Annie-1 Year

Dear Annie,
You turned one last Wednesday. Your Dad and I took the day off work and took you breakfast for your first donut (Dunkin Donuts, plain glazed). You were excited to be out at that time of day (it was 6:30 in the morning) but could take or leave the donut. Later in the day we ventured to the zoo and were one step ahead of a huge slow moving crowd the whole day. Though we were a bit rushed, you loved the penguins house and any aquarium-type feature we found. You are truly a water baby. Because we pushed our luck at the zoo a bit, you must have napped for about 5 minutes in the car on the ride home, because you had zero interest in napping for the rest of the afternoon. It's the first time we've ever seen you fussy from being over-tired. I mean really fussy. You didn't even want your bunny, which was a first. I guess making it a year before we saw that is an accomplishment. One I am in no hurry to repeat.

I have been putting off this post a bit and trying to collect my thoughts, to think of exactly what I want to say. But each time I try to think of what to write, I get choked up and end up looking at pictures of the last year. Quite simply, I think it's safe to say it's been the best year of my life. I think your Dad would agree. I have heard it said so many times but I truly can't imagine our life without you. You slid right into a little void in our family that I truly didn't know was there. You make me laugh out loud at least one time a day and make the sweetest faces. I think my personal favorite is when you raise your eyebrows at me, usually in response to something you think is funny or amazing that you have done.

You are now in size 4 diapers and still in the 12-18 month old clothes. You are still not walking, but I blame this on the size of our house. It's so small, and furniture is so close in places, you can "cruise" from one area to another by just grabbing onto things. You will walk using your walker or even with just holding one of our hands with no problems. You just haven't let go yet. I am in no real hurry to let you go.

Your naps are sporadic these days. You will usually take two naps, but they are pretty short and some days (aforementioned birthday) you only take one. Those days are not great because you can't seem to handle it just yet. You still take 3 bottles a day and we haven't switched you over to milk yet because we haven't officially had your 1 year checkup where the doc will give us the green light. You have proven that a person really only needs two teeth to get through 97% of foods on this earth. You will eat just about anything and are recently obsessed with feeding yourself, or at least holding the spoon or fork while shoveling in food with the other hand. You eat grapes and bananas (quartered) as if you have not consumed food for days. You tolerate pasta and love grilled cheese. You weren't as crazy about your birthday cake (pics to come) as I would have thought and I think you just loved having all that attention. You are NOT a fan of having anything "dirty" on your hands, which might have been the problem with the cake. If you are crawling and something gets stuck to your mits, you immediately stop and throw your hands up for my inspection and object removal.

Twenty years from now, I want to remember how much you love your sweet bunny, how fun you think it is to retrieve bunny and binkies from between your crib slats (binkie is loosely forbidden out of the bed), how your first words are officially Dad and Gib (Jen's dog-I know where I stand in the heirarchy of a 1 year old), and how everything else is "dee". I want to remember how it is so easy to tell when you are sleepy now because you will just lay your head down on my shoulder. You absolutely refuse to let me cut your nails, which is becoming less and less cute and more and more of a hazard to yourself and others, but I am optimistic enough that this will be a phase worth documenting here. I want to remember how messed up your semi-curly hair is every morning and the wild squiggly hair in the back that will not be tamed. I want to remember how your sticky little hands feel holding my index fingers as we walk around the house and how we keep going going going, despite your weary wobbles and my aching back. I want to remember how you turn away from strangers and snuggle into my chest when I am holding you, only to offer them bunny as a friendship token moments later (demanding it back 5 seconds after that, of course). I want to remember how you look when I change you in the middle of the night (a possibly misguided notion that having a less full diaper will make you able to sleep past 5:45-yet to be proven 100% accurate) and how you are big enough now to "rescue carry" with your body draped over both my arms. I want to remember how much fun you and your Dad have playing and listening to music and dancing, and how excited you get when he comes in to wake you up every morning, and how you holler for him at the door when he leaves for work.

I want to remember everything. We love you, sweet girl. I hope you had a perfect birthday.

Love,
Mom