Splish Splash!

To say Bella loves to swim is the understatement of the year. I cannot emphasize enough how much Bella LOVES to swim, she is a little fish! It is one of my favorite things to do with her because it is always filled with laughter and a squealing, happy baby! Today she started trying to do a swimming motion with her harms which I, of course, thought was adorable. Look at her go!

Just an Inch! That's All She Wants!

Bella is really working on her crawling. You can just see how frustrated she is that she can't crawl to something she wants or to one of us, poor thing! All she wants to do if she is on the ground is flip to her belly and try to crawl! Here is a little video I got of her trying to crawl to me, she can really turn herself around on her belly now and has moved small amounts forward (ok, maybe like millimeters, but it seems like a lot!) and has accidentally scooted backwards now a few times, she is a determined little girl!

Rainy Day at the Lake

We were leaving church, it was overcast and rainy and such a nice day! Rowdy mentions the idea that maybe we should drive up to Bartlett Lake for fun, half kidding. We decided we wanted to go on a family adventure so we headed that direction. On the way we stopped at my parents house to borrow the camera because I had forgotten to throw mine in the bag, and get some refreshments for everyone. We started the drive up to the lake, which is really not very far and a pretty drive. What a fun day! We didn't stay too long because when the sun was out it was pretty bright and next time we will bring some more coverage for Bella so her sweet little baby skin doesn't get overexposed to the sun. It was so beautiful there and it was just a nice, simple afternoon. I had such a hard time picking my favorite pictures so I just included most of them.

I love her, I could squeeze her all day long!

So pretty and foggy/rainy!

A closeup, I love Bella's look on her face. It makes me think of the paparazzi pictures in People magazine of celebrities. They are always looking over their shoulder and suddenly realizing they are being photographed and have an irritated look on their face like, "why are you spoiling this special moment by taking a picture"....that is Bella's face in this picture!

Love my peanut

I thinkwe tend to forget there is such beauty in AZ so near by, it's nice to be able to go outside and enjoy it when it's not a million degrees!

LOVE

Looking at the water and the boats and jet skis

LOVE them! She looks so much like her daddy! (And how cute is she in her jeans!!?!)

They love eachother

Bella put her feet in the water. Since we aren't headed to the beach this summer this is our beach moment :-) So adorable to watch them together!

She is a little fish, so naturally, she loved the water!

Love my family!

Just chilling with our jeans rolled up on the "beach"

Luckily, we had an umbrella in the car so we could cover Bella. Bella was more obsessed with getting things out of her diaper bag and usually chewing on her diaper bag :-)

Bella chewing on her diaper bag, crazy girl!

Isabella Grace is 6 Months Old! Happy Half Birthday!

Isabella Grace: 6 Months Old

I will say this a lot, I know this, I accept this, I can't stop saying it: how can my tiny, scrunchy, itty bitty, premie clothes wearing, precious little angel be 6 MONTHS OLD?! Half a year has gone by! Sometimes, when I'm sitting on the couch watching tv, I still feel like a big old 8 month preggo lady on bed rest (which I was not very good at), patiently waiting to meet my daughter. Wondering what she will be like, what she will look like. I was just watching a video we took of her during her first month when I was holding her. She was just a tiny little thing looking around, occassionally letting out that tiny little cry that could barely be heard (and yet somehow it felt like the loudest thing in the world to me.....little did I know). She was so fresh and new, just trying to figure out where she was and what was going on. It seems like so much time has passed and yet so little, it feels like I have known her for a thousand years and it also feels like I blinked. It's amazing how much can change in 6 months, how different a baby becomes! Isabella's little personality is so evident now, so funny, so silly, so sweet, such a girl, such a little person with her own tiny thoughts and own tiny personality. When you are pregnant you spend so much time wondering what your child will be like and when you meet them and really get to know them it is so clear that they couldn't be anyone else but who they are. I can't imagine my daughter being different from Isabella, sure I hope to eventually be blessed with another child, but there is no other Isabella. Nobody else in the world gets to spend all day with my Isabella, nobody else in the world gets to experience my Isabella's smile, my Isabella's laugh, my Isabella's cry, my Isabella's first roll, crawl, walk, etc. It's just such an incredible thing! Rowdy and I feel so incredibly blessed that she is ours. God created our perfect daughter, he created her to join our family, to bless our little world and the world at large and we are just so happy she is here! Ok ok, enough gushing, here are some sweet pictures of Bella and some updates on what she is like at 6 months:

Love her sweet face

So beautiful! Such an adorable smile!

Trying to get a picture with Bella and the "6" cube, she was far more interested in playing with it than sitting by it

She loves to hold her feet

Mmmmm....avocado

Learning how to use the sippy cup, right now she just likes to chew on it (like everything else!)

Playing in her jumperoo, so fun!

She loves to feed herself with the mesh feeder, eating some yummy banana

• Bella is eating one solid meal a day aside from nursing. She always has oatmeal and another fruit or veggie. So far she has had: applesauce, banana, avocado, sweet potatos, pear, green beans, peach and peas. Her favorites so far are banana, avocado and sweet potatos.


• In other feeding news, she loves her mesh feeder. She loves it if I put a half of a banana or some chunks of avocado in it and she can just gnaw on it. She seems to actually get irritates when I just give her mushed up banana instead of in her mesh feeder. We are also trying to introduce her slowly to the sippy cup. So far she is a little confused about it, she likes if I hold it for her but doesn't seem to really understand what is happening with it yet, she will drink but doesn't seem super interested.


• She is working on sitting up. She is not an independent sitter yet but she is getting stronger each day and she is super strong with very little support. She loves to sit in a highchair in a restaurant like a big girl and play with her toys!


• She is rolling both ways but seems to only like to roll from back to belly so she can play with toys and reach out for things.


• She is working on crawling/scooting. She will move her legs and plant her knees or feet and try to move forward. She lifts her butt up in the air but so far hasn't really made it anywhere yet but she can sort of work her way a little towards things. She is trying really hard and it's so cute! I can't believe we are getting close to crawling, how did we get here?!


• She doesn't laugh a ton yet but loves it when we blow raspberries on her belly, that seems to be her favorite so far. Her sweet little laugh is the best and even when she isn't laughing she is giving the biggest smile and there is nothing better than that!
  
• She absolutely loves her entertainer (and really likes her jumperoo as well)! She could be in the worst mood and you could put her in there and she would light up! She loves moving from toy to toy and trying to chew on them. She likes to hit them as well, but primarily, she wants to chew on them.


• She is an awesome sleeper. She has always been pretty consistent, only hitting little sleep snags here and there. She has never given us too much trouble in the sleep department (especially when it comes to night sleep) so we have been very blessed! We usually put her down between 6:30-7 and she will usually want to eat once during the night which only takes a few minutes and she falls right back to sleep (this can be anywhere between 1-5am, it really varies but usually around 4ish) and then she will sleep until about 7:30 typically and sometimes I have to go in there at 8 and wake her up to try to keep her on schedule! We feel so lucky to have such a great night sleeper! She is also pretty good with naps now, she generally takes 2 naps that are about 1.5hrs and 1 last catnap that is generally about 30-40 minutes long.

• Bella primarily sleeps on her belly. She will sometimes still sleep on her side but generally it is on her tummy. She almost never sleeps on her back!

• She is a joy and a blessing to everyone around her! We love her SO much!
  

Bella Babbles the Day Away (and rolls too!)

Bella is quite the little chatterbox these days. She babbles so much during the day while she plays, it's SO cute! And occassionally a "mama" will slip out (don't worry, I'm not delusional enough to believe she intentionally said it......or am I....) ;-) Also, towards the end of the clip she rolls from back to belly. She has been doing it for about 2 weeks now and she as become quite proficient at it. She is getting so big I can't believe it!

Houdini in Training

How does this child do it?! Seriously, she amazes me! She was always able to get out of any swaddle, not just with blankets, but with velcro, she would get both arms out and be wearing her swaddle like a skirt. We haven't been swaddling for a while now but today she reached a whole new level of "impressiveness." I was listening to Bella play in her crib this morning after waking up, I didn't look at the video monitor but just listened as she babbled and made sounds and seemed to be just enjoying her time in there. I finally decided, alright, it's time to go in, she has to be getting hungry, she's been awake for a little while. I walked in and this is the little goofball that I found. I don't know how she did it but somehow she managed to get her ENTIRE left arm out of her LONG SLEEVE pajamas. Not buttons undone (unless she has somehow managed to master the skill of buttoning/unbuttoning!). The neckhole was pulled under her left armpit and she was playing with the sleeve and chewing on it. She gave me this huge smile when I came in and just kept on chewing her sleeve, almost saying "look what I did mom! pretty cool, huh!" I love her and all of her craziness!

"Whats up mom, did you sleep good? I've ust been hanging out in my crib, and look at this cool thing I did!"

Super cool new chew toy, her sleeve!

Cute little baby in her big crib

Yum!

She was so pleased with herself!

Sunday Morning Family Time

This Sunday we played hooky. We skipped church and just enjoyed some fun time together as a family. Don't get me wrong, we love going to church together but so many times we are busy on Saturdays and don't get to spend time together just enjoying each other and then Sundays hit and before we know it, we are scrambling to get Bella a nap after church and get lunch and get the house cleaned and so on and so forth. So today we just slowed things down a bit and enjoyed being together, with NO plans! We slept in (Bella let us, yay!) played around a bit and headed out to Mimi's Cafe. Bella is getting so big and loves to look around and see things, she gets frustrated sitting in her infant carrier now when we go places so we decided since she is getting so close to sitting up independently that she was ready for the restaurant high chair. I love my Floppy Seat that I got as a gift, it is so handy and she loves playing with all the toys I can attach and bonus on the germ front, nothing falls on the ground if it's attached and trust me, everything ends up on the ground if it's not attached! You can also see in the pictures below that Bella is rocking a pretty sweet mohawk courtesy of Dad.

It was basically impossible to get her to look at the camera. It's usually so easy! She was just so fascinated by everything happening around her. She would just watch all the waitresses, following them from table to table, so cute!

She was so cozy in her seat! She looks like a little princess on her throne! (Everyone at Mimi's agreed, they all thought she was adorable!)

Here she has decided to suck on her thumb, which she has rediscovered in the last few days, still watching the waitress....

Every bite Rowdy would take she would watch him get the food on the fork and then watch him as he brought it to his mouth, and again, and again, she was practically drooling! (Actually, she probably WAS drooling!) Rowdy picked her up and she LUNGED at the french toast!

Heading back to the car, it was so bright out so Rowdy lent her his hat :-)