Happy Birthday Claire!!!!

Happy Birthday Claire! Mommy and Daddy love you so much and we have really enjoyed this last year. You have grown so much over the last year and are such a sweet, smiling, little girl. We have loved getting to watch you grow and get to know your personality. Daddy made you a video for your birthday to show your changes over the last year. You have learned so many things and are such a loving little girl. We love you!!

Claire's 1st Birthday Party

Claire's 1st birthday party went so great today! Thanks to the grandparents for putting so much work into helping prepare for the party! We had so much fun celebrating her birthday and enjoyed spending the time with family and friends. Claire really did well with so many people there, even though she was pretty tired for the last half of the party. We planned on having an outdoor luau by the pool but the weather was not cooperating, so we went ahead and did all the deocorating inside. Here are a few pictures of the pig cake(that really took way too long to make--but I think it turned out cute), and Claire eating her own little cake(although she was already full from eating and only seemed interested in the "1" candle on top of the cake).

Getting Ready for Claire's 1st Birthday

We have been working hard all week to get ready for Claire's 1st birthday party tomorrow. We can't believe she is already one! I have been working on a quilt for her since I found out I was pregnant and decided that it would make a great 1st birthday present. I finally finished it last night and was pleased with the outcome. I am in the middle of baking her a pig cake to go with her luau birthday party theme---we'll see how that turns out. I'm not going to be surprised if I have to make a trip to the grocery store in the morning to get another birthday cake! Wish me luck! Here is a couple pics of the quilt:

Funny Faces

Usually I share all of the pics with her smiling perfectly, but last week my Mom got a lot of cute outtakes while trying to get some good ones of Claire playing. Here are a few. As an update, she now has her two bottom teeth (they look like they are about half way in), and she is standing up all the time and actually tried to take a step on her own last night but fell down. She wants to walk soooo bad. She got promoted to the 12-18 month class at daycare last week and I think it is inspiring her to act like the older kids. We also are starting to slip milk into her bottles now to wean her off the formula, so far so good. She hardly eats any baby food anymore and is pretty efficient at feeding herself table food. Her favorite food is the Gerber Graduates little crunchies--she won't eat anything else if she even sees the can in the room (they are pretty much cheese puffs for babies--they are good, I can't blame her for liking them). Grandma has taught her how to hold up the number one when you ask her how old she is, that is what she is doing in the second picture. We practice it about 100 times a day so she will be able to do it on her birthday!