First Birthday Party

What a day!  Amelia's first big day - her Birthday party!  It was so much fun and our little monkey had a blast.  For a kid's one year birthday there's not a whole lot of options.  And honestly if Amelia didn't have so many friends her age, I would have kept it to a family barbeque.  But, since she is such a social butterfly, we felt it appropriate to invite all the kids to a party at Gymboree.  There was music, play time, pizza and cupcakes!  It went off without a hitch - minus a few small casualties.  


So our little girl is turning one!  I can't even believe that it's been a year.  She's grown up so much and she's doing all kinds of fun stuff now.  She repeats things we do, she's walking with the aid of furnture, she's standing on her own for short bursts and she eats big people food (when she wants to).  We're still battling with her lack of appetite, but she's growing and doing well so I'm going to relax a little.  And, a huge milestone that I missed, she took two steps in our living room this morning!  Martin was with her and I was taking a nap!!!  Can you believe it?  Martin says it wasn't really on purpose, but still - I missed it!  She's getting super brave and I think she'll do it again soon.  Then she'll be walking and I'll regret wanting her to walk.  But for now, I can't wait to see it!

Ava & Amelia

Saoirse didn't like the noise

Little Josh! 

Edie climbing the play gym

Chelsi & Remy - look at those eyes!

Amelia loved riding in the parachute

I worked very hard making these cupcakes

1st Cupcake!

Russell, Caleb & Perrine

Edie & Ava

Kathryn

Jack loved his cupcake

We opened presents the day after - look at how many gifts she got!

Buggy wanted in on the action

On a side note, I'm thinking of changing from a blog to a website.  Any thoughts or suggestions on that?  

San Francisco Vacation

We just spent a week in the Bay Area on our family vacation.  The vacation was much needed but it was jam packed with events.  Primarily we spent time with the Grandparents and we got to meet our new niece and Amelia's only cousin on the Turner side - Tildyn.  During the week we went into the city and spent an afternoon in Golden Gate Park, went to the San Francisco Zoo, drove down to Carmel & Monterey where we went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, we went to a SF Giants game, and met up with friends!  Like I said - jam packed.  Amelia was such a trooper and traveled well on the plane and handled the busy schedule well.  

Little plane traveler

Kung fu Panda

With Great Grandma Bobby

Amanda with Tildyn (so cute!)

Our Family

Jelly fish!!!

Grandma & Grandpa Turner

Little Giants Fan

Big girl eating her waffles

I heart Mum!

She's hit her 11 month mile marker and we're fast approaching her 1 year birthday!  I can't even believe it...  Wasn't I just pregnant?

Busy June

It's taken me a while to get a blog post up because it's been quite a hectic month.  For Memorial Day we went to Dallas to visit friends.  Amelia had so much fun playing with her little friend Lucas and Molly the dog.  I had my first trip away from the family for work and it was a little stressful but overall not too bad.  Martin was a total champ and kept things running.  Amelia got bathed and fed daily:)  And last night Amelia went to her first SF Giants game!  She had a great sign "Vote 4 Pablo" and "I heart Kruk & Kuip".  But we didn't make it on t.v.


We are a couple days shy of Amelia's 11 month birthday!  I can't believe how time has passed.  Some new milestones for her - she now has 8 teeth (4 on top and 4 on bottom), she's eating lots of finger foods, her hair is finally getting thicker and growing, and, most importantly, she's doing a lot of standing while holding onto things.  She's also walking and holding.  And today, she let go for a few brief seconds twice.  This kid is going to be walking any day now!


Next week we will be taking a vacation to visit Grandma and Grandpa Turner in San Francisco. This will be the first time we get the two cousins together - Tildyn is 3 months old.  There will be lots of fun pics and videos to come.  For now, here are some recent funny photo moments.

Kisses, daddy

Amelia & Lucas

Amelia & Molly

With Grandma & Grandpa Garza

"I need to make a call"

"Ba ba ba.  De de de ba ba da da"

"Can't you see I'm on the phone?"

What's for dinner?

Amelia & Ava with the parentals

The Children's Museum

This weekend we took Amelia to the Houston Children's Museum for the first time.  I really wish this place had been around when I was young - it is awesome!  So many fun things to do and play with.  Even for the infants and toddlers.  Amelia had a particularly fun time crawling up and down the steps in the play area.  She has been doing a lot of standing at home and holding on to stuff but only with our assistance.  Today she pulled up into a standing position all on her own!  Of course Martin and I are pretty excited.  Check out these cute videos...

Failure to what?!?

We had a successful 9 month check up.  Amelia weighs 15 lbs 2 oz - which is less than 5th percentile - I'll come back to that in a minute.  She's 27 inches long and her head is about 17 inches around.  Her head and length are near the 50th percentile.  First of all, how do they come up with these percentile rankings?  As a mother, you're always comparing where your kid stands in the percentile mark to see how they compare to their peers.  But ultimately, every baby is so different it's hard to come up with averages.  And I've never met one baby who was average all the way through.  So Amelia is less than 5th percentile in weight.  Which we knew was a small issue - no pun intended.  The condition is called "Failure to Thrive".  By the way, this diagnosis sucks.  No parent wants to hear "Failure to.... " anything with their kid.  Her pediatrician wanted us to do some blood work to make sure her chemistry was fine.  And sure enough, all blood work came back normal.  What does that mean now?  Now we have to see a nutritionist and do some calorie counting.  The goal is to make sure she's getting enough calories per day to continue developing at a normal rate.  Some recent recommendations from her doctor and nutritionist friends include adding butter to her cereal!  Not a bad diet, huh?  The upside to this issue is that she has been able to use her 3-6 month clothes for an extended period of time!  I keep trying to put her in 6-12 month clothes and they just swallow her up.  Either way, I'm mixing it up and some things are 3-6 month and others 6-12 month.  One day she'll fit into her big girl clothes!


Amelia recently started going to a new daycare. Martin and I were not crazy about her old day care and felt it was time to change.  This new place is amazing!  Because this new place is so much better, I feel like we've been slumming it this whole time at the old place.  But we have learned a valuable lesson - go with your first instincts.  The new day care is part of a Baptist church and the teachers and staff are so wonderful.  On Friday, Amelia had a mother's day present for me - a flower picture frame and her hand print with a poem!  I love being a mom!  Tomorrow is my first Mother's Day and I'm so looking forward to it.  On top of being so happy to be a mom myself, I have never been in such awe over my own mother.  I now understand so many things about her and what she gave up for me.  My admiration and appreciation of her is beyond words or description.  To my mom - I love you more now than ever.  Thank you for being the most wonderful friend, mother and grandmother anyone could ever ask for!


Happy Mother's Day, everyone!

Big hug and kiss for mommy:)

Silly girl after bath time

She loves being in the water!

Playing on the big girl slide!