Fun Around the House

Madeline spends the majority of her day exercising her ability to walk. She loves her stroller to cruise around the house. She's becoming more and more daring to take steps all by herself, and lately, she's been going farther and farther without assistance. The ladies at the gym daycare have really gotten her to be more adventurous. Madeline will be a proficient walker before we know it. Until then, she's enjoying her stroller assisted walks around the house.

And, as you can see from the very first picture, she has quite the set of teeth. Unfortunately for her, she probably inherited those "famous McCarthy teeth" that she'll have to grow into. But, she's still pretty darn cute.

Madeline's First Birthday Party

We had a wonderful celebration for Madeline's first birthday on Sunday, August 16, 2009. It was filled with family, close friends, yummy food, and delicious ice cream cake.

Madeline made many trips around the house greeting her guests. Grandpa and Aunt Kim were good sports about it!

Posing with Aunt Kim--Aunt Kim never let Madeline's tutu become un-fluffy!
Yummy cake! Madeline was not sure about the cake at first, but once she got a taste, she really enjoyed it! Since it was so hot, I decided to make an oreo ice cream cake. It was pretty tasty and refreshing.

Playing in the yard with Aunt Brittany

Daddy throwing Madeline around...Cousin Drew looking on waiting his turn.

Madeline spent a lot of the party like this checking everything out.

Grandpa McCarthy spent a lot of time with Madeline on her big day.

Pretty birthday girl

Taking some steps to go cozy up with Grandpa.

Resting in Mommy's lap

Getting some snuggles from my very best friend's mom who we refer to as Grandma Connie. Connie was like a second mom to me, so it's only natural that she be an honorary Grandmother to Madeline.

Birthday Girl was tuckered out...one of many yawns!

Heading to Grandma McCarthy's lap for some love.

Madeline had a wonderful day filled with lots of hugs, kisses, presents, laughs, yard games, and most importantly, LOVE! She is one lucky little lady!

***Our friend, Jen, took lots of great photos as our "official photographer" for Madeline's party, but I have not been able to get together with her to retrieve the CD she made for us. At some future date, I will be posting a sampling of her photos. She does AWESOME work!

WOOO HOOOO!

We sold our house, and we are beyond happy with the way things turned out with our buyers. Now, we are on the hunt to find a house to rent. We have two really great prospects, so things are looking good. However, the thought of packing all of our stuff makes me crazy, but that's just part of it. Our new house won't be ready for 4-6 months, so at least we can get settled into a rental place for a bit before we have to re-pack and move again. Did I mention our closing date is September 18? The next few weeks will be crazy, but I'll take it over being the proud homeowners of TWO houses!

***On a side note, I have not forgotten to do a post on Madeline's first birthday party, but I'm waiting on some pictures from a friend to share with the post.

ONE YEAR OLD!!!

Good gracious, where did a year go? Our sweet Madeline is one year old as of Monday, August 17, 2009. She entered this world on her exact due date, and her father and I couldn't help but immediately explode with love for this little girl. Madeline has made our little family so happy, and we just feel so blessed that we were chosen to be her parents. We love being Mama and Dada, and her sweet little "HI!" with a wave every morning just makes our day start out so perfectly. As you can tell from the 12 month pictures, I decided to let her birthday outfit speak for itself on this month's update -- no sign & posed pictures this month. I think the 1 on her shirt and the pink tutu say it all!
Madeline is certainly a mover and a shaker these days. Being held is not high on her list unless she's in an unfamiliar place or is tired. Otherwise, she's busy. Proficient walking all by herself is on the horizon. Each day she becomes more and more daring taking those tiny, wobbly, unassisted steps. Sometimes, I think she's standing and sees something of interest and just walks without even thinking about it. Madeline has really started to navigate around the house well with her push stroller. She's even able to get herself out of jams by making her 100 point turns. Climbing is becoming more of a "situation" these days. It's as though she views everything as a large stair. Nevertheless, loading & unloading the dishwasher becomes interesting when she's climbing in it. Madeline has the dancing bug for sure! She LOVES to dance and shake her bootie to music!
Madeline has quite a large personality for such a little person...she's bubbly, squealy, happy, dramatic, stubborn, determined, and extremely affectionate. Kisses and hugs are given out frequently, and we sometimes are surprised at who is on the receiving end of these kisses & hugs. Although she is a loud busy body at times, she continues to retreat to her room to play by herself or look at her books all on her own. This little lady craves her alone time, and I'm happy to give it to her. Her vocabulary is still pretty slim --- mama, dada, & hi are her words right now, BUT she is trying so hard to repeat other simple words like uh-oh & bye-bye. Madeline studies our lips intently whenever we talk, and I can just see her little lips quivering and moving trying to figure it all out.

With Madeline's new found walking/fast crawling, she's wiped out at naptime & bedtime. It's great because she seems to have grown out of that flailing around in the bed before she goes to sleep. Her morning nap seems to be going away, and the afternoon nap seems to be stretching out. Her bedtime is between 6:30 and 7:30 PM based upon her disposition. Some days, I just put her out of her misery, and we call it a day when she's just grumpy and exhausted. This adjusted schedule makes me a happy Mama.

As of right now, Madeline has 6 teeth with a couple more coming. Her finger gnawing has started back up again, and her little gums are a bit swollen. However, this lack of teeth hasn't slowed down her eating...she will TRY just about anything...key word here --- TRY. Getting her to eat it is another story, so I've realized that she has become a bit picky, unfortunately. Upon the advice of our doctor, I've been serving her the meal, she eats it or not, and we move on from the meal. Unfortunately, this Mama is not a short order cook, so I'm implementing the "here's your meal" rule early. Our doctor said not to feed into the pickiness by creating lots of things for her to eat at one meal, and he assured me that I'm not starving my sweet girl. Madeline does have some favorites --- juice, whole milk (believe it or not?!), yogurt, mac-n-cheese, pork, spaghetti/ravioli, mandarin oranges, cheese anything, waffles, Cheerios, bananas, and any junk food (of course). Madeline is still on the bottle at her naptime and bedtime (with formula only), so I guess my next big milestone is to get her off the bottle routine at her naps and bed. There's a good chance that I might be more concerned about it than she is, but I suppose it could be a complete nightmare too. Once I commit to no more bottles, then I'm in 100% with no turning back. I still have some formula to use up, so in efforts not to waste it, we'll keep those routines the same for now until the formula is gone.
Madeline Grace, you never cease to amaze us with your antics and personality. Your Daddy and I couldn't love you more if we tried, and we look forward to this next phase of your life.
( We had our 12 month well visit this morning, and Madeline received a glowing report from Dr. Kapp. Everything is moving along just fine --- height, weight, head circumference, developmental skills. Madeline is 22 lbs. 2 oz. (69%), and she's 31 inches tall (96%). Her iron was still a little bit low, so we'll keep working on those iron rich foods! She received 4 vaccines, and to say that Miss Madeline was angry about those shots is an understatement! Her flair for the dramatics was evident! Poor thing.)

Remember...



...the Ultimate Grocery Game Challenge a few posts back?



Well, I think I did well for my first major grocery shopping savings challenge. I spent $378 for two families (3 meals a day, kid/beach friendly food we don't normally buy, & beach junk food snacks!!) for a whole week at Fripp Island. And, I must note that we ate "nice-adults-only-like-we-were-out-to-a-restaurant" kind of dinners not just quickie meals.

Fripp Island -- August, 2009

We had a wonderful trip to Fripp with our good friends, John and Shay!! We already cannot wait until next year!

We had lots of good times playing golf & riding on the golf cart.

We all ate much more than we should have, but the food was delicious! I must say, Shay and I can whip up some goodness in the kitchen!

John and Shay brought their boat down to the island, so we were able to have an adults night out on the boat. What a great time we had, and the views were just breathtaking.

Of course, we spent lots of time at the pool and on the beach just having fun and being silly!

We enjoyed all the nature that Fripp has to offer -- feeding deer, watching sunsets

We relaxed and snuggled!

Shay's baby, Emily, was especially snuggly after a long, busy day at the beach. She just asked me to hold Emily for a second...

Our friend, Brian, came to visit us one night. The babies loved tugging on their "big furry bear"!

Fripp was filled with big belly laughs, 4 sun-kissed adults, 3 very sunscreened children, lots of great food, too many yummy beverages, hilarious antics of a 3 year old matched with an almost one year old, relaxing naps on the beach (for the kids because of course they all napped at different times!), wonderful friendships made even more wonderful, and two re-energized families that actually tried to rent the house for the next week. Too bad for us that it was already rented because we were ready for another week! Oh well...we are eagerly awaiting our trip next year!