Santa visit

Brooklyn and I went to visit Santa at the mall last week. She was a happy camper 3 seconds before and 3 seconds after seeing him, but was TERRIFIED while on his lap...which made for some awesome pictures!

Here they are seconds before Santa

Merry Christmas to all!

Consoling each other after the ordeal

All smiles again

I just thought this was a funny picture!

More Gymboree fun!

Brooklyn has had 2 more Gymboree classes and is starting to really show off her creative talents. She is the ham of the class too, which I think is so funny since the other kids are 2 and 3 years old. She loves talking while she creates and watching just how the other kids do things. And she can finally finish all of her goldfish by the time the story is over! Small victories!

Not much has been going on around here. My crazy headaches are finally under control with the help of some steroids. Hopefully they keep working their magic and we can be pain free in a couple weeks, although I've had enough of their side effects already! I feel crazy, exhausted but can't sleep, hungry all the time and ready to break down at the slightest bit of adversity! But at least I can remember what happens throughout the day, which is more than I can say for the past month on pain meds! I pretty much slept through Thanksgiving, I think!

We went to a Christmas tree lighting at a nearby mall a couple weeks ago...it's all a little hazy to me! Good thing the camera remembers which day the pictures were taken!

Apparently a single bloodshot eye comes along with the headaches I had. Tell me that doesn't make your eyes water! I'm crying right now just looking at it! So gross!

But Brooklyn looks so cute in her hat!

Now it's Christmas time and the fall decorations are still on display at the house! Hopefully we'll get our Christmas tree up before too long. Brooklyn has already demonstrated her ability to take ornaments off of random trees we've seen, so we'll be placing them just above her reach! We're also planning a trip to go see Santa, so I'm excited to see her reaction this year! I have a feeling we'll either get a screaming gal or sticking her tongue out. That's her new thing when you take a picture of her. Lovely!

Arboretum and 15 month check up

A few weeks ago we met up with our friends, Jill and Isaac, at the Arboretum. It was a beautiful day and the kids had a great time! The great pumpkin festival was still in full swing so there was lots of playing with pumpkins!

Such nice kiddos sharing pumpkins with each other!

Brooklyn couldn't believe how big these pumpkins were!

A little posing outside the entrance

Posing in front of some mums

A house of pumpkins!

Look how excited those kids look to be taking another picture!

Brooklyn also had her 15 month check up a few weeks ago. She's still a light weight and "average" height (sure!) according to the doc. And is still in the 90th percentile for head circumference. I blame Greg! She's doing so much new stuff lately. Our new words include bubbles, pop, puppy, thank you and oh wow! She's learning sign language faster than I can look up new words! She likes to use all the words she knows at once if she really wants something. So you'll get please, thank you, more, all done all at once. She's a bubble blowing machine, loves to jump and go on walks, still takes 2 naps a day and sleeps almost 12 hours at night (I love it!), loves giving hugs and kisses to Mommy and Daddy and still has 3 teeth! I think that's all for now! We're looking forward to the amazing weather this weekend and a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Gymboree

So a couple months ago we bought a Groupon for 4 weeks at Gymboree. I took Brooklyn to one of the play classes a few weeks ago and was a little disappointed because I felt like we could do the same stuff at the mall play area or at the park. I also peeked in on the music class and it was very similar to what we do at the library. But there was one more class that they offer and it was an art class so I thought it might be something we could try. Too bad you have to be 18 months to participate and the Groupon expires at the end of the year. So Brooklyn's birthday was moved up 3 months and we went to our first class today! She did amazing! See for yourself!

The teacher picked out green and pink for Brooklyn to paint with. She was very impressed that this was Brooklyn's first time painting!

We had to get an extension put on for Miss 90th percentile!

Mommy did the gluing and Brooklyn did the feather coloring.

She painted this turkey using a feather and then shook some glitter on!

We also played with cornmeal which took Brooklyn a minute to get in to. She kept brushing off her hands when she touched the cornmeal. Eventually she started playing with the toys and not worrying about getting her hands dirty. We played with Play-Doh for the first time too! What a wonderful experience! I'm getting ideas for art projects at home. Apparently Brooklyn is ready for some!

Gracias, Tia Katie!

Thanks for my beautiful rosary! This is how I like to wear it! I walked around with it on all day! Thank you for remembering the first anniversary of my Baptism! I hope I get to go to Italy one day too!

UT vs. Baylor game

We went down to Austin this weekend for the UT football game. We took 2 delicious breaks at the Czech Stop in West on the way down! Despite the good guys losing, we had a great time at the game. Brooklyn loved looking over the railing at the band. Any time they were on the field, she was leaning over to get a better look. She also read the program to see how both teams were looking. She fell asleep after A LOT of pacing in the hallways and was able to get some sleep in the car on the way back. We got in around 2:30 Sunday morning and she started stirring at 6:30 and finally woke up at 7:45. I miss those weekends of sleeping in!

We were able to meet up with some of Greg's old roommates and college friends who live in Waco and Austin while we were down there. We pointed out Austin landmarks to Brooklyn as we crept along stuck in Austin traffic. Overall it was a nice, quick getaway weekend. Thanks for inviting us down again, Ryan!

Happy Halloween!

We took Brooklyn to the neighborhood Halloween party last night and then we went to a nursing home close by to go trick-or-treating. She figured out pretty quickly that getting candy from strangers was an awesome thing! She started holding out her hand for more by the end! Then we came home and handed out candy to the little kids (No one in their teens, driving around in a car or carrying a trash bag to collect candy should be trick-or-treating in my opinion! I know I sound like an old lady, but I don't care!) OK, back to cute babies on Halloween! Here are pictures that I took with Brooklyn today. She has the best faces when she runs down hills!

HayBoo Fall Festival

We went to one of Greg's work parties a couple weekends ago. They had it at a pumpkin patch across the street for the first time. It was a great night and everyone had a good time. I love the top left picture of Brooklyn and Greg riding in the barrel. Brooklyn looks like she's waving as if she's a pro barrel train rider! Brooklyn was terrified of the goats, but had a great time playing with Isaac in the pumpkins! She was so worn out that she fell asleep in the car on the way home, which she NEVER does! Oh, and apparently that is her pumpkin patch outfit! Who knew!

We had our 4th Annual Pumpkin Carving Party last weekend. Apparently we we€€re too busy having fun to take any pictures though! This weekend we're heading down to Austin for the UT game, so hopefully we'll remember to get out the camera while we're down there!

Trip to St. Louis

Brooklyn and I went to St. Louis for the week and Greg joined us for the weekend. We had a great time visiting the zoo and the pumpkin patch and spending time with my family! The weather was perfect and it was so nice to be able to play outside without sweating to death! Brooklyn loved playing with Sammy, Grandma, Grandpa and A.J.! She still does this little dance when she sees Grandpa on Skype! So funny! Hopefully we'll get a video of it soon. She loves dancing in the morning and her repertoire of movements is growing every day. She has also been very generous with her 'courtesy laugh' as Greg calls it. And everything new gets an "ooooohhhh" now. Her top, left tooth is in and I think she's working on the next one. She loves showing all of her teeth with a goofy smile. She is the biggest ham and loves to turn on the sweet girl charm to get what she wants.

The afternoon that we returned to Dallas, we drove up to the lake for one last trip before winter. Brooklyn slept in until 10 both mornings for some reason. It was awesome! She would wake up for about 30 minutes and play and then fall back asleep for a couple more hours. I think Sammy must have worn her out! On Sunday we went out on the boat to drain the gasoline before storing it for the winter. Unfortunately Greg used up the gas so well that the boat ran out of juice about 200 yards from the dock. So Greg and Chris had to swim us in to the boat ramp in the other direction. The wind was helping a little, but they had to swim hard for about 45 minutes! Brooklyn and I just hung out in the boat taking in the views! Then Greg had to walk barefoot while carrying Brooklyn (so I could keep the boat by the shore) to the house to get the truck. He also claims that it was uphill the entire way and that most of it was gravel! So funny!

Brooklyn and I are loving the cooler weather here too! We've been on walks every day and she likes to pick up everything on the ground for me to hold. She also enjoys climbing up people's driveways and then running back down. She waves to her shadow and runs from mine when I pretend to grab her.

We have lots coming up in the next few weeks. Hopefully I'll be better about updating the blog!

Labor Day and beyond!

We spent the long weekend at the lake trying to get our fill of boating before the weather cools down too much! My dad, brother and his girlfriend joined us in hopes of surfing and 4 wheeling all weekend. What they didn't know was that Greg had lots of work planned for them! OK, again my family comes to visit and we end up working most of the time! This time we cleared a lot of the woods out and made several bonfires! So thanks again family for your help! We couldn't have down it without you! The lake was incredibly low, which left a perfect muddy area for 4 wheeling. We did get out on the boat a couple times. Brooklyn even got behind the boat on her 13 month birthday! Greg took her knee boarding while I drove the boat. Her life jacket interferes with her ability to sit up independently, so Greg had to help her sit up, hold on to the rope and try not to fall off the back of the board all while being dragged behind the boat at 5 mph! Brooklyn just took it all in. She didn't really seem excited or scared. Maybe next time we'll put her out there by herself! OK, probably not!

Before we left Brooklyn and I took pictures at the lake by our house. She was loving the weeping willow trees. And she was fascinated by the large flags lining the street. At 13 months she is learning new stuff each day. She's great at making towers of blocks and knocking them over. She usually waits until you say, "ready, set, go!" before knocking them over. She understands two step commands such as, "go to your room and lay down so I can change your diaper"! I'm sure it's too early for potty training, but she clearly knows when she needs to be changed because she will walk into her room and reach for a diaper in the drawer and then lay down on her changing pad. She is also impressively good at waiting for things. For instance, the bad storms a couple weeks ago left a crazy amount of leaves and flowers in the pool (along with a frog!) that took me 45 minutes to skim out. Brooklyn just hung out outside watching me, helping empty the skimmer into the trash and just walking around pointing at things. I may have had to tell her once or twice to not get so close to the pool, but that's all! And she also sits on the counter while I get food ready or cut up fruit!

I'm pretty sure she understands almost everything that I tell her. She's also been mimicking words lately. She has three variations of "ah, ah" for a dog barking, a bird chirping and monkey noises. Also, if you name something in a book she'll use the same number of syllables that you do. She can't pronounce all the different sounds yet, but she's figuring it out! Because she's forward facing in the car now she loves pointing at the stop lights and saying "op" and holding up her hand for "stop" when the light is red and "dooooo" and pointing forward for "goooo" when the light is green. She also has learned sign language for "please" and made up her own sign for "baby". It's frightening to me the speed at which she is learning!

Other things we've been up to...

This is Brooklyn's new move when you tell her it's bath time!

Showing off her swimsuit. This was probably the last time we'll get in the pool this year.

And one from behind

She loves watermelon.

We're learning how to use a fork. She's pretty good at stabbing things and getting them into her mouth (even if it won't fit!)

She dumped some cheerios on the floor and then proceeded to stomp on them in between bites. Lovely! I don't know where she gets these ideas!

Big girl!

Brooklyn got herself a new car seat for her birthday! We had it in the bedroom while I was reading the instruction manual and she climbed into it every day to read books and play with her toys. Hopefully she'll enjoy it just as much in the car as she did inside!

sleepy girl

testing out the new car seat

She's also been trying on our clothes. She put my tank top on by herself. Too bad she couldn't fit her head through the arm hole!

What a fashionista! Good try, Brooklyn!

We put Greg's soccer jersey on her one day and she loved her dress!

Then she wanted to get it off so she could get back to playing with toys!

Happy Birthday, Grandma!

Hope you're having a great day! Isn't Brooklyn nice for sharing her decorations?!

ONE!

We made it! Brooklyn turned ONE on Friday! What a difference a year makes! She's gone from this...

to this...

She's still the sweetest girl and we've had so much fun watching her grow over the past year (even though it doesn't feel like it's been nearly that long!)

On Friday we made a special breakfast of french toast and eggs, had lunch with Greg, let her open and play with a couple of presents and sang "Happy Birthday" many, many times!

On Saturday we had her first birthday party, which was lots of fun and a little overwhelming at the same time!

At one year old, Brooklyn is:

-walking/running

-saying "mama, dada, nah, and hey"

-wants to feed herself all the time

-mimics people (tries putting on our shoes, attempts dressing herself in our clothes or hers, undoes her diaper, 'talks' on the phone or an object she considers similar)

-hands objects to share with others

-uses signing for 'more' and 'all done'

-would prefer to eat fruit all day

-enjoys swimming and playing in the pool

-likes to help her mama with house chores!

-waves 'bye' although not usually on command

-points to things she wants (she's especially good at finding airplanes)

-plays chase, likes to slam dunk things and knock towers of things over

I think the list could go on and on. It's amazing how much she learns every day and how fast she picks up on things! Kinda scary too!

Here's to another wonderful, fun-filled year!

Another picture

I forgot to add this picture. We went up to Arkansas to celebrate the Fourth of July. It was Brooklyn's first time on the boat in the water. She wasn't sure what to think at first. She just sat very quietly and just took everything in. And then when we let her get in the water she started having fun! Next year she'll be ready for skiing and driving the boat! Look out!