Daily Happenings - New Foods

As you can see by the pictures, Brylee has taken to solid foods very well! She is trying more and more foods, including sweet potatoes, squash, avocado, and lentils (beans).

What a sweet face & a good eater! She is now reaching for the spoon, and rubbing her mouth & nose, spreading her food all over her face. As long as she's happy, right?!

Keep up the good work, Brylee!

Five Year Anniversary Weekend

Last weekend, officially June 3, Bryan and I celebrated five years of marriage. We had such a great weekend, full of activities, and some good quality time between just the two of us.

Originally, we had planned on waiting until the day after our acutal anniversay and going out Saturday night to celebrate. But due to Bryan's truck unexpectedly dieing last week, we called in our babysitters a day early. Bryan's parents came to stay with us beginning Friday after work, and Bryan and I spent several hours car shopping Friday evening, followed by a late night casual anniversary dinner. Nanny & Papa spent the evening entertaining (or being entertained) by sweet Brylee.

We got a good amount of preliminary shopping done Friday night, but thought we would use our babysitters to their full potential and went back out to look at cars Saturday morning. We saw another couple car shopping with an infant, and it looked miserable! Just think...having to put the car seat in & out of each car you test drive, not to mention keeping the babe happy throughout the whole process.

We had planned on leaving the dealerships by 11 am, in order to have time to come home & get ready for our actual anniversary date, but we ended up finding a car we couldn't leave without. So we bought & drove home a 2011 Nissan Altima.

As soon as we got home, we turned around and left to head to downtown Ft. Worth for our anniversary date. We had no agenda....we just wanted to spend time together doing things we couldn't do when we had a baby with us. So we walked around down town, saw a movie, went shopping, had a nice dinner, and spent the night in Ft. Worth. I was very proud of myself, only checking in on Brylee once before her bed time. It helped that she was in very trustworthy hands. Sunday morning we slept in and had a casual breakfast downtown, then headed home.

Sunday was my birthday, but all I wanted to do was to stay home with my family and my baby, whom I hadn't seen in practically 36 hours! We had a very busy, productive, and fun anniversary weekend. And I can check off another first....my first overnight away from Brylee! It was very refreshing to get away, but I sure did love being with her when we got home!

Naked Babies

Our good friends, Michael, Shannon, and Tyler, came to have dinner with us the other night. We love good company, made even better by great dinner and a fun games. Brylee is seven weeks older than Tyler, but Tyler has her out grown by a mile! These two are pre-destined to get married one day, and only then will they ever be allowed to be naked together again, ha! :)

Brylee was all smiles to have her friend by her side

Holding his hand

Brylee would be one lucky girl to snag a tall, dark, and handsome boy like Tyler

Gulf Shores

Every time one of us "kids" graduate from college, my parents take us all on a family vacation. It started after I graduated from ACU, and we made a point of taking a family vacation that summer, seeing as how we hadn't had a family vacation in several years since I was busy with college. My trip was a Caribbean cruise. My middle brother, David, graduated in the winter, so we went to West Virginia on a ski trip. And last week, my youngest brother, Andrew, graduated from Georgia Tech, and we all met in Gulf Shores, Alabama. Here is a picture diary of our family vacation:

My parents rented a four bedroom house directly on the beach. It was so nice to be able to walk out the back deck and step directly onto white sand. It was also nice that our house was close enough to the water that when Brylee went down for a nap, our monitor would reach the distance outside and we could continue having fun! We lathered this girl up in sunscreen every morning. It was her first bathing suit experience.

Uncle David loves his niece, that's for sure. I think the feeling's mutual!

David's girlfriend, Emily, is a personal trainer (who also just graduated college...way to go Emily!). Somehow, she convinced the entire family to participate in a morning 'boot camp' exercise session on the beach. We were all so sore the rest of the week!

My mom loves taking pictures (and I'm glad she does), so we have several great new family pictures! Sunset was beautiful!

My youngest brother, our most recent college graduate, Andrew

The weather was wonderful! During the day, it wasn't too hot, so we could stay on the beach in the sun all day without sweating. And at night it was cool and comfortable, and a light sweater was all we needed.

Clear skies without any rain the entire week. It was great!

I was able to put Brylee to sleep, and then we would all stay up late playing games. I love this time with my whole family!

It was a 12 hour car ride, and Brylee took it like a champ. Of course, we all had our moments where we wanted to be out of the car, but she napped most of the ride and surprisingly was able to stay on her schedule when we arrived. It was nice to drive because we got to bring all of her baby "stuff," like her Bumbo and pack-n-play.

Brylee's first experience at the beach

She would enjoy herself momentarily, playing with sand toys...

...or playing with Meme...

...or Gramps...

...and tolerated me making her wear a hat all the time...

....but it quickly turned to this!

Brylee wasn't the biggest fan of the bright light, wind, and sand, and her and Meme frequently left the beach and spent time together in the hammock under the house.

We played ladder golf, home-run derby, whiffle ball...

...and built many sand castles.

Andrew volunteered to be buried...

...onlyhis face was showing!

One of the activities Andrew chose to do was to go golfing. None of us were very good golfers...

...so we went to a fairly inexpensive course and played a scramble.

It was Team Andrew (Andrew, Bryan, and Me)...

... vs. Team Emily (Emily, David, my dad). Proud to announce that Team Andrew won!

We stayed home a few nights for dinner, but also went out to some very good sea food restaurants. Brylee sat in a high chair for the very first time!

We had a family "photo shoot" session. Here are our portraits...enjoy!

(Bryan was in charge of carrying Brylee's "stuff"...bib, burp cloth, extra bow, paci)

I just LOVE her expression here!

I love my family! And now that all of the "kids" have graduated college, we have to come up with a new tradition as a catalyst for our family vacation.

Gulf Shores, Alabama - May, 2011