The First of Cora's 1st Birthdays!

Cora had a little birthday party on Sunday with her BFF, Avery. We ended up doing the Winter "ONE"derland theme. While I had many great ideas for this party, we ended up running out of time to do most of it. However, the party was fun and perfect for little girls. Lee and I cut snowflakes and hung them around the house. We made snowflake quesadillas (chicken, cheese, and avocado) for lunch. We made snowmen out of construction paper. Cora only wanted to eat the glue. The party favors were these neat little crayon tote bags and finger-knitted scarves that my Mom made. We had chocolate cupcakes with chocolate frosting that were delish! It was a lot of fun.

Cora with her party hat sitting at her new table.

Kim and Avery

The birthday crew minus Lee (photographer). L to R: Kim, Cora, Rory, Avery, Sascha

Craft time!

I told you she wanted to drink the glue. It was closed. ;)

Showing Daddy her very cool snowman. LOL. I don't want any joking comments about my art skills.

Daddy showing Cora some of the snowflakes we made the night before. We stayed up until 1am cutting them. We were going to spray paint them with glitter but lost motivation. It was actually a lot of fun and we're thinking about making it a holiday tradition.

The first snowflake quesadilla. Success!!

Kim helping Avery and Cora eat their quesadilla.

Present time!

Helping/Teaching Cora how to open birthday gifts. Avery is patiently waiting.

Avery gave Cora the neatest gift. It is a laser machine that beams stars onto the ceiling. You can adjust the cloud cover and everything. The stars move as well. It is so neat!!

Birthday Cake! Lee and I didn't want Avery to feel left out so we put a candle in her cupcake as well. This candle crackled a bit. The sound and the crazy flame scared her to death. Poor thing. She soon got over it. The chocolate changed her mood real quick. Cora, on the other hand, just wanted to touch the flame.

Cora was getting antsy. She wanted that cupcake.

Cute, curly blond girls before they got too messy.

Isn't that just cute?

Avery is learning to share. She enjoys sharing so much that she wanted to feed her Dad straight out of her mouth. Yummy.

Cora was lovin' the chocolate cupcake.

The are starting to become comatose from the sugar and chocolate. Rory referred to this as Chocolate Zombies. :)

She really got into it after a while.

Avery was a somewhat cleaner eater.

How much cupcake can Cora fit into her mouth at one time. I think you all would be surprised!

Cora's first birthday was so much fun! Thanks to Kim, Rory, and mostly Avery for making her birthday party so special. :) She had another party at daycare. I'm getting tired, so I'll post pictures of that tomorrow. Wednesday is her actual birthday so we'll have a special afternoon/evening with her. I love our little girl more and more every day. We can't wait to share her with out family for Christmas.

We're Back!

We have definitely been MIA the last 2 weeks or so. That is because we have been super duper busy. We have moved (mostly) to a new townhouse. We absolutely love it. Our internet just got hooked back up earlier this week. Thank goodness. Now I can finally blog again. I have been busy with school, and Lee has been busy with work. Now, we're busy getting ready for Cora's 1st birthday. Say it with me, "HOLY MOTHER OF PEARL! WHAT HAPPENED TO 2009?"

Here are some pictures to update you of our past 2 weeks.

Cora was introduced to citrus. Turns out she loves oranges.

This was the night that we were moving. Cora fell asleep like the good little girl she is, but I had no where to put her. Into the basket she went.

The first photo of our new home. This is the view of the living room from the kitchen. These are the first installments of our new place. More to come later (one's with furniture).

Looking towards the dining room from the living room.

The Kitchen. Big Red Truck.

Looking upstairs from the entry way.

Looking at the entryway from upstairs.

Master bathroom.

Cora's new bedroom.

We are almost moved in. We have had some small difficulties with this move. Problem 1: We first received about a foot of snow. Problem 2: The temperatures then decided to dip to about, oh, -50. I am not exaggerating. Problem 3: The extreme cold didn't allow our vehicles to start for about 5 days. Sooooo, we will officially be moved in by Sunday night/Monday morning of this coming week.

Look how big she is getting!

Cora loves riding her horse.

Hippy Baby has the munchies.

The best for last. :)

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

Ho Ho Ho!!

Merry Christmas! Christmas is in full swing here in Canada. It is a little bit weird having Thanksgiving in October. Every part of the holiday season is really thrown off for Lee and me. The Christmas stuff all came out October 31! We decided we would celebrate American Thanksgiving by taking Cora to the mall to meet Santa Claus. Lee and I were just a wee bit excited. She was in a great mood. She laughed in line. She babbled at the other kiddos. She giggled as I carried her up the stairs to Santa's big throne. Then, I sat her on Santa's lap. All was NOT well in Happy Cora Land. She cried. She screamed. She belly ached. She was more than upset. We all laughed. It might have been even more funny because the kids in front of her all cried and the kids behind her all cried. Poor Santa. I kind of wanted to slip him a 20 dollar bill for being a good sport.

Happy Cora waiting to meet Santa.

VERY Unhappy Cora sitting on sweet Santa's lap.

Cora loves to practice her walking (if you can't tell from her huge grin). This was post-Santa so you can see it didn't take her long to get over her dislike of Santa.

11! Eleven? ELEVEN!!!!

Can you all believe it? Cora is 11 months old! What happened? I have literally enjoyed every single day since December 23, 2008. She is the sweetest, most funny, happiest little girl. She loves to make Lee and I laugh. She has the best laugh. Of course, I haven't caught it on video, but I will. She is turning into our shadow. She loves to mimic us. There are so many things I want to catch on camera, but she clams up on video. She tends to just smile, which is A-OK with me.

Well, onto the infamous bullet list of what Cora has been up to lately. :)

• She gives kisses and hugs (See previous post for video)
  
• She is getting much better at Patty Cake
  
• When we head upstairs, I say, "To Infinity and Beyond" and point my finger in the direction we are going. She holds her hand out and says, "Wooooooo" in a high pitched voice. Sooooo cute.
• She is getting very interested in silverware. Every time she uses a spoon, she gets better and better.
• She loves walking while holding on to our hand. She took a couple steps a few days ago while only holding one of my hands.
• She is a little monkey and has no fear of falling. She'll try to climb on everything. Of course, sometimes it ends up in a crash and burn. She has the bumps and bruises to prove it.
• She clicks her tongue (I actually have a video I took today of this. However, I haven't had the chance to upload it to the computer and then to YouTube).
• She hasn't said an official word, but she says mama and dada all the time. I don't count it as a word because she'll look at the wall and say Mama. Hmmmm, yeah I don't think she has put two and two together yet.
• She loves books. While I change her diaper, she holds a book and reads. Every word is dah, but she changes her tones like she is actually telling a story. Another thing I have to get on video.
• She can color. She is really starting to get it. We have to pay close attention to her because she still likes to chew on the crayons. You just have to remind her that the crayons are for coloring, not eating.
  
• She bites. Not because she wants to hurt us, but because she wants a reaction. It hurts. She has only bit Lee and me. She acts like a little wild animal. I don't think it will amount to anything, but we do what we can with an 11 month old to deter her. Currently, we look at her and tell her, "That hurts. Biting is not OK." We then set her down and walk away. She hates being left behind. I think it is pretty effective because she doesn't bite after that. Of course she'll bite again the next day, but it isn't like she has any concept of right and wrong or long term memory. Her boundaries are made by testing her limits so I think it is most important for us to be consistent. Who knows. Nobody ever said disciplining is easy.
• She is very ticklish. Everywhere. Especially right above her knee, her feet, and her ribs. She'll laugh so hard she can't breath. I know how much I hate being tickled, but I can't help but tickle her at least 57 times a day. Her laugh gets me every time.

I can't really think of much more. She is cuter than ever. Her hair is getting long. She is getting chubbier by the day. I hate not being able to spend 7 days a week with her. I guess I am one of the lucky ones who only has to put her in daycare 3 days a week. It sucks for me. She absolutely loves daycare. I think it is really helping her blossom. She has become quite interactive in the last few months. We attribute this to being exposed to a lot of people through daycare.

Here are some pictures I took this morning. She is so pretty in pink. Enjoy the photos and have a Happy Thanksgiving to all of our American friends.

Oh, before I forget. I need to add a little disclaimer about Cora The Red Nosed Baby. Yep, she has her first rug burn on her nose. She took a really good spill on the carpet and has a pretty decent rug burn right on the tip of her nose. Poor baby. She was pretty upset for, oh, 2 minutes. Nothing a bottle and a cuddle can't fix though. ;)

Look at all those teeth.

I can't even begin to tell you all how much I love her legs. This picture really shows how irresistible they are.

She looks so innocent, but really. Who is she kidding? :)

110% beautiful.

This picture is Cora. It captures exactly what I see everyday.

Melt My Heart, Please??

I have added a video of Cora's sweet kisses and hugs. She is such a cuddle bug! Here are some other pictures for everyone to enjoy that Lee and I have taken over the last couple of weeks.

Such a wascally wittle wabbit.

This is a picture of Cora's new car seat. It is a Graco My Ride 65. She loves it and Lee and I love it. It rear faces up to 40 lbs and then forward faces to 65 lbs. She was just about to the weight and length limits in her infant carrier, so we finally bit the bullet and bought a new one. She giggles when she has to sit in it. We are very happy so far with our purchase. As you can see from the photo, she is starting to look like a toddler. Just a little bit.

This picture was taken on Lee's 27th birthday. Cora gave him two books. My Daddy and Me and Dr. Seuss' Hop on Pop. This was late and Cora is barely awake. :)

Yummy. Who wants some spaghetti??

Nap time on Daddy. I love this picture. It really shows how golden her curly locks are, how plump her sweet little lips are, how rosy the apples of the her cheeks are, and how beautiful her eyelashes are.

We finally have graduated from the exersaucer. She spent a couple weeks playing underneath. She was a nice little girl and gave it back the Jen and Corey for their new baby-to-be.

These are pictures of fabric I bought to make Cora a couple dresses. The first dress is a reversible. The turquoise dot is the trim. I absolutely love the paisley. The second picture was originally supposed to be her Christmas dress. Well, I couldn't pass up the butterflies. The fabric is gorgeous. This will be a pillowcase style dress.