There She Goes!

'Round and 'round she goes!  That's the theme in our house at least.  Kate has become pretty darn good at pushing her little walker around the house.  She goes from the kitchen to the living room to the foyer, down the hall, and back to the kitchen....over and over again.  And she is so proud of herself when she zooms by mommy!

We're hoping all this "walking" will lead to independent walking very soon.  Kate actually took her first three steps without support on June 1st (3 days shy of what would have been her first birthday).  Blake took some time off this week and we worked and worked on walking, but Kate seems to be a cautious learner who won't try anything new without being completely sure of herself.   This is a pretty good trait to have, I suppose.

Our new favorite evening ritual is having Kate walk in between us.  When she reaches Blake or I she falls into our arms and gives us the best hug ever.  Every time I wrap her up in my arms a tiny piece of me wishes she would stay like this forever.  

There she goes!

'round and 'round!

Giving Back

Our wagon of goodies for the Family Room!

For Kate's first birthday we asked friends and family to bring donations for the Ronald McDonald Family Room at Forsyth Hospital instead of gifts.  The Family Room serves NICU parents and provides a comfortable place to grab a meal, a snack, and just to unwind. Blake and I used that room almost on a daily basis to eat lunch and get a snack (it took us a long time to want another pimento cheese sandwich again). :)

Today we took all of the donated goodies to the Ronald McDonald House on Hawthorne Rd.  The Family Room Coordinator was transporting everything over to Forsyth Hospital this afternoon.  We are so thankful for the support of this wonderful organization and know that lots of other families will benefit  from our donation.

Hanging out with Ronald 

Showering Drew, Mandy, & Baby Zoey with Love

Books galore!

Last Saturday we survived the impossible: a baby shower with three energetic toddlers running/cruising around.  As Blake said at the end of the evening, "that was much more fun than I thought it would be!"  He certainly wasn't knocking the company or the idea of the party, but you just never know what can happen with a room full of little ones!

We are so happy for Drew and Mandy (Kate's god-mommy extraordinaire) and can't wait to meet Baby Zoey.  I know she and Kate are going to be fast friends!  I hope you enjoy some of the pictures from the book-themed shower!

Strawberry cupcakes with the recipe courtesy of Oprah.com

Zoey Rae is going to be one loved little girl!

Flowers from our garden

Opening gifts

Mandy might be thinking, "what did I get myself into?" after being around the kids!

Excited daddy!  :)

 

The mom-to-be!

Caroline & Nate playing a potential disastrous game

Kate helping to open presents

Kate with the bow she "borrowed" from Zoey

End of the night...I think someone is worn out!

Oh, What a Weekend!

Kate's favorite expression when something "surprises" her

This post will be short because I haven't uploaded the photos from our weekend yet, but I wanted to include Kate's "surprised" expression on the blog.  This little face gets us every time!

New Experiences

It's amazing to watch Kate grow and play each day.  It's so fun to witness her making new discoveries, almost on a daily basis.  As she continues to learn to walk independently, we have a new skill...crawling!  Of course I'd describe her crawling as more as half-crawling, half-walking, but it allows her to make quick, forward progress while she is still learning to walk.  

Another new experience for Kate is eating watermelon.  I've included lots of "juicy" pictures of Kate enjoying her favorite new fruit!

Watermelon is so yummy!

Isn't summertime so wonderful?  While it's not technically summer yet, it sure has felt like it lately with the 90+ degree weather.  As a result, we've had limited outdoor playtime as a family.  Even though it's been a little toasty, we did sneak in a romp in the grass one evening this week and, of course, we had to peek at our growing garden.  Here's some pictures of Daddy and Kate having fun outside!

My favorite ride!

Veggie garden

No, those aren't weeds...those are our blackberry & raspberry bushes!

Splish, Splash

Kate in her chair!

Loving the new porch!

Well, it seems like we've skipped spring around here and have just run head-long into summer.  One week it was cool and rainy and the next we've been having 90 degree weather.  What happened to 70 and sunny?  Oh well.  As a result of the balmy conditions, Blake and I made a new purchase Saturday night: a plastic baby pool (yep, you read that right).  We now have a "redneck hot tub" as Blake calls it.  Even though Blake complained about getting the baby pool,  he can't get over Kate's delight when she gets in her new toy.

As you can see below, they both enjoyed the pool yesterday afternoon.  It sure does come in handy after an afternoon of yard work!

We've really enjoyed our 3 day weekend together.  Lots of fun in the sun, playing outside, enjoying the new screened-in porch, and some relaxing thrown in there too.  Work will be hard tomorrow, but at least it's air-conditioned!  Here are some more pictures from our weekend:

Trying to 'scoop' up the water and drink it

Come join me!

Long Time, No Post

Sorry it's been several weeks since I last posted on the blog.  There just doesn't seem to be enough hours in the day to work and play.  We've also pushed Kate's bedtime to between 7:30 and 8pm which doesn't leave me much time to do things around the house before I need to go to bed.  Needless to say, our laundry pile is quite large by the time I get around to tackling it! Anyways, here's some "news" from the 'ole home-front.

First of all, BIG news in our house....Kate has TEETH!  Her bottom two teeth started poking through at 13 months and 1 day.  Better late than never!  I've heard from lots of people that the later the teeth, the healthier they are, that she'll soon get all of her teeth at once, it will be less painful, the list goes on and on.  Not sure any of this is true, but we're just so thankful she won't be a spokes-baby for Baby Polygrip after all!

Second, Kate has been doing such a great job transitioning to "real" food.  Even without teeth, she can chomp down on chunks of chicken and turkey, pasta, bread, and a host of fruits and veggies.  She even tried cheese pizza one day!  What a big girl!

Kate enjoying her pizza!

Finally, I enjoyed a great 2nd Mother's Day.  As some of you might recall, Kate came home from the NICU on my 1st Mother's Day.  We spent the day with my parents and grandmother.  We enjoyed a Mother's Day brunch at my grandma's retirement community and baked a chicken dinner for dinner.  All in all, a great day!

Kate and Mommy on Mother's Day