August + State Fair

Found Grandpa's Ice Cream Truck at the local Farmer's Market!

August has come and gone!  Whew...where do the days go?  Jason spent a good portion of the month in Rio at the Olympics, so me and the girls spent lots of time together and had some special visitors to help out mommy!

We are gearing up for Lucy to start Preschool next week - she's going 3 days a week ALL DAY, so 9:40 to 4:10...I can't believe it!  Our neighbor has a little boy in kindergarten and when I see the kindergarten bus come and pick him up, I can't believe that it will be here turn next year already!

Lucy has another esophagus dilatation this week, so prayers welcome that it goes well and that the docs find her esophagus growth slowing down finally!  Otherwise she's doing good from a health perspective and is proving to be a very doting, protective big sister!

I'll update after her dilatation with the results!  In the meantime, here are some pics from August:

Dressing in our princess outfits!

Snuggles in the morning

Reading to sissy!

My life while Jason is gone...lap full of love!

Gearing up for the Olympics!

Snuggling with Vinicius - the Olympic mascot

Cheering for Helen Maroulis - a women's wrestler who won GOLD!

Enjoying some swimming time in Mom and Dad's lake

Reading with Grandma, who came to stay with us for a while when daddy was gone - what a life saver!!

Top pics from the State Fair - Bumper Boats, sleeping baby and Cotton Candy...So. Much. Fun.!!

July

Sisters!

I'm sure you understand why we are FINALLY just catching up on July, since welcoming sweet baby Ruby Rio Bryant on July 8th.  She has been a great addition to our family and big sister Lucy is so proud of her and so gentle!  She loves tucking her in when she's asleep, saying, "hey, Ruby...watch this!" and making up new nicknames for her, like Miss Ruby Roo and simply "Roobs."  It's been a challenge having a newborn and a 4-year old in the house...mostly finding ways to keep Lucy entertained and engaged with Jason and I as we navigate the neediness of a tiny baby.  Ruby is overall a pretty easy baby.

Sleeping Beauty

It has also reminded of us how many special moments we missed out on with Lucy when she was first born, since she was in the NICU, often sedated and with so many tubes in her!  So thankful for the progress that she continues to make and the opportunity for her love for others to shine through as a big sister!

Enjoying some TV time together...

Teaching Ruby how to play

We've been enjoying the summer on Lucy's new swingset, swimming in the neighbor's pool and enjoying our non-scheduled days and weekends.  Lucy attended 2 weeks of "Preschool Adventure Camp," which was taught by her preschool teacher from last year, so that was super fun for her!

Floating...

No shirt...playing in the back year (she took a nose dive into the wading pool, so decided to take her shirt off instead of stay wet or go in and interrupt play time to get something dry!!)

Stay Cool and Enjoy the pictures!

Happy Birthday, Lucy!

Posing at her new backyard swingset

Lucy is 4 years old today!

I cannot believe how fast the past 4 years have gone.  Jason and I are beyond thrilled with the progress that Lucy has made in the past year.  She went to preschool and made "friends" on her own, her eating continues to improve, she only needed 1 esophagus dilatation, (she had one RIGHT before she turned 3, and then just one in December!), she's got a TON of spunk and loves to laugh.

We celebrated with family and friends with a backyard BBQ and (of course) Ice Cream cake on Saturday afternoon.  Lucy was THRILLED that daddy and Grandpa got her backyard swingset done in time for her and her friends to play on it at her party.  Today, on her actual birthday, we started with pancakes shaped like the number "4," a trip to Como Zoo, Finding Dory at the Movie Theater, a Chick-Fil-A picnic at the park and finally complete exhaustion, haha!  It's fun to be 4, that is for sure!

Can't wait to see what the next year brings for our sweet little Lucy!

Ice Cream Cake!

Wearing one of her new dresses from Grandma J. to church

New lab coat - now she can really get into the role of playing with all her medical supplies!

Riding a turtle at the zoo (that is the one animal she told us she wanted to see - a turtle!)

Riding the Train at Como Town

Finding Dory at the Movie Theater!

Happy Father's Day!

Happy (belated) Father's Day to Lucy's awesome dad.

Jason and I don't spend too much time reflecting on the journey we've been on with Lucy, but it's been rough at times, as you well know.  Together we have weathered each rough patch and I wouldn't want to do it with anyone else by my side.

Love you, Jason!

A few of my favorite pics of them together:

Holding Lucy in the NICU

A loving gaze to her daddy on his birthday

Comfort after an out-patient surgery

Backpackin' at the Baltimore Aquarium

Dressing up for Halloween together

School's Out for the Summer!

First day of preschool vs. Last day of preschool

Well, we are all very excited for summer around here...hot weather, kiddie pools, popsicles, Lucy's birthday, a new baby and all sorts of fun, fun things!

Since she was just in 3-year old preschool, she didn't technically graduate yet, so she got to pose with the "1 more year" frame :)

We've already been celebrating the nice weather and end of preschool doing some fun things like the Vehicle Fair at Lucy's school - some of Lucy's favorites were the school bus, the Fire Truck, the Garbage truck and the Coborn's Delivery truck, as well as the Bouncy Bus (a converted school bus that now houses an indoor gym!)  Jason had his last overnight out of town trip before the baby comes, so Lucy and I went to the Library and Dunn Brothers for treats and she even convinced me to walk to the FAR part with her one day to do some yoga, haha!

Asking the fireman a million questions about all those valves and buttons.

Hopping out of the fire truck at the vehicle fair

We've had 2 doctor visits in the last month; the first a follow-up to the follow-up from her hospital stay in March.  She's doing great - no obvious long-term complications and we discovered she is 80% percentile for height and 50% for weight - she's really getting big, if you remember that back at her 12 month check-up she was in the 10th percentile for height!!

The second doctor visit was with cardiology, to check her VSD (hole in her heart) and verify the surgery she had on her double aortic arch is still looking good.  For that visit, she had to have an Echogram, so lying very still and having an ultrasound machine check her heart from various positions.  She did great...just a little sad at the beginning before she realized there would be "no ouchies."  She's such a little charmer that she got some special lead stickers to take home for her dollies to add to her medical kit (which is really quite impressive for a 3-year old...she has some legit medical gear in there).  Overall, her heart looks good - nothing new there, so we are just on the books for annual follow-up.  With this condition, there is always the possibility that she would need a repair because of an infection that develops or a leak that develops in the aortic valve.  However, that is not currently the case, so we just have her monitored by cardiology consistently.

Hope you are all enjoying the first sweet, sweet days of summer!

Yoga in the park

Treats and Dunn Brothers

Since we don't have a dog, Lucy has to fetch us the Sunday paper, hahaha!

Happy Mother's Day!

Lucy giving baby sister some lovin'...she can't wait to meet her (neither can we!!)

What a gift to be a mother!

I was aptly spoiled on Mother's Day this year - Lucy slept until after 7, which is totally sleeping in for her!  Jason took Lucy to pick up a cheese danish for me for breakfast and I got a nap and some relaxation time outside in the beautiful sunshine plus a walk to the "far park" with Jason and Lucy!

I also got a variety of handmade gifts from Lucy - although she was getting a bit sick of Mother's Day by the end of today so she told me to picture she colored all black at church was actually hers - for "Big Girl Day." Haha...guess she was tired of all the crafting for Mother's Day by then?!?!

Lucy'c Mother Day crafts

Big shout out to my mom who is not only awesome and super helpful, but who also watched Lucy overnight on Friday so Jason and I could celebrate our 6 year wedding anniversary - we went to a local dinner theater and stayed at a hotel overnight - sleeping in, brunching with no sticky syrup fingers touching us and wandering around some fun stores!  Thanks, Mom!

Six years married...where does the time go???

Happy Mother's Day to those who are Mothers, want to be a Mother or who have a Mother...especially one who is no longer with us here on earth.

Lucy, me, mom and Grandma, last summer...

Oh, and an update from our last blog...we located the tomatoes a day or so later...packed neatly in Lucy's lunchbox.  Thankfully they were still intact, hahahaha!!

Hhmmm...even that lunchbox looks mischevious...

Aha...the missing tomatoes!!

April

She's getting so much bigger and more independent at the park - I can't believe it!!

April has been a fun but relatively uneventful month for us.  After an unexpected hospital stay for Lucy in March, that was MUCH appreciated!  We've been busy doing yard work on the weekends (we've mowed our yard twice already this year - that's unheard of in April around here!) and going to preschool, swimming lessons and the park whenever we can.

For the most part, Lucy's recovered from her stomach bug / hospital stay.  She's sleeping through the night for the most part, She's back to being potty trained - not having accidents or close calls in the potty department anymore either, which is great!

Lucy continues to be sunshine in our lives - she loves to try to "read" by sounding out words or comparing them to words she already knows, make up words that rhyme, her current favorite song is "5 Little Monkeys" (annoying, haha!) and she is VERY excited to be a big sister.  She is convinced we should name the baby, "Susie," but Jason and I aren't sold on that name, haha!  She is basically hilarious all the time and sometimes a bit mischievous.  Case and Point, here is a conversation we had today:

Me: Lucy, what did you do with the entire container of cherry tomatoes?
Lucy: I made you tomato soup
Me: Thanks.  Where is it?
Lucy: I don't know

(We still haven't found the missing tomatoes - I'm a bit worried where they may turn, up!)

Here are some highlights from April:

Lucy got a new bed so we could turn her toddler bed back into a crib for the baby...she also had to sort through her stuffed animals and choose 5 to donate to charity and 5 to give to her baby sister...it was tough for her to part with some of them!

Cousin Dawson came over and we showed him one of the parks in our neighborhood - so fun!

Dad's gotta be ready for her to drop from those monkey bars so he can catch her, haha!

Lucy's a pretty big fan of frozen yogurt dates - this time with daddy while mommy was out with a friend.

Lucy's a trooper when we run errands on the weekends...here she is relaxing in the Home Depot cart!

She takes after me in her love for shoes - I think she tried on more than I did that day!!