First Word

We have our first word! {insert drum roll please...} DADDY!

We've been hearing sounds for months that are 'daddy', 'ball', doggie' - but she didn't seem to actively link the sounds she made to the thing they represented. Until last night. Dan came home from work, and Kendra and I were upstairs. She crawled to the baby gate and was looking down. As soon as she saw him, her face lit up and she said "daddy!"

Although words are slow in coming, we are amazed at how much she understands. If you ask her questions she will answer you with little sounds that mean yes or no. She's also learned to point to what she wants, which is a tremendous help in figuring out what she's after.

We also, officially, have four teeth. The second top one has been giving her trouble for weeks, and it finally broke through yesterday. Yay! Four down, 22 more to go.

The First Birthday Party

We celebrated Kendra's first birthday today, with about 25 of our friends. We had rented some picnic tables in the park, decorated with lots of balloons, and had a great time. The area was perfect as there was a playground right next to us for the older kids to occupy themselves with.

The weather was a gorgeous mid-70's day, with lots of sunshine. (See Dan's sunburned head as proof). We BBQd some brats and burgers, and topped it off with a yummy white cake filled with strawberry mousse.

Dan gave Kendra a beautiful dress to wear (she's opening it in the above picture) that he picked out himself. I was pretty impressed! I gave her the "It's my birthday" crown that she actually wore, for a few minutes anyway. Mostly she crawled around, ate things off the ground and watched the bigger kids play on the playground.

Click here for all the pics from the party.

Of course, since Kendra didn't actually want to take the time to eat at her party, she's now starving. She's already eaten a hamburger, some veggie stick chips, blueberries and she's working on cherries while trying to convince Dan to give her some pizza.

For All the Parents To Be

In my fantastic group of friends, right now there are a bevy of pregnant women. This post is for them, and the dad's-to-be, of course.

This is such an exciting time! Being pregnant has its ups and downs; its scary, emotional moments; and moments where you could conquer the world. You wonder if you are up to the task - after all serial killers had moms too, right? You think back to your own childhood, and realize all your parents did wrong. (Yes, I'm being very tongue-in-cheek here - but they are things that ran through my mind.)

Are you ready? Can you really do this? These thoughts are all normal, and yes, you can. In my humble opinion, one of the best things any parent can do is love their child unconditionally. Luckily, that's the easiest part of being a parent. Unfortunately, it's also the hardest part.

In between picking nursery colors and dreaming of what your new little person will be like, I have a game, of sorts, for you to play. Hopefully it will help you chuckle when you need it. Find a nice notebook, or the back of your baby book, and start a log of phrases you never thought you'd have to say as a parent. As time goes on, and your sweet, compliant lump of baby turns into a demanding, mobile, opinionated toddler, go back to that log and write down the date you actually had to say the phrase.

Be creative! Some of my personal favorites are:

• Don't play in the toilet
• Don't eat the toilet paper from the middle of the role...start at the end so we have less to clean up.
• Get out of the dishwasher.
• Don't lick the dog.
• Stop biting my toes.
• You're right! Spaghetti sauce does make good hair gel.
• No matter how much you cry, you're not getting daddy's beer (I thought we'd have until at least her teens for this one!)
• Don't eat the... {insert correct word} SD card, twig, rock, sticker, leaf, shoe, bug, paper clip, penny, cigarette butt...

Ok, so forget what I said earlier about love...the most important thing for you to do as a parent is keep your sense of humor!

Good luck to you all! May God bless you with an easy labor and a baby that sleeps through the night quickly.

Mom and Baby Survive Bus Ride

Kendra and I took ourselves on a small adventure this afternoon. We hopped a city bus - alone - for the first time ever! We successfully navigated our way to Pike Place Market (ok, there were no transfers and pretty much a straight shot, but still!) We bought my dad a father's day gift, restocked our supply of spices, picked up some fresh fruit and a peirosky for dinner and found our bus home.

I think we both rather enjoyed it. Definitely beat dealing with rush hour traffic and hordes of tourists who have no idea where they are going - but know they don't want to park more than 10 feet away from it. Parking is always bad here. During summer months it's downright horrendous.

It may be silly, but I'm pretty proud of us!

Cute But Deadly

She's cute; I'll even go so far as adorable. But at the rate this child is going she will not live long enough to see her first birthday.

Our darling daughter has learned what the word no means, and she doesn't like it. When said offending word is directed at her, she will - very loudly - voice her displeasure. On a really good day, there are even real tears.

She's also come to some very definitive conclusions as to how the world should be. When the world does not conform to her ideas, such as the cabinet she wants into not opening, she lets us know - again very loudly - of her displeasure.

The terrible twos have started before age one. We are so screwed.

In other news, my co-worker had her baby last Monday - 3 weeks early. Mom and new baby boy are both doing wonderfully, and I'm back up to full time. Kai agreed to babysit for us for 3 hours a day so I can get some uninterrupted work time. Hopefully it's a very temporary situation until she finds full time work, but I have to say - she is fabulous! I've felt less stressed this past week than I have in months!

We are frantically preparing our house for Dan's mom arrival next Sunday. Mostly it's cleaning the guest room, but we're also trying to accomplish some little projects. I have several pictures that have needed to be hung for a while, so we got some of those up. Today we hung a 6' bamboo blind on our deck. It will help block the afternoon sun from coming in the sliding glass doors and hopefully keep the house cooler. I also bought some thermal lined Roman shades for the office. Again, the afternoon sun is brutal coming in there. The shades will hopefully block the light and heat and make that room more tolerable to work in during the afternoons.

Thank you Cousin Michelle for the adorable dress Kendra is wearing in the picture. Both of them you gave her look great! (And she is clutching her favorite toy - "Octi" the stuffed Octopus. Of all the cute stuffed animals she has, the stupid octopus we bought as a joke from Goodwill was chosen as her luvie; her must-have-at-all-times. I've already ordered two more off the net - just in case!)