Unbelievable

It is crazy to think that in 8 days my daughter is going to be 1 years old. I look at her and it is hard to believe that she has been on this earth almost an entire year, but at the same time it seems like she has been here forever. I ask myself all the time "what did I ever do before Makayla?" I can't remember life without this girl. She is the highlight of my day... everyday.

It is also crazy, or should I say embarrasing, to think that it has been 2 months since I have updated this page! How could you all let me get so far behind. I will have to say that Jill and Duncan have been on me about the page so I will give them credit. But rest of you should have been overloading my email about this. OK... I will stop trying to point the blaim!

Makayla is now NONE STOP!!! She can stand, but chooses not to. She has taken a few steps here and there, but would much rather crawl. I don't know why she doesn't trust herself. She has fallen a couple of times, but not enough to discourage her... I don't think.

Christmas was fun. We were trying to hold out on getting a tree because we knew Kayla would be all over it. When we were finally ready to get one there were no good ones left so we just got a fake one. It didn't look so small until we put all the gifts under it. It ended up fitting perfectly in that spot though.

Also... you can see three of Makayla's christmas pictures over the TV. They are so cute. I wasn't here for that. I was at one of my many boards, but Duncan did a great job at picking out the dress and getting the pics taken. It took him three days and a number of phone calls to me to pull it all together, but he got it done. Good job dad!

We decided to let her open one gift on Christmas eve. It looks like she was trying to open it but she was really trying to use it to stand up. We had to open it for her.

Christmas morning was no different. Her touching this elmo bag was as close as we got to her opening gifts.

After 3 nights of wrapping all these gifts Duncan and I sat there and opened them all back up. She would not touch the paper to save her life. Even if we opened it a little and let her see it. She would just point at the open part... like this.

When she got a hold of the toys she would play with them momentarily and then move onto the next.

This is definatley her favorite. Every time you shake elmo his mouth opens and he talks and laughs. It was cute for the first 2 mins. Now it is REALLY getting old.

She got lots of book to add to her collection. We still read every night, so its nice to have more variety.

These two are also favorites. I'm sure you can all guess which she likes better. Elmo... of course! They both do the hookey pookey. This was the point of the morning when I got mad and almost threw my tape recorder. I had it all ready to go but for some reason the stupid thing didn't want to work. Makayla was dancing with those two dolls and the recorder wouldn't work. I was so mad... I REALLY wanted that on tape.

Of course after all the gifts were unwrapped she sat in the middle of the paper and played for probably 20 mins. She kept looking at me as if to say "Now why in the world would you spend all that money on toys? You should have just bought a couple rolls of wrapping paper and some bows and let me go at it!"

Duncan's mom flew in Christmas afternoon and spent a few days with us. She lucked out because her grandson was also in the area. We went down to see them Christmas evening. Adam has grown so much. It was crazy to see them standing next to eachother. Adam is over a year older than Makayla and Kayla is almost the same height as him. Here they are playing with a walking and barking toy dog. I'm not sure Makayla knew what to think about it. She just kind of watched it. She stuck her hand out to touch it a few times but pulled it right back. Adam on the other hand liked touching it... mainly to puch it over.

Heres Duncan and his handson nephew.

Here's Chris (Adam's dad) and Kayla in a santa hat.

This is the sweat shirt we got for Makayla (and her grandma). We all got a kick out of it. She has almost grown out of it... so Jill...I will be sending it to you soon!

By the end of the night Makayla was so tired, but would not go to sleep. The crazy thing is that she wasn't cranky at all. She just laid in my lap or her dads lap and just watched everything that was going on.

Heres Makayla on a swing for the first time. She liked it, but a couple of times she started to look like she was getting sick. Most of the time she just stared at the ground.

Have I ever mentioned to you all that Makayla loves books? Here she is with her new leap pad. She popped the book right out of the base and started flipping through the pages. I sit with her and the leap pad, but I don't think she likes it as much as me reading stories to her. That is fine by me because I love reading to her. Watching her point to different things on the pages and turning the pages is the best.

This picture is for all of you that think my baby never gets stressed out. LOL I crack up every time I see this picture because she looks like she just has so much on her mind that she just can't take it any more. In reality she is just really tired.

Like I said earlier... she can stand! We had her distracted by looking at the moose on the noggin channel. (Another favorite of hers) She stood there for a while, but once she realized she was standing....

she lowered herself to the ground. Never taking her eyes off the moose... as you can see!

Here is Makayla checking in with her Bible. She goes over to this Bible a few times a day and just opens it and flips through a couple of pages. She never pulls it down to the floor and never tears any pages. I should probably knock on wood though.

Another favorite and first word of hers is the duck. My bathroom is decorated in rubber ducks and she loves them. She actually says duck now. Its more like "du" but were getting there.

She must be in heaven now... she has a duck in her hand and the moose on the TV!

While im thinking about the bathroom... let me tell you all. I have moved Makayla from the kitchen sink to the bath tub for her baths. The first time she was in the big bath tub she freaked out! She was screaming and trying to crawl out. She was acting like I was trying to drown her. It was funny.... and on tape! (That just sounds wrong) Well, now she is much better. Once the tears stopped I was happy but now I have shown her how to splash and kick her feet so she loves it. Getting her hair rinsed is still not a favorite but no tears and involved so we are good to go.

Here is little miss smiles!

And little miss sassy!

Look how lucky I am... I get to see this numerous times a day. Can life get any better?

"Give me five Kayla!" And she does it. Its more like 35 cause she just keeps going and going.

Here she is experiencing bubbles for the first time. She liked it but she looked confused at the same time.

Well, I really want to update you all on what I have been up to but I want to get this posted to night so that will all have to wait for another day. At least you all get to see the princess.

I know... its been a while...

I apologize for my lack of pictures and updates. A lot has been going on here at Fort Knox, most of which I don't care to mention. I have uploaded a bunch of pictures and found a few more that I forgot last time, so this post is filled with pictures. I'm sure you all will love that.

Makayla has changed so much. She has become a pushy... independent baby. She has learned that if offered something she doesn't want she can flap her arms around in front of her and squint her face and people pretty much get the idea. She has also learned to push my hands away if she doesn't like something I�m trying to do... like whipping her nose or switching out her earrings. She has also become extremely determined when she wants a toy... or to be picked up.

She has mastered crawling but still likes to "low-crawls" from time to time. (Low-crawl is a military maneuver that requires soldiers to use only their arms and legs to move forward on the ground. Very tiring if I may say so myself.) I think she has discovered that her grunting gets my attention really quick because that�s what she does when she decides she needs to be picked up. One of the best feelings in the world is when she grunts until I pick her up and when I do she lays her head on my shoulder and grips onto my shirt and holds on for a few seconds. Then she turns around and starts attacking her toys again. Its almost like she�s telling me "I just wanted to give you a hug and tell you I love you."

She is such a sweetie pie. After forcing myself to sit back and let my baby learn to do things on her own I realized she can pull herself up on furniture and inch around it. I have a really bad habit of not wanting to see her struggle. Anytime she is trying to do something like pulling up on the furniture I always help her up. She can also balance for a few seconds... so I'm sure walking is right around the corner. Here she is testing her ability to balance and get to me. She never moved her butt off the couch though, but she tried.

She loves her toothbrushes. In the mornings and after her baths at night I always brush her teeth, then hand her the toothbrush and let her do it her self. She mostly just chews on it, but at least she is getting familiar with it.

Part her demonstration of independents is her ability to turn her mobile on and off. I put her classical music CDs on anytime she takes a nap or goes to bed, but I guess from time to time that just isn't enough.

She is still in love with books and doesn't mind spending time by her self. Here she is "reading" in her bed by herself. This makes my life harder. She is content long enough for me to take a shower and get ready for the day.

Most of the time we play on the floor in the living room, but from time to time we play in the floor in her room. I really need to get her rug for her room.

Here she is consentrating REALLY hard on the toy I was playing with. To me it looks like she is really sad, but I promise she is concentrating!

See... this is the toy she was watching me play with. You pull the lever down and the arrow in the middle turns around as it tells you the sound the animal makes that it was just pointing to. It looks like she is trying to figure out how I got that arrow to turn around and talk to her.
It is very rare that Makayla will fall asleep in anyones arms. She is so used to putting her self to sleep in her own bed. I was lucky this day. I enjoyed every min. of it because I'm sure it wont happen again any time soon.

We had a great first Halloween. She was a ladybug. And the cutest ladybug I have ever seen, if I may say so myself. A girl I work with brought her 2-month-old son over and we walked the 2 of them around the block� just o show them off.
This is the one of the outfits she wore during the day before it was time to dress up.

I was trying to get a few cute pictures, and she was trying to watch TV. She was actually waving her arm right before I took this picture, as if telling me "MOVE MOM, your in my way!!!"

Here is Kayla and her pumpin buddy. She would NOT let go of that hanger. I have another picture of her whinning becuase I took it away. I'm telling you... pushy... pushy!

This is Madeline... another pumpkin buddy that she has. Madeline is about a month younger than Kalie.

Theres that darn hanger again, but she has such a sweet expression... how could you be mad?

And finally a perfect smiling lady bug. I could not get enough of her in this outfit. I took pictures with the camera, my camera on my phone, and video taped it.

Heres Duncan doing a little yard work, and Kayla "helping." I really hate yard work, so I appreciate any help I can get. I have the biggest yard on the whole block. What was I thinking when I decided on this place?

Theres that smile we all love!

And again!

Heres a happy baby at bath time. I remember the days when she HATED baths. Now she loves it. I know you are probably all thinking she is to big for that sink, but she slips and slides so much she wouldn't last in the big tub. We are going to try is soon though.

Here she is enjoying her Noggin shows. The only time she really pays attention to the TV is when Moose and Zee are on there. (Zee is the bird you see on there now.) She also loves the credits and the songs they play.

I have got a few phone calls lately asking me about the board that I had recently. I think I explained what a board was the last time I mentioned it so I wont go into that again. This board that I went to this past week was for soldier of the year and I won! There were a few more tasks to do this time, but it was fun. I am SO happy that it is over, but more stressed out about the next one that I have to go too. The next one will be soldier of the REGION! Talk about over whelming. It will be in Virginia, so I will be away from my baby for probably a week. All of this time away from Makayla is the reason I�m NOT re-enlisting.

Hope you all enjoyed the pictures. I will try my hardest update more often. I have so much on my plate right now, but I am going to get better at managing my time soon.