15 Months already?!

Why did no one warn me that time goes by even faster with the second child? My kids are growing up way too quickly. I just cannot believe that Lena is already 15 months old. She had her check-up yesterday and Dr said she is doing great. Lena finally hit 20lbs...20lbs 2 oz to be exact, which puts her in the 5-10%. She is 29 inches long (up half an inch from her 1 yr check, and in the 5-10%). Her head % decreased from 100% to 96%. Good for her, pretty sure girls with abnormally big heads look funny. Conclusion...Lena is still a petite peanut. And we love her for it.

This girl continues to warm my days...and nights. Oh yeah, at 15 months she still hasn't quite caught on to how awesome it is to sleep at night. She is lucky she's so cute. Lena smiles and laughs all.the.time. I have honestly never seen a happier toddler. Ugh, did I really just call her a toddler?! She is super snuggly and will randomly walk over to me (or Mike) to give a hug and kiss. She loves to climb up on my lap and just hang out or bring a book with her to read. She loves to give her baby dolls hugs and kisses, too. And she kisses every baby she sees in a book. Seriously...super kisser on our hands...this could be trouble when she hits her teen years.

The Dr was uber-impressed with Lena's language skills. Our guess-timate is that she has about 30 discernible words. Some that I can think of are: dog, puppy, yummy, milk, Mama, Daddy, Dylan, ball, bubbles, No, Yeah, eat, blanky, binky, Hi, bye bye, baby, and dance. And she just babbles all day long. So much different from her brother at this age...he just whined all the time.

Lena started walking about a month ago and hasn't looked back. She is starting to try to run occasionally and it is hilarious to watch those little teeny legs make the attempt. She normally falls flat on her face, but she gets right back up and tries again. Guess that means she's a persistent little girl.

She loves to watch TV. I have to be careful to re-direct her throughout the day because Dylan likes to have the TV on for background noise. If I would let her, Lena would happily sit and stare at it all day. Doesn't even matter what is on. Although, she is quite fond of Elmo. Funny story about Elmo, I was walking through Target with Lena the other day. We walked past a display of Sesame Street t-shirts and Lena pulled an Elmo one off the rack as we passed by. I let her hold it for a minute and then hung it back up and started to walk away. As I started pushing the cart, she started sobbing and screaming 'No, no...Mo (Elmo). No, no...Mo.' I thought to myself, 'Surely she is not crying over that shirt.' But, I backed up and handed the shirt back to her. She immediately quit crying, hugged the shirt of Elmo and said 'Awww, Baby.' Needless to say, there is now an Elmo shirt hanging in her closet.

A few more of Lena's favorite things: her blanky (stupid Pottery Barn and their insanely soft blankets), dancing, Mommy, Dylan, Daddy, pots and pans, books, cars, being outside, bracelets, and milk.

Oh sweet girl...I love you and still thank Heavenly Father every single day that you came to our family.

AHA!

I've been having quite a few 'Aha!' moments the past couple weeks. Some good, some I haven't been so fond of. Such is life, right?

One thought I had the other day...I'm bored with life as is, I'm ready to move again. As soon as I had the thought, I scolded myself. Why on Earth would I think that?! Mike and I are going on 7 years of marriage and we have lived in as many houses, in 5 different states. Why, oh why, would I say I'm ready to move again?! Apparently all the moving we have done, has caused me to not be able to sit still and just enjoy life as is. So, in an attempt to spice things up without creating chaos, I'm trying to get more involved with some hobbies and activities.

I have been contemplating getting more involved with Photography for quite a while now. I lack self confidence when it comes to my artistic abilities. I don't feel that I was really blessed with talent in this area...I'm okay with that, I just realize my main talents lie elsewhere. That being said, it doesn't mean I can't learn and become good at something artsy. I have had many many people tell me I take good candid pictures and I do enjoy documenting life this way. So, here I go. Until the past few weeks, I only practiced with my kids and personal things. But, I have recently asked a few friends if I could practice using their little models. Although I still have a huge learning curve ahead of me, I feel like I'm progressing nicely and am actually proud of what I've done thus far.

Okay, just threw this one in because she just cracks me up. Love this girl to pieces.

Olivia is one of Dylan's friends from Primary at church. She is so super cute and has lots of personality, so I figured she'd be plenty of fun to shoot. This was my first shoot in the evening and I must say, while it is different to shoot with evening sun...I loved it! The color and contrast in the pictures was so vibrant! I must practice more at this hour.

Little Ava is another friend of Dylan's and her Mommy is one of my friends. They were my first practice session and they were so cooperative! We ended up with a perfect, cloudy day. Lighting was awesome and I really didn't have to do much editing. For the first time, I was able to actually say I was proud of something I'd created!

I've got a few other projects I'm working up the motivation to work on in the next little bit. Hopefully they turn out...that will help me keep up motivation to keep trying new things so I can find stuff to keep me entertained. I don't like when I have those 'bored' thoughts...usually something huge happens to us shortly after such thoughts.

I may have just jinxed myself.