Happy marriage, Allison and Kyle!

On June 23, we celebrated the marriage of our friends, Kyle and Allison. Taylor played matchmaker for them, so we were especially excited to attend their wedding.

We travelled to Dallas the Friday before the wedding, so Taylor could meet with some folks at Redeemer Seminary in Dallas. On Saturday morning, we stopped by Taylor's grandmother's house to introduce her to Emilia, then headed over to Ft. Worth for the wedding. Taylor's cousin, Bethany, who lives about thirty minutes away from Ft. Worth, drove in to watch Emmers for us. Sweet baby girl has definitely been going through separation anxiety, so I don't think it was an easy time for poor Bethany! Thankfully the reception was being held only a half mile from our hotel, so when Emilia wouldn't take a bottle from Bethany, Taylor and I were able to swing by the hotel so I could feed E before the reception.

E eating squash in our hotel room in Dallas

Reading books with Dadoo in the hotel room

Gigi meeting Emilia!

Mrs. McAllister (Amanda's mom) meeting Emilia!

Taylor and I somehow didn't take any pictures together at the wedding,

but I did take this picture with my sweet friend Lauren from Vandy,

who assisted us in the matchmaking venture.

Yay! The Beach!

I love love love the beach! Taylor, well, loves me. And he loves seeing my family. And my family loves the beach!

When we arrived at the beach, we were so worn out from the drive that we didn't tell anyone we were there (we were staying in a condo just a few down from my parents' with Catie, Matt, and the munchies, who weren't due to arrive for another hour or so). My mom was the first to sniff us out, and then Aunt Heather :).

Here's our trip in photos:

Cousin Timothy greeting Emmers and Aunt Heather.

We last saw my family in Birmingham in March.

Pop playing on the floor with E on Sunday morning.

Each morning we wandered down to my parents' condo

for breakfast and coffee.

Emilia's first time on the beach!

We didn't think to go until it was already almost her naptime,

so we didn't bother with a bathing suit and sunscreen.

(And yes, that's a Redeemer Seminary Austin T-shirt I'm wearing,

designed by my wonderful and talented husband.

Contact him if you want to purchase one for yourself!).

E and Aunt Catie heading to my parent's condo for lunch on Sunday.

Yay! The beach!

(Perhaps "Yay" is not exactly what Emmers is thinking here...)

Aunt G and Emmy G in matching patriotic swimwear.

Feeling the ocean for the first time...

And maybe the last!

Relaxing in the condo with Uncle Matt.

"This is much better than swimming in the ocean!"

Yay! The pool!

Aunt Heather and E

Aunt Catie showed up with four new outfits she made for E.

Here is one of my favorites that I couldn't resist putting on Emmy,

even though it is still a little big on her.

See the criss-cross back and the cutie drawers that go with it?

And here are some cutie boys in T-shirts Catie made for them

(she makes all of their clothes!)

Playing on the floor with Uncle Coco

Yup! Another precious, beach-appropriate outfit from Aunt Catie!

And it gets better - Emmers matches her munchie cousins!

A highlight of the trip was getting to see one of my dear friends

from high school, Rachel. Her family vacation providentially overlapped

with ours, and they were staying only 20-30 minutes away, so she,

her husband, her sister and her sister's husband drove over one morning

to meet Emilia! Rachel and I were on the dance team together and almost

went to Ole Miss together (she actually went). She lived in Charlotte post-college,

when Taylor and I were in Davidson, NC, just 20 miles north of Charlotte.

She is still in there, though so we don't get to see her much :(.

I love this girl!

Emilia, looking super-girly while she plays with a munchie truck.

Since Emmers wasn't totally into the beach, I quit bothering

with bathing suits and just tried to get her to stay happy as long as possible

so I could enjoy the beach as much as possible.

All dressed up for family picture night on the beach!

"Cheese!"

All the kids and grandkids, minus my brother Blake.

Matt, Timothy, Catie, John David, Gracie, Emilia, me, Taylor, Heather, and Cody.

Patriarch Pop and matriarch Cappy included.

Mommy and baby.

Family photo.

Emmers, being such a good sport for all the photos.

This is a new smile E has started doing in the past few weeks.

I love it! It looks to me like a fake smile John David does when he

is trying to make someone laugh.

The munchie cousins weren't too sure about joining E

on the damp sand for the photo shoot.

Squatting down was about as far as they wanted to go.

Until we bribed them with fruit snacks, that is :).

Our last morning, E woke up super-early after a terrible night's sleep

(*see below), so she and I went down to the beach while it was still

nice and cool. I almost called my mom to come join us,

but then I decided not to, in case she was still sleeping.

Two minutes after we got there, she wandered down on her own!

You may have noticed by now that my mom doesn't appear in any pictures

with E; unfortunately she had poison ivy all over her arms from gardening,

so I wouldn't let her hold her! She did hang out with her a lot, though.

Did you notice the third cute dress, compliments of Aunt Catie?

On Friday, we made a last minute decision to leave at 1 pm instead of 5 pm,

so Heather and my mom watched Emmers while Taylor and I packed.

Then everyone came over to our place to say goodbye.

Here is John David holding E one last time.

And here is John David deciding he was done holding her.

Thankfully, Catie was there to catch her :).

Emmers fell asleep ten minutes after we got on the road,

and she actually took a decent nap this time. We drove all the way to

Taylor's parents house in Houston, arriving at 11 pm.

Thankfully, it only rained for about an hour and a half on this leg.

*What these pictures don't show, unless you look very closely (and unless you know Emilia very well), is that Emilia was not feeling herself all week. She had a fever off and on, one night as high as 101, and she didn't nurse well, eat solids well, or sleep well during naps or at night. The poor sleep could be attributed to sharing a room with us, since whenever she woke up in the middle of the night, she could look right at me... With all the other factors, though, I think it was more than that. A second tooth popped out ("Second?" you say. Yes, second. Sorry I didn't post about the first!) in the middle of the week, so I figured we could chalk it all up to teething, but then the tooth disappeared a few days later (another Epstein pearl?). My mom and sister began to wonder if it could be an ear infection. Our last night there was the worst night of sleep Emilia has had since the two nights before we started sleep training (she was in and out of our bed all night), which was part of the impetus for our deciding to leave at 1 pm instead of 5 pm. We were actually able to make it back to Austin by 11 am the next morning (a Saturday) to see the doctor. He checked her ears and throat and even took blood but couldn't find anything wrong. He said there was a good chance she had some small virus earlier in the week. My sister said her boys did something similar when they drove to Iowa last summer, and her doctor diagnosed them with being "overtired and over-traveled."

We leave tomorrow for Colorado for a week. Here's to hoping that we don't end up with an "overtired and over-traveled" baby again!

Driving, driving...

Taylor, Emilia and I drove to Panama City Beach, Florida in early June to meet my family for a vacation. It was a long drive. In the rain. Like, pouring cats and dogs, drive 20 miles an hour with your hazard lights on, blinding rain.

Here are highlights from the drive:

We left Austin around the time of Emilia's first nap, about 8.45 am.

She fell asleep pretty quickly (see her reflection in the mirror?), which

was unfortunate, since we had about a half hour of stoplights to get through

before open highway. Of course, she woke up when we stopped at the very

last light and thought her nap was over (she'd only slept twenty minutes).

But she was happy to play at Mimi and Dee's. She took her afternoon

nap there and otherwise loved playing with everybody, especially...

Cousin Elizabeth!

And I loved getting to see my sweet niece.

She's ready to take off!

(Thankfully, she hasn't yet)

Doting grandparents, Mimi and Dee

Playtime on the floor with Dadoo

Taking a bath in the kitchen sink!

Into her jammies and back into the car to continue the drive.

Departure time from Houston: 6.43 pm.

After sporadic sleep for Emmers and some misadventures on the road

(which included inexplicably coming to a dead stop on the highway for over

ten minutes at 10.30 pm and finding out that all the hotels in and around

Baton Rouge were booked), we made one last stop to pee and feed E before

checking in to a Homewood Suites in Slidell, Louisiana around 12.30 am.

This picture of E was taken at exactly midnight.

Playing in the suite early on Saturday morning while

Taylor rested up to hit the road again.

Fifteen minutes after we got on the road, it started raining...

But Emmers was a happy girl,

come rain or more rain.

Still raining. These pictures don't do justice to just how much rain there was.

I had hoped the rain would help Emilia sleep better in the car,

but none of her naps were very long. I tried to keep her entertained

by piling all her toys in her lap at once.

Detouring through downtown Mobile,

hours before it flooded...

Stopping to eat our bagged lunches at a gas station outside of Mobile.

We heard some crazy-thick Southern accents - I'm talking, twang, y'all - and I

explained to Emilia that her mommy was from that state.

Yup. Still raining...

And still awake...

We pulled up to our condo just before 3 pm. In the rain. Thankfully, it only rained once or twice for the rest of the week - we had beautiful beach weather! Beach post coming soon.