General Conference Weekend

Has General Conference already come and gone again? The weekend always flies by when that happens!

This post is a combination of cute pictures (and a video), and my reflections on some talks.

I took Cora on a run early in the morning Saturday, she loves it.

She had her sweet little hat on that I dubbed her "Cora the Explora" hat, an homage to Dora.

We had a birthday party to go to, so Cora didn't get her morning nap until almost noon and was pretty tired. She slept for most of the morning session, which was nice!

She did wake up and we had her watch the afternoon session with us.

(Distracting Brandon.)

We told her to be reverent and this happened... so obedient.

But she just wanted to watch us! Little Tinky Winky. She fell asleep by the end of the afternoon session, snuggled up to Brandon.

Brandon went to dinner with a friend for his birthday then to watch Priesthood session, so Cora and I had the night to ourselves. We partied it up.

 We have been working on getting her hooked on a pacifier vs a thumb sucker... so far it has been ehhhhh.

This face kills me! She has been making this expression a lot and it makes me laugh.

Sunday morning, Cora woke up at 6:45 and didn't want to go back to sleep. We could see that the sun was about to rise, so we loaded her in the front pack carrier and walked to the beach. It was stunning! I'm going to blow up one of these pictures and put it on our wall.

Cora enjoyed being out. Although, it was 72 degrees, downright FREEZING in Miami! So she got cold. Which means we get to wear pants hooray!

Between sessions of conference we caught the CUTEST video of Cora laughing. She really is a serious baby and doesn't laugh as much as some other babies might, but she is pretty ticklish.

That was just before she went down for her nap. When she woke up, she was NOT ready to be awake. This was the look I got from the other couch for a solid 20 minutes.

I think she was offended that I handed her to Brandon.

So yes, what a great conference! That was a great first Conference weekend with the 3 of us. 6 months ago I was laying on that same couch, but hugely pregnant and ready to pop. And Graham had just been born!

There were so many great talks this past weekend.

Like most of the young mothers who watched conference, I  have to say my favorite talk was probably Elder Holland's. He spoke so eloquently of the trials that mothers go through, and what they put into raising their children. And it SO SPOKE TO ME. I have been wondering if I am stimulating Cora's brain enough, and if she will be able to see her potential through what I am doing. It doesn't help that she acts so bored at home... but anyway. It was so wonderful to hear someone speak of the love a mother has for her child, because it is true. You carry your baby for more than 9 months.

I love hearing from President Monson. It is so sad to see the years catching up with him. Ever since his wife passed away he seems to have aged much faster. And who could blame him? He is a saintly man, and I hope we get to hear from him again.

Elder Bednar's talk touched me. When he got emotional talking about his 6 friends who have passed away since he was called as an Apostle, you could really feel his sadness and pain. Those 15 men must be such good friends, and they mourn with each passing and welcome the new men in.

Other great talks included (but are not limited to): Sister Marriott, Elder Oaks, and Elder Nelson. I will be reading a lot of these talks in the next few months!

It's all just a phase.

The last few weeks have been rough.

A few weeks ago Cora woke up GRUMPY. She cried all day long, and when I had to go somewhere that night she cried all night long for Brandon. We thought she was teething, so we gave her some Infant Tylenol when she was extra fussy and some Orajel. Whenever I gave her the Orajel she gave me the funniest look and smacked her lips like "hmm, ok so what is this?"

By Friday it had been almost a week of this, so we took her in to the doctor.

 She was perfectly well behaved when we got there, and the doctor said she was NOT teething and was in perfect health. He did mention that her head size had grown from 75-80%ile to 100%ile. But I'm 98.5% sure that is just from being born into this family.

He mentioned that she might be getting more hungry than I can nurse her, and to start her on some rice cereal. It made me sad that she must have been hungry, so we bought some rice cereal immediately and began giving it to her.

  She INHALED it. Literally. She put her mouth on the spoon and sucked it in.

Since then it has been such a hit and miss with her sleeping, happiness, and eating.

 Sometimes she is so happy...

 Sometimes she refuses to eat her cereal. She cried like this then spit it all over Brandon one night.

 She can be so grumpy.

 On this day she was SO ornery. She laid on the ground and screamed no matter what I did. Finally, after texting an SOS message to Alyse and my mom they said to bring her outside. (We had already gone on a few walks.)

 She stopped shrieking as soon as we got out of the apartment door, and just sat there the whole time. So apparently we are really boring and need more in our apartment! We are putting more things on the wall daily, so she has more to look at.

She even loved our morning runs. That face kills me.

So, it might have just been a phase. I am praying that it is mostly over, and we can have more good times before the next rough phase comes along.

5 months- I never want to forget.

Seriously. Cora is 5 months old? What the heck. She needs to be the tiny baby that we used to hold in one arm still.

-I love how wiggly she is. She is ALWAYS moving. Sometimes in the mornings, we will lay in bed and watch the rainstorms go by. I can only tell when she falls asleep when she stops wiggling.

-I love her noises. She is SO screechy right now. After a while it does make your ears ring, but it's so funny. She's also starting to move her tongue while she screeches, so it turns into a "WAAAALAAAALAAAALAAAALAAAAAAAAA!"

-Her giggles. She has been so happy lately.

-Her flexibility. She is starting to suck on her toes a lot, which means you can get hit with 4 flailing and wet limbs at the same time. It's her favorite thing.

-How she is always grabbing her toes. Seriously, always scrunched up. This isn't exactly new to this month, but I sure love it. She also tries to grab things with her toes, and uses them to feel things.

(Be still my heart. She loves his beard so much!)

-Her teeny tiny fists. She is ALWAYS sticking them in her mouth. Usually both at the same time, and she can never figure out why she is choking.

How did we get so lucky?

Being Busy.

We had a multi-stake conference yesterday. We had no idea how crowded it would be, but when the ushers told us to pull onto the lawn and right up next to the building we knew we should have gotten there about 45 minutes earlier.

 (I took a picture to document. It was insane.)

It turned out to be a conference for 3 stakes throughout Miami Dade County, which made our drive of 25 minutes not that bad. Some people probably drove an hour or so.

As it turned out, they were forming a new stake. Everything directly south of us was put into the new Miami stake, while we were taken from the Fort Lauderdale stake (where we had been for a year) and back into the Miami Lakes stake, which extends east of us.

What amazed me was that the man who was called to be the new stake president was in his early to mid 30's. He sounded grateful but completely overwhelmed, which I totally do not blame him for. I know that before our ward split (before we moved in) there was a bishop who was chief resident while he served as bishop. This may or may not have been the same man (I'm not sure). It reminded me of how grateful I am that Brandon takes the time to do his calling, even with being super busy in school. It won't ever get easier, the challenges just change. From Brandon being in school with a sick wife to us now adjusting to dealing with a wiggly baby in church, it is just changing. But we luckily believe in a lot of the same things, like how doing your calling to the true best of your ability will actually help you in school (as demonstrated by Brandon's GPA), and that the best thing we can do is teach Cora that we ALWAYS go to church. We already spend a lot of time out in the halls walking her up and down. She sleeps for Brandon during third hour though.... but anyway. I love that Brandon doesn't complain about being too busy for his calling, even to me. I know I have not been too good at that, especially with my previous calling of Relief Society Activity chair in Rexburg. But I am learning now just how much you can be expected to do, and being in a small ward means having a baby doesn't excuse you from a calling. So I feel like I am learning.

As a side note, we saw our friend Mikey there! She is in downtown Miami area, and looks like she is doing great things. Cora really liked her shirt.

Rolly Polly Olly

Oh no.

Cora rolled over tonight.

It was actually really cute. We were FaceTiming with my parents (because now that she is going to bed earlier she isn't taking as much part in our video chats at night), and she was just laying on her side. I was right in the middle of explaining that she likes to just hang out there and usually doesn't even try to roll all the way when she started to slowly topple over. My dad was the only one watching and called my mom over, but she just barely missed it! Right onto the cold tile. She was not too happy about it.

We got it on video again later. As you can see, she wasn't too thrilled.

Our life was going so well, now we have to be watching out for her on the move all the time!

Just kidding, we are super excited for her and for her new skill. She is a cutie pie, and I won't worry about running after her until she starts really moving around and rolling all the time.

Random August Happenings

Phew, I'm behind. I'll back date to cover everything I've missed so far but this is what I have!

Here are some of the less exciting but more every day things we did in August.

 Cora is getting really good at sitting in her bumbo! This was the day we got back from our trip, she looks so tiny.

 She likes laying with her toes folded over each other.

 The only way I get a shower before noon... she comes into the bathroom with me.

 Brandon won an award at Barry for moral and ethical leadership. His classmates were teasing him for winning the "niceness" award, but I think that fits.

 Gabrielle has a shop where she designs pictures, and she made Cora as a mermaid! It is so cute. I love that the mermaid has red hair, so we can remind her of how her hair looked as a baby (if it isn't still red).

 Many afternoons have ended in this... Brandon will read her a story, fall asleep on the floor, and Cora will just stare out the window. She's also starting to suck her thumb!

 Stinker.

 I've been taking a picture of Cora in her car seat every month, to put in a collage when she turns a year old. She is getting so big!

 Grocery shopping has gotten a whole lot more interesting as well.

 We went to "Story Time" at the library, and Cora loved it. She sat there and watched (either the librarian or the big kids sitting next to us, depending on the moment).

 Poor baby got tired.

 At food trucks it was "Glow in the Dark" night, so these giant Transformers came out and started dancing. Cora was terrified. (Whoops!)

 I've been reading the Harry Potter books again, and Cora has been very interested. I'll read out loud to her and she stares at the black print on white paper.

 We are ALMOST rolling! I caught this topple-over in action. But she hasn't really shown too much interest in trying yet.

 My little shopping buddy.

 So every year, we empty our change jar and use it for an anniversary celebration. One year we were able to pay for a night at a hotel. This year, being strapped down with hospital bills, we were able to pay for 2 sandwiches at Firehouse Grill. Party on!

 We have a tiny wiggle worm! She will sometimes push off with her heels and keep moving around.

 See?

 We are transitioning into size 6-9 month clothes, because Cora is getting too round. I love this dress though.

 Got stuck in the Bumbo!

 One of our fun ways to document the time passing this second year is taking a picture of Brandon with Cora on the first day of each rotation. First up, Internal Medicine.

 She is starting to like her front pack carrier... MUCH more fun carrying a 16 pound baby around.

 Cora loves to nap on her tummy. But when I go in and find her like this it makes me panic a little!

 3 of her favorite things- holding her hands, licking (ALL THE TIME), and being naked.

 This is the face I get when Cora can see the trees outside.

And here we are in the morning. We love our happy baby!

Our sleeping schedule was thrown off by coming back into town, but we seem to be getting onto a routine. 2 naps, going to bed a little earlier each night, and sleeping longer at night. Hallelujah!