ONE YEAR OLD!

I know they say the baby days just fly by, but boy do they.  I blinked and my baby girl turned one.

Milestones:

Seven teeth
Lots of mimicking our actions and and sounds we make
Different facial expressions, including a pretty mean looking stink eye
Pulling blankets over her own head to play peek-a-boo
Saying "Hiiiiiiiii" and "Heeeyyyy"
Lots of finger pointing

Likes:

Being chased---she'll peak around a corner until we start to come after her and then she RUNS!

Cats---Violet LOVES cats.  She got a book for her birthday called Meow Meow! from her cousin and she went nuts over it.  We also saw a cat on a leash on our outing today which was pretty exciting for her.  

Eating whatever we're eating---she's happiest when she's got food in her mouth.  

Being outside---she loves going for walks, exploring the front and backyard where she likes to pick up and crumble leaves, and swinging.

Dislikes:

As expected, Violet doesn't like being told "no" or not getting what she wants.  Tough life, huh?  The other day I found The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman: The Famous, Inspiring Story of One Woman's Courageous Battle for Freedom amongst her pile of board books.  She's quite the oppressed little reader.

Life Now-a-Days:

Violet is such a sweet, little girl.  She has a smile on her face from the moment she wakes up.  I usually wake up to hearing her on the baby monitor saying "hiiiiiiii" to her little lamb security blanket.  When I go in her room to get her, she offers me a pacifier, though sometimes it's a fake-out.  All day long she is so generous with her hugs and kisses.  She loves to share everything from her toys to her half-chewed food (yummy, right?).

Happy birthday, sweet Violet!

WONDER WEEK 55

If you don't know what I'm talking about when I say we're going through a "wonder week," consider yourself lucky.  If you do know, then have sympathy on us and our sleep deprived sanity.

So Violet's brain is having some major development going on right now, which also means she has been more like a grumpy old man than the sweet little angel baby she usually is.  She's been needier, constantly wanting to be held.  If I try to put her down she pulls her legs up, refusing to stand.  She's been throwing little temper tantrums when she doesn't get what she wants.  And she's been an insomniac the past three days.  Last night she was up until past midnight acting wilder than a meth head hillbilly who just won the lottery.

At the end of this wonder week (which could actually last up to 6 weeks--ugh), Violet will have some new abilities.  I know it's not nearly as mind blowing for everyone else, but it's pretty exciting for me to see her realize she's capable of doing new things.  Some of the new things she's already doing are: mimicking our sounds and actions, pointing at things she wants, putting things back into baskets and drawers instead of just pulling them out and throwing them wildly, and perhaps the most frightening of them all---she's figured out how to climb.  She's not quite tall enough to actually climb on furniture yet, but she has been literally climbing up the baby gates using her toes like a monkey would.  She's also been sharing her most coveted possessions--her pacifiers--which she sweetly offers me when I come into her room to get her after her nap and in the morning.

Here's a little video of Violet "reading" a book that we can't stop watching because she is just so stinking cute.  Seriously.

So if you find yourself Googling rhetorical questions like, "What is wrong with my baby?"  Or "Why won't my child sleep?!!!!" then you are very likely experiencing your own wonder week.  If you survived it without pulling your hair out, I wanna know how.

THROWBACK THURSDAY: OUR ELOPEMENT PARTY

Back in July I wrote a post about our elopement and how Jon and I held a celebratory party a few months after our wedding.  Jon and I didn't really have a true elopement because we actually sent out little notices to our family and friends letting them know we were getting married and inviting them to our party in October.  We held our party at LeMieux Art Gallery in downtown New Orleans.  As expected, it was a gorgeous day.

I mentioned before, and you probably already know, weddings are ridiculously expensive.  Elopement parties, however, are much more affordable.  We shopped around reception halls (whoa---$$$) and art galleries (prices really jumped around) and LeMieux was the best deal, so we booked it! It was a great open space with a back room for the caterers and speakers for our iPod hook-up.  (Not having a band saved us thhhoouuusssaaannnndddsss.)

We rented a handful of tables with linens and a dozen or so chairs expecting most guests to mingle around.  For decorations I bought some mason jars, rocks, and white gerbera daisies.

We had delicious food catered from a restaurant and bakery right outside of New Orleans.  New Orleans has delicious (delicious, delicious, delicious!) food.  Buuuttt when you're feeding over a 100 people, it can get pricey quick!  We also purchased our own drinks and hired a bartender for way less (like 20 times cheaper) than an open bar at a reception hall.

It was really great having so many of our friends and family at our party.  If we had a "real" wedding, there would have been no way (zip, nada, zilch), that we could have afforded to invite as many people.

Jon and I were so happy with how it all turned out.  We had such a great time and we know our friends did too!  Hopefully our less than conventional wedding and reception helps inspire other couples who want to celebrate their marriage with friends and family, but want to keep it simple, affordable, and stress-free.

PUMPKIN PICKIN'

Today we took our little pumpkin to pick out a pumpkin.  I love Halloween, so I'm really eager to bring her to a pumpkin patch with hayrides, corn mazes, and face painting, but she's too young to enjoy it.  So instead we took her to a nursery not too far from us that has a bunch of different kinds of pumpkins--- orange, yellow, white, big, small, tall & skinny, fat & short, warty, and striped.    

Violet was quick to let go of my hand and investigate every rock, pumpkin, and bale of hay the place had.  She was especially keen on two little kitties that were just as interested in her as she was in them.

The only thing that would have made the day better would have been some fall weather.  Lord, it was hot.  What the frick, Mother Nature?