1 year check up

just for the record Rory had her first year check up last month and is meeting all bench marks easily. She weighed in at 21.6 lbs and 30 inches. In the month since this check up she has done nothing but eat, so I am guessing (by my sore biceps) that she has put on some lbs since then. I just wanted to get it in the books (since a baby book is non-existent at this point, the blog will have to do). Also wanted to record a few details of Rory at 1. She loves to eat avocados, bananas, cheerios, granola bars, yogurt (peach is her fav), broccoli, and grilled cheese. Annie's whole wheat and alredo mac and cheese is quickly becoming a staple. She continues to drink a ton of water, wasn't wild about cow's milk in the sippy. no juice still. As for her favorite activities, she still loves weebles, loves to shoot hoops, likes to ride her tricycle, LOVES to be outside (in fact would stay at her sand/water table in the back yard as long as I would let her) likes bubbles, is obsessed with dogs, generally likes to re-arrange anything, is a hug flirt,loves to have people around (started crying monday morning when she realized all our weekend guests had left and it was just her and I) loves to give hugs and kisses. She is totally entertained by outings to the zoo, omsi, the park, the store, and well, really anywhere. She has become quite the shopper, I think due to her time with Baba every week. She likes to take things off the rack and carry them around while "commenting" on them. She is also really into those musical cards- we have them stashed EVERYWHERE. She is signing a bunch. she can say, car, bath, dog, cat, monkey, house, bird, mom, dad, grandma, aunt, all-done, more, sleep, milk, please, thank-you, water, food, cereal, no, music... I know there are more I am just blanking at the moment. This whole entry is really more for my benefit then any of you readers. I was at shannon's today and she said how much fun it was to go back and read the journals she had kept when connor was a baby and I realized I should be better about blogging since that is essentially acting as my journal and baby book for the moment. Rory is at such a fun, very busy, but fun age. I love our outings and how excited she gets when I get home from work. I know that I am blessed and that things are good. ~Britt

Spring Break in Seaside- recap

So Madi and I both had the week off from work for spring break so we wanted to do something fun. Sunriver was out b/c of the long drive and the weather and us only having 1 night to be away due to other commitments, soooo we decided to go to the beach with dad and linda. It was soooo fun. They stole Owen to join us so the four adults and 2 kids climbed in the mini van and headed to the Oregon spring break mecca- Seaside. It was great to go in one car- the kids helped entertain each other. This pic is of Rory sharing her pirate's booty with Owen. We did get some good beach time in, and did lots of activities on the first day. Owen loved the bumper cars and Rory was a huge fan of the carousel. She even gave her horse a kiss when she was done. She got lots of good grandma and grandpa time and even got to go swimming at the hotel. We stayed in a really nice suite and just played, played, played. It was great- we did have a dicey trip home b/c it started snowing! not exactly my vision of seaside spring break- but fun anyway. Rory also enjoyed the arcade- including the roll the ball game and dance, dance revolution, or DDR if you are cool. She was exceptional at the ride-on motorcycle game- a scary thought for mom. We ate corndogs, clam chowder, and elephant ears. We fed the sea lions. In fact I think in 24 hours we did everything there is to do in Seaside. Thanks to Dad and Linda for a great trip- and I now can't wait to take rory to the beach this summer- she is a natural beach comber. ~Britt

Rory's 1st 2nd Holiday

So Easter was Rory's 1st holiday of her life last year, so this year it is her first repeated holiday! I know...dumb. We celebrated by opening easter baskets from John and Joanne in the morning and then going to my moms and doing more easter baskets, decorating eggs, and having dinner. As usual Rory loved all the new stuff, especially the markers she got to use to color the eggs. We continue to struggle with the teething issue- you can tell by the red patch on Rory's cheek and all the drool. The following day we went to Corvallis to spend the first part of spring break with the cousins and had dinner at Aomatsu- a fun japanese restaurant. Rory loved the fire on the grill and kept signing for more- I finally got a good photo of her signing. After she ate she grabbed her blanket and binkie and "took a break" on the floor- this is her new thing- essentially taking 2 minute naps on ANY floor- I'm sure the waitresses were less then impressed at my killer parenting skills. I figure as long as no one is going to step on her she is fine- probably cleaner floors then at our house- I am sure they get mopped more often! Again, sign me up for mom of the year! ~Britt

Rory turns 1- recap

This seems like a long time ago now- a whole month! Looking back it is clear that we celebrated in style and that she loved every minute of her birthday celebrations, especially the singing. On her actual birthday many people called to sing to her- at the conclusion of each call she would sign "more" "music" - so finally Joanne called and we missed it- so she left the singing on the VM. It was perfect- I just kept hitting repeat all day and Rory could hear her special song as much as she wanted (trust me it was a lot!). Besides lots of singing, she got lots of wonderful presents and cards. The invention of the musical card has been a lasting gift. for those of you with babies- it is the cheapest entertainment ever. ROry got a couple of them for her birthday as did pat and I for our birthdays. We now keep one in the diaper bag, one in the car, one in the ergo and one in each stroller- they make for very compact very effective entertainment! Joanne reports that when they go to target Rory immediately wants to go to the card section and pick out one to take home. Recently she picked out the electric slide- go figure. ANyway- back to her bday- on her actual day we went to dinner at a local pub and she got to have some apple cobbler. the other pics are of her with her cake at her party. It was a lot of fun! enough rambling. ~Britt

Owen turns 3-recap

So Brady and Shahnaz put on a great party at their house for Owen's 3rd birthday. They claim it was all low-key and last minute- but it had lots of creatity and fun details. Basically my dad made the wagons into pirate ships and sent the kids on a treasure hunt. Rory got to sit with the older kids (thanks Caden!) and was rocking the super tight jean jacket (thanks Aunt Madi!). In one of the pics Rory is attacking Quincy with a kiss- that is kind of her thing- she goes straight to 2nd base! The other picture shows Shahni feeding the 2 babies- like 2 little birds in a nest. 2 very hungry birds- they are too cute together. It was a really fun day with LOTS of babies and lots of friends and family. ~Britt

Pictures from March

As mentioned in the last post- things have been crazy and I am behind on posts- so this is a catch-up. First, we celebrated St. Patrick's Day by going to the Kell's tent downtown. I figured we had spent our last spd there before Rory, but they actually have some really kid-friendly activities during the day. Rory loved the Irish Wolfhounds and all the dancing and music. Brian and BrieAnn met us- so that was fun.

The next morning we joined the ENTIRE Maloney clan (I think we had around 20 people) for the Shamrock Run to benefit the children's hospital. This is the 2nd year we have done it and it is quickly becoming one of my favorite family traditions. Rory looked cute in her gear and made it about 1/2 way before passing out in her stroller- rough life! The rest of us made the trek back and forth across the bridges and then Pat and I bee lined for Corvallis for Owen's 3rd birthday. Quite a busy day. More Later

march madness

So as mentioned in the last post- March is absolutely insane with birthdays. check out the sahnow boys blog for a good recap- shahnaz did a good job of documenting. We celebrated Madi's 23rd bday by taking her to the Dublin for a little "Boys next door" (a great cover band that has been playing there since long before MY 23rd bday (which I also spent there)). Anyway, we cooked dinner for a few of her UPS friends and then hit the Dub. It was fun to get to meet her friends and have a night out sans baby. Then came Owen's 3rd bday. He had a pirate themed party down in corvallis including a full blown treasure hunt and costumes. it was absolutely adorable and Rory got to participate a bit by riding with the older kids in the pirate ships (wagons). Next was Rory's 1st bday which we celebrated with 40 of our family and a few friends. She was a champ- she made it through the whole crazy day with a smile and impressed all with lots of flirting and signing. She liked the little bug cake I made her and of course tried to grab the flame of her 1 candle. Fun was had by all and she was so wired afterward she didn't go to bed until 10pm- lucky us. It was also National Corndog Day (http://www.corndogday.com/) so we watched some bball in the afternoon and tried to put our house back together post party. I stipulated no gifts on the invite- but that didn't fly so we had tons of wonderful new things for her to play with and find a place for. Then last week we had Pat's 33rd bday which he and I celebrated with dinner at Oba- always a fav. And we finished this crazy marathon off with having tons of old friends in town for the fake, oh I mean fantasy baseball draft. This basically means 10 boys in my basement playing cards on friday night, and then disappearing all day to do their draft and then reappearing for a big group dinner on Sat. at a local pub. It was fun to see those guys and fun for them to get to meet/see rory. I will add pics to this post later, but for now, Spring Break is officially over and I have to get back to work! good night, Britt

A day at the zoo for two

So Rory and I spend a lot of time together by ourselves, but I relized today that rarely do we go to the zoo, omsi, children's museum or other event places alone- we almost always have family, friends, playdates with us. So today it was 11am- She was fed, napped, and dressed and the weather was nice, but not too sunny, so I decided to run up to the zoo for a bit. I figured I could kill 2 birds with one stone because I had wanted to work out today and if you do the zoo right, you can get in a great speed walk! I hadn't realized how long it had been since we had done an outdoor outing- talk about spring fever! It was a totally different experience going with almost 1 year old Rory instead of 7 mos. old Rory. She LOVED it- she was totally into watching all the animals and kept trying to share her snack with them. I took a ton of pictures b/c I just kept trying to capture the look of wonderment on her face. My personal fav. was the larakeet landing- she kept doing the "come here" sign to the birds, followed by the "please" sign- I think she thought if she asked nicely they would let her pet them. She did get to get pretty up close and personal once we bought the nector to feed them. She also loved the sea lions, the polar bear(although she kept doing the sign for dog- so she might be a bit confused), and of course the monkeys. I need to figure out how to do a slideshow of pictures because I have a lot of them. My friend Seth's blog does all slideshoes and it makes it easier to see more pics.- I will work on that. Other then zoo trips, we are staying busy with all the march b-days. Madi's was todays. Owens this week- Rory's next week, Pat's the week after, and smattering of friends in their as well- my one goal for our next child is no March bday- it is just too full! Enjoy, Britt

Bubbles

Just a few pics of Rory's new favorite sunny day activity. Bubble, bubbles and more bubbles. At least it is a cheap habit. I am loving the nice weather and am dreading the dark and rainy days that I know are still in store before summer. In one of the pics you see her newest super cheezy smile and in one you see her new favorite sign "come here" it looks like a low baby wave. She likes to use it when I am asking her to come to me, as if to say, "no mom, you come here." Ah the next 15 years ought to be fun... Enjoy the pics, britt

A little old

So this clip is a bit old, but I had so much fun watching the video of cole badger on his blog, that I thought I would attempt to start figuring out how to add video to ours. since our camera does take video, I had some old footage. This is of Rory and my friend Nicole's daughter Sierra with Madi at OMSI. It was right after Rory learned how to dance. ~Britt

Since I added the video, I might as well add a few of the cute pics of them as well. Rory is around 9.5 months at this point and Sierra is around 6 months I think. As you can tell from the first pic Rory is using her age and newly aquired kissing skills to make friends with Sierra.

a whole new phase

So we have entered a new phase of Rory not only being very mobile both crawling and walking, but being very adept and interested in opening things. Currently the fav is to unload the pots/pan cupboard. She is so funny, the more noise the lids make, the happier she is. We officially installed the permenant baby gate (thanks grandpa stan!) and are on constant mischief watch! It is pretty cool to see how curious she is and how quickly she is able to figure things out. I think we are going to have our hands full. On a not so fun note, she is getting her 1-year molers and it is brutal. she isn't sleeping, is incredibly irratible, and seems to be in pain most of the time. I just hope they come in quick like her first group did- cuz this sucks for all of us. I am off to put the kitchen back together again, Britt