Love, Mum & Dad

dear Layla,

while your mom and you take a well deserved nap, i’ll fill you in on a few things that have been happening since my last letter

• your mum and i are engaged! after much discussion about what marriage means for us (totally romantic yeah?) we’ve decided to make it official. in short, when you become a parent it’s easy to let your relationship take second place when neither can outweigh the other. we see that being your parent’s we are committed to you, and to support each other in raising you, however we also wanted to commit to each other, publicly as well as personally, in front of all our friends and family. can’t wait to marry your mum! (you’ll also make a cute flowergirl)
• for the past 2 weeks you’d been sick and have barely touched your food. we’ve been trying our best to endorse eating with lots of ‘mmmss’ and ‘yummmms’, a powerful sales technique indeed. in the last couple of days, your appetite has returned with a vengeance and you’re using our tricks onus! ‘mmmm’ is now used for anything you wan’t to get your little piggy trotters on. if we don’t give something to you straight away, you try it louder – that usually works. [More]

dear Layla,

apologies for a big pause between letters, as you’ll see below we’re busy just keeping up with you!

last we talked, you were a crook little monkey, were still technically a baby and had finally accepted me as a close second to mum. since then (in rough chronological order):

• we celebrated your first birthday in spectacular fashion, the whole fam came in family dress fand you were spoiled rotten! fav pressies include your swing, ball pit & slide. least favourite present – the poppin fun elephant i got for you (the ad got me very excited).
• you started walking full time! after some sneaky little trips between the couch and various objects when you thought we weren’t looking, you just stood up and decided it was time to walk. by the end of the day you were walking the length of the house. now, you only bring out the crawl if you need some serious speed. this now means that most of our stuff needs to be placed higher up! this also makes you a toddler!
• you made your first painting! you really get into your work, with as much paint on you as there is on the paper. you are also partial for a bit of chalk drawing (and for eating the chalk)
• toys are now top of your priority list. each morning when you get up, it’s time to get your dolls together on the couch to share your morning bottle. if you’re in the car – you must have your stuffed dog. without it, well….you don’t want to know.
• you’ve got another little tooth up and are brushing regularly
• you’ve upgraded to cow’s milk! still having two formula bottles a day, but real milk is the clear winner. please remember to stop for a breath and try not to give yourself whiplash smashing it back!
• you have your first pets! two fish, glenn and dil who you feed every morning! (remember, you can’t give them your toasted sandwich)

it’s beautiful and amazing watching you grow and learn. things we take for granted everyday become big milestones.you seem to understand a fair bit of what we say, even if you can’t say it yourself. likewise, since discovering your pointing finger and saying something that sounds vaguely like that we’re able to understand alot of what you want. mostly this is your mum, something to eat, drink or for us to pick up something you’ve just dropped – and likely will again now you know we’ll get it!

you are talking non-stop now. usually you will just babble and give us a curious look as to why we don’t get what you’re talkin bout (willis), however you’ll pull out a new word every couple of days. some of your latest include:

• ottle (bottle)
• daddy
• dog (or og)
• dolly (also doo, dollll or olly will do)
• ishies (fish)
• lee
• moo (you love reading the farm animal book where we make the sounds)
• mummy (alternate with muma)
• uddle (cuddle)

i think we’ll have to start watching what we say with a little parrot around!

love  you always little l,

dad xx

dear Lalyla,

we’re spending the day together again, 4th in a row!

its not all good though, you’ve got a touch of conjuctivitis so your eyes are pussy and when you fall asleep, tend to seal over with gunk. you had your first visit to the optometrist on sunday who said you have great eyes (eye gunk excluded).

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dear Layla,

mum said i couldnt post this picture to facebook, so i didn’t.

nanny said not to call you gollum, so i wont.

love you always my precious,

dad x

dear Layla,

its been ages since our last letter and there’s heaps to talk about and heaps you’re talking about!

last time we wrote, you were just getting the hang of mum (albeit with a lot of umumums at the end), now you’ve got a decent little vocab going:

• dad -right up there and often competes for top of the list with the next two. particularly happy with this milestone as mum rulled vocab for the first month or so!
• nan – at first you used this with nanny sheryl, however now its also used to describe your mum, since i call her nan all the time. i’ve switched to calling her mum now and correct you whenever you say it, but you mostly look at me like i’m a fool and either say nan louder or with more emphasis on forming the word with you mouth so i can learn how to say it too. thank you for your patience with me
• mum – the less used of the top 3, but slowly gaining popularity through intense re-training on our behalf
• hello – this is often your go to word, particularly when you’re out and about. today, you said it to about 100 people in city and gave a cute little waive to each and every one of them. you can’t do your l’s properly yet so it sounds like ehyo
• Layla – as above, you say ayeyah [More]

dear layla,

alot to report since we last wrote and some exciting mile stones have been reached!

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dear Layla,

poor little bub, you’re in the wars!

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dear Layla,

you’re adding new moves every day, the most recent addition – “thhhppppptttt”. that’s how i spell the sound you make when blowing a raspberry!

happy? thhhppppptttt.
sad? thhhppppptttt.

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dear Layla,

the last few weeks have been amazing for us to watch as you learn and grow at an unbelievable speed! we have spent the better part of the last few weeks encouraging you to start crawling. you were up on all fours rocking about and we were so excited for you to make your move. your little chubby legs would flip around as if you were ready to run but you weren’t quite sure  how to coordinate your arms.

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dear Layla,

the teething terrors have settled down at last and just when we thought you’d gone back to this:

instead you’ve turned into this… [More]