We've been keeping pretty busy the past few weeks. Here's some of the things we've done…
Cow Appreciation Day at Chick-fil-a
Dress up like a cow = free food
I realized afterwards that I had the ears upside down. Oh well. Lol.
Bella loves Kayla and Kayla loves Bella. I love seeing these two together.
My big girl!
Kayla is now 6 months old.
On the day she turned 6 months, she decided she would start holding her bottle on her own.
Yay for me! Haha.
The day after she turned 6 months was her checkup.
She weighed 19.8 lbs,
she's 27.4 inches tall,
and her head circumference is 17 inches.
I didn't get the exact percentages but she's pretty up there compared to other babies her age. And all the babies we know… she huge compared to them!
How to keep the baby distracted/happy… Just give her a pacifier for each hand.
We went to Katy this past weekend to celebrate my Mom's graduation from BYU-I online.
One of our favorite things to do in Katy is hit up the pools. Kayla is a big fan. And all of my siblings were in town to celebrate my Mom, so that meant lots of cousin time. We almost had the whole family together. We were just missing Caitlin and Bailey.
Henley and Bella at the pool
Daddy and Kayla
She just kicked her legs and chewed on this star the whole time
Most of the pool gang
It was too bright and Kayla was too busy eating the floaty to care about the picture
The graduate
Harrison loving on Kayla
(He's 15 months and she's 6 months. Seriously, my baby is huge!)
He was so cute - cuddling and kissing her
Kayla and her great grandma - GG
We had a great time hanging out with all the family. Now we're gonna relax a little before we get busy again next month with a lot more cousin time!
I'm really bad when it comes to surprises. As in, I always figure it out. And it drives Jacob insane that he can't surprise me. 4th of July was on a Saturday this year, but we had just gone to Dallas the weekend before, and we both had to teach on Sunday at church, so we decided we would stay home. Apparently, on Wednesday (July 1st) Jacob found out that he would have Friday (July 3rd) off. So Friday morning his alarm goes off, I fall back asleep and wake up a little late and he's still in bed. The conversation went something like this:
C: Jacob, you've got to get to work!
J: I don't work today.
C: But it's Friday. (I thought he was thinking it was Saturday)
J: I know, I don't work.
And then it clicked that he was off and I was so excited and giddy (and he was pretty happy that he finally surprised me) and I just couldn't fall back asleep.
I let him sleep in since he had the day off, and then he took care of some stuff later in the morning. And we went to Katy in the afternoon. He took longer than expected with his errands so rather than driving there and coming back home after a few hours, we spent the night and left Saturday afternoon.
My sweet baby girl!
It was Kayla's first time at the pool, and she LOVED it! And we ended up staying for a few hours. I didn't think we'd be there so long but we had a blast!
And Chrissy and Emma met us there. It only took us 5 1/2 months to get a picture of the girls together. Too bad they wouldn't look.
Kayla 5 1/2 months. Emma 11 months. (Yes, my kid is huge)
And we finally got one all together!
(Ok she's not THAT huge, we're just standing closer to the camera ;) Lol.)
My sweet little family <3
We always end up going to Katy the same time as Stephen and Bella. But it's more fun that way ;)
Kayla's first time taking a bath with a cousin. When I sent this to Aunt Caitlin (who had to stay in CS to work) she said 'it looks like Kayla is taking a selfie'. I thought that was pretty funny. But the truth is I'm holding her hand so she doesn't fall backwards and hit her head. Not quite as funny, sorry. Haha.
We weren't gonna go swimming on Saturday, but everyone else was so we decided to after all.
Friday was us, Uncle Michael, and Chrissy & Emma.
Saturday was us, Uncle Michael, Stephen & Bella, Grandma (part of the time) & Grandpa, the Seckingers, and the Mowers. Again, we stayed much longer than intended but we had a great time!
Love this guy!
Elizabeth and Bella dancing during adult swim!
Papa and Kayla
We ended up staying for lunch too and finally headed back home around 4pm. Later that evening we picked up Aunt Gina & Uncle Stephen to go watch fireworks. We went to the rooftop parking lot above BBB and parked the truck. Took the elevator down to the ground level and walked to Cold Stone. And then went back to the truck to play games and chat while we waited for the fireworks.
The picture doesn't do it justice. We had a pretty good view of the George Bush Library firework show.
Gina and Stephen!
We had a great and extra long weekend celebrating Independence day with family!
And a few pictures since then...
Kayla loves going on walks!
Crazy girl rolled herself under the recliner.
Lunch date with Daddy. It's no question that he's her favorite ;)
At Kayla's baby shower my Mom gave me a scrapbook and a bunch of supplies for her baby book. I finally got around to finishing it. I love the way it turned out! But I think I'll stick with Shutterfly photo books from now on. Ha!
Bella was having fun with a leftover decoration from the baby shower that wasn't used for Kayla's book.
Sweet cousins. They love each other and it makes me so happy!
Uncle Stephen and Bella joined us for a game of frisbee golf!
Bella had a great time!
And she was such a good helper, pushing her cousin.
Afterwards, we went out to dinner with them. It was a great evening!
I'm just gonna take a second to give a little shout out to my husband (even if he may never read this). I've been super unhappy about my weight lately and have been struggling with getting a workout routine down. He has been so kind, and helpful, and motivating. As I mentioned before, he got me a fitbit for Mother's day, and he has been so good about encouraging me to meet my goal. When I don't go on my walks in the morning (bc let's face it, after a certain time it's just too dang hot outside) he goes out with us in the evenings. And when I would be content with being just under my goal, he encourages me to do just one more loop around the park, so I get more steps in. And I'm just so grateful for all his love and support that I just had to make a note of it. I sure do love him!!
Kayla loves walks so much, she usually falls asleep during them. They're just so relaxing ;)
I've lived in College Station for almost 4 years, and I've lived in this current place for almost 2 years. But I haven't taken advantage of this WONDERFUL place called Wolf Pen Creek until recently since Kayla's been around. In fact, after the first year when my roommate and I were looking for a different place to live, she mentioned how she wanted to be close to Wolf Pen and I thought "what's so great about that place…" Now I understand! Haha. And just this past weekend I discovered another part of it, which is probably my favorite!! We normally go to the main/biggest part. It has a bunch of trails, a frisbee golf course, playground, and an amphitheater. But on the opposite side of the big intersection there's a long trail that goes behind a bunch of businesses and goes all the way to another main road. It's shaded pretty much the whole way, which is a huge plus with this Texas heat. And I think we're gonna use it much more often. Anyways, it's a great place and we love going on walks there. And it's maybe half a mile from where we live! We love it!
The other day as I was walking over the creek I found a few turtles making their way up the creek. (There's 3 in the picture) So that was pretty cool.
"Look Mom! I can sit up and hold my bottle!"
Now, if only she could hold it and drink out of it at the same time… We're working on that ;) Haha.
Kayla rode around in Ruby for an afternoon, which is kind of a big deal. Ruby is Jacob and his Dad's, pride and joy, 1966 Ford Galaxie LTD. I have no real reason other than I just didn't want her to ride in it until she was older. But Jacob finally convinced me to let her.
She thought it was pretty cool, I guess… ;)
I'm been trying to get more pictures of us with the baby and not just the baby. So here's a random picture of Daddy and Kayla at church.
One Sunday evening was just too much for Kayla to handle. As we sat around the table talking, she fell asleep in Papa's lap just like this. Ha!
And now for my confession… Shortly before she fell asleep, Aunt Kiya had just sent Grandma and Papa a picture of Kayla's cousin Lina, who is 3 weeks older, sitting up by herself. Since then I've been telling myself "Okay Kayla you've got 3 weeks to get this down". So you'll notice a lot of pictures of her 'sitting up'. But really it was her sitting up long enough for me to get her to smile and snap a picture before she tumbled to the ground. I'm such a good Mom, I know ;) But I do have to say she's been pretty good at doing it on her own for a while now.
I just can't get over her smiles! She's such a happy girl!
This girl has got the rolling thing down!
She's constantly chewing on whatever she can get her hands on. Which means if there's no toy or blanket, it's her hands.
And she LOVES her feet!
Since she's been sitting up so well, I decided to try to sit up in the shopping cart. I say success!
After bathing, I started taking her out of the chair and letting her get a feel for the tub without it as the water drained. She loves being chair free for bath time now!
But really, as soon as I took it she fell down.
Daddy's Father's Day present. 'Kayla's Book of Reasons Why I Love My Daddy'. I missed the cutoff time for free upgraded shipping to make it in by Father's day by about an hour. And then it said it would be about a week to a week and a half after Father's Day before it would arrive. I was so bummed! The day after Father's Day I was having kind of a crappy day. We went on a walk to get out of the house and I came back to find this orange package on my front porch. It seriously made my day! I was so happy, and couldn't wait for Jacob to get home and see it. He loved it BTW! :)
Kayla likes the TV. And she's seriously mastered rolling. This is where I put her down...
And she ended up all the way to the right of the living room underneath the piano!
After a long afternoon of running errands, Mommy made the mistake of trying to put her in the seat of the shopping cart. This tired girl couldn't take it. I finally got her to fall asleep in my arms and was able to lay her down so I could grab what I needed and go home.
Mmm… carrots…
Side note: I've been making my own baby food and freezing it. And when she's ready to eat some, I just put it in the microwave for a few 15 second intervals to melt it. But the past few weekends as we've gone out of town I've just grabbed the pre made baby food from the store. I'm totally sold on making my own. I do dread putting in the work, but it's so worth it. It's cheaper, it's less messy (better texture), it's healthier, and she likes it so much more! I'm sold!
^ but this was the only picture from the whole weekend.
For Mother's Day Jacob got me a fitbit. I'd been wanting one for a while so I was thrilled! It only took almost 2 months but I've finally got a good routine down for us. And Kayla loves our walks in the mornings!
And a few random videos...
She LOVES kisses!! But she also gets distracted by my phone.
She wants to crawl SO bad. She just needs some help lifting her tummy up ;) Lol.
Daddy is kind of hilarious!
Kayla's first lemon. (I love Bella's laugh in the background!)
