Park Life - Parks, parks and more parks!

One of the greatest things about living in Silicon Valley is the weather. It is January and we are still able to go to the park! There is this great blog called Silicon Valley Toddler and she does awesome reviews of various parks. So I often check out her site for fun ideas for the weekend.

The first park we went to was Silver Leaf Park in South San Jose. It wasn't too far from us which was wonderful. The park had a large green open space, which we didn't make use of but would be great for the older children. The toddler area was nice as well. They had the rubber squishy stuff, 4 baby swings and it was all gated. Our little girl doesn't really care about anything but the swings but I know she will in just a short while. As a momma I love the squishy rubber stuff too, much easier for my bum than tan bark :)

There were a couple cons - there wasn't much shade, no bathroom and the park was a bit run down. There was some graffiti as well but overall we enjoyed ourselves.


The second park we went to, also recommended by Silicon Valley Toddler, was Edenvale Garden Park. This one was even closer to our house and if I was really pushing I might even be able to walk to (Google maps says its 1.2 miles which doesn't seem far but I'm never sure how long Ryley will last in the stroller). The park was great! I loved the very "nature" feel, the walking paths and the play area was adorable. Here are a few pictures from our day:

We had so much fun! The train look of the park is super cute too. There was some tan bark but also the squishy stuff. We will absolutely be going back here!

Baby Life - Glorious Food

Food has been so much fun with Ryley. We are doing Baby Led Weaning - the basic concept is that Ryley gets to eat what we eat. This isn't always possible but I feed her whole foods instead of purees. If you are interested in this idea make sure to read the book, lots of good information there and it will help you be less nervous about the idea.

So far Ryley has had:

• Broccoli
• Red Pepper
• Asparagus
• Pasta
• Chicken
• Carrots
• Banana
• Avocado
• Sweet Potato
• Cucumber

I think that's everything. Tomorrow I think we are going to try pears. Here are a few pictures of her eating

Broccoli at Christmas

Hard to see but she is enjoying herself a couple of carrots

She doesn't actually eat much, most of it ends up in lap or on the floor but she really loves the experience. It's actually pretty adorable, if she is sitting in that chair eating we also have to be eating or she gets upset. Apparently she doesn't like to eat alone.

I'm still a little bit nervous about the whole thing with baby led weaning but I love the idea that she gets to figure out food on her own.

Thanks!

Fit Life - Barre3 Challenege

Today marks the first day of the Barre3 Challenge. I'm excited to get going! What is the Barre3 Challenge you ask? I'm going to be doing 4 barre classes per week, doing an additional 10 minutes workout at home and making the weekly barre3 recipe.

I even WON this barre3 challenge kit. I never win anything!

I've been doing Barre3 for a few months now. I started with just once per week, then twice, and now I'm doing 3 or 4 times per week. It's kind of crazy, I've never found a workout I've actually really liked. I had 2 weeks off, one because Ryley was sick and the other because of being in Ohio, and I couldn't WAIT to get back to class. I felt so right with the world after I did class on Monday.

If you've never tried barre classes I highly recommend them. It's yoga, pilates and a bit of ballet. It's a great strength workout including awesome core work and making this butt look good! ;)

One of my goals for this year is to lose the rest of my baby weight and these classes are SO going to help :)

What are you doing this year to get in shape?

My Life - Happy New Year!

2014 has been pretty amazing. Just to name a few of the incredible things that happened this year:

• We enjoyed a long weekend in Santa Barbara to celebrate our babymoon and our anniversary
• Our little girl was born!
• Lots of family came to visit to see our baby girl
• We went to Ohio to celebrate Christmas with family

Each year of my life seems to get better and better. But getting old is weird! I'm going to be turning 30 here in less than 6 months. I can't believe it! I still often feel too young to be married yet alone have a child :)

I'm beyond excited for the next year and the years beyond. Watching Ryley grow up is going to be pretty amazing, just the past 6 months has been amazing. Here are some of Ryley's accomplishments in 2014:

• She slept through the night for the first time at 6 weeks from 10 pm - 7 am
• She rolled over for the first time at a play date at 3.5 months
• She began sitting up at 5.5 months 
• She took swim lessons and LOVED it
• We took our first flight to Ohio for the holidays

It's been a blast being a mom. This next year is going to bring with it some pretty amazing things. We are going to start gym class soon, sign language and get to celebrate Ryley's 1st birthday! We have lots of vacations planned as well; we are going to Arizona in June, Seattle in August, and Ohio again for Thanksgiving. 

2015 is the year of health for Matt and I. We've been learning more and more about clean eating. We aren't going crazy and changing everything right now but we are learning to make better choices. I've been getting into my barre classes so working out has finally become FUN!

What are you looking forward to in 2015?

Friend Life - Friendsgiving

Matt and I LOVE hosting events at our place. Usually we go over board and make way too much food. We've been working to get better at that in the past few years so this year for Friendsgiving we did Potluck style! Sadly I forgot to take a picture :(

There was so much great food. Matt and I did a little competition to see who would make the best turkey. I did a traditional one - no brining but with herb butter and shallots. Matt used our infared fryer and beer can turkey. In the end we really couldn't decide who's was better, so we are both awesome :)

We love getting together and enjoying good food and drink with friends. I wish we could actually fit more at our house :) We tend to have a few parties a year but the best ones always stem around some sort of dinner party.

On actual Thanksgiving Matt and I enjoyed taking Ryley to Turkey Trot. We did it last year and thought we'd make it a tradition. Our plan is actually to do it every year, wherever we live. Next year we may be spending Thanksgiving in Ohio so we'll have to see if there is a Turkey Trot near there.

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving!!

Baby Life - 4 Months

I love the 4 month age, Ryley is SO fun. She smiles a lot, except when I'm taking pictures, giggles, "talks" and plays games. It's awesome! She's becoming so much aware of the world around her and enjoys being outside to investigate the world.

There is a thing called "4 month sleep regression" which I guess is the downside of this age. Ryley hasn't gone super crazy in this regression but has done a bit. She used to sleep totally through the night but recently has started waking once or twice a night. Sometimes just crying out for a couple minutes and other times wanting to feed. And my "mommy ears" have really turned on because I hear her crying even before I ever hear her on the monitor (guess I don't need that guy anymore).

Adorable!

I still feel lucky though because I'm in a Facebook group and people are talking about the troubles they are going through. There is this thing called Wonder Weeks and I guess around 4 months is called Leap 4. It's a great developmental stage - and you can see it. It's awesome. The way she looks around, taking in everything, it is truly amazing to watch. All that "learning" she is doing during the day is what affects her sleep. She started rolling over so that has definitely affected her falling asleep; when she rolls over she starts crying and hasn't learned to roll back over to her back. But she LOVES sleeping on her belly once she's actually asleep.

The past two nights we are back to sleeping full nights and I'm SO thankful! Even if she isn't making me get up to comfort her I still struggle getting back to sleep. You'd think since I don't even get out of bed it wouldn't affect me much in the morning but I can feel a huge difference when I get the full 8 hours uninterrupted. It's truly wonderful. We are almost done with this "regression" so hopefully her sleeping habits continue. Next up - teething...we'll see how that one goes!

Thanks!

Sorority Life - Initiation

The thing that makes each sorority different from the next is our ritual. It's the secrets that bind us together. Sadly in this day and age you can find lots of things online about the ritual of various sororities; it makes me sad that people put this information out there.

Anyways....the chapter I'm advising has Initiation this weekend. This is when our new members, we call them Alphas, become sisters, we call them Deltas. (As a note: when you graduate you become a Pi, so Alpha Delta Pi). It's a few days of just sisterhood. It's a time to go deeper in your relationships with your sisters and bring our new members into the sisterhood. It's all very exciting!

My initiation was May 2005...wow I can't believe it was almost 10 years ago! I'll be honest, I don't remember a ton about my own initiation. As a new member you aren't sure what the course of events are going to be and it goes by quickly. But as a Delta it is so awesome being a part of bringing the new members into our sisterhood. I always loved bringing my little Diamond Sisters through initiation. Bringing more women into our sisterhood and sharing everything that I love about my sorority was an exciting thing for me.

Ashlei and I hanging out on our bench! No other sorority has a landmark on campus :)

At my school on Blue and White Day we had a small ceremony at the Philomathian bench on our campus. The Philomathian Society was at ASU long ago and gave this bench to Alpha Delta Pi. We were installed on October 14th, 1950 and the second oldest chapter at ASU. It's amazing to see how long we've been on campus. I feel old but I love seeing the pictures and hearing the stories of how my chapter is doing. I also love being an advisor to this other chapter. It all brings me back to the many initiations I was a part of. Sharing our secrets with our new members to continue the legacy of our sisterhood.

Pi Love!