Welcome back to Kylanet!
Can you tell we've been a bit swamped this summer? Now just as Rachel's schedule lightens up a bit Dan starts a new job! The nice thing about a new job is that there isn't a big backlog of things to do (usually...) but the tough part is learning the job and hoping that your new boss doesn't decide he/she made a mistake!! :)
I'm sure Dan will do a great job, so no worries here...
Anyway, back to the cute subject at hand.
In her three months of life, Kyla has now been to 6 states! (we crossed briefly into ND) And on this tour she met a bunch of Rachel folk including great aunts and uncles (wow, Brian, you are a *great* uncle!!), a great-grandma, and a slew of cousins.
We started our trip in Colorado where Dan's friend Dave got married. It was a gorgeous wedding held at the Rockygrass site in Lyons.
Congrats Dave and Veronica!!
Unfortunately we didn't take enough pictures with our own camera so don't have photo documentation, but Kyla hung out with a few Dan friends including her old pal Ethan who she of course remembered from her first week of life.
While in Colorado, she stayed overnight with Uncle Mark and Aunt Julie and met cousins Kristin, and Jeff and Maki (including Julianne and Sato, who are Kyla's second cousins!). Too bad we didn't have our camera at Jeff's as Julianne was a being a very cute and gracious host!
Here is Kyla with Uncle Mark: (more pics with Julie and Kristin to come after they send them to us...)
Before I forget, a notable part of this trip was that Dan flew to Colorado ahead of Kyla and I since he was in the wedding party and wanted to participate in the bachelor party madness. (I had to stay home and give a final exam!) I was a bit nervous about juggling this small child and her things on my own, but it went reasonably well. My generous neighbor Angela drove us to the airport and helped me get checked in. However the challenge ended up being security... I had the fantasy that perhaps they would let me take my bottles of nursery water with me, but no, it could have been "terrorist water" (it has fluoride in it, you know) so I had to dump it out in the trash can. That doesn't sound so bad except that the trash can was about 20 feet away and I had Kyla in the stroller on the other side of me and my bags had already been sent through the x-ray machine. Needless to say, I was feeling a bit spread out and wondered which item I would lose! Luckily it was not busy that day and the security folks were fairly helpful. They suggested I mix up one of the bottles which would then allow me to take it through. (one enfamil powder has been added the water immediately becomes much less of a threat...) They also helped me fold up the stroller and get it on the conveyor belt. Apparently the only thing you can walk through with is the baby herself. Good thing she doesn't wear shoes yet...
While I'm thinking of it, another interesting security experience was during our trip from Colorado to Minnesota (which occured not exactly on schedule, but I won't go into the reasons... :0) when they made us go through the puff of air thing. Yes, I had to stand inside the "box" holding Kyla! The puffs of air make me jump, but she must have been just sleepy enough (and had me holding her tight) that she didn't really mind. But really... do babies have to go through that?? Maybe we could have been allowed to hand her around or something.
Okay, anyway, back to the more interesting part... pictures!
As I just mentioned, we went from Colorado to Minnesota and drove up to Grand Forks to visit grandma.
Here is Kyla with her great grandma:
Napping with cousin Michelle:
Snuggling with cousin Kay:
She also got hugs from Yvonne and Jim and met her great, great aunt Madge (Kay's mom!).
While in northern MN, we took a side trip to Bemidji where it is a requirement to take pictures with Paul Bunyon and Babe the Blue Ox (apparently they were thinking of taking these figures down but there was too much protest, so they stay! who wouldn't love a large blue ox...)
No, Dan is not actually trying to feed Kyla to Babe....
Can you find Kyla in this next photo??
We took a nice walk around Bemidji lake enjoying the cool weather (after leaving the San Diego heat wave behind):
Before leaving the state we spent a day in Minneapolis with Uncle Brian (oops, excuse me, great-uncle Brian) and Aunt Laurel, Ben and Sam. I could tell that it had been way too long since I've visited these cousins since Ben is probably three or four feet taller than the last time I saw him! Guess it just goes to show that people should come visit us in San Diego more often...
Turns out some grad school friends live right down the road from Brian so we were fortunate enough to visit with Amy, Steve, Shellie and Mike. Amy and Steve's adorable daughters were off somewhere playing princess. Shellie and Mike's little girl Claire joined us for the picture and, of course, their newest munchkin has yet to emerge from mommy's tummy (although at the time of this visit Shellie was two weeks from her due date and that was a week and a half ago... any news Shellie??).
The Minnesota weather was good because Kyla got a chance to wear some of her warm weather clothes just in time before she outgrows them! (it's all about fashion, even at three months...)
The thoughtful girl, featured in a "halo" thanks to iPhoto:
And I should add that she deserves that halo because this weekend she slept through the night for the first time! woo hoo! We woke up and "did you get up and feed her?" "no, did you?" and then immediately went in to see if she was okay...
Perhaps this is another growth spurt because now she has napped long enough for me to write this very long post!!
When awake she is quite busy so she makes up for it. :)
