July Eve

Happy July 1st eve! ;)  July has always been my favorite month of the year, so I'm pretty excited it's here.  Tyler took a couple extra days off this week to make an extended holiday weekend and to hangout with Ellie and I on my birthday.  We don't have much planned except to see our family a couple times, but I'm looking forward to having him home for a five day staycation.  We're hoping for some nice weather this weekend so we can take Ellie for her first swim at my aunt's house!  I'm so excited to see what she thinks of it.  Even if she ends up hating it, she'll look pretty cute sportin' her chubby legs in her bathing suit! ;)

I also have a couple projects I want to work on at some point.  One being a gallery wall in our living room.  We have a huge empty wall and I've had pictures printed for awhile but no frames.  I ended up ordering some cheap frames on Amazon (frames can be so expensive!) and they'll be here on Thursday.  I also want to paint the inside of our front door.  Right now it's just white so I'm thinking of painting it the same light blue-ish color as our coffee table to add some color to the room - it's currently fifty shades of brown.  The reality is that Tyler will be doing these things while I do laps around the house with Ellie.  But that's life, right? ;)  

With the 4th this weekend, I'll likely try to fit something red, white + blue into our menu.  I love getting a little festive with my food around a holiday!  Sometimes we (I) eat like five year olds but I don't care.  I can't wait until Ellie is old enough to appreciate my efforts though!  The Fourth of July is pretty easy to do this with.  There are so many red, white + blue options out there!  Even these waffles we had the other day look festive with just some whipped cream, strawberries and blueberries!  You might even be able to make the waffle look like a flag. ;)

Pinterest is always my go-to if I'm looking for any kind of recipe.  Last year, we had "star spangled sangria".  There are tons of recipes out there and I didn't follow any one exactly.  I think I ended up just mixing Pinot Grigio with Fresca until it tasted how I liked, then added strawberries, blueberries and star-shaped pineapple chunks.

Yes, I took the time to cut the pineapple into stars with a cookie cutter.  Yes, it was a giant pain in the ass.   Word of advice - make sure your cookie cutter is small enough that it won't be cutting into any of the core!

I also used the cookie cutter to cut watermelon for fruit salad.  This was definitely a lot easier than cutting the pineapple and equally as cute!

I've seen these layered drinks all over Pinterest and think they look so cool, but I'm not sure how they would taste.  Ridiculously sweet, I'm sure.  And maybe kind of gross?

Of course, a Fourth of July cookout would be perfect for a sundae bar like we had on Labor Day.  You could even include some red, white + blue sprinkles! :)

(original post)

 And because no post is complete without my Ellie girl, I caught these two holding "hands" this morning in bed.  

Before Ellia was born, we totally thought Aubrey wouldn't like a baby.  Turns out, they're BFFs in the making. :)




 Hope you're all having a great week!

Two Months of Ellia

Age: Two months

Height: 22 inches

Weight: 10 lbs 4.5 oz - the doctor said both her height and weight were in the 30-40th percentiles, but didn't give me exact numbers.

Clothing size: 0-3 months.

Diaper size: 1. 

Eating: Girlfriends still got a healthy appetite!  She eats about every 2 hours during the day sometimes more, sometimes less (usually more).  At night, I'll typically get one 4-4.5 hour stretch out of her (woo hoo!).  I'm trying to decide when I will switch her over to formula.  I wouldn't be considering it yet if I wasn't going back to work in a few weeks but I'm not sure how pumping will go logistically when I'm traveling around to different clients, especially trying to keep up with her current demand! It might take up half my work day.  I will definitely be sad when we do make the switch.  Breastfeeding can be a pain sometimes but I totally didn't think I'd actually enjoy it. Mostly just the time cuddling my girl :) and not having to get up in the middle of the night to make a bottle!  Tyler gave her her first bottle around 4.5 weeks.  I said I would give her a bottle a day to get her used to them but considering I kind of hate pumping, that stopped pretty quickly.  I am just a little bit dreading the transition, especially because she does a lot of comfort nursing... Not sure it's going to go over too well for either of us! 

Sleeping: She's now sleeping in our bed every night. I just found she slept so much better with us (actually the only way she would sleep for more than 15 minutes at a time), so it made the most sense since I liked getting a little more sleep, too!  She's been pretty consistently going to bed around midnight.  Other than that, there's not much of a schedule being followed.  I guess most nights she'll wake up sometime between 4:00 and 4:30, and then every 2ish hours after that until she finally gets up around 10:00.   Some nights she'll still get up every 2 hours though.  The biggest difference from the first month is that about 95% of the time, she'll go right back to sleep after she eats so I'm not doing laps around the house at 3 am trying to get her to sleep.  She just kind of cat naps all day. Sometimes I'll get a solid hour nap out of her, which is nice if I want to actually try to accomplish something!   She still grunts and snorts like crazy when she's waking up - little beast! ;). 

Tyler took this picture one morning before work. How could I say no to that little cuddle bug?!  She hardly takes up any room - see? :)

Favorite toys:  She is really liking her activity mat now!  It can entertain her for like half an hour at a time. She stares and kicks and squeals. It's pretty cute. :)

Loves:  Still loves being held and eating!  Definitely enjoying her baths now, too.  Cannot get enough cuddles, especially from mama.  She loves to be the little spoon! She loves being on the move - just walking around the house or in the car (not a fan of the car seat if the car isn't moving though).  She also likes watching TV.  

Ellie loves to talk and kick her little legs!  She's also learning to scream, so she'll do that randomly.  She's got really good head/neck control now and loves to show it off.  Most of the time, she's got the most serious face on but she's getting more and more of a personality, which is so cute to see.  She's growing so much, so fast!

I'm almost certain we have the cutest child that ever lived. :)

Happy two months, Ellie Belle!

 Those CHEEKS!

 

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to my two favorite guys.

My dad. The most hardworking person I know.  He would do anything for his girls.  We are so lucky to have you as our dad.  "E. Summer" is so lucky to have you as her Grampy, too.  We appreciate you more than you know.  Love you!

And Tyler.  The person who can make Ellie smile the biggest and never complains about a diaper change.  The guy who never fails to bring home a surprise from the grocery store and always goes along with my endless lists of projects around the house.  The (second) most hardworking person that I know. :) My chauffeur, oil change-getter, delivery phone call-maker.  Pizza + pancake chef, grill-master extraordinaire. ;)  You've been helping to take care of me for years and I love seeing you take care of our baby girl now, too.  

 You're also the most fabulous daddy to our fur babies who spent a long nine months on litter box duty. ;) We all love you! xo

As for our Father's Day weekend festivities, I'm planning on making Tyler a special breakfast on Sunday if I can get 10 minutes away from the babe (special because I never make him breakfast, not because I'm planning anything extravagant haha).  Not sure what the rest of our day will entail but I'm guessing it will involve sweatpants on the couch + deep dish pizza take-out. ;)  Exciting stuff over here!

Hope everyone has a great Father's Day weekend + a happy first day of summer!!