daddy's girl

For credits, see my 2Peas gallery.


Just wanted to post this page that I did today. I'll be back tomorrow with a Disney/Florida/Jenny's wedding recap.

Excuses

I know, I know. I'm a bad blogger. But at least I have an excuse - I have a new baby. For a few weeks before I had Maricela, I would use the excuse "I'm going to have a baby soon" for almost everything. Keith was starting to make fun of me - he said I'd been saying that since the first day I found out I was pregnant. Now I have the excuse of "I just had a baby". We'll see how long I can milk that.

My mom was out for a week. We had a lot of fun with her.

(I had another picture I was going to post, of her with the other girls and blogger won't let me. I'll try to add that one later.) The girls were really excited to get to spend time with Gamma. After we dropped her off at the airport, Elena cried almost the whole way home. "I want Gamma...Why can't Gamma stay with us...When will Gamma come back". Then the next morning, she got up early like she had been doing for the past week, and I heard her wandering the house, saying "Gamma where are you? Gamma let's read". It was sad.

And we leave tomorrow to go to Florida, so I won't be back until next week. My sister Jenny is getting married, so we're going down for the wedding, and a trip to Disneyworld. The girls are SO excited. So I'll be back with lots of pictures.

For now, here's the first scrapbook page I've done for Maricela. This picture was taken on July 23, she was 2 days old. She smiles so much!! I've even been able to catch more smiles than this one. She is one happy little girl.

For credits, see my 2Peas gallery.

Recent Pics

I just wanted to post a few pics from the last couple days.

Here are Amya and Elena at the juice stand that they made. The little boy is our neighbor from across the street. He went around on his bike to all the other neighbors, asking if they wanted to come buy some lemonade from our girls. Keith bought a glass from both of them and one other neighbor came over to buy a glass as well. The little boy bought some, then asked for his money back. :P They were charging a dollar a glass! Keith said it was worth it, cause they filled up the whole cup. Anyway, he was very proud of their entrepreneurial skills.

Téa was so excited that Marisela was giving her 'kisses'. I didn't want to spoil her fun and tell her that she was really just looking for some milk.

Apparently, Maricela thought that there could be milk in her hat as well. Sadly, she was mistaken.

Introducing.....

Maricela Kathleen Vallejo

July 21, 2006
6 lb 13 oz
18 1/2 in

We came home on Sunday, and she's been sleeping and eating really well.

Back later with more pics.

2 MORE DAYS!!!! I can't believe I only have two more days left before I'm the mother of four. I don't know if I'm ready. The last few days I've been on a cleaning spree. I've gotten all the baby clothes out, washed, folded and put them all away. The bed, the swing, and the carseat have all been cleaned and are ready. The house is looking pretty clean (cause we know Keith won't do any major cleaning while I'm in the hospital, so I had to get it ready beforehand.)

Let's see, is there anything else? Oh yeah, a name. We still don't have one. ACK!!!! I've given Keith plenty of names to choose from that I like, and he says he doesn't really like any of them. He only has about two that he kind of likes, but I don't really like those.

Just in case anyone's wondering (and so that we can have it down to remember later) here is a list of names that I like and the reasons Keith doesn't like them.

Ariana - probably my favorite, Keith says no because he has a sister named Aria and the names are too similar. But everyone calls her Edia, so it's not that big of a problem, but he says no.

Eva - again, he has a sister named Iva, so he says it's too similar.

Iliana - too much like Elena.

Celia - he doesn't really like this, but likes Cecilia. I have an aunt named Cecilia (she goes by Ceci) so I'm not sure how that's ok, and the others aren't, but oh well. I kinda like Cecilia, but it's definitely not one of my favorites right now, so I'm trying for others.

Mariela - he says this is the only one that he sort of likes. But really, he likes Marisol. There are two reasons we're not using Marisol. One - it's the name of one of his high school girlfriends that he kissed. Two - (if number one didn't matter to me...and it does) it doesn't end in an "a", so it doesn't really match with the other girls. I'm looking for a name that goes - the other three all sound alike at the end, I think it'd be weird to have something else for the fourth. Example: "Here's Amya, Elena, Téa, and Shannon." See how it doesn't fit?

Talia - he says it's too ghetto. Whatever that means. (I also like Natalia, but someone in our ward just named their baby that a month ago, and I don't want to copy them)

Sariah - (a name from the Book of Mormon, pronounced Sar-i-ah). I also like the Spanish version, which is Saríah (pronounced Sar-ee-ah, emphasis on the "ee") but he says no. Doesn't really have a reason, just no.

Aaliyah - I don't know if that's how I'd spell it, or if I'd figure out another way to spell it, but again, too ghetto.

So there's my list of names. He only has the two (Cecilia and Marisol). Since I've carried this baby for 9 months (and in this current sweltering heat it's not easy) I think I should have a little more say. But apparently I don't. I guess this baby will be coming home nameless as well (Téa didn't have a name for 2 weeks, also Keith's fault), unless we figure something out before Sunday. (I will be having her on Friday, then I plan on taking advantage of my full 48 hour stay at the hospital - free food and no chasing after the kids for two days - you better believe I'm doing that.)What else, what else....

Kara's here. She got in last night. The girls are really excited to be spending time with her. Amya is VERY excited to go scrapbooking with her. She keeps asking Kara if she knows where the scrapbook store is. She wants to make sure that they won't get lost on the way there, I guess.

I think this post has been long enough. I might come back later with some recent pics. It's just so hot in our upstairs (where the computer is) that I haven't felt like coming up here lately. Also, if you read through this whole long post, and have any name suggestions (that end in "a"), please let me know. I'm getting a little desperate.

Names

Téa can now say Elena. Well actually, she says "Nena". We just got Elena to stop saying "nena" and now that's what Téa says. Oh well, it's sweet that she's trying to say her sister's name. Amya's pretty jealous - I keep hearing her say "Téa, say ay-a. Téa, can you say Amya?" Maybe she'll be able to teach her quickly. After all, it didn't take them long to teach her to say crack. No news on the baby name front - we still can't agree on anything. And we have less than two weeks left.

read

I started this page awhile ago, and forgot to finish it. So I finally finished it tonight. Téa still carries that book around with her a lot. It's one of her favorites - Ten Little Ladybugs in spanish, a present for the girls from Aunt Kara. (Pics are from April 1.)

For credits, go to my 2Peas gallery.

spring beauty

just a page I did today. This is Téa, back in April, sitting in the field by our house. Now I need to do a page that has all the outtakes from trying to get this shot. :)

For credits, go to my 2Peas gallery.

We don't...

So we've had a virus go through our house the past weekend. Everybody has been feeling sick, except Elena. (Now I'm jinxing her) Last night, Amya threw up all over their little Dora couch. Here's what Elena had to say about it.

"Mom, I don't like that awful stuff. Clean it up!!"

"Amya, we don't throw up on the couch. It's awful. Go to the potty."

ah-choo

Just wanted to post the page I did today. Keith was so excited that he caught Elena sneezing on camera. Pics taken June 11.

For credits, go to my 2Peas gallery.

Ummmm.....

I don't have too many new things to report and therefore, can't come up with an interesting title. We've just been taking things easy the past week and haven't really done much. Elena now insists on saying her own prayers - she doesn't want any help from anyone. She says really sweet things too, like "Help us be happy" and stuff like that. Three more weeks until the baby is here. I hope the three weeks go quickly - it's so hot here and I'm getting way uncomfortable. We still have no name for her, guess we better get crackin on that.

I forgot to do a recap of our trip to Texas. We didn't do too much while we were there. Went to Benjamin's birthday party, went to Juarez, went to the funeral. We had a really good time, it was relaxing to have a little vacation. The girls had a lot of fun playing with Ariel, Soly, and Benjamin. We didnt'take very many pictures so I don't have that many to share.

Here's one of Amya jumping into the pool at Benjamin's party.



Here's Keith doing one of his crazy pool tricks. (I don't know why this is coming out so small - if you click on it, you can see it bigger, although I don't know how much bigger you want to see Keith. Maybe this is a good size after all. :P )



Here is one of us in the mercado in Juarez.



I would have taken way more pics in there, but Keith didn't want anyone to see us with the camera and then try to steal it, so we didn't take it out until we were just about to leave. We really had a great time going there. We ate lunch at a little shop inside the mercado - chile relleno burritos with avocadoes, tomatoes, and lettuce for $1.50. You can't beat that price and what's better, they were THE BEST chile relleno burritos we've ever had. Plus a huge glass of lemonade for another buck. We had so much fun talking to the people there and shopping. I got a really pretty picture to hang on my wall (maybe I can take a pic of that later) and we got matching dresses for the girls - even the new baby has one. (They're the dresses the girls have on in the Father's Day pics). All in all, it was a fun trip.

run

Just a page I did today. I was playing with the camera, trying to take pics of Amya running where she's in focus but everything around her isn't. The big one didn't come out exactly right - her hand is in focus, but nothing else - but I just love the smile on her face.

For credits, go to my 2Peas gallery.

Random Pics

I also wanted to post some silly pics of the girls that we've taken lately, so here they are.
Here are the girls in the shirts we bought them in Vegas. We couldn't find a funny saying for Amya, so her's is just a monkey. Elena's says "I have to hide my candy from my mommy" (which is totally true) and Téa's says "I didn't do it, Nobody saw me do it, I want to speak to my Grandma". Yes, we bought it for her, not her grandma, but we thought it was funny.

This is Téa making her own pizza the other night. We did this a little bit ago, and I thought she was too young to do her own, so I made one for her. When we had pizza again for Father's Day, she wanted to help, and sure enough, she did a pretty good job. She had a lot of fun putting on the pepperoni and pineapples.

Here's Elena, trying to hide the fact that she's sucking her thumb. I don't know what we're going to do with her.


Here's Amya getting Spiderman (Elena) ready for the day.

Amya making a silly face.


Elena with a Kool-Aid mustache. (and apparently very pleased about it)

Me and my pregnant self.


Téa trying to carry a 2 liter soda pop bottle. Maybe she was thirsty?

Happy Father's Day

Okay, I know it's not Father's Day, but this post is about it, so why not have that as the title, right? We had a pretty laid-back Father's Day. I had gone to the store the night before with Amya, and she picked out some cinnamon rolls that she wanted to make for Keith for his breakfast. Then we went to church and when we came home, Keith got to take a LONG nap. While he and the two younger girls were asleep, Amya and I made him some cards and got his present ready. I bought him a Willow Tree statue that has a dad holding a baby.


I had wanted to get the dad and daughter one, but all the stores around here that carry Willow Tree have been sold out of that one for awhile. So maybe next year.

The girls had fun playing with Keith and helping him open his present. We made a card and I traced their handprints on the card and they each wrote inside their hands. (Well, Amya did the only real writing, but the other two tried) These girls sure love their dad!