Desperate Measures

In a vain attempt to promote his nap while avoiding her own Lilly brought all of her bed time things into the living room yesterday and offered them to Jack while he tried to enjoy some play time on the floor. She she must have been as desperate as I was for Jack to take a nap because, while very good at sharing, Lilly rarely offers monkey, pillow and especailly blankie without expecting something in return.

Traylor Park Princess

Lilly loves princesses and loves to play dress up. So, when she asked Santa for dress up dresses I wasn't surprised. She specifically asked Santa for a purple dress and a blue dress. He assured her that he would get to work on those dresses as soon as he returned to his shop. Imagine if you will how excited she was on Christmas morning to find that Santa had not only left dresses, but also an entire trunk of dress up items. There were dresses, skirts, sparkly tops, shoes, jewelery and a tiara. Lilly dove into the box and began pulling everything out. The magic of Christmas shone in her eyes as she pulled out the purple dress to show Bryan and I. We couldn't have been happier, she was so excited. Then, a moment later she crushed us when she turned to Bryan and asked, "Santa's still working on the blue one?" Santa fail.
But, Lilly has since forgotten all about the blue dress. (It helped that she already had a blue dress up dress that we now store in the dress up trunk.) She plays with the items in her dress up trunk all of the time, and there are often dresses scattered all over the living room and some times the house.
She also uses the dresses to pretend to do laundry. I know, I know...if she wants to do laundry I have plenty she could do. Here she is sorting her laundry. I know that she has learned this laundry thing from watching me, but I assure you: I don't wear silver sparkled shoes to wash cloths. Not to mention I typically have on pants while I do my housework.
In true traylor park fashion Lilly displays her wedding attire. Please note: The skirt is inside out, she's only wearing one purple heel and she is never without her trusty wife beater undershirt.

Here is Lilly in full princess attire. Purple velvet and satin gown? Check. Gawdy jewelry? Check. Magic wand? Check. Wife beater and purple heels? Double check. Hair done? Ummm....no.

Big Jack's Big Day

Jack turned two months old yesterday and had his two month check up with the doctor today. At 12 lbs 6 ozs and 24 inches long he's kind of a hoss, but that doesn't matter because he's as sweet as can be. He's right on target, doing everything he should be doing at two months: smiling, cooing and even trying to roll a little bit. He also tracks my voice and some times follows his hand or watches a toy. But, his favorite thing to watch is Lilly. Weather it's out of fear or admiration we still aren't sure, but Jack lights up with Lilly interacts with him.
Everything that Jack loves most can be done on his boppy: eating, sleeping and and thinking about eating. He can even yell at Bryan from his boppy if he wants.

If someone took a picture of me in my bath towel and then posted it on the internet I wouldn't be happy either. But, he sure looks cute. I, however, would not.

Bryan and Jack. Please notice that Jack is NOT screaming at Bryan. This is very rare and had to be captured on film (film? digital image? whatever I took a picture)

The Princess and The Frog

Lilly loves princesses and her new favorite game is to pretend to be a sleeping princess. She asks that we make a 'tent' or castle in her room with a blanket (which we do). Then she lays under it on a pillow and closes her eyes. Then, she yells from her room, "Daddy! I need you to come be a prince!" So, Bryan goes in, kisses her and she wakes up.
That's when its his turn to lay down and be the sleeping princess. This is actually a coveted role. Its rare that you can make a child's day by laying under her tent with a blanket and pillow in a dark room after a long day at work and 'pretending' to be asleep. Some other roles in this game are Hank as the Beast and me as the evil stepmother or witch. I, personally, think that we all have been type cast.
Here's Bryan as the princess. This was after dinner on Sunday night and I think he might actually be asleep. On another princess note: Every morning when Lilly gets up I go into her room and we have the same conversation:
Me: "Good morning, did you sleep good?"

Lilly: "Yes, I had sweet dreams."

Me: "You did? What did you dream about?"

Lilly: (big smile) "I dreamed about princesses."

The Most Wonderful Time of the Year

Where to begin? I've been sitting here for a few minutes trying to decide how to start this blog. This Christmas was probably one of the best we've ever had. Lilly finally understood that Santa was coming and what that meant for her, it was so much fun. It was also the first Christmas ever that Bryan's parents had both of their kids, spouses and grand kids together. But, this Christmas began with sadness and loss for the Traylor family.
Nine days before Christmas Bryan's Granddad, Jack Traylor, lost his hard fought battle with cancer at the age of 88. Bryan made the trip to Kentucky for the memorial services alone, spent four days with his entire extended family reminiscing and mourning, and then returned with his parents, his sister and her family in tow.
The whole fam made the trip here this year since Jack is still too little to travel. We all gathered at our house for a traditional family Christmas complete with dinner, napping, presents and snow.
Lilly opening a gift. She was a little slow at first, but after a little practice she was really tearing into them. Jack lucked out. With Aunt Cammie, Uncle Ed, two cousins, a Grandma and Granddad he rarely had to sleep in his bed. We let Cammie take a nap without making her get in her bed too.

Matthew and Lilly playing in the snow. The layer of ice made snowman building impossible, but with a little help from Matthew Lilly was able to make a snow angel. She didn't weigh enough to break through the ice layer by herself so Matthew had to push on her to break the surface.

Bryan's family headed back to KY on Thursday. The next day was Christmas Eve and we spent the day relaxing. This relaxing led to laziness and laziness led to what will, I hope, become a new Christmas Eve tradition for our family: carry out sushi for dinner.

On Christmas Eve Lilly and I also made some cookies for Santa. She was very excited to leave the cookies and some milk out for Santa and a few carrots for the reindeer. This excitement turned to confusion in the morning when only a few bites of each were left on the plate. The confusion switched back to excitement when she realized she could eat the bites of cookie that were left on the plate. At 9:00 in the morning.

This was the most fun I've had on Christmas morning since I was a kid myself. I think Bryan and I were even more excited that Lilly. After she woke up and asked, "Is Santa here?", she heard Bryan in the kitchen and whispered to me, "I think he's in the kitchen." Bryan had already explained in detail how Santa would come down the chimney, eat the cookies and then leave presents under the tree. He did not, however, explain to her how Santa would leave. After explaining that Santa didn't stick around for breakfast we steered her towards the cookies to point out that they had been eaten. Then we could hardly wait while she remembered on her own that if Santa had eaten the cookies he had probably left some things under the tree. We followed her eagerly into the living room and didn't even take any pictures as she saw everything that had been left. She looked through all of her new things and didn't know what to play with first. Then, while looking through the trunk of dress up dresses she looked up at Bryan and asked, "Is Santa still working on the blue dress?" Oops. When Lilly sat on Santa's lap she told him that she'd like to have a purple dress and a blue dress to play in. The dress up trunk came with a purple dress and several others, along with accessories, tiaras, heels and jewelry. But, the lack of a blue dress did not escape Lilly's notice. Santa fail.

Lilly spending a little time with Jack on one of his Christmas gifts, while wearing one of hers. We spent quite a bit of time on Christmas morning taking Lilly in and out of dress up dresses, but not a blue one.

After spending some time on Christmas day playing with all of Lilly's new things we made our way to my mom and dad's house, along with Wes and Kristy to have dinner.

A rarity: A picture with both me, my mom and Kristy in it. We are usually the ones taking the pictures, but in a rare event Wes got behind the camera and snapped a few. Too bad he didn't tell Kristy we were posing.

The day after Christmas was a great day for sleeping in. But, after the sleeping in was over we met Wes and Kristy at my parents' house for some sledding.

After all the Christmas excitement poor Jack was just worn out.

Its Jammie Time

I have no new blog material and I have also been pretty lax in my picture taking. So, I thought I'd share a cute picture of everyone in their jammies. Well...maybe not everyone. I prefer not to be photographed in my jammies...and Bryan doesn't wear any so you don't want to see that either.
I took this picture while Bryan was out of town and sent it to him with the caption, "Good Morning, Daddy". It made his day, so I did it the next day too. The first day Lilly was excited to hold Jack and I got a smile out of her and was able to get him to look at the camera. The next day, not so much. Lilly was annoyed and about thirty seconds after I propped Jack against her she said, "Um, I'm done holding him. Can you please take him now?"

No jammies here, but I just had to post this picture of Jack's little bottom in the air while he was sleeping.

What a Difference a Month Makes

Jack is one month old today. He's already changed so much, I can't believe it. When Lilly was an infant every day was like an eternity, but Jack's first month seems to have slipped right by me.

He is a good baby and a sweet little boy. He is still sleeping good at night and naps good during the day. All he seems to want is to be rocked to sleep, a clean diaper and to something to eat. And boy does he eat! Jack weighs a whopping 10 lbs 9 ozs. For all of you math majors that is an almost three pound weight gain in just four short weeks.

Newborn picture from the hospital. 7 lbs 13 ozs

About two weeks old.

Three weeks.

One month. 10 lbs 9 ozs