Lucy's 1st birthday

Lucy's first birthday was on a Friday, but we celebrated on Saturday afternoon so that we could do it at a better time of the day instead of late at night when Ryan would've gotten home from work.  We just had pizza and some snacks, opened her presents, and finished with cake and ice cream.  Besides Ryan and I, my mom and grandpa came, as well as my friend Marci and her two kids, Mya and Ty.  I wanted to invite a few more friends (of mine) but knowing how Lucy gets a little overwhelmed and clingy when there's too many people around, especially people she doesn't see everyday, I figured that this small group would be just right... a few family members and a couple little friends (plus Lucy really does love Mya).  Lucy was a serious grump this whole day and had bad reflux, poor girl, but I still managed to get a quick smile a few times.

Lucy sitting in her new car seat from her great-grandpa, along with her other presents (I feel like this picture looks like she was totally spoiled, but we had literally one toy for her age and got amazing deals on these).

 The big cake was for everyone, the cupcakes were just using up the extra batter, and the smaller cake was Lucy's smash cake.

She had fun pulling herself up and pounding on this big box over and over.

 Getting some birthday kisses from Big Bear, who she still loves (and to think I wanted to wait to give him to her for her birthday!)

 As close to a smile as she would give.... :)

 Indian giver.

First attempt at a group shot: no smiles.

Second attempt at a group shot: Lucy decides to try a new trick that she has since been doing like crazy.

Third attempt to get Lucy to smile for this picture, I tossed up a pink ballon, which immediately made Lucy and Ty get up and rush for it.  So much for that one!

After the first couple of presents, Lucy was over the present-opening, which was great because Ty and Mya were awesome helpers in that category.  At least someone enjoyed ripping them open!  Then we moved on to the cake.  Lucy was not impressed with that either- ha! 

 This was as much of the cake as she got into.  Lucy got pretty frustrated that her hands were so messy and covered in sticky frosting so I had to go wash her off pretty quickly.

 Rainbow cake!

 After cake, the kids played a bit with all of Lucy's new toys.

 I was holding Lucy right next to my grandpa and she started laughing and smiling at him and even reached out to let him hold her!  But as soon as I turned around to get the camera, the flood gates opened.

 Lucy riding on her new bike.

 Aaaaand she's done.  Whew.  Fun party!

The next best thing

For a while now, some of my old roommates and I have talked about getting together for a reunion.  Every time we want to make it happen though, a few are about to have a baby or move or things just come up.  So one day Tiffany came up with the idea to do a google chat so we could all be there and see each other.  Brilliant!  Why none of us had thought of that before, I don't know.  But we scheduled some time on a Sunday evening when our husbands could watch kids, and we all "hung out" and took turns updating each other and introducing our kids that we hadn't met yet, etc.  It was the first time any of us had used this, so there were a few small tech glitches we had to work out, but next time will be even smoother.  It was so fun to catch up with all of these ladies that I love.  Definitely the next best thing to actually being together in person!!

One year!

It's hard to believe this, but we have a one-year-old around here!  I can't help but feel a tad bit emotional when I think about this fact.  It's not that I don't want Lucy to keep growing as many parents often say-because I love that it just keeps getting better each month- but I just think about where we've come in the last twelve months and just how much our lives have changed... for the better.  I'm not going to lie though that quite a bit of this year was a very tough adjustment for me, and at the time I was a little bitter about it (not about being a parent, but just the issues we were facing that caused for such a rough time).  But miraculously I can now really feel gratitude for that time in my life. It's not that we don't have sleepless nights anymore or that Lucy's reflux is gone (because it's for dang sure that beast is still here) or anything like that,  but thanks to lots of prayers, I can finally see the bigger picture and recognize the blessings amongst the trials and I know it makes me appreciate everything a lot more now than I would have.  Ryan and I are so thankful for our sweet little girl and the blessing she is to us! She makes us laugh all the time and there's nothing better than seeing her beam with pride when she learns or discovers something new in this world!  With that said, here's what she's been up to this month:

• She finally decided she wants to hold her bottle... now that our bottle days are almost gone. ha! 
• Lucy recognizes so many words and songs these days.  When I start singing "the itsy bitsy spider" she automatically raises her hands up and starts making the spider crawl up with me.  Also, if I ask Lucy if she wants to sing "if you're happy and you know it" then she starts clapping her hands and smiling before we even start singing.  
• She has started to imitate things that we do, sounds that we make, and things we say (not that she's talking yet- but just making the general sounds of certain words like hi, bye, yeah, etc.)
• Signing is still definitely not her thing, other than the word "food," which she's got down. Even then, she's still prefers to just shout about being hungry. :)
• Her bedtime routine after dinner is usually just bath, bottle, pray, bed.  But the last few weeks she has decided to add in "cuddle with dad" after her bottle.  It's funny because right when she decides she is done with her bottle, she throws it off to the side and excitedly crawls right over to Ryan, sits in his lap, and puts her head on his chest to snuggle.  I'm just trying to ignore the fact that she will only do this with Ryan and not me. :)
• She is so close to walking.  Every day we bundle up and go outside for a walk with her little walker and she loves this!  She has started to just use one hand on the walker and she can even walk quite a distance just holding on to one of my fingers with one of her hands.  
• Lucy finally and consistently eats a solid three meals each day.  It's pretty funny though when she only wants to eat what is on my plate or in my hand- even if it is the same thing that I put in front of her to eat.  
• Speaking of food, this girl goes crazy for peas.  I used to cook them and she would get so frustrated waiting while they cooked and then cooled a bit, so I started giving them to her frozen and she like them just the same which is totally cool with me!  No work involved.  She also loves string cheese, cheerios, and bananas a lot.
• Another tooth broke through with another one or two looking like they are not far behind.  This makes a total of 7 teeth- 4 on top, 3 on bottom.
• Her separation anxiety has really started to mellow.  She will let someone else take her from me and hold her for about 10-30 seconds before crying!  (That probably sounds like I'm being a little sarcastic, but I'm not at all.  This is a huge improvement seeing as she would totally lose it if someone even looked at or touched her).
• Still having major flare-ups of reflux.  It always happens with teething but it's definitely no fun.  For this reason she's been extra clingy and fussy and not really sleeping great lately.
• Speaking of sleep, still doing 11.5-12 hours a night (on a good, non-reflux night) and 2 naps a day (one at 9am and one at 2:30pm).  Lucy did really well with the time change.  We kept her up later the night before and she's adjusted pretty well since then, thankfully.
• Lucy likes to "give bonks" which basically just means she headbuts as a sign of affection. 
• She loves baths still and is getting used to having water over her face.  The other day she was so proud of herself for putting her face in the water several times. 
• She also loves playing hide and go seek at both dinner time (after we eat, Ryan will get down and hide and sneak around her high chair and she thinks it's hilarious) and after naps (when she sees one of us come in, she will often start laughing and crawling from one end of her crib to the other super fast, which is a sign she's expecting us to play hide and seek).

We are celebrating her birthday tomorrow instead of today, but I still wanted her to have a good day so we did a few fun things she likes, such as swinging at the park and watching dogs.  Lucy thinks it's so funny to put her little sunglasses on but usually pulls them right off.  Today though, she put them on at home and left them on all the way to the park and even while we were there!  It was funny because it was hardly even sunny at that time either.  Also, the highlight of the day for her was seeing a dog escape from its owners and sprint like mad through the park and right up to her!  Here's some pics from the last month.

Getting caught digging through things other than her toys. :)

Lucy spilled food over her high chair one  day and then when we got her out she sat right down in it and crawled all around.  Gave us a good laugh.

One of her current favorite things to do is go on walks with her walker all around our street.  We do this every day.

 Snuggles with dad before bed.  A nightly ritual.

 We voted!  In Ohio! Sooo glad to not be bombarded with stupid election stuff, although I do wish many of the outcomes were different.

 She wanted the sticker more than I did.

Suuuuper tired and just trying to stay awake.  I forgot to mention that she is obsessed with Ryan's ipad.

Lucy's first halloween

Last night as the weather continued to get worse, Ryan and I decided it would probably be best to just stay at home and pass out candy.  We were a little bummed to not take Lucy trick-or-treating for her first time, but we figured we could dress her up and just hang out at home and pass out candy.  Well, a couple minutes past the start of trick-or-treating (yes, there are designated hours of 6-8pm here), Ryan and I decided to brave the rain and wind and take Lucy to just a couple of houses.  So we bundled Lucy up in about 4 layers, grabbed the big umbrella, and we were out.  We ended up taking her around our whole loop in the back section of our development mostly because everyone had their lights on and NO one was coming around, so we felt bad skipping some houses.  Also, Lucy seemed to be liking it.  She also like to ring everyone's doorbells. We let her take the candy and it was so cute to see her pick out one piece and throw it in her bucket.  There were also a few dogs that she got beyond excited about.  By the time we got back home, Lucy was still really warm... except for her fingers which probably needed gloves that we didn't have.

Once we got home, she got a nice warm bath to help her thaw out.  Even though her pajamas went on after bath time, we forgot that Ryan wanted to skype with his parents to show them Lucy's costume, so we put it back on over her pj's.  Let me tell you- the girl went to town on her candy!  We didn't open any of it, but she had such a blast chomping down on all of the wrappers.  The funny thing was that I later realized she made it right through some of the wrappers and got some actual bites of chocolate, suckers, smarties and tootsie rolls.  I got a short video of it, but the funniest part (which I didn't get) was that she would take any new piece of candy we put in front of her and chomp it to pieces, but as soon as we gave her the little container of playdough, she would immediately toss it over her shoulder behind her.  She did this several times.  Ryan and I were dying laughing.  She must have inherited my sweet tooth!

Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures while we were out and about because the weather was too bad to take a camera out in.  But these will have to do!

These are just Lucy playing with Ryan's face and snuggling when he got home from work.  It's one of her most favorite times of the day.

 All bundled up and ready to go!  All the layers helped beef up her costume, since she didn't really fill it out too well. :)

Halloween faces

I tried very, very hard to get a cute picture of Lucy on her first Halloween.  I envisioned her sittting amongst our pumpkins while flashing me big happy smiles.  Cute, right?  Well, the following is all I got.  I can't stop laughing looking at these.  To Lucy's defense, it was as cold and windy as the middle of winter outside, and she still can't quite figure out how to catch her breath in such forceful wind!

Happy Halloween!  If the weather is anything like they are predicting, we may or may not be taking Lucy out to trick-or-treat tonight.  Staying bundled up in our heated home with some soup and hot chocolate sounds way better than pouring rain and freezing cold wind.  We'll see what tonight brings!