Grammie and Grandad came to visit for Lillian's birthday party. It was a rough day for them getting here, but they made it! As they boarded their flight from Denver to Houston, they found out their flight from Houston to Corpus was cancelled. Mom texted me about 1 minute before I started teaching, so I told her I would handle it as soon as I was done teaching. They were flying into Bush Intercontinental, but every flight from there to Corpus was cancelled. There were two flights from Houston-Hobby to Corpus - one was at 5 and the other at 7:30. I tried to get them on the 5:00 flight, but it was full, so I booked them on the 7:30 flight and we were praying they could get on the 5:00 one...especially after we found out that the 7:30 flight was delayed by 2 hours. As they were grabbing something to eat and taking a cab from Intercontinental to Hobby, I called Southwest and was able to get them on the 5:00 flight! They got to Hobby around 4:00 - and were delayed. (ugh!) Fortunately it was only about 30 minutes, so they finally got into Corpus around 6:30. We took them to dinner at one of my Dad's favorite places - Rudy's.
Lillian enjoyed her first banana pudding!
On Friday, my parents wanted to go to Toys 'R Us so they could get Lillian a gift for her birthday.
Evelyn found her goggles - when I asked her what she was doing, she said she was looking for bugs!
The girls found a princess Mustang
(Evelyn said, "Look! This one is for me and Lilly!")
Big girl thought she needed to try a big girl bike!
(and actually rode it pretty well!)
Evelyn was thrilled that it rained - she got to get her umbrella and rain boots out!
We went to a restaurant next to the pet store, so we stopped by after lunch.
The girls love the kitties!
Helping Grammie wake Lilly up from her nap
While the girls napped, Grandad put together a surprise for the girls...
What, guys? I'm tired...
Dan getting the big sprinkler ball blown up for Lillian's party!
The girls had a day with Daddy today! Dan took 3 days off over the past couple of weeks to stay home with the girls while I was teaching. The first two days, he didn't get to do many of the fun things he had planned because Lillian wasn't feeling well. Today, though...it was the girls' and Daddy's day of fun!
Lillian's first donut!
Mmmmmm...
Then they went to Brinca (the indoor bounce place)
This was Lillian's first time on the slides!
Daddy has some mad video skills...Lillian loved the slides!
(Dan said all the moms there were gawking at him as he would let her slide down by herself!)
Our photographer does really cool cake smash sessions for one year olds, so we decided to do that for Lillian's first birthday pictures. It was so fun to see her dig into the cake! I found a fun outfit on Etsy and when I went to try it on her, Evelyn wanted to wear it. I decided she could wear it for dance as well, so we got her one as well and had her join in on a few pictures. Here they are!
Today you have made it one trip around the sun, sweet Lilly! I can't believe that an entire year has passed since 12:17pm on July 9th. In many ways, I feel like you get the shaft as the second born, but in many ways, I think you have better parents as the second born. It's amazing what some confidence can do to your parenting! This last month of your first year of life was filled with many firsts. It seems like you learned so much in this past month. Your two biggest accomplishments were learning to sit on your bottom from your stomach and crawling! You started crawling on Father's Day and didn't take long to start cruising around everywhere. For the first few days, you would still get mad when we would walk away from you, but then you figured out that you could crawl to where we were and were so much happier! One of the funniest things you do is get so intent on crawling somewhere that you forget to raise up your head and see where you are going...then we'll hear you cry because you bonked your head into the couch or wall! You are definitely starting to push some limits and figure out what your boundaries are. With that, you are starting to be told "no" more often, and you usually respond with a cute little head nod and a smile on your face. The good thing is you are starting to understand what "no" means, the bad thing is you hate to be told it. We started giving you almond milk this month to help your transition from breast milk to cow's milk. You love it, and actually didn't have any troubles transitioning to cow's milk. You also pretty much weaned yourself. I had planned to scale you back over time, but you did it yourself. One of your favorite things to drink, though, is water - especially if it is from Mommy's camelbak! When you are thirsty, you usually crawl to wherever you see a water bottle and cry until we figure out that's what you want! You pretty much eat everything that we do now, just in smaller bites. You are babbling like crazy now. You consistently say "dada" and "mama" as well as "wow" and "uh oh" - and you have your own signs to tell us you want your pluggie and to eat. You also clap anytime someone says, "yay" and raise your hands if we say, "hooray" (or "touchdown broncos!"). You also wave bye-bye when you are done with something (or you blow raspberries), when you are done eating you wave bye-bye with both hands. To say goodbye to someone, you will usually wave bye-bye about 10 seconds after the person leaves. :-) It is such a joy to be your parents! We can't wait to watch you continue to grow into the person God created you to be. He has given you unique passions, desires, and gifts - and it is our prayer that you learn to walk in those and serve Him wholeheartedly. He loves you so, as do we! Happy Birthday, sweet LillyBelle!
The birthday girl having some birthday Cheerios!
Evelyn wanted to make Lilly a birthday cake - so we did while she was taking her morning nap!
Hooray for being one!
Can't...quite...reach...it...
Dinner at your favorite restaurant - McAllisters...for the mac-n-cheese!
Time for some birthday presents!
She loved her monkey card from Evelyn
And her new favorite stuffed animal - a frog named Sid
(in honor of Grandad's nickname for her)
Yay for presents!
After presents we had cake!
Big sister really wanted to help!
Oooooo...what's this?
Hooray for cake!
Here Lilly - have some cake!
And now...ice cream! Homemade strawberry ice cream for your first taste!
Every year, our church has a 4th of July BBQ and Shoot Out. Pretty much think Texas...where meat and guns are a way of life. They have a big grill out, a shooting range set up, and fireworks to end the night. I was so excited to go last year, I so wanted a picture of me 9 months pregnant shooting a rifle. But Dan got hand, foot, & mouth the week before so we decided to lay low knowing Lillian was making an appearance any day.
But this year we got to go! Evelyn always talks about firecrackers and wanting to see them, but every time we see them, she hates how loud they are. So we got her some ear protection to block out the noise.
Ready for the firecrackers!
She insisted on wearing them the entire night...
Here, it was actually necessary to wear them - out at the shooting range!
Dan shooting
Dan and Evelyn getting mauled by mosquitoes helping to pick up the whole clay discs
Pastor Glenn giving me a lesson in how to hold the rifle
(so much fun - I want to go hang out at the shooting range, now!)
The ranch we were at for the cookout was about 30 minutes outside of Corpus. Around 8:00, the mosquitoes had become pretty much unbearable - especially for poor Lilly, so we decided to head back into town. We killed some time at a Sonic on the way into town to hopefully time it to see the City of Corpus Christi's fireworks display as we came into town.
We ended up driving downtown and watched them from the car.
It ended up being a brilliant plan because Lillian just slept, and they were going off right in front of us. Traffic was pretty much stalled, so we had a great seat. By the time they were wrapping up, we were out of the downtown mess and headed home!
