5 MONTHS LATER!

It has been 5 months since I have posted anything on our blog and I feel so guilty!! When I was in Guatemala, I was so good about posting weekly, but now that we have a 2 year old and 2 MONTH old, things have slowed me down a bit!! So speaking of little ones, we welcomed sweet Lyla Jane Williams into our family on May 4!! She is absolutely beautiful and was quite a surprise as many of you know. We were told for years that we would have difficulty conceiving so after adopting Blake, we were ready to call ourselves a family as was. Lyla is truly a miracle baby and I still stare at her daily, amazed that she is a part of us. She is growing and changing quickly and went from a tiny 6 lb. 10 oz little monkey to a 10 lb bubbly baby who is now beginning to smile!! She keeps me occupied eating every 2-3 hours and I'm still trying to figure out how to manage 2 little ones, but we're doing it. Our kids make us so happy and keep us laughing daily :)

Blake is an absolute hilarious, intelligent, mischievous and delightful 2 year old! He says the funniest things one of being "Happy Birthday Mama and Daddy" for the last week every day! Not too sure where that came from! He continues to amaze us with his ability to speak in two languages and when he talks it is clearly a combination of the two. For example, "Los fuegos go boom, boom, mama!" ("the fireworks go "boom boom!"). He will be 2 on August 7th and we enjoying watching each day as he changes from a baby to a little boy.

When Lyla was born, he gave us a run for our money and we had a bit of a rough transition being that Blakey wasn't the center of our attention anymore. It was hard for me as well, (not being able to give 100% of my attention to my baby boy) and still is, I have to admit, but we are doing our best to share that attention now. Blake has the ability to make us laugh, (when he shakes his sippy cup of milk all over Lucky our black Lab or reads a story to himself and we hear him over the intercom speaker), cry (when he falls down, is hurt, or feeling left out), and make our heart melt (when he comes up to us and says, "Hug mama and daddy" or "Te amo mucho Mama and Daddy" or "Blakey happy!"). I can't tell you how much we are in love with this little boy and baby girl.

Tomorrow we leave for California for the memorial service of Chris' Aunt. His entire family on his Mother's side will be there and some of whom have never met Blake and Lyla! We look forward to spending time with family and I'm sure we'll have lots of pictures to post once we return! I hope our blog followers will come back if I promise to post more frequently! We love you all!

Blake is 2!

It is hard to believe that our baby is now 2! On February 6, we celebrated 2 years home in the U.S. and the next day, his 2nd birthday. We had a wonderful day with Mickey decorations galore (his new favorite character), a Mickey cake made by Grandma Bennett and Mickey balloons. Last year, we had a quick 1st birthday since we had just returned from Guatemala so it was nice to plan this year! Blake is doing so well and continues to make us smile and laugh every minute. He is growing tall and looks so grown up all of a sudden. We love him so much. I keep thinking, "How am I going to share this love with two?" when the second one comes along in May, but I know it will just happen. We will be a busy family! One major accomplishment that occurred once and hasn't occurred again, is that Blake went #1 on his new little toilet on his 2nd birthday!! We were overjoyed and continue to encourage this new habit - although I think it will be awhile before he's completely independent in the bano! It was quite hysterical watching him sit there after getting out of the bathtub and then hearing the little music play when the pee pee hit the potty (pardon the potty talk). He was SO proud of himself and every time we enter the bano now, he has to follow suit. It's very cute. He wants to be so grown up. And...let me tell you about the 2's :) He's now in a "no" stage so when he's grumpy, every answer is "no" and he'll also say, "No, mama" and "No, Daddy" when he wants to do something independently! He's a big boy now apparently. He has been enjoying my pregnancy as well and takes our little fetal heart monitor and puts it on his own tummy saying, "Blakey baby!" Priceless. He does this to Daddy too. He's also into being Mr. Social so whenever we're out in a store and he sees another little boy, he'll say quite openly, "Hi nino!" I had to laugh when he said it to a little Asian boy who didn't speak any English. That poor little boy was probably thinking, "What the heck is he saying?" Anyway, with a few days of sun lately, we've been trying to get outside more and now that I'm on mid-winter break this week, we will have more time to spend together! We are anxious for Spring, this baby and playing in the sun! Rumor has it I am having a boy, but we'll be surprised in May - you never know! We will be happy either way. We are so grateful for our family and for this blessing.

Happy New Year!

Blake Rides the Christmas Train with "Bear Bear"!

This was at Chris' 40th Birthday party if you're wondering why Blake is holding Rogain for Men!

SO THANKFUL AND 17 WEEKS PREGNANT!

Hello friends! I realize it has been such a long time since I've posted to our blog (over a month). I continue looking at it excitedly to see if we have any new comments, but why should we when I can't even keep it current!!! :( Anyway, I know pregnancy can run you down, but honestly, I didn't realize I would feel completely out of my mind at the same time. Here are some examples of what I've been experiencing lately: not remembering if I've responded to emails at work so I send a response only to realize I DID already respond, forgetting to call people back and important meetings, and feeling like I got hit by a truck every day to name a few. And, this is only the beginning. I am now 17 weeks pregnant with a due date of May 21 and I've been told, it will only get worse. Well, yippee! I'm in for a treat! Honestly, things are going rather smoothly pregnancy-wise despite the above mentioned items. My midwife told me my growth is exactly where it needs to be, the baby looks healthy and all of our genetic testing came out normal. We feel SO thankful to not only have the luck of becoming pregnant, but to have such a beautiful son too. Speaking of Blake. He is the apple of our eye. He is amazing and we are absolutely head over heels inlove with him!! He is hilarious every day and keeps us constantly smiling. He will be 2 on February 7th and let me tell you, he is one bundle of NON-STOP energy. EVERYTHING is amazing to him and his latest fascination is flushing the toilet 5 times in a row and putting toys in it. Hmmm...this is fun for mom and dad. He also thinks it fun to pull things out of every drawer or cupboard in the entire house and then put these items into the dog's water bowl. Does this give you a little indication of maybe why his mom feels exhausted?!!! We love watching him. Every time we play music in the car, in the house or if he hears it in a store, he begins dancing. He is the happiest boy and we are overjoyed that he is ours forever. He is also talking up a storm and is just on the verge of putting short sentences together (right now they involve 3-4 words at the most). He loves his Grandma and Papa and goes to their house every day while Chris and I work. He is also fascinated with their toilets, by the way. My mom has neverending patience and loves him so much. We are again, so lucky to have her watch our son. Chris and I will put up our Christmas tree this weekend so I'm sure it will be lots of fun watching Blake "help" us decorate! On January 6th, Chris and I have our big 5 month ultrasound where we can find out the sex of our baby. While I would LOVE to find out what we're having, it means a lot to Chris to keep it a surprise, so it looks like we may not know until May! I know we will be so happy either way. We hope everyone is having an enjoyable holiday season thus far and will be able to spend it with friends and family. We will stay at home this Christmas and visit Chris' sister Heather and her family who will be here from California soon. It looks like our annual trip to Hawaii in April is off as my midwife has told me I can't fly at 37 weeks of pregancy! Darnit! Oh well. We will be thankful to just relax this year and get ready for #2! P.S. These are 12 week ultrasound pics! Hope to post the 5 month ones to compare in January!

YES WE WILL!!

What a refreshing change and historical moment. We are so proud to have our children born and raised during this man's presidency. As he said repeatedly, "Yes we will" and we have faith that he will.

1 MORE MAKES 2!!! YES, IT'S TRUE!

Well, you all told me that this would happen and of course, I didn't believe you thinking, "After all that we've been through trying to get pregnant, I won't be the one it happens to." Well, guess again? Here we are going on 11 weeks PREGNANT!!! Chris and I read the plain as day word "pregnant" on the trusty little pregnancy test on Sept. 21 with mouths gaping open. It took awhile for us to realize that "yes," it was true! I made my first appt. that was scheduled with a nurse a week later and it was confirmed! As of now, my due date is May 21. My first doctor appt. will be Nov. 5th. We've been waiting patiently (actually for me, rather impatiently) for this appt. because it will be the first time we'll be able to see our baby for the first time with an ultrasound. I have to tell you it's a bit nervewracking the 1st trimester of pregnancy because you of course, worry about everything and hear every horror story (why do people feel the need to share this information?!) Thank goodness for family and friends that know just what to say to ease my nerves. We are very thankful and excited at the same time and know Blake will be so happy to have a new baby brother or sister!
Now, onto Mr. Blake! He keeps us going, I must say. That kid has more energy than any kid I know! Form the minute he wakes up in the morning, until his head hits the crib, he is wound up. I'm not saying he's hyperactive, just very active! It's hard to believe he will be 2 on February 2. He is now, almost 21 months old and like they say, the words keep-a-coming! He now says, "Mama, dada, hi, bye-bye, mas, pez (fish), more, Gus, Remi, Lucky (all dog names), nana and sometimes mama (for Grandma), papa for (Grandpa), hee-haw (when he wants to hear the farm song about the donkey), my dada and my mama (which means he wants you to do whatever it is he wants you to do - for example if he's jumping and he wants Daddy to do it, he'll say, "My dada," zapato (a new one) gracias, thank you, "ees" for "si" (not sure why this is still a backwards word, but it is), no mas, no more, ya (ready in Spanish), and this list goes on and on. He's also able to say all the sounds for the following animals and people when he's asked in Spanish or English: dog, cat, sheep, rooster, cat, cow, horse, dad (snore sound), donkey, chick, frog and bunny (both say "hop, hop") and lion. His favorite things to do are: jump, climb up and down on anything he can climb onto, run away from Daddy (he thinks he's always trying to catch him :), eat fish crackers, get into anything he can get his hands into, read books, play outside and in the rotting garden (this is nice), run in the leaves at Grandma's house and go on walks! Blake is one happy little boy and still quite a flirt. Let me give you a visual of his flirtatiousness. We were at Cucina, Cucina for dinner last night with some friends of ours which is always quite an adventure with an almost 2 year old anyway. It was homecoming weekend for several local high-schools so we were able to see many beautifully clad teenagers enjoying dinner before their big dance. Blake decided he would target one particular table next to us with 5 lovely ladies and spent his evening saying, "hi" to them and just standing by their table staring at them and looking cute. The girls thought this was hilarious, so they played along with their new little boyfriend. We just sit there and laugh. He is definitely Mr. social :) Then, once he had flirted enough and touched enough sequin dresses for the evening, he decided he would ride his Cucina, Cucina like a horse under the chair(see pictures). We all just sat waiting for the big moment it would pop and after a few giddy ups, it did. He couldn't figure out what had happened and he kept looking around for it which was equally hilarious. Once the novelty of looking for the popped balloon wore off, he decided he'd join the waiters and waitresses in clapping to the Italian rendition of "Happy Birthday" which ironically was sung to the group of Blake's lovely ladies! There is never a dull moment, I swear! Anyway, I'll leave you with some new pictures of our growing baby who is not so much a baby anymore! We hope everyone is well and in good health and looking forward to the upcoming holidays - I know I am already! Take a look at the difference in our sweet boy from last October in Guatemala!