Happy Birthday to Audrey

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Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday to you. Happy Birthday my dear Audrey. Happy Birthday to you…

You, my little sweet, are one in a million. You know what you want already and go after it. Your smile could light up Darrell K. Royal Stadium. Your laugh is one of the sweetest sounds I’ve ever heard. You are such a special You – and I can barely remember what it was like before you were part of our family.

We are so lucky and I’m loving watching every moment you grow, grow, grow…

Has it really been one year? It HAS! It has gone by way way way too fast…Before I know it you will be walking and talking and cracking the whole family up with your bubbly personality.

I love you Audrey.

–Mom

 

Audrey’s 12 month appointment stats:
Height: 29.5 – 62%
Weight: 17.11 lbs – 18%
Head: 45.5 – 63%


Mammoth for Thanksgiving! The Plague…and now ’tis the season!

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We went to Mammoth for Thanksgiving this year. I love Mammoth – I hate the drive. Holy cow it is just soooooo long. The kids were actually pretty good for the ride. Despite Bella coming downstairs on Thanksgiving morning and vomiting all over the kitchen floor and bringing what I like to refer to as “The Plague” into the celebration – we had a really nice time. Poor kid – she actually only had the one incident that day, and just seemed a bit more tired than usual for a couple of days…(a few hours after puking, she asked to go outside to build a snowman…so we were relieved she wasn’t stuck in a bathroom all day…) Did I mention we had 7 adults and 6 kids staying in the house with us? I was obsessed with Lysol wipes, and so scared we were going to pass it along to everyone there. Unfortunately, it did pass on to Hannah and Audrey – only a week later.  This sickness was a mean one – comes back to make you relapse (causing poor little Bella to puke all Saturday night and Sunday on the way home) and then Bella was stuck with a fever for a week following. She went all pasty and pale – so Jeremy and I were just starting to lose sleep about it, but finally she has bounced back this week. Poor little Audrey went through it too – with second relapse and all, but luckily no fever yet…

But, I digress…Thanksgiving was actually really nice. Jeremy Howard made an amazing maple bacon covered baked turkey that was fabulous, Amy made her famous apple pie, and everyone brought these wonderful sides that made quite a traditional spread. We went through way too many bottles of red wine, laughed with all of our friends and let the kids play and watch endless amounts of TV (Bella WAS sick after all…) We even went out on the mountain for some early season snowboarding. All in all a great trip with good friends. We certainly will miss our buddies the Radcliffe’s – as they are moving to Texas in January, and this was a nice way to spend some good quality time with them before they go.

Tonight we went on our “Neill Family Christmas Outing” to the SD Botanical Garden of Lights. We roasted marshmellows and made S’mores, ate dinner in the garden, visited Santa Claus, walked around checked out the lights, listened to the Carlsbad Carrollers – it was a lovely evening – Audrey was terrified of Santa – but she is going through a mommy phase right now, so that is to be expected. As we were walking away, he snuck up behind us for a photo, but she was pretty much onto him and not budging on her opinion. It was pretty funny. But Bella actually sat on his lap and told him what she wants for Christmas “MAKEUP” (we are awesome parents…) – All was great right up until the very end when disaster occurred…

They bring snow in and had a sledding hill. Bella checked it out right when we arrived and promptly decided she did NOT want to do it. But at the end when we were leaving, she said she wanted to go check out the snow again. So we went over and I said that I would go on it with her if she wanted to do it. We got right up to the sled and she said “NO I changed my mind, I don’t want to go…” I said ok – but the lady was super insistent – said “Oh Mom, why don’t you just get on and go. (It was wet, I really didn’t want to get wet…but she was very pushy so I said ok. Then the crowd was like – your mom is on, go on and just hop on with her…”) I said, “Hop on with me Bella – so she did…We went down – it was fun…until we crashed right into Jeremy at the bottom of the hill and fell out. Bella hit her face on his leg or boot (I think) and has blood around one of her top front teeth and screamed the whole way home. Said it hurt really bad. Poor thing – went straight to bed (by choice). I’m hoping it is ok tomorrow, but if not, guess we’ll be making our way to the Dentist in the morning. The photo is awesome though because it is the happy part of the slide. Check it out…I’m really hoping this doesn’t scare her away from liking snow sports!

Audrey turns 1 on Friday. ONE YEAR. It has gone by so fast. She is so precious – just growing and growing. She is still a peanut though – I wish she would gain weight. Before “The Plague” she was sleeping through the night a bit, but last night I was up with her at 10pm, 1:45am and then up at 6am.  She was super fussy all day today too – so I am about to go crash right now in case we have a long night again. We are trying to think of a fun family celebration for her on Saturday…I do plan to make a cake (that is all natural ingredients)!! I still can’t believe she is already turning 1. Not walking yet – but saying little words here and there – and I can tell she is understanding alot more too!

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