So many more Firsts!

It's unbelievable how fast our days go by! Finding time to blog, or do anything else is impossible. I am going to make a point to write more on this blog because it all goes by way to fast and I know that I am forgetting things everyday! Since Christmas Idella has really changed. She had just started sitting on her own at that point and was well in the groove of eating solid foods. However, those are old habits by now. Idella loves sitting on her own and doesn't really like to lay down for anything. She is now sleeping on her stomach and refuses to sleep on her back. She can crawl backwards and army crawl forwards. I don't think she's very far from really being on the move. She can also push herself up to sitting from laying down. Her crib and pack n' plays have all been dropped down so she can't flip herself out and over the edge. She loves trying new foods and has started eating finger foods. Her favorites are the rice crackers and banana. It's amazing watching her discover and learn all about these new things everyday.


Her hair is starting to really grow and you can see clearly it's going to be red. Not auburn, but red. When she wears blue or pink it's actually orange looking. Her eyes have become so blue. She is adored by everyone at the store and has had to "help" with employee reviews and even went to a meeting with our new warehouse with me. One of her favorite things to go is go into the backpack and walk around the store with me or her grampy. She loves all the bright colors and reaches out for the packages on the shelves. Everyone comments on how curious she is. Nothing gets by her.

She also just had her first overnight at grammie and grampy's house. She did great, mommy not so great. I was up at 5:30 and heading out so I could be there when she got up. I'm just so used to always having her around I feel like I'm missing something when she's gone. She is still going to hang out with great-grammie on Mondays while I'm working and will be heading to day care this coming fall. I am going to have her go there for just a couple days a week so she can get some interaction with other kids.

We have been working on the word no lately. She knows what it means and knows when she is doing something she shouldn't. She definately doesn't like hearing it. When she tries to take her walker into the bathroom or reach for something she knows she can't have she looks over her shoulder at me to see my reaction, as if I might change my mind and all of a sudden let her have her own way. She especially loves buttons on remotes and phones so she throws a mini-fit everytime we say no. Daddy likes to give her what she wants to stop the fit... This kind of sets us back but we are working on it. She is going to be such a daddy's girl. I am going to have to be the Enforcer
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I can't believe how much she has changed already, and how many more changes there are to come. I love every minute of it and can't imagine life without her. I don't even remember what it was like before she was here... What did I do with all my time??

Christmas!

Well it is ridiculous how long it has been since I last posted. Idella is so active and changes so much everyday it's hard to keep up with her, never mind try to find time to do anything else! Her first Christmas has already come and gone but we had a fantastic time. We started the holiday celebrating with our friends and their daughter at their house. We had a great time and Idella loves her new Leap Frog activity table that she got. Here we are admiring the new gift!


We then celebrated our Christmas at home on Christmas eve (Santa came to our house early this year) Idella loved ripping open the paper, but then immediately tried to eat the paper, or whatever was in the paper. She didn't really care much about the cute clothes...


We spent Christmas day at my parents. There were definitely plenty of gifts for Idella to open over there. She had a really bad cold though so we gave up the idea of her wearing her cute red Christmas dress and tights and opted for the red Santa pj's with reindeer on the feet. Idella ate dinner with us and had some of the sweet potatoes which I was able to sneak some green beans into; she doesn't need to know. Then we went home and ended the day playing with all of her new stuff.

At this point she is loving solid foods, I can hardly get her to drink any formula, loves to play with a sippy cup, can roll all over the place, and can sit on her own. The sitting up thing happened a few days before Christmas. She was sitting in front of me playing and when I went to answer the phone behind me on the table I realized she wasn't leaning on me at all. I then just stood up and there she was, sitting like a big girl all by herself. I can't believe how quickly the first six months and her first two major holidays have gone by!

First Thanksgiving!

This year we are definitely thankful for our beautiful healthy family. We had a great first Thanksgiving at my parents house with Idella. She has been eating solids for awhile now so she snuck a few tastes during the day from grammie. I believe I caught her trying chocolate cream pie, sweet potatoes, and at one point some of the pumpkin roll, of course she liked it all. When we were eating dinner she was watching me ever so carefully and every few bites I took I could see her opening her mouth like I should be giving her a bite to.


We also had a Thanksgiving/Christmas dinner with Jacob's family at our house. His two sisters and their families came (along with Idella's three cousins), his grandmother and great aunt and uncle. It was great to be able to see everyone. The kids all exchanged Christmas gifts early since we were all together and everyone is so busy. I think they all enjoyed the wrapping paper more than the presents! It was so much fun to see Idella trying to unwrap the presents; she would grab the paper and rip it off then either throw it on the floor, or stick it in her mouth. This is one of the first presents she opened (with assistance from daddy), as soon as it was open she was mesmerized. We had to take it out of the box right away so she could then look it over carefully and then immediately try to fit it in her mouth.

Of course the best part was getting to spend time with family that we don't see often enough. Idella's cousin is only 13 days younger than her and she loved getting to see her. This is a great picture of them, it looks like they are shaking hands.

There were more great things that happened near Thanksgiving including Idella rolling over. She has been rolling back and forth onto her side for awhile, but hadn't really conquered the complete roll over. However, one morning she was on the floor in the living room on her back while I was packing the car to go to work with her and when I came back in she had rolled over and was pushed up looking at me. Over course I flipped her back over and she immediately rolled back over. She has been non-stop since then.

Christmas will soon be here and I'm sure she'll be crawling or close to it. We have many more firsts to enjoy with her and Christmas will be one of them. It's amazing to watch her and how excited she is about the most simple of things. She is definitely teaching me to slow down and take a few minutes to enjoy something instead of just rushing to get it over with, and this is the perfect time of year to learn this lesson.

Construction site, Walker, Bumbo Adventures

So we started construction on the new store in Northport this past week. It is exciting to finally be starting this since we've been waiting a year and it's been a long haul since we tore down the old building. I am excited to have Idella around for all of this and think it's great that we're going to be able to take all kinds of pictures of her around the new store. It's ironic because my parents tore down their original business in Brooks and re-built the existing store shortly after I was born. There are tons of pictures of me in peoples arms during the construction process, and even more of me inside the building while everyone was stocking shelves and building counters.

We went down to visit Jacob at the site a few days ago and took Idellas first construction site pictures. I am sure there will be many more to come!

We also got Idella a walker and even though her feet don't quite reach the floor she loves sitting in it. She swings and kicks her feet like crazy and I know that the minute her feet hit the ground I'm in trouble. It's hilarious when she hits the rattle ball how excited she gets, she starts to kick her legs and her eyes get so big.

Idella also has another favorite thing to do; she has learned how to lean over and out of her bumbo like she is trying to escape. We can't leave her unattended for 2 seconds, crazy child. This is a picture of her trying to get out and help put away groceries at grammies house. She's so cute some days I can't even stand it!

First Solids & First Shopping Trip

Idella ate her first solids a few days after Halloween. At first she seemed to not really understand what the funny textured stuff in her mouth was but then she caught on. We tried feeding her before bed but she actually started getting up earlier and it threw her whole eating schedule off. We moved it back to lunch time, but that didn't really work either, so she is now eating the cereal after her first bottle in the morning. This seems to be working and she seems to like it more since she's a little more awake.

This picture is from the first time she had cereal. The look on her face was so cute I had to get my camera and interrupt the feeding.


Idella also participated in the long Dubay tradition of the annual Portland shopping trip. Only girls are allowed, and you have to be either under a year old or over 18. The participants are all the women on my mother's side, my sister, my mom, my Aunt Maureen, Aunt Cheryl, my cousins Amy and Charlene and usually my nana. This year nana wasn't able to go since she was just in the hospital and didn't want to push it; she is almost 80 but still teaches two classe at the YMCA every week. Anyway, Idella went this year and was fantastic! She loves shopping, all the bright lights, colors, and sounds really entertained her. It was great being able to bring her this year, and I know I'll miss her next year but I remember how exciting it was every year when mom left for the weekend. She always brought back a gift for when she got home to go along with all the Christmas gifts that were hidden until the big holiday came around. When I finally turned 18 and was able to go it was like being part of a secret club. At that point it knew it was about more than just shopping, it was about taking the time to be with family, eating good food, and catching up since we don't always take the time to see each other the rest of the year. I hope that someday Idella feels the same way about it that I did and still do.













This is a picture of Idella in her new hat that we got on the first day of shopping. She likes to sneak it off her head and suck on the pom-poms.

And this is her napping after a long day of shopping. Obviously it's been a hard day, she managed to lose the socks and shoes and cover her own face with her blanket giraffe. Good thing she was strapped into the seat or she would have probably been on the floor.

I'm sure there will be many more shopping trips, but she's going to have to wait a little while to go on the sacred shopping trip again!

First Halloween!

Well Idella's first Halloween has come and gone. We didn't really dress her up like anything this year, but she did have the cute pumpkin hat on all day. She was the talk of the town when we went to work this morning, especially since she was making eyes and flirting with everyone.

This first big holiday came and went so fast! I can only imagine how Thanksgiving and Christmas are going to be. Again I'm so glad we've decided to do this blog so we can look back and appreciate all the big and small moments.

In just one week...

It's crazy how much Idella has changed in just one week. She has become so talkative; she doesn't even want her pacifier anymore unless she is going to sleep. The rest of the time she is squeaking and squawking to whoever will listen. She even laughs out loud when she gets really excited. Her favorite thing is when I blow raspberries on her stomach and give her kisses on her cheeks, she starts to freak out and talk to me and then comes the belly laughing. I absolutely love it, makes me smile no matter what every time.... Another thing she has learned this week is where her hands are, and what her mouth is. Anything and everything goes into her mouth... for example: her ducky during bathtime. She had the ducky on her belly having a stare down for a few minutes. Then she suddenly grabbed it and mashed it into her mouth. That is where it remained until I took it away. She constantly has her hands in her mouth. She likes to suck on her fingers and then rub them all over me. I keep telling myself she doesn't know what she's doing, but she seems to really enjoy it. Another new development this week is learning to make her bouncy seat bounce on her own. Usually I tap my foot on it and it bounces; however, since Monday she has learned how to really get it going on her own. I have to make sure she is stapped into it at all times. She also has started bracing her feet on the bottom of the chair and pushing off so it looks like she is going to flip over the side.

Every year in November the girls in my family (18 and older) go on a Christmas shopping trip in Portland. It is really just an excuse to leave the guys and headaches at home and eat and shop for a weekend. This year Idella will be going along since she is under a year old, next year she will have to stay with daddy. We have been practicing shopping, eating at restaurants, and traveling to prep. She has been doing fantastic! She loves shopping since she is so nosy, there is just so much to look at. She usually stays up while we are out and then crashes afterward, like in this picture with her grampy... This was moments after grandpa stopped in this week on his way home from work, it only took seconds and she was out.

She has so many more changes to come, and they are going to come fast! I just ordered more pictures to scrapbook for her and can't wait to keep adding to it. We also just got her one month pictures that Chris Riley took for us, he did our wedding as well, and they came out fantastic. We are going to take her around Christmas time again since she'll be around six months old and most likely sitting on her own since she is so close to being able to do that right now. I don't know if I have enough wall space in the house for all the pictures I want to hang up, especially since there will be so many more to come!