12 Month Stats

Addison went to the doctor today for her 12 month well-baby visit. She was such a ham for all the nurses; talking and answering their questions with "yea"s and "no"s! So cute!! She is in the 50th percentile for height, 45th for weight and 85th for head circumference (H: 29", W: 20 lbs, 3oz, HC: 18"). Yes, she has a big head. That only means she's super smart!!

The doctor said she was doing great verbally (which Addison demonstrated the entire time we were there) and that she was not at all concerned that Addison's not walking. She's cruising and crawling around enough to be extremely mobile still. It won't be long...

The bad part of the visit was that my poor little baby (I started to write girl, but that just makes her sound so old. She's still Mama's Baby!) had to get her little finger prick to check her lead levels and she also had to get three shots! She screamed and then cried (the kind of crying where she can't catch her breath) for 10 minutes afterward. I felt so bad. And making it even worse was that I had to get right back in the car (without her) and come back to work while Jordan took her home. I so wanted to stay with her to comfort her and cheer her up. She was, of course, fine. I'm sure it was much more traumatic fro her Daddy and I. I told Jordan he needed to take one of his anxiety pills before her next appointment. Haha!

I'm glad to know that my baby is healthy and growing and right on track with her development!

Addison's Big PARTY

Today was Addison's big Birthday party! We had nearly fifty people there and everything ended up going really well. It did rain a bit but only for a short time.

Here's the beautiful Birthday Princess in all her glory! These wallet prints were the take-away favor.

This is Addison's smash cake. And smash it she did...

Here's the big cake. Loved the pink and greens!
We had a big bounce house set up for the big kids. Jordan let Addison try it out before anyone else got there. She was pretty unsure of it.

This is Addison playing in her new Rose Cottage House. My wonderful Aunt Vivian gave this to Addison on Friday for her birthday. She had it already set up for us. She loves playing with all the little pieces and household appliances. My favor part is the birthday cake. It is in 4 pieces that all Velcro together so you can serve them out. Oh, and it even came with plastic paper plates. They are so cute and you can tell they are supposed to be little Dixie plates. Thanks so much, Aunt Viv!Here's the party girl pre-party playing on my bed.

Playing with one of her many presents.

Isn't she just precious! She loves her GranDee.

Eating her dress...?

Again with GranDee.

These are the babies that were at the party. It's Salem (with mommy LeeAnn) and John (with mommy Charlin) and Addison (with mommy me :) That are only 3 and 1/2 months between the oldest (John) and youngest (Salem). We are all pregnant at the same time and in the same innerchange bible study group together. There was one other couple in the group that have a little boy (Tyler) in the middle but they were at the beach.

Here's one of the tables.
She had a piece of watermelon that she was loving!! We had to sneak it away from her.
She didn't know what to think about the candle.

Playing in the cake. Starting out cautious.

Finally digging into it.

And this is the finished result. In the hair and everything.

Here's all the presents. Addison was not interested in opening any of them. She just wanted to play with Conner. See his little broken arm? Poor little guy. Looks like Ellett was trying to play with Conner too! He's such a little cutie!

We had so much fun! Thanks to everyone who helped make this such a special day! We love you!

Addison's Birthday (Party # 1)

This is a long post. with lots of pictures. Here goes:Monday night we had a small(ish) party for Miss Addison at our house. It was so much fun and Addison was such a little ham!
We ate outside on the covered patio even though it was slightly chilly from the rain. We had marinated chicken, salad, broccoli and cheese, bread, banana pudding and pink lemonade cake! We invited my sister, Kyla (the photographer-not pictured), my parents (on the right), my uncle Glenn, Aunt Pat, my cousin Greg, and Jordan's parents (his dad is on the left, his mom couldn't come). And of course Jordan, Addison and I.

Here's my Dad and Aunt Pat. Can you tell they're siblings? They are both wild over Addison.

The birthday girl and her mommy!

Here's "uncle" Greg with Addison. She doesn't look like it in this picture but she loves Greg! And he is totally wrapped around her little finger. He calls her "Girly" and rides her on his shoulders and worries over toys that shes trying to put in her mouth. It's really sweet.
Here's Addison and her Papaw. He is another one of her favorite people!

Our happy little family of three!
Here's the delicious pink lemonade cake and smash cake that my mom made. I thought they turned out so cute!

As we were presenting Addison's cake to her she just kept looking up at me like, "Mom...What is this thing. It's on fire! You realize you are giving me fire?!?"

But then after we blew out her candle and she started sticking her hands in it she realized she liked it. "OOOHHH... It's gooey and sweet!"

Then she started looking up at us with a new facial expression after every time she touched the cake. It was hilarious! See what I mean about her being a little ham!?

Addison didn't destroy the cake completely like I thought she would and she didn't really eat it. She tasted the icing a bit but was not at all interested in the cake.
She only wanted to dump it off the plate and then she wanted to lick the plate...

and put it on her head. She didn't get as covered in icing as I expected, but she got pretty messy.

Then came bath time. She was NOT enjoying her bath. I think she knew that other people were there and waiting for her to come open presents.
She's just to pitiful and although she was screaming and whining, it was so cute!
Once we started opening presents Miss Addison decided to cheer up some.
She definitely enjoyed her audience! See the pile of new clothes she got! The girl will not need any more clothes for a while!

This is my favorite picture of her for the night. This is the new toy that in mentioned in this post. She was speeding down the hallway and I had to run backwards in front of her to catch a picture of her! Look at that huge grin!

She had such a great birthday! Thank you to everyone who made her day special!

The End of an Era

As we approached Addison's first birthday, we started to introduce whole milk into her bottles. The closer May 17th came, the higher the ratio of whole milk to breast milk became. This past weekend Addison took several bottles that were all whole milk and didn't seem to notice a difference at all, which is wonderful!

So what does this mean for me? NO MORE PUMPING!! (Get ready for TMI in the next few sentences...)

I am so pumped (haha) excited about not pumping! I had decreased the number of times I was pumping daily until I was just pumping once in the morning. I did that for about a week then did it every other day for a few days and now I haven't pumped since Saturday. I'm feeling it. It doesn't feel good. I'm hoping that my milk supply dries up really soon because this process is quite painful! I was reading about natural remedies to dry up milk supplies in an article online and it suggested several things (most of which I'm not going to try) one of which is to take a decongestant because it's designed to dry you up. So I'm trying it and hoping that it works. We'll see.

It's been so nice to not have to lug around my pump, pump accessories, and cooler to work and home every single day! It's nice to be able to stay out on the teller line every morning and afternoon without having to duck out to my back office to pump and feeling guilty about lines forming in the lobby. I'm so, so glad that I was able to breastfeed and that I did it for Addison's entire first year, but I have to say that I am so glad that I'm done! ( I just wish I could skip the engorgement phase. My boobs feel like they might explode!!)

Just had to share... :)

Happy Birthday Addison Kate!

Addison,

You are one year old today! I cannot believe how quickly this past year has gone by! You are such a beautiful, happy, sweet, spunky little girl! You're getting so big and starting to do so many things now! You are almost walking, just a little scared to let go and do it yourself. And that's okay with me. I'll let you do things on your own time, baby. You are curious about just about everything now. When we go shopping you like to stick your little hand over the side of the stroller and grab anything you can reach. Then you just grin up at me when you reel your new treasure in. I love you so much more than I could ever convey in words. I never imagined how much I would love and care about you. How I would ache for you when we are separated. How I'd miss you when you are in the next room sleeping. How much joy I would get out of simply watching you explore and figure things out. You have given your Daddy and me so much happiness and joy over the past year, I can't wait to see what's in store for us over the next few years!

Happy Birthday, Sweetheart!

I love you so much!

Smith Girls Rocking the House!

My mom's sister, (my Aunt) Cheri and my cousin Zach came into town a couple weekends ago. While they were here, We had a Rockband party at my house. At first Mom and Cheri were taking turns on the microphone, singing... But we finally convinced them to try the guitar. And they both did very well. Much better than I did the first time I tried to play, that's for sure.

Here's Cheri rocking out! (on a side note: If you look really closely to the dinning room wall in the background, you can see my stripes that I've been talking about for months. Love it!)

All of us pretending to play/sing for the camera.

You gotta love this picture! That's my cousin Greg being crazy! Fun times!

Mother's Day

We went out to Jordan's parents house for lunch on Mother's day. It was a beautiful day! All of the kids enjoyed playing outside with bubbles and nerf guns and softballs. Addison even tried to play badminton (didn't you always think it was called bad MITTON? I did when I was a kid and definitely didn't know how to spell it. Well actually, I still don't...I had to google it to make sure I had it right.) We had a great time being around family and soaking up the sun rays! My first mothers day was so wonderful! I spent the whole day with my little sweetie and she was such a good girl!

Addison and Jordan got me some plastic ware for Mothers day...That's right, Gladware locking lids containers. I tried to buy them in Walmart the other day and Jordan just looked at them and asked if we really needed them when we have a whole drawer full of plastic containers. So I just put them back on the shelf. Although that's something I wanted to get, I would have been quite disappointed if that had been my only present (not that I need a present to know I'm appreciated or my some sort of payment for loving my baby. Addison is gift enough for me! she melts me with each smile and holds my heart in every giggle. I love her so much!) My real present was a Philips MP3 player. I told Jordan that I wanted an I Pod or MP3 player for my birthday in August and then promptly forgot that I had even mentioned it. I was quite pleased when I saw it and have thoroughly enjoyed it (since I figured out how to use it. I was very intimidated by new electronic devices that I've never used before, but it was very simple). Thank you my wonderful Husband and Daughter! You are the best! I love you!

Addison was so tired after the full day and had only slept for about 30 minutes all day so this is what we found int he car when we got home. She went on the nap for about 2 hours. So cute!

My Baby Girl is becoming a TODDLER!!

I know! I can't believe how big and grown up my Baby Addison is getting! She is crawling around like crazy and cruising all over the place. She got a new toy (a hand-me down) on Sunday that she is in love with. It's an adorable little Radio Flyer wooden horse scooter. She's never been on a toy like that where she has to straddle the seat and walk (okay, never mind. I realized as I was typing that that is exactly what she does in her walker-it just has a tray and a seat that contains her instead of being open with handles.). I didn't think she would know what to do with it but as soon as we put her in it she took off across the room. When she got to the other side, she stopped and turned around with the biggest smile on her face which was all lit up with excitement. Now every time we walk by the toy she reaches for it and cries to ride it! What a cutie I have!!

Last night I was playing in the floor with Addison and she was crawling/walking (while always holding on to something-she just won't let go yet-and that's okay with me!) all over the place. She was trying to get to the horse toy (mentioned above) which was in the kitchen. In our house to get to the kitchen from the living room (where we were playing) you have to step up onto a platform (that is the first step to the upstairs. straight across you go into the kitchen. left turn you go upstairs) and back down into the kitchen. Addison scurried over and climbed up on the platform. I was right behind her and had to catch her before she went down onto the tile floor in the kitchen. While we were on the platform she happened to notice there were lots of steps that stretched upward. Well the girl just takes off climbing them. I didn't think she'd be able to climb them since she never has before but she went up three. then four. then five. I was hovering right behind her with my hands inches from her ready to catch if she stumbled. My big girl climbed all the way up the staircase 3 times last night! It was crazy!! Like she'd been climbing steps all her life! We'd get to the top, I'd bring her back downstairs and she'd head right back over to them. She obviously has a new obsession; one that we will have to put a stop to with the baby gate.

This and That

Aghh... I have been so slack about blogging! I don't know why, but I just don't feel like writing anything. It's not like I don't have anything going on. It's not like I don't have a beautiful 11 month old crawling around doing all sorts of cute, funny things that I could tell about. It's not like I didn't just move into a new house that we've repainted and are currently decorating trying to make it our own. It's not like I'm not trying to plan a huge birthday party for 2 weeks from now. I have so many things I could write and share about but I have no motivation to do it. But then again, maybe it's because of all these things I haven't been able to make time to write... Oh well I'm doing it now, so here goes...

I was sick about a month ago. I was diagnosed with everything from strep throat to mastitis to a sinus infection to pink eye. All I know is that I felt like death with a fever and no voice and gunky, swollen eyes. I tried to blog-ument my illness and multiple doctor visits but just never finished the post. I had to miss 3 days of work with a weekend in between. I finally am better. The first antibiotic the the first doctor I saw prescribed made me vomit and extremely nauseous. I will never take Keflex/cephlexin again!!

The second doctor I saw told me that I had to stop breast feeding for the 10 days I was on the antibiotic/eye drops. I was so, so upset when I left the doctor's office. It's not that I want to breastfeed forever (quite the contrary, actually. I'm ready to be done nursing and pumping.) but I want to make to Addison's first birthday so that I don't have to use any formula. I want to ease it out instead of simply being cut off. He was just so definite and harsh about it, I felt that I had no options. And I was so scared that Addison wouldn't adapt well to changing her diet. When I got the meds filled, though, I asked the pharmacist about it and she said, without hesitance, that neither medication was unsafe to take while continuing to breastfeed. I was so relieved to hear that. I know most people don't understand why this was such a big deal for me, but I just wasn't ready yet.

Since then (It's been 3 weeks) I have started the weaning process. After being bitten a few times I decided that it was time to stop nursing. I'm still pumping, but Addison is getting bottles that are mixed with whole milk to ease into taking no breast milk. So far it's going well and I'm feeling better about the whole weaning process. After she gets used to the whole milk (we'll start upping the whole milk to breast milk ratio little by little) I'm going to start phasing out her bottle for a sippy cup. They make transitional sippy cups that have a soft top instead of a hard plastic top and I think those will be good for her. Addison will take either kind now, but only for her juice or water. She doesn't seem to like it when we try to put her milk in the sippy cup. It frustrates her for some reason.

Addison is such a sweet little thing! Yesterday when I got home with her, I was getting all her stuff ready to go upstairs and give her a bath (The only thing we use the upstairs for is to give her a bath and for her overflow closet usage...girl has a lot of clothes. :) ) and Tripp was acting really playful. I was carrying Addison and she kept leaning around me to see Tripp and she would just cackle at him. So then I started chasing him around the house and jumping out around corners at him (all while holding A) and she was loving it! She laughed so so hard and I was laughing right along with her (in between huffing for air, that is. Running around with a 20 lb baby on you hip for 10 minutes is hard work!! Totally, Totally worth it, but hard work!) I just have so much fun with her and she has so much personality.

Another Addison funny: Little Miss Thing has discovered Tripp's dog food bowl. It's right down the hallway from the kitchen leading into her bedroom and across from the laundry room. A few weeks ago I was working on some laundry and had A on the floor playing in the kitchen. She got really quiet, so I started to listen for her. After a moment I hard the dog food move around and realized she was playing in it. I ran over to her (she was just out of my sight around the doorway) and got the 5 pieces out of her clinched fists. Ever since she discovered it, her goal when in the area is to get to the dog food. Now she knows that I'm going to tell her "no, no!" so as she crawling toward it she will pause and look over her should and smile at me while I tell her "no" then giggle and go faster. It's really cute and I can't help but laugh at her. Sometimes I forget for just an instant what she's going to do and when I find her there, she's licking the food. So gross! She just looks up at me with the biggest smile on her little face!

Addison's birthday is on May 17th!! I cannot believe it's already here!! We're planning her party for the 22nd. It's going to be big with a lot of people but I'm trying to keep it low key, mainly in order to keep my sanity and to not go into debt for a birthday party. A party for someone who is too young to remember it! Yes it is a big deal, but I'm not losing my head over it! We celebrate her on a daily basis! :)

So I'll try to get some pictures up (been a little slack about taking pictures too, surprise, surprise...) and do better with my blogging regularity!