This is why mommies need more than two hands

you can't carry baby and other things at the same time, so you improviseJulia's sporting her three month old clothes now
and this is just because we don't take enough pictures with the parents in them.

Time for an Update

It's been a couple weeks since I posted, but really there's not much interesting going on around here...so I'll just have to bore you with the mundane details of our lives and post a few random pictures. Julia's still getting big. Everywhere I go people think she is older than she really is because she looks so big. She actually stays awake now for a while after she finishes eating, but still managed to sleep all through church today and through most of the BBQ we went to yesterday. She seems to want to save her grouchy time for only Robert and I =) .

Robert took a couple days off of work this week to sand down the frames on our windows so we can paint them after we replace all the actual windows in the next few weeks.

The big excitement today was some idiot speeding down our street, lose control of his car, and run into a tree a few houses down from us. I looked out the window to see what had happened and saw someone running down the street, so I looked to see where he was running to when the neighbor across the street ran out of her house screaming at him not to ditch. Turns out it was the driver running away.

We're looking forward to our summer plans visiting family. We have my family reunion in June, my brother's wedding in July, and Robert's sister's wedding in August, plus Robert wants to do a camping trip in September. Any tips on traveling with a two/three/four/five month old? We'll be driving ten hours in June and flying for both the weddings.

Okay, here's the pictures.Julia gets lots of kisses from Daddy.
And lots of snuggle time with me. And this is her being pretty in her Sunday dress. We have a picture with the full dress too, but she was screaming in that one, so not as cute. BTW, can you tell how she likes to be held best? Half the time she's crying I just put her up on my shoulder and she stops.

Homeless Families

This CNN video is about a lady staying at the PATH homeless shelter in Los Angeles, which is one of the sites where I used to work back when I worked at two sites. Families like this, homeless with no place to go, would come in and I would help find them a shelter to stay at. This lady is one of the lucky ones who gets to stay at the PATH. PATH is clean, in a decent neighborhood, and allows residents to stay for six months. Unfortunately in Los Angeles even shelters that are in places like skid row and have a 30 day stay are almost always full. Back when I was still working we were seeing a lot of families with children come in who we couldn't place in shelters right away.

Other Highlights

Other highlights from the past week:

Baby Shower in West L.A.- Aunt Wendy threw us a baby shower in West L.A. so all our old friends could come and see the baby. I was kind of nervous that Julia was going to be fussy since it was in the evening and Julia has started to get fussy a lot in the evenings. She ate literally right before the shower though and slept in the arms of grandma the entire time. The shower was great and it was so fun to so all the friends that we haven't seen since we moved. We are so blessed to have so many people who care about us!

Mother's Day- Robert made breakfast for me (first time since our anniversary that he's cooked anything) and then we went to church for the first time since Julia was born. It was a little nerve wrecking wondering what I was going to do if she woke up and started crying, but once again, she slept all through sacrament. (One day I'll look back and laugh about being nervous to take her anywhere.) After that we skipped out on the rest of church and went to West L.A. once again for dinner with family and to take grandma to the airport. It was wonderful having Robert's mom here (actually, even though I missed Robert when he was in Chicago, it was a lot better than having Robert here since grandma is good with babies and is a wonderful cook.)New Den- We did a little rearranging in our house this week. We got a new sectional couch and made the open part of the kitchen into the new TV room, and moved the table to the middle room to make it the dining room. Here's Julia enjoying her new digs.
Chicago- Robert went to Chicago last week for training, however he specifically chose to go to Chicago for training this year so he could go to both a Cubs and a White Sox game. I'll let him post more about his trip if he wants, but here he is at the Cubs game.

One Month!

Today Julia turns one month old! It's amazing how time flies by with a little one (I think its because the days all meld together from lack of sleep). She is doing great. She's finally figured out that nighttime means its time to sleep and will usually only wake up once at night, and then she eats and goes right back to sleep. Of course, that's usually what she does during the day too (and yet she is still so much work!), but she's started being nice to me and sleeping for longer stretches at night.

You can probably tell from the pictures that she is getting big. She seems so smart to me and I think of her as her own little person. She's got her own personality and I really look forward to when she will be able to interact more with us. It's going to be so much fun to get to know her. Even though mommyhood has been much harder than I expected it to be for me, I still am loving it and loving it more and more everyday as I get used to this new lifestyle.

I still don't know if I can officially say Julia is smiling for real, but she does seem to smile a lot more than she used to when Robert and I are talking to her. The cutest thing she does is smile and chuckle in her sleep. I don't know what that all is about (is she really smiling and laughing?) but it sure is adorable.

Family Resemblance?

Melarie
Julia

Check It Out Daddy

Hey Daddy! I went for a walk today in my "Cadillac of strollers" (grandma's words). I loved all the new sights and sounds and the fresh air. I even stayed awake the whole time. (And check out our green grass.)

What I Did Today

Dear Daddy,

Today was another fun filled day with grandma and mommy. I ate, slept, ate, slept, ate, slept, ate slept and then watched grandma and mommy eat dinner. After dinner I was awake so they took more pictures of me. I must be famous because I get a lot of pictures taken of me. Then I ate, and ate and ate and finally went to sleep. It was a tiring day.

Love,

Julia

Dear Daddy

Dear Daddy,

Mommy says we have to do lots of blog posts this week since you are in Chicago and missing us. Since you left Grandma Wheat came to visit us. I really like spending time with her and am very well behaved (except when I'm hungry, which is actually pretty often). Here's a picture of me hanging out with grandma.Today I went on my very first outing (not counting doctor visits). We went to West L.A. to visit at Uncle Steve and Aunt Wendy's house. I really liked the long freeway drive. In fact, I slept the whole way there!I liked meeting new family members today and was actually awake a lot of the time so they could see me. Mommy says I'm getting big so fast so she took lots of pictures of me today. Here's me with Aunt Wendy.

We miss you Daddy and can't wait until you come back next week!

Love,

Julia

P.S. I'm three weeks old today!