Learn & Groove Table

Yesterday the last present from Amanda's aunts arrived - the Leap Frog Learn & Groove Table. She LOVED this! Everything on the table makes a noise or says something. She's totally fascinated! I had to post some pics:

Happy Anniversary!

Today was Mike's and my 4th anniversary. We celebrated by going out to dinner at Island's. It was very good. Amanda was very well behaved, even though we were out a bit past her bedtime :) We'll probably do something more next weekend to celebrate our anniversary and Valentine's Day. When he got home, Mike brought me these:


And after we put Amanda to bed, we sat down to watch the season premiere of LOST. Sophie immediately curled up with Mike. I guess I won't be getting any snuggle time with my hubby *lol*

Some cute pics

This first picture is from a couple of nights ago. For her birthday Amanda got a play "purse" that plays music, teaches numbers, and has several items she can take in and out of it, including play money, a mirror, a bracelet, keys... and lipstick. After her party, my sister tried to show her how to "put on" the lipstick, but she'd just laugh and hand it back to have Ilene do it again. Then the other night, she sat down to play and started babbling to herself, while "putting on" the lipstick! Priceless!



This is last night. I was making dinner (stirring some rice in a pot), and Amanda got into the cupboard I leave open for her and took out a wooden spoon and bowl. She "stirred" just like mommy!

I'm in heaven...

Why did no one tell me my favorite Girl Scout cookie came in ice cream?!?!?!?! I found this at the market and have since had several bowls of heaven on earth. Ahhhhhh... no more trying to find the stores with the girl scouts selling cookies in front, I can just go in and find some Dreyers!! This used to be so much easier when I was a girl scout, I'd just buy some boxes from myself. I can't wait until Amanda is old enough, then I don't have to search out my beloved girl scout cookies!

Latest Fortune Magazine

I'm going to divert a bit from the family for a moment, so skip this post if you don't want to read about current events...

Anyway, if you haven't read it, there is an article in the latest Fortune Magazine called Melinda Gates Goes Public. It's an amazing article about an amazing woman. She is what I aspire to be like. Have you seen pictures of her? Does she *look* like the wife of a multi-billionare? No. She's so down-to-earth and not so plastic and made up that you don't recognize the real her anymore. I love that about her. I like that she has stayed true to her own self-image and hasn't given in to the pressures of being "perfect" in the public eye. And she runs the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which gives more charitable contributions than you and I will ever see in a lifetime. Amazing. Anyway, I don't want to go on an on about it, so just read the article if you have time, it's very eye-opening.

Fun with laundry

This morning as I was doing laundry, Amanda climbed into the basket and wanted to go for a ride, I had to oblige! I stopped to take a few pictures of course ;)





Also, we've had a *lot* of rain here the last couple of days, and last night it finally started to break up. On my way home from work I saw this and thought it looked cool, so I took a pic. You can *almost* see the sunset :)

Happy 1st Birthday Baby!

Amanda turned 1 on Thursday January 17, 2008. I can't believe my baby is 1 already! The first three months went by SOOOOOOO slow (probably because I was learning what to do), but after that we definitely cruised through the next 9 months no problem.

Thursday a gift from her aunts in Illinois arrived. I decided since it was her birthday I'd let her open it. She had fun finding what was inside :) She got a fridge magnet set which has been so much fun (more on that later)!

Saturday was her "official" party. As I was getting ready, I stubbed my toe on her baby swing (still sitting in the living room), and I'm pretty sure I broke my pinky toe. So when everyone arrived I was icing it :( Nevertheless, we had a good time. We did make-your-own pizzas in honor of Amanda's love of pizza. Everyone put the toppings they wanted on, and my little sister was in charge of the oven and cooking each one.

Then we did presents. First, from Aunt Ilene, a Build-a-Bear that she LOVED. It even sings a special happy birthday song to her, and she wants this bunny with her ALL.THE.TIME. now. It's weird how vehemently she has bonded to this bunny!

Amanda also got a lot of clothes, the most memorable was this shirt ("My Dad is the MAN"):

The biggest gift was the Discovery Dome from my parents. Her cousin Zach had this in Illinois and she LOVED it. So now she has it at home to play with! Notice how she's always looking off to her left? My nephew was sitting over there playing with her toys. She seemed more interested in him than in her gifts at times!

Then we did cupcakes. As I'm sure most 1 year-olds do, she LOVED her cupcake!! She took one taste of frosting, and then she was off! She devoured her cupcake more quickly than I've seen her eat anything else! Here's a few pictures of that:

Here's a picture of the cupcakes that were left after everyone had one:

That night I set up the magnets on the fridge, and Amanda had so much fun!

Other than that, it's been business as usual around here. Mike's working late a lot as they get to the end of the video game he's working on, so most nights it's me and Amanda. She got a book from Mimi called "first 100 words" with these big bright pictures of things like "Yellow Duck" and "Blue Shoes". She has taken an interest in this and loves to point at things and listen to me say them. She sometimes imitates the sound if it's easy enough. I think we're right on the verge of hearing her first words (other than the obligatory 'Uh-oh' that she currently uses every time she drops something). It's just a matter of time!

Quick update

Not much going on here.  Amanda has the bug that's been going around.  Last Tuesday night/Wednesday morning she started vomiting.  I couldn't get her to hold anything down all day Wednesday or Thursday.  She started getting better Friday and by Sunday she seemed back to normal.  But I sent her to daycare today only to get called in the afternoon that she had thrown up again and I had to come get her.  *sigh*  No fever, and other than not eating she seems fine.  We went to the doctor on Friday and he said it's just been going around, and not much I can do for her except try and get her to drink liquids and not get dehydrated.  So we are waiting.............

Meanwhile, I got a new dining room table last week!  Funny story actually.  I've been bugging Mike for years to get a new table, but he didn't want to spend the money.  Then last weekend we were talking about remodeling the kitchen (which is when we had agreed we'd get a new dining room table), and Mike mentioned he would like to get a table that is small and round (we have a very small dining room), but that you can open and add leaves to.  I said good idea!  Then I was looking through the newspaper and saw an ad for Cost Plus World Market - they were having a 50% off all furniture sale, and there it was, the perfect table!!  So I called all around and finally found one in Northridge.  We got an awesome deal (which made Mike happy), and it's exactly what I wanted!

Here's Amanda playing with the box while Mike was assembling everything:


And here's Mike all spread out assembling a couple of the chairs.
 

And here's the table set up tonight!  


As you can see my hutch no longer matches, but I think we're just going to put up with it for now and when we remodel the kitchen, I'm going to knock down the wall between the kitchen and dining room and put a bar there that will serve as my "buffet".  Now I just need to convince Mike to remodel the kitchen sooner rather than later!!

Amanda turns 1 on Thursday (the 17th), and that Saturday (the 19th) we're having a small party for her.  So I'll probably  have pics from that soon.