Riley Says...

you should stop and smell the flowers (or eat them, whichever works best for you)!

I think I can, I think I can...

Not quite this time (I think me taking pictures ruined her concentration)...but soon!

Riley's New Friend!

Riley has a new friend! Our friend's Greg and Lyndsay had little Clara Monday morning. Riley has had a a bunch of play dates with Clara's older brother Xavier so we're very excited for Greg, Lyndsay and Xavier and look forward to Clara joining in on the fun! Riley's going to teach her how to play with dolls and play with her house when Clara gets a little older. We went over to their house last night to meet little Clara. Can I just say I forgot how small they really are and she's about 2 lbs bigger than Riley was as a newborn! She is absolutely precious and Greg and Lyndsay are amazing, they went to a birthday party that morning and then had us over and they fired up the grill for a bbq! Xavier was as adorable as usual but he was on the go so I didn't get a chance to snap a photo of him.

Sweet Baby Clara sleeping during dinner (oh how I miss those days!)

Mommy and new baby:

Clara and I, such a sweet little girl!

Greg and the Ri-Bug!

Last Supper Out

Marc worked at home today so I suggested we actually go out to eat since we could go early enough to get back for Riley's bedtime. We went to On the Border for an attempted dinner out. Let's just say the last time we actually went out to dinner was when Riley was probably about 3 months old and fell asleep in her car seat at Buffalo Wild Wings on a Friday night. These days we can barely get her in her car seat to drive in the car so I knew we would not be blessed with a napping baby. Mistake number one of the night, not bringing her booster seat. I don't know what we were thinking but we showed up to On the Border with a diaper bag, Riley and our appetites. Marc sat Riley on the table and she was all over everything, she wanted the menu, she wanted our queso, she wanted my margarita. She went from sitting to laying to sitting again and she's sneaky! So after we ordered, Marc ran home to go get Riley's booster seat, it at least has toys on it to keep her entertained. While he was gone I attempted to keep her entertained and tried to feed her. It was then she discovered my guacamole, sour cream and the chip bowl. He got back 20 minutes later, our food had been sitting out for 10 minutes. We put Riley in her booster seat which kept her entertained while we finished our drinks. I will say Riley was very well behaved, meaning there were no meltdowns, she was as happy as could be (the big problem was just keeping her out of trouble) and I did get her to eat an entire container of green beans. We're used to take out and eating after Riley goes to bed (I was really looking forward to having dinner before 8:00 too)! She definitely loved being in a restaurant and watching everything. It was quite comical the whole situation, hey at least we tried! Lesson learned...bring booster seat (that is if we ever eat out again!)!!!

3 Generations of Alboms

I just had to share this picture that my mom's cousin sent her the other day, my dad scanned it so we could all see it. It's truly amazing, the photo dates back about 62-63 years when my mom was about 1 (sorry mom, I just let your age out of the bag) but this photo is so amazing. My grandfather, also know as Poppa, is on the far right, my Nana (who passed away when I was 7. Riley's middle name is in her honor) is sitting in front of him holding my mom, who is about 1. My mom told me that makes my Nana about my age, so crazy. One of my grandfather's brothers, Charlie is the other young man standing, he's with his wife and 2 of my mom's cousins. The other couple that is seated is my Poppa's parents, my great-grandparents, whom I never met. Poppa will be 97 in November so it is so neat to see him as a young man. I feel so fortunate that Riley has been able to meet her great-grandPoppa! We definitely need to make another trip out to Florida soon to see him so that she can get to know him better! This photo is truly a family treasure!

Videos

We had a lovely weekend, we had nothing planned and we all (especially Riley) enjoyed Riley's increased free time from her brace.

Marc got this video Friday morning before her Doctor appointment. We all knew Riley loved Puppy but I think this pretty much proves it: :)

This weekend was super relaxing, we didn't have any plans so Riley and I kicked it off by going for a walk with our neighbors and then we hung around the house most of the weekend and let Riley practice her crawling with her new found freedom. She's loving being out of her brace, our only problem is getting it back on her, she doesn't seem to enjoy that too much. Hopefully, we'll outgrow this phase soon! We set up one of Riley's new toys, it's a little Fisher Price Laugh and Learn Playhouse and she is pretty fascinated by it. I've noticed Riley is very detail oriented, she always finds the little things and focuses in on those instead of the big things, like she'll find a tag on a toy and examine that or when I am holding her she will hone in on my little charm on my necklace. It's a pearl and little disc with Riley's name on it and she focuses in on it and grasps it between her thumb and pointer finger and stares at it, examining it. She'll also hone in on a little dragon fly on her Exersaucer or play mat and just run her fingers over it. Makes me think she's going to be anal like her mom and dad! Could be a good or bad thing! ;)

Today it was super warm so we set up Riley's pool in the backyard and let her splash around. (She also found the blow up plug under the water and started playing with it, she's all about the details!). Here's a video of her playing in the pool, her parting "words" are her new signature. It cracks us up!

Riley was having a meltdown at shoe time, there's nothing like a zerbert on the thighs to bring out the smiles and laughter from my girl!

Top 10%

This is my brag post (ok, what post isn't)! We took Riley to Dr. H today for her regular check-up and she got a great report. He said she looks amazing, we could go down to 16 hours a day this month and then 12 hours a day next month! He actually told us she looks so great that we could go down the 12 hours but I told him that made me too nervous since we are currently doing 20 hours and he said he figured (he knows me too well!) so I compromised with Marc and we're doing 16 hours this month and then 12 hours until she graduates. He said her feet looked so great that he classified her as top 10% of his clubfoot patients! And she's ready for size 00 shoes! Woohoo! Go Dr. H and Riley! I am so relieved we are chugging along this journey and so far so good! I feel so much better that we went today and we don't have to go back until October!

How is it...

...possible that my baby is 7 months old already! I can’t believe how fast the time is going, I know I say that every month but now that we are on the side closer to Riley’s 1st birthday I can hardly believe that there are now only 5 months until Riley is a year old! Riley is more and more fun every day, she is just a complete joy and I am so proud of everything that she accomplishes. She is such a strong, opinionated little girl and I can only hope that she channels these characteristics to drive her to success as she grows older. Riley has really started to blossom developmentally this month. She started crawling/scooting better (with and without her brace - she spent last night chasing poor Morty around the family room), she started trying to pull up, and she has mastered the razzing noise which absolutely cracks her up! She has this great big belly laugh that is just contagious and she has started imitating us, my dad was zerberting her belly and then he laid on the ground and she tried to zerbert his belly. If I stick out my tongue, she sticks out my tongue, so cute! Her hair is growing so it’s a matter of time before I get to put cute little barrettes in her hair! And most importantly she continues to be a happy, happy girl!

Here’s her monthly growth trend (you'll have to excuse Riley wearing the same outfit two months in a row - it won't happen again!)

Little Blue Box

It's never too early for a girl to get acquainted with the Little Blue box. Riley's Aunt Jill and Uncle Edwin brought her a beautiful necklace with her initial on it for her baby naming which we're having in a few weeks. They're moving back to Virginia so they won't be able to make it to the ceremony so when they came over tonight to say goodbye they brought Riley her present. As you can see Riley hearts the little blue bag!

Cabo

Marc and I just got back from 5 days in Cabo courtesy of a trip my team at work won. It was an awesome time and best of all it was pretty much 100% paid for by work. We came in 3rd place this year for improving our mix at work so we were eligible for our company's sales incentive trip. They sent the top three teams to Cabo San Lucas for a 4 night stay at the Fiesta Americana Grand, all inclusive (yes, we both gained about 5lbs while we were there!). It was also our first vacation since our honeymoon two years ago since I was super sick with morning sickness last year, so it was much needed! We arrived last Thursday afternoon and were greeted with 100+ degree weather plus humidity. The company arranged for a shuttle to take us from the airport the the resort. Upon arrival we were greeted with some yummy beverages and then received our welcome packet, including sunscreen, a pair of Maui Jim sunglasses for everyone (good thing since as we were landing in Cabo Marc asked me if I packed my sunglasses and I hadn't) and $300 cash per couple. Our room was awesome, we had a great view of the pool area and the beach. (Cancun ladies, there was indeed a swim up bar - all we ever wanted! And no Carlos, he was replaced by the friendly neighborhood gecko, a much better visitor if you ask me!). We had some lunch (we learned quickly that the shrimp in Cabo is absolutely amazing!) and then hit the pool before getting ready for our welcome dinner.

Friday we got up, had a nosh and then headed out to our excursion for the day, which we chose as Zip Lining! (My company let us pick an activity for Friday and Saturday). Zip lining was way more fun and less scary then I thought it would be, though I will admit the first few times all I thought about was Riley as I was flying across a huge canyon in the air! We also did rappelling, which I would be ok never doing again. I was not a fan of that! We basically had to rappel down an 180 foot cliff, yeah not my idea of fun. All in all it was a good time, I'm glad I did it even though it was scorching hot out there.

Marc rappelling:

After our Zip Line adventure we headed back to the hotel for some lunch (more shrimp) and the beach before heading downtown for dinner since we had the night to do what we wanted. We went with most of my team to La Golondrina for dinner, it used to be Trailer Park II, Sammy Hagar's restaurant. This is the menu:

That should have been a clue as to how dinner was going to go, the portions were enormous, the biggest I've ever seen, I wish I had gotten a picture. My friend MaryJo ordered lobster and she got two lobsters that could only be described as ginormous! After a disgustingly large dinner we all headed down to Cabo Wabo for some drinks and 80s songs!

Saturday was our last activity and we chose an 80 minute massage! It was absolutely amazing! The spa at the Fiesta Americana was instantly relaxing and the massage pretty much put me to sleep. Then off to the beach for the day! That night for dinner we had a dinner cruise which took us along the Cabo coast.

Here's Lover's Beach:

The point where the Pacific Ocean and Sea of Cortez meet:

Sunday was a completely free day so we got up and hit the beach early and got ourselves a nice hut with bar service. We stayed there pretty much all day. I felt like I was living a Corona commercial. It was so super relaxing and would have been perfect had we had the Bugga there with us! That night we had a reception and a going away beach bash which turned into my team having a dance party on the beach. And Monday afternoon we were back home.

My parents came up and stayed with Riley and she had a great time with them, who wouldn't they spoiled her (as all grandparents do!). Riley also went to her first birthday party on Saturday and had a fun time there! Her expression wasn't quite what we expected when we got home, we expected her to be super excited and smile and squeal in delight and she just had a shocked look on her face and then got hysterical. All was back to normal today and I was greeted with my super smiley Riley when I got her out of her crib this morning! Riley's hair grew while were gone (it no long sticks straight up and it overlaps her ears now) and she also learned how to make razzing noises, it's so cute, she makes them and then starts smiling and if we laugh she laughs right along with us. She's also started imitating us! I took today off to spend more time with her since yesterday we had about an hour with her before bed time and I am so glad I did, it's so fun to be with her during the day!

Marc and I are now on major detox and diet - a true sign of a good vacation!

More Fun With Daddy!

Marc helped Riley with her crawling some last night, she really does like it I swear!

Out of Town Visitors

Saturday my Aunt and Uncle came out to spend the afternoon with us. They are from Florida and were in town with some friends doing site seeing and what not but wanted to come out and spend some time with us. They braved BART from the city so Riley, Marc, and I met them at the BART station. Riley had a great time with her Great Aunt and Uncle. We played at the house for a little bit where she showed off her mad crawling skills and then we went to lunch where Riley sat in her booster seat like a big girl and entertained herself the entire time while we ate. First time ever! Thank you Fisher Price for putting toys on booster seats, pure genius! We then took them to Mitchell Katz Winery to try our favorite wines. This was Riley's 7th or 8th visit to Mitchell Katz, they have seen her there since she was about 3 weeks old. The ladies there just loved her on Saturday, one of the ladies even came out to hold her and just loved her feet (she said they were the cutest, little feet ever! Yay for Dr. H's handy work!!! Marc said the look on my face was "Are you mad woman!?!" but she couldn't even tell there was something wrong with them at one point and she's a preschool teacher so she sees lots of little feet!) After some wine we headed back to the house for Riley to play with my Aunt some more. My Aunt brought Riley a new stuffed bug to play with and I think Puppy is feeling a little left out these days, while Riley still loves Puppy, she definitely is a big fan of her new bug. I'm not quite sure what her obsession with bugs is but as long as they remained stuffed and cute, I'm ok with it, it's when she starts bringing in real bugs into the house that I might have a problem with it! :) All in all it was a fun day and Riley had such a fun time with them she boycotted napping for the day with the exception of a couple of cat naps in the car, fortunately she was in a fairly good mood!

Riley and her Great Aunt Shelley:

Riley and her Great Uncle:

Do I have something on my face?