Last clue

We're stateside - although i would rather be at some of the exotic locales you've mentioned. :)
You can see the downtown buildings behind me in this photo and the notable skyline behind it. Where could we be? We're coming home in a day or so, and I'll do a proper blog post then.

Another Clue

Hmmm where could we be?

Guess where we are!

I'll give you a hint. I took this picture from the window of the plane on our way here:

Is it possible that my baby could outshine even Kate Middleton?

The answer is yes.

Behold Jane, in all her Easter dress glory.  She did have a little tumble and got an owie on her chin earlier that morning, but it was probably a good thing because if there were no imperfections her beauty and cuteness would have probably broken the camera lens.

So many of the photos turned out amazing (how can a mother choose?) so I put most of them in an online web album.  But here's a preview:

Random Jane stuff

I have a long, boring (but cute) video of me playing hide and go seek with Jane.  My house is messy but when they start playing cute games with you, you don't have time to pick up the morning's clothes before you grab the camera, right?

Also, I just wanted to let you know that this is my version of crack:

Soooooo good.  And sweet.  And cute.

Also, this has nothing to do with Jane, but check out the deer that I watch daily from the kitchen as I'm doing dishes.

Totally Awesome Birthday

I had a great birthday this year.  Michael took care of Jane in the morning so I could sleep in, and when I woke up I listened to him do the dishes and run around after Jane - beautiful sounds!  Then he made me an amazing breakfast with eggs and bacon and biscuits.  He'd even gone to the store before any of us woke up so he could buy Tron: Legacy since it had just come out that day!

I had to work from 12-9 which was a bummer, but one of my co-workers made a yummy crumbly chocolate cake for me, and everyone was so nice.  On my lunch break from 4-5 my brother took me to this Italian restaurant in Provo that I really like, where they have what I think is possibly the best cake ever!

When I got home from work Michael had picked up fish tacos for dinner and we watched Tron together.  I didn't get to see Jane since she had already gone to bed, which made me sad because I hardly got to see her on my birthday.  I wanted to take a picture of the two of us together, but her nap in the morning was longer than usual and we didn't have a chance.  I had Michael take a picture of me with some of the flowers he got me - did I forget to mention that he got me flowers, too?  He really did a great job of making me feel special and doing so many nice things for me.  The only bad part about my birthday was that it had to end!

Since I didn't get a picture of Jane and me on my birthday, I'll have to settle for showing you these from a few days before:

So, so tired

We are all pretty tired around here. Jane has had ear infections for the past two months and just last week was on her 4th round of antibiotics. So yesterday she had tubes put in her ears at the hospital. Did you know they make little hospital gowns for babies? She ran around the room with her little diapered tushie sticking out the back. It was so cute but at the same time so sad that she needed one.

When her turn came she ran off into the hallway with the nurses, giggling. Michael and I just watched her go feeling like, "Fine, Jane. We'll just wait here."

For the procedure they put the babies under with a little bit of gas, and apparently when the babies come out of it they feel funny and it scares them and they start crying.  When the little boy on the other side of the curtain in our room came back, he basically cried until they left.  So I kept hearing babies crying out in the hallway and thought they were bringing Jane back to me, but no! When they finally did, she was quiet (and dumbfounded), wrapped in a blanket and carried by a nurse who said, "Well, she's our first non-screamer of the day!" with a cheerful smile.  Jane was just looking around like, "What? Who said that?"

After giving Jane a bottle we took her home, where she (and Dad) fell asleep in the picture you see above. And after I took the picture I promptly laid down on the couch and slept, too. This hospital visit and the past two months of sickness have been on top of some very trying months for Michael and me, and we are all pretty wiped out.

But at least Jane can start feeling better now.  Already I can tell her ears aren't hurting her and she's been quite cheerful today.  We played hide and go seek, and one of Jane's favorite places to hide is behind the gliding chair in her room.  I love it because when I walk in the room it is usually still gliding back and forth, giving away her position.  I'll ask, "Wheeeere's Jane?" and then she giggles and runs behind her crib and sits down, usually leaving her legs hanging out in wide open view.  If I go behind her glider then she runs out of the room and into the bathroom where she slowly shuts the door.  When I ask, "Where's Jane?" I can hear her giggling behind the door.  When I finally do catch her she screams and giggles and then runs off to a new spot.  Words aren't cute enough for this girl!

Also, over the past few weeks Jane has been picking up words like crazy.  Here are the words I can think of that she has said so far:

Daddy - (she will roam around the house, looking for him, calling, "Daaaaadaaaaaa")
Mama - rarely used =(
Woof Woof - pronounced oof oof
Response to "What does the lion say?" - RRRrrrRRAAAAAARRrrrrrrr!!!
Quack Quack - pronounced ack! ack!
Shoe - pronounced "Shhhuhh" but once or twice she's said the whole "Shoo"
More! - accompanied by the correct hand sign, woo!
All done - done on Monday for the first time, THREE separate times, with the hand signal!  Pronounced "aahh dunn!"
Again - this one I heard for the first time today after I asked her, "Oh, you want to do it again?"

It really seems like just within the last week she has been picking up lots of words and repeating things back to me that I never expected her to.  More, All Done, and Again were complete surprises.  I think she is just eager to grow up even though I told her to cut it out on her birthday!

Now if I could just get her to say my name! =)

What do you feed your one-year-old?

Many of my friends have kids that are close to Jane's age right now (around 1 year), and my questions is: what do you feed them?

We have been trying lots of new things with Jane, and I have been getting books from the library about what you can feed babies and toddlers, but I'm really craving more ideas - especially practical ones.  The books I got are nice, but some of the listings have over 15 ingredients!  Or they include weird things like barley (sorry if you are a big barley eater.  I have never even seen it at the store even though it's probably there somewhere).  Jane is able to pick up small pieces of food and swallow them okay, but I feel like I'm repeating the same things over and over and I want to branch out (cheerios and bananas anyone?).

I'd love any ideas for quick easy finger foods that Jane could pick up off her tray and eat.  I'd also love any ideas for foods you can give your kids that you also incorporate into a larger family meal - i.e. what everyone else is eating.  I've been wanting to give Jane the foods that I make for dinner, but I'm always afraid that something I've prepared wouldn't be right for her - like what if I've put in too much salt?  I have no idea.

So what do you guys do?  What's your favorite finger food to give your toddler?  What do you give them from your family meal (or what do you hold back on giving them from the family meal)?

In which I milk a cow and get violated by a llama

Today I took Jane to the petting zoo at Thanksgiving point for the first time.  It was really, really windy, but Jane didn't seem to mind it too much.  I bought a little handful of feed and when the goats ate it out of my hand Jane GIGGLED and giggled as though it was the funniest thing in the world.

They also had a little pony ride, and I put Jane on a little Shetland, and at first she clung to me but then when it started to move Jane looked around like, "Heeeeeyyy!  I got this!"  And then she just held on to my one finger as we went around.  The guy running the pony ride was nice enough to take a picture, and nice enough to not care that Jane had turned her head all the way around to look behind us, and just handed me back the camera because he was DONE.  It was magical.

After that I took a few kernels of feed over to the llama pen, and an obliging lama came over and ate out of my hand while Jane giggled away.  When it had eaten everything, the lama suddenly looked me straight in the face, and slowly started moving forward, slowly, slowly, coming close and closer to my face, and somewhere in my head I'm wondering if I should back up, but the main part of my brain is thinking, "What on earth is it doing?" and it's mesmerized me, I'm just watching it come closer and closer, and then suddenly there was this monstrous PHHHH!!  It blew a blast of air right in my face that was so forceful that it actually forced my lips open and its nasty lama breath went into my mouth!  BAHH!  And I laughed like some idiot and then this wave of hideous embarrassed mortification hits me and I start to look around to see who's nearby, but then I stop because I don't really even want to know if anyone saw it, and Jane's just eyeing the llama like, "The hell did you do to my mom?"  Aaaand that was when we went back inside and I washed my hands and then I scrubbed my face and my mouth out.

Then I noticed the cow that all the little kids were crowded around, taking turns milking it.  Jane and I watched them milk the cow and we stood up by the its head and every time the cow lifted its head, munching and munching with its tongue coming out, Jane would LAUGH and laugh.  After awhile the kids left and then some of the timid adults started coming forward to take a turn milking the cow, including ME.

If you look closely in this picture you can see that I am TOTALLY missing the bucket and the milk is just squirting out onto the floor.  I guess I was too distracted by the warm squeeeeeeshiness.  I hope I just grossed you out.

Here's some more pictures for the road:

Jane's First Birthday!

Today Jane is one year old!  It's hard to believe but it's true.

This is her a year ago on the day she was born:

And here she is today!

Jane had a great day. She had a small party this afternoon with just Mom and Dad and her two Grandmas.

Jane had opened a couple of gifts in the morning, two books from her mom and dad.  Grandma Bobbi brought her more balls for her ball pit, and as soon as she saw the bag she knew exactly what they were and got really excited!

I think she seriously has more fun in the ball pit now that it has more balls!  So we know now that:

More ball pit balls = More fun!

She got a third, special birthday book from her mom and dad, and an Elmo doll that came just yesterday. When I opened up the box she gasped when she saw his red fur, it was so cute!  She thought he was pretty cool, but then she was ready for more!

She really loved this little dog/backpack/leash that my mom got for her, she CLUNG to it and wouldn't let it go.  Grandma Bobbi also got her a cute warm fuzzy outfit with hearts and a bunny.

Grandma Carrie got Jane a cute tote bag with socks, a bug puppet with lots of legs (Jane LOVES puppets), an awesome book with flaps and tabs and all sorts of animals, and a warm fuzzy jammie.

Pretty good for her first birthday!
So it was a simple party - grandmas, gifts, cupcake.  I had really been looking forward to giving Jane a cupcake because she hasn't really had sugar yet, and I thought it would be a special first birthday treat and that we could maybe take some pictures of her covered in frosting.

Unfortunately, life has a way of not always being what we expected.  After Jane opened her presents she started getting pretty fussy and holding onto her right ear.  We realized that she had an ear infection, and how sad that it got bad right in the middle of her birthday party!  Poor girl!  We put her in her highchair and sang her happy birthday and set the cupcake in front of her.  She had a tiny taste of frosting and she liked it but then I saw her flinch and I think her ear was just hurting too bad.

After that we did a video call with Michael's brother Rodger in Texas.  (Jane liked seeing herself on the computer screen).

After awhile I noticed that Jane had calmed down quite a bit, so I took her into the kitchen to see if she wanted to give the cupcake a second try.  I sat at the table with her and I took a small bite of the cupcake.  Yummm.  Jane watched me with fascination.  So I picked up a piece and she opened her mouth and I popped it in and Yummmm.  She closed her eyes, she enjoyed it so much!  We ate that whole cupcake together right there, alone in the kitchen.  No one was there to take a picture and she didn't really get frosting all over, but she did enjoy it and I was able to give her the one treat that I had wanted to.  I took a picture of the aftermath:

Aside from her poor ear hurting, I think she had a pretty good day!

Jane,
Happy Birthday, we love you so much!
- Mom and Dad