Happy Halloween!

This year, Amelia had 3 outfits (Mommy couldn't make up her mind). She wore one of them to Boo at the Zoo - she was a flower princess. Here she is in her "day" outfit.

Girly skulls!

Here are our pumpkins:

Yawning pumpkin (me & Alex's pumpkin)

Smiling pumpkin (Amelia's)

Halloween is also Pampaw's birthday. We spent the afternoon at Mamaw & Pampaw's house and had dinner, birthday cake, and a little trick or treating!


With the birthday boy!



Changing into my costume - a GUITAR!

But I don't WANNA be a guitar!

Wait, there's candy involved?!?

With the torturers, I mean, Mom & Dad.

The best part about trick or treating is running around outside.

Aren't I the cutest guitar EVER???


Happy Halloween, everyone!

Boo at the Zoo

One of the greatest things about St. Louis is our Zoo. Not only is it really really cool, it's free. The St. Louis Zoo has events year round, and for Halloween they have Boo at the Zoo. It's basically a safe, fun way to take the kids trick or treating. You get to see animals and get candy...what could be better?

We had a family field trip to Boo at the Zoo with our good friends Brad, Liz and their daughter Natalie. Amelia and Natalie are BFFs. It was a little chilly out, and to see most of the animals you had to follow the "trick or treat" path. No candy for Natalie & Amelia, so we stuck to the path less traveled and checked out the animals outside the lines.

The girls were good sports and seemed to enjoy themselves. When we were getting ready to leave, Fredbird (the mascot for the St. Louis Cardinals, for all you non-STL readers) was available for pics with the kiddos. Liz & I took the girls over, eager for the photo-op. Amelia was FREAKED OUT! She was wailing, trying to climb up my face. Needless to say, Amelia didn't get her pic with Fredbird. Maybe next year.

Enjoy the pics!

Apple Picking & Pumpkin Patch-ing

Today we took Amelia to Eckert's Orchard in Grafton, IL. I remember going there when I was younger, so it was really fun to take my daughter there.

It was a GORGEOUS day - sunny and much warmer than the weather we'd been having - so it was perfect for an outside field trip. Eckert's had goats, a pig, some ponies, chickens and a bunny - Amelia LOVED watching them! We took a tractor ride out to the apple orchard and picked some apples. Amelia had so much fun running around, picking up apples, and throwing them! Then we took the tractor out to the pumpkins.

We had such a great time! Amelia got way dirtier than she's ever been (and I did my best NOT to freak out about it - I only used the hand-sanitizing wipes 2 or 3 times), and we were all really pooped out.

Of course we took pictures...

Amelia's 1st trip to Michigan!

We took a family trip to Michigan to visit Alex's family. It was Amelia's 1st time up there. It was definitely fall, and it gave us an opportunity to dress Amelia in some of her cute warm clothes!

It was such a great trip! We went to Ikea (squeeeeeee!), but mainly just chilled at Babcia and Dziadek's house.

On Saturday, we had an open house for people to come meet Amelia. It just so happened to take place on my original due date, October 3rd. It kind of ended up being another birthday party (that's 4, if you're keeping track). We had a lot of fun with everyone.

Meeting baby Reed

I love Reed!

Pigtails! They were in for about 5 seconds.

With Miss Jodi

Me, Wujek Mikolaj and Babcia

Mark, Emma, Daddy & me

Daddy, me, Mommy, Mark, Jackie & Emma

With Pani Jadzia

I LOVE my Wujek!!!

Playing outside with Daddy

Having fun in the backyard.

With my Dziadek

1st Birthday Party Pro-Pics

Here are just some of our faves taken by the fabulous Trish Seelen!

1 Year Check-Up

Amelia had her 1 year check-up the week of her birthday. She weighed 23 lbs, 2 oz (80th %) and was 31 inches tall (95th %). Basically, she's the size of your average 18 month old! :) Our little preemie sure grew!

Amelia can snap her fingers (I couldn't even do that until I was 5!), and is walking/running pretty much exclusively now. She can say a few words - mama, dada, go, hiiiiiiiii, eat/um-um - and a bunch of other sort-of words ("na" for no, "ot" for hot, "shhh" for shoe)...those are in addition to her babbling words that we can't figure out what they mean! She rings doorbells, turns lights on and off, and can reach the door knobs but doesn't know what to do with them yet (thank goodness!).

Overall, she's doing really well. Amelia still has the dairy/soy intolerance, so we're giving her rice milk. She still gets some of the Nutramigen formula to make sure she gets enough of the necessary nutrients. The good news is that she can handle SOME dairy and soy in her diet - small doses of yogurt, pudding, and other products that contain dairy and soy seem to not bother her too much. We just try not to give her too many foods that contain dairy and soy each day. Hopefully, she'll outgrow this and will be able to drink regular milk someday.

September Pics

I'm a bad blogger! We've been busy. Since you probably care more about pictures than reading my little blurbs, I've decided to just get to the point. Here are some pics from September, including Babcia & Dziadek's visit over Labor Day, Amelia's 1st birthday, and our 2nd trip to the Zoo.

Playing with pots & pans

In my cute Dora dress

Birthday celebration with Dziadek

On a walk with Babcia and Dziadek

With Daddy, Babcia & Dziadek (& Pooh, of course!)

I'm 1!!!! Blurry pic, but cute.

On her actual 1st birthday...annoyed with another cake!

Reading birthday cards

With Babcia

Playing with my new purse

Walking

The penguins at the Zoo - Amelia HATED them!

MONKEYS!

Posing with Mommy & Babcia

Looking at the elephants