Lily: 1 Year and 1 Week (3/1/10 – 3/7/10)

Monday was Lily’s 1st birthday! My little girl is growing up way too fast. I took the day off from work to spend with her. I plan to make this a tradition. It was supposed to be a day of hanging out together and having fun but we visited two potential daycares as well. I know that makes it sound like visiting daycares is some sort of torture but I just find it stressful and sad. I got a good feeling about the first one I visited but nothing will measure up to Kirsten.

The rest of the week was spent busily getting the house cleaned and all of the supplies purchased and plans in place for Lily’s birthday party on Saturday. Kirsten couldn’t watch Lily on Thursday or Friday because she had a bunch of doctor appointments scheduled for her kids. It’s hard to have my mom come down to watch Lily right now as she cannot drive due to her broken foot so we asked Auriel to watch Lily for us. She is always so nice and accommodating as back-up care. We really appreciate her. Unfortunately, we got a call on Thursday morning that she was throwing up and was in no shape to baby-sit so Paul ended up calling in to work and staying home with Lily. While she was home with him, Lily got a big cut on her forehead. Paul couldn’t figure out how she got it as she hadn’t cried about it, he just noticed at one point that it was there. Later that evening we saw her hit her head in a similar spot on our dining room table so that’s probably how it happened. We have a round table but she must have clipped the bottom edge of it just right. I am bummed because now she will have a mark on her head for her party pictures. Her nose and forehead just healed, darn it.

I signed up for U of M’s Kid Kare at Home program which is an emergency back-up childcare program where someone from the company comes out to your house to baby-sit. I have never used it before as it is kind of expensive and I didn’t know how Lily would do with a stranger but we were desperate for care on Friday. Neither Paul nor I could miss work and Auriel was still recovering so I used the service. We had the sitter come over about 20 minutes before we had to leave for work so that we could give her instructions, show her around, and let Lily get acclimated to her. Lily was nervous at first but by the time we left for work, she was sitting on the floor playing with the sitter. I was nervous as well having a stranger in our house taking care of my precious little girl but it all turned out just fine.

Saturday was Lily’s birthday party which will be a separate blog entry. All of the festivities left my carefully cleaned house completely trashed but we were too exhausted on Sunday to clean it up. Lily spent the day having fun playing with all of her new toys amongst the rubble. She only had one nap again (Lily missed her afternoon nap on Saturday due to the party) but got up and went to bed at her normal times. She didn’t fight the nap, she just didn’t seem like she needed it so we never put her down for it. I wonder if perhaps she is already growing out of needing two naps a day.

Lily’s first bottom right molar has finally broken through and the left one is seemingly all the way in. She is still shaking her head “no” a lot and seems to already be displaying some signs of the terrible twos. I certainly hope that she isn’t entering them already, she just turned one! She seems to have little temper tantrums when she can’t have something she wants or we don’t understand what she is trying to tell us. I know that a lot of the terrible twos behavior comes from not being able to fully communicate. Lily is definitely very interactive and communicative even though she doesn’t know a lot of words, and she certainly already has a mind of her own. However, for the most part, she is a sweet and lovable little girl who loves to cuddle with her mommy. I am sure that her behavior is completely normal; it is just that she is usually so easy-going that any crying or frustrated behavior on her part stands out to us.

Here are some pictures from this week.

Lily loves to visit with the cats while they eat. Unfortunately, she frequently tries to sample their meal:

I’m one today:

Looking for a yummy snack in the fridge on Thursday:

Lily playing with the Easter eggs that Paul brought home from his team building game at our work meeting on Friday:

Lily playing with her favorite toy on Friday evening:

Then she started playing with her second favorite toy, the gumball machine:

She is so strong that carrying her awkward and heavy toys around are no problem:

Pushing the button:

Out come the gumballs:

Our sandhill cranes returned this weekend. Here they are eating birdseed in our yard on Sunday morning:

Lily trying to eat her foot after lunch. Don’t worry, she’s strapped in:

Laying down watching TV on mommy:

Lily is One Year Old! (3/1/10)

I can't believe that it has been a year since my little baby girl was born. Time sure flies! Lily has truly made this the best year of my life. I love her so much. Here is a retrospect on how she has grown and changed each month.

Lily Rysso, day 1 (7 lbs, 12 oz, 20.5 inches tall):

1 month old (10 lbs, 5 oz, 22.1 inches tall):

2 months old:

3 months old (15 lbs, 4 oz, 25.1 inches tall):

4 months old:

5 months old:

6 months old (17 lbs, 11 oz, 27.1 inches tall):

7 months old:

8 months old:

9 months old:

10 months old (20 lbs, 2 oz, 28.9 inches tall):

11 months old:

My big one year old (21 lbs, 4 oz, 30.4 inches tall):

My tiny baby girl is now a toddler. I can't believe it.

Lily’s 1 Year Portraits (2/27/10)

Here are Lily's one year portraits taken by Christina and Two Angels Photography (http://twoangelsphotography.com/). Christina did a great job Photoshopping out Lily's injuries and tears. I am glad that she got some good shots despite Lily's protests. I had to purchase this first picture, though, as it is how most of the photo session went:

Happier baby:

Even though Lily didn't go all out and smash her cake like I wanted her to, I love these pictures:

I love this storyboard that Christina made:

Lily's 52nd Week (2/22/10 – 2/28/10)

It was super rainy on Monday morning which was awesome because both of my windshield wipers fell apart on my drive in to work. Thank goodness I only had to drive to the Brighton Health Center and was able to buy new wipers on my way home!

Lily had a really fitful night on Tuesday night and woke up crying multiple times. In the morning, she wasn’t acting ill but was teary and clinging to me. It didn’t help her morning mood that Paul somehow gave her a big scratch down the front of her forehead while changing her clothes. When we got to Kirsten’s house, we told her about the difficult night and Kirsten checked Lily’s mouth to see if she was perhaps teething. Lily’s gums were swollen and hard on the bottom where her first set of molars are located so it looks like they are getting ready to come in. Lily hates it when we check her mouth for new teeth and frequently bites when we try so new teeth tend to go undetected for a while. I never even thought to check as she has never acted like this due to teething before. However, molars are much more painful to break through than the skinny pointy front teeth. Poor Lily! Kirsten gave her some Tylenol and she was fine for the rest of the day. The molars didn’t seem to give her any more trouble and by the end of the week, the right molar was all the way through and the left was still lingering just under the surface. So now my little baby girl has 9 teeth with 1 more on the way!

Lily was scheduled to have her one year portraits taken on Saturday so I was a bit worried about Tuesday’s scratch but had hopes that it would fade throughout the week. Unfortunately, it scabbed up pretty good. Then on Thursday, Lily wiped out while walking around Kirsten’s living room and smashed her face into a big wicker basket, putting a big cut on the side of her nose. AAH! Luckily Christina said that she can most likely Photoshop out the injuries.

Lily woke up crying really hard on Friday morning at 4am and was trying to crawl up onto me. When I touched her, she was soaking wet. Paul got her dressed after her bath on Thursday night then we put her right to bed. When I got Lily on the changing table, I discovered that Paul put her pajamas on with no diaper underneath!!! I yelled for him to come in and see what he had done as I tried to clean up and change my freezing, soaking, crying little girl. I knew that he wouldn’t believe me unless he saw his mistake with his own eyes! The bed was still soaked where she sleeps and I was too tired to change the sheets so we threw some towels over the giant wet spot and I kicked Paul out of bed so that Lily could take my place and I could take his.

Lily had her one year portraits with Christina and Two Angels Photography on Saturday. Unfortunately, she was not an agreeable photography subject for Christina again. She just doesn’t respond well to Christina for some reason which stinks because she is a really good photographer. Lily kept crying and wanting me to hold her so I had to leave the room. This made her a little more cooperative but she still wasn’t smiley. I was excited to do some cake smash pictures but, unfortunately, Lily wasn’t very into it and barely touched the cake. I think that Christina got some good pictures of Lily daintily tasting the frosting, though. I hope that we at least got a few good shots out of the whole ordeal!

Sunday was a fairly relaxed day after a somewhat crazy week. Lily was so cute in the morning. She usually wakes up smiling and talking. She loves music so last weekend, I showed her how to turn on the radio on my alarm clock. She didn’t touch the button again all week and there are a lot of buttons but when she woke up on Sunday, she crawled right over to the alarm on the headboard shelf and pushed the correct button. As soon as the music came on, she turned to me with a huge grin on her face and started bopping to the beat. It was so adorable! Then she spent some time pushing the button on and off and on again, always smiling with delight to the onset of the music.

Here are some pictures from this week.

Lily wanted to feed the jar of baby food to herself on Monday. It didn't really work:

Walking around with her lion and her pacifier on a string. She doesn't like it when you attach the pacifier holder onto her clothes as she prefers to whip it around and chew on the metal end. Crazy girl:

Lily went to bed Monday night with wet hair and woke up with a crazy hairdo on Tuesday morning. Paul had to document it:

View from the top:

And the side:

What!?:

I wanted to get a picture of Lily in these adorable kitty pajamas but she was less than happy about it:

Looking outside at all of the squirrels on the birdfeeder on Sunday:

You can see the scratch on her poor forehead. I seriously hope that she doesn't scar easily like I do:

Yummm, Girl Scout cookies:

You can see the cut on Lily's nose in the following pictures. Again, I hope that she doesn't scar like I do. Lily wanted to share my orange with me but kept making hilarious faces at the sourness of it. She still kept eating it, nonetheless:

Lily discovered the fridge this weekend and likes to play in it whenever we open it. There are so many neat things inside: