People say the darndest things...

All of you who have children probably are used to the random comments strangers make on a regular basis... However, I'm still getting used to it. Here are a few of the highlights from several recent "conversations" I've had with people I don't know.

1. As I was loading Hannah into the car in the Target parking lot today, a gentleman walking by muttered," Enjoy them while they are that age, they are terrible when they are 4". Apparently, the man did not have a good experience with a 4-year-old, and unless he was talking about his grandchild, it has not been a recent experience. The man, who was not exactly a spring-chicken, did not even slow down his pace in order for me to respond. This worked out because in this type of situation I never know how to respond anyway. I mean, what do you say to that?

2. Yesterday, at the Riverwalk, a lovely man and his wife stopped to say hello to our dogs and as soon as Lilly was done licking and jumping on him, he turned his attention to Hannah who was, might I add, looking very cute in her stroller and striped hoody. After commenting on her cuteness and saying hello to her in a voice that was several octaves above the norm, he looked at me and said "She looks like she's what... 12 pounds." Although I was quite impressed by his correct guess, I was also perplexed as to why he felt the need to guess her weight. I mean, are we at the fair playing one of those games where you guess some one's age or weight? I had no overly large stuffed animal to hand him for the correct guess.

3. A week or two ago a nice lady was admiring Hannah and she said "He is so cute" to which I responded "thanks" and then she said "He is so small, how old is he?". Granted, this was my opportunity to correct the lady and let her know that SHE was 2 months, but for some reason I am always embarrassed in this type of situation. Why? I have no idea! Frankly if the nice lady had been looking at "him" long enough to notice that "he" was cute, she would have also noticed that "he" was wearing a shirt that said CUPCAKE on it with pink and red letters accompanying pants that had red hearts on them. Not quite a manly outfit.

The Many Faces of Hannah Mae Lyle

Our Valentine's Treat!

I finally downloaded some pics from the past 2 weeks. We had a great Valentine's Day weekend! On Friday night, Todd surprised me by getting his parents to babysit Hannah and we went out to a nice dinner. Apparently, a lot of other people had the same idea of going out on the 13th because the restaurants were packed. We had a great time!

On Saturday (Valentine's) we babysat our good friends kids so they could have a night to themselves. They came over to our house and we made homemade pizzas and watched a movie. IT was a lot of fun but Todd and I were pooped afterwards!

Savin' the big bucks

So lately I've gotten into couponing. Something I never thought I would really "get into" because it combines two things I normally hate doing: Math and Grocery Shopping. Anyway, with the help of a couple of great friends I am starting to learn how to save a lot of money by shopping on certain days of the week, using certain coupons and going to certain stores. It's actually an art form. So on Monday, I went to CVS and Publix. I spent about $70 total and saved about $33. So I'm almost at 50% off of my grocery bill. If you think this is good, you should talk to some of my friends who are so good at it that they basically make money by grocery shopping! It's amazing. If you are interested in trying it out and you are in the southeast, go to the website: www.southernsavers.com. It's a great way to start out.

In other news in the Lyle household, Hannah has started "napping". I'm trying to get us both on a schedule but it's been a little tougher than I thought because some days she will want to eat every 2 1/2 hours and somedays it's 3 or 3 1/2. Let me know if you have any pointers. The good news is that she is napping right now and she went down with only 1 minute of fussing! It's amazing how much I can get done when she is in her crib asleep.

I'll post more pictures soon!

2 Month Check-up

Hannah had her 2 month check-up on Thursday. She "passed" with flying colors of course. She is now over 23 inches long, which puts her in the 97th percentile of height, and 11 lbs, 4 ozs, which is the 69th percentile of weight. She got her shots, which was painful for us all!

Hannah's First Word!

I know, I know, most babies Hannah's age don't start talking for quite awhile... but my very smart daughter said her first word yesterday. That's right... she's a talkin'!

So what was her first word? GOO. Yup, it was "goo". For those of you who may be thinking this is not a word... you are wrong. I looked it up on dictionary.com.

goo   [goo] Show IPA Pronunciation
–noun Informal.
1. a thick or sticky substance: Wash that goo off your hands.
2. maudlin sentimentality.
Origin:
1910–15, Americanism; perh. short for burgoo

HA! Hannah is a genius! I'm calling Oprah!

8 Weeks Old!

So today Hannah is 8 weeks old! In some ways I think it's incredible that it's already been 8 weeks, and in other ways I can't remember what it was like before her. We are slowly working into a routine in the house. Hannah is pretty good most of the day and is now sleeping in the nursery at night. She likes her bouncy seat and sometimes likes her swing. She also loves to be on her back, especially on the changing table. This works as great leverage when I want Todd to change her diaper because he'll do anything to see her smile:)

A couple of other things I have come to realize in the past 8 weeks:
- Children's books and most nursery rhymes do not make sense and rarely have a plot. Take "Goodnight Moon" for example. Great book, but really, where's the suspense? I mean, how exciting is it to just say Goodnight to everything?
- Apparently at 8 weeks, babies do not know how to hold a paci in their mouth. This is especially evident at about midnight when I am again walking to the nursery because Hannah's paci has dropped out of her mouth thus waking her.
- Somehow the day passes by very quickly but nothing seems to be done. I find myself sitting on the couch feeding Hannah at 5pm and realize that it is about to be dark and I am still in PJ's and haven't even had breakfast yet. OK, I'm exaggerating, but it does go by fast sometimes.
- Poop can appear anywhere. I won't exaggerate on this one.
- I love my child very very very much!