August 15, 2006

Today is Aida's official first birthday. I think she decided to commemorate the occasion by crying almost exactly when she was born, unfortunately, that is 3am. She got a birthday hug and went immediately back to sleep! Yay! (Wish I could say the same for me.) She has her 1 year check-up next Monday, so we'll see what the official word is on her progress. She is walking all over now. It's a bit like a monkey/penguin waddle. She keeps her hands in the air for balance (wave your hands in the air like you just don't care...) and her legs look like her arms inverted, so that's the monkey part. She has two teeth slowly coming in on the bottom and loves to eat solids. She will eat pureed food if you let her feed herself... which always means bath time directly follows. She had a great party. Lots of fun for the little ones on the trampoline and in the space ship. Aida was in a very good mood all day. She loves to be the center of attention. The morning of her party, a neighbor came to visit at our back door, so there is a photo of that. Of course, we have the party dress, the cake and her big brother the present-opener-helper. Speaking of Liam, he is also doing very well. He had his first trip to Water World and loved the slides and just everything. Brack wants to take him again really soon. He is really into "drawing" people's names right now. He scribbles and then asks me for help. I draw dotted-line names for many of the people he knows. He has also been talking about people he hasn't seen in a while lately too. (Aaron, Mac, and Rah Rah, he misses you all.) He also tells me that he misses me all the time too. He's a little conniving when he doesn't want Aida to be near him. Instead of "pushing" her with his hands, he will slowly edge her out of the way with his body, his head or a toy. He is definitely learning quickly that any of these are wrong and will get him a time out. Other times, he completely surprises me by playing so well with her, tickling her, or helping her when I happen to be out of the room and walk in on these acts of kindness. He's a good kid. He just wants some alone time every once in a while to work on his puzzles or recreating a block construction he saw on the package or something. He is VERY linear and organized. He lines things up and sorts them all the time. We'll see what he does with that in the future. Short notes on the "Mama, and Dada" of this cute pair: Beth starts back to school on Monday, even though she has been in her classroom many times over the past couple of weeks to get it ready. She's not looking forward to going back, but is excited that Liam is really excited to go back to his school. Brack recently competed in the Mountainboard Nationals, and did really well- especially for the small amount of riding he has done over the past year. Both have been working their butts off trying to get the yard growing again and the office transformed into the Star Wars office. It is "most impressive." Hope everyone had a great summer.