The Road to Independence

Every single day that passes represents one more step on the road to Annabelle's independence. The day before yesterday, Annabelle insisted on feeding herself. She has been self-feeding for awhile now, but it's always been little (non-messy!) finger foods that I have broken down into bite-sized pieces and laid in front of her. This time, however, she grabbed for the spoon and insisted on feeding herself. My presence at her high chair was evidently no longer needed. I don't know if any of the food actually made it into her mouth, but it made Annabelle very happy, so I just let it go. I'm *STILL* cleaning spaghetti sauce out of the tile grout in the kitchen!


























And my baby has started walking!! She hasn't quite mastered this difficult skill yet, but she is taking 2-3 steps at a time, repeatedly. She falls, stands right back up (without holding onto anything!) and attempts these steps again. It is now just a matter of time. I am so excited to be able to witness this milestone and Annabelle, obviously very proud of herself, will be off and running in no time flat!

Born to be Wet!

Big sister Gabby had her birthday party at the park, under the pavillion. Afterwards there was swimming....which Annabelle thoroughly enjoyed! She loves the water and had a blast playing with Aunt Joanie in the "Raindrop" (kiddie) pool and watching some of the bigger kids playing and kicking a beach ball around.

Toys, Toys, and More Toys!

Annabelle's birthday party was what I consider a success. Lots of children, lots of food, and lots of fun. Annabelle refused to nap on this day, so she was functioning on no sleep. All things considered, she was remarkably well behaved for the intense amount of excitement and suger, combined with the fatigue I know she was experiencing.

Rather than post all the pics from Annabelle opening her presents...or rather, *us* helping Annabelle open her presents, I figured I'd just take pictures of Annabelle playing with some of her new birthday presents. I think this makes for cuter pictures, since the actual gifts weren't always visible in my "unwrapping" shots. The first few pics are from Annabelle at her party, and the rest are taken over the next couple of days...I just snapped a picture as I caught her playing with one of her new toys.


Her adorable Pooh cake:











Such a sweet smile!














Annabelle loves to suck on the lemons from Grandma's iced tea!















Grandpa cuts the birthday cake:















Wow! A birthday cake that moonlights as Play-Dough!




















Gabby's friend, Tiffany, gave Annabelle this ball for her birthday. Annabelle loves it!

















Aunt Joanie and Cousin Tristan gave Annabelle a "Learn and Laugh Book" and a "Learning Purse", both of which Annabelle loves!





















Mommy and Daddy gave Annabelle a "Fairyland Playhouse" and an "Enchanted Castle". There's nothing better than getting lost in a fairy tale:




















Annabelle loves to sit on the scooter that her friend, Wesley, gave her. She can't quite figure out how to ride it yet, but sitting on it is just as much fun (for now!)






















Richard and Jimmy gave Annabelle an "Activity Walker" that makes all kinds of cool sounds and plays tons of different songs!



















Annabelle loves to push on the lion's nose because he sings when she does. Grandma and Grandpa made a great choice with this gift!





















Annabelle looks so pretty in one of the dresses that Aunt Wendy sent from North Carolina.

Annabelle's Birthday Dinner

On Annabelle's actual birthday (not the day of the party) we all (hubby, Gabby, parents, sister & nephew) all went out to Mama Fu's Chinese restaurant for dinner. It was a fun night that we all really enjoyed. While we were there, the waitress found out it was Annabelle's first birthday (yes, we told her!) and she offered a piece of chocolate cake to Annabelle. This was Annabelle's second cake for the day and she enjoyed it every bit as much as the first one. What a mess she made! I am *STILL* trying to figure out how to get the chocolate out of her high chair!

It's Fun to be One!

My little girl is officially one year old! I can't believe how fast this year has flown by! I just brought my little princess home from the hospital yesterday....how can she be one already?!? Wow! What an incredible year this has been! I took Annabelle out for her one year portraits and it went so well. The photographer insisted that I bring a cake along and just let Annabelle dig into it....so I did! It was a lot of fun watching her with this cake (her first one ever!) She didn't know what she was supposed to do with it until I put a small piece in her mouth. She figured out the rest all by herself! The day before was big sister's 16th birthday, so we did some double portraits as well, just to mark the occasion.

Will Somebody Please Slap Me.......

......if I ever even *THINK* about having double back-to-back birthday parties again? We had Annabelle's first birthday party and Gabby's Sweet Sixteen party (two milestone birthdays nonetheless!) this past weekend (Annabelle's on Saturday and Gabby's on Sunday) and I am totally exhausted (as well as broke!) All in all, though, it really was a fun weekend......just a bit much for one weekend. I would have preferred to have had these parties on separate weekends, but my sister and her 5-year-old son (whom I haven't seen since he was 3 months old!) came to visit for a week, and we wanted both of them to be here for both parties. It was nice to see them again after five years. Time really is too short to spend it so far away from our loved ones. Hubby and I are already trying to figure out if we might be able to make it over there to Georgia (where they live) next year for a visit. I love road trips, but have never taken one with an infant before, so I'm not sure how that would work......but I'm trying to figure something out.

We had Annabelle's party at Chick-fil-A. All in all, there were 9 other children there (if you include my older daughter and her friend, who sometimes act the same age as Annabelle & her friends, there were actually 11 children there!) Two of the children showed up 10 minutes before the party ended, but it was nice that they came. Annabelle received SO MANY wonderful gifts, most of which are battery operated (thanks a lot guys!) Up until now, Annabelle has not had a single battery operated toy. That's not necessarily because I have anything personal against battery operated toys, I've just always opted for the non-battery operated ones for some reason or another. I guess I always suspect, somewhere deep in the back of my mind, that battery operated toys are more likely to break.....or just suddenly stop functioning when the batteries die. The second scenario is not necessarily a problem unless I have no spare batteries to replace the dead ones with. Determined not to let that happen, I carefully checked all the toys to see what size spare batteries I should keep on hand. Wouldn't you know it.....every single one of these battery operated toys requires a different size battery! Go figure. Hmmmmm, perhaps *that* is the reason I have yet to purchase a battery operated toy for Annabelle?

Needless to say, I have dozens and dozens of pictures from this past week. With my sister in town and both birthday parties, it has been kind of a week-long holiday for me and I am currently working on bringing myself back down to reality. I am going to post some, but not all (There are WAAAAAAY too many!) pictures from the parties, as well as some misc. photos, but I am going to post them all under their own separate blog entry. This way, I can stop this entry here and not worry about it turning into 4 pages of rambling nonsense that nobody wants to finish reading.

Ersatz Binky!

OK......here is what happens when Annabelle is "deprived" of her precious binky. She takes the binky cover and...... VOILA! Ersatz binky! I almost fell over laughing when she did this! :-)