Happy Birthday, Baby!

I have to admit that I like this birthday a whole lot more than last year...even if Eliza and I were both sick today! and Eliza decided to wake up at 5am! I guess she just couldn't wait to get the party started!Steve called in sick so he could care for us two sick-o's! Sorry, Steve! But even though we were sick, we still managed to have some fun!

Eliza and I celebrated an early bday for her last week before we left my parents house. We had a blast and ate Eliza's favorite for dinner- SPAGHETTI! which was followed by a scrumptious family recipe, Banana cake w/ cream cheese frosting that my mom made- YUM! Eliza was definitely a fan of it too!

She felt it for a minute...

...and then went for it!

and loved every bite!

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So since that rockin' party Eliza's been enjoying her presents from Oma, Grandpa Ron, and Aunt Abby. Especially this fun blue tunnel to play with outside! I foresee many fun days and games with this toy!

Steve and I got Eliza several things, including a barnyard set but she seemed to enjoy the box the most:

She liked dropping her things into it...

She manage to throw in two sippy cups, both of her socks that used to be on her feet, one shoe, and a paci!

She eventually was able to start enjoying the actually toy...

My favorite present that I found for Eliza on ebay were these adorable "Under the Nile" Organic Teether Toy Fruits!

They're made out of organic Egyption cotton and are handcrafted and machine washable, produced in an "environmentally friendly manner," are dyed with natural, heavy "metal-free" colors, and most importantly, they are "fair traded for the benefit of all people producing their products."... and they're adorable! I think they'll be fun toys with which Eliza can use her imagination!
We also got corn and broccoli... so cute!
Maybe we can save up for the next holiday and get a strawberry or banana or asparagus! We did get out of the house a little bit today to get some lunch at Stix-- a super yummy Mediterranean place in Pantops.

At the restaurant, Eliza showed off this impressive skill:

She can tell you how old she is!! Nice, huh?
It's hard to hear with all the background noise, but she was saying "one" also.

After lunch, Eliza fell asleep in the car so Steve and I decided to run to the mall and get Eliza some tennis shoes that would give her some sturdy support to encourage her walking skills. She woke up while we were there and we let her play on the plastic renditions of Jefferson's memoirs... she was REALLY good at climbing up the scrolls/slides and loved watching the big kids.

We actually ran into our friend Meredith and her two cute kids, so it was fun to visit with her!

Back at home we had some birthday dinner and Eliza got a little carried away with her partying...

Don't worry, it's just ABC root beer...! Nice sugary bday treat, right?

Here's a video clip of Steve and I serenading Eliza with the birthday song! Steve on violin and me on Kazoo... Eliza on vocals, castanets, and dancing--sort of.
(We got her a wooden set of musical instruments).

But we sure love our one year old sweety!
When she was a newborn EVERYONE said she looked more like Steve. And although I get several, "She looks just like you!" I think most of us know who she really looks like...

I love these pictures of my two loves!!!

We sure have come a long way in a year!

Happy Birthday 'Liza! Eliza means "God keeps his promises" or "God's gift," and we are so so grateful for the gift that she is in our lives!

One Year Old Portraits!

It's that time again! Eliza turns one on this Wednesday, but last Tuesday, my mom and I went ahead and got these portraits done while we had the chance! We seem to get portraits done about every four months thus far. That wasn't our original plan, but it's what has ended up working out! (thanks for all your help, mom! I could NOT have done it w/o you!)

Here's Eliza getting sleepy while we wait for hours for our turn at the portrait studio (like usual- why do they always overbook so bad?):
JC Penny's is actually very affordable and does a fairly decent job. Their individual sheets are priced at $4 as opposed to the $20 charge at Sears or most other portrait studios. Crazy, right? So there's my little add for JC Penny's...

But here are most of the shots they took. We only bought like a copy of half of them, though, in various sizes.

(First tongue shot, many more to come. Like I said in a previous post, Eliza was doing some major teething on that molar!)

(I call this Eliza's monkey shot!)

(This is the one we got wallets of that you'll probably be receiving in the mail if you're a relative who we know likes Eliza or if you let me know you want one in comments here!)

I really loved this outfit that I found for Eliza at Gymboree using my
Gymboree bucks $25 coupon! Yay for coupons!

(Eliza kept ripping the one off before they could catch a shot of her with it on... silly girl! They had Velcro on it so they could put on other #'s and that was not strong enough to stop Eliza!)

(total teething picture... notice the drool on her blouse and wet tongue!
I think she was actually blowing a raspberry in this pic, though.)

I hadn't decided to take pictures with me in them before I got to the studio, so I hadn't thought about it when getting ready that morning. And any mom knows how hard it is to just get their kid ready for the day or for portraits, let alone getting themselves even decent before heading out the door!! or maybe that's just me....?

On a normal day, I have to get dressed in stages... change Eliza's diaper in the morning, feed her breakfast, then get her dressed. Then I get to wash my face and put my eyes (contacts) in, get out of jammies and rush around looking for my outfit while Eliza chases after the cat or something. Once I'm relatively dressed or Eliza's attention span runs out, which ever comes first, then I do her hair and shoes and pack her diaper bag up with all the essentials (sippy cup, crackers, diapers, wipes, paci- DONE!), and then see whether she will be entertained for another minute by her wheely caterpillar toy while I try to do SOMETHING with my hair and then grab my keys, bag, and baby and run out the door before I realize that I forgot to do my makeup... yeah.

Thus, I didn't really like how I looked in the pictures; however, I want Eliza to have pictures of me someday, and I remember how much I've liked seeing my mom in the portraits of us when we were growing up, so I relented. Steve says he likes them, though... and that's when we got the happiest shots of Eliza, so it was worth it!

I LOVE the three generation shots we got!
I was so glad Mom agreed to be in them with us!
How fun are these:

The photographer told us to do this one:

We're hoping to get a four generation shot with MY Oma when we're out in San Diego in June for her birthday!! It'll be such a fun trip-- especially for Eliza she'll get to meet my mom's mom, Oma or Rosalie, and my dad's dad, Grandpa Bob, for the first time! So I'm trying to get Eliza to learn the sign for grandma and grandpa before that time! We'll see how she does! We can't wait for our Cali trip!!

Oh, and if you're a grandparent or someone else who would like to know the access code to order some of your own prints, just let us know and we'll give it to you!

Going to the zoo zoo zoo!

We got to visit the Riverbanks Zoo in Columbia while we were down in SC which was a BLAST! This is the zoo I grew up going to, and it really is a good one! It's no San Diego zoo, but it definitely ranks higher than the Hogle Zoo in Utah. We're hoping to make it up to the DC zoo one of these days, but my working weekends has prevented some of the bigger expeditions from happening. I have a couple days off in May, though, so maybe we'll try to do it then!

But Eliza LOVED the zoo! She was wide-eyed the whole time and looking here and there for the next neat animal she could spot! Some of the loud ones freaked her out a little (mostly the howling monkeys... those things kinda freaked me out too, though), but she was really cute about it and just clung a little tighter to whomever was holding her and still wouldn't break her gaze of those funny and exotic creatures!
Eliza probably liked the barn animals best b/c she got to (hit) pet those and feel their fur and getting really close to them. Since Eliza's world usually only entails dogs and cats, I have an inkling that she might have thought that the zoo was a collection of a variety of really big and small and colorful dogs b/c she kept doing her sign for doggie. We're working on that...

Eliza especially was intrigued by the chickens, bunnies, goats and the cow. And this metal elephant that she got to ride...

(Eliza's first molar had just broken through like the day before, so a lot of her pictures this week have involved her tongue sticking out of her mouth... including in her one year old portraits-- more on that later)

(checking out the chicken coop)

(Flamingos!)

The Penguin exhibit is the COOLEST at Riverbanks. Eliza loved watching the little guys swimming and splashin' around! and I thought this picture was wild!

Eliza's favorite wild animals, though, are still the poodles and the parakeet at the Meldau zoo! She really honed her skills of hand-feeding her string cheese to the poodles during our visit. Orah and Zara were very gracious to let Eliza practice on them.

Eliza eventually just decided to join the dog pack. She's just one more hairy, four-legged floor dweller, after-all. She and Zara are like two pea's in a pod!

But I'm glad we're raising an animal lover!

*You should also check out a video that Abby posted on her blog illustrating an example of Zara's poodle brilliance!