First, I don't have any belly/pregnancy-related photos, so you get photos of Riley obsessed with her reflection in the mirror and giving herself kisses.

I haven't been very good at doing pregnancy updates.  I planned on doing weekly ones, but clearly that hasn't happened.  I figure I'll start my real weekly updates once I get to 12 weeks.  For now, I'll just do a general update about life so far being pregnant, with a toddler in tow. 

I am now a little over 10 weeks pregnant, and let me start off by saying it is WAY harder this time around than I had anticipated.  When I was pregnant with Riley, I did experience nausea and fatigue, but it's just on a whole new level this time, and with a busy 13 month in the mix, it makes life, well, hard.  I was looking back at my notes/journal from my pregnancy with Riley, and I read that on days I wasn't working, I would sleep 12 hours at night, and then take a 3 hour nap!!  No wonder I'm feeling way more tired this time, I don't have the luxury of that kind of sleep. Not even close.

Some days I feel super sick and unable to really eat the things I want to eat.  Other days I feel a little bit better.  But if I eat too much of anything, I feel absolutely awful.  For a while I had really been craving fresh fruit- berries, peaches, watermelon, anything really.  Then the other day, the thought of eating a peach made me gag.  So who knows.  I've been really liking chocolate milk, which is random, since I hardly ever drink milk, especially not chocolate milk.  I always feel like I want to drink a jamba juice, but then always feel gross afterwards. But two things that are always guaranteed to be delicious so far this pregnancy?  Bagels with cream cheese, and potatoes (not together).  Random, I know.

On Monday, I have my first "real" OB appointment.  They will try and listen for the heartbeat (I think), although if I remember correctly, with Riley they tried to listen around 9 weeks and couldn't find it, and it FREAKED me out.  So I'm trying not to be optimistic about it, although it is such a wonderful sound!  We still have a couple weeks until the first ultrasound, and I cannot wait!!!  The ultrasound makes everything feel so much more real.  Especially since my days are so consumed with the cutest little 13 month old in the whole world, the only time I really think about being pregnant is when I'm trying so hard not to throw up. Nice, I know.  Oh and when I take that lovely prenatal vitamin.  Other than that, this pregnancy doesn't consume my thoughts nearly as much as last time around.

As for weight gain, I've been fluctuating between a gain of 0 pounds and a gain of 2 pounds.  So no real consistent weight gain as of yet, which is just fine by me!  Anyway, hopefully this will be the start of actual pregnancy updates, I'll try my best to keep up with it!

Riley and I have been taking advantage of the amazing summer weather, and spending lots of time outside.  We have daily picnics out on the lawn in front of our apartment complex.  We bring out a blanket, some drinks, some snacks, a few toys, and we just hang out and chat.  She waves to everyone that walks by.  I tell her all about the grass and trees and birdies.  We wait and watch for daddy getting home from work.  She walks around the grass and tries to eat leaves. 

And of course, inevitably, she sees the swimming pool, and bolts away from me right towards it (not to worry, it's closed off by a fence).  And she cries when she realizes we're not getting in.  Every. single. time.   The child LOVES the water.

I love this funny little baby so so so much. :)

Time is going by faster than ever.  Riley is now 13 months old, and has added all kinds of new skills this past month.  Riley is now a 100%, full time walker, (and has been for quite a while) and she is FAST.  She's practically a speed-walker, wanna-be runner.  She now weighs almost 22 pounds (yikes!), in size 4 diapers, and is in mostly 18 month clothes.  She's in between size 3 and 4 shoes, which is always fun. :)

She learns things SO fast these days.  She's learning body parts- right now she knows (and can point to when asked) ears, tongue, fingers, toes, feet, eyes, teeth, mouth and hair.  Sometimes she gets nose right, but mostly when I say nose, she thinks I said "noise" and then makes a "piggy noise."  Close...?   She knows the color red.  She knows the letters A, B, and C.  She knows even more words than she knew last month, her receptive language is unbelievable.  Words she says: mama, dada, yum, "nana" (banana) and again ("aga"), "bubba" for baby, and "ma" for more, "ba" for bath and ball.  She can also say "nigh-nigh" (night night) and she tries to repeat a lot of what we say.  She can also moo like a cow, oink like a pig, bark like a dog, baa like a sheep, and growl like a lion.  If you ask her a question, if the answer is yes, she does this little squeak thing as her version of "yes."

This month she really discovered climbing.  As in, oh hey, I can climb on to that chair and then stand up and reach all those things I wasn't supposed to reach!  We taught her how to get down from things like couches or beds feet first, and she actually does it pretty well.  She often needs to be reminded, but if we say, "feet first Riley!" she turns around and climbs down the right way without face planting.  Except if she's really excited, then she will just go flying off furniture any which way.  She also LOVES going for mini bike rides with her daddy... or just playing with the bell on his bike.

We finally started the process of weaning.  We have now eliminated day time nursing, and she drinks whole milk from a sippy cup during the day like a champ.  We've gotten rid of all bottles, although she hasn't has a bottle since around 11 months so that was no big deal.  We are basically down to nursing one time in the early morning, and will drop that last feed in the next couple of days I hope.  As for sleep, I thought she was transitioning to one nap a day, but she took 2 x 2 hour naps today, so I could be wrong.  Who knows.

She does the hand gestures to "wheels on the bus" although they all look the same... She has become even more obsessed with reading books, if that was even possible.  She will pick up her favorite books and bring them all the way across the room to us so we will read them to her and she FREAKS OUT with joy when we start reading.  I really need to get it on video because it's so so cute.  And she will bring us the same books over, and over, and over again.  She has learned how to BUILD towers instead of just destroy them, although clearly destroying them is much more fun.  She has also learned to put things IN something rather than just remove them (i.e. putting small objects in a box rather than taking them all out), which is helpful for clean-up time!  It is NOT helpful when she hides the keys in a box inside a box, and we have to search the whole house for them.

She has learned how to kick a ball, and will do it on command.  She can throw balls/toys across the room as well.  My mom has been teaching Riley all kinds of fun "tricks," so when we say "ta da!" she throws her hands up in the air and smiles, and when we say, "oh no!" or "doh!" she smacks her hand on her head.  Pretty darn cute.  She loves to be thrown onto the bed or the couch, she loves swimming, and she loves going for "car rides" in her new pool toy that she prefers to play with on the carpet.  She thinks any thing remotely electronic looking is a phone, and will hold it up to her ear.

She refuses to even try and feed herself with a spoon, but does well with a fork (if we put the food on it for her).  She is also really stubborn about using a sippy cup.  She prefers that we hold it for her, so the only cup she will use completely by herself is a straw cup.  Oh well, we'll get there.   We've eliminated day time pacifier use, so she only gets it in her bed (unless she needs to take a nap on the go and then she gets in in the car/stroller).  She still love love LOVES to be scared/surprised, and still loves to be chased all around the house.  She's obsessed with doggies.  She responds 100% of the time to "sit down" and "stand up," which is pretty impressive.  She almost always responds to "go give this to (mama/dada/whoever)" and even consistently responds to "come here."

And on to some not so awesome new developments- biting.  Riley has discovered biting as a form of protesting being told no.  And it's totally my fault.  Her biting all started when I was trying to put my fingers in her mouth to check for new teeth coming through.  (Speaking of teeth- she currently has 10- 6 on top, 4 on bottom with another bottom one about to break through... THREE of those are molars!!)  But anyway, when checking for teeth, ahe usually clamps her mouth shut and won't let me see, so I made a game out of it so she would open her mouth.  She'd bite down on my fingers, and I'd go "ouch!" and she would laugh, and then open her mouth again.  It then progressed to her randomly initiating that "game" when I wasn't expecting it.  And then it progressed to her realizing she can bite whenever she wants, and then deciding that if I tell her no for any reason, her immediate response would be to bite me (or her dad).  Needless to say, we no longer play that "game," and we no longer think biting is funny in the least.  I'm just hoping she doesn't figure out she can bite other kids, yikes.  But even when she bites, it's so hard to get mad at this little face, no?

Happy 13 months to my little bug-a-boo!

Birthday parties equal balloons, and balloons make for a very happy little girl.

I actually took pictures today.  Amazing, I know.  It helped that Mark took the day off work, so the three of us went to Stanford for a little bit and let Riley run around.  This was the very first picture I took, and I know the focus is soft, but I love it anyway.

Riley loved walking around the halls and exploring the gardens.  She didn't want to be held, she just wanted to go go go. 

This is a pretty typical Riley picture these days.  She point at everything, all the time.  And can we please take a second to note her HAIR sticking up everywhere??  That means she actually does have hair!!

Today was only the second day in her little life that she only had one nap instead of two... I don't really think she's ready to transition to just one nap quite yet, as she was absolutely exhausted by 6:30pm, but she did pretty well.  Now here's to hoping she stays asleep for a very long time!!

I have a few moments to myself since my saint of a husband came home early from work, and even though he's not feeling well, he took Riley to Jamba juice to get us all a smoothie.  I thought about squeezing in a nap, but they will only be gone for about 25 minutes, so probably not worth it.  So second to napping was a quick blog post.  I don't have any pictures, which is pretty pathetic really, but blogging and taking pictures have just not been even close to top priority lately.  And I basically rarely even get on the internet these days, soo if I haven't commented on your blog lately, bare with me I'll be back, I swear.  Right now, we're just trying to make it through the day without passing out.

A couple weeks ago I started the process of weaning Riley.  I'm really proud to have made it to a year, but the combination of breastfeeding plus being pregnant was really taking a toll on me.  Plus, Riley was still waking in the night wanting to nurse.  So we've slowly been eliminating nursing sessions, and now we're down to one a day.  But because I'm not nursing her in the middle of the night (or before bed), she's sort of protesting by waking up in the middle of the night and screaming.  For hours.  Seriously last night she was awake from 3:30-5:30am, and no matter what we did (or didn't do), we could not get her to go back to sleep.  FINALLY she passed out at 5:30 and slept for another hour and a half.... just in time for us to get up and go to work.  Oh yeah, I'm working this week.  Just from 8-12, but that means I'm out in the sun all morning and by the time I get home, I'm beat and it's only 12:30pm.  So as I said, I'm sort of in survival mode.  Hence the zero motivation for blogging or taking pictures.  I'm really hoping this whole second trimester boost of energy remains true when you're pregnant for the second time. 

On the upside, I had my first prenatal appointment the other day.  It's going to be very interesting to compare the prenatal care here versus in New Zealand.  Huge differences already and I've only had one appointment!  Now this appointment wasn't actually with my OB, it was just with the nurses in the practice.  Took some tests, scheduled my first "real" appointment and my NT scan in a few weeks.  And gave FOURTEEN vials of blood.  They did all the routine tests plus another whole list of tests due to some genetic disorders in my family, so I ended up giving quite a lot of blood.  But I'm excited to listen to the heartbeat for the first time and get to see our little baby #2 for the first time in August!!  I think then everything will feel more real, rather than just exhausting and overwhelming.

Anyway... time to go enjoy a jamba juice with my husband and baby.  Pictures to come... eventually.

I can't wait to do Riley's 13 month update in a little over a week.  So much has changed this month, it's crazy!!  One big thing?  She's now totally into climbing.  On everything.  She climbs on the couch, her toys, pillows, her daddy, basically anything she can hook her little leg onto and boost herself up.  Including her bike.  She climbs up, stands on the seat, stands on the yellow sides, and gets back down all on her own.

Her newest challenge is trying to climb on top of her music table.  It's only a matter of time before she's able to stand up on that thing, and then we're in for some real trouble.  Her daddy does all kinds of crazy things with her these days.  He throws her on the couch, he drops her on the bed so she bounces and giggles like crazy.  He flips her and flings her around, and she loves every second.  And?  He taught her how to jump in the pool.

Actually it's kind of more of a "walk the plank" than it is a jump, but the baby is fearless.  She'll do anything to get in the pool.

Aaaaahhhhh.  Don't you just love the weekends??

I'm pregnant.  I'm exhausted.  I feel sick a good portion of the day.  I have a super busy one year old to take care of that often wakes up at 5am ready to start her day. We live in a one bedroom apartment, which is a bit of a change from our 3 bedroom 2 bathroom house in New Zealand.  We don't exactly have a ton of money at the moment.  But you know what?  Life is just so darn good right now. 

Our little one bedroom apartment?  Is a 5 minute bike ride from work for Mark.  Which means, he gets up early with Riley in the morning, hangs out with her and feeds her breakfast while I get to relax in bed.  Then he goes to work, and comes home at lunch time to eat and hang out with us.  He heads back to work, and comes home for dinner.  Some days he goes back to work after Riley goes to bed, and I call it an early night and go to sleep.  We get SO much more time with him since he's so close to work and Riley is absolutely loving it. 

And yes pregnancy is exhausting, way more so than last time around, but you know what?  This little one (Riley) has turned in to quite the day time sleeper, which means she takes 2 x 1.5-2 hour naps a day.  Which means, I get to take two 1.5-2 hour naps a day.  And I do pretty much every single day.  Heaven.

Our apartment complex also has a pool, which means she gets to go swimming every single day.  And she still cries every time we get out.  Swimming is definitely one of her top 5 favorite activities.  It's up there with reading books and playing with the ipad.  And stealing my camera lens.

Ahh yes, life is good.

Just wanted to post a few more pics from the wedding I went to over the weekend.  I'm a little ashamed to say that I didn't get even ONE picture of my own daughter in her lovely party dress.  Not even ONE.  I'm hoping the actual wedding photographer got one!  Otherwise I'll just have to put her in it again next weekend and snap a few and we can pretend. :)  But anyway, a few more photos from the wonderful day!

On the way to the "reveal"...

The decor...

Congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Justin Castro!! 

I've been a little MIA.  Reason being?  I spent the weekend (well, Thursday-Sunday) in Baltimore for my best friend's wedding!  It was a whirlwind vacation, and get this, I didn't even bring my computer, hence the complete lack of blogging.  I was super nervous about flying yet again with Riley, since it's like 6+ hours of travel, but of course, as usual, she was a trooper and things went much better than I had imagined.  We just got back today, and I'm pretty exhausted, but I wanted to share a little photo I took on the wedding day.  This is the bride's new 6 year old step daughter, Stella.  She was sitting at the window, watching her new mama get ready.  She was absolutely adorable.  I wish I could have taken more pictures, but being a bridesmaid made it a bit difficult to take pictures too!  Oh well, I got a few at least. :)

Regular posts with lots of pictures to come, very soon.  :)