Bernadette's baby shower

A success! Everyone had a great time at Bernadette's baby shower including, most importantly, Bernadette. Caroline, our little social butterfly, "worked" the room while Nora hid out in the back room watching tv, eating cupcakes (she kept asking "Is it cupcake time now?") and occasionally guarding her toys as Thomas Pokorsky tried to play with them. She eventually fell asleep on the couch watching tv...too cute! Here are some photos which I'm hoping Mike will be able to access and share with Josh (Bernadette's husband), who is also on the Iwo Jima.

More cat confusion

We had a fun afternoon at Reagan's house making caramel apples from apples she and her parents picked over the weekend. Caroline chased Mr. Kitty around the house, calling him a dog ("doh") the whole time, and Nora, Taylor and Reagan had fun playing together, especially on the front lawn as we were about to leave. It was a beautiful, but chilly, afternoon. Earlier this morning we went to both of our gyms - first, Tidewater Gymnastics for the girls' gym class, then the YMCA for Mommy. Tomorrow it's school in the morning for Nora while Mommy and Caroline go grocery shopping for Bernadette's baby shower, which we're hosting on Saturday.

Big girls DO cry

Sorry folks, but no photo today. It was a busy, eventful day, and I forgot to look for photo opportunities. Omi and her friend Charlotte stayed here overnight en route back up to NY from FL, and then I took Caroline to her 1 year check up after dropping Nora off at school. Caroline's a healthy 23 lbs. and 31 1/2 inches long...on the outer curve of the growth chart for height (big surprise there), and slightly under for weight. We sure do grow 'em big! She also got 5 shots (the flu, mumps/measles/rubells, the last hepatitis shot, chicken pox, and I forgot what else...can you believe they have a vaccine for chicken pox now?). She cried hard...her lower lip was trembling and she spent a good 5 minutes trying to catch her breath afterwards. It was a heartbreaker. But she was in good spirits this afternoon, especially since we spent it outside on our front lawn, enjoying the unseasonably warm weather with our neighbor Mark and his kids Reilly and Zoe.

On the road again

After going to church in the morning and stopping at home for lunch, we got in the car and took at trip up to Alexandria, VA to see Kay and baby Audrey, who were visiting from Arizona for a few days. I knew it was ambitious to drive up there and back in one day, but I didn't know when we might get to see them again, and figured the girls would nap on the way up and go to sleep for the night on our way down. My plan worked pretty well as far the girls were concerned, but not driving-wise. Traffic was terrible, and it took us 4 hours to get up there, and 5 1/2 to get back. I sat still on I-64 from 11 p.m. until 1 a.m. just waiting to get through the Hampton Roads Bridge Tunnel into Norfolk. Did you ever wonder if and how they clean the tiles on the inside of a tunnel? Well, now I know. They close one lane, get out some pressure washers, and make a lot of people very upset. As soon as we were in the tunnel, people rolled down their windows and started shouting assorted expletives into the night air, and got creative with their horns. I would have been laughing if I wasn't practically crying from exhaustion.

Anyway, aside from the traffic, we had a lovely visit and dinner with Kay and her parents. Audrey is adorable - very observant and interested in people - and Kay looks and sounds great. Nora and Caroline were interested in Audrey, but more interested in chasing Jake the cat up and down the stairs. Caroline kept trying to call Jake a dog, and we soon corrected her and got her to say "gah" (she doesn't put consonants on the ends of words, just the beginnings...so "gah" is cat, "doh" is dog, "bah" is ball, "bah bah" is bottle, "buh" is bear, "Noa" is Nora).

More bathtime fun

As I turned my head from the girls in their bubble bath tonight, I heard Nora start to sing "Who's gotta beard that's long and white?" (Raffi's Santa Claus song) and turned around to discover that she had given Caroline a bubble beard, much to Caroline's delight. Caroline is such a good sport...I think these girls are going to have a lot of fun together in the months and years ahead! It was a chilly, rainy day here, so we stayed close to home. We're taking a day trip up to Northern Virginia tomorrow to see Kay and baby Audrey, who flew in from Tucson for a visit, so that'll fun (and is sure to produce more photos for the blog!).

Party time!

Yesterday was a day of firsts - the first cold, rainy day we've had in over a week, the first day that Caroline transitioned from using crawling as her default mode of transportation to walking, and the day we celebrated her first birthday! We had a nice morning together - we got lots of phone calls, including one from Daddy, baked cupcakes, and readied the house for our party later in the day. Assisted by Nora, Caroline opened her presents after lunch (since the party was a "no-gift" party). She got two new "Nubby" books from Nora, a duck pull toy from Pop Pop (which both girls now love), more lift-the-flap books from Mommy and Daddy, touch-and-feel books from Aunt Alli and Uncle Gregory (although she particularly liked the Elmo card identical to the one Daddy gave her and the newspaper stuffing from the box) and, today, cool Gap clothes from Aunt Nancy. Thank you all!

Alli Paul and her girls Claire and Elise came over around 5, and were followed by Lisa, Shannon and Taylor, then Bernadette, Bronwyn and Lauren, and Kelly. We all had a great time - Caroline got to eat lots of pizza, her favorite, and tore apart her birthday cupcake. The 4 girlfriends (Nora, Taylor, Lauren and Claire) spent most of the party upstairs in Nora and Caroline's room - trying on dress up clothes, playing with stuffed animals, and jumping on the bed - which gave the grown ups an unusual chance to talk and catch up with one another. Poor Caroline didn't quite know what to do with herself...she was a little too big to play with Elise, who is 8 months, but too young to jump up and down on the bed with the girls (which is where she really wanted to be). We'll have to make sure that she has some of her own friends to play with for her second birthday party so that she's not always tagging behind Nora, the oft ill-fated role of the second child. I am so grateful for our wonderful friends who warmed our hearts and home on Caroline's special day. What a blessing.

Daddy's home (well, sort of) and Happy Bday Caroline!

On Wednesday afternoon, Nora and Caroline were thrilled to discover another mailing from Daddy...this time, a package containing two books - "Ladybug Girl" and "Pinkalicious" - and a DVD of him reading them. Nora watched it that night for her bedtime stories (she begged me to watch it twice), and we watched it again yesterday (Thursday morning) with Caroline, and again last night before bed. It was fun to see Caroline's reaction...she was busy standing on the couch, looking out the window at the backyard (one of her new favorite activities), when all of a sudden, she heard Daddy's voice. She turned her head and stared at the screen with a perplexed look on her face, and then lit up and said "Dah" (I kid you not!). I helped her off the couch and she crawled right over to the tv and started smacking the screen with delight. Nora got annoyed with her (prompting a whiny "Ca-ro-line!!!," a phrase we're hearing more and more of these days) b/c she was trying to follow the book and Caroline was in her way. What a wonderful gift, Mike. It's almost like you're right back home with us, only not really. We should have taken more video like this before you left, but oh well...maybe I'll just dig up old family videos and we can have Daddy-movie-night once a week. (Nora took the photo of just Mike on the screen...I like how she captured part of the map and how the word "World" appears next to Mike's face).

Today is an exciting day - Caroline's 1st Birthday! I sang Happy Bday to her when she woke up this morning (the 5:30 am wake up, and not the 1:30 am wake up that woke up me and Nora and prevented us from falling back to sleep until after 3 am!) and organized a little get together with a few friends and neighbors this afternoon to celebrate with pizza and cupcakes. I hope to squeeze in a trip to the Y as I do all my errands to prepare for tonight, but we shall see how that goes. There's always tomorrow...(which makes me think of the song from "Rudolph the Rednosed Reindeer," the movie Nora watched on our way up and down from NY, and loves).