Party Time!

The Sunday following C's birthday, we invited family and friends to our house to celebrate our girl with an "Under the Sea" themed birthday party. Since she was about 3 months old, Catherine has been mesmerized by the Baby Neptune episode of Baby Einstein. It is all about water and there is an octopus that she absolutely loves. She even has an octopus toy from the show that she's played with for just as long. So it only seemed appropriate that we run with that and go all out for an under the sea party!

I decorated every night after putting C to bed for the entire week before, but still needed the last minute help of my mom, sister, sister-in-law, and Husband until 2:00 a.m. the night before! We may have gone a little overboard, but you only turn one once, right?

When guests arrived, they were asked to write a note to the birthday girl in a book from my childhood called My Very Own Octopus. It was on display by a 10 month portrait, her invitation, and her birth announcement.

Her monthly photos from the past year were displayed in the living room.

The dining room was decorated with a birthday banner, paper lantern octopuses, and a "water wall" made out of streamers; and I made a white slip cover for the seat of honor.

The table was full of sea themed treats, delicious and beautiful cupcakes made by Aunt Mallory, and the octopus cake!

It was so nice to have our house filled to capacity with family and friends to celebrate our sweet girl. It may have been a little crowded, but I wouldn't have had it any other way. She in one lucky girl to have so many people in her life. 

As soon as everyone arrived, we went right for the cake. Maybe it was the crowd of people staring at her, but she was not feeling it this time. 

She was intrigued by the cake topper, until Mommy took it away...

Mean Mommy taking away the choking hazard! 

We needed to cool off for a minute outside before presents.

A little visiting and we were ready to open presents, and more presents, and more presents!

Oh, how I wish she had something to play with!

I can't thank everyone enough for helping us celebrate our one year old. It meant so much to Husband and I to be able to share this with our family and friends. Thank you to everyone who made this day so special! We love you and so does our sweet girl!

Happy Birthday, Catherine! Hope you loved your first party!

The Birthday Girl

Even though we had a big party planned for the weekend, we wanted to spend Catherine's actual birthday with our family of three. Husband took off work and we headed to the McWane Science Center with our one year old! 

I'm not sure who was more excited about going - Catherine or us. Husband and I had never been either, so we were pretty pumped and even more so to get to share this day with her. 

The McWane Center is huge and only a little part of it is toddler appropriate, but we somehow managed to spend three hours there taking it all in. We started with the World of Water because we just knew Catherine would love all the sea life. We were right! She was in awe of all the fish and there were some tanks that were right on her level. She was a little afraid of the big fish (they were bigger than her) and buried herself in my legs, but she loved the smaller, brighter fish and really liked the jellyfish.

...ignoring my double chin because she looks so cute...

After looking at every creature under the sea, we made our way to a play area just for toddlers called "Just Mice Size." As the name suggests, it was mice themed, with a maze and a play area shaped like cheese. In this area, was a miniature sized water table. It is meant to teach water flow with movable dams, waterfalls, and plenty of cups, funnels, and mesh to watch the water move through. It was like a giant river of bath time fun with clothes on. We got soaked and she LOVED it!

A little more play time while we dried off...

 

Then a snack before we headed home...

 

And as we pulled out of the parking deck, our birthday girl was wiped out after a fun filled day!

On the way home, we stopped by Edgar's for a birthday surprise, because it just isn't a first birthday celebration without a little cake smashing.

What a perfect day celebrating the day we became a family of three.

Happy birthday, sweet girl! 

One.

She's one. Our sweet little angel has been in our world for one whole year. Crazy.


In the past year, our house has changed a bit. I love that we now constantly maneuver through a maze of baby gates and that opening a door to the outside now takes a little more effort. I love that there are bibs and burp cloths where koozies and bottle openers used to be.

I love that there is an entire compartment of tiny spoons and forks in my silverware drawer. 

I love that more often than not, our toilet paper looks like this:

And although I've written time after time about loving those sweet newborn snuggles and wanting to pause time with my six month old, I have to say, one is so much fun! 

She is this tiny little person following me around, walking, imitating my every move. She "talks" constantly, carries her baby doll around and "cooks" in her kitchen. She sits in her tiny chair like an adult, lounging with her feet over the edge while watching a movie.  She is funny. She is smart. She is so much of Husband and I combined - organized, deliberate, a bit stubborn - and we can't help but laugh each time we recognize a part of ourselves in this miniature version.

There really are no words to explain the sheer pride and joy felt by not only bringing a child into the world, but watching her grow, think, learn, and develop into a person.


She is growing like a weed, holding strong to the 90th percentile in height at 30.5" long and weighing in at 19 lbs, 6 oz. (25th percentile) at her one year old check up. She eats  basically anything we give her and seems to be eating constantly. Her current favorite, without a doubt, are blueberries. She will eat them all day, every day, until her fingers are purple and her clothes are covered in stains. She also really likes strawberries, grapes, bananas, peas, avocados, chicken, and cheese. She eats banana waffles, cottage cheese pancakes, and blueberry muffins. We're attempting spoon training with yogurt. It's...interesting...

Two spoons. Very little contact with mouth.

She's walking faster and faster each day. I love watching her smile after she realizes she's made it all the way across the room. In every moment of every day, she's learning. At bath time, she watches the water flow from the mouth of a rubber frog, trying to grasp it like a rope as it runs through her tiny fingers. She studies the morning sunlight on the living room floor, gently touching it with a pointed finger before patting it hard with her flattened palm, wondering why she can't pick it up. She turns everything upside down, end over end, trying to figure out how it works.


As we played before bed tonight, I watched her correctly slide a stacking ring onto its post, place shapes into the shape sorter, and then clap her hands; and I realized, I had taught her how to do all of those things. A lot has changed for our family in the past year, one of the biggest being our decision for me to become a stay at home mom, a decision we have never once regretted. And tonight, as I watched my past year's work right before my eyes, I found myself very pleased with my year end review.


Happy first birthday, my love. We love you even more today than yesterday. Our hearts seem to expand daily to accommodate all the love that you give. We are overjoyed with the person you are and the person you will be. You are simply exquisite and there will never be anyone else exactly like you in the entire world. I hope only that you will grow up knowing you are special, you are important, and beyond all else, you are loved. Your Daddy and I can't wait to see what this next year brings with our toddler!