Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to all the Moms out there. Last year on this day Katerina wasn't yet a week old. :)

We were in Rochester this weekend to celebrate Theo Strat's graduation from Nazareth with his Masters Degree. During the ceremony today, they kept referring to the Mothers in the audience and I couldn't help but think that someday Mike and I would be sitting in the audience and it would be Katerina getting her degree...

Happy First Birthday Katerina

Today is Katerina's first birthday. She was born today at 11:05am one year ago. While we celebrated last weekend, today, Katerina, Baba and I stayed home a little later and enjoyed a yummy breakfast of eggs, toast and sausage.

Then Katerina brought in cup cakes to school. Her teacher, Ms. Sharon, said she didn't drop one piece of that cupcake--I think she really liked it!

She must have known it was her birthday today because she only napped for 15 minutes at school, but despite that she was all smiles when I picked her up at the end of the day.

It is hard to believe an entire year has passed. It has been a wonderful year. Parenthood is a blessing and it certainly teaches you a lot about yourself. In this blog post, in addition to writing about Katerina's milestones, I have also included some of my own.

Here are some of Katerina's recent milestones:

• She is legitimately walking now, even on grass
• She has fallen in love with a stuffed Kitty, and sleeps with it at nap time and at bed time
• She now drinks whole milk out of a sippy cup (although we are still struggling to get her to drink enough during the day)
• She no longer drinks out of bottles (although sometimes I wonder if she misses them)
• Sometimes she will try to repeat a sound you are saying...such as "Ba" or "Kitty"...or at least it sounds that way

In the past year, Mommy has:

• Learned that babies change every day
• Learned patience... and that sometimes things do not always go according to plan... and that's okay
• Learned that a child can make you smile even on your most difficult days
• Learned that there if often not one right answer when parenting...sometimes its trial and error and each child is different
• Learned to appreciate the little things in life such as Katerina's good morning smile, her laugh when playing a game and how much fun it is to simply watch her observe and explore the world around her

Happy First Birthday Katerina!

Katerina's First Birthday Party

We held Katerina's first birthday party this weekend. It was a hot summer-like day. Katerina enjoyed all of the attention from her aunts, uncle and grandparents who came to visit her. And she thoroughly enjoyed the food-- she ate a hot dog and had a HUGE piece of birthday cake that her Baba made her (It only took about 3 hours to make the night before). She made a wonderful mess, which was fun to watch. Mike cut her quite a large piece, and she ate three quarters of it. I think she was on a sugar high for the rest of the evening. :)

Katerina received wonderful birthday gifts too...although at certain points she appeared to be more interested in the card envelopes, ribbons and the bows that came with the gifts. In fact, in one card contained a gift card to Toys R Us...she grabbed onto the gift card, and didn't want to let it go! She got a bunch of clothes, some new books and some cool toys.

Mommy and Baba got an outdoor castle for her, with a slide and swing. Grandma gave us the idea. It only took Baba, Papou and Uncle Billy 1 hour to put together, even though the box said "Only 20 minutes to assemble." She loves it--well certain parts of it. She likes the swing, and she likes the "landing" where she can stand up high, and turn the 'captain" wheel, but she HATES the slide. She cried and cried and now she won't go near it. Maybe by the end of the summer she'll enjoy it.

She'll be turning 1 officially on Thursday at 11:05am. It doesn't seem possible sometimes...she is such a big girl now.

Playing games

Katerina has been playing a lot of games recently. One of her new things is to point and laugh at you. We haven't told her yet that its actually not very polite! :)

The other day when she was having dinner, I asked her if I could have some of her chicken. She picked up a piece and held it out for me, which I assumed meant she was going to share. As I opened my mouth to take a bite, she put that piece of chicken in her mouth and laughed at me. She proceeded to pretend to share several more times, but each time I went for a bite, she took a bite herself. I couldn't help but laugh at how clever she was.

Of course peek a boo is an all time favorite. She will even hold up a blanket in front of her as I say "where's Katerina..." and then drop it down waiting for the "peek a boo"

We are having so much fun playing these games. This is such a wonderful age!

Walking...

I am not sure when you can officially say a child is walking...but Katerina is certainly doing a lot of it. Just within the last week she has gone from taking a few steps and falling, to walking across the room on her own accord. She prefers walking I think, but still crawls, particulary if she wants to get somewhere fast.

It has been very fun to watch her delight as she can get from one object to another while walking...such as the couch to the stairs. And she has soooo much energy!

p.s. ignore the date on this picture...our camera keeps screwing up the date...

Discoveries

Katerina has made several discoveries recently, which has been fasinating to watch and observe.

She has discovered that grass is soft, bumping and feels kinda funny. She doesn't want to crawl on it because she doesn't like how it feels.

She has discovered that while teeth are good for chewing food, when she puts her fingers in her mouth and clamps down--it hurts!

She has discovered her nostrils--and that her little finger fits perfectly up there!

She has discovered that walking is lots of fun, and if she whines and fusses long enough, Mommy or Baba will hold her hands so she can walk around the house.

Finally, she has discovered that throwing up is much different than "spitting up"... she had her first stomach bug on Wednesday night. Mike and I had just fallen asleep and woke up to her throwing up. She proceeded to throw up several more times that night. We did a lot of laundry and she got her first midnight bath. We set up the pack n play in our room so that we could hear her, but she eventually ended up sleeping in our bed. We felt so bad for her. Luckily it was only a 24 hour bug. Its now Friday night and she is finally back to her old self and eating chicken fingers and peas!

11 Months Old!

Only 1 month until Katerina turns 1. We can hardly believe it. Here are some of her recent milestones:

She stands by herself with ease.

She is taking a few steps --her max is about three before she falls.

She will wave "bye bye" and "hi."
She claps whenever she is excited and will clap along to patty cake.

She has experienced many new table foods, including fish, spanikopita, peanut butter, and blueberries!

She hasn't had cake yet...we are waiting for birthday party!