Clara Turns One!

Here are some shots from our little one's first birthday! The celebration part was pretty low-key, but we did get some special pictures throughout the day. Enjoy!

We got to go spend time with Daddy on his lunch break!





A few other pictures from the big day:




Dinner! A "Clara favorite": pasta!


Somebody had a melt down when it was time to open a present... we're not exactly sure why...


...but she got over it!




Cake Time! I decided to do something relatively simple and went with a pink teddy bear head... Clara's been enjoying her stuffed animals lately. She seemed mostly interested in the candle! I probably could have just stuck a candle in the middle of a round cake, and that would have been just fine!




She was rather "lady-like" in her cake consumption... and didn't eat very much. She seemed particularly uninterested in doing much with the icing. At some points she seemed to be trying to pick the cake out from underneath the icing!




Our little girl is growing up so fast! We love you, Clara Belle!!!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY LITTLE GIRL!

A VERY Special Treat!!!

We got a very special treat last evening and today! Aunt Margie came to visit!!! She has been in this part of the country seeing some family, and made a special trip out to visit us! We were honored and so happy to have her!!! She came last night and we got to have super together, chat, look at pictures, etc. This morning, Stephen was able to go in to work a little late and we got to have a special crepe breakfast all together. After Stephen took off we ladies did a few things and then got ready and went to a place I understood had some nice areas for walking. We ended up doing a 5 mile trail!!!! It was good exercise and soooooo beautiful and such a treat to have Aunt Margie here! She left about an hour ago. Thanks for coming Aunt Margie! It was so much fun!

Here are some pictures from today's outing:



Clara slept for a little while.

At one point I tried to feed a turtle some graham cracker, and the turtles and fish started congregating! We had about 10 turtles swimming around in the end and a bunch of fish. I think all three of us were quite interested!!! And aren't those two BIG???!!! They were probably about 2 1/2 or 3 feet long, nose to tail tip.






Clara had fun chasing ducks and geese, but unfortunately, Mommy didn't protect her like she should have, and she did get attacked by a goose... not too badly though.

A Precious Momma Moment

Last night, poor Miss Clara woke up an hour or so after we had put her down. She was extremely distressed. We're assuming it was a molar. Comfort was refused for quite some time. However, after baby Motrin and Daddy pushing on her gums and lots of soothing, she eventually calmed down, and I got to enjoy one of those precious "Momma moments", that Mommas treasure, as she quieted down and fell asleep in my arms.

Cookout!

On Saturday we decided to have a family cookout and break in our grill and dutch oven! We had fun! It started sprinkling right about the time we were ready to get started, so we headed out front where there is a covered area. We used a scrap piece of counter top to protect our landlord's cement from the coals... it stunk dreadfully, but did the job! Clara had a great job toddling around and trying to be in the thick of things. Daddy had to assembly the grill, so some of Clara's "helping" was more like "helping Daddy get a headache!" Anyway, Momma snapped pictures like crazy! Here are a bunch of them! Enjoy!







Clara and the dutch over how-to / recipe book.





Parts for the new grill... how fun!



We had to keep an eye on that girl! She likes to be in the thick of things!



Daddy cooking! If you are wondering what on earth that is that we have the dutch oven on, it's a scrap piece of counter top. We did that to save the cement from getting black patches. We were having our BBQ out front in the covered area because of the rain!


We decided to try baking hamburger buns as our first project in our new dutch oven. Here they are rising!

And here they are all done!!! We were so pleased with how they turned out. They were a little under-done on the bottom, so we will need to do a little adjusting next time, but we still considered it a success!!

Let's eat!