Start of the Holidays!

Time is flying.

Trying to at least capture a few of Alli's texts or posts.

Baby went bowling on Nov 18th

She sat on Santa's lap on Nov 21st










And proudly was able to take her own shirt off on Nov 26th :)

But this is still my favorite video, from back on Oct 22nd :)

Baby turns 1 years old!

Lana amazing is a 1 year old now!  And she really is an amazing little girl already.

Baby is getting pretty good at walking with her walker/cart thing.  Alli said it's pretty funny watching her little body getting around like that. :)  I think this walking method was discovered by baby at the cabin initially, using grandma's foot stool and pushing it across the carpet. 

Alli texted me a few days ago, to say that Lana says "num num" "night night" and "mama" now.  Also, she thinks she's saying diaper but she's really saying dada.

Alli and Umar are both so proud of their little girl and they should be.

This video is from Lana's 1st birthday party.  I think it's one of the first time I could see her really 'playing it up' for the camera!  She is saying really her first words of "good girl", whose origins may be from everyone's favorite Labrador Retriever.  Maddie knows she's a good girl and so does Lana!!

 

Baby crawls now!

My inexcusable infrequent cadence of postings makes for exciting headlines! But in actuality, little Lana does something new and amazing everyday.

In early June "baby", as I often refer to her...came up with it myself...officially started crawling !! 
She had a little gimp goin with one leg in her crawl but she worked it out and has been perfecting the move since. She is now motorin around...free-wheeling, wild and crazy!  This video really does capture one of the first times she crawled.  She was going after one of her favorite items now in the house, which is also one of mine...my cable DVR box

As I write now, July 28th, just back from the cabin with her for the second weekend in a row.  She started sliding great grandma's white footstool around the carpet and using it as a training walker!

She's a girl of Instagram fame with her incredible looks. Alli has had many people suggest modeling for her.  When I mentioned it to her one day she said dryly "yea, the baby should be working to pay for diapers" :)

Little Lana Returns!

'Baby' as she's uniquely called by Grandpa, returned to her northern roots as an 8 month old!

She is a girl who has an incredibly focused and loving Mom.  Alli has been introducing some organic baby food to Lana, while still breast feeding (#ultimateorganic) and that little girl runs on her milk.  She's a very lucky little baby.

She has a good disposition and her own sweet personality.  Her incredible smile has become quite the internet personality on Instagram and Vine recently.  Her peeps can't get enough of her.

She loves her bathtime...loves being in the water. 
She even got to swim in a pool for the first time, on April 29th, when she went to Uncle Chris's apartment (Cedars of Edina).

She's teething right now and that's definitely on her mind at times.  She had a 102? fever one day, that her Mom thought was from the teething.







Her Mom loves dressing her everyday.  The weather finally got warm here one day and Lana got her shorts on and showed off those rolls everyone loves.  Somebody could break a tooth pinching those leggies.

She has a Baby Einstein video that she likes a lot.  We sleep with the songs in our heads. I came home from work one day and Alli had ran upstairs for a minute and left her in front of the TV.  When I walked into the room I didn't expect to find this little munchkin on the floor with this huge grin on her face...sitting up all by herself.  I think the 52" screen is probably large enough for her.

She's very attracted to electronics and even has her own baby laptop already.  While we talk about how to keep her in reality and away from the virtual world, how can she not be drawn to these noise-making, vibrant colored, amazing, personal entertainment devices that everyone seems to have and flashes towards her everyday.   One day I had her in her stroller at Southdale Mall and when I saw many young pre-teens on iPads in the Apple store, I quickly turned away from the entrance.

She's still working on getting her crawl on.  She seems very close to figuring that out.  She can sit up now. She's been doing that for maybe a month now?   When she does try to get on the move, she will go to four on the floor and a few times has found some leverage to get herself pulled up back to sitting or standing.  That's somewhat new, as before when she would get on all fours, she would almost always face plant and then wait to be rescued as 'rocket girl'.

She still likes to pucker her lips and give the raspberries. She started doing that a little frequently while she was eating from a spoon.  Alli thought either she didn't like the texture of the pureed food or the spoon was maybe bothering her teeth but either way, she seemed to be having a little fun with it and making a Mom a little crazy too. Lana got to use an old highchair that's been in Randi's family for possibly 100 years?  They don't make em like that anymore.

She's really something!  :)