Wedding Weekend

Last weekend I flew to Minneapolis for my cousin, Bronwyn's wedding. Don stayed back home with Lucy, where he was able to indulge in some quality father daughter bonding time. It was so hard to leave Lucy (and Don) behind, but it was nice to get more free time with my little nephew. Bronwyn's wedding was gorgeous. She has such impeccable taste! From the flowers to the amazing cake, every detail was just beautiful. Here I am at the reception with my cousins and my sister. I held Milo for most of the reception. It was great to actually have time to focus one-on-one with him. Normally I feel so distracted with little Lucy needing my attention as well. Check out his adorable party pants.
Here's the beautiful bride with her new husband, Kevin. The electricity went out right due to a rainstorm and the entire neighborhood was out of power. But at the very end of the ceremony, the power came back on. It was such a relief, I don't know what they would have done without power for the reception!
My mom and dad and my sister and I.

I was also able to see my dear friend Jenna for lunch the afternoon of the wedding. And she came over to our hotel for a dip in the hot tub on Saturday night. It is always great to catch up with her. She is pictured above with her daughter, Jillian, who is four days younger than Lucy. On Saturday we went to my aunt's house and watched Bronwyn and Kevin open their wedding gifts. We were also took a ride on the pontoon boat, which was really relaxing. Here I am with my Grandpa on the pontoon boat. My Grandpa was actually one of the groomsmen in the wedding. BTW, I know this post has a lot of pictures of me which may be a little much but that is only because I don't have any of Lucy and Don from that weekend. Maybe I should have titled the post "all about me" :)

Precarious Places

Now that Lucy is mobile, we often find her climbing into some strange spots. Here she is on our living room shelf (after clearing off all the books first).

That childproof gate is working out nicely...








On another interesting note, I recently went grocery shopping since we were all out of stuff, and I was overwhelmed by the list of dairy products consumed in our household now. For Lucy there was: one gallon whole milk, whole milk yogurt, cottage cheese, and string cheese. For Kim and I there was: skim milk, yogurt and cheese for lunches, skim cottage cheese, and 1/2 and 1/2. I got home and told Kim we should just buy a cow instead.

Weekend at Bethany Beach

So last weekend we joined our friends Erika, Brent, and their 16 month old daughter, Sophia, at Erika's family's beach home in Bethany. For those of you not from around here, Bethany is located on the ocean in Delaware. It was such a picturesque setting. The weekend was very relaxing. We enjoyed good food, good conversation, and good company. We were able to enjoy lots of beach time, and when I say "we" I am referring to Don and I. As you can see from the picture below Lucy was not such a happy camper on the beach. We discovered that she doesn't like sand. Can you believe it? When we tried to put her on the beach, she would start crying and refused to put her feet down. You couldn't help but laugh, it was kind of funny.
Lucy was much happier sitting on her little chair. As long as her feet didn't have to hit the sand she was happy. Also Sophia's tent was a big hit. Lucy hung out in there playing with toys, but when I would try to entice her to come out she wasn't having it!
This is the best shot we could get of the two girls sitting in their matching pink chairs!

Don and Brent attempted to fly this stunt kite. It never really got any higher than it is in the picture, but they had fun trying.

What a cute family!

By the second day on the beach, Lucy was more calm. Although she still didn't want to sit on the sand, but she was happy on my lap.

Jason's Wedding

Just before the 4th of July weekend Kim and I left Lucy with her Grandparents and attended my friend Jason's wedding in Saugatuck, MI. I was able to catch up with many of my college buddies who now live all over the country. Here we are singing a little "Sweet Caroline" during the Karaoke part of the reception. The groom is third from the right.

Here is Kim and some of the other wives that were there, including my sister-in-law Susie (middle) and our good friend Laurie (far left).

1st Year Stats

Weight: 19 lbs 3 oz (25th %)
Height: 30 inches (75 %)

Head Circumference: 44.5 cm (25-50th %)

Interests: Pointing at everything she sees and gesturing as if she is asking the name of the object, playing with balls, taking items off shelves and putting them on the floor, riding on her speedracer from grandma (pictures to come soon), going swimming, getting tickled, throwing her food on the floor while in her highchair (my personal favorite)

Developmental Updates: Continues to cruise, can stand alone but if she realizes she is standing she gets timid and sits down, she took 4 steps on her birthday, crawls everywhere

Words: Mama, Dada, All Done, Uh-Oh, Ow, Ouch, Hi, Bye, Ball, Bubbles, Baby, Beep-Beep, Bu (that how she says bunny), Bottle

Lucy's First Birthday Party!!

We had a birthday party for Lucy while in Kewaunee with my parents, my sister, Eric, and Milo. I had SO much fun making Lucy's birthday cake with my dad and sister. I bought one of those cake molds and then got cake decorating supplies. Of course we had to do a butterfly shaped cake since that is the theme of her room. I seriously think that I want to be a baker because I never knew that cake decorating could be so relaxing and exciting. You know that you have officially succumbed to the parental lifestyle when your biggest weekend thrill is cake decorating :)
The smiley birthday girl!
We put the cake in front of Lucy and allowed her to do whatever she wished with the cake. I was hoping that she would mash her hands in it and really dig in. Instead she was pretty dainty about the whole process and just delicately wiped away bits of frosting. BORING! Maybe she will be more aggressive with her 2nd b-day cake!
Lucy kept crawling on top of her present from Grammy and Puppy. She had so much fun turning the steering wheel and beeping the horn while it was still in the box that we just kept it in there so she could it explore it that way for awhile.
This is the best shot that we could get of Lucy and Milo.

We got her a special b-day bib for her big day!

We had fun decorating the cottage and setting up this little gift area for her.

Lucy was the star of the show in her party dress!

4th of July in Kewaunee

So we are totally behind on blogging because we have been out of town. First we flew to Chicago on July 1st, then from Chicago we drove to Michigan to visit with friends and to attend a wedding (pictures to come soon). From Michigan we drove to Wisconsin to my parent's cottage to celebrate Lucy's 1st birthday there. Then we drove back to Chicago and flew back home to Baltimore on Wednesday. We are exhausted, but had so much fun seeing people. We packed a lot into the week we were gone. I promise to post pictures from Lucy's b-day soon. Be patient with me-I am just getting back into the blog swing of things :) Below is our adorable nephew Milo all decked out in one of his TWO 4th of July outfits. We had a great time celebrating the fourth at my parent's cottage. Don and I stopped in Indiana on our drive to Wisconsin to purchase fireworks. You have never seen a scarrier place then the huge firework warehouse we went to. I kept hoping that some kid didn't think it would be a funny joke to light a match. Seriously they had fireworks the size of small children. I am sure the bad boys we lite off were totally illegal in Wisconsin. Good thing my parent's cottage is pretty remote so we didn't get into any trouble.

I was pretty stoked when we found this little number for Lucy to wear on the fourth. The headband was a hit because for once she actually didn't try to pull it out of her hair. Usually as soon as we put a clip, bow or rubber band in her hair, she rips it out within minutes. So I was pleased that she left the headband alone.

Lucy had fun looking at herself in the mirror. She kept pointing at herself and saying "baby."