.....One Large Step.

Both Owen and I have seen it coming for weeks now. And while I've been somewhat dreading it, my wonderful husband has been encouraging her. Miss Kate took her first tentative steps tonight after supper. :0)

Owen took her out of her booster seat after she had finished eating set her on the floor standing up (she mastered standing up on her own over a month ago w/o assistance) and then took a few steps back and said "Come here Kate" and the little monster did, she took 2 full steps before she started to lose her balance and sunk to her knees. Tasha got excited, I got excited and we all cheered for her. It was a bit of an emotional moment for us all. I think more that all of us had witnessed those first steps together, where as with Tasha I saw her walk first and then it was a couple of days before she walked again in front of Owen.

I was able to get her to take a few steps again a few minutes later to come to me, but I don't see her running by next week. :P Her balance is still a bit precarious and I imagine it will be a few weeks before she's mastered her new "talent". No video yet as she's just taking a couple of steps into our arms, but I'll post one as soon as she will walk to one of us that is further away then a couple of feet.

Life will never be the same around her now that little miss mischievous is starting to find her footing. Owen says he sees no difference between this and crawling but I see it differently. She's a fast crawler as it is, I can't imagine how fast I'm going to have to be to keep up with her once she's walking confidently.

Tashee took her first tentative steps exactly 2m after her first birthday and Kate's first steps are exactly 3 days later. Those damn overachieving 2nd born kids. :P

Kate Turns One!

Hard to believe K is One. It's been such an exciting year for us. From her quick arrival (delivered at home in our bed by EMS) to her first smile, laugh, rolling over, crawling...it's so cliche but it really does go so fast! And not just the first year, each year just zooms by! I was just saying to O last night how I could not believe that Tasha starts Kindergarten in the fall.

We just had a small family party for K. I'm thinking about having a 'friend' party in the new year, but with the timing of her birthday (what was it I said to Owen almost 2yrs ago now? I don't care when your child is born, I just want another child. hah) how busy work is for me and how busy it is this time of year for everyone, we decided just to have a family party.

Tasha and I stopped at Michaels on Saturday on our way home from the movies and she picked out the butterfly for Kate's cake. Then on Sunday after supper we sang happy birthday and Kate dove in. You can see from some of the photos that O was holding her back while I tried to get a photo of her with her cake. You can see how successful that was. :P

Her expression as I'm bringing the Cake over to the table;

Owen holding her while I try to take some photos of her with her cake;




Let me at the cake already!


And finally giving her a piece;

One Year Old!

Shocking that my baby girl is a year old! I can't quite believe it myself. A look back at the past year and her affair with the Bunny;

Natasha Turns Four.

Unlike in the past, this year Owen and I decided to keep things a bit more low key for N's birthday. It was a combination of things really. I was just getting over a month of having been really sick (pneumonia, loss of voice, hacking cough for a month), my parents were in town and things were hectic between my work schedule and other things going on. So instead of having a big party, we invited just a few of her friends. I think it all worked out well.

Regardless of size, I think everyone had a great time. I baked gingerbread snowflake cookies for them to decorate (originally I was going to have them paint ornaments but changed my mind hah), I made mini pizzas for supper and of course there was Cake for dessert!

I think everyone had a great time. :0)

The Cake, it was my ingenious idea to buy the Christmas Tree Ornament for the topper. :D





Tash being silly;

And to think my little girl starts Kindergarten next fall!

A Visit with Santa

I had high hopes for a photo with Santa this year with both my girls smiling. The previous weekend we had attended Owen's company Kids' Christmas Party and Kate had no qualms at all about sitting on Santa's lap. Tasha was a little scared but I had been hyping him up all week and getting her to think about what she wanted to ask Santa for Christmas so I thought all would go well.

But after the 10m wait in line and bad timing (Kate woke up earlier than usual that day so was getting tired) K lost it as soon as I handed her over to Santa. And because myself and the photographer were focused on seeing if we could get her to smile, we did not notice Tash was making faces at the camera until the woman who was watching them come up on the computer behind us said something. :P

Ahh well, she faired better with Santa then Tasha did at that age. On to next year. :0)