Blizzarding...

We just remembered that we have an interblogs that needs updated. Luckily, we have lots of pictures to put up here. Last month, Tess survived her first blizzard, and got to play in some snow for the first time. We put a bunch of layers on the poor girl. We should have taken a video because she looked just like the kid from A Christmas Story. She couldn't move her arms or legs and if we let go of her, she would just fall over.

It was still snowing when we went out. The girls played for a little bit.


While I tried to clear off the cars.


But it was really all in vain since the next morning all of the snow had been replaced by new snow.


Tess really wasn't all that impressed, and was much more interested in getting back inside to continue her expeditions on the plastic containers in the living room.

4 legs in the morning, 2 in the afternoon...

Over the last week, Tess had started letting go of the couch and trying to take a couple of steps. Usually that is as far as she would get. The best was when she took one step with her left foot, didn't fall and then took two more steps with the same foot. It was like watching a fish swim with one fin. This first video was taken on my phone. It's awful quality. But it was taken right after Tess suddenly decided tonight that she could, in fact, walk. And then it turned into a game. She would let go of the couch, take some steps, fall down and then crawl back to the same spot on the couch to start over.


This video isn't that great, except it ends with Jaime saying: Yay...What a..." And it cuts off. Feel free to assume Jaime said any number of horrible things.


She can even walk in pants.

Chocolate baby...

Tess is a year old. 12 months. Basically a teenager now.

Since we forced her to dress up as a monkey and paraded her around for others to laugh at her on Halloween, we decided to make her birthday all about her. We took her to Target to let her pick out some party favors. Tess wanted us to get this hat for her and to call her "Your Majesty" all night. We did neither.


Afterwards we took her to a toy store, and Tess was in heaven. Her arms were basically flailing wildly from the time we went in until the time we went out. And then there was cake. This is Tess eyeing the cake:

Touching the cake...not sure what it is. Is that chocolate or poo? Chocolate or poo?

It's chocolate. Both hands in. This could be good.

Oh yeah! This is promising. Not entirely convinced yet.

GET YOUR HANDS OFF MY CAKE!!!

Saving some in her hair for later.

This is the best birthday party I've ever had!

And here's a video. Not too exciting. It might have some part of her sucking the cake off of her hands. It was pretty nasty.



And the after party just got hotter...We got her a little walker that also is part awesome four wheeler.



This is a video of her walking with it.

Brass Monkey...Chunky...

Celebrating Tessa's first Halloween. Here we are arriving at a Chili Cookoff/Trunk-or-treat at the church.



It was raining in Philly, so instead of having the kids go around begging for treats at everyone's cars, we all stayed indoors. Tess and I took a walk down the hallway to check out what candies were available.



We decided not to actually walk around with her collecting candy. Instead we gave her one wrapped up ring pop, and the crinkling plastic kept her attention until the trick-or-treating was done.



So we just hung out with Aunt Miriam and passed out candy.



By the end of the activity, this is how our little angel was feeling. And we didn't even make her walk around a neighborhood. Afterwards we went home, passed out candy to the neighborhood kids and watched the Phillies lose.

A few more new videos...

Kisses and Hugs:



Future Band Leader of America:



Have Your People Call My People:

Ready for Halloween...

...our little monkey is! I'm going to have to clip that little pink bow (or something even more conspicuously girly) to her ear to fend off the inevitable comments about what a cute son I have.

Notice how she's holding her favorite matching monkey friend. We love this girl!

She's using her words now...

...and she has at least three of them!



I think she thinks "nana" means all food. Here's why: when I feed her banana, I always say "nana" but I haven't really been telling her the names of anything else I give her. And then whenever I'm cooking or I have food that she wants to eat, she crawls up and says "nana" over and over again. In between saying "nana" she opens her mouth to make it clear she wants a bite.

She's not confused at all about who her mama is, though. And she's getting a pretty solid grip on the dada concept too.