1 Year!!

Rebecca officially turned one year old on Thursday!  Mike and I reflected a lot on what we were doing exactly one year ago.  The resulting emotion was a little overwhelming for me, and while we both remember being exhausted and confused and nervous, we also remember being excited and overjoyed and amazed!  While I was putting her to bed that night, I told her the story of how much we wanted her and how it was my dream come true to have a beautiful little girl and how overwhelmed I was when I got to see her and hold her for the first time!

Here is her 1 year picture!

Now, that picture is not the best but it is very difficult to get her to sit still long enough to take a decent picture.  These next few are in a section I like to call "It's My Party and I'll Cry if I Want to":

 

And then she settled down long enough to take a birthday picture with daddy:

I decided to make her a special birthday pancake for breakfast - maybe we'll make that a tradition for her.  I even gave her a couple of drips of sugar free syrup!  And she helped supervise me while I made them:

 I also decided to see how she'd do with a fork for the first time.  Grandma and Grandpa gave her a little Minnie Mouse plate set for her b-day and this is the fork.  I put a piece of pancake on it for her and handed it to her.  She turned it the right way and stuck it right in her mouth!  She looked a little confused on what she was supposed to do with it from there, but after that, if I put the food on it, she was actually lifting the fork to her mouth and eating off it.  That may be perfectly normal for this age, but I thought it was a big exciting accomplishment!

That evening we went out to dinner - more of a celebration for me and Mike for making it through the first year!  Here are some pictures from then.  The second one is a little strange, but I was trying to get a picture of all her teeth:

And finally, we did the cake thing for a second time.  I chose vanilla this time to hopefully make it a little less messy, but I still had to take her into the shower and hose her off!

 

Overall, it was a fun and exciting day.  It was also very emotional for me.  My whole life, the only consistent thing I can remember wanting to be when I grew up was a mom.  It took me a long time to get there - turning 40 before her 1st birthday - but I am so thrilled to be her mom!

She is a beautiful, smart, sweet, busy little girl.  I will also say she is very, um...spirited...is that a nice way to say stubborn?  She definitely has a stubborn streak already, but I'm hoping she's getting out of her system early!!  I am also so grateful to be doing this with Mike.  He is an amazing daddy and loves her so much.  The way her face lights up when daddy comes in the room is a testament to how much she loves him.  We are truly blessed and excited that we get to be Rebecca's parents.

Happy Birthday my beautiful girl!!