A Lovely Lewis Life

When I was in high school I had a really great group of girl friends. We cheered together all through middle and high school and we spent countless hours getting ready for games together and too many weekends were spent just being goofy. Though there are so many memories that stick out in my mind, one of my favorite traditions that we started back then was an annual Christmas party. Before Joey and I built our house, we had the party at my mom's house but now we always do it at my house and I love it. We start planning a month or two in advance to try as best as possible to accommodate everyone's busy schedules this time of year. This year we decided back in October that December 12th was our date so when Saturday rolled around and I knew my girls were going to be coming over for dinner I was so excited. We always do some sort of gift exchange and have lots of yummy food. One year our theme was favorite memories, a couple of years we've done ornament exchanges, and this yea...

What a whirlwind of a weekend! I had 5 days off but we were busy busy the entire time to the point where it almost wasn't that enjoyable. We were able to split time pretty evenly with our three dinners thanks to one of them being on Wednesday so that was really nice. Beckett got to play with lots of kiddos and really enjoyed himself. First up on Thursday we headed to my cousin's house for lunch with my dad's side of the family. We ate some really yummy food and some of the adults played a really fun game of Cards Against Humanity while the kids played outside. We had a great time with this fun group! [caption id="attachment_340" align="alignnone" width="2869"] All the cousins on my dad's side of the family. There are 9 of us (I'm the oldest) and 1 great-grandchild, Beckett. Fun fact: Kacey and I are the only two who are only children on the Kestner side (our dads are brothers; we each have a sibling on our mom's sides). Our uncle ...

I didn't do an 18 month update so I figured I'd mix the last two months together. I can't believe that he's already over a year and a half old! In so many ways I feel like he's been here for much longer but in other ways I feel like he should still be a tiny baby. He says new words all the time and it's super cute! It's so fun to see him developing his vocabulary. He loves to hide under a blanket and he'll say "Betit" (Beckett) so we'll start looking for him. So cute! (11/18/15 first time he said his name) Back at the end of September I started working on getting him to sleep in his crib because he's just getting too big for us to all comfortably sleep in our bed. He has done surprisingly well! We typically let him fall asleep in our bed and then put him in his bed and turn on the music on his monitor. There are a lot of nights that he will wake up in the middle of the night and will end up back in our bed but there are plenty of ...

Two Fridays ago I decided to delete my Facebook and Instagram apps from my phone. I found that too often I was turning to my phone for "entertainment" instead of having a conversation with my husband or playing with Beckett. I'm embarrassed to say how many arguments these apps have started between me and Joey because one of us is always on our phone when the other is trying to talk. It's just easy to pick up the phone when you're "bored" and open those social media apps. I've been wanting to have a social media free weekend for years but never actually followed through. I've tried to set "rules" for myself once I get home to stay off my phone until the baby is asleep yet I always find myself on my phone while sitting on the couch with him as he watches his evening cartoons or while he plays in his playroom. Sometimes he will tap my arm and give me the sweetest smile with his head cocked sideways as to say, "Hey Momma, put your pho...

Back in October we had family pictures taken with  Photography by Nikita . We started using her when I was pregnant with Beckett and she's just so good with kids, especially the kind that want to run around and throw pumpkins during a photo shoot (a.k.a Beckett Cruz). :-) She somehow managed to get pictures that didn't show us bribing Beckett with the pumpkins, him throwing them at her every chance he could get, or him throwing a fit because we took the wagon away that he insisted on pulling the entire time! The drool.. there is no escaping it! I love how he's holding my hand above. <3 Sort of obsessed with this one of Beckett and Joey! He was not having me holding him! He was trying to jump out of my arms. HA! So happy as long as he was pulling that wagon! Telling us about the fish in the water The hair! It was a little windy and his hair was blowing all over.

This was Beckett's first time participating in Halloween. I personally think it's just a dumb "holiday" so I didn't dress him up or anything last year. Honestly, if my mom hadn't offered a costume that was my brothers (14ish years ago) then he wouldn't have dressed up again. There was no trick-or-treating because, come on, he's only 18 months and has no business going door to door getting candy from strangers. Maybe my take on Halloween will change as he gets older, who knows? What I do know is that he was a super cute little lion and he loved handing out candy to trick-or-treaters! One of my girlfriends told me about a local event that was supposed to be fun for kids with some different things to do such as games and face painting. We got there late and kind of missed out on the events so we let the kids play on the playground and then went to lunch. Beckett was content swinging and we thought he was going to fall asleep at any second. After lunch, we...

Since the point of this blog is to recount (more detailed and not in my Chatbooks) memories, I have several photos I need to get off of my phone. I just love the way he's posed and the expression on his face here. I imagine he's thinking, "Alright Momma, I'll sit here long enough for you to take one picture because I know I look cute." :-) This boy loves a bath! I sometimes have to put him in my bathtub in order to keep him occupied while I get ready. On this night, he was really anxious to get into his tub and start playing. He's so close to being able to climb right on in, which really scares me! He was playing around and we heard him giggle and looked over and saw this. He was standing on top of his little elephant's head that he rides on. He was so proud of himself for this accomplishment.  My brother gets the best pictures of him! He had just gotten out of the bath and my mom was getting him dressed and he was cheesin' it up for Uncle T. I was cle...