The Excitement Continues

As I said in the last post, Meili's birthday party was this Saturday. Even though it was November 5th (because that worked the best as far as scheduling), I still wanted to do a Halloween party. Our house was super crowded, because Josh and I both have big families now and there were lots of rowdy kids, and the whole thing was a little bit chaotic. But I still thought it was super fun, and we're very grateful for everyone who came and was a good sport about all the chaos.

(I always forget to take pictures of the decorations before the party, so this was after the fact. But you can still see them.) My sister, mom and I made these pumpkins a few years ago as Thanksgiving decorations, and my mom let me borrow them for the event. I still love them!

I made the banner and am hoping that it will hold up for a few years, so I can get my money's worth out of it. Scrapbook paper is more expensive than it was the last time I bought single sheets! I also made the cupcakes-which was quite a fiasco. We had pumpkin (against Josh's wishes), chocolate, and funfetti (because I LOVE funfetti!)

The night started with some kids games, including face painting. Two of my friends from work were nice enough to agree to do the face painting (even though they wanted everyone to know that they are not pro.) I thought they did a great job, and the kids loved it! Thanks Jen and Jillian.

I'm sure Bren (and Jillian) would like me to let everyone know that this is a snake and not a worm!

Alex and his spider.

Alex and Bren came back later for bats too!

This is the best picture I got of Meili in her bee costume. Even though she hates costumes she did pretty well with this one throughout the night. I think there was so much going on, that she forgot she was wearing it.

Look who came to Meili's party! It's Dwight and Jim from the office! (Hee Hee Hee) My sister-in-law Sarah, prepped us for Shasta's costume by saying how excited she was, and what a good costume it was. I was not expecting this!! She even has her stuff in jello with her!

What a good sport! I'm sure she'll get revenge on them later for dressing her up like this!

Here's another example of parent's torturing their kids when they have no say. Wynn was such a cute little stinker. Everytime I saw him, he was still smiling, even though his parents are so mean!!

Chloe the cat, and Gigi the cheerleader. (My very talented mom made both their costumes!)

Audrey as none other than Fancy Nancy!

My sister Bethany with Kennedy...

...who is obviously Pebbles

Yes, it was Meili's birthday, but I think the skunk was Josh's highlight. While Meili was opening presents, Josh got a little sidetracked taking pictures.

Get me out of here!

Meili opening shoes from Grandma and Grandpa

An Aggie outfit from Jake

I added this picture because it shows the stroller that we got for Meili (which I was super excited about), and it does a little bit of justice for the chaos that was Meili's party.

Here's Meili just getting going with her cake. She started out by taking the spiders off. Then she picked all the little purple dots off and ate them. Then she dug her fingers in through the spider web. When she really got going, and started getting messy, she dropped the cake on the floor. I think she enjoyed herself.

I was trying to get a picture of her messy face, and she was distracted, so when I tried to get her attention, I startled her and she started crying. It's sad, but I kind of like this picture.

What a fun family Meili has! Thanks everyone for coming, and for all your love for Meili. She is so lucky!

Too Excited to Sleep

There was a Disneyland commercial when I was younger, where a family was getting ready to go to Disneyland, and she went into her parents room in the middle of the night and told them that she was too excited to sleep. I totally know the feeling.

I told Josh and my mom in the last couple of weeks that I have never been so excited for a birthday in my life. (Granted, my sisters disagree. They think I was probably more excited for my own birthday when I was 5, 8, or 10 (Inside joke)). In the last month, I can think of at least a few nights that I couldn't sleep because I was planning for Meili's birthday. The funny thing is, I knew exactly how it was going to go: she would have no idea that her birthday was any different than any other day. I would go to work and she would go to daycare. She would take a few naps, we'd try to get her to eat food. Then we'd try to get her to open presents, and she'd wonder why we were making her go through so much work to see clothes that look like everything else that's already in her closet. Yes, not much would change on that day, but I was still so excited.

This wasn't actually on her birthday. When Josh bought seeds for our garden, he bought pumpkin seeds, because he said that Meili would need a pumpkin since her birthday is on Halloween. We planted 4 plants, and got this one tiny pumpkin. Lucky for us, it's just the right size for Meili and she loved it.

I love this picture. It totally looks like she's posing. Because Meili's birthday is on Halloween, and we were having her party this weekend, the only "birthday stuff" that we did on her birthday, was open presents. I also didn't make her actually dress up for Halloween, since she would have to wear her costume at her party, and she doesn't particularly like costumes.

Don't you just love that picture!

I've shopped for presents for Meili all month (well actually for a few months.) and I might as well have just stopped with this ball. It was her favorite! I took A LOT of pictures with the ball, but they're all blurry because she was moving too fast cause she was so excited. (I also could have gotten her a camera, because rather than opening presents, she just wanted to play with my camera.)

I thought she would like this car the most. (I feel like these cars are kind of a standard one-year old present.) She doesn't like it so much. She hasn't even touched it since her birthday, and we've stopped trying to get her to play with it. (And we got it for super cheap which is why it looks like a boy car.)

New developments this month:

-Meili tried really hard to get some teeth out before her first birthday-but with little success. We can see them barely under her gums, so any day now.

-I also had a glimmer of hope that she would start walking before her birthday, but no such luck. She took 3 steps on the 22nd, but now, even though I think she could walk, she chickens out. She's kind of regressed, so now I don't know if she will even before Thanksgiving.

-We've started transitioning from bottles. I really think Meili couldn't care less. She's never been much of a food girl anyway. Josh and I are just having a hard time cause bottles are so convenient.

-She's pretty much transitioned to whole milk, and didn't mind that change either.

-Her chattering just gets more fun everyday.

-And, no matter how hard I try, I can't get her to keep shoes on for anything.

At her doctor's appointment on Friday, she weighed 17 lbs. even (with a full diaper no less). Which puts her barely below the chart (in the 2nd percentile). Can you believe that? She's gained one pound in 3 months! I do think it's funny that she was exactly 8 lbs. when she was born, and exactly 17 at her 12 month appointment. She was also 29 1/2 inches which is the 63 percentile. So at least her weight can be a little more evenly distributed in her body.

Happy Birthday Big Girl!

1 Year pictures

After reading the title, I know, you're thinking, "Have you gone nuts Kaleena?" Well, as a matter of fact I have. But, in spite of that fact, I do realize that Meili is not 1 year old yet. Oh, trust me, I am savoring every last minute of my baby before I have to start calling her a toddler. However, I decided at the last minute that I wanted to get Meili's 1 year pictures taken outside before it got too cold. So, one of my coworker's husband's, who is an aspiring photographer, graciously agreed to try his hand with our crazy little wiggle worm. After the first few outside, he said that she was doing better than other kids that he had worked with...I think he was regretting his words later that night :) JK! I think she did as well as can be expected for the fact that I had tried on about 7 outfits on her that day, and she didn't get to do anything she wanted for about 2 hours straight. Anyway, enough talk... Brady, Jillian, and Holly, thank you very much for all your hard work! We love them!

For the rest of you, enjoy...

This is more of an outtake, but how cute is that face?

How big is Meili? SO Big!

And, I AM HERE!

I love this picture, because Meili has a Pooh Bear like this that she loves, and she will just go up and cuddle with him randomly.

This is Jillian's family's horse, how cute is that?

Please don't grow up anymore baby. I can't handle it.

11 Months

So, for real this time, this is my favorite stage of Meili's so far. I swear, she gets more and more fun every month.

-I think it was toward the end of last month that she learned to get down the stairs by herself. That made life a lot easier for me because now she can go up and down all day, as much as she wants.

-She also has gotten better about playing by herself.

-Meili is chattering more and more everyday, and Josh and I like to pretend that she is saying whatever it is that it sounds like.

-She has gotten better at cruising around the furniture, but she really can't stand by herself, so I don't know if she'll start walking this month or if it will be next month, but probably pretty soon.

-One of my favorite things, is that she gets more cuddly the older she gets. When she is playing, every once in awhile, she will turn around and just come hug Josh or I. I LOVE THAT! She also has a baby that she hugs every time she sees it, and a Pooh Bear that she loves to cuddle with.

-While we were in Texas she learned how to clap, and that's the only thing, so far, that we can get her to do on command.

-I also like that we can feed her pretty much anything we're eating.

Yes, I've loved this month, but I'm sad that this is the last month before she turns one. She's so old :(

In this picture, I think Meili is saying, "Not now, Mom! This is so embarrasing!"

This is of Meili eating a donut. Yes, she is taking after both her mom and dad, and she LOVES sweets. I don't know how babies know what is good for them and what isn't right off the bat, but if we try to feed her bread and a donut at the same time, she will turn down the bread, and always eat the donut! I don't get it, but it happens every time!

There was a time that I said that Meili was pretty neat when she was eating. Those days are long gone!

I wish this picture wasn't blurry! Because I swear that's the cutest face I've ever seen!

Yes, she also likes ice cream sandwiches :)

And I gave Meili her first haircut today. Yes, that was pretty much as many hairs as I cut. And yes, there is more hair than that when I shave my legs. But it really was a huge difference, and I couldn't stop looking at the change all day long. Such a big girl!

No Need to Stress

We took a quick trip with Josh's brother Jared, and his wife Amy this weekend to Texas. As many of you know, I am a pretty high-stress person, and that only intensifies when it comes to Meili. So as the trip got closer and closer I found more and more reasons to stress.

1) The flight: I was so worried about how Meili would handle the air pressure change, being held for like 5 hours straight, and the fact that it was interrupting her nap schedule. Plus, I've heard horror stories about children on flights and I didn't want everyone to hate us. The result: We took lots of snacks, treats, and toys, and it wasn't a problem at all. Plus, she ended up sleeping about the half the time. (And I think she loved taking naps in her daddy's arms, so she was fine.)

2) Sleeping at night: Meili has always been so good about sleeping through the night, but I didn't know how she would do sleeping in a strange place, and with other people getting up at night or moving around, etc. etc. Plus, I didn't want her to keep everyone else up if she did end up crying herself to sleep, or coughing at night. The result: She was awesome. As soon as the lights were out, she found a comfortable spot, and zonked out. She never really woke up crying, and she didn't cough at all at night-the first time in weeks! She slept on an air mattress with either Josh or I and I think that was actually pretty fun for her, because she never sleeps with us.

3) Naps: I have worked 10 long months to get her naps to where they are now, and she is a different child when she hasn't had her naps. The result: We ended up driving and flying at pretty much the perfect times, so she stayed on almost her same napping routine.

4) Driving: We had to drive for about 4 hours and we've never gone that long with her. In case you don't know, Meili is pretty active and likes to just crawl around and get in to things. The result: We broke the drive up, and she still did awesome. She slept for about 2 hours, and we kept her entertained for about an hour.

5) The ball games: We went to 3 ball games in 3 days, which means lots of loud noise, being held yet again, and messing up her nap routine again. The result: Meili was totally fine. She even took a little bit of a nap in each game (even in a stadium with 100,000 people) There are only a few people that I know that could do that! And she learned how to clap! Yea!

Moral of the story: Meili is awesome and I never should have doubted!! (And Josh was SO helpful-which I also shouldn't have doubted!)

Here's Meili on her first flight. We flew out on Saturday morning.

We quickly stopped in Dallas at the JFK memorial.

Pretty much where my head is, is the mark on the street where JFK was shot.

I don't know why or how this tradition started, but people were taking turns taking their picture on the X-which is where JFK was fatally wounded.

The grassy knoll, where they suspect another shooter was hiding. This was just a short detour on our trip, but I thought it was very interesting, and there were a lot of well-deserved memorials for such a loved president.

We went to a Texas Rangers baseball game on Saturday afternoon. The sad part is that when we originally planned the trip, the game was scheduled for 7:00. Well, they changed the time, and we had no idea. So when we stopped to get lunch, the game-that we were supposed to go to was currently being played. So we were only able to go to a couple innings. I think Meili was fine with that. :)

It was still a beautiful stadium though- and it's a good thing that the Rangers won. We didn't have such good luck the rest of the trip :(

The Dallas Cowboys stadium is across the street. So we got this shot when it wasn't busy.

Our family, outside home plate.

The next day, we went to a Houston Astros game. Jared lived in Houston for a year, and that's his team. Sadly, they are the worst team in the league right now. But that meant we were able to get really good seats, pretty cheap, and the game wasn't crowded at all.

The final score of the game... 19-3. Ah, nuts!

I thought this was a cute picture. (If you notice the bruise on her face...First daycare battle wound. Ugh! I was mad!)

See...proof of how much Meili loved the game!

Then on Monday, we went to the Dallas Cowboys game. (Or, more importantly, the Washington Redskins game-because we all refused to cheer for the Cowboys!)

How could something so cute have caused me such stress?

Daddy and baby getting all pumped up before the game.

The stadium was huge, it was so crazy!

Then we had to test out the sports mode, and zoom on the camera. Because, trust me, we were in the nose bleeds!

Again, sadly, the Redskins lost with a last minute fumble. But we all still had fun!

We found the secret weapon for flying... Ring pops!

All in all, I'd call it a success.