all day computer time

Despite the title, and how fun it sounds, don't be fooled . This was not pleasant computer time. Blech! I spent the day, all day, searching for a physician for Kris and myself. What a nightmare. I wanted to puke my brains out! After finally finding a FREE website to compare docs, (that took an hour or so, and discovery of many websites you had to pay for), the discovery of this one was wonderful! You do have to become a member, but there is absolutely no charge, it's more like creating an account to sign in to (if anyone wants to go, it's www.ratemds.com). I searched for hours finding the better docs, and then I called them all to find out is they accepted our insurance, when their first appointments were, if they were accepting patients, etc. Only to find out that they either were not accepting patients, did not take our insurance, or did not accept our HMO (that was AFTER I had given all of our information), or their first appointment wasn't until the end of November, which was too late for what we needed. I just about pulled my hair out. But, now that it's over, I'm a happy girl again.

Kris helped a friend move last night after work, so I was at home with Marin all day, alone until around 8:30. Today Kris has off from work, so this morning I took baby to a class at the YMCA. It's an outdoor stroller class, and I wasn't sure how much of a workout it would be, but good grief! I am sore! It was from 9 to 9:45, and The instructor was FAST! My poor pelvic bones are so used to taking a nice leisurely waddle, and the walk was kind of hard. I'm not used to being the slow one in the group, let alone the one at the end of the line! That's embarrasing for me! It was a great class though, I met some cool girls and got a good workout. Marin was great, she slept pretty much to whole time!

Speaking of sleeping, we went to bed at midnight last night, and she woke up 0515 t be fed. NICE! I was so happy:)

So now, Kris an baby and I are going to get out of the house for the rest of the day. He played with Marin this morning, kicking her legs and stretching her arms above her head, making all sorts of fun noises. It was so cute! She was smiling and loving it! She was really talking to Kris, making all sorts of cooing noises and trying to talk. What a great thing to watch your husband be a great dad

Pictures:
A little look around on the chnging table

I love this one, this is during her nap, and she's all curled up, just adorable:)

I Like Sunday Afternoons!

The last few days Marin and I have just been "chillin'", so we've had a good time. Friday she helped me make banana bread. That was the third loaf! I had SOOO many frozen bananas in the freezer, and each loaf called for 3, so that's 9, and I think I have one more in there now if you can believe it. Who knew I had such a passion for collecting those little brown frozen things? Anyway, the first two loaves I had made for the sisters I visit teach (which made Kris very sad by the way), so I made one Friday just for us:) I had made some cinnamon rolls for my doctor as I mentioned in a previous post, and poor Kris was beside himself thinking I was going to give the doctor the whole delicious pan of them! I could see the sweet relief on his face when I only packed up 5 on a plate to take. I love my husband, he makes me laugh:)

Saturday was nice. I didn't have anything to do, and after such a busy week, it was nice to just stay at home with my little one. We did get up a little early, but we took a nice nap together and just hung out all day. In the evening, I made some dinner, Kris invited our friends from Mesquite (an hour north) who were subsequently in town, over for dinner and to Jazz on the Lake. I made a whole chicken and to flavor it, I made a seasoned butter with salt, pepper, garlic, lemon rind, rosemary and thyme and stuffed it under the skin so it would soak in as it baked. It was DELICIOUS! I also made some red potatoes, cut them into chunks and put them in a heavy pot over low heat, with 6 tablespoons of butter and salt and pepper until they were tender. Then put some cut up freash parsley and green onion in there. Again, SOOO yummy. And then just some steadmed broccoli. Then we headed to jazz on the lake, the band was ok, it was more like elevator music than real jazz, so we didn't stay too long.

After we got home it was shower and snacktime for baby, then into bed. She slept so well, from midnight until 5! How wonderful! Then she got up again at 0630:( Oh well, I'll take what I can get.

Church was great, the Primary kiddos did their program today. So stinkin cute! I remember being the primary chorister and as I watched all those kids singing, I missed my old calling! Relief Society had a lesson on motherhood, and that was really great. Now were home and baby is asleep for the moment, so I can post this:)

Time for pictures!

I finally caught a smile! I love these cute open mouth smiles, they are just the best. She gave me some sweet smiles in sacrament meeting today too.
A little post-diaper change picture.

She has started to enjoy laying underneath her baby play thing, rainbow mat, whatever it's called. She'll just lay there and look at the colors.

Here she is just looking around. I love seeing the back of her fuzzy little head.

striped pants

Last night finished out a little rough. After I posted the blog, we went to the grocery store to pick up some much needed vegetables and a few other things. Marin screamed the whole time. Now, this wouldn't normally be of much concern. If I were at home, I would have been fine, but when a baby cries in public, everyone wants to come over and look at the crying baby or try and calm the crying baby or tell you why your baby is crying, and even sometimes try and touch your crying baby (not so much anymore). This drives me nuts. The last thing a mother of a crying baby wants is attention, and, to say the least, having people come over and try and tell me she's hungry, or jostle her car seat around to try and calm the baby. Ughh! That drove me nuts. I had a store manager or something come and stare at my child and wiggle the car seat the whole time I stood in the checkout line, trying to calm her down. I think my nerves were at a breaking point and if I had intercepted, I may have left a bloody mess and a headless store manager:)

Things went better after dinner (A late dinner). We took her in the shower with us, which of course, knocked her right out and calmed her down. Then into her jammies, a snack, and into her basket. She slept a little over 4 hours:)

Today was fairly good. My doctors appt today went well. Marin was a little fussy through that. It wouldn't have been so bad, but all women who have had children know that on your 5 or 6 week checkup, the doc needs to check everything out. So trying to calm a fussy baby with no pants on and a oversize paper towel wrapped around your waist is a little tricky!

Then we dropped off some prescriptions, went home for a late lunch and went to see our friend Keli. Her baby is almost 4 months old, and she has a 2 year old, so we chatted for a bit.

Kris came home fairly early today, so I made dinner (which was not bad by the way). I tried a recipe for goat cheese stuffed chicken breasts, and they weren't bad. Not a favorite, but tasty for dinner nonetheless.

Nothing big in store for tonight, I think Kris and I will try to watch a movie and we'll take Marin into the shower again before bed. Tomorrow the TV guy has to come and fix our satellite service, and we have a baby shower for a friend to go to in the evening.

Here is Marin today. She's wearing a whte onsie with a fuzzy pink tree and a fuzzy brown bird, with matching brown striped pants:) Very cute outfit. I tried putting on the pink and brown shoes, but she kept kicking them off.
Here is the little fussy bugger yesterday, just a rare moment between crying.

Only one smile yesterday for mama though.

The kitty and her bugs. . .

Here is Marin in her bouncy seat. It's naptime, and she is soooo tired, but she fights it so hard. I can just hear her little brain telling her poor eyeballs: "Must. . .stay. . .awake!" She does this a lot. I wonder if I did that as a baby? We bounce her until she falls asleep, which I'm doing as we speak with my foot. I'm becoming better and better at multi tasking, and I thought I was good before! You can see in the picture the bags under her eyes, and you can also see her skin. Poor thing, her skin broke out with baby acnes about 6 days ago. I thought it was something I was using on her or me and it rubbed on face when she ate. The doctor told me yesterday it's just my hormones that are making her break out, and she gets them through my milk. He said it takes a few weeks to show up. I just wash her face and occ put some hydrocortisone cream on it (per the doc, thank you very much. I'm not doing it as an experiment.).
Now to explain the title of this blog. Our cat, Saide has always been fairly playful, and one of her favorite things in particular is to play with bugs. She likes it because unlike toys, the bugs "play back". Well, they are mostly trying to get away, but Sadie thinks it's great fun. Last night she had a couple of run in's with some bugs. She was sniffing a particularly small one ( I know because I was watching her), just a tiny little ant, and she must have taken a nice deep whiff, because it went right up her schnozz! At first she sneezed a few times, but I think it was crawling around IN her face, because she exploded into this gagging/sneezing/snorting wide-eyed frenzy. It worried me a little until she calmed down, but looking back it was pretty funny.

You would have thought she had learned her lesson, but Kris showed her a cricket that was in the house, and she was ALL OVER that one. Crickets are especially fun for her, because not only do they run, but they jump too! Bonus!

Here she is playing with her little bug friend the cricket.


I think she's deciding what to do next.

It had been hopping around quite a bit, and now she's decided that it's time for a little cricket snack. Oh yes, Sadie eats the bugs after she's played with them (except for the beetles (beatles?)). I chuckle every time I see her crunching away on something. We don't need to spray for bugs, we have the cat!

And she's just about done with her cricket. Not sure how it tasted, all that was left was the back leg.

That's all. Kris is off rock climbing and baby and I are going to make cinnamon rolls. She hasn't gone to sleep yet.

The doctor will see you now. . .

Today we had Marin's 4 week appt with the doctor, even though she'll be 5 weeks on Thursday (CRAZY!). She's making progress! A whole 9 pounds this morning, yay! I think she would have weighed more, but this morning was a big poop-a-rama fest! I changed 3 dirty diapers and Kris changed 2 more, all before we left the house at 1000, and after getting up at 0730. Good grief is all I have to say! She must have pooped out a few ounces at least! I still can't help but wonder how a sweet tiny little girl can produce so much mustardy-goodness in her little britches! She is making up for it though, she's been nursing all..morning...long. Hungrry girl I guess.

The nice thing about working on a pediatrics floor, is that when it comes to choosing one for my daughter, I know pretty much most of them, which did indeed come in handy when the time came. The pediatrician I picked is just a really great guy, very nice and I totally trust his judgement (as a mom, AND as a nurse, that makes a difference. I tell you this because when we got to the office today he asked me if they (the staff) had brought me right back and I said "No, we had wait for a little while" and he said, "Well, I'll have to talk to them, I put a little note in your chart to have them bring you right back when you get here. You help us out a lot at Summerlin (the hospital), so we should be able to bring you right in.". Talkabout a nice guy. never had noticed that on our previous visits, we barely sat down and they called us in. Nice!

This week is going to be busy. Our Dr's appt today, enrichment meeting tonight (Kris got suckered into participating in the child care for the sisters:) ), I'm visiting teaching tomorrow and making cinnamon rolls for my OBGYN (I promised him some), MY doctor's appt on thursday, and Friday the Direct TV repair guy comes and Kris and I have a baby shower to go to Friday night. Long and busy week. That is ok though, It's better than feeling like I'm trapped at home.

Here are some pics for you from the weekend:

A little nap for Marin, all curled up on her side in her pack and play. She's starting to get some chunk on her thighs, hooray!

In some pajamas my mom got for her. They don't have legs, just a little opening in the bottom, like a little sleeping bag, sooo cute though!

This crazy pic is from Saturday when we were taking baby pictures. We were next to the car, and this HUGE bug landed on the antennae of the car. I think it's a dragonfly, but I'm not sure. It's cool because it was bright orange and it's head was all crazy shaped and hard and . . . wierd.

Now it's naptime. Marin is sleeping on my chest, and I'm a little sleepy myself:)

Family Photo-op

Welcome to Monday everyone:) We had a really good weekend here in Sunny Las Vegas. Kris's mother and sister and brother in law came down Friday night and left Sunday afternoon, just a quick visit, but a wonderful diversion nonetheless. It was Trine's (mom) birthday on Saturday, so during the day we went to the park and Sam (bro-in law) took some family pics of us. They turned out incredible! Sooooo good! It was wonderful to be able to have some pics of our little girl when she is little like this. The weather was perfect and sunny and breezy, it was really a great time. We have sooo many pics to sort through and decide on, there are just too many good ones! Anyway, in the evening we went out to dinner and just spent time together with everyone. It was really a great day:)

This past weekend, Marin has really been getting th hang of smiling. It is the absolute cutest thing in the world. She will study your face for a minute or two and then her mouth erupts into this huge open smiley grin. It is adorable. I caught a picture of it with my phone the other morning, just the best. I set it as my phone wallpaper, am I a true mom or what?!

Last night was a little rough. Marin, true to form, woke up just in time for dinner, so I'm really getting the hang of nursing and eating at the same time:) we took her in the shower with us last night, which she LOVES, and fed her and she went right to sleep, so I thought things were going pretty well. She went down and woke up at 0415 to eat (not bad!) and then she grunted and whimpered in her little Moses basket (that's what she sleeps in) for an hour until she broke out in an all out cry. I think her belly was hurting, so I put her on my chest and leaned back against the headboard. She fell right to sleep and rustled around every 20 minutes or so until I patted her back. So from 0500 to 0730 I stayed awake with her. Then she ate again, and fussed on and off for an hour again in her real crib while mama tried to catch a few (if I didn't, my patience would have been dangerously thin). So she ate and stayed awake while I tried to eat breakfast. Finally she went down for a nap. Poor girl, she was sooo tired :(

I've been trying to figure out why I haven't been hungry lately. My last month of pregnancy, I was so excited to not be pregnant so I could eat again, but now I just have no appetite whatsoever. I have to force myself to eat, it's really kind of wierd. I'll eat a few bites of food and be full or just not want any more. I don't feel sick, just not hungry. It's been like this for 2 or 2 1/2 weeks or so. If anyone has suggestions, let me know. And you would think I would be shedding pounds a little quicker because of this, but I've styed the same for about a week. Strange.

Here are the pics, enjoy!

Baby girl snuggling mama
A little thumb sucking

Hanging out with mom and dad, she really was so good all day for the pics, just perfect:)

Just the girls, I love this picture, the light hits her eyes just right to make the blue really come out, just like moms.

SUCH a cute closeup, what an adorable little girl!

Daddy and his little girl, he's just so proud to be a dad:)

The whole family facing the camera, well, Marin is asleep, but facing the camera!

A different pose. Such a beautiful day, you can see in the background!

That's all folks, hope you enjoyed the pics.

Just some pictures:)

Well, I guess these are the only pics the computer will let me upload tonight. These are from yesterday. This one is during the evening, in her favorite spot to cuddle, right on mommy's chest. She is such a good cuddler! It's moments like this that I remember how wonderful it is to be a mom.
I was trying to capture Marin in her moments of interaction. She really does try to make faces and noises at me. I'll look at her and smile and make "o" shapes with my mouth and she will study SO intently and then make an "o" shape too. Occasionally she can smile, even though it's incidental, it sure is a cute little open mouth smile. Here is her "o" mouth.

During the day Marin gets tummy time. Even though I am very strict that she sleeps at night on her back (well, I tip her a little on her side, just in case she spits up), during the day, when I am right there, I will let her nap on her belly. I think it helps get ot some of that gas she gets in there. I only let her nap this way when I am right in the room and can check on her every few minutes. Babies sleeping the night on their bellies is NAUGHTY. And little babies sleeping in bed with their parents is especially naughty.

Another almost-open-mouth smile. She really tries so hard, it's adorable.

Nothing exciting today. Some dishes and laundry. Marin has been sleeping a lot today, We call these sleepy days her "growing" days. She just goes right back to sleep after she eats. Those are nice days. I can actually get some stuff done.

I made dinner tonight and she fell asleep as I carried her around in the jeep carrier, so just before Kris and I sat down to eat, I laid her in her pack and play. We had about enough time to bless the food and put food on our plates and she woke up. So far, I've nursed her every time we eat dinner. Not the most comfortable. Ahh well. Soon enough. She's already growing faster than I can believe. Enjoy it while it lasts right?

Happy Birthday Marin!

Today is Marin's 4 week mark! Crazy! I can't believe how time has just flown by. She is growing every day, and I can see the changes in her face, and I think some "chunkiness" starting on her legs and arms. She is still kind of that newborn skinny though.

Nothing too exciting today. Baby girl has been crazy hungry today, eating pretty much most of the day. No trip to the park, a little to warm, and actually humid too. I did make brownies though, I guess to celebrate Marin's 4 week birthday.

Other than that, some laundry, and dishes and dinner and the day is done! Day's go by so quickly now, it's amazing. Time to eat those brownies. . .

Finding the time for. . .?

It's Wednesday already? Wow, where did the week go?! I think I tried about 3 times to post something on here, and either the internet was CRAZY slow, or Marin kept waking up from her nap. She seems to do that a lot, wake up too early from her naps. So, I get excited that I either get to nap or get stuff done, and then she wakes up 15 minutes later, just as I'm starting to fall asleep/load the dishwasher/uploading pictures etc.



Ahh well. So last week I think I was able to post that Kris and I (oops, and baby too:) )went to Utah to see family. It was a great 3 day trip, nice to get out of the prison. . .I mean, house, for a while. We got to take in a breath of some much cooler air, which was fantastic! And see lots and lots of trees and grass. I miss grass.



Marin has been much more vocal lately. I don't just mean crying (although there is plenty to be had of that), she has been making some cooing noises and it is just the cutest thing! There are select moments during the day that she will look at your face and try to imitate what your doing. She studies your face soooo hard, and thenif you open your mouth and make noises and smile, she'll try to do the same thing. It really is adorable. I know she may be a bit young for smiling, but these are NOT gassy smiles (she does have those, and I know what they look like). I'll be hardpressed to get a picture though, thoses moments are fleeting and rare, but soon enough I guess.



Today we went for a walk in the stroller down to the park. The weather has FINALLY been cooling off enough during the day to be able to go outside, and today was wonderful. So we went and stayed for half an hour and walked back. Good exercise for me also. I've lost about 30 pounds (YAY!) since giving birth (out of the slightly over 50 I gained :( ), but, the weight is coming off, and today is the first day I have been able to put on NON-maternity jeans. Granted, they are still about 3 sizes larger than I usually wear, but progress is progress. Only about 20 more pounds until I'm at my starting weight (25 more pounds for pre-pregnancy) but as a nursing mama, 20 pounds is perfect:)



So, here are some pics:



This is Marin sucking on her hand. Kris thought it was funny that she enjoyed chewing on her little fist. Cute girl!



Ahh, poor girl has been getting over a cold, and has subsequently been stuffy and needed sucking out (as I call it) These are her two worst enemies.

Sucker+Nasal Saline+Mama= (see below picture)

A VERY unhappy little girl :(

And here we have a picture of redemption!

Breast pump+bottle+bottle warmer= (see below pic)

A BIG thumbs up from mama :)

That means that once a week or so, daddy stays up with baby, and mommy gets to sleep ALL. . . NIGHT. . . LONG! :) :) :)

long drive, sweet peaches

Finally, Pictures:

I think I may be having technical difficulties, but, here are some pictures, Kris and baby and I went to Salt Lake for a few days, just to get out of the house. The above is a pic of a NASA display near Brigham city where Kris's dad lives.

Below is a picture of a pear tree just off the deck of Kris's dad's house, it is absolutely LADEN with fruit.

Here is Marin in her Jeep carrier, the day we left for Salt Lake. She was very content just to hang out with mama and help with chores. As you can see in the picture, she has a favorite spot to suck on:)

Here is Sadie, just lounging on the sofa. She'll sit on the window sill behind the cough in the sun and then jump down and stretch out on the rug.

Here she is on the sill behind the couch. This picture makes her look horribly fat, and she's really not. If I were her and I knew someone had posted a pic of ME looking fat, I would be pretty upset!

So, anyway. The las few days we have all been out of town. We went to Salt Lake and spent some time with family. We stayed with Kris's mom the first two nights and then drove up to Brigham City where Kris's dad lives for our last night.

It was so nice to get out of the house, and out of Las Vegas. I was so happy to see some rain! I do miss seeing rain every so often. And I saw grass and trees. Well, we do have trees here in Las Vegas, but they are certainly not indiginous (I know that's not spelled right) and they are transplanted weak little palm trees. I was so happy to see real, deciduous, strong and healthy, wet-with-rain trees :)

We were able to see Kris's bestamor (Norwegian for grandmother), she is serving in Salt Lake on a mission, and was very excited to see her "grand-granddaughter"!

When we went to Brigham City for our last night an ate at a tasty steakhouse for dinner last night, I had some Bison by the way, tastes essentially like beef I guess. It was amazing how much produce they grow up there. The place is like the fertile crescent of Utah I think! There are fruit and vegetable stands everywhere. Just the trees off the back deck of the house had so much fruit, I was amazed! I really liked it up there, a nice breeze, fresh produce from farm stands (it really is the best!), open spaces, very reminiscent of New York I think.

We were sad of course to come home today, but, life must go on. Marin did so well for the trip up and back, in her carseat I mean. I feel so bad for her, she can't change position, she just sits in one place. She cried for the last 20 minutes of the drive back today, she was ready for some food and snuggling, poor girl, I don't blame her.

She is still eating like crazy though. She's been a little stuffed up lately, so I've had to suck her nose out with the bulb syringe. Boy does she hate that. She screams! But, I get all the gunk out. She was so stuffy this morning, we brought her in the shower, and she sure did like that. She fell asleep in the my arms. Such a cute girl.

It's late, time for bed!

Where is the off button?!

My goodness! I knew that some babies cried a lot, I've babysat lots of them, I've learned how to deal with them, but at the end of the night, I hand them back over to their parents and escape along my merry way, home to my nice clean, un-wrinkled, (QUIET I might add) bed.

But to think that I could produce a bundle of joy that cries with the persistence that my daughter cries with, is, ok, well, pretty believeable. I guess she takes after her mom (sigh!). I can't get over how long she makes an effort to squeel for! She will cry and get a second wind and cry and get a third wind and then a fourth and fifth and sixth and it continues!

Where does all of this energy come from! I need some in pill form to take before I go running or something, or at least in the morning after a sleepless night! I know she's not colicky, I've dealt with lots of those, and this is not a colicky cry. She is just so blasted persistent. After she eats, she'll start crying half an hour before she should be hungry, just to ensure that we don't forget to feed her I think.

Lest my father read this and think I just let her cry all blasted day, no, I do not. This occurs mostly happens in the evening, her fussy time, but today, she is just not happy. And no, I hve not been eating crazy foods. I've been eating very bland-ish foods thank you very much.

So today, I sit here on the couch and wonder. . .are we there yet? No, wait, I'm there, and I think I'm ready to leave...or at least take a break. :)

Weight gain, and loss...

Yesterday was Marin's doctor's appt., and things are right on track! She weighed in at 8 pounds and 20.5 inches long since our last visit 10 days previous, so she gained 13 ounces and grew half an inch! Mama's milk must be somewhat decent eh? She's been nursing like crazy lately, some days it's every hour or so! I guess all that milk is being put to good use though.

Getting to the docotrs office was a little challenging, as was being there. Our appt. was at 1115, and my goal was to be out of the door by 1030 to get gas and be there in time. Well, the night before she was up at least every 2 hours if not more frequently (remnants of mommy's cold I think, she just didn't feel well and was stuffy). So the morning was off to a slow start, I was exhausted and I didn't wash my hair that morning, just to save some time. So at 1030, she wanted to eat, so we plopped down and I tried to hurry her, and I think I took her off before she was finished, she wasn't very happy with that. Then I had a girl from church drop by with some banana bread (yum! :)) so that added a few more minutes. I finally left a minute before 1100, and as luck, and Murphy (murphy's law) would have it, I caught every single stinkin red light from the house to the doc's office.

When we got there (after she had cried in the car halfway there:( I do feel bad) They needed to do her second PKU (a heel poke and severl squeezes to fill these little circles on special paper), and they did it rigt at the beginning to the visit. Baby was FURIOUS! Well, I would be too I guess, and she wanted to EAT! Unfortunately, I didn't know how long it be for the doc to come in, so I didn't want to chance feeding her. Marin screamed the whole time we waited, and the whole time the doctor was in to see her. I felt so bad! Poor girl! I really like our pediatrician though (one of the perks of working in pediatrics at the hospital is that I know all the pediatricians, so I didn't have to go into making the decision blind) and he said he would flag the room so I could feed her, and just come out when was ready. I like the way he runs his office, nice guy (smart too!).

Marin ate like I had never fed her before in her short little life, from both sides! She was satisfied after that, so we went to Sam's (mom was starving!) for lunch and to pick up a few things. Then we came home ad I was going to nap while she slept. No such luck, she woke up.

But the day went well altogether, today we are just hanging out at home. Picture time!

Daddy getting some snuggle time with his little girl before bedtime.
A further away pic. I love seeing Kris snuggle with her, it's so cute:)

One more pic from MY side of the bed, you can't see the back of her fuzzy little head, but just imagine a fuzzy head.

Here she is yesterday evening, she is getting to be more an more awake, taking in the world.

Just looking around!

Oh, so about the blog title! Lest I forget. Marin is gaining weight, as she should be, and I, I think, am losing weight. Hooray! I gained roughly 50 pounds during pregnancy, and we bought a scale the other day so I could track my progress, and I have about 30 pounds to lose to get back to my starting weight. I'd like to lose 40 to get back to my complete pre-pregnancy weight, but we'll start with 30. I did some pilates this morning (my belly is sooo weak) and worked with my yoga ball. It helps that I'm beastfeeding, because baby sucks off around 500 calories a day, nice! Anyway. That's all!

Recovering?

My goodness! Today is Tuesday already? Marin is almost 2 weeks old! Good Grief! Where does the time go?! It's been a little while since I've been able to update the blog, but, we need to start somewhere.

Friday Kris's dad and step-mom came down to the city, It's been a while since weither of us have seen them. Saturday Kris took everyone, except baby and I (we were pretty pooped) to Lake Las Vegas. "Lake?" you say? "In Las Vegas?". Why yes! However, it's man made (or at least made bigger) and all the way on the opposite side of town. It's a very posh community, where the super rich live, Celine Dion, when she was still performing at Caesars, had a house down there. Anyway, the area next to the lake that has the casino has a very upscale shopping area, very French bistro casual kind of feel. With misters on the trees and music playing, and people eating outside of the cafe's. Kris and I like to take picinics and go eat on the grass down there. So, like I was saying, Kris took everyone to the Lake Saturday night for Jazz on the Lake. It's free, every Saturday evening at 7 pm, and there is a different jazz band each Saurday. The band performs in the small ampitheater next to the lake and the crowds can sit on the grassy hill with picinics and it' really cool. Last time Kris and I went, I was 37 weeks pregnant, very swollen and uncomfortable, but dying to get out of the house. We didn't last very long. I just couldn' get comfortable in the 100 degree weather. But I digress. Everyone had a good time I think, even if my parents don't get into jazz. . .

Sunday was the baby blessing. My parents came to Sacrament meeting with us, where they were blessing 2 babies that day, then we came home to get ready for our little one's blessing, which we did at home. Kris did a great job with the blessing. I know he was a little nervous, but it was a wonderful blessing and I need to get at the tape recorder so I can type it up. I'm so glad to have a wonderful husband who is able to bless our baby, it means a lot to me. Marin wore the dress my mother wore for her christening, and it fit perfectly. There was some moth damage, but we just hand washed it and ironed it and it came out beautifully. (Pictures are below, no worries, I didn't forget!)

My parents left Sunday night and Kris's family left early Monday morning. It's been strange to have an empty house, we've been entertaining for 3 weeks now! I'm a little sad to see everyone go, but it's nice to be able to get into the groove of things, or, at least try. I keep wondering when I'm going to get back to life and feel like I can leave the house with a baby and not have it be a big deal. Where running to the grocery store is routine and not a scary project! I suppose that will come with time:)

I came down with a cold a few days ago. I could feel it coming. I think I overdid it. I've been running everywhere with everyone and getting up with baby during the night doing everything by my gosh-darn-independent-self, I think I forgot to take care of, me. Kris slept downstairs with the baby the last 2 nights so I could rest (and he could. . .not be sick), which has been wonderful, I feel a million times better, even though I'm still hacking up a lung, I so feel better.

Kris goes back to work on Thursday. I think he's glad. Nevermind, I'm being reprimanded as we speak. He's not glad to go back. I love my husband he's so funny! I;m laughing at him now! Anyway, it's will be good to get back into a routine:)

Picture time! Here's our little girl in her bath today! Isn't she cute? She rather likes the warm water, and I just keep pouring it over her chest. That's a washcloth over her front to keep her a little warmer.
She had pooped all over her pretty little oufit, so she needed a bath. I keep telling her to stop pooping on her clothes, but none-the-less, it happens anyway.

L to R, Sally Lyman, Duane Lyman, Kris, Marin, Myself, Alison Owens, David Owens. This was Sunday after the blessing.

Marin cuddling with grandpa Lyman. Sally had her eyes closed, oops!

Here is the blessing dress. Kind of hard to see, but is was cream colored sheer fabric with green silk ribbin accents over a very pale green slip. Just lovely and a perfect fit for Marin.

She's just so blasted cute! Fortunately, she did not poop on this outfit. Mama and grandma would have been pretty upset.

Daddy cuddling with his little girl after church.

Her Sunday outfit. An adorable dress I got from a baby shower. She pooped on the onesie. Ahh well.