Sincerely, The Lishias

Month 5

8:28 PM

This month has been full of "firsts". We started her on cereal and when she got the hang of that, we have started adding "first foods". We bought the Beech-Nut brand baby food, which I think tastes the best, and so far she has had apples, pears, bananas, and sweet potatoes.

As of Sunday, she can blow raspberries. I can remember the day so well because we all, including Juliet, discovered that she could do this little trick during church... during the sermon. Yeah. Joey had to sneak out because she wouldn't stop. Since then, she does it all. the. time.

She also found her feet and she thinks they are delicious! Along with all this she has also started teething, sitting up, AND sleeping in her own room. She did so well with the transition. It's like she had been doing it all along. Plus, I love going in her room after she wakes up, seeing that huge, sweet smile and hearing her babble and coo at me.

Enjoy the rest of your week!

Eating Cereal & Making Muffins + Jelly

7:07 PM

It's March already? When I started back to school in January I dreaded being away from Juliet for so long. I'm glad to say that the semester is almost over and this mama is counting down the days! We took Juliet to see her doctor on Friday and after those horrible shots were over he gave us the go ahead to start her on cereal. Yay!

15 pounds : 5.4 ounces : 25 1/4 inches long

Can I just tell you that she slept for 13+ hours that night... She has done that before, but when she did it again for the 2nd night in a row- that's when we knew that it might be because of the heavy food in her tummy. She is feeling full and sleeping so much.

(As you can tell from this picture of her goofing off in the mirror with Daddy!)

March has brought some warmer weather along with it, Saturday it was in the 60s and Sunday was a high of 73! Just to have something to do that made me feel like Spring was actually here, I made some Blueberry muffins that honestly has ice cream in the recipe. Genius! It's super easy

- 2 cups of SR Flour

- 1/2 cup of sugar

- 1 pint of vanilla ice cream

- and 1/2 pint of blueberries

Bake at 375 for 20-25 mins

(I also pulled them out after 15 mins; put butter and a sugar and cinnamon mixture on top and popped 'em back in for another 5 or so mins.)

Also, my mom and I made a couple jars of blackberry jelly on Saturday and surprisingly, it was so easy! I seriously want to can everything now... We will never buy store bought again. There is also a raspberry vanilla bean jam recipe that I want to try that sounds amazing.

Enjoy the week ahead!

Sincerely,

The Lishias

Tummy Time

9:20 PM

Juliet's favorite toy now is a play table that my sister-in-law gave us and she absolutely loves it! :) I love the occupational therapy side of my job. During college I had to take several OT classes and they were so interesting. I remember reading and being so inspired. I wanted to implement what I was learning immediately. Well now, I'm getting to dust off those textbooks and use some of what I learned to help her grow and gain strength.

One- Even as a newborn, I took the legs off and propped it up next to her to encourage her to find her "midline". Babies are not born with midline orientation. They have to be taught through experiences on their side to get a sense of balance, symmetry, and it's also an introduction to defining sides; left and right.

Two- I added two legs so that is was on an incline. This allowed her to practice sitting and reaching for things that might be out of reach.

We also put her on her tummy while it was positioned like this and it was so rewarding watching her shift her weight onto one arm while she reached for the lights and toys with the other.

This table has completely changed the way we do tummy time. :)

It's our favorite pastime now!

Sincerely,

The Lishias

Anniversary Weekend & Entry Update

7:08 PM

This weekend was extra special. We celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary Sunday! We honestly celebrated all weekend long. I was surprised Friday at work by our FedEx man carrying flowers. (The flowers were from Joey, not our FedEx man.) We also spent Saturday night hanging wallpaper together, (which was actually a blast). We binged on Netflix, (bought groceries somewhere in there), and lastly, had dinner together.

We had to steal a few million kisses before we left her to play with Gran for a couple of hours while we went out for dinner.

(First Anniversary with her.)

Our main gift to each other was this wall,
which we are so "cheese-ily" calling it, "Our Anniversary Wall".

We are so relieved that the hard work is behind us and now we have this beautiful room as a result!

The wallpaper is from Hygge & West and we bought all of our supplies for hanging it at Lowe's.

The 7th year gift is copper, right? Ehh... close enough.

It only took us about 3 hours from beginning to end to hang the wallpaper, but we also painted the surrounding walls so that they area looked clean and fresh. The color we chose is a great white, for those of you looking for a beautiful, clean, bright color. It's called Alabaster from Sherwin Williams. We cleaned the room out, took a deep breath, and hoped for the best.

This was our first attempt at hanging wallpaper...

But to us that's the fun of home improvements; DIY!

The end result is the reward. Here's a few pictures from the process...

We worked from the middle of the wall to the outside.

wallpaper: Hygge & West

wallpaper paste / roller / smoothing tool / straight edge / knife / sponge

We love it!

Now we have rearranged all the living room furniture away from the TV and toward this view!

And because I can't write a post without mentioning Little Miss- I have to announce that she reached up and grabbed the mobile of her RockaRoo this weekend! She's getting stronger and stronger everyday and it's so fascinating to watch her change and grow.

Hope you guys had a fun relaxing weekend.

Month 4

7:49 PM

Our four month photo shoot was quite comical. It began ok, but the longer it went the more restless she became. It looked something like this...

Moments to remember!

Settling in for the night before a snow day with Mama!

Valentine's Day!

Relax... I'm not letting her eat out of the bowl. We are smelling the vanilla in the cake mix!

Our Weekend & Getting Baby Better

3:02 PM

With our baby girl's birthday in October, that leaves her first little months spent in the cold, cold winter. We have tried to keep her inside as much as possible. I'm thankful for the couple of warm days that we've had where we could enjoy a stroll around the neighborhood or a quick trip to Target. Sad to say, Juliet started sounded congested Sunday night and she's been fighting a cold ever since. Poor girl! It is so hard when they are sick AND this little... So we just rested most of the weekend and watched episode after episode of Fixer Upper on HGTV.

I've compiled a list of all the things we've used to try and help her feel better.
The Vicks Baby Rub has really helped her. I put it on her feet with socks at night, on her chest, and a little on her nose/upper lip. Also, one thing that REALLY has helped was turning on the shower and closing the door to let it steam up the bathroom.
Giving her a bath in the sink with Johnson's vapor bath in the steamy room. (This really helped reduce swelling and open up her sinuses.) Also, if you follow me on Instagram, you know that I am a firm believer in the Nose Frida. I don't know how mom's lived without it before!
The Vicks waterless vaporizer is actually something that I've had since college and I simply put in the bed beside her at night while she sleeps. And let's just say this... even though she's sick, she has sleep all night ever since we put that in her bed. She's on the up & up!

On a happy note, Daddy had a Spanish test this weekend so we made him a "Good Luck" cake to help him out! This is one of our favorite cakes because it's light and not too sweet. You can find the recipe here.

We think that she got sick from us taking her to church- can't win for loosing! But doesn't she look pretty for Sunday School?! One of my friends bought that dress for her for Christmas and I just love it- I couldn't wait for her to wear it.

Our sweet Juliet.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend!

February Festivities

1:08 PM

It's Valentine's weekend and we are getting a feel of what holidays are going to be like for the next several years and I have to say, we are in for a fun ride!

Valentine's morning we woke up to gifts and pancakes! Joey had stopped by the butcher and picked up a pound of hickory bacon, and I made us heart-shaped pancakes. We read stories to Juliet and spent the rest of the morning being lazy. While Joey went on a bike ride, I got little miss down for a nap and then we hit the town for a bite to eat and a quick trip to Crate & Barrel. Here are a few gift ideas that we picked out for our girl and a couple snapshots of the day.