Madi Goes to Iowa

At six weeks, Madison and I took a trip to Iowa to see my Grandma (Madison 's great-grandma), Aunt Marta and cousin, Megan. Madison did SO well. She is such a trooper! Our trip was going to be a short two and a half days and three nights because I had to go back to work the following week, but I wasn't going to pass up the opportunity to go to Iowa and visit while I had the time. I was so excited for Madison to meet them and know they were really looking forward to meeting her too. Dylan helped us get checked in at the airport and made sure we made it to our gate and then had to say bye to Madison for the first time. :( Unfortunately, he didn't have the time to take off from work to go with us. The trip started out pretty rough... Apparently, there was bad weather in Dallas , so after we had boarded the plane, the pilot announced that we were going to be delayed for at least a half hour, maybe longer. To make a long story short, we were delayed long enough that we missed our connecting flight (supposed to connect in Dallas at 3:45 p.m. and got there at 4:15). The next flight out was cancelled, so we were put on standby for the NEXT flight out that wasn't supposed to take off until 9:40 p.m. After standing in a million lines and talking to so many different people, we secured a spot on the 9:40 flight and arrived in Cedar Rapids, IA around midnight. What a mess! I must mention though that Madison was such a good girl - she slept almost the entire flight and handled being in the airport for all those hours just fine. When she did wake up, she even smiled (which we had only seen her do maybe one other time at that point) at the girl sitting next to us! All of the other passengers around us (though also quite perturbed about the delay and cancellations) were so nice - either that or I looked like I really needed some help. :) Despite the somewhat chaotic trip there, we had a great time in Iowa.

Madison got her first Halloween costume and some fairy wings that I had been looking for - pictures below. She also loved meeting Grandma, Aunt Marta, Megan, Laura Phearman, and Megan's friend Ali. They all loved her too. :) Of course, she got all kinds of gifts while we were there that we actually managed to fit in our bags and get home (it was definitely a challenge)! I'm so glad that we got to spend that time with Grandma and all our other family and friends. After having done it once, I'm confident we can do it again and look forward to going back!

See album of pictures from our trip....

(Sleepy) Fairy Princess

Eight Weeks Already!

My goodness - everyone says time flies but who knew it would really go by this fast!? I cannot even believe that Madison is already 8 weeks old. She is doing so much more and is so much more alert than she has been. As I mentioned before, Madison smiled her first "real smile" at us at about 5 1/2 weeks! It was so exciting to see her cute little grin and we couldn't wait for her to do it again! She is smiling much more now, but we've yet to capture it on camera... I think she wants to keep it a secret for a little while longer. :)

At about 7 weeks, Madi started cooing. She seems to be very interested in what Dylan and I say to her - stares at us so seriously and then coos back. We love hearing her make all her little sounds and just wonder what is going on inside of that little head of hers.

Just the other day, Madison laughed out loud! She did it two or three times in a row as if something was just so funny to her! She got the biggest grin on her face and almost seemed somewhat surprised herself at the noises she made. We've tried to get her to laugh again since then so that her daddy can hear her, but she must be saving it for something really worth laughing about.

She has also noticed her feet and absolutely loves kicking at toys that are hanging by them. She gets the most determined, serious look on her face, puts her arms out to her sides, stares down at her feet and kicks away. It's adorable!

It has been so fun to watch her change and learn new things. There's so much more in store too, which is very exciting. Here's some of our favorite pictures from the last two months.

How Exciting

Well, this is our first official post to the new blog! I wish I had known about this site when we first learned we were going to have a baby! It was a long and interesting 9 months, for starters, and Madison has already, in her first two months, had adventures worth sharing. :)

We are having the time of our lives being parents - we think we'll keep her around. ;) We've set up some albums with ultrasound pics, some pictures of Madison's nursery, etc. for those of you who haven't seen them and want to "catch up". We've also posted a few blogs about the past two months. Time is really flying way too fast already. Hope you'll come and visit the site often!