So you say it's your birthday!

Okay, I'm a day late on this one, so sue me! :-) Lily's FIRST birthday was officially yesterday, but we chose to celebrate today to give us a little more time to get organized. She was very happy and bubbly as usual all day yesterday. It was almost as if she just knew it was her birthday. She would smile and laugh whenever we said, "Lily's the birthday girl today!". We got the girls a big slide from Toys R Us as sort of a birthday/moving gift. They were so excited when we brought it out. Hopefully they will enjoy it through the winter months in the basement and outside in the summer.

Tonight we celebrated Lily's birthday with my mom and Dave, my dad and Clare and Grandma Mazie. We ordered pizza and celebrated with a Dora cake. Lily stuck her hand in the cake before we even got the candle lit! :-) She was a little perplexed while we sang Happy Birthday and Ella was crying and hiding under the table (do we really sing that bad? I'm sure the answer to that is, yes. I'll post a video in the next few days and America can be the judge.). Lily cried after we were finished singing. But she was sort of interested when we put the cake on her tray. She had a few licks of frosting and then dug into the cake. After awhile she just picked the cake up with both hands and took little bites off it (like a squirrel). She actually was quite neat eating, until she rubbed her eye and got it all over her face. Then, she decided it would be fun to finger paint on the tray with the frosting. All very cute! And captured in digital pictures that I'll also upload in a few days.

Ella and I helped her open a few gifts and she played a little bit in her new Dora car (Ella also got a police car--with her birthday gift cards). Lily also enjoyed pushing her new baby doll stroller all around the house.

After her bath, she promptly fell into a blissful birthday sleep. Happy Birthday to our little one-year old! We can't believe its been that long already. The year has gone by so quickly. We have loved every minute with Lily and look forward to all her amazing feats!

Sidenote: we took Lily to her one-year checkup and she is 23 lbs. and 32" tall! That's 90th percentile for weight and over 100% for height. She's a tall girl! And their baby books are packed but I know that Ella was about 20lbs and 30" at her first year checkup. Lily really is amazing when it comes to language. Her favorite word is "bubble". She loves to say it. She calls balloons "Bubbles" which I think is the cutest thing ever. She also says "thank you" in CONTEXT after you give her something!

Other than that, things are getting organized and we're still getting settled here. We will be going to my friend Claire's wedding tomorrow so look for pictures from that as well. AND, my brother-in-law, Benjamin is running in the Portland Marathon on Sunday morning. So good luck wishes sent to him. If you're curious about his progress throughout the race you can check out his running blog. I'll be his guest poster for the day and sending updates every two miles or so.

Hope you are all doing well!