Mylee w/ Mr. Bear at 1-Month

Another little tradition we have at the girls monthly birthdays during their first year is taking a picture next to their giant bear from Uncle Alan. It just shows us how they've grown and seriously how fast it is. We also weigh them in and measure how long they are. Mylee weighs in at 10 lbs. and is 21 inches long at her one month birthday. A few updates also as to what she's been doing the 1st month of her life...pretty much just sleeping! We can't believe how much this little girl sleeps! From the first day she came home she pretty much was sleeping at least 4-6 hours and now it's really consistent that we can get 6-7 hours a night. It's been wonderful! That's really it for now.

Here's Daddy bringing down Mr. Pooh bear from Mylee's room to take her photo. He's silly!

Mylee posing for her monthly photo. Smile!

Mylee's 1-month Celebration

We celebrated Mylee turning exactly 1-month old today. It's a big deal in the Vietnamese culture to do so with some traditions that I looked up below since I was curious as to why it's important to celebrate........Based on the Buddhist family, in the morning of the baby’s 30th day, sacrifices are offered to the gods so that the gods will care for the baby in his following life. Furthermore, in the morning of the baby’s 30th day, it is also the time to inform officially to all ancestors that the new member of the family so they will protect the newborn baby. On that day, several relatives and closed friends of parents are invited to have a small party. The purpose of the party is the chance for relatives and friends have a look at the newborn, pray for him/her a good life and give the newborn baby gifts. These are mostly old superstitions but we still carried some of it through to take this time to celebrate with the family.

Here's Mylee with her special Lilikoi pies that I made her. These are the same pies that I made for her Big Sis Makayla too during her 1-month celebration. We also tried to take the exact same photo as we did for Makayla with her pies while sitting in her Papasan.

Big Sis Makayla just loves to hold her Baby Sister!

Mylee sleeping so soundly but cuddling with her new so soft toy from Auntie Som & Alan. They also got her a cute little book too!

Ba Ngoai holding Baby Mylee and giving her some TLC!

Mylee's Birth Announcement

We finally got Mylee's birth announcement out in the mail to all our friends and family after a month of her being delivered. Not so bad right? Isn't it cute? There are some of the photos from her newborn portraits. We're so happy with them! We hope you all enjoy our new little bundle of joy! She's just so precious and soooo cute and we're having so much fun!

Makayla's Playdate at school

We have a play date at Makayla's new school, so that she gets familiar with the kids & teachers and just school period. We are really excited that they offered this since we weren't sure how she was going to be......

She put on her Daddy's really old Tour de France hat that Grandpa just dug up. Great timing since the tour just started and Ry's really into watching it since he was really into cycling himself years and years ago.

Here's Makayla in front of the gates to her potential new school. We're still on the waiting list for a fall am class so keep your fingers crossed for us! I still can't believe that they need to start school this early, she's just 2 1/2 so we'll see if she's really ready.....She knew her school from walking with Grandma over to check it out and seemed very excited!

Look who else is here? Her buddy Jordan, these two girls seem to be doing so much together lately! I'm glad she has a close friend that also lives in our neighborhood. They are both very lucky since they both have wonderful Grandmother's that watch them! I think the Grandma's are becoming good friends too and lots to talk about!

Festival of Folktails

Grandma Arakaki goes to the library all the time and she told us about this fun event they were having for the kids to kick off their summer reading program so we all went to check it out. We couldn't believe how crowded it was. They had a bunch of neat games and events for all the kids. Grandma had bought some advance tickets for Makayla to play games and things and good thing she did so we didn't have to stand in those long lines. They had bean bag tossing, pick a lollypop, plinko, toss a fake pancake and many more.

Makayla making a necklace out of Fruit Loop cereal. It took too long and she kind of lost interest so we took it home to finish up......

Next she wanted to get her face painted, she really loves getting this done since she's gotten so much experience from all her birthday parties that she attends. Seems to be a popular thing for the kids. Her artist was so sweet to take a picture with her and her beautiful butterfly on her cheek.

She's now treasure hunting...she got a sticky bug toy? Icks!
After this we went to check out what the Summer Reading Program was all about....I thought she was too young to enroll but they said we could read to her and come back each week to get credit. Since Makayla goes to Storytime almost every Tuesday we thought why not. It's never too early to learn about the library, reading books, checking them out and taking care of them. Sounds like a good program, we'll see what happens......

Her friend Mia joined us and they had so much fun together. Mia showed up a little later so Makayla had already done a lot so she did them again with Mia. Even got the other side of her face painted along with Mia. They got cute flowers on the other cheek. Mia's mommy, Tara brought her along with her new baby brother Logan. After we were done at the festival we headed over to the McDonalds by Seacliff shopping center for lunch. Tara said they have a fun play zone for the kids and sure enough, the girls ate their lunch and went to play some more and had a blast!

More Pool Time

After Makayla's 1st swim lesson on Friday we decided to take her out to the pool again over the weekend to practice blowing those bubbles and just to get more and more acquainted with the pool & swimming. She did such a good job for her Daddy. The summer has been so nice so being around the pool is just great. I take Mylee out there also and we just all hang out and get some rays!

Makayla's 1st Swim Lessons

Makayla started her private swim lessons today at our neighborhood pool with Miss. Brianna. Miss. Brianna is her teacher at My Gym so she's really familiar with her. She does this for the summer and makes it so convenient by coming to our pool. Makayla loves the water but we really want her to be super comfortable and safe when in the pool or by one, so we're hoping that the lessons will get her to a position where she can swim to the side and get out of the pool safely in case of an emergency. Already on the 1st day she was picking up rings and surfing on her body board with Brianna. We'll see how she progresses. Hopefully she'll get to go under water without it being a big deal too. She also learned how to blow bubbles which is how they breath under water. Pretty neat what we're learning along with all this too. We'll keep you posted on her lessons and how she's progressing.....

Mylee's Newborn Portraits

We had Mylee's professional newborn portraits taken today. She's about 2 1/2 weeks old now. We scheduled this before she was even born when I had my pregnancy photos done. We for sure thought Mylee was going to be asleep for the whole session because that's what she does best but we were lucky and got a few shots with her eyes open! Can't wait to see how they all turn out! They're going to all be so cute and so hard to narrow down what we're going to buy. Megan our photographer was just great with her and with our little Miss. Makayla also. Got some cute shots of the two girls together too! Come back later to see a few of the images once we get them.

Daddy's Day!

Happy Daddy's Day! This is Ryan's 3rd Dad's day, but it's extra special this year because he now has 2 little girls to celebrate it with him!

The morning of....he wakes up and his M&M's have a card, gift & hugs for him. What a way to start off the day!

In the past 2 years Makayla has made her Daddy a customized t-shirt with her picture on it and he wears it all day long no matter what we do or where we go. This year we actually got both girls on his t-shirt even though Mylee is just a little over 2-weeks old. Daddy & his girls!

We celebrated Father's Day with all the Dad's in the family at a super nice brunch at Roy's in Anaheim. They did a fantastic job for us! Binh & Janai even made it down from Hanford after visiting her Dad for their Father's Day. Our family is so big now! We're so happy that we can all get together for all these special occasions.

We have another gift for Daddy that we gave to him at brunch, but he only peeked in and wouldn't open it all the way because he saw and knew what it was right away. The only reason we gave it to him at the restaurant was because Janai brought it. It's the Wii Fit! It's so hard to find and Ry was so silly and didn't want anyone else to see it since it's so hard to get a hold of. Thanks to wonderful Janai for picking it up for us. She waited in line at Toys R' Us for 2 hours for it. She sure does love Ry for doing that!

Here he is trying it out right after brunch. I guess it was a big brunch and it's time to work it off! For those of you who don't know what the Wii Fit is, it's a video game system but you actually use your whole body and it's supposedly a work out. We'll see....

Mylee's 1st Pediatrician Visit

It's Mylee's 2-week check up and first visit to her pediatrician, Dr. Harrison. We know his office well since he's also Makayla's pediatrician. Everything still checked out and was all healthy with Mylee. She's still weighing in under her birth weight of 8lbs. She's 7lbs. 13 oz. and still at 20.5 inches long today. She's right in between 25th-50th percentile in weight and height.We didn't really have any questions for the doctor since we've been through all this before but it sure seems so much easier the 2nd time around. Or could it be that Mylee is a great sleeper. She's sleeping anywhere between 5-7 hours at a time. We're soooo lucky! Our next check up and first set of shots for Mylee are at 2-months. Not excited about that visit at all.

Mylee's Belly Button

You're probably wondering what the heck this picture is about. Well...it's been exactly 2-weeks since Mylee has been born and her umbilical cord stump fell off her belly button! We didn't use any alcohol to keep it dry like we did with Makayla since it's supposedly not recommended anymore for some reason. But either way it's off and now she's ready for the full bath and getting all wet. We've had to keep her belly button dry and had to fold down diapers so it's not in the way either. But Huggies newborns were great since they have the cut out for that area so no need for folding it down.

That's the stump cord on her blankie.

Aquarium of the Pacific

We've been wanting to go check out the Aquarium in Long Beach for awhile now so we took this opportunity while Ry is able to be home with us for a few weeks to do some family stuff. We went on a weekday and couldn't believe how crowded they were. I think a lot of the kids were on their field trips. Makayla just loves fishes and animals in general so she really enjoyed herself.

She went right up to the window to see the Sea Lion and he came right up to her. She was so thrilled!

She's gotten brave and is touching the water where the sting rays and some fishes are in. Mylee came with us also but she was pretty much snoozeroos the whole time. I think it's going to be like that for awhile.

Elmo Grows Up

Ryan got us tickets to see When Elmo Grows Up in Long Beach but it was way too close to my due date that I told him to take Alex & Alexis since she just loves Elmo too! Well, Alexis ended up getting sick so we couldn't let the tickets go to waste. I was feeling pretty good with the new baby so the whole family went to see Elmo together! It was lots of fun and I'm really glad I ended up going since I was kind of bummed that I might be missing a family excursion.

Here are my girls in their Elmo shirts before heading on the road.

Makayla is checking out her program and that's Mylee in our new pink & brown peanut shell sling. It is the best sling ever! Super easy to get her in and all snugly. She slept the entire show and I was also pretty comfy too.

Thanks Daddy for taking me to see Elmo! I loved it and had so much fun!

Makayla and Elmo, she took a picture in the same spot but was much younger when she saw him last year.

During intermission they brought out Elmo balloons. Of course every kid was going to want one. Can you see behind Makayla the sea of Elmos? I can't believe they were $8 each!

Here's a glimpse of most of the Sesame Street characters during the show. It was pretty entertaining with lots of music & dancing. Makayla had a blast!

Mylee's 1st Real Outting

It's been about 5 days since Mylee was born and today is our official first fun outing. We had a doctors appointment a few days ago but that doesn't count as a fun outing. We headed for the mall just to walk around and let Makayla ride the carousel. Plus Ry is home with us for the next 3 weeks too! Yippee! Then after the mall and lunch we headed over to Mommy's work at R&B to show off Mylee!

Check out my girls cool ride! It's Makayla's own little Segway. We just love how this works to get our girls all around. It's still so light and convenient! I'm not too sure about the double strollers quite yet. I really don't want one so will go this way until I absolutely have too. They just seem too big, bulky and heavy!

We're at Mommy's work and this is Barbara just snuggling with Mylee.

Next was Rita in line to hold the new baby. They were all so excited that we came to visit so soon! I'm sure we'll be visiting R&B lots since I'm sure I'll be missed and of course I'll miss all of them!

Mylee's Stork & Makayla's Star

Ryan got Mylee her stork for our front yard. He also remembered Big Sis Makayla and got her a star that said "Proud Big Sis". It was so cute and let everyone know that our baby finally arrived! It's super cute and we get to keep the stork bundle with Mylee's arrival information and Makayla's star. They take the stork back after about a week or so. Ryan surprised us with this when Makayla was born so of course he had to do it for Mylee too. We've been pretty good at keeping things pretty equal but it's going to be real tough to keep it up but we're going to try our hardest to do so!

Mylee & Mommy's Check Up

It's been a few days and we had to go back to the hospital for a check up at their clinic. They just want to make sure Mom & Mylee are both progressing nicely which we are. Everything checked out Aokay! Mylee lost a few ounces and weighs in at 7lbs 5.1 ounces but that's fairly normal with new babies. She's nursing fine too so the weight should go back up in the next few weeks. We see our pediatrician in a few weeks too so nothing to worry about at all. I'm healing nicely and feeling really good to get up and about quite a bit. I'm still walking a little slow but that's okay and expected. Again, I have to say this is much easier than a c-section for sure!

Our nurse was real nice but she kept on insisting that I come back to check out their breast feeding clinic which I so don't need. Done it before and was fine and I feel so much more comfortable from the beginning then I did with Makayla. All from experience!

Big Sis & Lil' Sis

We just wanted to share a couple of photos that were just too cute of new Big Sis Makayla and her Lil' Sis Mylee. Makayla has been such a good Big Sis! We're just so proud of her! The first couple of days were a little rough. She was a little naughty but then she came around and I think we just figured out how to deal with it also. And I think she knew that Mylee wasn't going anywhere and was really staying here with us. We just needed to give her equal or a little more attention then usual. Overall we couldn't ask for anything better! Love our M&M's!

Makayla so happy with showing off her new Lil' Sis!

Big kisses from Big Sis!

Mylee hanging out in her Papasan that was handed down from Makayla.

More Vistors...

Auntie Stace, Uncle Naters & Rachael came to visit Mylee today. They got her some new cute clothes to wear. Yay, so not everything will be my Big Sis's hand me downs! They came over while Makayla was still at the birthday party but they stayed long enough for her to come home. She was so excited to see them since she just loves to play with Rachael.

Gisella's 2nd Birthday

Makayla and all her birthday parties. It's Gisella's 2nd birthday party at Hullabaloo's Clubhouse in Anaheim today. We're excited about this place since we've heard about it since last year and haven't been able to check it out so this is just perfect! It's only been a couple of days since Mylee was born so Daddy took Makayla and Mommy stayed home with Mylee. They had a blast playing!

Here's Gisella and her pretty, pretty cake just blowing out her candles. It looks so nice! They had an Elmo theme.

Gisella the birthday girl and Makayla just waiting so patiently....wonder if it's pizza or cake they're waiting for? Thanks for the invite!