Christmas Photo Sesh

For Lyla's first Christmas we were lucky enough to have Auntie Jo around to take some cute Christmasy photos of L.  This year it was up to me, and I'm an amateur at best.  The day we were putting our Christmas decorations away I made up a little photo booth with high hopes for getting a couple of cute pictures of our baby Evie Sis for her first Christmas. 

It went even more terribly than I anticipated which led to my own meltdown and timeout.  There are two things that will send me straight through the roof - 1) not cooperating for photos and 2) not nursing / messing with my milk supply.  I'm telling you, it makes my blood boil just thinking about either of those things.  Also, E is the queen of finicky nursing and L is the absolute worst with the camera.  I have more meltdowns than I'd like to admit.

Anyways, I'm glad I gave it a second chance because I got some really cute ones!  I was so excited and my blood pressure finally returned to a normal range.  My poor family.

I used picmonkey.com, a free photo editing website for the editing - I highly recommend it!

- K

 

Baby Boom

I'm pretty sure 90% of my Facebook friends are getting ready to have a baby, or just did.  I don't know what happened 9 months ago, but I feel confident that we are in the middle of a brand new Baby Boomer generation.  We even have our own little baby boom happening in our family right now.  Savannah, my sister, had a baby boy named Bane a couple of weeks ago and Ryan's sister, Alycia, is having a baby in just over a month. 

I got to sneak home with my girls a few days after Bane made his appearance, and he was the most precious little thing!  Savannah married into motherhood, she has two of the sweetest boys as stepsons, but seeing my sister have a baby of her very own was completely incredible.  Since becoming a mom one of my favorite things is to watch women become moms and witness the transforming and overwhelming love that takes over their lives.  Seeing that with my sister was as close as it comes to having experienced it myself.  She's a total natural and is handling the whole new motherhood thing with such grace.

While I was home we also had Alycia's baby shower, which was so fun.  Lyla was so excited to have a party for the baby, and ate a year's worth of sugar and "helped" Auntie Alycia with every one of her presents.  Evie was (and still is (insert all the misery emoticons here)) teething, so I pretty much hung out in the corner trying to keep Ms. Crabby Pants distracted.  Alycia isn't finding out the sex of the baby, and I'll tell you what, that is s-m-a-r-t when it comes to showers.  I can't tell you how many headbands I got for Lyla's shower, but Alycia got so many things that were actually useful, including what I estimate to be 2 years worth of baby soap and lotion.

The trip was difficult at times, being on my own, but it's always nice to get home.  Especially when it includes some 60 degree days and a brand new, squishy little nephew in my arms.  Can't wait to meet the next little one in March!

- K

Winter Days

The other day I saw a quote that said "You can never have too much winter in the winter", and I thought to myself, that person has obviously never survived a Minnesotan winter.  This year has actually been really mild so far - we didn't even have a white Christmas, but believe me, I did not complain. 

The first weekend after Christmas we got a pretty good little snowfall AND it was still above freezing - a rarity in these parts.  We bundled up the girls and went out to do some sledding, and Lyla made her first ever snow angel.  It was so fun, and I'm glad we took advantage since the temp quickly took a dive below 0 and has been there ever since.

- K