first sign

Annie has her first sign: All Done. She started using it 2 days ago and has become more consistent. I don't know if she fully comprehends it yet, but she is getting there. It's exciting because I feel like we can communicate with her more and teach her more signs.

Happy 1st Birthday Annabelle!

1 Year old! Wow!

Annie, you are so special to us. We have loved spending this year watching you grow, getting to know you, and playing our part in caring for you.

You are walking more and more now. I rarely see you crawl. You are big on dancing too. Your big achievement this month has been pointing. You are an excellent pointer now. You point to what you want and you will point to things if we ask you where they are. This is how we figured out that you know a lot of words. Balloon, window, mommy, daddy, nose, eye, elmo, etc... You aren't much into hugs and kisses - though you will come up to me and put your mouth on my nose which we are currently interpreting as a kiss. You do like to give 5 and we are using that to help you greet new people.

You are good at waving and use it for different things. Hi, bye, goodnight, and 'you're dismissed' (normally reserved for doctors or when you are tired and want daddy to leave so you can go to bed.) We started you off waving by opening and closing your fingers. You have transformed that to more of a Miss America wave. You are still into clapping. Today I was running errands and you were with Nana and PopPop and you clapped when I came home. Cute! You have started making your stuffed animals clap. We were very impressed that you had put it all together to do that. You also have started giving us backrubs. I have no idea how you learned to do that, but we are totally encouraging it. You will stand behind one of us and either pat our back or draw on it. It feels good and it's cute. Last night you went back and forth between us giving us backrubs for about 5 seconds each time.

Your favorite games are walking and waving something (washcloth, pants, stick, anything), following a parent through the circle in our house and being surprised when they jump out at you, pulling the cds off of the shelf, bouncing on the couch, playing with a mylar balloon, and putting things in and taking things out of a box, bag, etc. Your favorite foods are quesadillas, cheese, blueberries, and bread. (In fact that's pretty much all you want to eat.) You favorite books are Spot books, peekaboo books, and these very simple 5 page Elmo books. The simple Elmo books are from the dollar store - $.50 each - and they show it. Really, they are pretty lame. But you love them. You ask us to read them over and over again. I think the record so far has been 10 times in a row - the same book. We try to get you to go back and forth between two or three of them. (We have 10.)

You are taller now, still thin but your cheeks are rounder. Your hair is really coming in - it is still wispy, but there is a lot more of it. You have 8 teeth and we suspect you are working on some molars. You have the cutest smile and the best laugh. Oh the things we will do to get you to laugh.

This past month we have played outside a lot. We've gone to the Farmer's Market, over to people's houses, and out running errands. We've gone to the library where you love to pull books off of the shelf and look at the large stuffed giraffe. When we go to the grocery store, you point to every balloon in the store. We took you out for a walk in your stroller which you tolerated for a little - but you are not a fan. You prefer to be active. We also took you to a number of houses this month as we were looking for a new house to purchase. We found one and will be moving at the end of the summer. We know you will love it - more room, a big yard, and a great neighborhood.

I can't believe I gave birth to you a year ago. I had no idea what I was getting into at the time. I remember leaving the hospital with you and thinking they were nuts to send you home with us and no one to check up on you. Your Dad and I were dumbstruck new parents for a while, but we are getting the hang of things. We love you more each day.

dedication

Today we dedicated Annie to God. At our church, we dedicate the child to the God, committing to raising her in Christ - and then when she decides she wants to follow the Lord, she can choose to be baptized.

Dedicating Annie to God makes us think about her life and her future. We want so many things for her - good friends, happiness, success. All of the usual things parents want. We also want her to get caught, make hard decisions, and conquer challenges. It's hard to want things that might be seen as negative for your child. But we know that that is how character builds and how she will grow into being a kind and successful adult. And when the time comes, we want Annie partying it up in heaven with us, worshiping our Lord.

And so we have dedicated her. We have committed to raising her in a loving home in the light of Christ. We will teach her everything we can and pray and call on God for the rest. And we know that He won't fail.

videos

update

I'm still trying to get back to posting more often than Annie's birthdays. It's been hard because life feels very busy right now. Number one reason - our daughter is a very busy person. Always into something, playing with something, doing something. We are all trying to get more sleep and hopefully that will give me more time. :)

So we put a contract in on a house! It's in Fairfax and we love it. Great neighborhood, house that we can grow into, move in ready but we can update things as we have the time and funds. We are very excited. We will move twice - once to get things out of the townhouse in order to put it on the market in July and then again in September when the new homeowner finishes renting our new house from us. We've begun packing and doing little updates in the townhouse like new light fixtures, etc. Annie has proven to be much better at unpacking than packing.

Annie is walking, but not as her primary mode of transportation yet. She will walk across the room or down the hall - particularly when distracted. But she still crawls to really get places. I'm guessing in a few weeks we will officially have a walker.

Annie has started recognizing words. She learned to point to things, so now we can test words. Where's Mommy? (she points to me) Where's your balloon? (point to balloon) and so on. She knows a lot of words! She talks a lot, but she doesn't have specific words assigned to a single object yet. She says dada for Matt, but she also says it for me, dogs, grandparents, anything that makes her happy, and as a general chit chatting sound. Her one consistent sound so far is she uses the N sound for things she doesn't like. It's so funny to us because we don't use the word NO with her. Don't get all in a tizzy - we aren't that permissive! We just use the reason for the no instead. Hot. Yucky. etc. But somehow she still assigned the N sound to no. :)

Annie is waving bye bye now. It's very cute. The best bye bye waving is at night. We do her routine as a family - bath, dress, stories, pray. Then after the prayer, Matt says goodnight and I sign a song and then put her in her crib. When she is really tired, she will wave bye bye to Matt before he is ready to leave. "You are dismissed, I need to go to bed. See ya Daddy."

Annie and I have been running errands a lot the past few days. It's amazing how many people talk to me because of her. They all just think she is sooo cute and have questions and want to talk to her. It's really fun and sweet. Luckily running errands with her is a long process anyhow, so I'm already settled into taking things slow - that makes the talking fun and not bothersome. Annie totally brings it on too. There's a big counter along the line at the post office and as we stand in line, I stand her up on the counter and she starts dancing. It's a hit with most people in line. I mean if you are waiting in a long line at the post office mid morning on a week day, why not watch the cute baby dance to no music.

And speaking of dancing - she cracks me up. She randomly starts dancing - and there doesn't have to be any music. She'll be walking down the hall, stop, and dance - and then start walking again. When one of her toys starts playing music, that's a cue to dance too. She bends her knees to go up and down, but she also sometimes will swing her butt side to side. It's killer cute.

Yesterday Annie started up with separation anxiety again. Much stronger this time. I usually say I'll be right back if I'm going to leave the room for a moment. Yesterday she was having fun playing and I said it. She threw down the toy, started crying, stood up, and clung to me for 20 minutes. It was surprising to me. My guess is that this comes with walking.

So there's an update for you!

little bit of walking

Happy 11 Months Annabelle!

Wow! 11 months! Annie - you are growing so fast!

We've had a busy month with you. You've been working on learning to walk. A few weeks ago you started walking only holding one of our hands. This week you've taken more and more steps on your own each day. Today I think we've counted 4 or 5. We think you don't realize that you can do it yet - once you do, you'll be off! You are also big on dancing - doesn't matter where - the counter of the post office, home, at church - doesn't matter if there's music or not either - you just like to dance and we love to watch.

You had a growth spurt and all of a sudden grew out of your 9 month clothes and into the 12 month clothes. In some cases 18 month clothes. Your hair is coming in some, but it is very pale blond and wispy so it's still not very obvious. You have one curl at the back of your head and it's very cute.

Your favorite things to do right now are walking, walking, and walking. When our backs can't take it anymore, you'll settle for being under a blanket playing with us and jumping. You also like exploring, banging things together, and of course reading. You are still very into books - you love to read with us, you love to read on your own, and you love to pull the books out of the book box and just look at them. Mid month we discovered just how much you've been taking in when we read to you. We spread your books around you and begin reciting one of them from memory. You will look around and select the book that we are reciting. We change books and start a new one and you will put down the first and pick up the new one. It's rather impressive - we've tested it a number of times and it looks like you really know what you are doing. You are one smart cookie.

Things we've done this month - we've hit a few festivals. You enjoy petting zoos, so I keep a look out for petting zoos so you can pat the animals. Everyone is always impressed with your confidence with animals. You are sweet with them and curious at the same time. We have also attended a wedding and a large Memorial Day picnic. You enjoyed both, but you seems to have some seasonal allergies that made it tough for you the following day. We went over to Shawn and Shannon's house and you had a lot of fun playing in their cats' water bowl; it was really cute. We've also gotten together with some of your friends - Kaleigh and Leah, Charlie and Katie, Kayleigh, Anson, and Molly. Lastly, we painted pottery for Mother's Day gifts - it was a mess, but fun and they turned out great!

The big scare of the month was when we gave you scrambled eggs for the first time. You broke out in hives and we had to rush to the store for medicine and keep an eye on you to make sure we didn't have to go to the hospital. It was scary for Mommy, but you were a trooper and were hardly bothered by it.

Annie, we love you. We love that you are part of our family.