Emma's birthday

Here are a few pictures of Emma's 1st birthday party.  We took a few videos I hope to have time to upload over the next few days.

The table set up right before dinner time.

The two youngest Morrises -- Emma and Ames.

In just 6 more months, we'll be celebrating another 1 year old :)

Enjoying dinner.  Note the Cheerio necklaces I made for the ladies to wear at the party.

Cousin Levi and Emma both have August birthdays.  We'll be celebrating him in just a few days.

Getting some Uncle JoJo time.

McNeill was such a good helper to Emma.  They both opened presents together.

Needless to say, Emma was quite overwhelmed by all the attention.  Check out that Cheerio necklace and her face expression -- did she have a good time or what?

The two proud daddies with their babies.  I have a feeling those two will be good buds one day.  Only 6 months apart. 

And last but not least, the three Morris girls.

Emma was not put to bed until way past her bed time -- at about 9:15 pm.  But the excitement kept her up even longer.  For the following 45 mins or so after we put her down, we could still hear her playing and talking to her crib friends -- Bunny and Monkey.

A family of three

A year ago today, our family of two became a family of three.  

Happy birthday, Emma girl!

(Stay tuned for many pictures and videos from her party)

Sick baby girl

Last Thursday afternoon, Emma registered a 101.9 fever.  By Friday it peaked to 103.  Our very generous-with-his-time neighbor, who also is a pediatrician, came by that evening to take a look at her.  No signs of anything, so just gave her some medicine to treat her fever.  Told us to keep an eye out for her temperature, and if it continued to be high, to take her in to the office.

We thought she was cured from the fever by Sunday, but Monday it peaked again, but this time it read 104.2.  My first day of graduated class would have started that afternoon, but the mama bear in me trumped and took her to the doctor instead :)  

After lots of crying, throwing up, a catheter, and two hours at the doctor's office later, the verdict?  Kidney infection.  She is on antibiotics (which is a two man job to give) and has lost her appetite.

But in the meantime, mommy and daddy get to snuggle with a little girl.  Lucky us!

Very thankful for pom and Bunny.

 

Videos of an almost one year old

A few recent videos.

First video (1 min) -- before we took the video she was spinning in circles trying to catch the dog tucked in her pants.  By the time we busted out the camera, she became distracted by her toys.  Fun video, none the less.

Second video (17 sec) -- Emma signs for milk.  Yes, when she wants milk she asks for it.  She is that smart!  She also now signs "all done" and "bye bye."

Crazy hair

Attic

Emma being mesmerized by the attic.

Homesick

I became very homesick last Saturday.

You see, Mexico won soccer's gold medal against Brazil.  First time E.V.E.R.  It's hard to portray what this win means to Mexicans.  To my American friends -- think Super Bowl and 4th of July fused together.  Think of people yelling "goooooooooooooolllll" all across the nation.  Think people (literally) flooding the streets after winning.  Think of the most patriotic thing you've ever experienced and times it by two.  Get the idea?

Cheap food even cheaper

I love being in the kitchen.  I love being able to stretch a buck by being efficient in it.  So I've compiled a list of things I have learned to make, instead of purchase, over the past few years. 

-  Beans.  According to Melissa D'Arabian, you can make your own beans using dried beans, soaking them, cooking them, then separating them into four ziplock bags and freezing them, making them the equivalent to four cans of beans for only 25% of the canned value (that is, 75% off).  (Watch her video here).  Huge savings on an already chap ingredient.  I normally make 2 lbs at a time, giving me the equivalent of 8 cans of beans for only $2. 
-  Sandwich bread.  This one took some time to learn and get the hang of, but now that I have, I love it!  Again, an already inexpensive ingredient can be made even cheaper once you do it yourself.  I make two loaves at a time, slice them, keep half of a loaf out, then freeze the rest.  I take half a loaf at a time.
-  Chicken stock.  When chicken is on sale (like 99 cents a pound), I buy several pounds and season them with salt and pepper and dump them all in the crock pot and let them cook away.  I then let them cool and shred them.  Place them in ziplock bags and freeze them.  This way I don't have to deal with raw chicken each time I want to put chicken in a casserole dish.  Anyway, all that to say is that by the end of that process, you are left with lots of yummy chicken juices at the bottom of the pot.  Just add some water, toss some carrots, celery sticks and the chicken bones and simmer away overnight.  You'll have wonderful chicken stock waiting for you in the morning.
-  Cream of chicken.   I wrote a post on this once.  Granted, it's not as creamy and salty as the canned ones, but work just as well.  (Probably much healthier as well).
-  Ice cream.  Yes, that's right, ice cream!  Though I will say this -- making your own ice cream comes out more expensive than buying it.  By the time you buy the whole cream and whatever other ingredient that will go into it, you are looking at spending at least $5 by the time you are finished (my strawberry ice cream I made the other day cost $7).  But it is sooooooooo good!
-  Baby food.  This is a no brainer.  You may as well be throwing your money away by buying baby food.  And no fancy appliances needed here, just a good blender and some ice trays.  Also, making your own baby food is much healthier.
-  Granola.  You can read my post and recipe for this here.   I love to always have this on hand to toss over my oatmeal, cold cereal, or blend in a smoothie.  Makes for a great gift as well.
-  Pancakes/waffles.  It takes an additional 15 seconds to make your pancakes/waffles from scratch than to buy the boxed mix.  I am not kidding!  There are countless recipes for this online, so have fun finding one you like :)

On the radar:  I'd like to begin making my own yogurt.

What do you make instead of buy?

Bath time!

It's official, Emma's first word is: "bath time!"  It sounds more like:  "aaiiittt aaaiiiimmm."

Very few things get her as excited as hearing her daddy say:  "baaaaath tiiiiiiime!!!  bath time for a little giiiiirl!"  She loves splishing and splashing in the bath tub, crawling from one side to the other, and playing with her letters.  Tonight we even got to squeeze some spelling lessons into this time.

Frozen yogurt

What a sweet blessing to be married to a man who adores both his wife and daughter -- "my dos princesas," he says. 

On a daddy-daughter date this afternoon.  Enjoying a frozen yogurt together (Emma only got fruit toppings, don't worry :p).

Randoms

We finally got our camera lens replaced (yeah!), but haven't been taking many pictures lately.  So here are a few random ones I've taken this past week:

Emma seems to enjoy being in her room by herself, as long as she can empty her changing station and throw all of her books out.

In the kitchen.  She loves being near her mama with just a few toys, rather than in the play room with tons of toys.

11 months old

Ladies and gentleman, my baby girl is 11 months old!  

Do you remember this picture?  She was only one month old.

On July 21, 2012 my Emma girl became one month from becoming a one year old.  We were at Illinois at the time, so her monthly picture with Johnny Bear had to wait until we got back.

She is becoming less of a baby and more of a little girl.  Tears form in my eyes as I type this.  She understands what I say -- she knows what shaking the head "no" means.  She is very obedient.  She will not touch an outlet but instead look at it, look at me, then shake head "no."  If she approaches something she should not get into, all I say is:  "AH-AH."  She then looks at me and shakes her head. 

Last Friday she also did her first sing language.  She signs for milk.  It was as clear as day.  The only problem with that is that now she asks for milk all the time.  The first day I saw her do this I nursed her each time she did it just to reinforce it, but then after that I went back to nursing normally.  Which leads me to the following:

I have started the process of weaning her.  So sad!  I know I don't have to, but there are a number of conveniences that I am wanting to get back to that need me to stop breastfeeding.  I will drop one feeding a week until we are all done by the time she turns one.

She is also very vocal.  In particular, when she is with a book or a phone.  She will start "talking."  I guess she has started to associate talking with both of them.  So cute!  She has also started to put the cell phone to her ear.

She has 6 teeth -- four at bottom, two at top.

A few no-nos that took place this month that I was too ashamed to blog about are (1) she fell off her crib, and (2) she was accidentally given some cookies at the church nursery I had made and mistakenly put in her diaper bag.  They had pecans, lots of butter and sugar, chocolate chips, oatmeal.  It's a mystery how she didn't choke to death eating them.  Anyway, that was her first time eating sweets and of course, she loved it!   

One year celebration while still 11 months old

While at my grandmother's this past week, we decided to celebrate Emma's first birthday so that Oma and Great-Gram could enjoy this special time with us.  We wanted to make a strawberry cake, but a fuse went out the night we planned on preparing it and left us with no oven, no stove, no microwave and no AC for 24 hours.  All that to say, it took some convincing, but we eventually ended up just buying a grocery store cake.  It was very good.  Just ask Emma, she can tell you herself what she thought of it :)

My mom brought a princess candle from Mexico to go on the cake.  One of the first things Emma did when the cake came out was stick her hand in it.  *Sigh*  Of course, once she tasted the frosting, she wanted nothing to do with anything else.  We sang and opened gifts before we let her enjoy her first slice of cake... ever!

My mom really, really, REALLY wanted to give her a dolly for her first birthday, but (1) she never found one she liked, and (2) I told her I thought Emma was still too young to enjoy one.  Instead, she got her a pink, fussy giraffe Emma already loves.

Great-Gram gave her two books.  Here she is opening them.

 

And now she is flipping through them.

 

Emma will be one year old in less than one month.  Time really does fly by.

Gram's 87th birthday

Emma and I flew to Rockford, IL to celebrate my grandmother's birthday this past week.  This was the first time in about five years that all six of her grandchildren got together.  My grandmother loves the outdoors, so we organized a camping trip to celebrate her. 

 Oma and Emma inside the tent going through her bag.  This kept Emma entertained for a long time.  This was one of my mom's favorite times with Emma during the visit.

Out on a hike. 

Aunt Linda, Gram, Kyle (Teal's bfried), and Teal.

Feeding Emma her supper.  Improvised high chair.

My sister took Emma for a stroller ride, and when she came back, she had a purple flower to match her outfit.  I cannot get over how big she looks in this picture.

My cousins -- Dakota, Sarah, Colton and Teal.

Yuuummm...

Right before Aunt Alison and Uncle Rob drive back home.

Out for breakfast Monday morning.  Emma loved playing with this bright, yellow balloon.

Mommy and her baby girl.  Not many pictures of the two of us together.

A few (cute-to-us) pictures

Ever night, Emma gets a bed time story.  For the past 10 months or so since we've been doing it, it's been like pulling teeth.  She would cry, fuss, or prefer to play/look at something else (this is still the case sometimes).  But more and more she is developing a fascination for books.  She loves to go get her books and just flip through them.  When we dropped her off at the church nursery yesterday, she went straight to the books.  When we walked pass her room between SS and the service, she was still messing around with them.

This was a sweet moment to watch from the kitchen window into the "play room" as daddy read Emma, Doggie and Miss Sally a book <3

Now it was my turn...

Emma only gets her Bunny and paci when she is in her crib.  Recently, we have noticed her sneaking into her room and pulling them both off her crib.  The other morning while Byron was eating his breakfast and "keeping an eye" on her, he suddenly noticed her crawling down the hallway like this:

What a stinker! 

Cow Appreciation Day

This past Friday was Cow Appreciation Way, which means that if you walk into Chick-Fil-A dressed as a cow, you get free food!  I wasn't planning on going, but my plans for that day got cancelled, so my lunch slot became available.  I called Byron at work and asked him if he would like to join us.  He said:  "I am not dressing as a cow, but I will go with you."  I said:  "I'll get your shirt ready in case you change your mind."  And so I did.

Good thing Byron chose to wear it -- he would have looked like a prize bozo if he hadn't.  Everyone was wearing something cow related, and those who weren't kept looking around in shock wondering how they missed the "memo."

We got $15 worth of food for NADA, including Emma's first kid's meal -- four grilled chicken nuggets, cup of fruit and a box of apple juice.  Yes, our 10 month old eats like a 4 year old.

 

Yup, those *blues* belong to my baby girl.

Emma enjoying her first box of juice ever.  We had to stop her half way through the box.  We weren't sure how her system would respond to this new liquid in such large quantities. 

Walking and playing

Emma has been enjoying this toy for quite some time now, but just recently has discovered how to be able to put the ball inside herself.  Thought Oma would enjoy watching this :)

Emma walks!  (with the help of a walker)... such a big girl! 

 

Big box

My Mexican girl

You would never know this by just looking at her, but my Emma girl is also a Mexican girl!  These hot days give me an excuse to dress her the way I would if we lived in Mexico with *hot* days and NO home air conditioning. 

This picture is able to "sort of show" Emma's four bottom teeth.  The two in the middle are well in, and then two more on the sides that are still tiny.

She loves Doggy!  Daddy says:  "Where is Doggy?" and she goes get it.  I had to get my act together, because when I would ask her the same in Spanish, she would not go get it.  My Spanish around the house has had to increase drastically.

 

She loves to look around her high chair for leftover food -- *sigh*

Pointing fingers

Playing under the kitchen table with the insides of her diaper bag.

Since Emma was about a few months old, I began trying to teach her sign language.  But between English, Spanish and sign language, it was just too much for me to handle.  Every once in a while I'll still remember to sign something, but not too often.

But who needs sign language when you can use your finger to point at EVERYTHING you want?  From Cheerios, to her bowl of food, water, napkin, book, toy, you name it...

When I take her to childwatch at the Kroc Center or the nursery at church, the ladies who help will comment on how she spent most of her time pointing at her diaper bag:  "she knows her own diaper bag!" they say.  They dig thru it to find what she wants.  Sometimes it's the Cheerios, sometimes it's a diaper change, and sometimes they give give it to her just to play with.

Water

As of this week, Emma has been drinking water out of her own sippy cup.  For the longest time she just did not like the taste of water, but I did not want to break down and add some juice in it to sweeten it up.  We spoke to her doctor just to make sure she wasn't going to get dehydrated this summer if she refused to drink anything else beside milk, and when he gave us the OK, we just sat patiently and waited for her to get the hang of it.

And she eventually did!  We ended up getting a cup with a straw in it to help the liquid flow easier.  She loves to drink out of it.  After a number of sips, she always comes off the straw and looks back at us with a big smile waiting for approval -- we clap and cheer with her!  She loves it.

Not the best picture of her, but it shows the little straw on the cup.

4th of July and pig tails

We spent Emma's first 4th of July and Memma and Poppa's house.  We left the house early and spent all afternoon there.  Emma took a long nap while daddy helped with some outside work and I helped in the kitchen and then relaxed on the sofa.

I had been holding on to this 4th of July outfit someone handed down to us.  Daddy had to first approve of the outfit since it had spaghetti straps :) :)

This is what Emma looked like before we left --

Memma took out her comb and rubber bands and gave Emma her fist set of pig tails.

Emma knows she cannot just sit around and do nothing while she is at her grandparents' house, she has to help!  So she decided to go through all of their magazines and books :)

We still haven't replaced our camera lens, so we are using our point-and-shoot camera in the meantime.  The picture quality is much lower and moments seem harder to capture.  But something is better than nothing, right?

Story of a chicken

I've been trying to stick to my grocery budget for the past few months.  The amount was pretty doable earlier this year, but once Emma started eating what we were eating, I began preparing "healthier" food, which means much more produce than before (which probably attributes to the additional 15 lbs I've lost from my pre-pregnancy weight -- yay!).  Therefore, to make everything work into our budget, I've been making a lot of rice and beans, enjoying toast or oatmeal in the morning instead of cereal, and eating lots and lots of chicken (instead of beef, pork, etc). 

So the other day I decided to stick a whole chicken in the crockpot to make things easier on me.  I just seasoned the inside and outside of it and turned it in on low for a couple of hours.  I took it out and left it cool for about an hour.  My friend Mary and baby Laura were over at the time.  I asked her if she had any tips on what to do with the leftover juices -- "I just top the juices in the crockpot with water, chicken bones, and veggies, and let it sit on low overnight" she said (I added the giblets in it as well), "then you have homemade chicken broth."  Yuuuummmm...

I did as I was told, and what ended up happening?  I ended up with toooons of broth.  Wonderful, right?  Well, the only problem is that I have only so much room in my freezer.  

What to do?  What to do?  Got on pinterest... What to do?  What to do?  I got it -- cream of chicken!  SCORE!

All prepared and ready to cool down before bagging.

Bagged and ready to go into the freezer.

I prepared this recipe.  I was not too pleased with it -- it had too much flour.  I am going to either tweak it or use a different one next time around.

What was Emma doing all this time?  Playing in the kitchen near her mama <3