Exciting Things...

There is a lot going on lately with our families...exciting things! Not only are my sister and her husband baking a little cousin for Clara...due the end of September! But they are also in escrow for an absolutely gorgeous house only 3 minutes away from us!!

so cute!!

My little brother is graduating this weekend from California Baptist University, with a degree in Biology. I am so proud of him, he is enrolled in EMT school, starting two days after graduation in the hopes of eventually getting into a program to be a physician's Assistant!

I did a mini photo shoot with him for his announcements.

My brother in law, Jesse, is also graduating this month from Cal State Fullerton, with a degree in Musical Theater. He also has an excellent job lined up with Lambs Players in the Play Smoke on the Mountain. It is going to be at the Horton Grand Theater in Down Town San Diego, and I am so excited to go see it!

Not sure who took this...I wish I could claim it ;)

The month of May is going to be busy, with two graduations, a birthday celebration up in the L.A. area for Jordan's Great Grandma (turning 100 yrs old), a bridal shower, a women's tea at my church, and Maui!!! Busy, busy, busy....I like it that way :)

Five Years!!

Today is our five year anniversary!! It's a little crazy to think that we have already been married this long, however, when I think of all we have accomplished in those years, it's amazing that it's only been five years! I have decided to pick my top five highlights of our married life, it's going to be hard to choose but here they are....
1. Obviously getting married is going to be in the top five, we had a beautiful wedding and honeymoon...

2. Of course the most amazing thing of my life would be the birth of our daughter, it's only getting better and better the older she gets...

3. A huge goal of mine before having kids was a European vacation, and we spent the most amazing 2 weeks in London, Paris, Venice, Florence, Cinque Terra, and Rome...

4. It's pretty cool that after we got married I graduated from College and Jordan graduated from Paramedic school, we stayed very disciplined in our life goals...

5. I absolutely LOVE the house we built 2 years ago, and I LOVE that my husband and dad built it together, it is the gift from my dad that I live in every day...sniff.

What a wonderful five years, I know that if we have anything to say about it there will be 70 more years of them. I love you Jordan with all my heart, you are my soul mate, you complete me. Happy Anniversary!

Oh yeah, and we have big plans to celebrate this occasion...tonight we are getting a babysitter and going to a play at the Old Globe in Balboa park, and dinner. We have also booked a 7 day vacation to Maui!!!

Photography

The past two days I have been in photography mode. I am proud of myself, because I not only did 2 mini photo sessions, but I also managed to edit the pictures as well, with an extremely fussy baby to boot...possibly teething? I am a total amateur and I pretty much just wanted to practice the basics that I already know. So all the professionals out there please don't judge too harshly. The first session was with my friend Tiffany Smith and her beautiful baby Chloe. We went to a park near my house and just played and hung out.

Today I went to a different park with a friend from Church. Trish and her son Thomas were fun to photograph. It was definitely a learning experience taking pictures of a very energetic one year old!

They are both amazing women who have been through so much, and it was a privilege to spend time with them. I hope you all like my pictures and I can't wait until I can take a class or lesson and learn more!

7 Months Old

Clara is 7 months old today and we call her squirmy wormy. She has this frantic look in her eyes when she can't find anything to grab, and as soon as she spots something, you see her eyes light up as she dives for the object. It has become almost impossible to hold her on your hip, she just plunges towards the ground, towards anything that catches her attention. I know that she desperately wants to crawl, and she gets pretty frustrated when she can't get where she wants to. She still has the biggest smile on her face all the time, and she will flash a smile to anyone who will smile at her.
We had a bit of a difficult sleeping transition lately, her napping schedule was very sporadic and we have been trying to get her to take 2 naps, one in the morning and one in the afternoon, instead of her 3-4 small cat naps throughout the day. I also had to break her of the need to be swaddled. I used to lay her down, wrap her up, walk away, and she would fall asleep. But then she began bursting out of the blanket every time I would walk away and then couldn't fall asleep. So I decided it was time she was done with swaddling. She is pretty good at falling asleep without it now, however, it requires more crying and she ends up sleeping in all sorts of funky positions. Her night schedule took a turn for the worse when she developed a cold a couple of weeks ago, and boy was I EXHAUSTED! Thankfully she is doing better and in the last couple of days has slept better than ever. I hope it lasts! Overall she is a wonderful baby and one can't help but want to squeeze her and kiss her chubby cheeks.



On other subjects, Jordan's leg is getting better. He should be able to put pressure on it in about 2 1/2 weeks and I am counting them down! We go to the pool pretty frequently for him to work on stretching it under water, and Clara enjoys the outdoors. We are all doing well, just getting a little stir crazy being home so much. As soon as Jordan is better we are outta here, off to do who knows what...as long as it means going somewhere!
Happy Easter everyone! I hope you all have fun times with family in celebration of the risen Lord!