"Happy New Year!"

Joey said this to me last night, gave me a kiss, and then said, "I'm not staying up 'til midnight." Apparently October 1st marks the beginning of a new fiscal year for Joey's job.

Lorelei and I have been busy. I've been painting almost every day, in little segments (have you ever tried to paint while tending a baby?). We've got just about our entire family room painted and are working on moving to other parts of the house. Now that we've got the logistics down better, we're hoping to have the rest of the house completed by the time that Joey's parents come down at the end of the month.

My dad and his wife are coming down to visit in a week. We're really excited about that. I'm a little disappointed that the house won't be completely finished by the time that they visit, but I'd rather be around family than have a perfect looking house. Getting ready for their visit is taking up the rest of my time quite nicely. This is compounded by the fact that Joey and I put most of the boxes with stuff we didn't want to deal with in the yellow room (it's not really yellow, but that's a story for another post). Since that room is currently our guest room, and our guests actually need somewhere to stay, it's become a very important project.

Lorelei is doing well. She's started with solids and has been enjoying the experience. She's now had rice cereal, bananas, and black beans, and is now working on green beans. We're not using the jarred baby food and are instead going with the advice of our pediatrician (but only after her mommy researched it online for awhile!). We have been mushing up foods that we eat and giving them to her for a few days. She's getting used to the idea that food can have texture.

Lorelei has also been standing more, and even working on being able to stand on her own. Just today she started not just having her legs stand up, but adding an arm to get better height... directly after which her mommy changed her play pen to not use the bassinet anymore.

Our little girl is growing up so fast. I'm told that I should be posting more pictures... well, if you all come look at the pictures, I'll try to be better about posting them, and I promise to get you some soon.