Birthday Suit

The birthday dress.

The birthday shoes.

The birthday hat.

The birthday girl, in need of a nap.

The mom, in need of a nap.

Lina's birthday party came and went so quick. Crazy how much preparation went into that event. The dress was homemade courtesy of Gaby Coronel (Armando's mom). The hat I can take full credit for. The shoes were a payless $5 special. 

And don't panic....the naps that we very much needed, were eventually taken. 

Pheww...I know you guys were really worried about the nap part.

More pictures of the actual event to come....when I get around to downloading them off of my MIL's and my sister's cameras.

Lina's First Concert

A couple of months ago my MIL, Lari, called me up to offer me some free tickets to a Sesame Street Live Show at Jobing.com Arena. Free!?  Of course I'll be there!
We picked Noah up to go "pull weeds" we told him so he was pretty surprised when we surprised him with this instead.
The tickets were for the suites, which I was pretty thrilled about. Comfy padded seats with leg room. A kitchen and table. Room for the kiddos to run around. The only downside to it was that all the characters would come off the stage and dance with the kids down on the stage level seats. This is probably one of the only events at this venue when you would rather have the cheap seats.
The kiddos loved it. I wasn't sure if Lina would even care but she was clapping, singing, shouting along for the first hour, after that she was more interested in crawling around in the kitchen.
We had a really good time watching them have a good time. I asked Noah that night what his favorite part was and he told me the ending, then I asked him in the morning when my mom was there and he said the beginning, then when Emma got home she asked him and he said the middle...I guess he liked the whole show!

Seriously!? Already??

I am coming to terms with the fact that tomorrow my baby will be a whole one year old!

Maybe because I've been using my not so flat stomach as a reference point for how long it's been since Lina was born, I didn't realize that this was going to fly by so quick! I mean, yah, everyone says it will, but at times it felt like it was never ending....I guess it just snuck right up on me! That's normal right? And my not so flat stomach.....totally normal too, right?....don't answer that question....I've succesfully convinced myself that it is.

There's a lot that's happened in the past couple of months.

Lina started walking, with help and some bribery. However, she's now reverted back to crawling and hasn't really taken up the walking thing again. No complaints here. My back was hurting from being hunched over holding her hands for her.

She points and babbles. No words yet. She mostly copies me. If I'm on the phone talking, she starts babbling. If I laugh, she cocks her head back and lets out a cute giggle. If I let out a high pitched squeal, she does too. But when I clearly say "mommy" or "papi", she just babbles at me.

She feeds herself...succesfully. If I put finger foods on her tray, at least 50% of them make it into her mouth. Sharing her food with Scooter is high up on her priority list apparently. Probably because she insists on stealing his food right from his food bowl.

She loves to read books. When we get to the end of one book, she just grabs another or opens it back up to the beginning. "Birdie Birdie Count with Me" is her all time favorite.

She does this funny thing with piles of stuff. For example, there was a pile of books set out on the floor, she'd grab each book one by one and toss them behind her. Tia Brook would quickly put the book back in the pile. Lina just kept on trying to get to the bottom of the pile. When Brook finally let her, Lina turned around to the mess of books and started piling them back up. She did the same thing with the clothes in her dresser drawer. She's so determined to get the things out of the pile....just to end up putting them back. Can we say OCD?

She has 7 teeth. One molar coming in.

She got an ear infection this weekend. She's been so cuddly. I'm going to miss that once she's feeling better.

I've come to understand that the way I love Lina is the same way that my parents love me. It's no wonder they said and did the things they did. I can't imagine how I will feel 25 years from now when Lina is my age and I'm my parent's age.

I have a feeling that it's going to just fly by....and my not so flat stomach will be one of the only constants in my life.