Susan G. Komen Walk 2010

Today Guiliana, Grandma, and Grandpa Tortora, and I all participated in a walk for a cure. This marks mine and Grandma's 10th year and Guiliana's 3rd. She kept asking me what we were doing and I told her that we were walking for "Boobies and Ninnies"!! She got a kick out of it and continued to say that throughout the walk. Its so amazing to be apart of such an amazing cause. I plan on sharing this with my daughter for many years to come.








SUSAN G KOMEN 2009





Susan G Komen 2008

Playdate with the Barbee Girls

This morning Guiliana and I invited Delaney and Libby over for a playdate. Libby made some super yummy muffins and the girls played and loved on each other while us old friends caught up. The girls had never met (well they did when they were babies but who remembers that! LOL!) and they played so cute together. All day Guiliana has been saying "I need Delaina" (that's how she is pronouncing her name) Love it! Thanks to Libby for capturing these adorable shots of our girls.

Guiliana's current interests...

I always like to look back and see what Guiliana was into and at what age. She has definitely moved on from her once huge love for Mickey and Minnie and the Disney Channel in general. I am really glad that we decided to have a Minnie Mouse Birthday party when she turned 2 because she had so much interest in her at that time and it was perfect! Right now she is very much into The Princesses, particularly Belle and Ariel. She also has really gotten into Dora as well (she has picked up so much spanish from both Dora and her school. She said to me the other day... "Mama, lets vamanos!")
I am very pleased that she has found a new love for books. We have always had a lot of books for her but she never took an interest. Now she wants us to read and for her to read (make up the story) to us too. She is speaking in full sentences and she is fun to hang and chat with. She loves music (any kind really and will sing along in the car all the time) and enjoys dancing. We noticed her love for music and dancing and enrolled her in a dance class at school which is every Friday. Grandma says that she watches her dance and she pays attention and follows the teachers every move!
She knows her full name, can recognize it on paper, and can almost spell her first name. She can count to 10 in Spanish and to 20 in English and has known her ABC's for about a year now. She is really thriving at her school and is doing very well. She is learning so much. They are teaching her the days of the week, the months of the year, and they have activity/art stations everyday. Next week at school they are learning all about grocery shopping. They have to bring in coupons, ads, a shopping tote, as well as some items to "shop" for. I am very impressed with what these kids can retain at such an early age.
I love (and can dislike at times) that she has her own likes/dislikes and opinions. She definitely has become a strong willed and independent little gal.

Potty Training!!!!

At the end of September Guiliana made the move to the "transition" class at her school. Its the class between the 2's and the 3's. One major part of this class is POTTY TRAINING!!! Well I am happy to say that last week she only had 3 accidents at school. We are so proud of her progress. Things were a bit rough at first. Guiliana is the type of child that if you say black, she says white! So she was going in the potty all day at school and then have accidents at home and just plain refuse to use the toilet! But yesterday was our first GREAT day both at school and at home. She started the morning off by actually peeing in the potty before we left. She had no accidents all day at school. Then last night we went out to eat and shopping and she peed twice in public restrooms, once at grandma and grandpa's, and they before bed. I think we are well on our way to a diaper/pull-up free household!
**just for documentation purposes... her first poop in the potty was 8/31/10!!**

AZ stay-cation 2010

This year we decided to take advantage of our 3 days off for Labor Day weekend and enjoy a stay-cation at the Pointe Tapatio Cliffs resort. The weather was nice and they have a large shallow pool area for the little ones. We checked in a little after noon on Saturday and left Sunday afternoon. We spent so much time in the pool and had some great quality family time, just the 3 of us.

SUMMER 2010

WOW!!! So I think this is the longest I have gone without blogging! Needless to say, Guiliana is keeping us quite busy and exhausted lately!! We had a very nice summer. It included lots of swimming and relaxing with friends and family, home renovations, and a stay-cation. I am going to sum it all up with some pictures.






Guiliana finally got her new bed and is FINALLY sleeping in her own room!! She LOVES her room now and Daddy and I are happy to have our bed back too.





Our home went through some changes both inside and out. We had the outside painted and landscaped over the summer and just with-in the last month we had all three of our bathrooms completely renovated. I have before and after pictures of the outside. The bathrooms were just finished and now have to be repainted so pictures of the bathrooms should be available soon. We have been in our house now for almost 4 years and with all of the changes and upgrades we are excited to stay at least 5 more years.










Gardening with my favorite Gal!






Some fun "cell-phone" shots from the last couple of weeks. The first one was taken tonight at Johnny Rockets.