the Chico life Reid style

Maia’s latest discovery is how to bounce in the jumper. It’s finally something that entertains her for more than a few minutes that doesn’t involve us carrying her around in the heat and working up a sweat.

She also found her nose while sucking on some other fingers (and catching a glimpse of the olympics). She had her finger in there for a good three minutes.

Hanging out with cousin Lauryn

Yoga: happy baby pose

Drinking out of cups during bath time

Luke, Mike, and Zack took their babies walking yesterday and got loads of comments around downtown Chico and Farmer’s Market…”What is it, Daddy day?!” “Oh, how cute!”

Maia wants to be cool like her dad.

She likes turtles (thanks Kristin!).

She has indy hair.

And she likes scooter rides. (Luke had a dream she was in his basket so he decided to try it…no of course he didn’t ride it

First of all, Maia happens to wake up with hair that resembles Dr. Suess characters on the same day Luke wants to dress her in the Dr. Suess onesie he bought her from the always fabulous Ross Dress for Less. Kind of hard to see in the first pic–hair blends in with couch.

And for the second time in a week, Maia pees on her dad on the way to the bath…

It feels like summer is over already since we returned from our last event on the calendar: cabin in Shaver Lake and staying with the fam for a week.  Here are a few pics that Dan Ray took when he and Luke and Mike Nevens came through Fresno during their “mancation.”  Maia is so big and active and alert and wants to stand up all the time!

Wish I had more pics to share…my camera died.

Here is my first attempt at video uploading:

Luke and Maia at the beach

I just wrote this in an email to my friend, Christy, and thought you’d all love to share in it:

Luke was at a bachelor party last night and so it was just us 2…it was pretty hard, actually. It took Maia 3 hours to completely fall asleep! I was so frustrated. Then this morning she woke up with a cold and I felt so bad…she probably just wasn’t feeling good It is hard to be a patient mommy. Then, I woke up and decided we’d go to church. She had a blowout first so I cleaned her up then put on a super cute new outfit. We drove to church cuz of the smoke, I put her in the moby and as soon as we started walking there, she had another blowout! I went straight to the nursery, cleaned her up, took off her clothes since it got on the cute dress, then realized I had switched diaper bags and didn’t have a change of clothes! Meanwhile she is fussy and ready to nap. So I put her back in the moby with just a diaper (then she spit up all down my chest), and went back home. Got out of the car and realized I had poop on my shirt, which was my only clean comfortable church-appropriate shirt (you know how you can kind of get in a better mood if you are wearing something you like?). Anyway, now she’s napping and we may try the 11am service…

Ah, motherhood.

It’s not too hot so far, just smokey up here in NorCal! Here are some highlights of our summer so far.

Sweet summer fruit, (Thanks Kacie for the cute outfit.)

Friends with pools who go out of town and let us have anytime access to a refreshing dip.

The Reeves visiting. Friends who are cool with chillin in a diaper!

SF with Rob and Leslie…oh, wait, that was last summer… Just thought I’d throw it in!

The beach with the fam this last weekend. Maia did pretty well…we were especially delightfully surprised she didn’t scream the whole way in the car like usual. I won’t say it’s totally turned the corner, though. Don’t want to jinx it!

Walking with Papa on the beach while Mimi (a tentative grandma name) and Aunt Suzie play catch at Avila Beach.

Every time I ask, “Who wants to wear Maia in the Moby wrap?” my dad perks up. We took many strolls around SLO.

Eating good while on vacation: Italian in SLO.

Passing Maia around, this time to Auntie Annie.

Marna’s best friend, Michele, let us stay at her beautiful house in Grover Beach. Here she exceeds expectations and helps to calm the fussy baby–and looks like she’s enjoying it!

Visiting Fresno means we get to see Uncle Bret too!

I’ll just leave you with that…

In celebration of Luke’s birthday, Father’s Day, and our anniversary, here are a few tributes to our favorite guy…

Playing with Maia

Putting her to sleep (and saving my sanity in the process). Check out that hard core swaddle blanket!

And even a little QT for the NBA finals (I know babies aren’t supposed to watch TV, but what would you do if it was the only thing working during fussy time?!) She may be following in her “cousin” Juan’s footsteps as a Lakers fan…

Learning to use the remote and snack in front of the TV like Dad…ok that’s going too far with the TV thing

A classic southern meal of fried chicken, mashed potatoes and gravy, biscuits, coleslaw, sweet tea, and apple pie for his b-day…the absolute best ever thanks to Marna

Gotta give props to his mama, you are the best, Marna! (At the park for church and picnic)

OK so I also have some little movies of Maia singing with Luke, one of her favorite happy time pastimes, and splashing in the bath with him, but I’ll have to wait till Alyssa, the bomb family blogger, shows me how to upload them, so stay tuned…

PS I’m trying hard to avoid the ever annoying referring to ourselves in the third person, but I probably still did, so bear with the baby talk. I did read we do it for a reason, though! Babies don’t understand pronouns like I, you, etc.

I think I’m reading too much.

A shocking nap not in Mom or Dad’s arms amid intense sh-shing, bouncing and swaddling…though only 15 min long. We’ll take it…

An extended evening happy time…

Some good Giants wins…

A visit from our friends Alyssa and Carter, who’s helping Maia pay attention to the dog tail here…

even though he really preferred to look at trains on YouTube with Luke…

And finally, we borrowed a “baby gym” from the Nevens’ so we don’t get tendinitis swinging toys above Maia’s head, or put her at risk of injury by dropping one on her face…

But most importantly (no pic for this)…9 straight hours of sleep last night!