Well, I've never claimed to be very good at this blogging thing, and I think I've proved that I tend to be even worse than I even like to admit. But, as in everything in life, this seems to need babysteps to make it work, so I'll just try to concentrate on those, rather than my lofty ideals of what the perfect blog should be.
I guess I should start with what everyone wants to know about: the lovely and spell-binding Miss Eliza. She is, as of today, officially fourteen months old, and proudly an energetic and curious toddler.
Everyday she learns to do something brand new, and most days she amazes us with learning more than one skill. On May 19th, she determinedly and deftly pulled up for the first time, as if it were nothing special and she had done it every day previously. Eliza continues to pull herself to standing at every opportunity and dares herself to stand just a bit longer than the last time. She still doesn't trust her feet enough to try cruising or walking much yet, but she has crawling down to lightning speeds.
She has exploded into chatter, first through signs such as "Milk," "Food," "More," "Hungry," "Bath," and "Oopsie." And just recently through verbal words starting with "Yea" and "No", moving onto "More" (which not surprisingly still sounds like "No") and as of yesterday "Nose" (as she enthusiastically points to the nearest nose available).
Her favorite activity (when crawling is not an option) is miming the hand motions to the first few lines of "Little Bunny FuFu" as we sing it ad nauseam - She especially loves when we get to the "Bopping them on the head" line, when she 'bops' her forearm repeatedly all the while giggling like a mad woman.
The day of Eliza's birthday was a very relaxed day - we spent most of the day just enjoying family time, and we got to have a low-key celebration dinner with Oma Marguerite and Uncle Andrew. I think I really needed it to be as calm and relaxed as it was, because it honestly was a very hard day for me. Not so much the "My Baby Turned One Today" syndrome, but more that I am still dealing with Cesarean Rage and the trauma of Eliza's surgical birth and all of the crap that surrounded it.
We took a trip to Colorado at the end of April so that I could get my driver's license renewed. We were hoping to have a larger joint birthday party for Eliza and I with the entire family, but due to various misunderstandings it never panned out.
The ever flexible Grandma Rosie whipped up an intimate celebratory feast with Marlys, complete with Eliza's own cake. As you can see she was absolutely thrilled to mush the cake into every crevice and strand of hair she could get her sugary little hands on:
The short trip to Colorado was very relaxing despite the long drive, and we even were lucky enough to catch breakfast with Grandpa Lee, Grandma Mary Ann, and Aunt Bonnie before heading back to Kansas. Here are a few of the other Colorado pictures, thanks to Grandma Rosie (I've been assured that there are more photos to come):
The other big news for Miss Eliza is that she was asked to be the Flower Girl in our friend's, Rae and Issac's upcoming June wedding. We have been having a blast helping them finish the last few preparations for their big event. They are the sweetest people I've ever met, and we are all so excited to be a part of their big day.
June will be a big celebration month for us, as we are lucky enough to get to go to Harrisburg, PA to be with my cousin Michelle and her fiance Ben at their wedding at the end of the month. This is a big time for them as Ben just graduated this past weekend with an MBA from Cornell, and has accepted a job with Deutsche Bank in New York City. Needless to say, with everything the celebrate about this looks to be quite the event! I've been keeping updated on the shindig with Michelle's fancy-shmancy website: http://www.michelleandben.weddingwindow.com/
After that it will be a whirlwind of packing so that we can move out to Colorado mid to late July. We don't have any solid plans yet - we are still working on trying to get Tim a job (and hoping that the State Troopers want Tim for 2008 - we should be updated soon!) And we are trying to collect all of the funds we will need to make this move happen. Hopefully everything will fall into place when it is supposed to and this will end up being a smooth transition.
In other news, I frequently get plenty of questions regarding David, Tim's Dad. I know many of you are terribly curious how he is doing and how his deployment is going. The short of it is that I truly don't know much. I do know that Dave and his group are safe and have done some heroic and noteworthy things over in Iraq (unfortunately I do not know what those things are, so you'll have to squash your curiosity!). They've been extended another three months or so, and are due to return to the states in December, 2007. Currently David is on R&R in Germany with Marguerite, Andrew, and Katie (and her family), and I'm sure they are deeply enjoying themselves. Tim and I are a bit sad that we won't be able to spend any time with him while he is on his break, but we can't wait to see him when he returns from Iraq.
If you are still curious about Dave's group, you can look around the 1st Engineer's website at http://www.diehardengineer.com/index.html.
I am sorry that I do not have any photos of my own to share with you today, we don't currently own a camera - but it is on my must-have list for once we move back to Colorado come July. In the mean time, please enjoy these two short movies of Eliza that Oma Marguerite and Uncle Andrew recorded (she is oh-so tiny in these!):
Dancing Eliza on Halloween:
Dancing Eliza enjoying Christmas tunes while we deck the halls:
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