Maya's Smile

Maya has been smiling at us for a few weeks now and I was finally able to capture it with our camera! She is such a charmer already! She loves to have some one's face really close to hers and have you talk to her! She'll start grinning ear to ear! Makenna and Maryn take great pride in trying to make her smile :)



Half-smile :)


"I'm thinking about smiling..."


Not smiling but still cute!

Big Sister Love

Everyone keeps asking how Makenna and Maryn are adjusting to life with Maya and I can honestly say that things have gone very well. There has not been a single act of hostility directed towards Maya and for the first time ever Maryn told Josh to put Maya in the bouncey seat when he was holding her the other day. Luckily it wasn't out of jealousy, it was just out of necessity because she wanted Daddy to wrestle with her :) Josh and I definitely thought we would have more "growing pains" than we did. It is so obvious how much the girls love Maya already.

Sleeping Beauty

Doesn't Maya look so peaceful and beautiful!!??


I think I woke her up with my flash...

Maya - 1 Month Old

Boy how time flies! Maya was one month old on Friday! It is really hard for us to believe. Time seemed to stand still when the other two girls were babies and now we don't know where it's going. I'm starting to feel like we're already out of the itty-bitty baby stage and it makes me sad :( But it is also fun to see her grow and develop. Smiling definitely has to be a favorite right now :)

I'm one month old today! And just out of the bathtub!


One month old Maya!


Thank you for finally putting some jammies on me Mommy!

Catching Up On Pics

Here are some more pictures of Maya from 3 - 4 weeks old. She is growing so fast! She was wearing size 3 month clothing by 3 weeks! We had a rough spell with sleeping last week but everything seems to be back to normal for the past 3 - 4 nights. We're back to waking up only once or twice and going right back to sleep. Phew... Mommy and Daddy were getting a little worried there for awhile :)

Our sweet, content Maya! This is how she typically is at our house... just hanging out. She was laying on the floor watching me and Josh eat dinner one night and I just couldn't resist taking her picture.


I'm The Little Sister :)


This couldn't possibly be comfortable but she seems to get herself in this position every time she's in her swing.


CHEEKIES!!! Holy Smokes!

Maryn's New Hair Cut

I've been debating for awhile about what to do with Maryn's hair. We're trying to grow it out but it just doesn't seem to grow that fast. Her bangs constantly hang in her face and the back was all uneven. I finally took her in yesterday and decided to take a few inches off the back to clean it up and trim her bangs. We're still growing the bangs out but at least they look a little neater now. She looks so big now with her short hair!

First Trip to Church

Last weekend we took Maya to church for the first time. She was good as gold and slept through most of the service in her Daddy's arms. The girls were thrilled that Maya wasn't wearing her jammies for the first time :)

Maya hit another big milestone this past week and she smiled voluntarily for the first time (at 2 weeks 5 days). I was getting her undressed for a bath and talking to her and she just started smiling away at me! Melts a mommy's heart every time! The next day she even did it for Peepie too so I know I wasn't imagining things!

She continues to have very dry skin. Currently her forehead and legs are peeling. So much so that when I went to change her yesterday, I had pieces of dry skin covering my black pants by the time I was done.

Maya is a very strong little baby and can hold her head up for limited amounts of time. She can also forcefully push her legs off against the person that's holding her or whatever surface she is laying on. When she was just 2 days old she was laying tummy down on the scale at the nurse's office and she almost propelled herself off the scale because she was kicking and pushing so hard with her legs!

No jammies for Maya today!!


All snuggled up in her car seat after church. Look at those chubby cheeks! She is the first kid we've had that has gotten comments about chubby cheeks!


Her very well known scowly face! She furrows her brow and scowls with the best of them!

Maryn - 2 1/2 Years Old

All About Maryn Leigh at 2 1/2 years old....



Nicknames: MarBear, Mar, Leigh Lou
Weight & Height: I'm extremely confident that she weighs 30 lbs since she insisted on getting weighed at each and every one of my OB appointments.
Hair: Her hair is still very thin but it's starting to fill in a little more. It's longer in the back and her bangs are growing out and even cover her eyes already. Now the trick is trying to keep a barrette or ponytails in her hair so she doesn't constantly have hair in her eyes.
Favorite foods: Pancakes, pizza, Raisin Nut Bran cereal (only the flakes, not the nuts or raisins!), Peepie's oatmeal, spaghetti and any fruit. Oh and I can't leave out frosting... give her any kind of dessert and she will lick all the frosting off and leave the rest!
Favorite Drink: Skim milk, water and watered down apple juice. She also tried chocolate milk for the first time recently and thought that was great!
Favorite toys: Maryn is most content to be playing whatever Makenna is playing. Whether that be dressing up like princesses, playing school or house, making pretend food in the kitchen... she just wants to be like her big sister :)
Favorite books: Arthur In A Pickle, So Many Bunnies
Favorite Game: Tag You're It!, Wrestling with Daddy, London Bridges Falling Down, Soccer, Duck Duck Goose
Favorite stuffed animal: Puppy
Favorite Person: Nenny and her friend Rilynn
Bedtime: Start getting ready for bed at 7:30, in bed by 8:00. But depending on the length of her nap that day she may still be talking to herself in bed well after 9:00 some nights.
Wake-up time: Almost always 8:00, give or take 15 minutes
Naps: Goes down for a nap everyday at approximately 1:00. Some days she falls asleep immediately and some days she really fights it and ends up hanging out in her crib for an hour first before falling asleep. I'm just hoping she's not starting to wean herself from naps.
What she's saying: She's speaking in full sentences and has really increased her vocabulary lately. We (being me, Josh and Makenna) understand almost everything she says but others still have a hard time understanding her.
Latest Accomplishment: She has been able to identify all the letters of the alphabet for a few months now. She can count to 40 by herself and can identify the numbers 1 - 9. She knows her colors (outside of the rare ones) and is starting to know most of the shapes. She also has become quite the little soccer stud. She can run across an entire length of the yard dribbling the soccer ball completely in control. She is much better than most of the older kids and has the aggressiveness to keep up with all of them!
Likes: getting chased by anyone, when Daddy gets home from work at night, watching videos on Daddy's IPhone
Dislikes: SOCKS, having barrettes or ponytails in her hair, having anything in bed with her that isn't suppose to be there
Health: Maryn has been extremely healthy this winter. She had a very mild version of the stomach flu this fall... so mild that I didn't even realize she was sick until after it was gone and all the rest of us were sick. Other than that I think she may have had a runny nose for a day or two but that was the extent of it.
How she's like Daddy: She has quite the little temper for a toddler. One night at dinner she was eating a piece of bread and accidentally bit through and bit her finger. She didn't cry, just got incredibly angry at herself, slammed her fists on the table and started to grunt in frustration! She is also very aggressive and won't back down... she'll get in the face of anyone that messes with her. She doesn't care how much bigger they are than her!
How she's like Mommy: She is SO Type A personality. She likes to organize things and make sure everything is in it's proper place :) If we're playing a game, she'll organize all the pieces by shape or color.
Interesting Tidbits: Maryn is a terrific big sister and is really taken with Maya. She always says "I take her" and wants to hold her. She is constantly talking to "Myna" and sharing her puppy with her. We are extremely impressed by how well she has adjusted to having a new baby in the house. She really seems to be enjoying her new role as big sister.



Maryn is a really good kid and is full of personality. She can melt your heart in seconds and can win over just about anyone. Her enthusiasm and excitement for life are contagious. And let's not forget to mention how absolutely adorable she is! She is a joy to have in our family! We love you MarBear!

Sleeping In Her Crib

Maya loves to nap in her crib. Every time she's napped in her crib she has slept for at least 3 hours. Most of the time I even have to wake her up! Actually I'd say she loves to sleep anywhere as long as she is swaddled. Ever since Aunt Nene came to visit and convinced me that we needed to try swaddling her once again, she has been sleeping like a pro. At first Maya would have nothing to do with sleeping in her bassinet or crib (or any flat surface for that matter), but once we started getting her in a tight swaddle she's been sleeping wonderfully! Thanks Aunt Nene!


Here's Maya all swaddled up enjoying a nice long nap in her crib...

Spring Fever

Last week we enjoyed some very spring-like temperatures here in Iowa. The girls were thrilled to finally be playing outside. So much so that one evening we had a hard time convincing them to come inside, even after the sun went down and it was getting pretty cool outside. They decided it was more fun to be outside shivering under a blanket than inside playing. Daddy decided to join them after awhile.

Maya - 2 Weeks

Maya was 2 weeks old on Friday and I wanted to post some pictures to show how much she has grown! Josh and I were just talking last night about how time has just flown since she was born. We don't know where the two weeks have gone! She had her 2 week doctor's appointment and weighed 9 lbs 2 oz (1 oz short of her birth weight) and was 21 1/4 inches long (somehow she shrank since birth???). That puts her in the 94th and 96th percentiles. The doctor said that she is very healthy and her breast infection has cleared up nicely.

Maya continues to be a great baby. We are actually quite amazed by her. She continues to only get up once per night to eat... she goes to bed around 9:00/10:00, sleeps until 3:00 or 4:00, eats and then sleeps more until 7:00/8:00. She is a very alert baby and has more alert/awake time than most newborns I've come across. She already has a typical schedule (she must be type A like her mommy!) and that includes almost 3-4 hours of awake time each morning, a long nap in the afternoon and then another good chunk of awake time each evening. She is a very serious baby and we get lots of comments on her scowly face and how she furrows her brow. Her umbilical cord fell out the night before she turned 2 weeks old. She continues to have very dry, peely skin but the doctor said that should go away on it's own eventually.

Life With Maya

Life with Maya is going very well. Maya is an extremely good baby. We don't know what we did to get yet another easygoing baby. She only fusses when she wants to eat or has to fill her diaper and she is already sleeping in 5+ hour stretches at night, meaning that I'm only having to get up once per night to feed her! And she doesn't even cry when she wakes up... she just lays in the bassinet and makes noises like she's trying to eat her way through the side of her bed :) It's unbelievable!

Unfortunately we've already had to make one extra trip to the doctor's office for Maya. Yesterday morning when I was changing her I noticed that both of her breasts were swollen just like Maryn's were when she developed that horrible infection as an infant. One of the breasts was bruised and warm to the touch and seemed to be bothering her. The doctor confirmed my suspicions that she does have the same kind of breast infection that Maryn had and she is already on antibiotics :( Quite the bummer but at least it's something manageable. Now I'm just praying that she doesn't get thrush from being on the antibiotics.

I'm also proud to say that I've now accomplished two whole days caring for the three girls all on my own :) One of those days even being a preschool day and Makenna was on time to school! I also took them to the store for the first time and learned a lesson the hard way... Hy-Vee Drugstore does not have carts that will fit an infant car seat. Thus I was carrying Maya in her car seat, carrying the diaper bag, and Makenna and Maryn were each pushing there own little children's carts. Then you add all the grocery bags to it after you check out and it was a little chaotic. I think I'll be going to Target from now on so I can actually get a cart that will work!



Maryn is a very proud big sister! Prior to Maya's birth we were more concerned with how Maryn would react versus Makenna, but Maryn has shocked us all and is absolutely great with Maya. She loves to hold her and asks if she can frequently. She knows to be gentle with Maya and loves to talk to her and show her all her toys :)


This was some time last week... can you tell I was still sleep deprived at that point?!




Daddy trying to wake up Maya to eat!


Our three girls! They were being really goofy one night last week and we let Maya get in on the fun!

Maya's 1st Bath At Home

Here are some pictures from Maya's first bath at home last week. This child seriously loves baths... she doesn't even make a peep. She just sat there staring at me the entire time I was washing her up! Using the blanket in the water to keep her warm must really help (that was a trick we learned with Maryn). The only time she got mad was when we got her out of the water to put her pajamas on her. Too cold!

Maya's Eyes

I have a hard time getting pictures of Maya with her eyes open so I just had to share! Her eyes are currently a very deep blue color but I'm sure that will change over time.

Bili Light Baby

Here are some of the pictures we have of Maya with her Wallaby bili light. It was a blue light attached to a 3-4 foot cord that we had to keep on her back at all times. It's too bad we can't take good pictures at night so we could have captured how bright this blue light was in the middle of the night.

Maya showing off her light


Had to use the bili light even during diaper changes


We called her our naked baby for a day because she couldn't wear clothes with the light on. Thus we tried to keep her bundled in blankets... the light is actually under all those blankets.


Too cute not to post :)