Holiday Cheer

After church this last Sunday, Reilly got her Holiday cheer on! First she helped her Auntie Melissa make Christmas ornaments by cleaning off all the stickers from the felt:

Then she helped decorate the little tree:

And climbed up the ladder all by herself to help decorate the real tree. We have an adventurer on our hands!

I was also decorating the tree and Reilly wanted to be apart of that too.

Happy Holidays!

Picture Highlights

The pictures below will give you and idea of what Reilly is up to lately. I don't have pictures for everything though and right now she loves bubbles! She can actually blow her own when I hold the wand for her. We play with bubbles for a long time and then I need to distract her with something else. She also likes dancing to any music and marching in place.

After making a complete mess of her bedroom, Reilly likes to climb into her baby tub and read books. The Clifford book is her favorite right now and we read it multiple times a day. I am going to start making up my own story line to keep it interesting.

Always ready for a game of ladder golf

Cooking with mommy in the kitchen

She and rock herself by throwing her body weight! What a big girl.

I was attempting to take a picture WITHOUT the ladder golf balls, but she would have none of it. She pretty much walks around all day with them around her neck.

Why read by the fire when you can read by the front door? Literature of choice: As I Lay Dying

Something is SO funny

Our BIG little girl

Nothing too serious is going on here today. I am watching Camden, but what's one more baby running around? He and Reilly have been getting into more little squabbles lately, so most of my day is playing referee. They are blessedly sleeping right now. Not to let a peaceful nap time go to waste, I whipped up some tea cakes from Martha Stewart and am boiling down homemade pizza sauce from fresh tomatoes. Smells delicious in here!

We did have a nice snow storm yesterday (nice because I didn't have to go anywhere...although Chris said the road weren't bad at all). There was so much heavy snow that too quite large tree limbs fell directly into the perfect spot on our yard where they wouldn't be a problem. That was close though. A lot of other people had no power yesterday or today, and obviously that is not the case for us (since I am blogging).

Reilly is not so little anymore. She is acting like SUCH a big girl these days and has quite the personality! She makes us laugh too many times to even fathom counting them all, and is delightfully turning into a little snuggler. She never was one for snuggling, but alas, she's starting to love us!

Reilly found the perfect task to keep herself busy while I am making dinner: She opens the dishwasher, takes one piece of silverware out, closes the dishwasher, walks to the drawer and throws it in! The fact that she does it one piece at a time is really in my favor because then I have lots of time for dinner prep. The only downside is she doesn't know the difference between clean and dirty...so half the time I am rounding up the dirty ones after she leaves the area (I would hate to hurt her feelings).


We wouldn't really get her to sit still for her picture this month! As you can see, we've come a long way since we first starting taking these pictures. Soon enough Reilly will be ready for tea time with Raggedy Ann!

Camping Trip

Here are some highlights from our camping trip a couple weekends ago. We had a great time during the day although night proved to be difficult. Reilly's nose kept getting stuffed and she couldn't sleep, so therefore we couldn't sleep either. The first night Chris took her to the jeep to sleep upright in her car seat and the second night we brought the seat into the tent. Neither night went very well. Please note the last picture: Reilly eating dirt. There was a lot of dirt eaten over the weekend.

10.6.11

Today Reilly and I went apple picking. It was the perfect fall day and tonight is the first night it has turned downright chilly. Tomorrow we will be making apple jelly with our spoils. Here is Reilly right before we left, very ready to explore:

I can't hardly leave the front door open anymore with out Reilly wanting to go out on an adventure. She would love to just be in the yard for hours. Having a big fenced yard has been so nice!

Here we are getting very excited about our new winter hat!

One day Reilly really enjoying climbing in and out of the clothes basket all by herself. After a couple rounds she starting bringing toys in with her. Where\ would be a better place to make a phone call? I can't think of a single one.

We started something new today...a march/dance mix. She is just too funny.

Lots to catch up on...

I finally stole a few moments to blog - sorry it's taken me so long. There is always just so much to do. But, I can happily report that I have sandwich bread rising, diapers washing and I swept the floor while the pictures were loading. Now THAT'S multitasking.

Reilly has a top tooth! It wasn't very fun getting it here though. It hurt a lot more than her two bottom teeth (probably combined!) and she even had a fever with this one. Anyway, we are happy to have it.

We got together with our Bradley class (the class we all took to prepare for labor) last weekend and had a one year celebration! It was so funny watching the kids interact and steal each other's toys all night. It has also been nice being around babies that are the same age but have been on a completely different growing schedule. Some were walking, some had a bunch of teeth, etc, but it's all still normal!

Another big development is now Reilly so throwing tantrums. She is only one! I thought we would have another YEAR of peace. Guess not. Her little routine is slam her little butt on the floor and then fling her head back into the lying position and then scream. We cringed the first couple times we heard her head hit the floor (luckily isn't only been on the carpet and she doesn't continually bang it - just once per tantrum) but it must not hurt her too badly because she has done it multiple times now. We don't really do anything about it either because we don't want to get her a reaction. So, we just let her cry or put her to bed if it's getting close to nap time.

I just liked this picture so I thought I would throw it in! She is wearing a birthday dress from Great Uncle Jack and Great Aunt Liz! Love the plaid.
Reilly will go to the extreme to get my wallet out of my purse. Not quite sure why it is her favorite, but I'm definitely over having to pick up all the contents multiple times a day.
I watch another little boy, Camden, one day a week and here is reading time! It's been so good for Reilly (and I'm sure Camden too) to have a constant playmate and to learn how to share! They usually fight over the toy piano that we have, and when Reilly gets REALLY frustrated she'll hold Camden's head in her hands, touch her forehead to his and shout. It's pretty funny.

Big girls get to eat at the big table! we are having a hard time learning to get the plate on the table. Usually she dumps all the food onto the table and chucks the plate. We're close to giving up on the plate altogether.

Thirteen month Raggedy Ann picture! I remembered to take it soon after she woke up and knew we had not a moment to lose or I would forget. This is why she is still in her pajamas.

Thanks for reading!

New Jersey Trip Part 2

Just a few more pictures from our trip:

This is how Reilly fell asleep - across our laps. It was very ideal because then we could sleep as well as one can on an airplane. She didn't wake up when we landed, got our bags or got into the car. She was one tired girl.

This was at Independence Hall in Philly. It was very cool being in the place where our constitution was penned...now only if our politicians could stick to it.

My Aunt and Uncle have goats! They brought the baby with them to make sure it got the care needed, and Reilly thought he was just the coolest! Samson did get a few nibbles of Reilly's fingers but she didn't even mind.

Here was her first swing set experience. The volume on this is pretty high so beware!

New Jersey Trip

Here are a few highlights from our trip:

Reilly was being so helpful by tearing everything OUT of the suitcases.

The first time at the beach. It really was the perfect day - cloudy but warm and breezy. Reilly loved playing in the sand and sampling every sea shell she could get her hands on.

We are waiting to board the plane and Reilly decided to help herself to Chris' nectarine. She ate half of it and I'm pretty confidant she could have finished it but it was dropped on the ground too many times. The Philly airport is maybe the dirtiest airport we've ever been in. We were very happy to leave and we were one of the first people on the plane.

The flight out was a little rough on all of us because it was a red eye and Reilly was SO tired, but couldn't let herself fall asleep. Luckily the flight back went a lot better. She ended up falling asleep across our legs - but I think Chris and I fell asleep before she did. :)

While we were back East we ate some great pizza, hoagies and cheese steaks, saw lots of family, ate a buffet in Atlantic City, went to Independence Hall, went to the ocean, went shopping and even had time to read our books! It was a fun weekend spent with family and we are so grateful we were able to do it. It also helped us appreciate Denver and our slower pace. I am not sure what is universally so important out there but people sure are in a hurry!

We are walking!!

Walking and eating a LOT of food is mostly what has been keeping us busy this week. On Sunday night Reilly got brave and started taking three steps by herself in a row. Now we are at eight to ten steps - and that gets her pretty much across our living room! As far as the food goes, since Saturday we as a family have polished off 4 pounds of strawberries, 6 pounds of bananas, 3 pounds of cherries and lots of string cheese. And that is not even counting our regular meals. I had no idea babies could eat so much. Although she won't be a baby for long...August first is her first birthday and then we've got a big girl on our hands.

String cheese!

Singing

Woo-woo is the classic Reilly sound

Exploring the TV stand

Her first Rockies game!

The toddler protein bar was delicious - obviously

Eating!

Sweetie

I feel like this is an outfit I would have worn when I was a baby. She is bringing it back in fashion.
We are practicing sitting on the potty so we will be ready to get potty trained!
Happy after bath time!
She is losing her baby face - what a big girl she is!
Raggedy Ann at 11 months. I couldn't get her to sit still and the only thing close by was my pedicure bag. Yum!
Here you can enjoy her sweet smile! Too bad it snapped a second too late to get her eyes all the way open. :)

Chris and I decided it was a good time to get away for the evening, so we checked into a bed and breakfast while leaving Reilly with her Uncle Brady and Aunt Melissa. It was a lovely mini vacation because we just fiddled around, ate out at a restaurant and took a nice long nap! We don't do any of those things on a normal day so it was a treat. Since Reilly did so well without us we might be tempted to do that again soon.