Spring Break

Mark had spring break a couple of weeks ago. We sure lived it up because we planned something fun every day he had off. It was a great week but we were pretty worn out by the end, Lucy especially. Lucy was hating her car seat and stroller by the end of the week and all my tricks for calming her down and getting her to sleep stopped working. It was a sad day when she got too smart for me.

Mark and I thought it would be fun to do the river walk in downtown Fort Lauderdale on a weekend night. We walked past the first houses and first schoolhouse built in Fort Lauderdale, yachts, mansions, parks, fountains, the shops on Las Olas, and the sunset. The walk took about 3 hours. Luckily, Lucy was loving the stroller rides then so she just quietly sat and watched everything go by. It was so nice!



The following Sunday, we blessed Lucy. She was so happy all Sunday morning until she was carried up to be blessed. She started screaming as hard as she could. :( Mark did a good job staying focused and went right on with it, but I could barely hear what he was saying. Of course Lucy was back to her happy smiling self right after. Great timing Lucy...Oh well, at least she got blessed.
This is probably the most accurate picture of what Lucy really looked like during her blessing.


While Lucy was in the hospital my mom was so sweet and made her a blessing dress. I finished it off by making the flowers and sewed on the ribbon. It fit Lucy perfectly!



My sister had a great idea to take some pictures of her baby with her own baby blanket. I stole the idea and took some pictures of Lucy with the baby blanket that my grandmother made for me when I was born. (Thanks Katie!)


We were also able to go to the Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden in Miami during spring break. They had every kind of palm tree you can imagine! I didn't realize there were so many kinds. The things I loved seeing most though were the cocoa plants (since I love chocolate so much of course), the tropical rainforest they created, and the butterfly garden. The butterflies were everywhere--so beautiful!




I also begged Mark to drive through Little Havana on the way home. Not worth it--the only thing I was excited to do there was lock my doors!
The next day we went to the Seminole Indian Village. I was so excited because I was told there was a village with indian craft and cooking demonstrations, a museum, an alligator farm, and an alligator show at this place. If they hadn't had that alligator show at the end, I may have asked for my money back. When we walked in, I walked right past the village with the "demonstrations" without even realizing it. The alligator show was amazing though. I was so scared the guy was going to get eaten the whole time! The alligators were hissing at him and he just kept doing these crazy things with them.
Mark also got to hold a baby alligator after the show.





I was having the time of my life until I stood up and a puddle of green, mushy poop ran all down my pants....WORST BLOWOUT EVER! Everything I did to clean it up just made it messier. To make matters worse, the bathroom was locked when I was running to it carrying poopy Lucy and my poopy pant leg . Also, my back up outfit that I had been carrying around with me for the past three months in my diaper bag magically disappeared. When they finally got the bathroom unlocked, I came out with green stained pants and with Lucy wearing a diaper and jacket in our 90 degree weather.

The next day I packed a couple more back up outfits and we were off to Naples beach on the west coast of Florida. It was beautiful! Naples had soft fine sand, seashells galore, and dolphins! Mark and I were just watching some birds dip down for fish and we saw a school of dolphins swim only about 100 yards from the beach! I even saw a couple jump out of the water! It was awesome!
Here are the birds...

and here is one of the dolphin fins! See!!! There's proof!




Sideways video--sorry!



For the finale of spring break, we went down to Anne's Beach in the keys with our friends Heidi and Alex. The beach wasn't my favorite but it was fun to be in the keys with some fun friends. We didn't take any group pictures so there you have it--Spring Break 2011.

February Fun

These are of Lucy and her little buddy Kylie at the beach. These babies were born about a week apart. Aren't they so cute together?!


Lucy trying to get a tan

We also went to the Orange Blossom Parade a couple of blocks away. What a great town I live in--parades for no apparent reason. We thought that Lucy was doing some great sleeping during the parade until we got back to the car and realized she had a major blowout. It was worth it though because I got to see a pig on a leash wearing clothes and a truck doing wheelies. Definitely not something you see every day.

The rest are ones I threw in because I thought they were too cute to leave out. :)

Happy Valentine's Day!

Speaking of hearts this Valentine's Day...We just got Lucy's checked to see if the hole in her heart had closed. We were thrilled to hear that she has one perfect little heart and the hole is closed! I am amazed once again at how we have been blessed. I can now officially say that Lucy is truly 100 % miracle! We love our little Lucy--what a blessing!

Lucy Favorites

Lucy is five months old. She is weighing about eleven and a half pounds. I am having trouble getting much done since I just want to play with her whenever she is awake. These are my favorite things about Lucy right now:

She is such a happy little thing. I love her smiles and the way she kicks her legs when she is happy. (This is when she isn't spitting up of course. Notice how she is wearing a bib in almost every picture?)

I love her big fat baby cheeks...maybe because this is the only thing she inherited from me since she is practically Mark's baby twin. How fair is that? Honestly?

I love how sweet Lucy is. I get to hear these sweet sighs out of the blue while she sleeps and many times she sings while she sleeps. She has been her own little sweet self from the very beginning. I remember her making these same sleeping noises in the NICU. The first time I heard it was during kangeroo care when she was only 2 pounds.

She also has these sweet cries that come out sounding more like little yelps. I may love her cry a little too much though since most of the time when she cries I just start to laugh. I should probably have more sympathy for her but I can't help myself. They just sound like these funny little girly yelps to me.

For some reason, I also love how Lucy looks in her carseat. Maybe it's because she just sits there so innocently watching everything I do.


A couple of weeks ago, I brought Lucy in from a shopping trip and left her in her car seat since she was sleeping. I couldn't believe how quiet she was. After a while I started getting worried. When I went to check on her I found this...


Of course! Who wouldn't sleep better with a night mask on?

Yesterday we were thrilled to be able to spend a day with Mark's sister Laurel and her husband Kory. Lucy loved Laurel and Mark got some great pictures of Lucy looking and smiling at her. I can't blame Lucy, we love them a lot too!