Giggle

A First for Elaina...

Tonight while giving Elaina her bottle she suddenly pushed it away. Then she gave a little squeal and looked at me with a confused look in her eyes.

Then she puked. It shot all over me, the rocking chair, the floor and the ottoman.

Yuck!

Yes, tonight was the first time Elaina threw up. Poor baby girl!

Not sure if she's sick or if she just over ate. No temp so we'll see.

Poor baby girl!

I think I must have puke in my hair because I can still smell it.

Oh the joys of mommyhood!

Happy FIRST Birthday Elaina!

Today we celebrated our baby girl's first birthday with a grand little party. All in honor of Elaina Isabelle of course!

We 'dolled' Elaina up in a pink and brown tutu and a personalized onsie with her name and "Look Whoo's Turning 1"

I may be a little biased as the mom, but I think she was adorable today.

If you've been following along in the blog you know the theme of Elaina's party was the owl. I was inspired by a dress and it spun out of control from there.

Well, not out of control. The theme was evident but I kept it minimal rather than over the top.

Those in attendance at Elaina's birthday bash today...

Grandma Pam & Grandpa D (my parents), Grandma Linda & Grandpa Jim (Dave's parents), Great Grandma Pat (my mom's mom), Aunt Dawn, Uncle Rob, & cousin's Brady and Alec, Cousins Matt & Sarah, Cousins Becky & Sara and Becky's kids Jack & Ryan, and friends Valerie, Karen, Larry & Maggie.  My brother Shawn and his kids Nick, Sam and Jack (as well as his beautiful and smart girlfriend Kate and her two girls) weren't able to make it as Jack had strep throat which meant Nick and Sam would soon be afflicted too. So they couldn't make it. Bummer! Zach said to Dave and I - "there are supposed to be MORE kids! Where are my more cousins?" So they were missed. Zach was missing Mira too (my sister Brooke's daughter.  Brooke, her husband Austin, and kids Isaac and Mira now live in North Carolina so it's a bit of a hike - but they were there in Owl spirit! *grin*

Elaina's First Birthday Cake - created by our friend Kristina the owner and baker for Sugared. As you can see she makes BEAUTIFUL cakes. The bottom tier of the cake was a super delicious chocolate cake with oreo cream filling and buttercream frosting. The top tier was white cake with strawberry cream filling - equally delicious. (To be very honest I've never been a huge fan of cake - it's just not my thing. However, Kristina's cakes are simply FABULOUS! (And I'm not saying that because she's a friend - the cake and the frosting are out of this world and I will say so much better than this little company called Buttercream.)  Okay - so I digressed - back on topic! She also made a little 'smash' cake for Elaina which I'll show later. :)

The "spread" -- I didn't photograph the other counters with additional food and beverages which didn't fit on the island.

The Decor - I kept it simple with a little owl garland banner I made.

(Owl garland banner: I used the Cricut cartridge "Give a Hoot" to cut out the owls and Ashlyn's Alphabet to cut out the letters. Papers: Bazzil Sugar Daddy, Bazzil Feather Boa, Bazzil In the Pink, and Bazzil Hollywood. It's pretty simple cut out all the pieces, layer and glue together. I fastened the wings together with brads so garland had some movement. On the ends I tied curling ribbon through two eyelets. Presto! Owl garland!)

The Party Favors....

Personalized Hershey bars...

and suckers.

Elaina making the rounds saying hello to her party guests...

Elaina with Becky

Elaina and Valerie

Elaina and Karen

Elaina with Sarah and Matt

Elaina with Grandma Linda (All toys brought by Zach -- *giggle*) after cake and a bath.

Elaina looking cute!

The birthday girl

I'm going to get you mom!

Elaina cruising

Elaina, Alec and aunt Dawn playing with puzzles

Brady (green stripes), Jack (Red), Sara (background...Becky is hiding behind her), and Zach

Ryan

Great Gram Pat, Karen, and Grandma Pam

Brady on the microphone and Zach playing guitar lead everyone in singing Happy Birthday to Elaina.

Zach helping Elaina open her birthday presents. This was the FIRST time Elaina ever opened presents; she was too little last Christmas.

Elaina - she enjoyed the tissue paper as much as the presents!

Elaina honking her pillow pet's nose while Mommy Megan shows the two cards made by hand by Jack and Ryan her second cousins.

Elaina playing with her new toys.

Elaina REFUSED to wear her party hat. I would almost get it tied on and she would just pull it off. So this mom gave up...

But it was cute while it lasted...oh well.

CAKE TIME! Isn't this the cutest little cake ever?

Elaina is ONE!

We all sung Happy Birthday again...

Then Zach, Mommy and Daddy (in the gold sweatshirt) all helped Elaina blow out her candle.

Elaina...what is this?

It feels sticky

Maybe I'll try it...

Naw...I'll just smash it up some more.

Elaina was really getting into smashing but not so much into eating. So mommy helped and 'fed' a piece of cake to Elaina.

Hummm.....

This is actually pretty good!

Nummm...this is really good!

OH am I going to town now with this cake!

Mom, I think I'm in a sugar coma

This is Elaina's "I'm all done now" face

Mom - I'm all messy...I'm really messy! Clean me up please!

This is me, the hostess.

Thank-you to everyone that attended Elaina's first birthday party!  To those that were unable to attend you were missed but we understand and you were there in spirit. Thank you to Kristina for making the fabulous cake, thank you to Nancy, Valerie and Wanda for lending extra chairs and tables so everyone had a place to sit and eat. Thank you to everyone for bringing the very generous and thoughtful gifts! The real test will be my memory to see if I can remember who gave Elaina what since I didn't write it all down.  

We made some great memories tonight - I will never forget Brady on the mic and Zach on the guitar getting everyone to sing happy birthday before we opened presents (so cute). I'm thankful my mom's health is on the rebound and she and my dad were here for Elaina's birthday. I'm not thankful that the Badgers kept the axe but I am happy and thankful that Jim & Linda were here for Elaina's birthday too. Grandparents are so special and Elaina has FOUR fantanstic grandparents. (She has fabulous great grandma's too!) (Unfortunately, I was having such a fabulous time socializing and doing hostess things I completely missed taking photos of Elaina with all of her grandparents! OOPS! Also missed the family shot. Might just need to re-create those later...hey it's an excuse to bring out the adorable tutu again! *giggle*)

Weekend Rewind

Friday was 'at home - date night'. We put Z+E to bed, then Dave and I cuddled on the sofa and watched the movie, The Switch, on OnDemand and shared some popcorn. Jennifer Aniston and Jason Bateman. Good flick with good comedic timing. A nice and low key evening.

Saturday we had plans to go to Esme's dedication/sip and see but we took Elaina to urgent care instead to see if she had an ear infection. She had a little cough and kept playing with her ears so we thought - ear infection naturally. Nope - she was just exercising a new 'sound' aka coughing and pulling on her ears because they must have been a newly discovered toy. Hey - at least no ear infection. Oh well. 

Saturday evening we went to Bob and Natalie's house warming party. Bob showed us what had changed since we were there last and we enjoyed nummy food and catching up with Bob and Natalie's family. The last time we saw their families was their wedding and I was very pregnant - so they all got to meet Miss Elaina. We talked baseball with Bob's brother Chris - GO DINKLEMAN! How is that Chris? Zach played with Gabby and all the older kids. He enjoyed his first watermelon for the summer - EIGHT PIECES of watermelon to be exact. YIKES! He roasted marshmallows in an open fire for the first time although he didn't want to EAT the marshmallows nor try the smore's. That's OK - mommy enjoyed them! Then it was time to go. Zach didn't want to go so off he ran and Daddy Dave had to chase him down and carry him to the truck. He was having way too much fun! So much fun he didn't want to say goodbye to Bob and Natalie. He fell asleep in the car (big surprise eh?) but we woke him up for a fast bath before tucking him in for the night as he was FILTHY DIRTY after playing all evening outside.

Today (Sunday) was pajama day at Hoelzel House.  We stayed in our PJ's all day. Considering the high for today was the low 60's it was a good day for pajama day. The best part of pajama day for mommy Megan was I got to sleep in! (Well, okay I got up at 6:15 to nurse Elaina then both baby E and I went back to bed.) Daddy Dave got up for round 2 with Baby E and Zach. Thank-you much sweetie!

So we spent PJ day watching movies and playing with toys simultanously. We watched in no particular order: The Incredibles, Over the Hedge, The Little Mermaid, and Cars. We played with Batman toys, cars and a bit of peek-a-boo with Baby Elaina.  We ate PBJ on a bun for lunch while Elaina had sweet pototoes and fresh mashed bananas.  Then it was nap time. (AKA time for mommy and Daddy to get stuff done around the house time.)

Dave got new license plates in the mail for the truck so he put those on and putzed around the garage while I made chili for dinner (note the temperature above folks) and cleaned out and organized the mudroom walk-in closet. It's not completely done but I now know what I need to complete the organization project.

The kiddos slept late so when they awoke we played and ran around silly. Then it was time for dinner. After dinner it was time to turn the dining room into one big massive fort! Yeah! It was a good guys fort. The the Bedtime Monster (aka Mommy) started rounding up kiddos. She found baby Elaina first. Zach escaped the Bedtime Monster by sneaking up the stairs with daddy and got in bed where he was 'safe' from the Bedtime Monster. *ROAR!*

Well it's time to make our bed up with clean sheets and climb into bed because tomorrow is a school day/work day.

That's it folks...not too exciting - but a fantastic weekend nevertheless.

Cereal for Dinner

Tonight Elaina had rice cereal for the first time. We were going to wait until she was six months but she's been getting up at 4 a.m. hungry for the past few days. So it was time to introduce some solids so she would go back to sleeping in until 6:30 a.m. because Mommy Megan is becoming one tired mommy with these early feedings! It is amazing how quickly you get used to not having your sleep interrupted throughout the night.  Besides she'll be six months in just 15 days. 

So we mixed up some rice cereal with formula and breast milk. At first Elaina spit it out. Although, once she figured out how to roll the cereal back on her tongue she kept opening her mouth like a little bird! She really seemed to enjoy cereal and ate almost the entire bowl Imixed up. Now the real test is to see if she'll sleep later.

Elaina's messy face.

Zach was very excited to watch his baby sister eat cereal for the first time wanting to sit in the chair next to her highchair. It was very sweet.

We now have a new routine, feeding baby Elaina at dinner time too!

First Giggle

Elaina had her first full body laugh today.

She has smiled and squeeled before but has never laughed. The sweetest thing is she laughed when Zach was trying to make her smile. It was so sweet to see him get HUGE eyes, an even bigger smile and then look at me and say, "Baby Elaina laughed at ME!" He was very proud of that.  I love the moments that take your breath away. This was one of them.

Some other things we've been noticing about Elaina....

Elaina has become quite the babbler. She enjoys hearing her voice and making sounds. She loves it when we make sounds back at her and it even seems like she will try to imitate us when we talk. She really enjoys the little conversations we have even if it is only talking about the stinkies in her diaper. *giggle*

Video of Elaina I took today - you can hear her "talking"...

Nursing is taking much longer now. Elaina is easily distracted by what is going on around her. She will stop to watch Zach play or if she hears a loud noise she'll look to see what caused it. I've found morning feedings are the most productive because we're up in her room by ourselves in the dark. I may have to start taking her up to her room to nurse at the other times. I've noticed while pumping at work the consistency of my milk has changed. It is much darker and thicker now. As Elaina grows she needs more so my body is giving her more nutrients that she needs. One sad thing to note is my milk production seems to be dimishing. Because she is not going to breast for every feeding I seem to be producing less. Although, on Mondays my milk production is back up to what it should be. But that's because I've exclusively nursed her all weekend. Hopefully I'm able to nurse her until she is at least 6 months. Which is only seven weeks away - she'll be six months on May 4th.  We have started 'cheating' and we cut her bottles for daycare with formula - so half formula and half breastmilk. She refuses to drink straight formula. She must not like the taste of it.

Elaina is now playing with her hands and feet and really enjoys it. You can't keep her hands out of her mouth actually. The only way to keep her hands out of her mouth is to plug it with a pacifier. *giggle* She is also grasping and playing with toys now. She'll also roll from her back to her tummy to go after something she wants such as a rattle. She will now amuse herself with her hands and feet or a rattle. It's not a long time but it is a start.

Elaina now has a lovie. She has a little bear blanket - which is a a bear head and arms with a soft and silkie blanket for a torso. She loves to hold and feel the softness of the blanket and look at the little bear. She has to hold something soft as she falls asleep as well.

She has her four month well-baby visit on Tuesday so I'll have more to add then. Until then, thanks for reading and good-night!