Riding a Horse

Yes, that's right, Jayden rode a horse today!

I learned from my friend that this carousel is free, and it's at this awesome park in Irvine with tons of open space, an eco-friendly play area, a farmer's market on Sundays and all kinds of other things.  So we ate lunch at the farmer's market (I had pizza from the same place we ate when you and I went there, Mom!), walked over to the carousel and then walked back to the car.  We were only there about 1-1/2 hours total, but it was nice to be outside in the gorgeous Southern California sunshine. 

Jayden still doesn't have teeth and he still doesn't crawl or walk or even move.  He does roll around a little, but nothing official. 

He continues to talk up a storm and he LOVES the water.  We had an extremely fun bath last night and we played in the pool a little bit today.

"We" floated around a little bit in the pool floater.  I ended up having to prop Jayden up because he'd just lean forward and try to drink the water.  Not exactly what we were going for....  So then we sat on the step and splashed a whole bunch.  And now he's passed out. 

I am trying hard to be a good mom, and I think I'm doing okay in that department.  I know I'm not being a great wife.  I'm just so tired.  All the time.  Which makes me have less patience and be less nice in general.  And there's always so much to do - I feel like I'm behind in just about everything.  I keep thinking I should just stay home from work one day but still take Jayden to day care and see if I can get some stuff done, as well as nap a little bit.  But then I think if I take a day off of work I'll never catch up there.  So it almost just seems better to keep fighting through.  Oh the joys of being a mom, and of being a work outside the home mom.  I don't want this to be taken as complaining - it's more just working out issues - and expressing what is going on in our lives.  Everything is a process and it always just takes a while, sometimes a long while, to get used to new routines.

To end on a high note, here are a couple more pictures of the cutest almost-9-month-old ever:

I think overalls are about the cutest baby clothes ever.  If I could, I'd dress Jayden in overalls every day.  Luckily some of our friends and family agree with me - we have at least two sets of overalls in his 12 month clothes and another couple sets for his 18 month clothes.

The sun was shining through the little window on the top of his sun canopy, making it look like his head was glowing.  The interesting thing about his hair, besides the fact that it's a hot mess, is that it's coming in a lighter brown, with some almost blonde touches.  It's quite pretty.