Holiday Pictures

It's 8 a.m. and Isabella is sleeping in today. So I have finally had the chance to sit down and write in my blog. It's been a whirlwind of activities in the last couple months. In November we moved to our new home. It's strange being a homeowner now. My mother came to visit during the move. She helped take care of Isabella while we packed, moved, then unpacked. Her help was a Godsent. I don't know how other people with babies move at all.

For Thanksgiving we went to Luigi's brother John's house out in Clear Lake. It takes about two hours to get to his house from ours. We enjoyed great food and company. Isabella enjoyed spending time with someone her own age. John's stepson has two sons. One of them was a two year old, and the other was 8 months. So Isabella got to crawl around and play with someone her own age.

Lynne came over last weekend and we decided to take some family photos. Unfortunately, Isabella had another idea. It was close to nap time, so she was a little restless. We snapped a few before she got really fussy.

This weekend, we went to see Santa Claus. It was Isabella's first time and I was thinking that she would probably scream her head off. However, we were pleasantly surpised that she didn't cry or even get uncomfortable. She actually smiled for the picture. What you don't see in the picture is her daddy and mommy acting crazy in the background, trying to get her to smile.

Well that's it for the latest update. Until next time.



A few casual shots before the real ones.

Some of the photo shoot

Isabella's first Santa picture

Our New Home

So it is official today. We got the keys! Yeah! So finally a home of our own. Here are a few pictures of our new place.



Kitchen

Dining Area

Living Room

Backyard

Master Bedroom

Bedroom 2 ( Bedroom 3 looks just like this)

Bathroom

Isabella's First Halloween

We celebrated our first Halloween with Isabella. We carved a pumpkin. Isabella sat and watched us work on it for a while. Luigi got to pull all of the stuffings out and I carved the face. After that we got Isabella dressed up in her Halloween outfit. She was a ladybug. She was surprisingly good about it. It looked a little uncomfortable to me. But she was fascinated with the texture of the dress and wanted to touch it and put it in her mouth. So she was entertained with it to say the least. We handed out candy for a while to trick-or-treaters. Then when the candy ran out we decided to go trick-or-treating ourselves. However, we only went to one house. We went over to auntie Lynne's to say hi and show her our little costume. After that we went home. Too bad it was raining this year. The poor trick-or-treaters had to walk out in the rain all night. Well that's about it for now.

Bishop's Pumpkin Farm

So I found this place on the internet that reviewed pumpkin patches. I wanted to take Isabella to her first pumpkin patch. She probably won't remember anything about it, but it was fun for us. We invited Lynne and the Winslows to join us, so it was a family affair. The place was huge and very kid friendly. I think we will take Isabella there again when she is older so that she can enjoy what it had to offer. They had a petting zoo, train ride, hay rides, pig races, slides, and lots of yummy food. Here are some pics from our day.

Baby Growth

It's amazing how fast our baby is growing. It's also amazing how fast she picks something up and runs with it. Last week, she couldn't coordinate her arms and legs to get in the crawling position. This week she has figured it out and is acting like a pro. She has even progressed to the next step of rocking like a rocking horse in her first attempts to crawl. No movement yet, but it's amazing that one week she couldn't get up in the position and the next week she could and won't stop doing it. Another interesting growth this week was holding her bottle. She is now making attempts to hold her bottle. It still isn't perfected yet, but she is trying now. For the last month we have been trying to get her to do this to no avail. Then finally in the same week that she decided to get in the crawling position, she also tried to hold the bottle. Sounds like a little thing, but I was pretty amazed.

Will we have a house? We're in, we're out. Two weeks ago we made an offer on a house in Antelope that was accepted. Then the bank didn't get back to us on questions about the home inspection. After 4 different kinds of paperwork, we are still in limbo. Last weekend, we thought we lost it, this week we found out we got an extension to complete the inspection. I hate this up and down thing. You get excited, then disappointed, then excited again. It's crazy. Say a prayer for us that all systems are go. We really like the house.

That's about it for now. Thought I would post a quick update. Take care.

Isabella's Pictures

So I got suckered into more pictures at Babies R' Us. How can you resist when she is just so darn cute. Enjoy the new pics.

Melanie

Update

It has been a while since I have posted a blog. So I thought I would finally take the time to sit down and update it.

This month I went back to work and I am thoroughly enjoying my new fourth grade class. It's hard to believe that we have already been through a whole month of school.

Our rental home is officially up for sale. Our landlord wanted to sell it,so we will not be renewing our lease in November. We decided that it would be nice to finally go out and look at what we could afford in the housing market. There are actually some nice places out there. Our mortgage would work out to be the same, if not less, than what we are paying in rent now. So we may possibly buy something in the next couple of months. It's a scarry thought that we might be homeowners soon. But that's why we moved here to Sacramento in the first place. So we are headed down that road.

Isabella is growing rapidly. She now eats a few solid foods. She has tried rice cereal, banannas, sweet potatoes, carrots, and peas so far. She hasn't really objected to any of those so far. So we are glad that she is willing to try new things. She is rolling over and babbling up a storm. Some nights she sleeps through the night, and others she is up once or even twice. She likes to keep us constantly guessing. So far we haven't figured out what makes her sleep the night through. She had her first extended swimming experience. She dipped her body in the pool at Connies house over a month ago. But last week she was able to go in the pool for a while. I got in the pool with her at my dad's and we stayed in for about a half hour. She kept looking down at the water that was in her floating thing. She got to wear her cute little Winnie the Pooh bikini for the first time too.

Well that's about it for now. Hope all is well with everyone.

Take Care

Back to Work

So after a three week break and two weeks of school, it is time for me to go back to work. I have enjoyed my time off and having a little extra time with Isabella. We traveled to Southern California so that Isabella could meet all of her realtives down there. We also went on a day trip with my dad to Lake Tahoe. Here is Isabella in two states at once.

Isabella has discovered her voice and is now practicing and experimenting with making sounds she never has before. Sometimes she babbles for several minutes straight. We got wrangled in to taking pictures at Babies R' Us again and she took a darling angel picture while we were there. Other than that not much else is new. Enjoy the new pics.