Day in Occoquan

Hector, Natalia and I spent the afternoon in historic Occoquan. It was a beautiful summer afternoon; the type that is perfect for walking outside. Occoquan is a small community not far from where we live. The town was established in the early 1700's right on the river. The town still has several of the old buildings mixed in with the new. There are cute little shops that line the main street. We put Natalia in her front carrier and strapped her onto Hector and went for a stroll along the main drag. This mansion was built in the 1750's and overlooks the little town and waterfront. I love old buildings, architecture and history. These are some of my favorite things about living on the East Coast. The history is rich in the DC and Northern Virginia areas.

This gazebo was to the side of the mansion and made for a perfect picture taking location.

About every person we passed on the street wanted to stop and look at the baby. I think Natalia made friends with half the town. She was awake a lot of the time, but really happy. She loves being out in the sunshine. The bright light and the warmth really calm her down. By the end of the outing, she had nestled into a nice little sleep.

Our little excursion was lovely. We went into several little antique shops and speciality shops. The antique shops, a fabric shop, and some history all combined made me think of my mom and how much she would like this quaint little place. We will have to take her here next time she visits.

While the length of our outings has drastically changed since we added a third party to our little family, it is fun discovering the things we can all enjoy together.

Happy Anniversary

Yesterday, Hector and I celebrated our four year anniversary. We left Natalia for the first time with a babysitter. She did well, but it was a little weird leaving her. I am so used to being with her 24/7. It is hard to believe that Hector and I have been married four years, yet at the same time it is feels as though married life is all I have ever known. It has been a good four years. This last year of our marriage has been especially memorable. Hector and I bought our first home and we have been doing home improvements ever since. I also got pregnant and gave birth to our beautiful baby girl all since celebrating our last anniversary. The time has flown by, but we have a lot to show for our four years together. I love being married to Hector. We are not without our imperfections, but it is so nice to share a home with someone I love. I am grateful that I made the decision to marry Hector. I do not believe in fate and soul mates. I think those are silly concepts created by good storytellers who have tricked the masses into thinking that decisions are out of their control. While some may think this concept is unromantic, I believe that it is more romantic for the person you are with to know that they were picked; picked above all others. I chose to be with Hector. I wanted to marry him and share my life with him. That is romantic; to know that the person you love wanted to be with you. Much more romantic than the concept of being stuck with someone just because the stars aligned or serendipity stepped in and took all the decision making out of your control. Hector is a good and loving man. I love seeing him in his new role as a father. He is very loving, intelligent and genuine. I look forward to many more years together.

The Grocery Store

Natalia and I ventured to the grocery store today. I fed and changed her right before we left with the hopes that I would take a happy, sleeping baby to the store. Well, Natalia was not on board with the plan. She was awake the entire trip and decided to start screaming on the top of her lungs while I was shopping. There was nothing I could do to calm her down. She turned the heads of several people as we passed them by. Of course as soon as we left the store she was fine again. Ahhh, the joys of parenting. I know....this is only the beginning.

Shower Time

Natalia loves tubby time, but she really loves taking showers with her daddy. I had to twist Hector's arm a little to get him to let me publish these pictures. She loves the warm water. Even if she is crying before the shower as soon as the warm water hits her she calms down and doesn't make a sound.

If we let her, she would fall asleep in the shower.

She is so much fun to watch. Hector and I usually give her a bath before bedtime and we both love watching her. While she was in the shower with her dad, I ran to get the camera. We had a lot of fun taking pictures of her in the water. She did not mind because the longer we took taking pictures, the longer she got to stay in the shower. I think she would stay in there all day if we let her.

She is just so cute!

Hector may or may not be wearing a swimsuit in these pictures.

Little Ducky

We love our little girl. Hector and I have been having a lot of fun watching Natalia grow. I am amazed at how much she has already changed in the short time she has been with us. She is really long and a lot stronger. Natalia has a lot more awake time. She is usually awake when her Daddy gets home from work. She spends some cuddle time with Daddy and then we usually eat dinner together. Natalia sits in her chair at the table and watches us eat. After dinner Natalia takes her bath and then she gets to put on her pajamas. Here she is in her new Ducky pajamas that Grandma Lourdes and Aunt Krystale got her.

Natalia loves to stretch her head and her face. Because of that, she makes some pretty funny faces sometimes. I wish I could capture all her stretchy faces on camera because they really are some of her cutest moments.

Natalia is getting so much stronger. She is learning to hold her head up on her own. She is able to pull up her head and even keep it up for awhile, but then suddenly her head will flop down.

Her head stays up well with a little help from daddy. Hector and I were trying to capture her cross-eyed look in these pictures. The cross-eyes are funny now, but we are hoping she will grow out of it.

We have had a fun week with Natalia. She rolled over this week. I am positive that she did not do it on purpose. She was very upset and rolled over in a an angry fit...but none the less...it was still a role over. She is sleeping longer at night and spending more time awake during the day. She is working on her smile. She loves to play copy-cat. We stick out our tongue or open and close our mouth and Natalia will try to copy the movement. She is pretty good at it. I must say; she is quite the talented young lady.

8 and 1/2 hours

Natalia dozed off after her bath yesterday a little before 8p.m. We strapped her into her car seat and headed off to get frozen custard (we have become regulars at our custard place). Natalia slept the whole time in the car and was still asleep when we got home. We decided to leave her in her car seat because we assumed she would wake up soon and want to eat and then we would take her out of the car seat once she was awake. Well, we went to bed and it was not until 4:00 in the morning that she she woke up. Yes, she slept for over eight hours. Now, if only her mother could do the same thing. I looked at the clock from about 1:00 in the morning on thinking that she should be waking up soon. I stated writing this yesterday. I am happy to report that Natalia slept for almost eight hours again last night. She has woken up at 4:00 in the morning the last two nights. This, while may seem awfully early to many moms, is actually perfect for our families schedule. I am able to feed her right before Hector gets up and then she is nice and awake while Hector and I eat breakfast at 5:00. Then Hector leaves for work at 5:30 after spending a little time with his ladies.

Frozen Custard and the Parents

Hector and I have a favorite frozen custard place that we love to visit on a somewhat regular basis. My mother has been looking forward to this place ever since we told her about it back in January when we discovered the little gem. Our frequent visits soared to a whole new level while the parents were in town visiting Natalia. It was not until the second week of their visit that we got custard the first time and I believe that we went a total of three time that last week of the visit. It is so good. Honestly, one cannot find a better frozen custard establishment. Not only is the custard amazing, but the portions are giant and the price is fabulous. My parents ordered the small cone. I have yet to try the large.

My mother liked the custard so much she decided to wear some on her shirt. I think she just wanted to take some home with her as a memento. Now my parents have two reasons to come and visit the East coast. Natalia and frozen custard. Hector and I do not make the list of reasons to visit until slot three. After seeing my parents love of the custard place, I am not sure who has the number one slot; Natalia or the custard.

It was great having my parents in town. We enjoyed spending time with them. My dad did lots of little projects around our house. It was great having my mom around to help with Natalia. It was nice to have someone to talk to while I fed the baby. My parents are the best. I am so grateful for all they taught me growing up. I am so glad that my children get have my parents as their grandparents.

The Milking Station

Just use your imagination! Honestly, if I would have seen these pictures six weeks ago, I would have had no idea what this was. Who would have guessed that feeding a baby could entail the use of such fun contraptions.

The rocking chair is the good part of the milking station. She is beautiful. My father is an amazing woodworker. I am reminded of how talented he is every time I see a piece of furniture he has contructed. Because I live on the opposite side of the states from my father, I do not have much hand crafted furniture made by my father. It is a little difficult to transport. However, that did not stop my dad from making me this beautiful rocking chair. He made all the pieces at his house and then brought the pieces on the airplane as his check in baggage. Once at my house he assembled the chair. It looks absolutely perfect in the nursery. Thanks Dad, it is the best piece of furniture in our house.

Natalia...Did you listen to the doctor?

I was so excited when the doctor told me I could let Natalia sleep as long as she wanted at night, but clearly Natalia was not on board with this new plan. Most nights for the last two weeks I have had to wake up the little munchkin after she had been sleeping for four hours. I knew she wanted to sleep longer but we were still watching her weight gain. Last night she had permission to sleep for five, six, even seven hours if she would have liked, but no; last night she only wanted to sleep for three. What a fickle little thing.

Finally

Natalia had yet another doctor appointment today. Drum roll please.......she finally gained enough weight to pass up her birth weight. 8 pounds 11 ounces! What a relief. The doctor also said that it is okay to let her sleep as long as she wants to during the night! What......I do not have to wake up a perfectly content sleeping baby to feed her? Life just got a little better!

Projects with Grandpa

My parents have been visiting for the past couple of weeks. It has been so much fun having them stay at our house. My mother has helped so much with the baby. My dad brought a book with him and did some reading and sun tanning the first week he was here...but then he got restless. This of course plays to our advantage because he starts looking for projects to work on. This weekend, Hector and my dad worked on the back yard. The yard was pretty rustic before the boys got to work. We had a crazy patio that was made of random bricks and cement pieces. It looked bad. The boys dug up all the pieces and reused them to build a new patio (a much nicer one), stairs and flower beds.

Hector and I love berries, so we planted raspberries and blueberries in the flower beds. Natalia is chummying up to the blueberry plant here. She wanted to join in on the fun the boys were having.

This is my dad at the end of the day. He really did put in a lot of hard work. The sun was out all day. I think the boys both burned off a few pounds.

My dad created stairs coming down the side of our house into the back yard. These stairs were inspired by a hike we did when I was a kid. Seven Lakes Basin was a beautiful hike, but we had to hike down (and then back up the next day) over two hundred rock stairs to get into the basin. They looked much like these. The stairs and the terraces turned out great. Plus I get to remember my first big hike every time I look at them. My mom does not have the same fond memories of the hike, so I guess it is good she does not have to look at the stairs everyday.

The new patio is much nicer than the old. I am bummed I did not take a picture of the old one, but trust me, this is a vast improvement.

Earlier in the week, I had my dad work on a shelf that sits in our stairwell. It looks great coming up our stairs. I had wanted to put something there for a long time. It turned out way better than I could have hoped for. My dad designed it and then built it. It has been so nice having my dad around. He has really helped us get some projects done around the house. We will miss having him here.

Fun in the Sun!

Sun bathing already...and only a month old. I bought a slip and slide for my nephews while my sister was visiting. We set it up one morning and the boys put on their swim suits and began having fun. One of my friends from work got Natalia this cute swimsuit and gave it to me at my baby shower. I knew it would be way to big for her, but I did not want her to miss out on the fun in the sun!

Natalia loved the swimsuit and the sun, but she was not much of a fan of the cold water. We dipped her toes in the pool at the end of the slide...but clearly she is a warm water kind of girl.

That is not a happy face!!!!

It didn't take long for Natalia to want to move to the shade. She has a nice natural tan already, sun bathing is really over rated for her. Everyone had fun looking at her in her over sized swimsuit. She has plenty of room to grow into it.

We all had fun watching the boys play in the water. It was fun watching Grandpa and Hector spray the boys with the hose. I decided that holding the baby gave me a huge advantage in a water fight. No one was aloud to spray me because I had the baby. I stayed very dry!

Mommy Time

My sister Rachel was visiting for a week. She is great at taking pictures. Both her and her husband have an eye for taking great pictures. It was a lot of fun having Rachel take pictures of Natalia and I.

Natalia is so little. Yet at the same time, I am amazed that something so big was able to...well you know...fit through a rather tight passageway. Ouch!

You may be wondering why there are no face shots of Natalia. While it may appear that Mommy and baby are having a happy mommy/daughter time, she was actually quite unhappy while these pictures were taken. Even when Natalia is crying, she is supper cute.

What a little Munchkin.

Natalia loves to take naps on mommy. And clearly by this photo, I love to take naps as well.