The First Three Weeks

Get your party hat out because today is Taryn's 3 week birthday! The time has flown by and she is changing so much every day. Her little cheeks are getting plump and she makes all kinds of cute faces. My personal favorite is her 'O' face! She loves to stretch really big which makes me laugh because she's so little! Let's be honest, learning to take care of a newborn baby is HARD work. We had no idea what to expect but we've been taking it one day at a time and learning so much about Taryn. My favorite times of the day are the mornings when she's so alert and curious. Her eyes dart all around as though she's trying to figure it all out. It must be complete shock for her to have gone from my dark, cozy belly to the real world with so many new sights and sounds.

We've had so many 'firsts' over the past three weeks so let's see if I can remember the highlights.

Taryn's first big girl bath went a lot better than we expected. I know, the crying face makes it seem like it was horrible but she only cried at the beginning. I think she actually likes the feeling of the warm water on her skin. We haven't quite figured out how to style her hair and usually after an hour it ends up sticking straight up. Do they make baby hair gel? I keep thinking I can see a few curls when it's wet but once it dries it's pretty straight.

We took advantage of the nice fall weather before it gets cold to try out the stroller. I'm sure the neighbors would have laughed if they saw us stopping every few feet along the way to take pictures. Our neighborhood has a great park with a walking trail around it so I'm hoping the weather continues to stay nice so we can venture out for afternoon walks more often

Our friend, Melissa, came over two weeks ago to take Taryn's first photoshoot. Melissa has her own photography business http://www.melissadarst.com/. I did some baking for her daughter's 1st birthday over the summer in exchange for a session. It was fun for all of us to be in the photos and despite a few little outbursts Taryn did really well. We tried to take more photos a few days later in her tutu from Meme but she didn't think she wanted to take photos that day. So stay tuned for tutu photos in the future!

We also got to take our first mini vacation when Evan came down with strep throat:(. The doctor said he would be contagious for 3 days and we couldn't take the chance of Taryn or I catching it so we packed up the car and headed to my parents, Meme and Gramps. I called them nearly in tears because I was so afraid of Taryn getting sick but at the same time I didn't want to leave home. They took such good care of us and we loved spending a few days at their house. Taryn and Meme had late night hang-outs so I could get some rest and then she got to snuggle in bed with Gramps in the morning! Thank you SOOO much for taking in your girls with no warning. Looking back I'm really glad we didn't risk staying home and being around Evan's germs. But he's all better now!!

And lastly, what I might consider our first failure was a trip to the mall. I'll spare you the details but we didn't intend for the first diaper blowout to take place inside JCPenny! I was a frazzled mess so this outing lasted about 10 minutes and we all returned home without shopping bags. We'll have to practice getting out the house a little more in the upcoming weeks so we'll be ready for serious shopping with Aunt Tiff and Cookie!