A Happy Birthday Party

One year ago a little Wren was born. Today we had a party to celebrate!

We had some chocolate cupcakes...

Some tissue paper decorations...

And sang happy birthday with a candle...

A whole year old!

She really liked the icing with coconut and delicately picked it apart.

After we had some food, Wrennie played with her guests...

Her best pal, Isla, was ready to party...

And Oliver came to play with Elmo...

A new rocking chair!

She is playing Peek-a-Boo, or otherwise known as "Where's Wren-Wren?" in our house.

There she is!

After only a couple of hours, the Wrenster was exhausted and needed a nap. Thank you so much to our family and friends for coming! We had such a fun time and Wren (and us) say thank you for the gifts :) It was a really fun party!

After dinner and a bath, Wren decided to try out some of her new stuff. This evening she just wanted to relax and watch some Sesame Street in the comfort of her new chair, thanks to Uncle Kyle and Uncle Jordan.

Oh, and cuddles with Elmo of course...

Hard to believe this day happened a whole year ago...

Birthday Girl turns 1!

Wrennie turned 1 today! What a big girl...

We gave her presents in the morning before Dad had to go to work.

For her birthday we gave her a baby shopping cart...

and inside her shopping cart in the blue bag, her Nokomis t-shirt!

On Sunday we party!

Book explosion

Heeyyy...those are Dad's socks..

Where are you going Wren- Wren?

Oh my.

Work Week

The weekend came so fast! I just finished my first week back at work, and it was great. It's sort of like starting a new job but already knowing what and how to do everything. And can I just say that if we could all afford to work part time, I think life would be perfect. 

Wren did great with my mom, Andrea and Kenton's mom too. Well, she did give Andrea a hard time for nap times, but other than that, it went really well for the first week back!

Hmm, someone got stuck in the toy drawer.

If there is a way in, she will have to figure the way back out..

Ta da!

Play time

My doctor told me that Wren is the size of a 1.5 year old weighing 25lbs and 32 inches in height. Wow!

We have been taking it easy the past week, and I start work tomorrow. A new routine to adjust to, and family to work into the whole plan. My mom, Andrea and Kenton's mom will be helping us with the days I am at work. 

Nice diaper bum, hey?

We have been having bed time battles with Wren the past few days. It goes like this:
Read stories and give her a bottle. Her eyes are heavy and closing.
Pick her up to put in her crib.
She arches her back and cries and refuses to lay down.
Stands up, jumps, cries, throws her soother.

Um...what just happened???

It's like a switch went off in her head. She doesn't even want her bum patted. And that is fine...we couldn't pat her bum to sleep forever anyways. So what do we do, you ask. Well, it hasn't been fun. If I leave the room, she will throw up in her crib as she gets herself more and more upset, so Kenton and I take turns just sitting in her room with her. She still screams, cries, jumps, throws her soother, and all that stuff. She is mad that we aren't picking her up and letting her play until she is completely exhausted and can't keep her eyes open anymore- which is a bad plan for her because she will stay up way too late.

Bedtime now takes an hour of screaming until she wears herself out completely.
Why do people make the cry-it-out method seem so easy?
And I let her cry for her naps, which usually is fine for her, but night time is a totally different thing. Sigh!!

It's the 3rd night now of this, and she was already getting worked up while we read stories together, and then before I could take her out of the room (to calm her down and show her she didn't have to go to bed yet) she threw up all over me.
I am going to need a support group soon.

Oh, here she is brushing her hair. So cute!

Doesn't she look so much older?

The cutest toes ever. Why are baby feet so irresistible?

She is trying to stand on her own so much now. She has taken a step or so at one time. She gets closer to walking every day.

And here is a picture of her from today. She actually stands up long enough for me to take a photo now!

She is saying, "Hi! It's me Wrennie!"

She either missed her ear on this call, or is brushing her hair again... :)

Silly faces

Just Some Wren

Wren Wren is trying to stand on her own a lot these days. If you are wondering when I think walking will happen, I will say it only once: I don't know. And I am in no rush for it to happen, because she is quite mobile as it is and she is growing up too fast :) Her first birthday is just a few weeks away....

I am making some of the decorations, so we will see how that goes. I can't wait to her to dig into her very own cupcake! I recently saw in a magazine that they melted marshmallows on the tops of cupcakes for fast icing. I wonder how that would taste? 

I found Wrennie standing over here by the door the other day, and it was cute to me so I took a picture. She has this look on her face all the time now like, "uh oh" because more often than not, she is getting into something she shouldn't. (Maybe we should move things off of the shelf?..nah.) So she gives me guilty face when I come around a corner. Just guilty of being cute this time.

Stack some blocks, and then watch how fast Wren will crawl over to knock them down! It's her favourite thing to do with anyone. You will be her new best friend.

On November 2 she was standing by the stool in the kitchen, let go, and tried to take a step!
This past month it has seemed like she has started to do a million things all of a sudden. Saying words when asked. She will do these little grunts when you ask her "What does a puppy say?". She started to do some baby sign language for "more" and "all done".

I wish she was sleeping better. It's almost like it's getting worse. She wakes up for a 1am feed, and then might wake up again around 4 or 5am and need to be fed again. If we let her cry too long sometimes and she gets really upset, she will throw up. I have tried feeding her less, but she will just wake up again for more. It's fairly frustrating to me. And exhausting. I read Elizabeth Pantley's No Cry Sleep Solution, and I guess we were basically doing that method as it was. We pat Wren's bum, or bounce the mattress gently to help her to sleep...but now she has to have that to fall asleep. I can let her cry it out for naps quite easily. It's nighttime that we take a big step backwards.

 I start work in less than two weeks and thank goodness only one day do I have to start at 9am. I am so thankful for my job and how flexible and accommodating it is. The other bonus is that the entire staff is female. Okay there is one guy floating around somewhere, but other than that, it's a lot of university students, married women and moms- more of the latter I think, so you can imagine that if something is going on with your kid, lots of them will understand. I may just need to invest in some heavy duty face cream- I can't believe how tired my face looks sometimes when I catch my reflection in a mirror at the mall, or someone else's house..sheesh!

I will be working Mondays (11-7) Wednesdays (1-9) and Fridays (9-5). The hours aren't set in stone, but how nice? 3 days of work. 2 weekdays home with Wren. Weekends as a family. I can handle that :)

And it's November, so in our family we have a monstrous amount of birthdays. This week is Kyle, Jordan, and my sister Andrea. Happy Birthday to the uncles and aunty!

P.S. You may have noticed my blogging has slowed down, and it will continue to do so once I am back at work. But I will try to keep up somewhat with new photos and updates!

Quietly "Playing"

Every single parent on the face of this planet has experienced the "quietly playing" moment in time where you think your child is, well, quietly playing and it turns out they were doing something somewhat different...

I guess to them it is playing though!

Today it was diaper wipes. Again.

What a face :)

Anniversary Weekend in Jasper

This November 8 is my parents 30th wedding anniversary. Whoa!

It is also our 2nd, awww..

To celebrate, my parents took us kids to Jasper and we stayed in a pretty amazing cabin for the weekend at the Lodge. 

Here are some photos while we hung out:

Wren can sniff out a treat anywhere..mmm cookie please Aunty!

Apparently this cabin is haunted. At the front of it, there is a loft with steep stairs leading up. A very long time ago a housekeeping lady fell down those stairs and broke her neck. We can't say that we had any ghostly encounters, but there were a few mice in the cabin, much to our dismay!

Andrea and Wrennie giggle and read a book together..

Kenton and I took her for a walk around the lake. She loves geese and all their honking and splashing!

That is the Lodge, from across the lake.

Cute teeth Wren- Wren!

Trick or Treat! Wrennie carried around a little pumpkin candy bag.

We tried so hard to get her to pose with Uncle Cam. Nice tummy...

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad!

Kenton and I were a little on the tired side...Wrennie was so excited about the fun weekend, she hardly slept a wink on the first night.

Outside of the cabin we stayed in. Heading home now.

Wren-wren wore her spooky socks...

That was a fun weekend!