Bella's First Birthday

Bella turns 14 months old today, and that reminded me to make a post about her first birthday! She is now a big one-year-old, and we had a fun little party at home for her to celebrate. I decided to minimize the chances Bella having a meltdown before, during, or after the party, so we had a small family gathering with all the grandparents at our house (Dad and Sonya even got to join in via skype). I was so glad that we went for small and simple! I tried every trick to make it an enjoyable experience for Bella-- I even reversed the traditional party schedule in hopes that it would help our chances of a happy baby, and began the party right after her afternoon nap. We started with pictures, then sang happy birthday, did presents, ate cake, then I prepared the meal while Bella played with her presents, and we ate the meal last. Whew! I almost felt sacrilegious reversing the party schedule (cake before food...?), but was very glad we did. Bella was a little confused and overwhelmed at the beginning, but she really got into the swing of things halfway through, and was really hamming it up by the end.

Not-so-happy overwhelmed baby at the beginning.


A lot of presents for a little girl!


Ready to eat the cake!


A friend told me about how her son reached out and touched the candle flame on his first birthday, so this is the closest Bella got to hers!


She ate half of her weight in cake!


Do I really have to stop now?


If you're interested in the party details, here they are: I made a cake out of cupcakes to resemble a flower, and there were lots of additional cupcakes with a "B" on them (for Bella, of course). We gave Bella the huge yellow cupcake in the center of the flower, and she devoured half of it! We couldn't believe how she kept eating more and more. We didn't do a theme exactly, just used pink and yellow for everything. But Bella loves flowers, hence the flower cake. For our meal, Stephen grilled some amazing chicken, and my Mom made a delicious potato salad and baked beans. We don't have many party pictures with the guests, because they were the ones taking the pictures, but you can imagine the grandparents all sitting around "oohing" over everything Bella did!

Decorating the cake with Mom's vintage frosting bags.



Bella's one-year-old stats: 31" long, 19.5 lbs. She is not walking yet, but is cruising well and does great with her walker. She is picking up lots of new words, which is super fun for us. Her newest word is hair (hauh). She feels of the hair on our heads, our eyebrows, and Stephen's beard while she's naming it! Some of her other recent words and phrases are banana (nana), bird (burh), bear (beah), bee, flower (fowah), bread (beh), dog (dah), kitty cat (kee-kah), thank you (kay-ku), zebra (zeba), ball (bah), tree (tee), squirrel (squh), daddy (a step up from dada), uh-oh, here you go (geh go), eye (ah), and baby. She has also started getting a Southern drawl already, drawing bye-bye out into three syllables and making a higher note at the end!

And, in other news... We started the summer out with a bang, with a week-long visit from Dad, Sonya, and my sisters Jennifer and Emily. It was so much fun, and we miss them so much already! I would include pictures from the visit, but I only took a few, so I'm waiting to get the rest... which could take a while! Stephen is teaching a seven-week long multicultural comp 102 class this summer, which only 12 students are enrolled in, so he is getting a much-needed break from his normal hoards of students, and also enjoying his first time teaching the multicultural class. Bella has become a very friendly (and flirty) baby lately (as long as she stays in my arms or in my lap!), so we have been taking advantage of all the kid-friendly events around town and she is loving every minute of it. Stephen and I have also been steadily working on the to-do list for the house and yard... which is slow going since we can't really work on that stuff until Bella is in bed. We've been spending every evening working in the yard after Bella goes to bed, which is really enjoyable, almost zen-like (despite the mosquitoes). So far we've given one bathroom a makeover, we're working on our curb appeal, and also planting a late veggie garden. (And I haven't forgotten about those pics of Bella's room... they'll be posted one day!) So there's plenty to do around here!