Lily's First Photo Shoot

Our cousins Tom, Layla and their little son Atticus came into town and Layla took over 100 pictures of Lily-bell. Here are just a few!

More videos!

We took a couple videos recently of Lily and Boomer which just cracked us up. We have a bunch more, but at the risk of boring everyone with endless videos, we'll just post a couple. In the one we took of Lily, I think we laughed more than she did!

In this one of Boomer, he was really in this position with shoes when I came home. He has a tendency to move our shoes (not chew them...just move them) whenever we leave and don't take him with us. It's like his sign to us that he won't be forgotten...

Bookstore and Baths!

Lily headed out to dinner and the bookstore the other night with mom and dad. She didn't make a peep in the bookstore, but was more mesmerized with the rows and rows of books. She might've been a tad bored looking at dad's selection of books (historical biographies), but she seemed to enjoy mom's perusal of recent NY Times bestselling fiction!

Afterwards it was time for Lily's bath! She usually likes taking a bath - it's just the intial getting into the water that she doesn't always like. Then it's playtime! I'm sure Lily will thank me some day when she looks back at her bath pictures!

Lily stared at the books or stared at dad carting her around! She got a lot of compliments from the bookstore staff too!

Bath time - wooohooo!

Dinner Parrr-tay!

We had a dinner party for 6 the other night and Lily got to hang out with Sarah and Joel's little Ari! She also met Riley (Alicia's new pup). Boomer was crazy excited that another dog came over to play! We also got to hear about Kelly's trip to South Africa which was awesome!

And what night would be complete without a game of "name that TV sitcom!?" Greg played the theme songs on the stereo and we have to guess which show. We even had Pez dispensers as prizes. I know - so dorky...but so fun! It brought back all kinds of memories of TV shows we used to watch as kids - Family Ties, Growing Pains, Golden Girls, even Fraggle Rock!

We look forward to many more dinner parties with good friends!

Lily has a LOT to say!

I was making dinner tonight and Lily was just chatting it up while Boomer looked on. Here she is, caught on tape...

Lily trains for her 1st marathon!

Here she is getting getting advice on running from her Uncle Dave! Well, maybe not running, but crawling. The Cincinnati Flying Pig marathon has a 15 foot crawl called the "Diaper Dash" for one and under. Lily is excited to enter her first race in May! She's been actively "working out" by kicking her feet in her little chair. Her diet only consists of milk at this point, but it's making her nice and strong. :)

Here's a video of Lily practicing her moves...

2 Month Milestone

I'm a little delayed in posting her 2 month pictures, but better late than never! It's hard for me to believe it's been over 2 months since we've had our sweet Lily. She had her 2 month doc appointment and weighed 12 lb 8 oz and grew a little over an inch. She got 5 immunization shots which just might've been harder on us than her. Do those needles really need to be so long!? One of her biggest "accomplishments" in the last month is that she's now sleeping through the night (knock on wood it stays that way!) After 8 days I realized we were into a routine. I didn't want to get my hopes up and jinx it! She usually goes to sleep between 9-10 and wakes up around 8ish. Every once in a while she'll wake up at 4 or 5 but not as much anymore. She always takes a morning nap and then a later afternoon nap like clockwork.

In her "waking hours" she has been smiling, cooing, tracking us wherever we go and making all kinds of funny sounds. She surprises herself half the time with the noises she makes! In the evening if she gets tired or fussy, we'll walk her around and she knows instantly the minute you sit down or stop moving. She'll even be in a partial sleep and will let us know that she wants to keep moving! When Greg gets home from work we usually have "dance party USA" in the living room and he'll dance her all around - it's the cutest thing. She seems to be partial to Buddy Holly and Ben Harper (those were the most recent songs that shuffled up on the ipod!)

Happy 2 months Lil'~

Here are a few mom pictures...

These are most definitely feet that will be ready to play soccer... :)

Ethan and Lil'

Ethan and Lily just hangin' out.

Lily is lucky to have a cousin that's only a week and 1/2 older than her! Ethan was actually born on Lily's due date (Oct. 16) - while Lil' decided to hang out a bit longer until her big debut.

It'll be so neat to watch them grow up together since they live so close by (they've already "bonded" during 2 big holidays!) Boomer is always excited to see Ethan too...because he knows his buddy Bailey will be there as well.

We probably took about 75 pictures of Ethan and Lily together the other day, but I'll just post a few...

73 Days Until Spring!

I'm not sure how promising that sounds, but it's something to think about when it's gray outside and sleeting. At least we've already had the shortest day back in December, so we'll have more daylight now until June!

And don't you think the Lily-of-the-Valley is just the prettiest flower (and smells the best too)!? We may be a tad biased when it comes to the Lily... : )

To Kill A Mockingbird - Lily's Favorite Book!

Well, maybe not by choice, but as we've been reading different books, we'll read passages to her and she likes to listen intently. She'll often furrow her little brows as if she understands what we're saying. This morning I was eating my cereal and reading the newspaper (I like the paper copy...not online) and read interesting sections to her as she sat in her little bouncy seat. She looked over the whole time and was totally content just listening to stories about the economy, the UC game, Obama moving to DC and all kinds of articles from the paper. I think we'll have a little reader on our hands!

And, if you haven't read Mockingbird in a while, you need to pick it up and read it again. Like my dad said, Harper Lee's words are like "gems."

Scout [narrating]: Maycomb was a tired old town, even in 1932 when I first knew it. Somehow, it was hotter then. Men's stiff collars wilted by nine in the morning; ladies bathed before noon, after their 3 o'clock naps, and by nightfall were like soft teacakes with frosting from sweating and sweet talcum. The day was twenty-four hours long, but it seemed longer. There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go and nothing to buy... and no money to buy it with. Although Maycomb County had recently been told that it had nothing to fear but fear itself... That summer, I was six years old...

More Pictures!

Here are a few more pictures from the holidays...


Cousin Ethan with his cute Christmas outfit on...


Brothers with their babies.

Adam and Boomer chillin' on Christmas morning.

Brandon, Ethan & Sean

The Holidays!

Merry Christmas and Happy 2009! We had a wonderful break and spent a lot of time with our family and friends. It was so fun experiencing Christmas and the New Year with Lily. On Christmas Eve we went to mass and dinner with the Bea family (and Lily slept through all of it!) and then on Christmas day we spent 1/2 of the day at the Cole house and the other 1/2 at the Bea house. It was a busy couple weeks...here are a few highlights: we went to my grade school reunion (yes - grade school! we had a close class and a lot of people still keep in touch!), Matt & Jo Masterson visited and had dinner together (thanks for the Skyline!), Greg coached in a couple wrestling meets, we met Rachel's sister and her friend Hayley from Wisconsin and had dinner at Indigo and we went on a long walk with Boomer when it hit 70 degrees!

New Year's Eve was a blast - we met 4 couples for dinner and then headed back to the Hellyer house for the evening. Each couple had a baby so every room in the house was occupied with pack n' plays and sleeping babies (for the most part!) If only we could have a side-by-side picture of NYE from the past and compare it to today...I think it'd be pretty funny! Here are a bunch of pics from the last couple weeks...

Greg and Lily were both asleep!

Lily loves this little doll...that has an outfit almost like hers!

Here are a few pics from New Year's Eve...

Cute little Gavin.

Happy New Year Chris and Julie!


The Hellyer Family

Lily and Evan in matching pumpkin seats and blankets!