On your mark, get set, blog...

Seriously - we have been on a marathon of a couple months and I have had very little time for blogging. So, I'm warning you now, this is a VERY LONG blog post because I have my faithful viewers who actually want updates on how things have been going with the Morales family and I'm determined to not miss chronicling the happenings in our lives. So here it goes, in order of events and dates...

The last I posted it was right before Trisha's wedding, so I left off right before her Bachelorette Party. She was super cute all dawled up and ready to take on all the cuties who would try to change her mind about the wedding ;)

These were all the ladies who had fun with her that evening. I hear they had a blast out on the town - I headed back home to my family before the night's festivities; wished them a safe time and lots of laughs!!

Then came rehearsal time - it was SO cold, but we stuck it out outside and helped get Trisha ready for her big day!

Abby's practice for her flower girl entry was more like dragging Azaleah down the aisle with her. I had to remind her to not run - the warning didn't come soon enough because she ate it that night at the rehearsal dinner. Luckily it didn't leave that big of a mark.

Daniel was just starting to sit up on his own a little by this point...

Then we had Trisha's wedding which was totally a blast, but totally A LOT of work for a mommy of two little ones. I highly recommend not bringing kids to weddings...they just don't appreciate it and you are stressin' the whole time and not able to have the fun that you want. But, my little sister is married and I now officially have to share my birthday with Chris from here on out ;) Welcome to the family Chris - we love you! (The reason I don't have pictures is because I was catering to my sister so much I didn't carry my camera with me and she has yet to get me any copies of her professionally done ones....soon!!)

Then came Thanksgiving day/the birth day of my very first nephew, Carson Jonathan Wilt. We were all eagerly anticipating his birth around Trisha's wedding day, hoping they wouldn't fall on the same day and sure enough, Carson held out for a couple more days and made his big arrival on Thanksgiving day - put us all through a little scare on his way into this world, but now is a handsome and healthy baby boy.

In the meantime, while we were waiting to get the latest on KC and Jonathan's delivery, we went to my parents house for Thanksgiving dinner - YUM! Daniel even thinks so while he nibbles on his fingers...

One happy baby boy with his Auntie T

I had the lovely opportunity to partner up with my Bible Study friends and some other girl friends of ours to put on a charity boutique. My friend Holly was so inspired to do something as a compassion project that would allow her to help people around the world while still being a house mom and staying in sunny San Diego. So she came up with this handmade boutique where everyone who sold something, part of their profits went towards a charity of their choice. It was really great to see all the charities that my friends picked.

I would like to claim that I was able to handmake something really cute worth selling, but I just don't have that kind of time available to me right now. What I was proud to contribute was my graphic design - so fun to work on and I have to say I'm a bit prideful of what resulted. I made our main flier, some postcards, some little labels for bags and then some cute signs that we had at each table to let people know what charity they would be supporting.

Then it was time to start getting ready for Christmas. This year was really fun because Abby got really into helping me decorate. I couldn't pull out as many as I normally would, but it was fun to still decorate our tree like normal, with all of our ornaments and to share the stories with each of them.

It's incredible to me to look back at all these things happening since the last time I blogged. Because I have these pictures in here of Daniel just scooting across the floor from the beginning of December, and as I'm typing this, I have a big boy who is already crawling across the room and quickly!! These next pictures are right about the same time that I discovered Daniel's first tooth had broken through - crazy that they have come so early!!

One of the things that had also slowed us up in December, but kept us busy at the same time, were colds. Daniel has been through six different rounds of a cold and I believe a lot of it is thanks to his big sister. But, here's mine and Abby's attempt at making some cookies since we had to miss our Annual Kalla Girls Cookie Bake because both of the kiddos were sick. I obviously did not put those cookies out on trays, but kept them at our house to enjoy.

We were invited to join the Kyle's on their double decker bus again for Christmas lights and this year was super special because Robbie actually was able to go with us and Abby was ripe at the age to be able to fully enjoy all the sights! She also linked up pretty quickly to one of the other little girls that went on the bus too, Mali. They were so cute together...

So fun for all these little kiddos...

And you can't miss out on any Kodak moment for future wedding slide shows... ;)

Then we got to enjoy celebrating baby Carson's 1 mos. birthday and Daniel's first Christmas!

Because we went to both our parents' house for Christmas, we decided to hold off on our own personal Christmas until the next morning because of overload for our little princess. And you can see why below...once she looked down from the top of the stairs, she was in shock and she just kept saying "more princess dresses." She immediately wanted to get in one and then she preceded to play in it ALL day long. Huge thank you to the Barnhard family for all the hand-me-downs. We didn't realize all that was in the bag until we began pulling them out to set it up for Christmas. It felt like Christmas for us too because of how giddy we were to see all that was passed down to us!

Robbie got a new Charger's hat and he enjoyed trying to get Daniel to wear it...

Silly me, I didn't take a picture of myself on my first 29th birthday - it was my golden year as I turned 29 on the 29th - Robbie was sweet to do some fun golden-themed things for me.

Then the next day we went to the Holiday Bowl parade downtown. It was Abby's first parade and she loved it! A beautifully crisp day!

Her first ride on a trolley...

Mommy and Daniel enjoying the festivities!!

Whewwww....ok, now that one is done and I can start on some more recent things...thanks for hanging in there :)

Squirmie Wormie

Daniel is officially a five month old. Can you believe how time has flown by? I can't!! He is growing up too quickly and I'm loving the little boy he's becoming. He is always full of smiles and he is overall a generally happy kid. He loves his sister - he lights up big and bright when she's around - mostly because she sings to him and speaks "Daniel's language" when she's around him. But let me tell you - this boy hates to sleep!!!! It's not that he doesn't sleep, it's just that he fights it at all cost. He doesn't sleep in a swing, in your arms, or in a carseat. He has to be in a crib in order to sleep and still it takes a while for him to actually fall asleep. He just wants to be a part of all that's going on around him. He teased us with two and half weeks of sleeping 6-8 hours straight at night, and then the boy got a cold which interrupted that stretch of sleep at night. Then his 4 month growth spurt kicked my butt big time!! He was up maybe 2-3 times a night to feed and was cluster feeding throughout the days. After that wasn't ending for about 3 weeks, I decided he needed more substenance - so we began feeding him some solid food and started supplementing feedings with some formula. I can't say I enjoyed making this switch because it has affected nursing him, but I will take the trade off - he is back on schedule again and is sleeping 6-8 hours at night again. Phewww!!

During all of this "growing" he was doing he has discovered some fun new things. He loves to be on his tummy and he often looks like a frog just kicking his legs and flailing his arms in the air while laying down.



And he has found his toes - you can't keep them out of his hands unless you actually put toys or rattles in his hands to replace those little piggies.



And he has discovered rolling from his back to his front. He rolls from his front to his back all the time in the crib, but still has yet to really do it on the floor. Then outside of rolling, we have come to call him our Squirmie Wormie because the boy does not want to stop moving. When we sit him in his Bumbo, he wants to turn around in it. When we have him in any kind of bouncy seat or swing we have to buckle him in. We never had to do that with Abby - she would just sit contently wherever we had her. Daniel just wants to keep moving - even while in your arms, he's trying to turn around to see what's going on behind him. I think we have our hands full for when he begins to get more mobile.



Daniel has also been doing some surfing lately - on his Aunt KC's belly. He's trying to say, "Hey cuz - come out already!! I want to meet you!!" We really are all eager to meet the next lil baby that's going to bless this family and it's going to be so awesome to see the boys grow up together. Daniel just now has some bragging rights that he got to surf on top of baby Carson :)

Ok, KC it's time to have that little baby already!! Just not on Sunday, Nov. 21 - that day is already reserved for my baby sister to get married - yeah, can you believe it?!! Trisha is getting married in one week!!!!!!! Crazy!!!! What a week it's going to be!!

A Beautiful Lady Bug!

Just wanted to share what a cute little lady bug we had for Halloween this year!

Daniel was just Daniel - no costume needed to be super cute! More pics to come!

Sunflowers for Trisha

Last week was super busy packed with preparing for my very own sister's bridal shower. Yeah, my lil sis is getting married in less than a month now...SOOO crazy!! So we had to spoil her silly and give her a day just for her. She loves sunflowers, brown is her main color at her wedding, and guests were asked to bring a gift in a basket, so we incorporated all of those things in one beautiful yellow and brown, sunflower, basket bridal shower ;)



It was so fun to have so many of our family out to celebrate Trisha!



Aunt Char, making Trisha's bow bouquet - Trisha only "broke" 3 strings....hmmmm



Yum...chocolate...and it went perfectly with the color theme.

Ok, so I have to say that I'm really pleased with how all the decor turned out! Thank you to mom for making it all happen!!!!

We made this cute emblem piece that read, "TLC" which stood for "Trisha Loves Chris" and we put it on everything

We gave away these cute little baskets with a little TLC for them to take home.

This was a prize basket for one of our games we played.