Car seats! Help!!

Cora: 2 weeks old & 9 months old...craaaazy.

So it's that time again that we need to start researching car seats...and I need your help!!

We have an infant carseat, that is great (chicco keyfit 30). We can use this gender neutral infant seat for the next babe. But little sweets is now 20lbs, and her little feet are touching the back seat. So I think we can start working towards a convertible seat? maybe a forward facing seat in the future? We have a truck and a jetta wagon. Neither of which have a ton of room in the back seat, but it's doable. For the infant seat we can only place it in the middle, with the passenger seat moved forward a bit. We are tall, so it's a little unfortunate. I should have bought the passat wagon umm 8 years ago....when I was a college student, not thinking about kids. But oh well.

I am mainly concerned about having a carseat that works well in the back of our Tundra -an upgraded truck we bought for kiddos instead of our Tacoma...yay!! suicide doors! fullseats! camping in the bed of the truck. ok. I'm excited. But more importantly I want our car seats we buy to work well. They aren't cheap either. So they must fit and be comfortable.

So any suggestions out there? What do you like? dislike? Do you happen to put yours in the back seat of a truck? Any input is super helpful!!

**update...we bought 2 of the safety first- alpha omega carseats at Costco, one for each vehicle. We love them. Affordable ($89 each) and Cora likes how upright they are. Win win.**

1st birthday plans.

first birthday party inspiration. thanks pinterest for being awesome.
1. carnival birthday party 2. pink straws 3. headband from etsy 4. simple, beautiful birthday party from lovely morning 5. all of my first birthday polka dot inspiration came from an awesome blog- just bella 6. sprinkled with love birthday party 7. cute onesie turned dress 8.  yarn balls for elephant party:inspired by this

 

oh, i love planning. big surprise. i know. but guess who is turning one in... well... 3 months?! crazy.  that means i have a birthday party to plan!! i'm so excited. the only thing that could make it more fun is if cora had tiny friends. she doesn't. so this will be a party for her, but full of grown-ups who love her. next year i'll try to do better, cora.

shhh... don't tell her but i have some ideas a-brewin....

theme: polka dots
color: turquoise (duh)
date: april 13th (she'll be 0.985647 years old actually, but she might not notice)

super fun. i hope you all come.

relaxing?

the stare-down. cora won.

Matt and I like to joke around about what our life used to be like. I have no idea what I did with all of my "free time"... I know, we were both in school and working... back then I felt as though we had no free time...and had little sleep...and had stress...and responsibilities. But come on, that's hilarious. We were kid free. If only we knew.

What would we have done differently? Oh, nothing. We planned on getting pregnant, it took us a year to do so. We wanted a baby more than anything and we thought we were ready. Laughable. Again. We hadn't a clue. We are happier than we have ever been, nothing in this world makes us smile so big or feel so much joy. It's cliche....vomit all you like, but it's true for us. But we still like to laugh/cry about the old days. The old days that we can hardly even remember.

Matt said the other day if we were to tell some kid-free friends about what it's like to have a kid...it would go like this...

"Oh, ....so do you like ...relaxing?" Oh, yeah... so... say goodbye to relaxing. There is no relaxing in parenthood. Always physically on the go chasing a little someone, and if not chasing then mentally exhausting chasing down all of your responsibilities over having a tiny life rely solely on you and your actions.

"And umm... do you care for sitting and watching a full TV show at any volume you choose?" Ha. Goodbye fancy sound system. See you in 15 years.

"How about....sleeping in?" Never again. When we sleep past 7:30am... we are lying there like...Fuck. Is she okay?! Do you think something happened? Should we go check on her? Maybe we let her sleep? Is she teething?... the never ending question on our minds.

Too funny.

*side note: we do you love you little cora... much much more than our pre-cora days. we will gladly add another little spud... or tater tot, however we still cringe when we see pictures from the first month of your life. Those days were trying, and we all made it. We will know what to expect for the next little member of our family, when we expect to be expecting*

nine months.

a very serious photo shoot. no smiles to be had.

9 months! You are turning into your very own human being. You're a little hodgepodge of your dad and I. You still blow us away...and it's sinking in more and more everyday that we are parents. It's glorious.

What you've been up to this past month...

• Lots of babbling! We don't know what you're trying to tell us, but you're working very hard at it. All sorts of sounds are coming out...loud and soft. We are hoping to hear a mama or dada...but so far we think we hear "hi" with a wave and "woo" for dogs.
• You do lots of walking, sometimes just with one hand for support, and some walking along the walls. Any day now we bet you'll be letting go...and probably running.
• You wave at people...and dogs. Its precious. Dogs enamour you and so do other little humans. We wish you had some little friends, but with time I suppose...perhaps even a sibling would be fun.
• You still don't sit still, its always a good time to explore in your world.
• You eat normal big girl foods... fruits, rice, meat, tortillas, milk. We are phasing out of the baby foods. Super fun. You don't like us to feed you any more however. So lots of finger foods...and lots of baths after eating.
• Sleeping is still great (thank you)...and no teeth as of yet.
• Your skinny little long body fits in 12-18 month big girl clothes, you took the leap. So much fun to shop in the girl section now. I can also put a hair tie in your hair to keep your whispie bangs out of your eyes. Oh girly things. Too exciting.
• You had your first christmas and new year. Some traditions were started in your little world, and it will only get better as the years pass.
• You had a major road trip to California...which you were incredible! Car time, hotels, more than your fair share of ins and outs of the carseat, oh yeah and a massive blow-out that took your dad, me, and some chucking of clothes to render clean. It was a fun trip that we will do again.
• You are our little sunshine, our little sweets. You make our world bright and wonderful. Our little nine month old cora elm, we love you.

Oh, 2013...

 

This is how we feel about life right now... couldn't be better. What's not to like? We are busy, loving the holidays... and taking full advantage of this sweet little person and her happy little world of childhood.

 

Hope you're all having some fantastic holidays and enjoying this new year. I will be back once the naptimes have less to-dos, and more for-funs.