More vacation pictures

I'll try to post a few pictures every day so you all can enjoy Bella :) These are from a trip to 2 Aquariums - one in Houston and the other one in Galveston.





Some pictures at the Moody Gardens' Rainforest exhibition.

And some more pictures at the beach in Galveston.

Some vacation pictures...

Some pictures from our trip to the Houston Zoo!

Looking at the elephants and giraffes :)

So excited to have seen a tiger in real life!!
Kissing grandpa...Enjoying all the animals despite the heat!
Talking to a sea turtle :)

We are back!!

And into our new house! Last Sunday, about 20 members from our church came and helped us move to our new house - 2 houses down! Unfortunately our landlord had to foreclose on his house. But God blessed us with a beautiful house owned by our previous landlord's sister. So, I've been organizing as much as possible! Of course my scrap room is almost done! :) LOL Bella has a bigger room and even has her own bathroom AND a walk-in closet! Little brat! We already painted it the same as her old room but havent put the border yet. We'll have to do that sometime this week.

Bella is walking every where and she loves when we pretend to chase her. She laughs to hard!!! And last friday she started clapping. So now she walks and claps at the same time. She looks like the energizer bunny walking everywhere and clapping! LOL

Pictures coming...

Vacation Vacation Vacation!

It's been a busy 2 weeks of vacations. We flew to Louisiana and stayed there for 5 days visiting Billy's family and had a birthday party for Bella. She got to see cows and horses in real life, which she LOVED!!! She also got in the pool for the first time at my MIL's house and she loved it. We got in every day!! :)
Then we drove to Houston to visit my parents and brother. We went to a lake on Friday and Bella is definitely a water baby! On Saturday afternoon we went to the zoo and she was beyond herself looking at all the animals. She would get so excited and "talk" to the animals. It was so cute! :)
We'll be flying back this coming Tuesday and then the joy of moving begins - NOT!!

Here are some pictures of Bella's birthday party in California. I'll post some from her party in Louisiana and the pool later.

Before getting dirty...

Eating the cake I made her...

Showing mom her dirty hands (although she was a VERY neat cake eater!)...

And she's walking!!!!!!!

We've been "encouraging" Bella to walk on her own, but every time we let go of her hand she'd sit down. She's been cruising since she was about 7 months and loves pushing her walker around the house. But today while we were playing, walking back and forth between Billy and I, I let go of her hand and she kept walking on her own. Only 3 or 4 steps. But I just started crying. I felt so overwhelmed with joy to see her grow and take her first steps. We already talked to her grandparents and they are all excited about seeing her walk next week when we go for a visit/vacation to Louisiana and Texas.

We also went to her "well check" appointment with the pediatrician this morning. She weights 20 lbs 12 oz and she's 27 and 1/2 in. She's in the 30th and 20th percentile respectively. She's gonna be petite! :) She also got 2 shots and poor baby cried and cried and then snuggled with Daddy. She's definitely a Daddy's girl :)

I'll post some pictures tomorrow so y'all can see my little angel :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO BELLA!!!

A year ago, Bella arrived to our world and changed our lives forever. I can't believe she's ONE!!! She's so adorable and cute and I love her beyond words. We built her a little swing/slide playground set yesterday and she was so happy swinging in it.
She's also getting more and more expressive every day. We went to Lowes to buy some paint and other stuff for the new house and she was waving "bye-bye" to a lady that picked up her ducky. It was so cute :love: She used to give me kisses (aka open mouth pecks) but I dont know why she's not doing it anymore :( I just keep telling her to kiss me and since she doesn't I just kiss her all over her face and she laughs.

Change we can believe in!

Some of you don't know that I can't vote because I'm not a citizen, but I've been following the Primary elections. And yesterday was indeed a historic day when Senator Barack Obama won the most delegate votes and became the first African-American Democratic Presidential Nominee for the November presidential elections. So, while I can't vote, I think every person that can should participate in this historic event that could become even more formidable if (and when) Sen. Obama gets elected as the first African-American president of the United States.

Billy and I watched his winning speech last night and he's an amazing speaker. So inspiring, graceful, and hopeful. We are praying for his safety and may God give him wisdom to lead this country to a better future!

ok, I'm off to scrap! :)

More teeth coming out!

What else can I say?! Her teeth are coming out and she's cranky! LOL

I can feed myself!!

Bella fed herself with a spoon for the first time on Wednesday. She was so cute trying to put the spoon in her mouth. Only problem was sometimes she would turn it and the spoon wouldn't quite fit in her mouth! I'll put some pictures later.

And yes, I'm still sick. Billy and Bella are doing better, thank God! But I'm worst. I think I have a sinus infection now :(

Update: I went to the doctor again today and he said I have bronchitis and asthma and a sinus infection. Great. NOT!! He gave me like 3 or 4 prescriptions for different meds. *sigh* When will it all end?!! I changed some sheets yesterday and did a bunch of laundry in an effort to clean the house and get rid of any possible bacteria still lingering around. The winds were wild out of control for like 5 days so that didnt help with allergy stuff. But it stopped today and I've opened all the windows and hoping the house will air out.

Still sick...

Here I am. Laying on the couch sick as a dog. Well, actually our dog is the only one not sick in our house. Go figure! We started giving Bella antibiotics last night and I got my prescription today for antibiotics too. Billy goes in for a doctor's appointment this afternoon so we'll see how he's doing. Bella still had a fever of 101.1*F last night so that's why we started giving her the antibiotics. Last night was rough too. She felt asleep around 6:30 pm but then woke up every 20-30 minutes crying until about 11 pm.

I haven't been able to scrapbook much and I feel sad. I was doing pretty good on Bella's baby album.

Now we are ALL sick... :(

Thanks for the prayers, good thoughts, and concerns about Bella. She's still sick. Last night was terrible too. She woke up at 4 and wouldnt go back to sleep for about 45 min, just crying and crying. We gave her Motrin and even fed her 6 oz. The urine sample was useless cause it didnt go inside the little bag it was supposed to... but I dont think that was critical since the white blood count was normal. We are just waiting to hear from her pediatrician today.

The worst part is now Billy and I are REALLY sick too. I had a fever last night and what I can only describe as a hot flash. Am I too young for those?? In any case, I have no idea what was wrong but I was super hot and couldnt fall sleep for 2 hrs. Now we have pounding headches, body aches, terrible soar throats... what's wrong with us?!!! We are falling apart... :(

One a happy note: Bella said Mocha for the first time. And both Billy and I heard her, so it's not that I'm allucinating with my illness :P She also discovered toilet paper and how fun it is to unrolled it! :)

Another trip to the ER

Please keep praying for Bella. Last night her fever went up to 104.1*F. We gave her a bath at almost 11 pm! We've also been giving her Tylenol and Motrin. But since it's been 5 days, we called her pediatrician in the afternoon and she saw us in her office. She doesn't have an ear infection or any other bacterial infection that the doctor could see. So, she sent us to the ER for lab work. We did that and thank God the nurse that drew her blood was really good and got it in the first try. We are now waiting for her to pee so we can bring a urine sample back to the lab. Sorry if it's TMI. Hopefully we'll hear from the doctor soon to see what we can do for our little one.

ETA: Well, the doctor just called and said the white blood count was normal. The hemoglobin and iron are a little low but nothing major. She's still waiting on a couple of other tests but wont get them until tomorrow. So, we'll see how she does tonight.

Top teeth are out!!!

Well, at least one of them. Her top right tooth came out 2 days ago. The other one is *wanting* to come out but still on limbo. No pictures yet, sorry :(

The sad news is that Bella's had a high fever for the last 4 days. And after our last experience with fevers (febrile seizure and all), we've been REALLY keeping a close eye to her temperatures. Last night she woke up at 1:30 am and her temp was 103.5*F. The night before it reached 104*F. We've been giving her Motrin and Tylenol, keeping her hydrated with pedialyte, and giving her baths once or twice a day. Please keep her in your prayers that the fever will go down and stay down!

Bottom Teeth are out!!

Isnt she adorable?!! :) Her teeth have been out for a couple of weeks but we hadn't been able to take a picture. Now one of her top teeth is coming out but that one is going to be even harder to catch in a picture... we'll see!

Almost 1!

Bella's 11 months and soon she'll turn 1! It's been quite an amazing year.

We've been planning her birthday party, actually TWO birthday parties! One here in Merced and another one in Louisiana at B's mom's house. A friend from 2Peas is working on the invitations and I can't wait to see them.