Mama's little gardener

How does Elmo's garden grow? First he tills the soil just so... Well, Elmo is ahead of us getting his hands dirty, but we're not far behind. We planted the front flower bed a couple weekends ago and bought all the vegetable plants and misc. other ones for the back bed, but it's been rainy and chilly for about a week so we haven't gotten them in yet. Lily loves being outside. When we walk around the house, we inevitably end up at either the front or back door. She reaches up for the door knob - smart baby - and we at least peek outside. We caught about a half hour of partly sunny skies yesterday so that Lily could inspect the dirt. She had tried to play in the back flower bed, but isn't tall enough to get her hands in there. Unlike the front one where she can pluck the blossoms from the flowering impatiens and begonias...

Lily also is very fascinated with Oakey the little oak tree - who was our baby before Lily came along - but she's still learning to 'be nice' and not pluck his gorgeous leaves off.

It's so nice to see her enjoying mucking in the dirt so much. Maybe she'll take after her mama.

So sweet...

This kid gets sweeter and more wonderful everyday. She's becoming more affectionate with her sloppy kisses and 'so-tight' hugs. If you could package up and sell this stuff...

Lily's also been sleeping pretty good, six and a half hours in a row last night - which is excellent for her! And her fear of strangers has greatly diminished. Unfortunately, she was so unsure of who I was the other morning in my gardening attire, including a hat, that she had no idea who I was - and clung to her nana. Wow. It was sad that she couldn't recognize me, but good that she knows that nana is safe. Baby steps. Lily and I have probably only been apart for about 8 to 10 hours in her entire life, so we're pretty attached. (I went xmas shopping, for drinks once and to Wal-Mart a few times.)

Even though it's nice when Lily's daddy is home to hand her off to once in a while - even though she tends to lunge or otherwise travel in my direction - I love every minute I spend with her.

She crawls!

Yayyy for baby Lily!!! This morning I sat Lily on the couch to take a few pictures in her new summer outfit ('cause it got up to 27 today) and she just started crawling towards me and the Cheerios. She hadn't been having much luck with crawling and always ended up frustated because she scooted backwards and away from any objects of desire. It's kind of funny because just yesterday I was (again) demonstrating the motions we have to make to crawl - maybe she was studying extra hard that time. Anyway, I am so proud of our little munchmallow. And fearful of all the upcoming floor cleaning.

Good night

Last night, Lily's daddy went to check on her after an 11 p.m. wakening. After about ten minutes of her sporatic crying, I decided to pack it in and go to bed to soothe the little munchkin. Sometimes she only wants her mama - which is nice because there's nothing better than a warm baby wrapping her arms around your head and nuzzling her forehead against yours as she falls back asleep. She's a cuddler, making her a perfect match for her parents. We've recently put our double bed on the floor and paired it with a twin bed so we all have a little more room to stretch out and it's amazing. Makes those weekend family naps sprawled out in the sun so, so good... Can't wait to crawl into bed tonight.

This is a test. It is only a test.

I find it amazing that I can so easily publish posts, that I'm simply just sending an e-mail to publish this. If there's any
consolation to going back to work in August, it is that I can
(hopefully) kill my spare time, and there always is some, writing
about my daughter instead of agonizing that the clock doesn't move
fast enough to 5:00.

Happy Mother's Day!

Today is my first Mother's Day. For the last week I've been pestering Lily to say ma ma ma - but she only wants to spit out ga goo bob boob ba ba ba. Lily's nana came over and we had a good supper tonight of steak, garlic baby potatoes, corn on the cob and strawberry mango pie with a nice Shiraz. Lily liked chewing on the corn on the cob, really the only thing that kept her from whining. This afternoon's nap apparently wasn't long enough... She's asleep now and has been for the past three hours. Sleep has been a challenge, as has eating. We're trying to cut out the nighttime feedings so she eats more during the day and even after only two days, it's making a big difference. Today we made some barley and celery cooked in chicken broth, then mixed it with a couple 'cubes' of carrots I had previously made. And she liked it. Not enough to eat a lot of it, but she had just finished a snack of mangoes. I'm so proud when she eats good. She's such my sucky; I love being her mama so much.

Brand spanking new

I've started this blog for my daughter, Lily, who turned nine months old today. She is an amazing little girl who gets better everyday, especially over the last few weeks when her sense of humour caught up with her wonderfully funny parents. Oh, she's been much easier to make and keep happy! Since her baby book cannot possibly hold all the wonderful little stories about her, I'm going to try and make this our little diary. Let's see if I can keep it up...

And I'll be burying masthead files here, too.