

 It was so great to have Michelle here.  She is hilarious, and even though I wanted her to have a break, she did a lot of the Thanksgiving dinner cooking.  She made delicious stuffing and gravy.  Such good eating.

There is nothing like having family around.

Lily's Four Month Checkup

We went to Lily's four month checkup.  She is 11 pounds, 13 oz, 24.5 inches long, with a head circumference of 38 cm.  She is long and thin, according to her percentages.

When I said she has a small head, the doctor didn't miss a beat and said "She has your head."  So I guess either I have a small head or Jason has a big one.  We were also concerned about her eyes crossing.  Dr. Kapp checked them, said they looked fine, but will refer us to a pediatric ophthalmologist to ease my mind.  He did say it looks good, but her eye shape and position may exaggerate any cross-eyedness.  Then he said she has Jason's close set eyes.

I guess we have a looker on our hands, with a small head and close set eyes.  I was joking at first but then I took this picture:

I LOVE THIS PICTURE! She looks a little drunk.  She just ate and it is a bad shot but it sure makes me laugh.  Here's a more photogenic one:

Our little sweet girl!!

Visit with Nana and Mamma

We were so excited to have Jason's mom (Nan) and grandma (Mamma) come visit is for a quick weekend!  They were here for just a few days but I am so glad Lily got to be held by them.  Lily was a little fussy at times but Nana and Mamma were very gracious and didn't seem to mind too much. We had a great time and it was very relaxing.  Hopefully next time Lily will be a little calmer.

Here is a picture of 4 generations of the Hardeman/Cole family.  What a set of lookers!

Jason looks huge next to his petite family.  We are so glad they came!

She's growing!

Today it hit me on how lucky we are to have such a great baby.  Lily went down for her morning nap with no crying, woke up happy, and then we ran errands.  She got a little fussy in a new store I wanted to check out but I did forget her paci in the car so I can't blame her too much.  I got her back in her carseat and she cried some until she got her paci back in her mouth.  The rest of the ride was quiet so I assumed she fell asleep.  I stopped at the library and then the grocery store.  When I was getting her out of her carseat and into my carrier, I noticed she was wide awake, no pacifier, and just looking around!  And when we were leaving the store, I got several compliments on how alert she is.  She is such a good baby!

Her new thing is the bouncy chair.  Jay took this video the other day.  He's right; we could listen to the sound of her voice ALL day.

I think that sound is the beginning of her laugh.  Its a squeal of delight!

Apple Picking

Since we didn't have any plans for Saturday, which is rare, we decided to go apple picking.  We drove for about an hour and a half upstate towards Spartanburg.  We pulled up to Niven's Apple Orchard.  It was a great day -- surprisingly cool for South Carolina.  I think it was in the low 50's outside with a cool breeze. 

 
It is a really cute place, however I should have called to find out if they had any apples left.  They do, but they were all picked and bagged up.  With no apple picking, only apple buying, we walked around the farm, checked out some cute baby goats, bought 2 bags of apples and some muscadine cider, and were on our way home within 15 minutes of arriving.  It wasn't a total loss though.  I got some Arkansas Black apples, which I never heard of before, and some Winesap apples.  So it is a little more special than the grocery store apples.  We took a few pictures.

We love to carry Lily, and today it worked out really well since Jay got to keep her warm.  She loves the carrier too!

And the two loves of my life.  With matching hats, kind of.

And a close up of our sweet girl!  She was great the whole time, in the car and for all 15 minutes outside.  Its hard to tell, but her eyes are slowing changing color.  Right now, her right eye is darkening faster than her left, so she has two different color eyes.  Its not extreme, but noticeable.  We can't decide if they are turning brown or green.  We are hoping for green, but she'd make brown look good too!  It was a really nice day.  Now for a nice bowl of spicy chili, made by Jay himself!

Halloween

We had a great Halloween party at a friends house Friday night.  Another friend, Melba, was kind enough to take pictures.  Here is our family portrait:  we dressed up as two farmers that grew a prize winning sweet pea. 

Lily was really good at the party.  Its not a great pic of her because we just woke her up to put the costume on her.  Plus, it was a little too big for her.  But we love her anyway.  And it was Jason's great idea to put the pin on her.  I thought it made it much cuter.

Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary to the best parents in the world.  We love you!

And Happy Halloween too!

Love her little Jack Sparrow hands!

Riley

I love our dogs.  Really I do.  One of them, Riley, is quite a character.  He has some weird habits.  First, the dogs are not allowed on our furniture.  So whenever we leave, Riley follows us to the door, watches us leave, and then gets on the couch.  I know this because he will look out the window for our car, and the couch is under the window.  Plus, we've come home and there have been drool marks on the pillows.  Don't worry, we wash the slipcover regularly.  We can't ever catch him in the act in the house because he hears the garage door and then goes into his room and lays down like he's been there the whole time.  Couch is still warm though.

Another habit of his is bringing us something when we come home if he really missed us.  It can be anything from his favorite toy to a twist tie he found on the ground.  Yesterday when Jay came home, Riley brought him this.

There were two of them from a birthday cake we bought for a friend.  Now these were on our counter, and Riley likes to help himself to things he wants up there.  You can hear his feet clicking as he jumps to see what's up there.  Anyway, Jay took this away from him.  I didn't think anything of it until I found this today.

Looks like someone is going decorate our backyard with some colorful balloons.

Yep, that's my boy.

One of us is feeling better

Well, Lily has been an absolute joy to be around these past few days.  I love waking her up in the morning; she usually stretches and grunts, and when you say "Good morning Lily," she breaks into a huge grin.  Yesterday she napped well and went to bed very easily.

Which was a huge blessing because I got some sort of cold.  I woke up Tuesday morning with a sore throat.  I assumed it was because we kept the windows open.  But as the day wore on, I felt worse and worse.  Today, Lily and I napped together most of the day.  She is feeling fine - still in a great mood.  Me, not so much.

Here is a picture from Boo at the Zoo.  I couldn't get rid of the red-eye, but its still a picture.  She is quite a cutie pie.

She is small still, buit we sure look like giants next to her!  She 3 months old in this picture.  Time sure flies!