This Is Just Starting to Get Good...

...Forget about the days of yore when my child was nothing more than a lump of flesh and bones. I can barely recall when she would allow me to carry her around like a sack of potatoes instead of a wriggling fish. These days, Alessandra Mae is full of life!!! She is such a joy to be with. Well, rather than read my droning on, see for yourself!

Let me preface the following photo montage with the fact that Ali recognizes a camera when she sees one! The minute mommy, daddy, or anybody else holds one up she hams it up right on cue. As you are about to see, she is quite the poser. What a cheeseball! Wonder where she would have gotten that trait from? Oh, wait...

First and foremost, Ricardo and I will need to be on the lookout for her flirtatious advances. We fully expected it toward some of her boyfriends like Keegan and Sawyer, but we did not expect it on such a holy day as Easter Sunday, right in the middle of Mass with a boy along the back wall! She continued to glance back at him and throw out that smile that will make your heart melt. Here she is in full force, planting one right on Sawyer Anondson:

Busted!!!


Sadly, when I look at all the pictures that I haven't posted yet to illustrate all of our new developments, I realize that these have all been taken so long ago suddenly! Alessandra is already 8 months old!

Here she tries "solid" food for the first time. Peas elicited perhaps the most hilarious expression I have seen on her face yet! If I could figure out how to upload the darn video camera onto this I would post it onto this site for your enjoyment. For now, a photo will have to suffice which doesn't nearly do the look that we witnessed justice. Apologies, as this happened nearly two months ago:


Easter Sunday at Grandma Jean's house...We still like dogs AND smiling! :)


As can be expected, Alessandra is now crawling and pulling up on things and pretty much just figuring out the world. In the meantime, mommy and daddy are scrambling to rid of all things dangerous or otherwise unfit for oral consumption. Childproofing, here we come!

Part of her exploratory nature has her always enjoying a good soak in the tub. A few weeks back we retired her "baby tub" that had us essentially spot washing her and introduced the bigger, better, and much more fun Duck Tub! Not only is he much more fun to look at, you can also give his beak a good squeeze and out comes the most hilarious quacking sound. Well, not that hilarious to us, but SUPER hilarious to Miss Ali Mae anyway, which is really all that matters. Here is one of my favorite photo sessions in awhile...Alessandra mid-bathtime fun, and I assure you this scenario is not unique. We have this much fun EVERY bath day! Both of her hands and arms splash, splash, SPLASH the water directly into her face and it still doesn't stop her! She just shuts her eyes and razzes her lips and keeps right on going. God I love her.



Whew! What a whirlwind couple of months! And now it is time for Ali to renounce her reign and hand her tiara/crown off to the newest Littlest Baby 2009. Any minute now we are expecting a call to celebrate the arrival of her newest cousin, Baby Collier. Yolanda is officially dilated and effaced (sound familiar, Constant Blog Reader?) and is feeling the contractions more and more steadily. Will we have a baby this weekend? She thinks so, and only time will tell! We are SO excited to see if Baby Collier is a boy or a girl and what special name Yolanda, Jeff and Gianna have picked out for him/her.

This is the last time we'll see this picture, as cute as it may be...It can only get cuter!


And what a great opportunity to segue into wishing some of my favorite people a very HAPPY BIRTHDAY!! Dad-to-be Jeff Collier is celebrating a birthday tomorrow, May 2nd.

AND MY BROTHER who is only a year younger than I will be celebrating his 29th tomorrow as well. Happy Birthday Mac!


And my NIECE! Happy 18th Katie!!

I love you all and hope you all have a GREAT day!!!

And that concludes another post. I am just about to upload some pictures from our trip to MEXICO onto our Snapfish site, so feel free to check those out and expect a post about our trip soon!

BIG hugs!

D, R, and A