Knitting Again

I hadn't picked up my knitting needles since shortly before Samantha was born. I saw some cute wine bottles on a Christmas cooking show, so I decided that our bar needed some accessorizing. I'll probably make a couple more. They're fun because I can get one finished during one of Sammy's naps.

Christmas in Jamaica

First of all, Happy Holidays to all of our friends and family! We were fortunate enough to be able to spend Christmas in Jamaica this year with my parents and brother, Richard. The weather was absolutely gorgeous, and it was so nice to spend a few days enjoying the sunshine.

I wasn't sure how Samantha would handle the trip, but she was a champ. She did really well on all the flights and was a little charmer once we got to the resort. We took Sammy to the beach our first day there, and she loved it so much that she cried when we had to leave to get cleaned up for dinner. She was completely fearless, and would have run out into the ocean if we would have let her.

She also really enjoyed all of the yummy drinks. Here she is sharing Grandpa's virgin Pina Colada. I think they were her favorite, followed closely by these delicious fruit shakes that all the bars made.

On Christmas Day, Santa arrived by boat. He was ready for a vacation after a long night of delivering presents.

Sammy missed his arrival because she was racked out on a lounge chair on the beach. All of that playing is hard work!

Grossly Overdue

I am grossly overdue for posting to the blog...my appologies! Things have been a little crazy around here trying to get ahead of everything before our upcoming trip to Jamaica. This post will mostly be pictures that we've taken over the last few weeks.

First is Samantha modeling her adorable new rain boots. She has a little trouble walking on the carpet in them, but she's willing to suffer for fashion.


And here's Samantha showing some unit pride in her Daddy's 18th Engineer Co t-shirt. Pat took command of the 18th last week.


A couple days before Pat took command, we attended the 18th's Christmas party. Sammy was not particularily thrilled about seeing Santa. On the upside, I guess I should be relieved that she's not willing to sit on some strange man's lap.

The Christmas party was at the skating rink on post, and Sammy absolutely loved when Pat would take her for a couple of laps around the skating rink. I managed to snap this picture as they went flying by.

And finally, here's a picture of Sammy's favorite new game...piling toys on whoever is sitting on the couch. Your role in the game is to sit still and not move any of the toys. The game is over either when she takes all the toys off of you and piles them on the floor or when she gets distracted by something shiny and doesn't notice you getting up.

Reading is Serious Business

I love when Samantha sits down to "read". She looks so serious while she's doing it. I think it makes her look very grown-up.

What is she doing?

Sammy has developed some quirky behaviors lately. She likes to eat with one foot propped up in her high chair. I think it makes her look very cool and laid back. ha ha

She also has decided that the most fun game is to take all of her toys out of the toy bin and then climb into it. The game is messy, but adorable.

Your fortune is...

We ordered chinese food for dinner tonight and ended up with three fortune cookies (possibly because we ordered enough food to easily feed three adults...I love leftover chinese). Pat opened his cookie and got this fortune.

I sassed the fortune cookie gods by saying that we already know that we're going to Jamaica in December, so it wasn't much of a fortune, and they responded by giving us this fortune in the third fortune cookie.

In my face.

First Words

Samantha has officially said her first word, "Hi". She started routinely using the word correctly and waving while she said it a couple of days ago. Yesterday she added "Bye" (with a wave of course) to her repertoire. You can tell when she's babbling that she's trying really hard to put other words together. The harder she tries, the more guttural she gets. It's pretty entertaining. It's amazing how much older this talking thing makes her seem. We're working on getting some video of it, but she's being camera-shy for now.

Samantha's 2nd Halloween

Samantha's 2nd Halloween was a big success! She was actually able to participate a little this year. We had an FRG (Family Readiness Group) Halloween party for Pat's Company on Thursday, and Samantha was quite a hit in her clown costume that Grandma made for her. I especially love her little matching bag.

For Halloween itself, we put her in this cute little jack-o-latern dress to run errands during the day, and then back into her clown costume for trick-or-treating. She wasn't too keen on going to the neighbors' houses, so she helped Mom and Dad pass out candy. I was pleasantly surprised that all of the kids in their costumes didn't bother her at all.

This Post Brought to You by the Letter P

Pigtails and Pajamas!

Penguins and Polka Dots!

Let Her Eat Cake!

I posted the mushy birthday post on Samantha's actual birthday, so now it's time for the fun one! We celebrated Sammy's first birthday with just our little family. Pat is working 12 hour shifts 7 days a week right now, so we waited to start the celebration until Pat got home from work (not until 7:30). Samantha got to open one present, a See 'n Say from Grandma and Grandpa Pankau while we were waiting to keep her occupied.

When Daddy finally got home, we ate a quick dinner, and then it was time for cake! I made a carrot cake with carrots from the farmers market and cream cheese frosting from scratch. It might not have been the prettiest cake in the world, but it was delicious!

Samantha started off eating pretty delicately.

But she quickly discovered how fun it was to squish the cake, stash it in her high chair, and chuck it over the side. At one point there was a piece teetering on the edge of her tray that finally fell off, which Samantha thought was hysterical.

After cake (and a bath), we let Samantha open the rest of her presents. While she was occupied playing with shredded wrapping paper, we stashed most of the new toys in a closet, to be rationed out over the next few days.

And finally, an adorable picture of the birthday girl just for fun. :-)

Happy First Birthday

Dear Samantha,

Today you turn one year old. In that year, you have blossomed into such an amazing little person. You are constantly busy learning and exploring the world around you. When you fall down you might cry a bit, but after a quick snuggle you are up and running again. You love being outside and looking at the rocks, trees, and animals. You invent new ways to play peekaboo, and then fall down because they make you laugh so hard. You love your sister-kitty, Mimi, more than almost anything else in the world. You shriek with delight when she comes in the room and try to pet her and give her kisses. You also shriek with delight when Daddy comes home from work. You immdeiately want to play with him and get annoyed that you have to hold still for some hugs and kisses. You are either wide awake or sound asleep. There is no in-between groggy period for you. You wake up immediately ready to face the day. You make the best faces! My favorites are your concentrating face and your scrunched-nose face. You are so close to saying your first word. For now, everything is either Ma, Ba, or Da. I'm excited for you to finally be able to start sharing your thoughts with us.

Daddy and I love you so much and want to wish you a very happy first birthday. We can't wait to see what your next year brings us!

Love,
Momma

Helicopters and Pumpkin Bread

I think we may have a budding aerospace engineer on our hands. Won't Daddy be proud? Samantha is completely enamored with flying helicopters. She has learned to recognize the sound of them and stops everything she's doing to run to the window whenever she hears one. Today she even stopped nursing so that she could look out the window and see one fly by. It takes a lot to interrupt a nursing session!

Now that October is almost here, I'm really starting to get into the fall spirit. I've been loving all things pumpkin lately (I blame Starbucks for advertising the heck out of their Pumpkin Spice Latte). I decided to bake some pumpkin bread, and it turned out super delicious. It's pretty heavy on the spices, but I like it that way. In case the picture convinces you that you just have to have some yourself, I'm including the recipe. It's slightly modified from the Food Network. Or you can just come visit, and we'll gobble up the one that's safely tucked away in the freezer.

I may reduce the total sugar and substitute some brown sugar for some of the regular sugar next time and try applesauce instead of oil. That way I won't have to feel quite as guilty when I eat the whole loaf in 3 days.

Ingredients

3 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
4 eggs , lightly bean
15 ounces canned unsweetened pumpkin
3 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
2/3 cup water

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour 2 9 by 5 loaf pans. Stir together sugar and oil. Stir in eggs and pumpkin. Combine dry ingredients in separate bowl. Blend dry ingredients and water into wet mixture, alternating. Divide batter between two loaf pans. Bake for about an hour or until cake tester comes out clean. Let stand 10 minutes. Remove from pans and cool.

An Awwwww Moment and a Funny

There are moments that make all the rough patches worth it with Samantha. Sammmy's 4th tooth is just about to break through, and it's made her a real grump these past couple of days. Yesterday evening we were hanging out on the couch nursing. Sammy popped off, sat up, and gave me a huge kiss. My heart just about melted.

Samantha has also become quite the little copy cat. This morning she let out a huge toot while playing and then made a big farty noise with her mouth. I'm not sure if that's more or less socially acceptable than when she laughs hysterically after farting.

Random Pics and Videos

No real theme today, just a bunch of cute pictures and videos that I keep meaning to post, but haven't had the time to do yet.

Eating breakfast this morning in her silly monkey pajamas.

We took a quick trip up to Bellingham while Jo was in town, and took this picture on a walk in the park by the Burgess' house.

Our little daredevil has decided that standing on her car is almost as fun as riding on it.

The first birthday card I made with my Silhouette!

Here's a video of Sammy being silly. She likes to put things over her head, especially her mesh laundry bag. I think she's also trying to eat the bag. Crazy child!

And finally, we were hanging out in the backyard yesterday, and Sammy was running around with her arms up Superman-style. It was too cute to not catch on video.

100th Post!

This is my 100th post on the blog! I should have baked a giant cake like they do when television shows reach their 100th episode.

Instead, I'll just write about Labor Day weekend. We've had a nice weekend just hanging out and doing whatever we feel like. We opted to stay close to home this weekend in case Pat got called in to deal with any problem soldiers.

Pat started off the weekend right by making meatballs from scratch for dinner on Friday night. After a slight catastophe involving marinara sauce all over the stove and floor, dinner ended up being deliscious! Samantha was equally thrilled with the meatballs. She shoveled it into her mouth as quickly as I would put more on her highchair tray.

It's been pretty chilly around here lately, so we didn't plan any outdoor activities for the weekend. A new restaurant opened at the marina just down the street from our house, so we headed there for lunch one day. The food was good, and they have 12 different kinds of gelato, so we'll be back frequently.

We also managed to take advantage of some of the Labor Day sales. We got a couple of cute fall outfits for Sammy since the weather is already pretty cool here. I also got her an adorable pair of owl pajamas (if you haven't guessed by the blog design, I've been on a bit of an owl kick lately).

Today we spent some time letting Samantha explore the backyard. We have quite a bit of moss in the yard, so it's a pretty soft surface when she falls down. Her favorite thing to do is pick up pinecones and hand them to us.

Flips

Sammy likes to do sommersaults, but she's not coordinated enoough yet to do them on her own. Instead she "assumes the position" and waits for us to flip her!

That's Crafty

As I've posted before, I've had a strong desire to get in touch with my inner crafter since becoming a mom. My own mom was always very crafty growing up, and we had elaborate Halloween costumes (I seem to recall an impressive pair of Popple costumes) and enviable teacher gifts to show for it.


Unfortunately, my artistic talent is pretty limited. Well, I think I may have found my perfect crafting tool. It's called a Silhouette SD. It looks a lot like a printer, but you hook it up to your computer, create an image using it's software, and it either cuts it out or draws it for you. It's like a die-cutting maching and plotter all in one, and I am in love!

I got it all set up in about 10 minutes yesterday, and then put a little embellishment on Samantha's crib using adhesive vinyl in about 15 minutes today. It looks like I stenciled it on there, but if I ever want to change it I can peel it right off. The only thing stopping me from decorating every wall in the house is the fact that our walls are so textured that I don't think it would look right. I plan to try my hand at making some cards next!

5 Year Anniversary

Five years ago (tomorrow) I started the day off at the hair salon during a torential downpour while Pat was getting soaked on the golf course. It was not the most promising start to what was supposed to be the happiest day of my life. By some miracle, the sun was out by the time my veil was in place and we were ready to leave. The rest of the day has the golden hue of sunshine in my mind.

Year 1 of marriage was hard, but not because we were deciding who got the bigger closet or which person had to give up their furniture that wouldn't fit in the newly-merged space. I spent the first year mailing care packages and waiting for the phone to ring while Pat was risking his life every day.

Year 2 brought Pat's return (Yay!) and the purchase of our first home. Now we got to bicker over closet space and furniture. :-) Years 3 and 4 were spent making our home in Waynesville. Life was good, but we began to feel that someone was missing from our family.

Year 5 was eventful! We moved across the country and welcomed our beautiful baby girl into our life. I feel so lucky to be living the life that I'm living, and I can't wait to see what the next 5 years have in store for us! Happy anniversary, Pat. I love you.

Dancing

We keep the TV on in the evenings, but Samantha usually completely ignores it. The only time she watches is during a specific commercial. Any time it comes on, Sammy stops what she is doing to dance. Thanks to the magic of DVR, we were able to rewind the commercial and catch some video.

This was the first one we shot...do you think we might have a little D.J. on our hands?

The second time through got her on her feet.

(Kind of) Walking Videos

I got a couple of videos of Samantha walking yesterday evening. She was getting sleepy, so she fell down a lot, and then the camera died. She's a lot more stable when she's well rested.

10 Months

Miss Samantha turned 10 months old yesterday! She's working really hard on cutting her third tooth (by which I mean nursing constantly and needing lots of cuddles) and started walking two days ago!!! She's managed to put about 6 very controlled steps together a couple of times. She doesn't do it too often because it's still faster for her to crawl where she's going, but we're working on catching it on video.

Operation Meet the Family Part 1

We're home and (mostly) recovered from our trip to Missouri. We had so much fun introducing Samantha to family and friends! It was a trip of firsts for Sammy. During Operation Meet the Family Sammy:

- Took her first plane trip
- Cut her first (and second!) tooth
- Went swimming for the first time
- Had her first visit to Steak 'n Shake
- Attended her first wedding
- Stayed in a hotel for the first time
- And most importantly, met lots of people for the first time

Before we left for St. Louis, we drove up to Bellingham to visit some of Pat's side of the family. Samantha had so much fun playing with Pat's cousins. We got to celebrate Emma's birthday, and Samantha met her Great Aunt Karen and Tina and cousins Ben and Jake. Here's Samantha at GG Jim and Dorothy's house playing with cousin Margaret.

Our first stop in Missouri was Clayton for the wedding of one of Pat's Army buddies (congratulations Mike and Jen!). We got to see several friends that we hadn't seen in a while, and it was so nice to catch up with them. After the wedding, we headed out to Hermann to spend a couple of days with my family. We probably had about 20 people over to the house on Sunday to meet Samantha. She was a trooper and played happily the whole time we were there. Clearly she has no problem being the center of attention. :-)

Samantha had so much fun playing with all the toys that Grandma had rounded up for her. I think her favorites were the balls and the xylophone.

Since having Samantha I've felt this need to tap into my inner crafty side. I got this idea to make some fleece diaper soakers for Samantha out of some strawberry fleece that I found on sale. I had used a sewing machine before, but don't own one, so I asked my Mom if I could use hers while we were visiting. The pattern was just 4 pices....simple, right? Thank goodness she was there to help me! I ended up doing some of the sewing, but left the trickier parts to her. We ended up making this cover and a little t-shirt to match.

After the visit at my parents' house, we headed to a hotel in St. Charles as a home base to see some friends for a couple of days. The hotel had a pool, so we took Samantha swimming for the first time. She had so much fun splashing Mommy and Daddy! We have a cute video of her in the pool, but Samantha got a little enthusiastic pulling on my suit, so it's definitely not going on the internet. ha ha

All clean after my shower!

Wow...this has been a long post. More to come later!

Future Guitar Hero

I had to take a break during my last post to shoot this video. Do you think we have a future Guitar Hero on our hands?

9 Month Well Baby Visit

Samantha had her 9 month Well Baby Visit on Monday, and everything checked out great! This visit was especially good because Pat was able to come with us, and Sammy didn't have to get any shots!!! Her next round of vaccines aren't until 12 months.

Sammy weighed in at 21 lbs and was 27.5 inches long. She's getting tall enough to reach most of the things we've tried to move out of reach on end tables. Pretty soon we'll have to put it all away.

Samantha continues to eat well and enjoy trying new things. She feeds herself applesauce and oatmeal with her own little pink spoon. Last night she was enjoying big juicy bites of peaches that we bought at the farmers market earlier that day. Here she is chowing down on a pita chip!


Today kicks off 2 weeks of visits with friends and family. Aunt Corky and Uncle Harry will be at our house shortly for a visit, and then on Wednesday we're heading up to Bellingham to see Jim, Dorothy, Don, Mary, Emma, and Margaret. Karen, Tina, Ben, and Jake will be in town also, so we'll get to see them as well! On Friday we're flying to Missouri to introduce Samantha to tons of family and attend a wedding. I have a feeling we'll be absolutely exhausted at the end of the trip, but we're so excited to see everyone!!!!

9 Months

Time really seems to be flying now. Our baby girl turns 9 months old today. She goes in for her 9 month Well Baby Visit on Monday, but I know that about a week ago she weighed 20 lbs 11 oz and was 27 inches long.

It seems like there have been some big changes this month. After months and months of only sleeping while being held or laying next to me, Samantha is finally turning into a pretty good little napper! Her separation anxiety seems to be getting better, and with it her sleep is improving. She is now routinely sleeping for 1.5 - 2 hours in the morning and the afternoon. Sometimes I have to nurse her back to sleep after about 45 minutes, but she goes back down easily. It's so nice to have some time to be able to do things around the house that are tricky with a mobile baby (like update the blog or paint my toe nails!). I snuck in and snapped this picture of her zonked out just a couple of minutes ago. I know that I was risking the fury of the sleep gods by using the flash, but Samantha didn't even flinch.

We've also moved Samantha into a new car seat. Her infant one was only rated up to 22 lbs, so now she's in a big convertible car seat. We'll be able to keep her rear-facing all the way to 35 lbs, and then she'll finally get to face forward. I was hoping that the car seat change would make her a little less fussy in the car, but no such luck. At least I'm able to sit in the back with her most of the time and keep her entertained.

We took Samantha to see the fireworks on the 4th, but they didn't hold her attention well. We watched them from pretty far away so that it wouldn't be too noisy for her. We were all bundled up in jackets and blankets because it was in the 50s. Brrrrrr! Luckily, Samantha seems to have inherited Pat's tolerance for the cold instead of mine. (Actually Pat says the credit goes to Pops!)

Playing

Samantha has been pulling up on everything, standing on her own, and even trying to take a couple of steps. We decided she would enjoy a push toy, so we headed out to Toys R Us yesterday to get one. Our choices were fairly limited, so we came home with a truck. It has headlights that spin around and make noise, and Samantha spent about 5 minutes solid spinning them yesterday. Here's some video of her walking with it. Sometimes she needs help standing up with it, but I figure she'll be a pro in a few days.

I also took some video of Samantha playing one of her favorite games. She likes to crawl around the ottoman so that she can't see us and then "find" us. She screams hysterically when she gets us. It's pretty adorable.

First Haircut

Poor Samantha has been dealing with her bangs in her face for weeks now, so I finally took her to get them trimmed. I was going to have her baby mullet trimmed as well, but Sammy wasn't having it. She sat on my lap, but got a little upset when the stylist started combing her bangs. I think Samantha thought she was going to try to put her hair in a ponytail, which she has started resisting.

"What does this lady thing she's doing to me?"

"I don't think I like this"

"Hey! I know that baby!"

"I can finally see again!"