Are you kidding me?  I have a child that is a year old.  Where does the time go?  She has been such a blessing in our lives.  She is funny, feisty, tiny, brave and clever.  

Stuff she is up to these days…

Walking-she took her first unassisted steps on June 16th.  She loves walking.  I thought she would rather crawl than walk because she is so efficient at crawling, but she would rather walk.  We had to finally get her some shoes.  

Reading books-this chick loves books.  Makes me such a happy mama!  

Shoe shopping-my child got her teeny tiny feet from me.  We went to Target to look at shoes for her and the 3-6 month shoes were too BIG.  Are you kidding me?  Payless was the best.  It was cheap and had her real size.  2.  Not wide!  She doesn’t like to walk in shoes, but I am done with the black feet when we are out of the house. :)

Swimming-She is in her last week of swim lessons.  She HATES them!  She cries the whole time, but has definitely made some progress with her instructor Danielle.  She can hold her breath under water, float on her back and is really trying to roll over on her back from her belly.  If we are not at swim lessons she is a fearless little fish that scares her mommy.  At least she is learning infant survival.  

Helping-This girl loves to help.  She helps close and open the dish washer, dryer, refrigerator, bedroom and bathroom doors.  She helps put the dvds back on the shelf after she throws them on the ground.  She helps put the laundry back in the basket after she takes it out and puts it on the floor.  :)

Eating and Drinking-she is pretty much eating most things that we are eating these days with the exception of anything made with dairy products or peanut products.  She loves spaghetti, salmon, chicken, turkey, brisket, most vegetables, all fruits, any breaded product.  I feel like we am constantly feeding her, but I guess she’s not going to get fat because the child is so tiny and she burns it all off anyway with her constant activity.  We am trying to teach her how to use a spoon with her cereal in the morning.  She loves to feed herself.  I am pretty much finished nursing so now she is drinking coconut milk and almond milk.  She really likes it.  

Partying-We had Maris’ birthday party.  It was so fun!  M didn’t love her vegan carrot cake.  I think the icing was too sweet. I sure devoured it!  So much for less sugar in my life.  I need to go to sugar rehab! 

Sunday School-Today was our first Sunday school class.  When we dropped her off she cried immediately.  She didn’t seem to have much fun!  She was being rocked in the rocking chair when we picked her up.  Aw!  Separation anxiety…

Talking-M is saying a lot, but sometimes we can’t quite understand it.  She says dada for a bunch of things.  When she sees a picture of herself..dada, when she sees herself in the mirror…dada, when she sees or we talk about daddy…dada, when she sees me sometimes…dada.  She does call me mama, but I usually hear it when she is in the pool with Danielle. Words she says…

mama, dada, kitty, cracker, yum yum, uh-oh has turned into uh-uh, nanana(not sure what it is), wawa (watermelon) but not for water…hmmm…, ra ra-raisins, tickle/turkey-something like that (not sure), thank you, good girl…if you heard her say these words you might not be able to pick them all out, but I sure can.  I am a master at Mad Gab!

Sharing-this girl loves to share.  Instead of putting everything in her mouth I have gotten her to give it to us instead so we aren’t eating rolly pollies or june bugs (it’s happened).  She shares the flowers that she pulls off of the plant in the garden, toilet paper she pulls off the roll, anything she picks up off the ground.  Such good manners. The one thing she still puts in her mouth…it’s somewhat of a game really…cat food. She is so sneeky.  She notices when we aren’t looking-for a second-and crawls or walk/runs to the cat food and SLAMS her hand in the bowl to grab anything she can before we snatch her up!  Hilarious! Luckily when she crawls to the bowls it’s crazy loud so we go running…otherwise I think she would eat all of their food.

Being petite-I took M to the doctor last week because she had a high fever (it was only a virus) and she only weighed 17.14 lbs.  Geez!  Not sure her height, but we are going to her 1 year appt on August 5.  Hope she weighs 20 lbs so I can switch her car seat.  Carlife will be so peaceful!

Love y’all!!

MW

1.  The Help by Kathryn Stockett

I have had this book for months and finally got to it.  I could NOT put it down and when it was over I was longing for more.  This amazing books is set in Alabama during the Civil Rights Movement.  Three very brave women secretly try to change their traditional town.  I LOVED THIS BOOK!  If you haven’t read it-you MUST!

2.  Same Kind of Different as Me by Ron Hall and Denver Moore

This is a true story-based mainly in Fort Worth, TX-about a homeless man who meets a godly couple are ready to change peoples lives.  It is not what I expected it to be, but OH SO GOOD!  Wow!  I highly recommend it.  It is amazing what one person can do to change the way people think, live and act.  

Gosh!  Where has the time gone?  My baby girl is less than a month away from turning 1 freaking years old.  Are you kidding me?  

10 Things this precious girl are doing at 11 months:

1.  Talking-a BUNCH!  She babbles constantly…but she is also saying, mama, dada, kitty, yum yum, na na for “I’m hungry!”, uh oh.

2.  Becoming more high maintenance and demanding than she already was.  When she is hungry, tired, wants down, wants something, doesn’t want to do something she grunts.  Pretty loudly I might add.  

3.  Moves around like a mad woman.  Crawls around like she has been doing it for years.  She goes from one place to the next in 5 seconds flat!  

4.  Standing up.  She is standing all the time on her own without support from something else.  She can stand for long periods of time.  MK loves to stand and dance by herself.  SO cute!

5.  Not yet walking, but she loves to walk pushing her little musical walker.  She goes all around the house.  

6.  For about a month now she has been sleeping through the night.  I was still nursing her 1-2 times a night and decided I couldn’t do it anymore.  I was getting no sleep.  It took pretty much 1 night to cry it out.  She is still getting up at about 5 am crying/whining for her pacifier.  I’m not sure why she is doing that thought.  She is ravenous when she gets up at 7am because she is so hungry.  

7.  Swimming.  Maris has been suited up 3 times now with mixed reviews.  We took her to our HOA pool.  We had the huge pool all to ourselves.  Jason out her her tube and she freaked.  I think it was because the water was frrrreeazing.  She liked playing in the baby pool. We also took her to our HOA Beach Club.  This place is pretty cool.  It has sand all around the pool.  It was really hot outside, but she still did not want to be in the water.  Maybe because the pool was huge and she is used to a tiny bathtub.  Not sure.  BUT…she LOVED playing in the sand.  She loved the texture on her hands and the flavor in her mouth.  :)  We also got her a little pool for the backyard.  She loved it, but only for a few minutes and then she wanted to go play in the grass.  

She is starting swim lessons next month.  

8. Making new friends.  This girl loves kids as I have mentioned before.  When she hears or sees kids she starts waving and laughing.  She cute.  At a Mom’s Club luncheon the other day she was having a GRAND time with the kids.  One of the girls (8 years old) was chasing after her and she thought it was so fun!

9.  Learning new things pretty much everyday.  She is learning to put things back into containers once she has taken them out.  WE have a game that shoots these plastic balls in the air and she is learning that she has to put them back in to make the game continue.  If I say “where’s daddy?”  or “where are the kitties?”  she goes crawling and looking for them.  She throws her arms up in the air when I say “how big is Maris?”. She claps to the song “If Your Happy and You Know It”.  Her favorite songs to sing are “The Wheels on the Bus”  and “Twinkle Twinkle”.

10.  Absolutely loves to play outside.  Loves crawling in the grass, messing with the flowers, trying to eat the dirt, swinging on the swings…anything to do with being outside.  

Can’t believe she will be one in less than a month.  We are having her party on June 25th.  You should come!

MW

MK turned 10 months on the 23rd and I procrastinated to post.  She is growing so fast I can’t even believe it.  

Things she is up to lately…

-she has two new teeth on the top…so now she can really chomp down on a finger

-her skin is getting soooo much better…hopefully she is growing out of this crap

-crawling like a crazy animal…she goes so fast we can barely keep up

-walking along the furniture and walking with her push walker

-she is a mover and a shaker…she is constantly going from one place to the next and she pretty much never stops

-this chick loves to dance…if there is any music playing she gets so excited and shakes and bounces and moves her arms kinda like the “sprinkler” dance move.  she loves to play with any toy that makes music or sound.  

-talking and babbling so much-she says nanana, mama, dada, bababa…she loves talking to the kitties…who knows what she is saying 

-she loves books and loves to be read to

-loves playing with her bestie Macie.  That crazy cat loves to hang around MK.  Hilarious!  

-LOVES going to her library music and reading class…we go every Thursday and one day we were late and had to sit in the back of the classroom.  She kept crawling up to the front and trying to grab the teacher’s guitar and puppet.  He told me after class that she was the most ACTIVE kid in all of his classes.  Great!

-eating pretty much what we are eating…salmon, chicken, turkey, vegetables, fruit…this girl loves to eat

-you would never guess it because she is so tiny…she weighs maybe 17 pounds

I soooo love this age.  She is learning so much and doing so much it is the most fun!  

MW

1. The Kite Runner Khaled Hosseini-fiction
This book is a story about a young boy named Amir and his “friend” or servant Hassan who live in Afghanistan. This book shows in detail what that country had to and still is going though after the fall of their monarchy. Amir sees his country change. Gosh! It is so much more than that, but I don’t want give anything away. If you have not read this book you MUST do it immediately. I have seen this book on book shelves for years, but never wanted to read it. I just didn’t want to have to read about that topic of war. My friend Whitney recommended it. I’m so glad I listened to her. It is probably one of my favorite books. I could NOT put it down.

2. American Wife by Curtis Sittenfeld-fiction
This book is loosely based on Laura Bush-her upbringing all the way to her husband’s presidency. I could not put it down.

3. The Pioneer Woman: Black Heels to Tractor Wheels—A Love Story-memoir
This is a story of my favorite blogger’s journey from living it up in at college in LA to her whirlwind romance at a ranch in Oklahoma with her Marlboro Man. It is very good. She is hilarious! Great fun read!

The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Perilous Journey Another great young adult read. I enjoyed the Society’s next journey! This one was pretty much like the first, but there was a kidnapping, an island and a super speedy ship!

The Accidental Billionaires: The Founding of Facebook A Tale of Sex, Money, Genius and Betrayal This is the book that the movie The Social Network was based on. I actually saw the movie first and it is excellent. The music really added something great! the book was really good. It was very interesting to learn all about Facebook and how it started.

Water for Elephants Loved it! I sped through this book! I could not put it down. It’s all about circus life back in the 50’s. Very much recommended!!

The Heretic’s Daughter I read this book for my book club. I wouldn’t have even known about it otherwise. I’m so glad I did! It is historical fiction based during the Salem Witch Trials. Very fascinating. The author wrote about her ancestors of that time. I just can’t believe what those men, women and children lived through. Soooooooo good!!

Can’t wait to tell you what I’m reading in April! Xoxo Meg