Ducks! (for real)

Laela and I went to feed the ducks this morning. I told her all about it and then I wondered if she would even recognize a "real" duck as a duck. All of her ducks are yellow (and one green). The minute we walked up to the pond she yelled "DUCK" and pointed to them. Immediately I was relieved! :)

Of course when we were walking up, the momma duck and her ducklings decide to take a swim across the small pond, so Laela and I decided to set up a trail. We tore up the bread, threw a bit out, and waited.

While we waited we got to say hi to a few joggers, watch a family attempt to catch some fish, and get a little wet from the light rain shower. Low and behold...our plan worked! Next thing you know...there were 10 ducks coming straight at us. Oh lord! I started to gather our stuff because I didn't know if I was going to stay or GO!

Turns out the ducks were super sweet, so we stayed. They were more scared of us. They stayed back about 4 feet from us (fine by Laela and I). We tossed bread and they ate it. Laela was super thrilled to see the ducks up close!

Then, the momma ducks and her eight ducklings came to visit too. That was super fun! I love how the momma duck just snatches up her food. I guess I thought she would help her babies get their food and then eat. NOPE! She was loving the hamburger buns we were tossing out to her.

What a great morning at the pond! :) We will definitely do that again.

13 months...

Friday, July 24th, Laela turned 13 months. Happy Birthday baby girl! Several things have happened within the last month. One big one...she is showing so much more interest in walking. She pulls up on me all day long and wants me to walk with her. She still needs to hold one of our hands because she is so cautious! On Friday, we went outside for a stroll down the sidewalk (yes...the width of our house twice, but in baby steps that is a LONG way!). She picked up the newspaper and carried it in one hand while I held her other hand. It was awesome! If we could only teach Laela and Allie to fetch the newspaper........She also likes to push her stroller around the house.This day Laela was pointing at the stroller and pointing at the... (In her language, that meant "Take me outside!"We are still working on food intake. She is getting a little more adventurous. Just yesterday, she ate an entire chicken nugget! Ro insists the reason she liked it was because it was the shape of a crown (From Burger King). I have tried them before, but she did not seem interested. I don't want her to eat chicken nuggets at every meal, but I do want her to eat more "human" food. Laela downed one nugget, a few french fries, 8 oz of milk, and a large jar of pears. Not too bad! Oh...after walking around the mall, we decided that we all needed to share a blizzard. YUM! Within the last month I have been showing her sign language for "all done." Here is her version. Not too bad!

Another thing that she seems to take a lot of interest in lately...books! Not so much when we sit down and read them to her, but when she has control (oh wait...I wonder where she got that from!) :) Anyway, she will grab a book and start "reading". If there is a dog in it, she will find it and point to it. Another funny thing about books is that she can not stand to have them turned upside down. If you give it to her that way, she will fix it almost immediately. Look at her reading a book in this chair. Laela looks so big and grownup.

Laela is really working on her words! Yesterday, I was changing her diaper after a nap. The lawn guys were outside and she kept looking around to see what the noise was all about. I told her the lawn guys were outside mowing the lawn and she said "MOW." I said "YES." :) I love it when she repeats words and uses them in context. For instance, when we are sitting at a red light, she says "GO". Then I spend 30 seconds explaining to her that I can not go because the light is red. I tell her "green means go" and she says "go, go, go!"

PS - Laela stayed with a babysitter for the first time on Thursday night. She did awesome! Laela was very excited to see Ms. Aileen (One of her teachers from school last year). I was worried she would not remember her, but she did great! She ate dinner, played, and went to bed when she was supposed to. No trouble! Oh...and we had our first date night since Laela was born. What was funny was that Ro and I are so used to rushing through dinner when we are with baby that we wound up rushing through our date dinner without even realizing it!

Mommy induced injury...

This morning Laela got her first "mommy induced injury." Sorry sweet girl! I was trying to help her up and one of my nails scratched her left eye. AH! I just knew that I got her eyeball, but I didn't. It was very close and I know it hurt. Sorry again! These darn nails...I took off my fake nails so that my real nails could "breathe". Real nails are sharp, mine do not grow very well, and I have to polish them every 2-3 days. Hmmmm...I think I like the fake nails better. They look nice, I get to sit in peace and quiet to have them done every two weeks, and they don't hurt Laela! I am back to the nail salon this week! Well...things got much better when I gave her the teether. She completely forgot that her mommy jabbed her "almost in the eyeball".
Comments by Ro: I do not understand how a real nail and fake nail are different in strength. I think either nail would have poked her eye out! :-) Next, the outfit Laela is wearing in the picture below was chosen by me. I know it doesn't match but I love the jail pants!)

Laela was caught!

Today I cleaned out the linen closet in the hallway while Laela cleaned out her drawer of bibs!Here is Laela scrurrying away from the scene...(notice the smirk on her face!)Oh! Something else funny. When Laela and I got home this afternoon Ro and Allie were out for a run. Well, of course Laela noticed the crate was empty and she thought it was very interesting...

She heard them come in the door and she jetted out of there!

Lovin' her Pancakes!

Today and other stuff...

Today was just hanging out at the house and going to the mall for a bit. While we were at home, I caught a few pictures of Laela doing what she does best right now...

Crawling under the dining room table, standing up and pushing the chairs out or sneaking up on mommy!

Doesn't she look like so much trouble in the picture above?

One of her favorite toys to play with right now is the barn and animal magnets on the refrigerator. You can match up the front and back of an animal, then the barn plays songs. Really cute! We haven't forgotten about Allie Mae either. Seriously...Laela changes her mind about the dog everyday. Today she screamed everytime she heard her paws clickety-clack on the floor. Yesterday she was rubbing her belly. Oh man...Allie Mae just wants to be loved!

Yesterday Laela got her walker and zipped right past Allie. She just smiles at her and zooms by. It is hysterical! Oh...and the walking. She is doing a lot more of "assisted" walking. She loves to walk with her little car/walker. Also, she is occasionally letting go of things and standing for 3-5 seconds. It is funny because she does not know what is going to happen so she just freezes. Then she laughs when she grabs back on to something. :)BTW...the blue shirt in the picture was given to Laela from the Murthy's the last time they went to India. It was really cool taking the tag off because it was hand-written with the person's info that made the shirt. No size info, but I do have the name of the person who sewed the shirt! :)

My cleaning buddy...

Our Serene Sunday...

What a fantastic, calm Sunday! Grandad is in town visiting from Florida, so we met with him this morning. We all went out to his hotel pool and had a fun time in the sun. The sun must have done something to Laela because she fell asleep in the car, got transferred over to her crib and still slept for 3 hours. YIKES! She was one tired fishy!
After nap time we cruised to Frisco for an early dinner at La Hacienda. YUM. Oh! Laela ate several bites of the refried beans. WAIT...I know what you are thinking...we are in for a lot of tooty-toots. Well...we will make it through. We were just excited for her to eat something in the "people" food category. She is having such a hard time transitioning from Gerber jar food to "people" food. I feel like the transition should have already been made, but she is one smart puppy when it comes to food. She knows where it comes from and whether or not it was processed in the Gerber food plant. Anyway, she is now eating cherrios, pancakes, granola bars, egg, french fries, biscuits, refried beans, mashed potatoes, goldfish, yogurt....hmmmmm...do you see a pattern...LOTS of carbs. AHHH!
Oh yes...also at dinner she used her crayons for the first time. Laela thought it was fantastic to see the color come off onto the paper. Too funny!

When we got home she enjoyed a ride on her car. Daddy was pushing her very fast and she loved it!

Before bedtime, Laela enjoyed a great ride on the rocking horse. She even sang a tune during the ride. :)

Cute outfit alert!

Is it bad that I love to post pictures of Laela wearing cute outfits? :)

Hot outside. Great arms. Fantastic tan. Why not wear a halter top? :)

Vacation time!

We took our first summer vacation this weekend. We planned to leave at 9:00 on Sunday morning and we did! We pulled out of the garage at 8:59 and we were on our way to Horseshoe Bay Resort in Austin, TX. Just a couple of days out of town and just the three of us.

Ro was a great driver and he got us there and back safely.

Oh Man...We knew going into this that Laela seems to be talking more these days, but HOLY COW! She talked, and pointed, and talked, and laughed, and talked and ... Nap time!
Then she woke up and laughed again! Laela did fantastic on the car ride down. She even got to read a few magazines during the trip!After checking in, we immediately threw on the swimsuits and made our way to the pool. AH! So nice. Yes, it was a little hot outside, but we did not care.After swimming, we went for dinner and a nice walk around the resort. Kinda reminded us of Kauai (okay...just a little bit...wishful thinking!) If you know us, then you know we love to shop! We were about an hour and a half from San Marcos' outlet shopping, so we made a morning of it. Again, we jumped in the car and off we went. Through Austin and off shopping in San Marcos. Laela had the greatest time on this rocking lion and rocking horse from Pottery Barn. :) On the way back from San Marcos, we stopped at the DQ and got a blizzard (Ro's first Blizzard experience). It was marvelous.

This morning, we just sat in bed for a minute this morning talking and playing until Laela decided that she wanted to order room service. She "read" everything on the menu!

Then we were out of there. A short vacation, but it was nice to get out of town. Here is the cool picture we took on the way out. When you drive in or out of town, you have to go about 5 miles on this little stretch of road next to the lake. WOW! The houses were beautiful and we decided that is our next big purchase...a lake house! :) (Oh...Ro doesn't know that yet, but now he does!)