Claire's 1st Birthday AKA "Cake Smash Fail"

Okay SERIOUSLY?! How in the world is she already one. I thought it went by fast with Lydia, but I feel like we moved to warp speed. Even thought it has gone fast, I also can't imagine our home without her. She lights up our house and she is Lydia's little sister. We just love her to pieces.

Because her birthday is in December I didn't take one year photos. I take a lot of photos anyways and we had just gotten family pictures taken not too long ago. I will be getting some new "posed" and traditional photos in the spring/summer!

I REALLY wanted to do a cake smash on the floor with her. She LOVES food and I thought she would be totally game. I made her a cute little cake with some yummy whipped cream frosting and bought a few accessories for her to wear! WELL, that's not what happened. I got everything set up on the floor and she just was NOT having it. Oh well... at least my effort was documented :)

It quickly went from THIS

to THIS in a matter of seconds.

So we tried taking off the hat and got her to take a little taste.

That helped a little, but it wasn't long before she had just had enough!

So we decided this was going to be a no go and cleaned her up and gave it a rest for a bit. Then we decided to just put her in her high chair with ONE piece and then we gave her the whole cake. Not what I had in mind, but she did enjoy this better :)

AND that was Claire's birthday party that she won't even remember haha. I'm glad she came around and at least enjoyed her cake because it was REALLY good.

Her are also her stats from her 12 month check up!

Weight: 18.2 lbs (22%)
Height: 29.5" (58%)

She has 8 teeth and LOVES food, but only if she can feed it to herself.
She pulls herself up to things, but isn't walking quite yet.
She crawls and rolls everywhere.
She is a needy momma's girl!

Love you Claire Bear! Life wouldn't be the same without you.

AND then one last thing that happened that same weekend was Lydia had her very FIRST dance recital! Most of the pictures/videos were taken on my phone ( I need a better zoom ) so I just have the one photo. She looked so grown up and was the CUTEST one on stage for sure (not biased).

They did a tap dance to the Fixer Upper song from Frozen. She even got to wear a full face of makeup for the very first time and needless to say she LOVED that.

Claire: 4 Months

Little Miss Claire Bear is now 4 months old! She is such a cute little stinker. I love her chubby cheeks and the cute little rolls she has gotten the last few months!

I dread going to Dr appointments because I know she will be getting shots and it just kills me inside to hear her cry like she does. Thankfully she is usually back to normal within 24 hours.

Here is how she is measuring up:

Height: 24.5 in (45%)
Weight: 12 lbs 11 oz (16th%)

She is slightly smaller than Lydia was at this age so they are basically on the same growing pattern. She does fairly well sleeping at night most of the time nowadays. She usually wakes up twice to eat, but on occasion she will only wake up once. I have come to terms that I will never have one of those miracle babies who sleeps for 8+ hours straight at 6 weeks! Naps are patterning after Lydia as well. She will usually only take a 45 minute nap when she goes down so she has to have 3-4 of those little catnaps during the day and Lydia was the same way.

Here are a few things she is doing at this age right now:

- Sucking on her fingers
- Standing up like a big girl (she loves that)
- Drinking water from mom's cup or a sippy cup
- She is ticklish usually when she is tired and her giggles are ADORABLE
- She likes to talk when she is getting her diaper changed
- She rolls onto her side, but hasn't rolled completely over yet
- Tummy time is probably one of her least favorite things, but she is getting better at it

It's Beginning To Look A Lot Like Christmas

December is  BY FAR the BEST month out of the entire year.
Why?
1. Christmas (duh)
2. My birthday
3. A break between semesters for Adam
4. Snow (I do like snow, but I just don't like it to stick around until April...)
See why I think it is so awesome?
Well anyways, I've done a few things around here to get in the Christmas spirit.

I already have a Christmas wreath, but because we have a storm door in front of the main door my current wreath was too fat and wouldn't fit :(
SOO I saw this really cute argyle christmas wreath that I wanted to duplicate. (YES another craft! What is happening to me?)
I am pretty happy about how it turned out!

Then, we obviously decorated our tree. I didn't take a picture of the full tree, but I was just playing around with the light bokeh in these photos.

Last night I made some really cute and yummy candy cane kiss cookies I found HERE. They are really easy and would be perfect for neighbor gifts or to bring to a christmas party for the holiday season!

Someone couldn't keep her fingers off them.

Or my table decorations.

She is even tall enough to reach up to the counter and grab things. She came waltzing into the family room twice last night with a fresh baked cookie in hand.
She has been such a little trouble-maker these days. She came into the kitchen one day while I was making lunch looking like this..

I frantically started looking for an open marker, but then saw an open tube of mascara on the floor. I just started laughing when I realized she knew the mascara was supposed to go on her eyes. I'm just glad she didn't poke herself with it.

And speaking of her getting tall, she had her 18 month Dr appointment this week. She KNOWS bad things happen there. She started whimpering when we first walked in. She is usually very friendly to anyone, but she wasn't about to warm up to the doctor or the nurses. Here is how she is measuring up:

Height: 32.5" (93%) 

I have  feeling she is going to be taller than me.

Weight: 21.2 lbs (10%)

Luckily, she doesn't have to go back in again until she is 2!

Tonight Adam and I get to go to his work Christmas party just the two of us. We don't get opportunities to go out without Lydia very often (even going somewhere with just the 3 of us lately is rare because of how busy Adam has been). Thanks Daniele and Steve for coming up to watch Lydia for us :)

Check Up

Lydia had her one year checkup yesterday. She would not even let the doctor touch her without crying. I had to lay her on the table and she was clinging on to me for dear life. She had to get two shots and get some blood taken. They only had to prick her finger to test her iron, but it took FOREVER to get enough blood and I had to hold her still and she was screaming and crying the whole time. I am sure everyone in the doctor's office could hear her. Very traumatic visit.
Well here is how she's measuring up nowadays:

Height: 29.5 in. (65%)

Weight: 18 lbs 1 oz (10%)

It's always hard to see her so sad, but it doesn't take her long to get back to her goofy self.

Here's a video that just makes me laugh.

Since she liked her jammies on her head I thought maybe she would keep a hat on....

Lydee Update

March is flying by I feel like I have barely been home! Lydia had her 9 month check up at the beginning of the month and I'm just now getting around to posting about it even though she'll really be 10 months old on the 27th..yikes!!

I'm just going to cut to the chase and let you know the basics about her right now:

Height: 28.5 in. (75%)

Weight 16 lb 1 oz (10%)

Teeth: 6

Likes: Goldfish, 'o's, cheese, sweet potatoes (or pretty much anything orange), apples, oranges, shoes, jewelry, cell phones, remotes, bath time...etc.

Dislikes: Green foods, being spoon fed, the "booger sucker", messing with her face/hands, cudding :(, and probably a few other things.

Tricks: Waving, ALMOST walking, crawling, standing up, climbing, saying "momma" "dadda" "baby", giving kisses (sometimes). This list keeps growing constantly!

That is pretty much everything my brain can think of at the moment.

Now here a bunch of photos I've been meaning to post taken this month!

We bought her a walker, but she hasn't quite figured it out yet!

Helping dad put together a desk.

Grandpa was nice enough to let her play with his phone......it's her favorite!

So after this last picture I couldn't find the rest of the pictures I wanted to put on so this is all for now. As soon as I can figure it out I'll post the rest!

All About Lydia

Yes this post is all about miss Lydia Fay. (they almost all are anyways) 

She turned 6 months old the end of November, but she just barely had her 6 month Dr. Appointment yesterday. Here's how she is measuring up:

Height: 27 in (75th Percentile)

Weight: 14 lb 6 oz (10th Percentile)

It alarmed me when I heard her weight was only in the 10th because it used to be in the 25th, but then her height is now in a higher percentile so I guess she's just growing up and not out. She's gonna be taller than me I can feel it! Anyways, a few days before her appointment she had a little bit of the stomach flu, so getting her shots just made her feel even worse. She got a fever this time and she would scream every time I moved her legs at all. Rough night...we didn't get much sleep. She is doing better today though and hopefully by tomorrow she'll be back to normal! 

Here are some cute pictures taken recently. 

All dressed up for church

I LOVE this dress on her

She ended up throwing up all over this in Target. It was a lot.

The doctor also said she's about a month and a half ahead of schedule when it comes to her motor skills. He said she'll probably be walking by 9 or 10 months. Seriously?! She's trying to get big way too quickly. She's going to be an independent one. I am glad we have one smart baby though. 

Does this outfit look familiar Nat?

I wanted to do a little comparison so I found this picture on my computer of Sophie when she was about the same age.

And here's just one more :)

And yes today is my birthday, but I've had a sick and cranky baby so we haven't been able to do much. More on the details later. Thanks for all the birthday wishes!

Shots

Lydia had to get her 2nd round of shots today at her 4 month appointment...poor thing. She handled it better than the last time and didn't cry as long (I didn't cry either). Last time when we came home she had a sad little whimper all day long, but she seems to be pretty much back to normal so hopefully it stays that way and her little legs don't hurt too much!

Here's how she's measuring up:

Weight: 13 lbs 1 oz (25th percentile)

Height: 25 in. (60th percentile)

Tall and skinny....anyone surprised? I just have a feeling she's going to end up taller than me...*sigh* 

Anyways here's a picture and video. I know that's what all the grandma's and grandpa's like to see :)

Getting ready for bed...it's hard to keep her in one position to get her diaper on and dressed lately.

She's trying to figure out the whole crawling thing. She knows her legs will move her somehow, but she hasn't figured out her top half has to be involved...

Big

Yesterday was a sad day for Lydia. She got her first round of shots at her 2 month appointment. Luckily Adam came because I couldn't watch them do it. Her crying made me cry! She was pretty miserable all day yesterday, but today she seems perfectly fine! Here's how she is measuring up:

Weight: 11 lbs (25th percentile)

Height: 23 In. (55th percentile)

She's growing up way too dang fast, but getting older is also making her less fussy so I guess it's alright :) Here are a few videos of her. 

First is her sucking her fist. She used to suck on her fingers when she was hungry, but now she just enjoys sucking on it. We find her like this quite a bit nowadays. She's become VERY slobbery.

The second video is her on her play mat we got awhile ago. She finally has gained some interest in it. She smiles at herself in the little mirror. Oh and ignore me making weird kissing noises..she usually smiles when I do that, but not while I have the camera on her I guess...

I could kiss on her all day long

Love her to pieces