Cake Time! Vivi's Birthday Part III -- July 26

Nana and Grandad came over in the evening with pizza, and Vivi got into opening presents.  She still had help from Hazel, but she was getting the whole rip-the-paper thing down.  

This pelican comes with little sea creatures that you can stuff in the pelican's mouth, and there is a hole in the stomach to take them out of.   Two of the creatures rattle,  one has a squeaker, and the other crinkles. It's pretty cute, especially the shrimp.  We set it up over the diaper table, and she plays with it happily during diaper changes now.  

Hazel liked the box the best.

Vivi's All-Day Birthday -- June 26

Because Vivian's birthday was on a Saturday, we got to spread out the birthday festivities a bit and not overwhelm her.  We opened presents off and on throughout the day, made sure we did things that we knew she would enjoy, and we made sure she had all of her naps.  We had pancakes for breakfast, played in the backyard, and Hazel helped open presents.  Vivi looked so grown up in her shorteralls, and it was just a good day!

Vivi had just recently figured out how to crawl into this little chair at the end of July. 

That is Cyril the fox-squirrel hiding in the corner there, a gift from Grandpa Van and Christina.  His tail is bigger than the rest of him, and he's pretty fun.

This is probably my favorite picture of Vivi ever.  She was playing peek-a-boo with the tissue paper from one of her presents,and having a pretty good time.

Birthday Girl Turns One! -- July 26

Vivian is one whole year old, as of July 26th!  

Vivian can do so much now, and she is changing so quickly still.  She is nearly fearless now that she can crawl, and she has become very determined to climb the furniture, the stairs, and to "cruise" wherever she can hold on to things and walk.  She has taken a few steps, and she tries stepping a few times every day.  It won't be too long before she is walking everywhere.  

Vivian can wave, clap, hi-five, point, play Great Grammy's "keep in touch" game, and hide herself to play peek-a-boo.  She is also starting to shake her head to say "no" when she doesn't want food that is offered or when she doesn't want to be picked up (which isn't actually very often).  

She likes music, and will always look up when we turn something on.  She likes looking out the window, playing the piano, is good friends with Emma, and she really likes to eat vegetables (cooked carrots, peas, corn, asparagus, green beans, yams, and pretty much anything else vegetable-like that we have offered her).  Vivian also likes to climb, slide, and swing at the playground.  She is super sweet, and gives the nicest little girl hugs.  

We are so looking forward to the next year of watching our amazing little Vivian grow!

Little Girls at the Piano -- July 24

Hazel can climb up on the piano bench, but Vivi has to reach from her tippy toes to find the keys.  Together they play quite the duet!

Seeing Daddy off to Work -- July 23

Almost every morning, the girls both get up on the couch to watch Andrew get his bicycle out of the garage and head off to work.  They will both wave, and Hazel will say "goodbye."  Hazel will also sometimes ask "you feed the dog?" as he gets his stuff ready, which is a reflection of the number of times that I have asked if Andrew fed Emma through the window.

Glacier Lake and Lost Lake -- July 20

We spent an afternoon on a 4-mile or so hike in the Snowies to Glacier Lake and Lost Lake (we did not get lost). We did find snow, and a lot of it.  Hazel made snowballs, and packed snow around.  She got tired after a bit, and did eventually fall asleep in the backpack.  The rocky trail made us a little nervous to have Hazel walking, but she loved climbing over all the rocks and would pop right back up again if she fell down.

The less fun part of the story is that in spite of liberal amounts of bug spray, Hazel was a mosquito magnet.  She got several mosquito bites, but the worst one was on her eyelid. We didn't actually notice it until the next morning, when she woke up with her eyelid swollen shut!  We took her in to see her pediatrician, and were reassured that everything would be fine, and to give her children's Zyrtec.  It was a few days before it looked any better at all, but it did get better and she's back to normal now.  She looked a little rough for those few days, though!

Sledding in June -- June 7

So, somehow I missed these in the last round of pictures and I had to go back and find them.

One evening I looked out the back door to see Andrew and Hazel running around in the back yard, Hazel giggling.  Hazel was on Andrews shoulders-or in the sled she found out in the shed.