Big birthday and lots of visitors

Zoa had a great first birthday filled with family and friends. On Friday, we spent a lot of time in the yard hanging out with Grandma and Great-Grandma while Brian and my Dad worked on baseboards for Zoa's room. That afternoon Papa and Nana (AKA Don & Debi) arrived and we all went out for a celebratory dinner. Zoa dined on fish and came home to be showered with gifts before bed. It was truly a perfect day.

Her party day the weather was not as nice as it was cloudy and cool and rained on and off for much of the morning and early afternoon. However, during the party the sun came out so we could venture outside. Zoa's favorite part of the party, besides showing off her new ability to stand on her head (more like downward-facing dog in yoga) to her friends, was definitely the singing of happy birthday. She had a huge smile on her face while everyone stood around singing to her. I honestly have never seen her look so happy! Of course, she also enjoyed her presents; although she had no interest in unwrapping them, and her first taste of cake.

In addition to the change in age, Zoa is coming ever-closer to "toddler-status." She has begun to enjoy walking while holding onto our fingers. At times, her walk is more like a run as we cruise around the living room and kitchen at high speeds often despite the back pain it causes me and Brian. It looks like she will probably be walking/running on her own soon.

She has also begun enjoying biting, which can be kind of painful with her ever increasing amounts of teeth (she is now at 6). She bit my nose so hard yesterday, that my eyes started to water and 4 teeth marks remained on my nose for the rest of the day. She does not bite in any aggressive way, but she sure thinks that it is funny. We are trying to down-play the biting and not react too much to it in hopes that she will become uninterested in our reactions.

Zoa also had her 1 year check-up yesterday which included yet more vaccinations. Today she is feeling pretty good. Usually she gets tired and a little feverish after her shots, but she seems to be in good spirits today. Zoa continues to be tiny. Although she is back in the 30th percentiles for head size and height, she is now at the -3 percentile for weight weighing in at 16 lb 9 oz. She is perfectly healthy, just skinny.

Well, I am off to enjoy the rest of the beautiful weather we have here. We took 100 pictures over the last few days, so I am sure that we will be posting more soon.

Birthday Girl

Just a quick post in celebration of Zoa's 1st birthday today. She is on her way to walking; she took exactly one step one her own on Tuesday, May 16th and stood up 2 times almost entirely on her own. I am currently at home taking a couple weeks away from the office, so I am thrilled that I got to witness these developmental milestones! She is also starting to take a lot of steps while holding onto our hands. The other day she took like 20 steps while holding onto my fingers. Well, I need to go and join the rest of the party. Here are a couple photos from this morning as Zoa was turning exactly 1 year old and one where she is saying, "Dios mio I can't believe I am a year old!"

There ain't no swimming in my show.

We have a waterbaby who rules her watery domain with cuteness. The pictures in this blog are dedicated to more Bugsly water-soaked action and a special treat at the end for those who believe my hair is really more of a helmet than anything (specifically my high school and college chum, Mike Zwieg, who to this day talks about how my hair was the exact shape of a old school round bike helmet when I would wake up in the morning).

So Bugsly has her one year birthday coming up. She thinks that is pretty cool beans. She's been eyeing up gifts, dropping hints, and playing cute. Of course she is having herself a wicked cool party, complete with baby friends and other assorted riff-raff. Great-Grandma Lienhardt, Grandparents Bloom, and Grandparents Penly-Garner are making their way down for the gala, which we expect to be a good time. Mel and I have been working on the house, specifically Zoa's room, to get it ready for Grandparent Terry to help finish some trimwork that we decided we didn't like. Melanie is done with classes and is at home this week, which makes getting the house ready for Lady Swinebottom's debutante ball much easier. We even purchased the world's cheapest badminton set for an attempt at lawn sports during the party (now that Jarts are off the market because some stupid kid somewhere was impaled with one during the 1980's).

Miss Zoa has been inching (centimetering for metric lovers) closer to walking this past week. She can stand on her own for at least ten seconds and can gently lower herself down to the ground when bored of the starts of bipedalism.

Ok, this post was more about the new video which can be seen at:

www.dropshots.com/bpenly

New room

Just a quick post tonight to display some pictures of Zoa's slowly transforming room. Yes, that's right she is almost a year-old and we still have not finished her room. Our extremely tight budget has unfortunately prevented us from doing many things with the house. I am happy to report that we have at least started on her room and are beginning to furnish it. At this rate, it may be done by the time she is five. Also, I included a picture of her using her stool-walker.