Due Date Party

Lauren's original due date was 8/29/09. We wanted to have a "due date" party for her to celebrate her being an adjusted 1 year old. We just had a small party with our parents and Lauren had a great time getting a few more presents and she really enjoyed her cake this time. Lauren loves watching Mickey Mouse on TV, so I had a friend make her a Mickey Mouse cake.

She recognized Mickey as soon as she saw him.
She really wanted at him!
Look at that grin! She is such a little sassy pants.
Family photo time!

KFC Mashed Potatoes

About a month ago Lauren tried KFC's mashed potatoes for the first time. She really enjoyed them and wanted to eat them all by herself. She didn't want to look at Daddy for a picture, but you can tell how happy she is to be feeding herself!

Auntie Sara Visits

My sister Sara was here in July for a visit and then again in September. Sara & Lauren got along so well and we wish she was around more often. Lauren still needs to meet Uncle Steve (Sara's husband.) I know that Lauren will love Steve because he will play all sorts of games and sing endless songs to her. I should also mention that my sister is also an amazing singer. Steve and Sara actually recorded a song for Lauren called "Lauren's Lullaby." I will try and figure out how to put it on here sometime, but its amazing and makes me cry every time I listen to it. They are truly 2 of the most talented people on this earth. We are actually planning on getting a little radio or something for Lauren's room because we listen to music every night before bed and we turn on the mobile for her when she goes in her crib, but sooner or later the crib will be a toddler bed, so the mobile will need to go.
Great-Grandma Kleinschmit! Lauren LOVES Great Grandma! We had the pleasure of having some of the family come over to my parents while Sara was in town.
Lauren and papa!

Dog Beds...

Sorry for all you out there who are not dog lovers. Adam & I both are and it has rubbed off on our daughter. She loves kicking the dogs off their beds and sitting on them or rolling around. Here are a few pics...
Sadie & Lauren just hanging out.
Sadie was making whining noises when Lauren was rolling around on the beds. I think she was concerned that she might get hurt. Sadie actually is seeming more protective over Lauren than Cooper.
And kisses! I know some of you are totally disgusted right now. It's all good they just love each other!

I Love.....

I love this little smiling face...
I love this tiny little hand...
And I love these tiny little feet!

Sorry it's been so long since I last updated. Just busy living life and as you all know time sure flies, especially with a little one.

Lauren is doing AWESOME! She is talking up a storm. Who would have thought, right?!?!?! She says ball, duck, hi, dada, mama, "mo" for Elmo, mmm for yum, no (shakes her head side to side when she says it, so cute) and lots of other words that I can't think of right now. She is a full fledged walker...CRAZY! She's practically running. And I will add that she is walking with flat feet. :) She weighs 23.5lbs and is about 30 inches tall. She is wearing 18 months clothes in most brands, but we all know how different sizes can be from brand to brand. Lauren now has 4 teeth! 2 front bottom ones and then she got one of her upper laterals and is now getting one of the upper front two. When she just had the lonely one tooth on top we nick-named her "snaggle." So nice of us...I'm sure she will appreciate that someday. She loves eating all kinds of table foods and has moved on from breast milk & formula to just whole milk. I got her off of the bottle right after her 1 year adjusted (so at the beginning of September) and the doctor was impressed that I was able to do it so quick. I am super paranoid about bottle rot and just her teeth in general so I didn't want her hanging onto the bottle for too long. Lauren is so much fun and continues to have a fun loving personality. She laughs....A LOT. Just ask anyone who is around her. I think she's going to be a class clown. She's a huge teaser too. She will tease Cooper with his ball and run away with it. And she thinks it's funny to run away from me when its time for bed or has something that she shouldn't. We are lucky and she still likes to take about a 2 hour nap everyday and sleeps from about 8:00-8:15pm to 7:30am. She did have cold about a month ago that I gave her. She's already gotten her flu shot for the year, but probably will not get the RSV vaccine since she's been "too healthy." Since it is so expensive (just under $2000 per shot and there are usually 5 or 6 of them) they don't give them unless the child qualifies. I'm a bit scared of her getting the virus (it's a bad respiratory virus) because she still could end up very ill and hospitalized, but that just means we have to continue to be careful with where we take her etc. I did speak with the doctor about all this and she said because she has been doing so well that we can start to treat her like a "normal" kid, but that still means not taking her around people who we know are sick.

I will post some more pictures tonight...hopefully. Lauren just woke up from her nap, so I better go get her!

Some Videos!

Lauren LOVES this toy! It plays music and shoots balls out and she plays with it everyday. She is talking so much now and one of the first things she said was ball. Listen really carefully when the video first starts and you can hear her "ball" really quietly. Sorry I'm so loud on it. :)




Lauren loves to dance as you've heard me say a million times before. Here's some proof! And sorry about the kink you're going to get in your neck since it's sideways, I don't know how turn it around.

Beach Time!

We went to the beach with a group of friends a couple of weeks ago. It supposed to be 80 in the valley and 70 at the coast. It was gorgeous all day long at the beach, but the only bad thing was it was very windy. All of us adults were also too worried about the kids getting sunburned that we kept reapplying their sunblock and never put any on ourselves. We all got fried! I had on capri's so I had a nice line and then red shins and feet. Poor Adam got burned from his knees down. Lauren was great though, no burn for her. :)
This was Lauren's first time being able to crawl around in the sand. I'm pretty sure she liked it. She wasn't quite sure what to think at first, but she had a great time with all of our friends.

Smiling at Daddy. Look at that red hair! Adam says she's "strawberry blond." Hahaha

Talking to Dad