Welcome! Layla's Dad here, I purchased this domain as a placeholder for the unknown and so I parked a page here on my photography website. Since you made it here, allow me to introduce you to Layla Rockstar!
Once upon a time, early 2020, the world was entering a state of unknown- a pandemic was among us and everything in life was shutting down. Meanwhile in La Paz Mexico, future Mom & Dad were soaking up the sunshine, worry-free on a strict tequila diet. Nine months later- well, you know what happened.
Layla was born December 11, 2020. One of the first attributes we noticed is how alert she was to all her surroundings, especially lights. We always have music on in the house, in the car, while she sleeps and everywhere we go. It was probably around 3 months where we would catch her wiggling to the music and soon thereafter throwing her arms up when music would start. Fast forward a couple months and she was shaking her hips and clapping every time a song would end. Instead of cartoons, Layla primarily watches music videos and live performances (she controls the remote). The way she reacts to music with the biggest smile and silly dance moves is addicting and promotes us to keep her interactive with live music.
We celebrated Layla's 1st birthday at 'Closer to the Sun', a reggae music festival in Cancun, Mexico. The first night I thought she may like to get a closer view of all the lights from the stage, I took her up to the front and held her up as the band Pepper was playing and they ending up singing to her. The next day people kept approaching us asking if she was the famous/celebrity baby and we responded NO until we found out that a photo was posted of her in the events Facebook group of me holding her in the air. I thanked the group for all the Layla love and noted that we were there celebrating her 1st birthday, not realizing what this would spark. The band Slightly Stoopid sang Happy Birthday to her in front of thousands of fans, The Common Kings spontaneously sang Eric Clapton's "Layla" to her, The Movement dedicated a song to her, Iration & Rebelution wished her a happy birthday on stage, as well as Hirie, who also gave a motivational speech about growing up to reggae music.
As social media does with most things in this day and age, Layla spread like wildfire throughout the reggae music community which led to her sponsorship with Banz Carewear, the manufacturer of the protective earmuffs that she wears at all concerts. I was hesitant to create her social media accounts but I figured as long as she's not exposed to any immediate dangers I'd give it a go for fans to follow and public inquiries.
The one social media outlet I hadn't created at the time was TikTok until a popular videographer- Jake Ceja, approached Layla in Venice Beach and created a video edit of her playing around in the playground. The teaser video that he posted received over a million views in a day and with the final edit, it had over 3 million views in a week. We were quite shocked.
Everywhere we go, Layla is typically smiling and waving to people (and dogs). You can often find her attempting to fist-bump everyone she sees. We are taken back by the uproar of love for Layla. Obviously as parents we know there's something special about her but to see that everyone else is moved by her overall joy and presence is touching to us. Layla appears to love all the attention and until she reacts otherwise, we'll allow her to feed into it all.
