A Day in the Life

Today was a good day. It was filled with a morning of coloring and a make believe tea party, lunch and an escalator ride with Daddy, a carousel ride followed by MORE escalator rides, another dance recital, a bubble bath and a bed time story filled with snuggles and giggles. Strike that. It was a great day.

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! 

A New Twist on Valentine's Day

I have never made a big deal about Valentine's Day. I really don't care about roses and chocolate and expensive dinners. That doesn't mean that Husband hasn't gone above and beyond in celebrating over the years; but when we decided to go easy this year, I wasn't disappointed. Instead, we celebrated our little love's very first Valentine's Day together. Because the day is really all about love in general and, we LOVE this little girl more than words can say.

We started the day with heart-shaped cottage cheese pancakes with raspberry-banana puree.

Then, we met Daddy for lunch at the mall. Conveniently, his office is in the Galleria Towers, so after eating a romantic Chick-fil-A lunch, Daddy headed back to work and Catherine and I enjoyed her very first "double doozie" cookie (I enjoyed 98% of it all by myself. She enjoyed a couple mini M&M's and some frosting).

Then we picked out a pretty pony and enjoyed a carousel ride...

...and Catherine enjoyed reading her first Valentine's Day card from Mommy and Daddy.

As far as Husband and I, we exchanged cards and enjoyed watching our favorite little love spend a day engrossed in love. Best Valentine's Day yet.

Catching Up

There is a new sound in our house: the pitter-patter of tiny little feet as they WALK around. We officially have a walker on our hands and now spend the majority of our time catching up to her. Watching her toddle around is one of the cutest things I have ever seen (and she's still slow enough to catch).

(Try to ignore my coaching...)

My mind has been racing lately. It's full of nostalgia for the past year and excitement for the upcoming. This time last year, I was excited about my upcoming baby shower, having no clue what the next week would bring me. Merely three days after the shower, gifts still piled in the basement, nothing washed, nothing put away, the car seat still in the box, we welcomed our baby girl to this world. A little early, but right on time. And our world changed forever.

I look back on this past year and can count on one hand the number of times I have hired a baby sitter. I have yet to sleep a single night away from her. I spend my days and my nights with this tiny person and have gotten to watch her grow and develop every day. For nearly 365 days, I have watched her breathe in and out with the lungs she grew inside of me. I have watched her eyes, my eyes, follow me, look for me, love me. I have watched her mouth, Husband's mouth, grin and laugh and cry and sprout new teeth and new words. I watched her fingers learn to grasp, learn to pass things from one hand to the other, learn to feed herself one tiny piece of food at a time. I watched her go from lying down to sitting up, to rolling, to crawling, to standing, and now walking. 

I have heard her cry and laugh and call for me and Husband and Banks in her own sweet language. I have felt this child with every sense, with every fiber of my being. She is my heart. My whole heart.

As we embark on her second year of life, I am so very grateful for the first. I am humbled by the job of motherhood. Although I've been here all along, I find myself just now catching up, just now realizing the magnitude of this past year. And I am in awe of this child, all she has become and all she will be. 

Dad

C and I are missing Husband this week while he travels for work. I just couldn't help but tear up while reading this blog post from another daddy of a daughter, and for lack of anything else to write about tonight, here it is:

50 Rules for Dads of Daughters

Come home soon, Daddy!

Turning 39 One More Time

I used to still think my dad was is the coolest. That's the thing about having such a great dad. The older I get, the cooler he becomes. Yesterday, my dad turned *ahem* fifty! If you ask him, he's still 39, but I'll let him tell that to whomever will believe it. It's the least I could do. It is his birthday, after all.

He's accomplished a lot in fifty years and I've been lucky enough to be a part of the last twenty seven. Growing up as an Army brat, his childhood stories were always my favorite. I still love to hear him recount his teenage years in Germany at Pirmasens American Junior High School. I was amazed how many broken bones resulted from silly boy bets (girls just don't do that!) and, even more, I loved the stories of he and my mom meeting in high school in Montgomery and working together on the yearbook. Thanks to facebook for these gems from PAJH:

 

It's amazing how quickly time passes sometimes. Just last week, he was teaching me to ride a bike; and a few days later, to drive a car, making me drive in circles in the same Jeff Davis High School parking lot where he learned to drive. Dad is the reason I love a lot of things. He introduced me to good coffee and foreign cuisine. He made sure my vocabulary was never lacking, enforcing use of the "word of the day" each day. Because of that, I use words like copious and perfunctory on a regular basis. He encourages patriotism with our homework assignment each Independence Day and encourages goofiness always, which I appreciate (sans the span of my tweens in which he was the most embarrassing dad in the whole world).


He's a talented writer and an even better speaker. I may have gotten my love of writing from him, but the talent of speech did not make it my way. I am in awe of how he commands a room, whether it were a PTA meeting at my elementary school, a program with Alabama's Junior Miss, or even his Sunday School class. He is well liked, appreciated, respected. 


He's the person people call when they need help (partly because he never sleeps, but mostly because they know he'll be there for them wholly). He's involved, invested, and dependable; but most importantly, he has a good time. It's no wonder why he's always surrounded by people. They just want to join in on the fun.

I've been racking my brain for something deeply moving and symbolic of his fifty years on this earth, an analogy that would sum up the weight of it all. But all I could think of is how glad I am that he was born fifty years ago, and that if I am half the person he's taught me to be when I'm fifty, I'll consider myself blessed.

Fifty looks good on you, Dad. You wear it well.

Happy Birthday, Dad (Poppa)! Thank you for being you. We love you so very much!

Like Father, Like Daughter

Husband is a bit of a computer nerd. Like, the kind of nerd that says "pwned" in everyday conversation and makes onesies for his daughter like this one:

Lucky for him, we happen to love nerds around here.

Lately, C has become a bit of a technophile as well. She is definitely her father's daughter. Since around 3 months old, we have fully embraced the wonder that is Baby Einstein. This happy show of hand puppets and rotating images of bubbles and syrup has kept C's attention while I did exciting things like shower and eat. But lately, her love of technology has expanded a bit. 

She loves my iPad. I mean loves my iPad. I'm pretty she thinks it's hers. I downloaded some child friendly games and she not only recognizes them, but knows exactly what to do. Some of her favorites are Bubble Popper Pro, Farm Animals for Toddlers, and Fruit Ninja.

Then there is the issue of the cell phone. It's shiny. It glows. We talk to Daddy on speaker phone. Why wouldn't it be appealing? The thing is, I am already a terrible phone owner. I drop them in water, down stairs, into glasses of tea. Bad things happen to my phones. So, not wanting to add "death by baby" to reasons I am no longer insurable, we did the only logical thing.

Got her her own.

Don't worry. It's my dad's old Motorola RAZR. She can't go over on her data plan and apparently, it is delicious.

Her birthdays are going to get expensive very fast. I should be worried, right?

Daddy's Girls

Something happens to a man when he becomes the father of a little girl. While he still maintains the manly gene responsible for finding fishing, golf, and baseball interesting, a soft spot develops in his heart, pushing the baseball cards and golf clubs aside, and making room for all things pink and frilly. 

My dad has never been the typical dad. I mean this in a good way. He was always there, ever present, wholly involved. His odd work hours which began his day at 3:00 a.m. allowed him to also be a room "mom", drive on field trips, serve as PTA president, and drive the carpool to dance and cheerleading practice. Often, he was the only dad there, comfortably chatting among the moms and passing out Gatorade and orange slices during breaks. He knows how to fix a tap shoe, how to turn a tutu into a bustle, and can fix a mean side ponytail. He hates, yet embraces, that glitter is a part of life. And, when challenged by my sister and me, he can do a headstand (well.... sort of...).

Always the "funny" dad, he made up songs about everything, gave all my friends silly nicknames, and kept my slumber parties lively. One of his silly songs still gets stuck in my head for days:

A fish is an animal that lives in the sea. It eats peanut butter and drinks iced tea.

He can quote many a "chick flick" and is only now, with both daughters grown and married, starting to get his fill of movies with car chases and explosions. He is the father of two very girly girls who after attempting soccer and basketball, settled on dance and cheerleading. His life has been full of assembling Barbie's dream house and reattaching Ken's leg and he stopped hunting the day I asked him why he wanted to kill Bambi. He's the daddy of daughters.

Father Daughter dance at my wedding

While I am very much my mother's daughter, so much of me is him. My love of writing and great Southern literature is from him as is my tendency to procrastinate (having watched him, on multiple occasions, write a speech en route to giving it). As a child, he took me on bicycle adventures and, after many painful sessions, taught me how to drive. He taught me how to change my oil, to change a tire, and how to cook. And even as I now have a daughter of my own, I am still a daddy's girl.

When I found out I was pregnant with baby C, part of me imagined how excited he might be if I gave him a grandson. Someone who would appreciate his signed Mickey Mantle ball instead of rolling it up and down the hallway like my sister and I did, diminishing its value with each toss. Someone to share his baseball cards with. Someone who would think bugs were cool instead of shrieking at their presence. 

But, when I told him we were having a little girl, he was thrilled. Thrilled to get to experience the Barbies and dance recitals and tea parties all over again. Thrilled to have a little tiny person with a giant bow shrieking to be picked up and tossed in the pool. Thrilled to now have a Poppa's girl. 

Poppa's girl

Having a daughter changes a man.

I see these changes in Husband as he snuggles his baby girl and sings Disney songs in the car. The youngest of four boys, his childhood memories mostly involve broken bones and dirt bike adventures. He spent summer nights digging for night crawlers while I spent mine catching lightning bugs. His Friday night movie selection was never The Little Mermaid. 

But, with two sweet nieces and now a little girl of his own, he gets it. He's changed a little to allow room for all of the pink and make-believe. He still loves an afternoon spent watching the Braves, but now, he does it with a tiny person in his lap, explaining to her as she listens intently how each play is impacting his fantasy team. He has mastered dressing her in little lace dresses with slips and teeny tiny buttons and he understands the importance of a properly placed flower headband. But there is oh so much more to come.

And I simply can't wait to watch him from my ringside seat over the years. 

Daddy's girl (perfectly placed
beneath the antlers on Daddy's t-shirt).

Happy Father's Day to my wonderful dad and Happy first Father's Day to my sweet Husband. We certainly are lucky girls to have such wonderful men in our lives.

Super Dad

Last weekend, we celebrated the marriage of my sister to Peter at Children's Harbor on Lake Martin.  The day was absolutely perfect, a sunny 86 degrees, blue skies, blue water. But, as we neared this weekend with a newly fussy six week old, I had my doubts.

For six weeks, I had loved my new role as a stay-at-home mom, but my role as matron of honor meant that I had to relinquish my role as mom for a few hours. Husband was quick to step up in the childcare department and would have her for basically the entire day and throughout the wedding all by himself. I certainly wasn't worried. He's a great dad. But as I have experienced, C is not always predictable and recently, not always consolable. 

Husband's role as Super Dad started the night before the wedding as he took over feedings so I could get a little sleep and not add haggard to the mommy weight I was sporting in wedding photos that would last forever. Then, as I spent two hours getting ready, it was Super Dad to the rescue with bottles and burping, swaddling and soothing. I left for the church at 12:00, leaving him to dress the littlest flower girl in her fancy dress (including slip and headband), as well as feed and transport her to the chapel for the 3:00 wedding. 


Not only did he accomplish all of this flawlessly, but was able to keep C quiet in the 100 degree chapel throughout the entire ceremony, including pictures afterward. She was spent from being adorable and slept through the entire reception, passed from person to person without a peep, but Husband made sure he knew where she was at all times, when she needed to eat again, etc. And when the men's restroom didn't have a changing table, he even tried to change her in the women's restroom (to no avail). (We will be writing a strongly worded letter about that!) Overall, he made sure that I could enjoy every moment of my sister's wedding while still enjoying being Mommy and I couldn't be more grateful for my super husband and Super Dad.

Our family of three at sunset