With a lot of help, prayers, tears of joy and loss and cursing (way too much cursing) we went from here…
(Birthday picture)
to here…
(First birthday pictures)
And she took her first steps today! What a year!
Lily gave me a sweet little kiss.
It was the best gift ever.
Her first birthday is days away. Last night Ben and I were talking about birthday cake. I weighed the options: making cupcakes or ordering a vegan cake from a well know vegan/vegetarian bakery. I thought it was necessary to say, “Whatever we have, she isn’t actually going to eat it.”
Without looking up from his computer Ben said, “No, she’ll throw it up.”
This is true.
She’s still trying to figure out the ins-and-outs of chewing. Anything that isn’t pureed usually comes back up.
Moments after I finished typing this post Ben announced that Lily wanted nothing to do with her usually feast of soy yogurt and pureed vegetables for dinner. All she wanted to eat were things she could practice chewing: chopped up bananas, little bits of a gluten-free breadstick.
That may be the case, but she still isn’t eating cake.
Also, you may notice a brown, furry, little bunny sitting with her inside the wagon in both of the above pictures. He is referred to as Night Rider Bunny in our house. We call him Night Rider Bunny because of the sound he makes when his belly is squeezed. It’s supposed to sound like a particular variety of rabbit, but instead it sounds just like the intro music for the Night Rider television show. It’s kind of eerie, but if you grew up in the 80s, the intro music for KIT was well known. So known that my baby’s bunny can now channel Kit and whiplash me back into 1982 where there were braces and homework and Friday nights that had, had, had to be something–a slumber party, or an all night phone call–because they couldn’t be dates or boy/girl parties yet.
That could have been more than a million and a half years ago.
.
Yeah, it’s comming. She now has expectations about how things should be, like if the baby gate is open and she discovers this, under no circumstances does she think it is acceptable for mama to close it. Closing the gate = tears and screams. She is also equally insulted when I don’t let her pilfer through the cabinets and toss all the previously contained items to the kitchen, bathroom, or bedroom floor. Diaper changes are now scream sessions, unless she is still half asleep.
On the plus side, because there is always a plus side. She now gives hugs, full on hugs. They bring me to tears with their sweetness. And she understands the concept of having an audience and how to play to it, which usually involves smiles and waves. She talks almost nonstop. We don’t really know her language, but she has one. And it is adorable. Today she plopped her body next to mine on the futon and snuggled with me while I read two books.
It just keeps getting better and better.
